Engaged For Her Enemy's Heir

‘You do. And I think it is a rare but precious thing.’ He leaned back against the wall of the lift and tugged her gently towards him, close enough so their hips nudged each other’s and heat flared, a spreading, honeyed warmth that left him craving more. ‘I would like to see it more often.’

‘We have been at a funeral,’ Allegra murmured, her gaze sweeping downwards. ‘There hasn’t been much cause to smile.’

The doors pinged open before Rafael had to come up with a response to that thorny statement. He stepped out, directly into the penthouse suite he’d booked. Allegra looked around the soaring, open space, her eyes wide.

‘This is amazing...’

Was she not used to such things? Rafael shrugged the question aside, drawing her deeper into the room. The doors to the lift closed. At last they were alone.

CHAPTER TWO

WHAT WAS SHE DOING? Allegra felt as if she’d stumbled into an alternate reality. What kind of woman followed a strange, sexy man up to his penthouse suite? What kind of woman fell headlong under his magnetic spell?

Certainly not her. She didn’t do anything unexpected or impetuous. She lived a quiet life, working at the café, her closest friend its owner, an eighty-year-old man who treated her like a granddaughter. Her life was small and safe, which was how she wanted it. And yet from the moment Rafael’s hand had touched hers she’d been lost, or perhaps found. She felt as she’d been wired into a circuit board she’d had no idea existed, nerves and sensations springing to life, making her entire body tingle.

She felt, and after the numbness she’d encased herself in that was both good and painful, a necessary jolt, waking her up, reminding her she was alive and someone, someone was looking at her with warmth and even desire, wanting her to be there. The knowledge was intoxicating, overwhelming.

Rafael was still holding her hand, his warm, amber eyes on hers, his smile as slow and sensual as a river of honey trickling through her.

It was dangerous, letting herself be looked at like that. Dangerous and far too easy to float down that river, see where its seductive current took her. They were here to listen to music, but Allegra wasn’t so naïve and inexperienced not to realise what that meant. Why Rafael had really asked her up here.

Nervous and unsettled by her spiralling thoughts, Allegra tugged her hand from Rafael’s and walked around the suite, taking in all the luxurious details, soaring ceilings and marble floors, ornate woodwork and silk and satin cushions on the many sofas scattered around the large living area.

‘This place really is incredible,’ she said. Her voice sounded high and thin. ‘What a view.’ Floor-to-ceiling windows framed a spectacular view of the city on three sides. ‘Is that the Coloseum?’ She pointed blindly, and then felt Rafael come to stand behind her, his body so close she could feel his heat. If she stepped backwards so much as an inch she’d be touching him, burned by him. She wanted it, and yet she was afraid. This was entirely new, and new meant unfamiliar. Strange. Dangerous.

Except...what, really, did she need to be afraid of? Rafael couldn’t hurt her, not in the way she’d been hurt before, soul deep, heart shattered. She wouldn’t let him. She was nervous, yes, because this was strange and new, but she didn’t have to be afraid. She took a deep breath, the realisation calming her. She could be in control of this situation.

‘Yes, it’s the Coliseum.’ His hands rested lightly on her shoulders, and a slight shudder went through her, which she knew he felt. Daring now to prolong the moment, to up the ante, she leaned back so she was resting lightly against him. The feel of his chest, hard and warm, against her back was a comforting, solid weight, grounding her in a way she hadn’t expected. Making her want to stay there.

Rafael’s hands tightened on her shoulders and they stood there for a moment, her back against his chest so they could feel each other’s heartbeats. Allegra closed her eyes, savouring the moment, the connection. Because that’s what she wanted, what she needed now...to feel connected to someone. To feel alive.

So much of her life had been lived alone, since she was too shy to make friends at school, too confused and hurt to reach out to her mother, too wounded and wary to seek love from the handful of dates she’d had over the years. But this...one single, blazing connection, to remind her she was alive and worth knowing...and then to walk away, unhurt, still safe.

‘Shall we have champagne?’ Rafael’s voice was soft, melodious, and Allegra nodded. She wasn’t much of a drinker, but she wanted to celebrate. Wanted to feel this was something worth celebrating.

‘That sounds lovely.’

