The Mills & Boon Stars Collection. Cathy Williams

been foolish—’

      ‘It’s all right...whatever you decide to do, it’s all right. Just don’t be upset about it,’ Jemima mumbled helplessly, resisting the urge to wrap both arms around him and offer him comfort. Even in the overly emotional mood she was in, she knew that was not the normal way to behave when a man dumped you and that the very last thing she should be worrying about was how he felt. And yet that urge was engrained in her when he was around, she thought painfully as he closed his hand firmly round hers and urged her on towards the cottage.

      ‘Why are we going to see Sancia?’ she prompted uncomprehendingly. ‘I admit she wasn’t the kindest hostess but I have nothing more to say to her.’

      ‘But I have plenty to say,’ Luciano incised, banging on the door with his fist.

      Sancia opened the door little more than three seconds later. It was barely nine in the morning but she was wearing a pristine white sundress and had a full face of make-up on, so she had evidently been expecting visitors. ‘Luciano...’ she said, wreathed with welcoming smiles.

      ‘Sancia...’ he grated, moving past her to stare in shock at the array of photographs and paintings decorating the cottage living room. ‘What is all this?’ he breathed.

      ‘Well, you should know,’ the blonde said archly. ‘You insisted on giving it to me.’

      ‘You asked me for it—you wanted it for your book,’ Luciano reminded her.

      Only moments into their visit and Jemima was already feeling better, for she could already see that Luciano had had no part in creating the shrine in the room to his late wife. That, it seemed, had been solely Sancia’s doing.

      ‘It’s been like this ever since the year she died,’ the blonde fielded, playing it for all she was worth.

      ‘You’re the only person who has ever used this place.’ Luciano released Jemima’s hand and swept up a book from the coffee table. ‘Wasn’t the book enough for you?’

      ‘I don’t know what you mean?’

      ‘Sancia, I was married to Gigi for five years. This isn’t a biography, it’s a work of fiction. You gave her fans what they wanted to read, not the truth. The truth would have been too ugly,’ he breathed, his deep, dark drawl roughening along the edges.

      Sancia switched to Italian and spoke at length.

      ‘No, we will discuss this in English so that Jemima understands,’ Luciano decreed grimly. ‘I want to know what Sancia told you yesterday.’

      ‘Nothing that was untrue,’ Sancia trilled, sweetly saccharine. ‘That you don’t like to talk about Gigi and that you said you’d never love a woman again.’

      Luciano grimaced. ‘Sancia! Where is your compassion? Your sister almost destroyed me!’

      ‘There is no need for you to tell—’ Sancia began urgently.

      ‘A couple who are about to marry should have no secrets from each other,’ Luciano declared, and as Jemima stiffened in surprise he smiled ruefully. ‘A very wise woman once told me that but I wasn’t listening.’

      ‘But you have never wanted the truth to come out!’ Sancia was still arguing. ‘You were happy for me to write a whitewash!’

      ‘I’ve matured.’ Luciano tossed the book back down on the table and looked at Jemima. ‘Gigi was not the glowing star and wonderful woman described in this book. I married her because she told me I was the father of the child she carried. She was repeatedly unfaithful to me with the leading men in her movies, and the day she died she was leaving me for another man.’

      ‘Oh, no...’ Jemima mumbled, pained by the look in his eyes.

      ‘That man, Alessio di Campo, is a famous producer and he was the love of Gigi’s life—well, as much as she could love anyone, she loved him,’ Luciano revealed doggedly. ‘He was a married man with a wife and only when his wife died were the two of them willing to go public about their relationship. Their affair had, however, apparently continued throughout our marriage. I told her that she was welcome to leave but that I would not let her take our daughter, Melita, with her.’

      ‘How can you trust her? She could go to the press with all this!’ Sancia screeched accusingly.

      ‘Jemima won’t and even if the story was to get out, so what?’ Luciano shrugged a broad shoulder with fluid fatalism. ‘It’s all done and dusted now. To finish the story, Gigi told me that Melita was not my daughter but Alessio’s,’ he revealed heavily. ‘I had stayed in a bad marriage for years for my daughter’s sake and suddenly she wasn’t my child any more. That truth was more devastating than Gigi’s departure with Melita that day.’

      ‘It was a cruel lie,’ Sancia swore, desperate to be heard again. ‘I never believed that!’

      ‘Testing was carried out after the crash,’ Luciano cut in flatly, his lean, masculine face unrelentingly grim. ‘Melita was not my child but I loved her as though she was and had she survived I would have kept her with me had I had the choice. As it was, both mother and child died instantly when the helicopter Alessio had sent to pick them up crashed on the flight to Monaco.’

      Jemima’s eyes were stinging. Only Sancia’s sullen, resentful presence prevented her from saying what she really felt because her heart was bleeding for him. He had been hiding the truth from her all along and she was deeply shaken by the true version of what his marriage had entailed. It had not occurred to her that Gigi could have been anything less than perfect. In reality, though, Gigi had been a horribly disloyal and dishonest partner and Jemima was no longer surprised that Luciano had required DNA testing before he had been prepared to accept Nicky as his son.

      ‘Let’s go...’ Luciano breathed, curving a protective arm to Jemima’s spine.

      ‘I could sell Gigi’s true story for a fortune,’ Sancia remarked quietly.

      ‘Go ahead. I no longer care,’ Luciano responded almost cheerfully. ‘But if you go naming names you will probably make a lot of dangerous enemies amongst the very people whom you still want to employ you. But that’s your business now that I will no longer be settling your bills. My pilot’s waiting for you at the helipad. I’m sure I don’t need to add that you’re no longer welcome here.’

      And with that final withering speech they were both back out in the fresh air and sunshine again. Shell-shocked, Jemima leant against Luciano for a few seconds, revelling in the strength of his tall, powerful body and the gloriously familiar scent of him. All she could think about was that Gigi had been a dreadful liar and then Julie had lied to him and cheated him and then Jemima had lied to him as well! How could he ever fully forgive her for having lied to him after what he had had to endure in his first, unhappy marriage?

      ‘You know... I thought you’d got cold feet about the wedding,’ she told him dizzily. ‘I believed you were back early to dump me—’

      ‘No, I was too scared I was losing you. I didn’t know what Sancia had done but I always suspected she could be poisonous.’

      ‘But how could you even find out that I was seeing her yesterday? The bodyguards?’

      ‘No, Agnese. She’s like a bloodhound. She phoned me to tell me that Sancia had invited you and informed me that that was suspicious because Sancia is not friendly towards other women.’

      ‘Why were you paying Sancia’s bills?’

      ‘At first I felt sorry for her because she was always overshadowed by Gigi. Of course, she knew all her sister’s dark secrets because she worked as Gigi’s assistant on the Palermo estate we lived on in those days.’ He hesitated. ‘With the timing involved, nobody guessed that Gigi had been in the act of leaving me when she died and I told myself that it was my private business. But, more honestly, I chose to save face rather than tell the truth. The paparazzi had dogged us obsessively throughout our marriage because, of course, there were always rumours about Gigi’s behaviour