‘I definitely don’t want your money. In fact I don’t want anything from you. Just the freedom our marriage offers me.’
Why did that bother him? Her calm insistence that she would take his name and nothing else?
‘My mother would like grandchildren,’ he was surprised to hear himself say. Baiting her, perhaps? Or trying to unsettle her?
She laughed—a sound that caught him off-guard completely. It was a musical laugh, full of the colour that was otherwise lacking from her.
‘She probably already has several, given your reputation.’
Dark colour slashed across his cheeks. ‘Are you suggesting I have unacknowledged children running about the place?’
She shrugged. ‘Well, I guess it’s a possibility you should consider.’
His eyes narrowed thoughtfully. She had more spark than he’d appreciated. It was hidden deep beneath the veneer of cultured, polite society heiress, but her intelligence and acerbic wit were obvious now that he was actually in a conversation with her.
‘There aren’t,’ he said with finality. ‘The responsibility of parenthood is not one I would abandon.’
Yes, she could tell that about this man. He had a sombre, ultra-responsible air.
‘Then your mother may have to live with disappointment. At least she’ll have the satisfaction of not seeing her son in the society pages for all the wrong reasons every weekend.’
She stood up, pacing across the room thoughtfully, reminding him powerfully of his own back and forth with Col earlier that same evening.
‘You would need to be far more discreet, though. I’m not marrying you just to be embarrassed or ashamed. The outside world would have to think it was a normal marriage. I suppose we’d have to attend some events together, be seen out in public from time to time—that kind of thing. But within the walls of your home you can do what you want and with whom.’
‘So if you were to walk into this room and find me having sex with one of my lovers you would not be concerned?’
Her heart kerthunked but she kept her expression neutral. ‘Only from a sanitation perspective.’
He bit back a smile at her prim response. ‘I see.’
‘Daddy seems to think a quick wedding is for the best, and if we were to get married within the month I’d have time to enrol in a couple of subjects for next semester...’
‘Subjects?’ he asked, a frown marring his handsome face for a moment. Then he remembered her plans to study in Rome. The revelation of Col’s cancer had thrown everything else from his mind, particularly Emmeline’s reasons for pursuing this marriage.
‘Yes. University. I presumed Dad told you?’
‘He did,’ Pietro agreed.
‘Well, then, you see? I’m not going to be in your hair. I’ll be out doing my own thing much of the time.’
‘And there we may have a problem,’ he said thoughtfully. ‘While I appreciate your generosity in agreeing that my social life shouldn’t be disrupted, I would have no such tolerance for you in return.’
Emmeline tilted her head to one side, her eyes meeting his with obvious confusion. ‘What do you mean?’
‘I won’t marry a woman who wants to go out with other men. Who wants to sleep with other men.’
Emmeline pulled a face full of surprise. The possibility hadn’t even occurred to her, but his hard-line stance wrought instant confusion. ‘Why not?’
His eyes narrowed dangerously. ‘Because it might create the impression that I can’t satisfy my wife.’
‘Oh, heaven forbid anyone should cast aspersions on your big macho libido,’ she said, with a roll of her caramel eyes.
‘That is a deal-breaker for me, cara.’
She darted her tongue out and licked her lower lip. She hadn’t planned to go out looking for a boyfriend. The thought had really never entered her head. But, as she spoke to him now, the injustice of his being allowed to continue sleeping his way around Rome but having no such opportunity herself seemed manifestly unreasonable.
‘Then maybe you should abstain as well,’ she murmured, tapping a finger on the side of her mouth.
‘That’s not a very clever suggestion, is it?’
‘Why not? It seems only fair.’
He prowled towards her. Yes, prowled. She felt like a bird pinned under a rock, with an enormous growling lion circling her, waiting for his moment of attack.
‘Because I like sex,’ he said, when he was only a step away from her. ‘I am a red-blooded male and it’s a part of my life. So if you force me to give up sex with other women that leaves only you...’
He left the rest of the sentence unfinished, hanging in the air between them like a plank she would definitely never walk.
‘Okay...okay.’ She lifted her hands in surrender, but it was too late to stem the wave of sensations that were besieging her body. ‘No sex.’ Her voice was thready. ‘I mean, sex is fine for you.’ She closed her eyes softly. ‘And I’ll talk to you if I meet someone I like...deal?’
He compressed his lips, his eyes studying her face. Her cheeks were flushed, her eyes wide, her lips slightly tremulous. Fascinating. Was that because she was annoyed? Or were more pleasurable emotions fuelling her physical response?
‘Si.’
She expelled a shaking breath, nodding slowly. ‘So we’ll get married?’
‘There are a few other matters to consider,’ he said quietly, the words thickened by emotion.
‘Such as?’
‘Your appearance.’
She froze, her eyes shocked into clashing with his. Arcs of electricity shimmied and sparked between them. ‘You mean how I look?’
His lips twisted into a tight, displeased smile. ‘That is generally what a person’s appearance means, is it not?’
She nodded, moving further away from him. She needed breathing room if she was going to keep a level head about her—particularly given this subject matter.
‘What about it?’
‘No one is going to believe I chose to marry you.’
He said it simply. So simply that she believed he hadn’t meant to wound her.
‘Why not?’ She narrowed her eyes, hoping her face wasn’t showing the effects of the cruelty his words were lashing her with.
‘Because you’re nothing like the kind of women I date. And, as you so rightly pointed out, there’s more than enough images of me with that kind of woman available to anyone who cares to search for my name on the internet.’
As Emmeline had. And she’d seen glamazon after glamazon in those online images: tall, thin, voluptuous, and all stunning. Pietro Morelli had a ‘type’, all right.
‘I like how I look,’ she said, but her mind cursed her for the lie it was. Concealing her body and playing down her looks was a habit that had formed many years earlier, and she wasn’t sure she had any desire to revise it.
‘It would not take much effort,’ he said quietly, his eyes moving over her dispassionately, assessingly.
A distant memory flashed before him of the first time he’d seen her, and the quick, instinctive desire that had warmed his blood before he’d remembered how young she was. She was naturally beautiful; why did she hide her looks?
Fire and outrage burned in her blood. ‘No.’
He