Valente rested cold dark eyes on her, his lack of conviction coolly emphasising his contempt. ‘Can I not? If you say no, I will close down this firm and put everyone out of work. I will also make no attempt to ease your parents’ plight…’
Reeling in shock from that deeply disturbing caveat, Caroline parted pale lips. ‘That would be utterly immoral and unjust—’
‘On the other hand, if you say yes to my proposition, I will invest in this business and ensure it prospers for many years to come,’ Valente informed her dulcetly. ‘I will also allow your parents to remain at Winterwood at my expense.’
‘That’s an impossible, absolutely disgusting choice to give me!’ Caroline gasped in growing disbelief. ‘You’re trying to blackmail me!’
‘Am I?’ Valente rested brilliant dark impenitent eyes on her flushed and furious face. ‘It depends what you want, doesn’t it? Come to me on my terms and you will be treated well and want for nothing that your heart desires. It’s a very generous offer from a man who has no reason to like you, much less respect you.’
‘If you neither like nor respect me, you can’t possibly want me that much,’ she threw back in breathless defiance.
His dark gaze burned scorching gold. ‘But I do. There’s no accounting for taste.’
Before she could guess his intention he had closed a hand over hers. While she stiffened, every muscle seizing taut, he proceeded to tug her across the space that separated them with cool determination. In a movement she could no more have prevented than she could have stopped breathing, Caroline broke violently free of his hold and fell back for support against the wall.
‘What the hell is the matter with you?’ Valente demanded in a raw undertone, watching her breathe in and out with the rapidity and heaving bosom of a woman on the edge of panic. ‘Did you think that I was about to attack you?’
Caroline was mortified by her knee-jerk reaction, and suddenly terrified that he might guess she was something less then the average woman when it came to intimacy. ‘Of course not…I’m s-sorry,’ she stammered. ‘It’s just been a long time since anyone touched me.’
Valente studied her, sensing something more. She was very tense and jumpy—a far cry from the calm young woman of twenty-one whom he recalled. Still waters ran deep. He had never wanted to know what her marriage was like, that being a can of worms that he preferred to leave firmly closed. But he knew enough to suspect that marriage to her childhood sweetheart had proved to be no picnic for her: Bailey had mismanaged the business, spent a fortune he didn’t have on luxury goods and left his wife penniless. He had also been rumoured to have slept with other women.
‘Really, I don’t know what came over me,’ Caroline babbled, moving away from the wall, smoothing down her skirt and even trying to pitch a faint smile on to her strained mouth. Her pride had come to her rescue. She could not bear the idea that he might suspect just what an oddity she was in comparison to other women. That was her secret shame alone. How else could she feel about herself when she was still a virgin after almost four years of marriage? It was not a truth, however, that she was prepared to share.
‘No?’ Quite deliberately Valente strolled forward, keen dark golden eyes nailed to her delicate features. He closed an arrogant hand over hers in an unexpected rerun of events and she snatched in a startled breath, stiffening again. He drew her closer and angled down his proud dark head to taste her mouth, with a tender touch and skill that made her head swim as dismay collided with surprise. Instead of freezing, as fear and revulsion rippled through her to make her feel nauseous, she stayed still, wondering, waiting, helplessly curious.
She had forgotten what it was like to be kissed by Valente. His breath fanned her cheek and her knees turned to jelly. The citrus aroma of his cologne made her tummy perform a somersault and she trembled, every nerve-ending screaming in quivering alert. He didn’t touch her body, made no attempt to hold her, and that sense of retaining the freedom to move strengthened and soothed her. His expert mouth was smooth as silk on hers, searching and uniquely sensual, to the extent that she leant forward to deepen the connection. He captured her lips then, and parted them with feathery delicacy, pausing to suckle at her full lower lip with lethal eroticism before slickly invading the moist, responsive space beyond. Beneath her clothing her nipples peaked into straining prominence, and a small sound came from low in her throat.
As that revealing gasp escaped her, Valente lifted his handsome head, narrowed dark eyes executing an almost clinical inspection of her bemused expression. He stepped back from her. She might be tense, she might be nervous, but she was still hot and ready for him, he reflected with considerable satisfaction. He was so aroused by the scent and the taste of her that with very little encouragement he would have settled her on to the desk behind him and eased himself into the silky welcome of her body without further ado. The very thought of having hot casual sex with Caroline whenever and wherever he wanted excited him.
‘Time’s up, piccola mia,’ he told her softly as an urgent knock sounded on the door.
As taut as a bowstring, Caroline again skimmed damp palms down over her skirt. Her brain was working at the frantic speed of fright. ‘You can’t mean what you just said—what you…er…suggested,’ she framed unevenly.
‘Unlike you, I’m very into sex,’ Valente confided deadpan, watching colour surge up below her skin while her delicate bone structure froze beneath it. He marvelled that even after several years of marriage to a boor she could still be so prudish. But then, he reflected lazily, her attitude told him even more. Evidently Bailey had botched his role in the bedroom. That was a little piece of knowledge that Valente, who had never ever failed to please a woman, prized more than any other.
The door opened and a young man addressed him in an apologetic rush. Valente moved a silencing hand. ‘Abramo, I’m aware that I’m running late. Show Mrs Bailey back to her car—’
‘That’s not necessary,’ Caroline protested. ‘We have to talk about what you said right now—’
Valente turned cold dark eyes on her. ‘What would we talk about? There’s no room for negotiation. I’ll see you this afternoon at Winterwood.’
‘At…Winterwood? ‘Caroline exclaimed in horror.
‘It is my property. I’ll see you at four for a guided tour.’
Caroline was appalled.
Valente dealt her a slashing smile that had the effect of making her back away from him. ‘And warn the family that I won’t be using the tradesman’s entrance, piccola mia.’
‘Mrs Bailey?’ the PA prompted, holding the door invitingly wide for her exit.
Seeing that she had no other choice, Caroline left the office. She was trembling with rage. She never swore, but she wanted to hurl curses at Valente. She yearned for the physical strength to grab him by the lapels of his fancy suit and slam him up against the wall to make him listen to her!
Sadly, Valente was evidently driven by too powerful a compulsion for revenge to award her a more generous hearing. Five years ago she had jilted him at the altar. Her misplaced trust in another person and her illness had together plunged Valente into the humiliating position of a bridegroom left standing by his bride. Circumstances had left her unable to ensure that he was forewarned of her change of heart before he reached the church. Although Valente had been informed of those mitigating factors after the event, it was very plain that he still blamed her for what he had undergone that day. After all, she still blamed herself, recognising the appalling blow that her no-show must have dealt Valente’s ferocious pride. He had fought for her and lost, and his iron will could not accept defeat.
Even in the act of driving back home