Her heartbeat was strangely fast, though that was probably due to the sheer adrenaline of the moment and the unexpected success of her mission, nothing at all to do with the seductive glint in Cardinali’s dark eyes.
Not that she should be thinking about how seductive he was when she was busy trying to work up the courage to pull that trigger.
‘In which case,’ she said, trying to maintain her cool, ‘Perhaps you should be begging for your life instead of making casual comments about me sleeping with you. Which, I may add, I would rather die than do.’
He laughed, a rich sound that rolled over her like velvet, all warm and soft with just a hint of roughness. ‘Oh, I’m sure you wouldn’t.’ That fascinating hint of gold gleamed from underneath his lashes. ‘In fact, give me five minutes and you’ll be the one who’s begging. And it won’t be for your life... Stella Montefiore.’
Shock trickled like ice water down her back, smothering the heat his sexy laugh somehow had built inside her, and distracting her totally from his outrageous statement.
He knew her name.
Kill him. Kill him now.
Her palm was sweaty, the metal of the gun cool against her skin. She’d practised this, shooting at tin cans in the makeshift gun range her father had set up in the barren hills behind the rundown house they’d had to move into after her brother had been arrested, working on her aim in between shifts as a waitress at a local restaurant—the only employment she could get, as no one wanted to hire a Montefiore. Not when they were such a political liability.
But shooting a can was very different from shooting an actual man. A man who would have his life snuffed out. By her.
She swallowed, her mouth dry.
Don’t think of him as a person. This is revenge. For Matteo. For yourself.
Yes, all she needed to do was pull that trigger. A muscle twitch, really, nothing more. And then all of this would be over—her father’s quest for blood done, Matteo’s death avenged and her role in it redeemed.
You asked for this, remember?
Her father had wanted to hire someone and she’d told him, no, that it was better for one of the family to undertake the mission, to minimise discovery, and that the person who did it should be her. He’d told her she was too weak for the job, too soft-hearted, but she’d insisted she wasn’t. That she could do it.
And she could. It should be easy.
But still her finger didn’t move.
‘You’re wrong,’ she said, not quite sure why she was arguing with him when a single movement would solve all her problems. ‘That’s not my name.’
‘Is it not?’ His eyes glinted, the curve of his beautiful mouth almost hypnotising in its perfection. ‘My mistake.’ His voice was as deep and rich as his laugh and the sound of it did things to her that she didn’t want.
The same things it had done to her all evening from the moment she’d seen him in the flesh and not as an image in a photo or an online video. She’d spent months studying him, reading up on his history, his lifestyle, his business practices and personality. Basically everything she could find on him, building up a picture of a dissolute yet charming playboy who seemed to spend more time in his string of clubs than he did in the offices of Cardinal Developments, the huge multi-national that he owned with his brother Enzo. He ruled the gossip columns and the beds of beautiful women everywhere, apparently.
‘The world won’t miss him,’ her father, Santo Montefiore, had said viciously. ‘He’s selfish, just like Luca was. Another useless piece of Cardinali trash.’
Yet when she’d stepped into that club in Monte Carlo, sick with nerves—unable to adopt the veneer of icy sophistication she’d perfected to get past the VIP bouncer—and Cardinali had appeared out of nowhere telling the bouncer that it was fine and she could come in, it wasn’t trash she’d been thinking of. Not when he’d smiled at her. Because it hadn’t been a practised seducer’s smile. It had been kind—reassuring, almost—and inexplicably comforting. In fact, he’d been kind all evening. He’d taken her under his wing, sitting her down in a quiet end of the club and getting her a drink. Then he’d sat opposite and talked easily to her about everything and absolutely nothing at all.
She’d been expecting predatory and cynical and he hadn’t been either of those things. To make matters worse, she’d found him so utterly beautiful, so magnetic, so charming, that she’d almost forgotten what she’d come to do. He’d overwhelmed her.
The attention he’d given her had made her feel like she was the centre of the world and, for a girl who’d come second best most of her life, it had been an intoxicating feeling.
Until he’d looked at his expensive, heavy gold watch that highlighted the bones of his strong wrist and said that he was going to have to leave soon. And she’d realised that if she wanted to make a move she was going to have to do it then. One more drink, she’d said. Just one more. And he’d agreed, not noticing when she’d slipped the drug into it.
Cardinali was watching her now and the smile turning his mouth wasn’t kind this time. No, there was something else there. A hint of the predatory seducer she’d been expecting, along with a certain calculating gleam. Almost as if he now saw her as an equal and not the nervous, inexperienced woman she’d been in the club, or the soft-hearted, weak girl her parents had always thought her.
It made her heart thump hard in her chest, an inexplicable excitement flickering through her.
‘My name is Carlotta,’ she said. ‘I told you that in the club.’
‘Ah, then you’ll have to forgive me my poor memory. Someone must have spiked my drink.’ He shifted on the bed, as if he was getting himself more comfortable, a lazy movement that drew attention to his powerful body. ‘So, are you going to stand there all night talking at me or are you going to murder me in cold blood? If it’s the former, I hope you don’t mind if I go to sleep. All this excitement is exhausting.’ He shifted again and she caught a hint of his aftershave, warm and exotic, like sandalwood. It was delicious.
She took a steadying breath, trying to ignore the scent. ‘Don’t you care at all which one it is?’
‘Since you’re not going to kill me, not particularly.’
Her finger on the trigger itched. ‘You don’t know that.’
‘Please, darling. Like I’ve already told you, if you’d really wanted to kill me you would have done it by now.’
He’s right. You would have.
Except she hadn’t. She’d told herself she couldn’t shoot an unarmed and unconscious man. Plus, he needed to know why he had to die, otherwise what would be the point? But now he was awake and she wasn’t telling him why he had to die. She was lying and pretending to be someone else instead.
What was she doing?
You don’t want to kill him.
A shiver passed through her. She had to kill him. This was the job she’d undertaken months ago, for her father and for the sake of her brother’s memory. For the honour of the Montefiores.
An eye for an eye. Blood for blood.
One of Luca Cardinali’s sons had to die and, as his older brother Enzo was untouchable, that left only Dante.
Except...
His eyes were inky in the dim light of the room and they seemed to see right into her soul. There was no sharpness in them, only a velvet darkness that wrapped her up and held her tight.
‘Lower the gun, sweetheart,’ he said quietly. ‘No matter what I’ve done, nothing is worth that stain on