The Italian's Token Wife. Julia James

made for the door and he stood aside to let her pass. It was uncomfortable passing him so close. He was so immaculately attired, obviously freshly washed and showered, and she had just spent several hours cleaning. She was dirty and sweaty, and she had a horrible feeling she smelt as bad as she felt. She hurried out to Benji, who, blessedly, was still asleep, and made to scoop up his chair.

      ‘Wait!’

      The order was imperative, and Magda halted instinctively, Benji a heavy weight on her arm. Hesitantly she turned round.

      The man was looking at her. Staring at her.

      Magda froze, as if she were a rabbit caught in headlights. Or rather an antelope realising a leopard had just come out of the undergrowth.

      Oh, help, she thought silently. Now what?

      Rafaello let his gaze rest on the girl. She was slightly built, drab in the extreme, with hair the colour of mud and unmemorable features. She also—his nose wrinkled in disdain—smelt of sweat and cleaning fluids. There was a smut of dirt on her cheek. She looked about twenty or so.

      He found himself glancing at her hands. They were covered by yellow rubber gloves. He frowned. His gaze went back to her face. She was looking at him with a look of deepest apprehension.

      ‘You don’t have to bolt like a frightened rabbit,’ he said. Deliberately he made his voice less brusque, though it didn’t seem to alter her expression a jot. She still stood there, poised for flight, baby in one hand, cleaning materials in the other.

      Rafaello took a couple of steps towards her.

      ‘Tell me—are you married?’

      The brusqueness was back in his voice. He didn’t mean it to be, but it was. It was because part of his mind was telling him that he was completely mad, thinking what he was thinking. But he was thinking it all the same…

      A blank look came into the girl’s eyes, as if he had asked her an unintelligible question.

      ‘Well?’ demanded Rafaello. The woman seemed beyond answering him.

      Jerkily, the woman shook her head, her eyes still with that fixed, blank look to them. Rafaello’s gaze focussed on her more intently. So, she wasn’t married—he hadn’t thought so, even without being able to see if she wore a wedding ring. And despite the baby.

      His eyes glanced across to the sleeping infant. He wasn’t any good at telling the ages of babies, but this one looked quite big. Too big for that chair, in fact. It was dark-haired, head lolling forward, totally out for the count.

      But a baby was good—however irresponsible the mother! A baby was very good, he mused consideringly. So was the rest of her. Once again his eyes flickered over her, taking in the full drabness of her appearance, and he thought he could see her wince.

      ‘Boyfriend?’

      Her eyes widened and then went even blanker. With the same jerky movement she shook her head. She also, Rafaello spotted, edged very slightly closer to the front door. He frowned. Why was she being so jumpy?

      ‘I have a business proposition to put to you.’ His voice was clipped as he banked down the anger at his predicament that still roiled within him like an injured tiger.

      A noise came from her that might have been a whimper, but that seemed unlikely since there was no reason for such a sound. Rafaello walked to the door leading into the kitchen and held it open with the flat of his hand.

      ‘In here.’ He gestured.

      The strangled croaking noise came again, and this time the woman definitely shrank back towards the door.

      ‘I have to go!’ Her voice came out high and squawky. ‘I’m very sorry!’

      Rafaello frowned again. Just then a door slammed on the upper floor. The next moment Amanda was descending as fast as her four-inch heels and very tight short skirt would permit. As she saw the tableau below her face lit up with a vicious smile.

      ‘Why, Raf, darling,’ she purred venomously, ‘how galling for you. “The first woman I see”.’ She gave a bad imitation of his Italian accent. ‘And that’s what you get. Bad luck.’

      The man’s accented voice answered the woman. He was purring, too, but it was the purr of a big cat, and it made the hairs stand up on the nape of Magda’s neck.

      ‘Yes, indeed, Amanda, cara, and she is just perfect for me.’

      The look that crossed the other woman’s face was a picture. Fury mingled with disbelief.

      ‘You’re joking. You have to be.’

      For his answer, Rafaello simply lifted one darkly arched eyebrow and gave the woman a mocking look.

      ‘Your taxi will be waiting downstairs, cara. Time to go.’

      For a moment the woman just stood there, fizzing with fury. Then with a tightening of her face she marched to the front door, shoved Magda aside, and flung it open.

      ‘Wait!’ squawked Magda, and tried to rush after her. What possible reason could the apartment owner have for wanting to know if she were married or had a boyfriend? No good ones she could think of—and plenty that were bad. She’d heard enough stories from other cleaners about men who liked forcing their attentions on vulnerable women in lowly jobs.

      ‘Get away from me, you disgusting creature,’ snapped the other woman. She stormed off. Desperately Magda tried to catch the front door, but it was taken from her abruptly.

      ‘I said I had a business proposition for you. Have the courtesy to hear me out.’ The accented voice dropped into a sardonic range. ‘It could be to your financial advantage.’

      Magda flung him a terrified look. Oh, God, she was right. He was about to make some kind of obscene proposition. ‘No, thank you—I don’t do that sort of thing.’

      The man frowned again. ‘You do not know what I am about to ask you,’ he countered brusquely.

      ‘Whatever it is, I don’t do it. I’m just a cleaner. It’s all I do.’ Her voice was a squawk again. ‘Please, let me go—please. I do the cleaning. That’s all.’

      The man’s expression changed suddenly, as if he finally realised the reason for her near panic.

      ‘You misunderstand me.’ His voice was arctic. ‘The business proposition I want you to consider has nothing to do with sex.’

      Magda stared at him, taking in his expensive male gorgeousness. Reality came back with a vengeance. Of course a man like him would not sexually proposition a woman like her. Seeing herself through those disdainful eyes, suddenly she felt as if she were two inches high. Mortification flooded through her.

      Abruptly, she felt the weight of her cleaning box taken from her.

      ‘Come into the kitchen,’ said the man, ‘and I will explain.’

      Magda sat, completely frozen, on one of the high stools set against the kitchen bar. Benji miraculously slept on, snug in his baby chair on the floor.

      ‘Say…say that again?’ she asked faintly.

      ‘I will pay you the sum of one hundred thousand pounds,’ the man spelt out in clipped, accented tones, ‘for you to be married to me—quite legally—for six months, at the end of which period we shall file for divorce by mutual consent. You will need to accompany me to Italy for…legal reasons. Then you will return here, and your living expenses will be paid by me. On our divorce you will receive one hundred thousand pounds, no more. Do you understand?’

      No, thought Magda. I don’t understand. All I understand is that you’re nuts.

      But it seemed unwise to point this out to the man sitting on the other side of the bar from her. She was acutely, utterly uncomfortable being here. And not just because the man was making such an absurd proposition to her.

      It was also