He moved away and she turned, wishing she could get hold of her galloping emotions, her racing pulse. Feeling this alive was both exquisite and painful. What was it about this man that made her want to take a step closer, instead of away? That made her want to risk after all this time?

The pop of a cork echoed through the room, making Allegra start. Rafael poured two glasses, careless of the bubbles that foamed onto the floor. ‘Cin-cin,’ he murmured, a lazy look in his eyes, and he handed her a glass.

‘Cin-cin,’ Allegra returned. She hadn’t spoken the informal Italian toast since she was twelve years old, and the memory was bitter-sweet. New Year’s Eve at her family home, an estate in Abruzzi, snow-capped mountains ringing the property. Her father had given her her first taste of champagne, the crisp bubbles tart and surprising on her tongue. The sense of happiness, like a bubble inside her, at being with her family, safe, secure, loved.

Had it all been a mirage? A lie? It must have been. Or perhaps she was remembering the moment differently, rose-tinted with the innocence of childhood, the longing of grief. Perhaps her father hadn’t been as doting as she remembered; perhaps he’d taken a call moments after the toast, left her alone. How could she ever know? She couldn’t even trust her memories.

‘Are you going to drink?’ Rafael asked, and Allegra blinked, startled out of her thoughts.

‘Yes, of course.’ She took a sip, and the taste was as crisp and delicious as she remembered. She blinked rapidly, wanting to clear the cobwebs of memory from her already overloaded mind. She didn’t want to get emotional in front of a near-stranger.

‘Tell me about yourself,’ she said when she trusted herself to sound normal. ‘What do you do?’

‘I run my own company.’

She raised her eyebrows. ‘What kind of company?’

‘Property. Mainly commercial property, hotels, resorts, that sort of thing.’

He was rich, then, probably very rich. She should have guessed, based simply on his presence, his confidence. Even his cologne, with the dark, sensual notes of saffron, smelled expensive. Privileged. She’d been privileged once too, before her parents’ divorce. More privileged and even spoiled than she’d ever realised, until it had all been taken away.

Not that she’d been focused on her father’s money. Although her mother complained bitterly that after the divorce she’d got nothing, that she’d had to scrounge and beg and pawn what jewellery she’d managed to keep, Allegra hadn’t really cared about any of it. Yes, it had been a huge step down—from an enormous villa to a two-bedroom apartment too far uptown to be trendy, public school, no holidays, often living off the generosity of her mother’s occasional boyfriends, a parade of suited men who came in and out of her mother’s life, men Allegra had tried her best to avoid.

All of it had made her mother bitter and angry, but Allegra had missed her father’s love more than any riches or luxuries. And at the same time she’d become determined never to rely on anyone for love or anything else ever again. People let you down, even, especially, the people closest to you. That was a lesson she didn’t need to learn twice.

‘And you enjoy what you do?’ she asked Rafael. She felt the need to keep the conversation going, to avoid the look of blatant, sensual intent in his eyes. She wasn’t ready to follow that look and see where it led, not yet, and Rafael seemed content to simply sip and watch her with a sleepy, heavy-lidded gaze.

‘Very much so.’ He put his half-full glass on a table and moved towards the complicated and expensive-looking sound system by the marble fireplace. ‘Why don’t we listen to your music? Shostakovich, you said, the third movement of the cello sonata?’

‘Yes...’ She was touched he’d remembered. ‘But surely you don’t have it on CD?’

He laughed softly. ‘No, I’m afraid not. But the sound system is connected to the Internet.’

‘Oh, right.’ She laughed, embarrassed. ‘Like I said, I’m not good with technology.’

‘You can leave that to me. I can find it easily enough.’ And he did, for within seconds the first melancholy strains of the music were floating through the room. Rafael turned to her, one hand outstretched, just as it had been before. ‘Come.’

The music was already working its way into her soul, the soft strains winding around her, touching a place inside her no person ever accessed. Music was her friend, her father, her lover. She’d given it the place meant for people, for relationships, and she’d done that deliberately. Music didn’t hurt you. It didn’t walk away.

She took Rafael’s hand, the sorrowful emotion of the cello resonating deep within her. Rafael drew her down onto the sumptuous leather sofa, wrapping one arm around her shoulders so she was leaning into him, breathing in his scent, her body nestled against his.

