Italian Deception: The Salvatore Marriage / A Sicilian Seduction / The Passion Bargain. Michelle Reid

when he’d walked in on a frankly suspicious scene, assessed and come to a decision with the blinding speed of light. That was the moment that she’d become a slut in his eyes and nothing she said afterwards could change that belief.

      She shivered, she felt so cold. Inside—outside—and found herself fighting a battle with her tongue that wanted her to blurt out the truth. What would he do if she brought it all out into the open again? she wondered. Would he respond as he had done the last time by accusing her of daring to soil her sister with her own sins?

      And what had Keira done? she then recalled painfully. Her sister had begged her to say nothing. Begged her to understand why she could never confess the truth to Luca, not even for Shannon’s sake. ‘He will tell Angelo. How could he not? If it was the other way round I would have to tell you or I could not live with myself!’

      Those words were emblazoned on her heart for ever now. Because despite everything Keira had said she had told Luca, she had tried to save herself at the expense of Keira’s marriage to Angelo.

      But Luca had refused to believe.

      Keira had been everyone’s vision of the perfect woman, therefore Shannon had to be the sinner.

      His opinion was not about to change because he’d discovered he could not keep his hands off her. He was still going to go on resenting her presence in his life and never trusting her alone with any man and probably using the sex as a darn great way of exacting punishment for betraying him.

      So, did she say—Believe me about Keira and I might consider your proposition, or did she say—?

      ‘My answer is no,’ she announced, then turned and walked back into the bathroom, having the sense to shoot home the bolt this time before she sank down onto the toilet seat to bury her face in her trembling hands and silently cried her eyes out.

      Because she knew that despite the long, hard lecture she had been a tongue tip away from tarnishing her poor sister’s image in his eyes for ever by insisting he listen to the truth. She even had proof to back her story up, though not here, but back in London.

      Luca stood with the sound of that bolt sliding home ringing in his ears and was damned hellish angry for opening himself up to that cold little no.

      Who did she think she was, turning down his frankly very generous offer? She was lucky to be getting one. Did she think he wanted to attach himself to a natural-born siren with eyes constantly on the lookout for the next man?

      But she was carrying his child. In his mind it was already a statement of fact—it had to be or his arguments crumbled to dust at his feet. If the witch believed he was going to allow her to walk away carrying that child with her, then she was in for a very big shock.

      Turning on his heel, he walked out of her room and down the hall into his own room. Once safely shut away in there he went to take a shower—while planning his next line of attack.

      There was a moment once his anger had cooled and he began to think like a rational man again that he questioned what the hell it was he was trying to do to himself by getting involved with her again.

      Trust? He could never trust her out of his sight! Shannon had been right when she had faced him with that.

      Did he really want a future of forever wondering who she was with when she wasn’t with him?

      No, he damn well did not.

      Of course he could not trust her. Just as he could not dare to trust his own judgement where she was concerned, because if anyone had suggested to him that she was playing around behind his back two years ago he would have laughed in their faces—before knocking them flat.

      The old dark feelings returned with a vengeance. Pushing his head beneath the shower spray, he rinsed off shampoo and saw images of that afternoon when he had come home unexpectedly to find Shannon standing in the doorway to the bedroom trying to block him from seeing the truth.

      And what a truth. ‘What are you doing back?’ She could not have appeared more horrified to see him.

      ‘I could ask you the same question. You were supposed to be in London until tomorrow.’

      ‘I came back early.’ She tried pulling the bedroom door shut behind her.

      ‘So did I,’ he answered absently. ‘I needed some papers from my safe …’ Instinct made him step around her and push the door open again.

      ‘Damn,’ he muttered as soap got in his eye. Switching off the shower, he reached for a towel and tried not to let his mind take him into that room as he wiped the stinging soap away.

      The room was a mess. The bedding pulled back and lying half on the floor. He picked up the scent of male cologne. Not his cologne, not his red silk boxer shorts that he pulled quite calmly from the tangle of white sheeting. He never wore silk underwear; he never wore red. He preferred cotton, black, white, grey—any damn colour but red.

      ‘Who do these belong to?’ He saw himself swing round in time to catch her sliding something into a bedside drawer.

      ‘I came back to f-find it like this. I don’t know wh-what—’

      His hand reached out to open the drawer Shannon had pushed shut. He saw her stiffen then start to tremble, then lower her eyes when he drew out the packet of condoms.

      Condoms, bloody condoms, he thought viciously. The blight of his bloody life!

      One was missing—not that it mattered that one was missing; the fact that they were there at all was enough to turn his blood to bile. They did not use condoms. And that scent—that damned strong male scent had clung to his nostrils while he’d stood there trying to deal with what it was he was being forced to face.

      ‘I can explain …’ She’d sounded deep-voiced and husky, like someone suffering from an intolerable amount of anxiety and stress.

      Without saying a word he put the packet back in the drawer and closed it, then turned to look at her. ‘Before you jump to your rotten conclusions—it wasn’t me, Luca, it wasn’t me!’

      ‘Who, then?’ he challenged.

      Her face was white, her eyes black pools of utter torment; tears trailed down her cheeks and worked at her throat. ‘Keira,’ she whispered.

      Keira. Of all the lying excuses she could have come up with, she had to choose to place the blame on the one person who would never betray her man—never. Her willingness to do that to her own sister broke his calm. What followed had been another nightmare that had lived inside him ever since.

      A telephone began ringing somewhere, bringing him out of the blackness of that second nightmare to discover that he was standing in the bathroom staring at the ceramic tiles covering the floor where water was dripping from his body to form a pool around his brown feet. He lifted his head and caught sight of his face in the mirror. It was not him. It was like looking at a stranger. A man with no colour and no warmth.

      Only Shannon could do this to him.

      And he had offered her marriage again?

      Pulling on a bathrobe, he made himself walk on legs that felt oddly stiff, as if he had just run a marathon. Maybe he had done—run a marathon through agony, lies and deceit.

      He had left his jacket on the chair by the lift. His mobile phone was in one of its pockets and he strode through the apartment to collect it. The call was from Marco, his assistant. He frowned at the lateness of the hour and felt a hard snap of irritation because if Marco was still in the office then he was probably being snowed under trying to keep up in his absence.

      He was bringing the call to an end when Shannon appeared in the archway. She was wearing the skimpy blue pyjamas beneath a thin blue cotton wrap, which hung open down her front. Her face was scrubbed and shiny, her hair piled up on top of her head leaving her slender neck exposed. Her eyes were like two dark bruises set on a background of porcelain white and her mouth looked tiny, pinched and—pink.

      Hunger roared to life