Chapter Seven
CHAPTER SEVEN
Antonio had woken three times during the night.
That he’d even fallen asleep was miraculous.
He’d been driven near out of his mind when he’d heard the shower turn on.
Images, conjured from a mix of fantasy and memories from their time in the pool, provided such a vivid impression that he’d had to adjust himself in his briefs.
The first time he’d woken, he’d found himself pressed against Ivy’s back, one hand fisting the sheet by his thigh and the other pinned beneath his head. He’d carefully removed himself and retreated to the other side of the bed.
The second time he’d woken to find that she’d turned to face him, her head tucked into his chest, and the arm that had previously been pinned beneath his head was now free to hold her to his side.
The third time, the final time, he’d blinked his eyes open and she was gone. And after a shocking moment of regret, he was relieved. Relieved and thankful. By that afternoon they’d be heading back to his villa, where there were two totally separate beds for them to sleep in.
But that didn’t help his present state of arousal. He cursed, throwing his head back on the pillow. It had been far too long since he’d last shared pleasure with a woman. He didn’t have to rack his brain. He didn’t even have to question when. It had been over six years earlier.
Antonio hadn’t initially intended to keep to his marriage vow to forsake all others, not consciously anyway.
Back then he’d still, whether he wanted to admit it or not, been reeling from the discovery that the woman he’d been seeing was more interested in his bank account than his personality.
Yes, he was self-aware enough to understand the irony.
Poor little rich boy. But she’d hidden it better than the other women he’d encountered in his life.
Of course, when Gio had threatened to cut him off she’d disappeared, just like all the others.
That was one of the reasons why Ivy had appealed to him.
Because he’d known what she wanted from the beginning.
Just the money. The terms had been agreed, there was no ulterior motive, nothing to be uncovered.
Nothing to catch him by surprise. He was the one in control.
And then, when Gio had cut him off, Antonio had thrown himself into the hard work that was needed to make his business as successful as it was.
He’d pulled eighteen, nineteen-hour days, seven days a week, for years.
And thinking on it now, this was the longest time he’d had away from work. Ever.
Women hadn’t even factored in those first few years, and then he’d realised that life had just been easier without them in it.
Less risk, more reward. But for the first time in those six and a bit years, he knew that taking himself in hand wouldn’t even begin to satisfy the need coursing through his veins, courtesy of his deeply inconvenient wife.
He threw back the covers, stalked to the bathroom. He glared at himself in the mirror, the dark smudges beneath his eyes advertising his restless sleep. He tried to ignore Ivy’s open toiletries bag and the mismatch of skincare containers.
‘…it’s the little things. Like knowing what skincare brand she uses…’
He didn’t want to know. He didn’t want Ivy creeping into his life even more than she had already.
Biting back a curse, he turned on the shower and stepped beneath the powerful jets of water.
The frigid temperature might have numbed his skin, but it did nothing to touch the heat bubbling beneath the surface.
Leaning one hand against the cool tiles, he took himself in the other with long, powerful strokes.
His head fell back, open to the water as it pounded against his face, the pleasure an unsatisfying imitation of what he really wanted.
Ivy.
Ivy smiled at Maria as she searched the breakfast buffet that was big enough to feed the army that was the Gallo family. She was looking for herbal tea, but craving the fresh mint that Agata made so well.
‘How did you sleep?’ Maria asked by way of greeting.
Terribly.
Amazingly.
Not that Ivy would even think of telling Maria what it was like to wake up to feel Antonio beside her.
How that, for the first time in ages, despite the way her body lit up like a firework, she’d also slept the most sound, deep sleep she’d had in what felt like years.
Yet, even though she was utterly rested, she was restless and agitated.
‘Good, thank you. And you?’
Maria gave a graceful shrug. ‘I drank too much,’ she admitted freely, and Ivy couldn’t help but smile.
There was something infectious about the energy Maria had.
It was powerful. ‘But you must have the cornetti —they’re homemade and divine,’ she added, before her eyes landed on the pot of coffee on the other end of the table and she disappeared, leaving only a moan in her wake.
Ivy smiled to herself as she wandered further along the table, seeing the pastries Maria had mentioned. She picked up a plate just as someone else picked up the tongs.
‘Allow me, signora .’