It was the closest she’d ever been to a man, and yet bizarrely the intimacy felt right, a natural extension of the music, the moment, both of them silent as the cello and piano built in sound and power.

Then Rafael drew her against him even more tightly, so her cheek was pressed against his chest, her body pressed against his, and Allegra closed her eyes, letting the music wash over her. She needed this. She closed her eyes, the music and Rafael and the champagne all combining to overwhelm her senses even as it made her want more, to let herself be swept away on this tide of emotion and see where it took her.

Underneath her cheek Rafael’s chest rose and fell in steady, comforting breaths. His fingers stroked her arm and his breath feathered her hair. Everything about the moment felt incredibly intimate, more so than anything Allegra had ever experienced before. If only they could go on like this for ever, feeling each other’s breaths, each beat of their hearts.

The music built to its desperate, haunting crescendo and then the strains fell away into silence. It had been, Allegra knew from having listened to the piece many times, just over eight minutes, and yet it felt like a lifetime. She felt both drained and intensely alive at the same time, and in the ensuing stillness neither of them moved or spoke.

‘Do you know,’ Allegra finally said softly, ‘the cello is closest instrument to the human voice? I think that’s why it affects me so much.’ She let out a shaky laugh, conscious of the tears on her cheeks, the rawness of the moment. The music had affected her more now than it ever had before.

‘It is a stunning piece of music,’ Rafael said quietly. His thumb found her tear and gently swept it away, stealing her breath, making her ache. ‘It causes me to both yearn and mourn.’

‘Yes...’ The sensitive, sincerely spoken observation pierced her to her core. This was the connection she craved, and unthinkingly she twisted in his arms, smiling through her tears, her face tilted up to his. Then she caught the blazing look in his eyes, felt its answer in the sudden, desperate thrill that rippled through her body. And this connection, even sweeter and more powerful than the last...

He dipped his head and she held her breath, the whole world suspended, expectant—and then his mouth was covering hers in a kiss that felt like both a question and an answer, a need both sating and sparking to life. It was enough, and yet it made her want so much more.

Allegra’s hands clenched on the crisp cotton of his shirt as his mouth moved with thorough and expert persuasion on hers, gentle and yet so sure. She’d never known a kiss could be like this, touching her to her very core, piercing her right through, knowing her. And right now she wanted to be known.

And then it became wonderfully, thrillingly more. In one easy movement Rafael swept her up and across the room and she found herself lying down on the soft leather cushions, his face flushed and his eyes jewel-bright as he looked down at her.

‘You are so beautiful. So lovely.’ With gentle hands he pushed her disordered curls away from her face, his fingers skimming across her skin, exploring her features. Allegra closed her eyes, submitting to his touch, revelling in it. The feel of his fingers on her face felt as intimate as the kiss, his touch so gentle and reverent it made her ache in an entirely new way.

He slid his hands lower, each touch a question, his fingers feeling her collarbone and then his palm moulding to the curve of her breast.

‘A different kind of music,’ he murmured, his mouth following the trail of his hand, and she laughed, the sound shaky and breathless. Yes, this was new music, and he was teaching her its breathtaking melody. She’d thought, in this moment, that she might feel fear, or at least uncertainty, but she didn’t.

She felt wonderful, and she wanted to keep feeling wonderful, to come alive under someone’s hands, feel as close to another person as she could. For one night. One moment. When would she ever get a chance like this again?

Somehow Rafael had managed to slip her dress from her shoulders, and now her upper half was bare to him. He bent his head, nudging aside her bra with his tongue, and she gasped aloud, the feel of him against her sensitised flesh a jolt to her whole body.

‘Oh...’ The single syllable held a world of newly gained knowledge as pleasure pierced her with sweet arrows. Her hands roved over his back, drawing him closer to her, desire an insistent pulse inside her.

Of their own accord her hips rose, welcoming the knowing touch of his hand. His fingers brushed her underwear and she bit off a gasp. She’d had no idea...

Rafael lifted his head, his gaze glittering as he looked down at her, his breathing as ragged as her own. The obvious fact that he wanted her as much as he wanted him solidified her certainty that this was what she wanted. What she needed. A connection, pure and true.

‘Will you come into the bedroom with me?’

