Hot Nights with...the Italian. Lucy Gordon

he was accustomed to the fact that she did not chatter unnecessarily from the days when she’d been a small, silent child, clearly overwhelmed by her surroundings, and through her years as a skinny, tongue-tied adolescent. A time, he recalled ruefully, when she’d constantly embarrassed him by the hero-worship she’d tried inexpertly to hide.

      She hadn’t even cried at her own christening in London, which he’d attended as a sullenly reluctant ten-year-old, watching Maria Santangeli looking down, her face transfigured, at the lacy bundle in her arms.

      His mother had met Lisa Cornell at the exclusive convent school they had both attended in Rome, and they had formed a bond of friendship that had never wavered across the years and miles that separated them.

      But whereas Maria had married as soon as she left school, and become a mother within the year, Lisa had pursued a successful career in magazine journalism before meeting Alec Brendon, a well-known producer of television documentaries.

      And when her daughter had been born only Maria would do as godmother to the baby. A role she had been more than happy to fill. The name chosen was naturally ‘Marisa’, the shortened form of Maria Lisa.

      Renzo knew that, much as he had been loved, it had always been a sadness to his parents that no other children had followed him into the waiting nurseries at the Villa Proserpina. And this godchild had taken the place of the longed-for daughter in his mother’s heart.

      He wasn’t sure on which visit to Italy she and Lisa Brendon had begun planning the match between their children. He knew only that, to his adolescent disgust, it seemed to have become all too quickly absorbed into family folklore as an actual possibility.

      He’d even derisively christened Marisa ‘la cicogna’—the stork—a mocking reference to her long legs and the little beak of a nose that dominated her small, thin face, until his mother had called him to order with unwonted sternness.

      But the fact that Marisa was being seriously considered as his future bride had been brought home to him six years ago, when her parents had been killed in a motorway pile-up.

      Because, in a devastating aftermath of the accident, it had been discovered that the Brendons had always lived up to and exceeded their income, and that through some fairly typical oversight Alec had failed to renew his life insurance, leaving his only daughter penniless.

      At first Maria had begged for the fourteen-year-old girl to be brought to Italy and raised as a member of their family, but for once the ever-indulgent Guillermo had vetoed her plan. If her scheme to turn Marisa into the next Santangeli bride was to succeed—and there was, of course, no guarantee that this would happen—it would be far better, he’d said, for the girl to continue her education and upbringing in England, at their expense, than for Renzo to become so accustomed to her presence in the household that he might begin to regard her simply as an irritating younger sister.

      It was a proposition to which his wife had reluctantly acquiesced. And while Marisa had remained in England Renzo had been able to put the whole ridiculous idea of her as his future wife out of his mind.

      In any case, he’d had to concentrate on his career, completing his business degree with honours before joining the renowned and internationally respected Santangeli Bank, where he would ultimately succeed his father as chairman. By a mixture of flair and hard work he had made sure he deserved the top job, and that no one would mutter sourly ‘boss’s son’ when he took over.

      He was aware that the junior ranks of staff referred to him as ‘Il Magnifico’, after his namesake Lorenzo de Medici, but shrugged it off with amusement.

      Life had been good. He’d had a testing job which provided exhilaration and interest, also allowing him to travel widely. And with his dynastic obligations remaining no more than a small cloud on his horizon he had enjoyed women, his physical needs deliciously catered to by a series of thoroughly enjoyable affairs which, the ladies involved knew perfectly well, would never end in marriage.

      But while he’d learned early in his sexual career to return with infinite skill and generosity the pleasure he received, he’d never committed the fatal error of telling any of his innamoratas that he loved her—not even in the wilder realms of passion.

      Then, three years ago, he had been shocked out of his complacency by his mother’s sudden illness. She’d been found to be suffering from an aggressive and inoperable cancer and had died only six weeks later.

      ‘Renzo, carissimo mio.’ Her paper-thin hand had rested on his, light as a leaf. ‘Promise me that my little Marisa will be your wife.’

      And torn by sorrow and disbelief at the first real blow life had struck him, he had given her his word, thereby sealing his fate.

      Now, as he walked into his apartment, he heard the phone ringing. He ignored it, knowing only too well who was calling, because the clinic would have used the private mobile number he’d left with them—which Doria Venucci did not have.

      He recognised that, if he was to stand any chance of retrieving his marriage, she was a luxury he could no longer afford. However, courtesy demanded that he tell her in person that their relationship was over.

      Not that she would protest too much. A secret amour was one thing. A vulgar scandal which jeopardised her own marriage would be something else entirely, he told himself cynically.

      As he walked across his vast bedroom to the bathroom beyond, shedding his clothes as he went, he allowed himself a brief moment of regret for the lush, golden, insatiable body he’d left in bed only a few hours before and would never enjoy again.

      But everything had changed now. And at the same time he knew how totally wrong he’d been to become involved with her in the first place. Especially when he’d had no real excuse for his behaviour apart from another infuriating encounter with Marisa’s damnable answering machine.

      So she still didn’t want to speak to him, he’d thought furiously, slamming down his receiver as a bland, anonymous voice had informed him yet again that she was ‘not available’. She was still refusing to give him even the slightest chance to make amends to her.

      Well, so be it, he had told himself. He was sick of the self-imposed celibacy he’d been enduring since she left, and if she didn’t want him he’d go out and find a woman who did.

      It had not been a difficult task because, at a party that same evening, he’d met Doria and invited her to a very proper and public lunch with him the following day. Which had been followed, without delay, by a series of private and exceedingly improper assignations in a suite at a discreet and accordingly expensive hotel.

      And if he’d embarked on the affair in a mood of defiance, he could not pretend that the damage to his male pride had not been soothed by the Contessa Venucci’s openly expressed hunger for him, he thought wryly.

      He stepped into the shower cubicle, switching the water to its fullest extent, letting it pound down on his weary body, needing it to eradicate the edginess and confusion of emotions that were assailing him.

      It could not be denied that latterly, outside working hours, he had not enjoyed the easiest of relationships with his father. He had always attributed this to his disapproval of Guillermo’s year-long liaison with Ottavia Alesconi, having made it coldly clear from the beginning that he felt it was too soon after his mother’s death for the older man to embark on such a connection.

      And yet did he really have any right to object to his father’s wish to find new happiness? The signora was a charming and cultivated woman, a childless widow, still running the successful PR company she had begun with her late husband. Someone, moreover, who was quite content to share Guillermo’s leisure, but had no ambitions to become his Marchesa.

      His father had always seemed so alive and full of vigour, with never a hint of ill health, so tonight’s attack must have been a particularly unpleasant shock to her, he thought sombrely, resolving to call on her in person to thank her for her prompt and potentially life-saving efforts on Guillermo’s behalf. By doing so he might also make it clear that any initial resentment