Chapter 4 #3
And he’d kissed her back as a performance?
Oh, he’d obviously enjoyed it regardless, but what did Ally know?
That was probably just normal, in that sort of situation.
Suddenly, she felt completely out of her depth in every way.
She pulled away from him quickly, running her hands down her sides, butterflies battering the insides of her stomach.
What the hell had she agreed to?
How could she have thought she would be capable of this?
Not without losing herself completely. Oh, God…
Luca had not been ready to begin their performance, yet. He’d wanted Allegra to have time to settle into this life, to become familiar with him, the requirements of the role. Or had he been the one who needed that time and space?
Marriage was not something he’d had on his bingo card—ever—yet here he was, somehow accidentally married to a virtual stranger, and worse than that was the fact he found he couldn’t stop thinking about her.
Staring at her. Lusting after her like some horny teenager.
In fact, even as a pubescent schoolboy he hadn’t felt like this, as though the very blood in his veins had become his mortal enemy, determined to singe and burn him from the inside out.
He hadn’t been prepared for what seeing Allegra in Italy would do to him.
It wasn’t Italy, but the way she looked at all things with such wonderment.
Things he had long since taken for granted, and barely even noticed, she treated like gold dust. Even the damned view had made her face look like something from a fairytale.
Never mind how the Italian sun had caught the blondest of her waves and turned them into starlight and shine.
As for the noises she’d made as they’d kissed, the fevered, desperate, passionate cries that had gone from her choked mouth to his, he’d been about three seconds away from dragging her through the house and to his bedroom, to hell with Valentino and their agreement about no sex.
To hell with anything about what they did to each other.
Which made the twenty minutes they spent on the terrace with his grandfather an agony.
It was an exercise in restraint and dishonesty.
He sat beside Ally with one hand resting casually on her thigh, even when his fingers ached to snake higher, to find the most sensitive flesh between her legs and tease her there, driving her wild.
Even when he wanted to tell his grandfather to leave, so he could make love to Allegra beneath the perfect blue sky, with the sea she adored so much lapping far beneath them, he did not.
He sat and talked to his grandfather of their shared interests, their acquaintance, their business, aware that by keeping control of the conversation he was shielding Allegra from potentially revealing how little she knew of Luca, and his family.
After all, how could she be expected to fake the role of his wife having known him for less than seventy two hours?
He'd thought they’d have this week for her to get up to speed—and for him to learn what he needed of her, as well. He’d thought, and been wrong.
And to Allegra’s credit, she was coping a hell of a lot better than he was.
Despite the way she’d looked earlier, after their kiss—could it even be called a kiss when they’d basically showed that they both wanted to rip each other’s clothes off?
—she was now a study in relaxed contentment.
One leg crossed over the other, leaning just close enough towards him to look comfortably in love, listening to their conversation with a serenely engaged smile on her face.
“This is very boring for you, I suspect,” Valentino said, as if reading Luca’s thoughts, turning to face Allegra.
“Not at all,” she said, widening her smile. “I love seeing Luc speak so passionately about his business—I know how much it means to him.”
Luca regarded her without a shift in his expression, but inwardly, admiration was surging, at the way she was fighting for his cause without making it obvious.
“All of my grandchildren are invested in the business.”
That was classic Valentino. Praise, and a lack of commitment, all at once. The man was as slippery as an eel—one of the reasons he was so successful.
“I can’t speak for the others,” she said with a shrug. “Though of course, I’m looking forward to meeting them. Luc mentioned a party?”
Valentino’s eyes narrowed and Luca understood what was going on behind the old man’s expression, because he knew him almost better than he did himself.
In many ways, they were the same person.
Sharp as a blade, always assessing. Valentino was starting to realise that Allegra was more of an equal than he’d realised—so was Luca.
It made him glad, and strangely proud. He had no reason for the latter.
Their marriage had been a drunken mistake that he’d turned to his advantage, but he’d had no way of knowing that she was smart and clever, that she’d be up to the challenge of managing Valentino at his own game.
Or was it that the old man was as smitten with Allegra as Luca had to admit he was?
Smitten?
He sat up, back ramrod straight, at the impossible description. He was not, and never had been, a man who felt anything like smitten. Desire, yes. Lust, yes. Need, assolutamente, and all of those things were firing through him now. That was all it was.
Yet with his grandfather, smitten was, perhaps, a more appropriate word. There was a kindness to the way Valentino spoke to her, even as he was clearly sceptical about the marriage.
The scepticism he’d expected, the softness he had not. In his whole life, he’d never seen this side of the old man.
Valentino drained his coffee then turned towards the view. “Well, I think it’s time for me to rest.”
“You mean leave?” Luca corrected, so a stifled gasp escaped from Allegra.
“Luca,” she corrected, apparently forgetting her new nickname for him.
He arched a brow. “It is our honeymoon.”
“I thought I would leave tomorrow. It’s a long journey, and I’m tired,” he said, playing up his age in a way that made Luca want to roll his eyes. His grandfather still ran two miles most days. He prided himself on his fitness and energy.
“Of course you should stay,” Allegra agreed, with all the confidence of a woman who’d taken over the running of the house. “We’d be delighted.”
“You, my dear, might be, but I can see for myself how he feels about it.”
“He,” Luca agreed, “was counting on time alone with his bride.”
Valentino held his hands up in silent agreement. “You will not see me again until dinner,” he promised, standing and smiling at Allegra. “Shall we say eight o’clock?”
Luca nodded once. “If you insist.”
“Oh, I do.” Valentino’s smile was wolfish. “It is one night, Luca. And we both know why it matters.”