The Proud Wife. Kate Walker

and there was no further sound from it. Marina stared at it, pressed a button and frowned at the empty space that lit up. Surely Pietro hadn’t given up? It just wasn’t possible. Pietro never gave up.

      Beep. Another message; longer this time.

      He hadn’t given up. Of course he hadn’t.

       Jet is ready.

      So he was actually prepared to send his private jet to get her there. That was something she hadn’t expected.

       Car for airport will pick you up in 1 hour.

       No.

      She could be as ruthlessly monosyllabic as he was—at least by text.

       58 minutes …

       No way.

      This time the reply came back almost before she’d managed the second word. And when her phone beeped again a brief time later she knew what she would see. She was right:

       57.

       I said no!

      She knew she was losing the battle but that didn’t stop her fighting. She wasn’t just some puppet ready to dance to Pietro’s tune while he had total control of the strings. The phone flashed back:

       Do you want a divorce?

      Did she? Right now it was the thing she most wanted in all the world. Just five brief minutes of letting Pietro D’Inzeo back into her life, and she wanted out of things as fast as possible. She’d needed the reminder of just how autocratic, how domineering, he could be. The way he wanted everything just the way he liked it and to hell with anyone else’s needs.

       You bet!

       Then get here. 55 minutes and counting …

      What was she arguing for? He was right, after all. It was time that the whole sorry mess that had been her marriage was sorted out. Ended. Done and dusted—and filled away under ‘Big Mistakes’.

      55 minutes, she sent back and could almost sense his reaction of surprise in Sicily or wherever he was as he received the positive response. It shut him up for a while anyway, long enough for her to get upstairs and pull a weekend case out from under the bed.

      But as she grabbed her wash bag and dropped it into the open case her phone beeped again and the message she saw on it made her frown apprehensively.

      Bring your lawyer, it declared ominously.

      He had to be joking. Men like Pietro D’Inzeo might have their legal team at their beck and call, ready to head off anywhere at a moment’s notice. But ordinary human beings like her …

      All the same, the single taut sentence sent a shiver down her spine just to read it. The note of command was right there in those three words so that she could almost hear Pietro’s beautifully accented voice flinging them right in her face.

      The thought that he was warning her she would need legal representation made the blood run cold in her veins.

      Pietro was obviously anticipating a battle over the divorce. Probably he thought that she would fight him for every penny she could get. Well, he was going to be disappointed there. All she wanted was for her foolish, youthful marriage to be over and declared null and void. Then she would be able to get on with her own life in peace. She didn’t even want any of Pietro’s millions, though he was obviously convinced that she would aim for half his huge fortune because she had never signed any pre-nuptial agreement before they had wed.

      Well, then, she was looking forward to seeing his face when he realised the truth. Even if that was the only thing she was anticipating with any sort of pleasure about the coming meeting.

      But if it was the only way of getting free, which it seemed to be, then she was going to go ahead with it, no matter what it cost her. And, if the arrogant string of commands that had issued from Pietro’s phone was anything to go by, her freedom couldn’t come soon enough.

      With a faint smile she picked up the phone again and pressed ‘reply’.

      50 minutes, she keyed in, punched ‘send’ and then switched it off completely.

      Let him talk to himself after that, she thought sharply, forcing her mind onto practical matters. She had plenty to do if she was going to get ready and she had had more than enough of Pietro for one day. Even very small doses of him were more than she could take.

      So, while she hated having to jump when he called and head for Sicily—hated the thought of coming face to face with the man she had loved so much and who had broken her heart into pieces—it meant that at last she would be free of him.

      New year, new start, she told herself. Think of it that way.

      And, judging by the gloom and swirling snow that was now outside her bedroom window, she would at least be escaping some of the worst of the winter weather. She needed to hold on to the positives when the thought of having to face Pietro again hung over her head like the dark, threatening clouds in the sky.

      Just another couple of days and it would all be behind her.

      A new year and a new start: at least, that was what she was hoping for.

      But first she had to go through the ordeal of seeing her estranged husband once again. Just the thought of that was enough to send a shiver down her spine that had nothing to do with the cold winds and gloomy skies outside.

      CHAPTER TWO

      PIETRO stood by the windows of his lawyer’s office and stared out at the driving rain that was lashing against the glass. His shoulders were hunched, hands pushed deep into the trouser pockets of a sleek silk suit that was the same steely grey as the water-laden clouds above. Impatience made him tap one highly polished black leather shoe against the floor, over and over again.

      She was late. They had been waiting far too long. The meeting had been arranged for ten-thirty and it was now almost a quarter to eleven. She was almost fifteen minutes late—if she was even coming, that was.

      Expressing his exasperation in a sigh, he raked one hand through the smooth darkness of his hair, narrowing his eyes against the downpour beyond the window. She was in Sicily, at least. Frederico, his driver, had delivered her to the hotel yesterday after picking her up from the airport. He had given her the package of documents that Matteo Rinaldi, his legal advisor, had drawn up for this meeting so that she could have her lawyer go through them and be prepared.

      He had told her the precise time of the meeting, so there was no excuse for her lateness. Where the …?

      His thoughts came to an abrupt halt in the same moment that down below in the street a taxi pulled up opposite the lawyer’s office, stopping in a splash of puddles and a spray of rain. The woman in the back was just a blur through the rain-dashed windows, only the glorious burn of her auburn hair giving any sign that it was indeed his ex-wife.

      But that glow of red, hazy though it was, was enough to give him a sharp kick in his guts with the reminder of how it had once looked spread out on his pillows as she lay beneath him, her soft body melded to his. Heat flooded his veins and had him gritting his teeth against the impact of the memory.

      ‘She’s here at last,’ he said to Matteo, meaning to turn away from the window and step back into the room. But as he spoke the back door of the taxi opened and the woman stepped out on to the pavement.

      ‘She’s here,’ he said again on a very different note. As he spoke, the woman—Marina—suddenly looked up as if she had caught the words from across the street, staring straight at him; their focused gazes locked and held.

      Even from this distance he could see how her vivid green gaze widened and fixed on him. There was no mistaking the way her back stiffened, her head coming up, her chin lifting. There was defiance in every voluptuous inch of her and she held