The Mediterranean Billionaire's Blackmail Bargain. ABBY GREEN

week reached out to her from across the road.

      Like any protective, loving older sister, she believed Melanie was beautiful and that everyone else loved her too…but Alicia knew well that she and her sister were not the type of women to turn this man’s head. He was out of their league, on a level that hadn’t even been invented yet. A grim hardness settled in her chest…That was exactly why he had discarded Melanie with such callous ruthlessness.

      The valet had opened the driver’s door of the open-top sports car. Dante D’Aquanni extricated himself from the woman and, with a brief kiss on her cheek, strode down the steps and to his car. After discreetly giving a tip to the valet, he slid into the driver’s seat and, with a muted roar of the throttle, sped off.

      The woman stood on the steps looking after the car, a look of comic chagrin on her beautiful face before she flounced back up the steps and disappeared, no doubt back to the suite from where they’d just emerged. It was only then that Alicia came to, shaken out of the crazy reverie that seemed to have taken hold. Hands shaking, she turned the key in the ignition and pulled out of her parking space. What was wrong with her? She needed all her concentration just to navigate in the unfamiliar car.

      She breathed a sigh of relief when she saw red traffic lights ahead and the familiar lines of the powerful sports car. The light went green and he pulled off again.

      She pictured all too easily the supreme nonchalance of his movements as he had come down the steps of the hotel just moments before. The way he’d coolly discarded the woman. It seemed to mock her now. This man didn’t have a care in the world. So utterly confident that he could wreak havoc, walk away and believe himself to be protected.

      Her phone rang shrilly on the seat beside her and she picked it up, listening for a second before saying briefly, ‘Just follow me, I’ll show you where we can get in.’ She looked back and, sure enough, another car was not far behind. She cursed herself; she’d almost forgotten about the others. She couldn’t let this man scramble her thoughts.

      Fear gripped her at what she was about to do but she willed it down. She couldn’t lose her bottle now. Not when she’d come so far. Not when she’d gone to so much trouble to find out where he was going on holiday, any one of his palatial homes being a possibility.

      The road beside Lake Como at any other time might have been a magical route, but she couldn’t enjoy the scenery, the way the rising moon was bathing everything in a dark, inky-blue light. All she could focus on were the car lights ahead of her.

      She knew that the back of his villa faced on to the shores of the Lake, of which he had an unimpeded view. And that apparently one of his favourite times was dusk: he would watch the lights twinkle and come on across the still waters from his terrace, which was covered with antique drapes. Or at least that was the picture of the man that the gushing article had painted. Idyllic. A man who could have anything he desired at the click of his fingers. Alicia knew all about the exclusivity of the Lake Como villas. They were never advertised for sale, it was all word of mouth, buyers carefully vetted. And prices invariably soared into the high millions.

      But then, for a multi-billionaire who controlled the largest, most successful construction company in the world, who would expect anything less? Her hands tightened on the steering wheel. She didn’t imagine that he would have the callused hands of his workers.

      His lights disappeared and Alicia had to concentrate. They were here, at the high wall of his villa. She cursed herself. She had to get it together. For Melanie. The effort it had taken her sister to say just a few words a week ago had been enough to tip her into unconsciousness. But they’d been enough.

      They’d given Alicia all the information she’d needed.

      She drove the car neatly into the space she had found earlier, partially hidden by an overhanging tree, and sat there for some moments waiting for the other car to draw up behind her. Alicia hadn’t even known about Melanie’s pregnancy until she’d come home from Africa and gone straight to the hospital after a series of panicky messages on her mobile and in their apartment had alerted her to her sister’s whereabouts.

      Since Melanie’s best friend, the only other person likely to know her movements, was away on holiday, it had taken the hospital a day to properly identify Melanie and get in contact. And since that moment everything had been a scary blur. Alicia’s thoughts revolved sickeningly on her sister’s fevered words, which had led her to this place and this moment.

      Melanie had gripped her hand, struggling to speak. It had made Alicia’s heart break. ‘Melanie, love, don’t try to speak; you need to keep your strength.’

      Melanie had shaken her head. ‘I have to tell you. I have to see…have to talk to Dante D’Aquanni… He’s the one…’

      ‘Melanie—’ Alicia’s voice had been urgent ‘—what do you mean? Is he the one who did this to you? Is he the one you talked about?’

      The communications between the remote area where she’d been working in Africa and the UK had been sporadic to say the least.

      Melanie had sagged back against the pillows, her words were broken and her breath jagged. ‘I was on my way to see him to tell him that I’d leave the company, do anything he wanted, if only to…I was so upset and then that lorry just came out of nowhere—’ She closed her eyes at the memory, went paler and gripped Alicia’s hand even tighter as her eyes opened again. ‘You have to find him, Lissy…I need him to…’ Alicia had been horrified to see weak tears rolling down her sister’s face. ‘Oh, Lissy, I love him so much and he sent him away…and I need him.’

      Alicia’s focus came back to the lake, lapping softly nearby. Her sister had been so feverish by then that she’d been incoherent, her words becoming jumbled. She’d obviously meant that he’d sent her away. The facts were stark and Alicia had pieced them together with little effort.

      Her sister had had an affair with Dante D’Aquanni, the owner of the corporation she worked for. He had cast her aside. Melanie had been on her way to see him when the accident happened. She’d been made careless by her distraught state. Alicia’s insides roiled again; she felt so guilty that she hadn’t been there. She could have prevented the accident. If only she’d been able to phone more frequently. All she knew was that Melanie had been seeing someone at work. Her e-mails had been like Morse code, in an obvious effort to protect the man who had stolen her heart…her innocence.

      After trying and failing to get in touch with Melanie’s friend, who might possibly know more, Alicia had turned to the Internet to find out what she could about this man. She’d seen that office affairs within the D’Aquanni corporation were sackable offences—hence Melanie’s ridiculously secretive e-mails—and yet the man himself had seen fit to be a hypocrite of the highest order…

      A car door slammed behind her. She pulled back her mass of unruly hair and twisted it up, tying it with a band, putting on a battered baseball hat. Then she got out of the car, easing cramped muscles. The late summer air held the slightest of chills and she pulled on her voluminous dark sweatshirt. Then, taking her small backpack, making sure she had her phone and that it was on silent, she made her way to the two men who had just emerged from the other car.

      Dante D’Aquanni drove his car to an abrupt stop on the gravel outside his villa. The feeling of relief was enormous. He vaulted out and ran up the few stone steps, his housekeeper coming out to meet him. They exchanged a few words and he strode through the open door and into the immense, palatial villa. Home. His favourite place in the world.

      He recalled Alessandra’s pleas to bring her back with him for the night. How she’d whispered what she’d thought were erotic promises into his ear on the steps of the hotel, but which had made any possible lingering desire disappear completely.

      He poured himself a drink and took it to the back terrace where the view of the still, dark lake acted like a balm. Alessandra Macchi was indisputably one of the most beautiful women in Italy. And she had made no secret of the fact that she desired Dante. His mouth tightened. Desired his wealth. That much was clear. When he’d arrived at Lake Como a few