Mistresses. Lynne Graham

excuse me for a few minutes … er, I need to call your boss.’ Gwenna squeezed the words from her dry mouth and retreated into one of the lower rooms to fumble through her bag until she located the card Angelo had given her. As she punched out the number on her mobile she blinked and shook her head several times.

      The minute she heard his voice she burst into speech. ‘It’s Gwenna. I’m sorry to disturb you.’

      Angelo almost smiled and gave his PA a wave of dismissal. ‘Not at all, gioia mia.’

      ‘It’s just you said you’d sort out accommodation, and I’m being shown this house and I don’t understand. It’s a stonking great enormous mansion with eight bedrooms!’

      Angelo spun round in his office chair to enjoy a view of the Manhattan skyline. ‘All the properties that I use must enjoy three essentials—the maximum space, privacy and security available.’

      ‘Yes, but a house that must be worth millions is utterly insane in these circumstances unless … er … You’re not planning on moving in with me, are you?’ Gwenna gasped in an appalled tone. That was the sole explanation for such extravagant expenditure that made sense to her.

      Silence hummed at the other end of the line. Angelo was gritting his even white teeth. She might have the grace of a gazelle but she also had the diplomacy of a rampaging elephant. Didn’t she know anything about him at all? Had not even the mildest curiosity stirred her into surfing the internet or checking out the gossip pages? He didn’t do commitment or live-in arrangements.

      ‘Naturally, I’m not planning to move in,’ he murmured with deflating cool. ‘I’m sorry if that’s a disappointment.’

      ‘Oh, my goodness, no!’ Gwenna asserted at a much more cheerful pitch, quite impervious to the presence of the snub she was delivering. ‘We wouldn’t suit each other at all. But that doesn’t explain the house when we won’t last five minutes together. All this trouble and expense is so unnecessary.’

      Angelo’s eyes flashed tawny-gold. ‘Perhaps you would like me to take you to some cheap hotel that hires out rooms by the hour!’

      Gwenna bit down on her ready tongue. She was shocked to realise that she was trembling. Honesty obviously didn’t pay with him, she reflected uneasily. She had made him angry and she knew that wasn’t a good idea. She dared not say what she had almost said for fear of provoking him even more. But, in her opinion, the fancy trappings of a house in Chelsea would not alter the nature of the sexual transaction he had offered her and if a cheap hotel got the wretched business over with quickly she would have been the last to complain. False pride was not one of her problems.

      ‘If it is my wish, you will live in a stonking great mansion even if it is only for five minutes. Is that understood?’ Angelo enquired in a chilling tone of finality.

      ‘Yes,’ she conceded in a voice wiped clean of any expression or life.

      ‘I have work to do. I’ll see you when I get back to London.’ Angelo set down the phone. He was furious with her. He had expected her to be overjoyed with the house. It had an award-winning garden. He had personally selected it from his property holdings. When had he ever made that much effort for a woman?

      Gwenna rejoined her guide and walked out into the beautiful garden, an oasis of peace and sunlight right in the centre of a huge city. Her eyes were stinging. She was all shaken up by that conversation with Angelo. She knew that she would not make the mistake of phoning him again. As far as he was concerned she had no rights and no opinions worth hearing that did not match his own. She would not make the mistake of forgetting that in the future.

      Her next port of call with Delphine was the luxury pet hotel where a booking had already been made for Piglet’s benefit. The underfloor heating, miniature bed, webcam and the promise of a daily photo and bulletin about her pet made little impression on Gwenna. She explained that she would only be making occasional use of the facilities. Piglet would be exiled only when Angelo was around and, going by Delphine’s encouraging comments on her employer’s schedule, Angelo was much too busy to be around that often.

      One week later, her eyes bright with extreme tension, Gwenna contemplated her imminent engagement at three with Angelo and its probable conclusion. A late lunch and then? Blocking out that intimidating thought-train, she studied her reflection in the vast hall mirror.

      Her shift dress was white piped with black, tailored to a perfect fit and strikingly elegant. It had a famous designer label, just like all the other garments picked by the fashion consultant who had had the task of kitting Gwenna out with a fabulous new wardrobe. In truth, Gwenna barely recognised herself after her dutiful morning visit to a beauty salon. Her honey-blonde mane of waves had been straightened into a sleek glossy fall, her face expertly made up and her eyebrows ruthlessly waxed into perfect curves. She thought she bore a striking resemblance to a doll with big blue eyes and an artificially full mouth.

      She had always happily gone for the natural look, choosing comfort and practicality over style. Her use of cosmetics had encompassed a touch of mascara and lipstick on special occasions. But Angelo had plunged her into the world of fashion and beauty in which her looks were all that mattered—and she was discovering that that was her equivalent of hell. She found it very hard to walk in flimsy high heels. She absolutely loathed the fake fingernails and felt hugely uncomfortable wearing white because she was convinced that she would brush against something and soil it. Even so, not a word of complaint had passed her raspberry-tinted lips; she had learned her lesson during that single voluntary phone call to Angelo Riccardi. He wasn’t interested in her personal preferences or her physical comfort. All the effort and expense that was being expended on her immaculate grooming was essentially for his benefit.

      ‘The car’s here.’ The housekeeper opened the front door and ushered Gwenna out. It was only forty-eight hours since she had moved into the house and she still felt very much like a guest staying in a top-flight hotel. Her new home had been furnished, fully equipped and staffed without any input from her.

      Gwenna slid into the waiting limo. The parlous state of her nerves offended her pride. But how did Angelo Riccardi expect her to eat when she was presumably destined to provide the evening entertainment without so much as a dress rehearsal? When her phone rang she very nearly leapt a foot in the air.

      It was Angelo. ‘It looks as though I’m not going to make it back in time,’ he informed her grimly. ‘The air traffic controllers here are calling a one-day strike.’

      Gwenna blinked. ‘Oh, dear …’

      ‘Dannazione. I’m sorry, I was very much looking forward to seeing you,’ Angelo grated, striving not to yield to the suspicion that her mild response lacked any note of dissatisfaction at his news. ‘I’ll call when I have more information.’

      Gwenna told the chauffeur to take her to Piglet’s pet hotel. As they sat in the heavy lunchtime traffic she couldn’t help picturing Angelo’s lean, darkly handsome face, hard with impatience. His compelling image was stuck in her mind like a fixture and she couldn’t push it out again. She realised that she was being torn in two by very different reactions: a sharp and shocking sense of unexpected disappointment, accompanied by a helpless sense of relief. She was startled by that stab of regret. For goodness’ sake, what was the matter with her? Okay, he was incredibly gorgeous and insanely fascinating in the same dangerous way that a sleek man-eating tiger would be. But in terms of compassion and decency Angelo Riccardi was an absolute bastard. Knowing that, how could she possibly respond to him on any level?

      Her phone rang again and she tensed—but it wasn’t Angelo; this time it was Toby. ‘I tried to catch you at home and got your stepmother instead. Digging info out of her was not easy. Since when did you move to London and get into a relationship with some guy I’ve never even heard of?’

      Gwenna winced. ‘I only moved this week … and, er, the relationship is very new.’

      ‘Not to mention sudden and impulsive and that is most unlike you. It can only be a wild passion—and about time too!’ Toby told