She nodded wordlessly, knowing there was only one answer her aching body and heart could give.

‘Yes.’

In one fluid movement Rafael rose from the sofa and drew her towards the bedroom. Allegra followed, barely conscious of her rucked-up dress, her tangled hair.

The bedroom was as elegant and luxurious as the living area, and Allegra glanced at the massive king-sized bed, standing on its own dais and covered in a navy satin duvet. Rafael turned her to face him, framing her face with his hands as he kissed her again, even more deeply, and she responded, his kiss drawing a deep, pure note from her soul.

Rafael tugged the zip down the back of her dress so the black silk fell away, leaving her in nothing but her bra and pants, both simple and black, hardly sexy, and yet his gaze gleamed with approval as he looked at her, and her heart swelled. She had never realised how wonderful it felt, to have a man look at her like that. Want her like that. He drew her towards him, her breasts brushing against his chest, her hips nudging his so she could feel the hard length of his arousal against her stomach.

‘Cold?’ he whispered, and she shook her head.

No, she was not cold. It was a balmy spring evening, and the hotel suite was warm. The shiver was because of him, and he knew it, and she didn’t care.

He kissed her again, working his way down her jaw and collar bone to press his lips against the V between her breasts. She threaded her fingers through his hair, anchoring herself to him. She felt adrift in sensation, and his touch was the only thing that tethered her to earth.

Then he was moving his mouth lower, peeling away her bra and pants with his hands, sinking down onto his knees in front of her so Allegra swayed, shocked and overwhelmed by the feel of his hands on her hips, his mouth...

‘Oh...’ Her breath came out in shattered gasps. It was so unbearably intimate, to have him looking at the very essence of her, revering her in an act so selfless and giving and... ‘Oh.’

Rafael’s dark chuckle reverberated through her bones as her body trembled on the precipice of an orgasm that felt like an explosion. He rose again and drew her to the bed, leaving her trembling and aching and wanting more.

She watched, dazed, as he shucked off his clothes, revealing a bronzed torso, the muscles of his abdomen scored into hard, perfect ridges. His legs were long and powerful, and as for the most male part of him...

He was a work of beauty.

‘You may look,’ Rafael said as he covered her body with his. ‘And you may also touch.’ And then he was kissing her again, his arousal pressing into her with thrilling insistence, and that restless ache became an overwhelming clamour in her body, drowning out all thought, all doubt.

She gasped out loud as his fingers touched her in her most intimate and feminine places, teasing, toying, exploring, knowing. Her fingernails dug into the satiny skin of his shoulders as her body strained for the glittering apex she felt, just out of her reach, a pinnacle she needed to find, that she wanted them to ascend together.

And then, finally, he was sliding inside her, his breathing harsh and ragged as he filled her up, the momentary twinge of pain lost in the utter rightness of the sensation, the union complete and total.

He stopped, swearing under his breath, and, lost in a haze of need, Allegra stilled underneath him.

‘Rafael...?’

‘You are vergine?’ he demanded, and she gulped.

‘Yes...’

He swore again, his forehead pressed to hers. ‘I had no idea...’

‘Why would you?’ she managed, and he let out a shudder, his eyes clenched closed.

‘You should have told me.’

‘Rafael...’ She arched her hips upwards, letting her body plead in a way her words could not. She couldn’t let him stop now, not when everything in her was aching and demanding. With a groan he kept moving, the delicious slide of his body in hers making Allegra forget that tense moment as she gave herself up to the sensations cascading through her, building in a beautiful crescendo, and then the glittering apex burst into crystalline shards of pleasure around her as she let out a cry that rent the still air and then fell away like the most sacred note of music she’d ever heard.

* * *

Rafael rolled off Allegra, managing to suppress the curse that sprang to his lips once more. She’d been a virgin. He hadn’t expected that, not even when he’d decided she was artless and genuine, and guilt soured like acid in his stomach. He’d stolen someone’s innocence. He’d used someone who should have been protected, cared for. He’d done something he’d sworn he would never do again. Break a sacred trust.

He’d assumed she was a woman of some experience, even if she’d seemed a little shy. He never would have brought her upstairs otherwise. He never would have gone ahead with his seduction.

