She remembered the men who had come and gone, chasing behind her mother...she remembered the way her foster father’s eyes had followed her even though she had dressed like a nun in his presence...she remembered the boys she had met at boarding school, the way they had looked, as though their fingers were itching to touch...
She remembered the way she had never quite managed to fit in, always standing out amongst those well-bred girls with their braying laughs and bone-deep self-confidence.
She thought that if one of that type had dressed in a short skirt and top Stefano would never have dreamed of making awful sarcastic remarks at her expense.
If, say, Katherine had worn an outfit which, quite honestly, was hardly anything out of the ordinary on a girl in her early twenties, Stefano would probably have complimented her on it, rather than asking whether she had forgotten to finish putting on her clothes.
‘I resent the way you insulted me,’ she heard herself burst out.
She honestly hadn’t meant to say anything and she couldn’t imagine why she had because that sort of remark was a glaring admission of her insecurities—insecurities she didn’t want to advertise. Not to him, not to anyone.
Stefano, thrown a curve ball, stared at her in frowning silence.
‘Explain,’ he said eventually. ‘And sit while you explain. You make me feel like a kid called into the principal’s office to account for himself.’ He turned away and poured them both a glass of wine. They had only drunk a small amount at dinner, which had seemed a good idea with Flora present, and right now he felt as if he needed to make up for the oversight. ‘How have I insulted you?’ He sat down and dragged a chair over with his foot, pushing it back slightly so that he could extend his long legs on it as a foot rest.
The joys of great wealth, Sunny thought, without a trace of envy but more than a hint of stark realism. Every stick of furniture in the kitchen was handmade. It was obvious. You could feel it in the solidity of the wood and the smoothness of the grain. However, it would never have occurred to Stefano to be precious around any of the furniture because if it got scratched or even destroyed, it could all be replaced with the click of an imperious finger.
‘My outfit,’ she muttered, already regretting having brought this grievance out into the open because, the second she mentioned what she was wearing, his dark, lazy eyes obligingly roamed over her body, bringing her out in a tingle of excruciating awareness.
‘What about it?’ Had she noticed the way men had stared covertly at her when they had walked into the airy dining room? Flora would have been mortified had she only noticed that the underage boy-band member had done his fair share of staring at Sunny. Stefano had noticed it all and he hadn’t liked any of it.
He’d never cared what the women he dated wore. Indeed, most of them wore less than Sunny was wearing now, hadn’t thought twice about displaying their wares, just so that he could be in no doubt as to what he was getting.
Had he ever felt the slightest inclination to demand that any of them change their clothes? Dress in something prissier? Something, preferably, that covered from neck to ankle?
Simple answer...no.
But he’d had to bite back the urge to hurry the meal along this evening so that he could remove an oblivious Sunny from the sideways glances she was commanding from every single male in the room with a pulse.
He could only assume that he was so accustomed to getting exactly what he wanted, when he wanted it, from the opposite sex, that her lack of availability was stirring all sorts of puzzling responses in him. Responses that were unwanted and definitely out of bounds!
Not only was she not making any moves to attract his attention, but she was actively discouraging it.
And it wasn’t, as he had assumed, that she actively discouraged all male attention. If she did, then she surely wouldn’t own an outfit like the one she was wearing.
‘I didn’t appreciate your insinuating that I looked like...like a tart.’ Her voice was barely audible and she was beetroot red, but it had to be said. Considering she’d begun.
Stefano flushed darkly because he could hardly try and adopt a pious stance when he knew exactly what she was talking about.
Even if she had managed to misconstrue the intention behind his words.
‘I thought you might have been uncomfortable with the sort of unwarranted attention an outfit like that might attract.’
‘I’m not wearing anything any girl in her twenties might not wear.’
‘But not many of them have the sort of knockout figure to do justice to it...’
Sunny blinked and then, as the full meaning of his words sank in, she felt her whole body react with just the slightest of trembles. Because those words, huskily spoken, seemed to target every single inappropriate thought she had had about him, ripping them free of the innocent labels she had done her best to attach to them.
He wasn’t making a pass at her, she told herself firmly. Maybe he was flirting but, if he was, then he was on a road to nowhere because she didn’t do flirting! Especially with someone like Stefano Gunn!
But he’d thrown her off course and she was having trouble marshalling her thoughts.
Stefano watched the way she stiffened, straightening her narrow shoulders. She wasn’t quite meeting his eyes, but her mouth had tightened and her expression was shuttered and she was perched on the edge of her chair as though making sure she could leap out of it as fast as possible, should the situation demand.
‘I apologise if you found my comment about your outfit...offensive,’ he offered gruffly. ‘And you’re absolutely right, of course. You aren’t wearing anything that any other girl your age wouldn’t wear. In fact, I know a few who would cheerfully wear half as much and they’re twice your age...’
Sunny relaxed a little. She stared at the glass of wine, as if only noticing it for the first time, and took a tentative sip.
Now she felt as if she might have overreacted. He’d hit a nerve, but how was he supposed to have known that? She was struck by another thought...
Had he made that remark, spontaneously and without thinking, because he had felt that she would not have blended in with the crowd in the posh restaurant he had taken them to? Had he thought that she would stick out like a sore thumb amongst the upper-middle-class suburban crowd with their cardigans and pearls? When he’d told her that he’d only been thinking about her and the unwarranted attention she might have been exposed to, had he really been saying that he’d been thinking about himself and his embarrassment at being seen with someone who clearly didn’t know the dress code for the expensive restaurant he had taken them to...?
In truth, she’d barely noticed who was there at all. She’d been too busy feeling self-conscious. But of course it would have been a wealthy crowd.
A fresh wave of insecurity washed over her, ebbing to leave a sour taste at the back of her mouth.
Now he was being kind and she hated that.
‘I only reacted because...’
‘Because...?’
‘My mother used to dress in skimpy clothes,’ Sunny burst out, inwardly groaning at the lack of control that seemed to sweep over her whenever he was around. It was as if he could somehow get her to say stuff she wouldn’t normally say and he could get her to do that without even trying. She feverishly played with the stem of her wine glass with frowning concentration. ‘I always swore that I would never dress in anything that wasn’t...wasn’t...’
‘Buttoned up to the neck? That didn’t cover as much as possible without inviting heatstroke...?’
‘She had no control,’ Sunny said helplessly. ‘In and out of drink and drugs and guys...’ She felt tears of self-pity sting the back of her eyes and she wanted the ground to