Ivy’s gaze flickered to the face of the man who had offered to help her to some pastries and stopped. ‘Micha!’ she exclaimed in a whisper.
‘It is good to see you again, Ivy.’
It was silly, she knew that, but she cast her gaze around, knowing that Antonio wouldn’t like her talking to him.
‘I had hoped to be here last night, but work kept me away,’ he said, picking up a cornetto and putting it on her plate. ‘Alessia was kind enough to extend an invitation to me,’ Micha explained as if she would have queried his presence.
The tension she felt shifted to compassion, sensing that he too was not entirely at home here.
‘I’m sorry about Signor Gallo,’ she said to him, and something flashed in his gaze. She imagined that most people thought Micha’s relationship with Antonio’s grandfather was that of employee and employer, but when he had approached her in London last year, Ivy had seen it to be more than that.
‘Grazie,’ he said, and he meant it, she could tell. ‘How is the—?’ He broke off and tapped beside his eye.
Ivy smiled, knowing that he’d been concerned for her when they’d met.
Apparently, Gio Gallo had a full dossier compiled on her and knew full well about her accident and her eye.
Gio, she assumed, was a man who’d wanted to ‘know thine enemy’ .
But by the time she’d met Micha, Ivy had been well on the way to recovery.
‘It’s about the same,’ she admitted, ‘but I’m working again and that feels good.’
Micha’s face was expressionless, but still she felt something shift.
‘Was Signor Gallo angry when you went back to Italy?’ she asked, wondering what had happened after he’d left London. ‘When I refused his request?’
Micha pouted and shrugged. ‘More surprised. You impressed him.’
That hadn’t been her intention. Although it might have been shocking to the Gallos to have someone considerably less wealthy refuse such a request, Ivy hadn’t even needed to think about it. She had given Antonio her vow. He was the only one who could ask her to break it.
‘Not enough to make him change his will,’ Ivy pointed out, despite the small burst of pride that she’d managed to impress Antonio’s grandfather.
‘No. Signor Gallo was consistent in one thing. He wanted his company to stay in the family. It was…important to him. He did many things to ensure it happened the way he wanted.’
There were shadows and a story in Micha’s eyes, but now wasn’t the place nor the time for it.
Ivy wondered, as Micha bowed his head and left her to breakfast, if many people took the time to look beyond the forbidding facade he showed the world.
But as she encountered the curious, sometimes hostile, mainly disdainful looks on the faces of the Gallo family, she doubted it.
She might have hated growing up with an absent father and a mother who cared only about her own wants and needs, but at least she’d had Jamie.
And that had to have been better than growing up in the viper den that was the Gallo family.
She went to sit at one of the smaller tables and was halfway through a mouthful of the—as advertised— divine pastry, when a ball hit her ankles.
A little girl with a riot of dark brown hair and startlingly blue eyes careened towards her in a way that suggested she hadn’t long since learned to walk.
And before she knew it, Ivy was embroiled in a game with three children, a puppy and a ball, so much so that she was completely unaware of Antonio approaching Micha after their encounter.
‘What the hell was that?’ Antonio growled into Micha’s ear, having stalked across the garden.
‘I have no idea what you’re talking about,’ Micha replied, not even bothering to look at him as he picked up the espresso cup by its rim, with his thumb and forefinger. Antonio wanted to bat the thing out of his hand.
‘Don’t. Not today. Not now,’ Antonio demanded. ‘How do you know Ivy?’
Rage was pouring through his veins, thick, hot, heavy, sending him out of his mind.
A distant part of him recognised that he was close to losing control.
It whispered for restraint, but all he could think of was the insidious idea that Micha, Gio and Ivy had colluded somehow, for some nefarious purpose.
That there had been an ulterior motive all along.
Even though he couldn’t see how anyone would gain from it, the thought had taken hold.
This couldn’t be happening. Not again.
Micha cast a look over Antonio’s shoulder. ‘You’re causing a scene.’
‘You think this is causing a scene?’ he demanded, not bothering to lower his voice. ‘Keep it up, Micha, it’s just the beginning.’
‘And how would your mother feel about that?’ Micha chided.
‘Vaffanculo—’
‘Watch your language. There are children present.’
Outrage poured through Antonio. Micha had the gall to scold him ?