And yet...the music, the mood, the way Allegra had looked at him with hungry hope...all of it had made him yearn in a way that now left him feeling deeply uneasy. Sex was a transaction, nothing more, pleasurable and easy as it was. He didn’t ever let it mean anything, and he hoped like hell Allegra wasn’t imbuing it with some kind of emotion he would never let himself feel.

And yet it had been the innocent purity of her response that had been his undoing. He hadn’t even used birth control. The realisation crystallised like ice inside him. He’d meant to reach for a condom, but in the moment he’d completely forgotten. He’d lost his head. He’d certainly lost control of his body.

Next to him Allegra was still, a rosy flush covering her pale, porcelain body, the perfect foil for the creaminess of her skin. Her hair was spread across the pillow in a tangle of red-gold curls, making him want to thread his fingers through them even now, and pull her towards him for an open-mouthed kiss. Even now, with his climax still thudding through him, knowing how innocent she’d been, he wanted her. He’d never wanted a woman so quickly, or so much.

Allegra rolled on her side, curling into him, her arms wrapped around his chest. Rafael froze, confusion colliding with alarm, irritation with guilt. He didn’t do pillow talk. Ever. All of his bed partners knew what he expected in bed, and what he definitely didn’t want. He made it very clear from the beginning that emotional attachments were a no-go zone, except Allegra, of course, hadn’t received that memo. And as a virgin she would no doubt expect some intimacy now, some soft talk that he knew he was utterly incapable of. He didn’t let people get close. People he could hurt. People he could fail.

As he’d already hurt Allegra, deflowering her in what amounted to a tawdry one-night stand.

Her leg found its way between his, her damp cheek pressed to his chest. She let out a shuddering sigh.

‘I miss him,’ she whispered, her voice sounding broken. ‘I miss him so much.’

Shock had Rafael stilling. What the hell...? ‘Miss him?’ he repeated tonelessly.

‘I know I shouldn’t, there’s nothing to miss,’ she continued softly. ‘I hadn’t even seen him in fifteen years. But I do miss him. I miss what we once had, what I thought we had. That’s why I came tonight, I think. Because I was looking for something, some kind of closure...’

She was talking about Mancini. But fifteen years... She couldn’t have been his mistress. She was in her late twenties at most.

‘Allegra,’ Rafael asked hoarsely, turning to stare down into her pale, lovely face. ‘Who are you?’

She looked up at him with tear-drenched eyes. ‘I’m his daughter,’ she said simply, and Rafael bit down on the curse that sprang to his lips.

Allegra was Alberto Mancini’s daughter. The daughter of his enemy, his nemesis, was lying in his arms, seeking his comfort, because her dear father, the man who had as good as murdered his own, was dead.

His stomach heaved. He felt a thousand different emotions—fury and guilt, disgust and alarm, regret and sorrow. He was sickened by his own part in this unexpected drama, taking a woman’s innocence, a woman who he should, by rights, have nothing to do with. He’d hated the Mancinis for so long, had wanted only justice...but what was this? What was he? Allegra was looking for comfort and he had none to give.

He rolled away from her and out of bed, grabbing his boxers and slipping them on in one jerky movement. From behind him he heard Allegra shift in bed, and then her voice, trembling, uncertain.

‘Rafael?’

‘You should go.’ His voice was brusque; he didn’t think he could have gentled it if he’d tried. Anger was coursing through him now, a pure, clean rage. Mancini’s daughter. Did she know what her father had done? Did she realise the blood he had on his hands? Reasonably he knew she couldn’t; she must have been a child when his own father had died.

And yet...she was a Mancini. She missed her father, a man he’d hated. She’d been innocent, and he’d abused it. His feelings were a confused tangle of guilt and anger, shame and frustration. It was all too much to deal with. He needed her out of his life. Immediately.

‘You...you want me to go?’ Her voice was a trembling breath of uncertainty.

‘I’ll call you a cab.’ He reached for his trousers and pulled them on. Then, because she still wasn’t moving, he grabbed her dress and tossed it to her. It fell on her lap; she didn’t even reach for it.

She looked gorgeous and shocked, sitting in his bed, the navy sheet drawn up to her breasts, her hair tumbling about her shoulders, her eyes heartbreakingly wide.