Wearing The De Angelis Ring. Cathy Williams

money.’ Her voice picked up with enthusiasm. ‘One thing led to another, and I found out about a women’s shelter that needed volunteers. I thought it would be just the sort of thing I might like—and I do. I help out there on every level...from mucking in with the general work to giving some of the women there legal advice...’

      She stopped abruptly, a little embarrassed at the way she had opened up, even though she was hardly divulging state secrets.

      ‘Anyway,’ she said, her guard back up and firmly in place, ‘there’s no need to dress up for my job or for my volunteer work—not that I feel comfortable dressing up anyway. You asked me if jeans and baggy jumpers and trainers are the clothes I like wearing and the answer is yes.’

      Theo didn’t say anything for a few seconds. He was still chewing over the picture she had painted of herself and marvelling that he could have been so far off target in his assumptions about this person who had been dumped on him.

      Then he shook aside the moment of introspection.

      Back to the matter in hand.

      ‘That’s as may be,’ he said, in a voice that allowed no wriggle room, ‘but you’ll need a new wardrobe.’

      Alexa was happy to fume once again, even though she could see the sense of what he was saying. Who was going to be convinced that he’d fallen in love with a girl who avoided parties and society affairs and whose wardrobe consisted of varying shades of denim? It just demonstrated how far apart they were in everything aside from their backgrounds, and as far as she was concerned similar backgrounds would never be good enough to bridge the gaps.

      Thank goodness there was a time limit on this charade!

      ‘And what sort of clothes would you suggest?’ she asked politely. ‘Do I have a say in what I wear as the radiant bride-to-be, or are you going to take over that aspect of things as well?’

      ‘Would you like me to? I’ve never been shopping with a woman in my life before, but I’m more than happy to test-drive the experience with you...’

      ‘I’ll choose my own clothes,’ Alexa said hurriedly as her head was filled with images of him sitting on a chair in a boutique and looking at her as she paraded different outfits in front of him. Short, over-endowed on the breast front, and lacking in the legs-up-to-her-armpits arena, she could just imagine the comparisons he would make and inwardly cringed.

      ‘And leaving Italy...?’

      He let that very important question drop and wondered what ripples it might cause. She was extremely close to her parents. He knew that. Just as he knew that she had returned from working in London post-haste the moment she’d felt she needed to be by her mother’s side.

      Alexa shrugged. It wasn’t a depressing thought. In fact it might be just about the brightest thing on an otherwise nightmarish horizon.

      Of course it would entail living with the man now scrutinising her...

      Which brought that awkward subject she had shoved aside back to the surface.

      What, exactly, would their married life entail? It would be a silly academic question, of course. She wasn’t his type any more than he was hers. But she would have to clarify things—draw a line in the sand, so to speak.

      ‘I would want to carry on working wherever I happened to be,’ she told him, and he nodded.

      ‘Do you imagine that I’m the sort of dinosaur who would stop you? At any rate...’ He shrugged and glanced at his watch, to find that they had been talking for a lot longer than he had imagined. It wouldn’t be long before her parents would return. ‘At any rate...’ he picked up the thread of what he had been saying ‘...within the constraints of our so-called marriage you would be free to do whatever you wanted to do.’

      Alexa nodded, and wondered what sort of woman he would have liked to marry, and what his expectations might have been. Would he have wanted a little stay-at-home wife? She couldn’t picture him as a guy who could ever be domesticated. There was something essentially untamed about him. She’d been pushed into this, but so had he. He must have had thoughts about marriage and now he was stuck with her—at least temporarily. His life had been equally disrupted and yet you wouldn’t have guessed.

      She had noted the way he had looked at his watch. So they might be talking business, but it still felt like an insult to be in a man’s company and to find him clock-watching because he wanted to get away.

      ‘Fine,’ she said crisply. ‘In that case I would look for work as soon as I moved to London. Which...er...brings me to... I feel I ought to get a few things straight...’

      ‘Spit it out.’

      ‘This isn’t going to be a normal marriage.’

      ‘That’s somewhat stating the obvious.’

      ‘We probably won’t see much of one another, which suits me just fine, and it’ll just be for a few months anyway, but during that time I would appreciate it if you didn’t bring women to the house.’

      Theo looked at her incredulously. ‘“Bring women to the house...”?’

      ‘I know...’ Alexa felt addled by the way those cool green eyes were resting on her face, making her feel as though she had made one big, enormous gaffe. Which she hadn’t. She was just getting things straight. ‘I know that behind closed doors...you know...we will be able to drop the act... But I would rather I didn’t have to bump into any of your supermodels on the staircase...’

      ‘You think I’m going to bring women back to the house I will be sharing with you? Put them in the room next door for easy access?’

      ‘You’re going to be with me for a year. I expect you will have...needs...so to speak...’ Her cheeks were flaming red and she licked her lips nervously. ‘And of course,’ she ploughed on into thick silence, ‘our marriage will be for show only. I mean...there will be no question of us...sharing a bedroom...or anything. I just want to make that clear.’ She gave a high laugh. ‘Just stating the obvious! So, when it comes to...er...’ Her voice petered out and she looked at him in helpless frustration.

      ‘To...er...?’ he encouraged.

      ‘You know what I’m saying!’

      ‘You’re giving me permission to have sex with any woman I want, just so long as I don’t bring them into the house I will be sharing with you?’

      ‘Yes!’

      ‘That’s very considerate and generous of you, but I’m not the sort of man who believes in fooling around outside marriage.’

      ‘But it won’t be a real marriage...’

      ‘Are you magnanimously giving me permission because you want me to respond in kind?’

      ‘I—I don’t know what you mean,’ Alexa stammered.

      His eyes were chips of ice. ‘Then shall I spell it out for you? Are you telling me that I can have sex with any woman I want because you want me to tell you that you can do likewise with any man?’

      Alexa’s mouth dropped open.

      ‘You can drop the innocent act,’ Theo said drily. ‘I may be older than you, but I don’t hark back to the Dark Ages. You’re in your mid-twenties, and I’m guessing that you have a boyfriend stashed away somewhere. Your parents didn’t mention anyone on the scene, in which case he probably isn’t socially acceptable...’

      ‘Not socially acceptable?’ was all Alexa could parrot in bewilderment.

      Of course—he was judging her by his standards. A bolt of white-hot fury lanced through her. She clamped her lips tightly shut and waited to hear where he would go next with his crazy assumptions.

      ‘If he was the sort of guy you wanted to show off to your parents you would have trotted him back home for a sit-down meal and a meet-and-greet evening by now...’

      ‘Because