Married Under The Italian Sun. Lucy Gordon
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“Angel,” Vittorio whispered. “Angel, what are you trying to do?”
She shook her head. She didn’t know.
He released her carefully, half expecting her to fall, but she stepped back and looked at him with the bleakest expression he had ever seen. He couldn’t bear to look at her.
“Why do you want me to think badly of you?” he asked.
“You will anyway, whatever I do,” Angel said sadly. “It’s safer this way. Go on thinking the worst of me, Vittorio. It’s probably true.”
She walked out of the room, leaving him stunned.
He tried to tell himself that everything was very simple. She’d just confirmed his worst suspicions. But he couldn’t make himself believe it.
Harlequin Romance®
presents
international bestselling author
LUCY GORDON
Readers all over the world love Lucy Gordon for powerful emotional drama, spine-tingling intensity and Italian heroes! Her storytelling talent has won her countless awards—including two RITA® Awards!
Escape to the beauty of Rome with Lucy Gordon’s upcoming story:
One Summer in Italy… (#3933)
Married Under the Italian Sun
Lucy Gordon
Lucy Gordon cut her writing teeth on magazine journalism, interviewing many of the world’s most interesting men, including Warren Beatty, Richard Chamberlain, Roger Moore, Sir Alec Guinness and Sir John Gielgud. She also camped out with lions in Africa, and had many other unusual experiences that have often provided the background for her books. She is married to a Venetian, whom she met while on holiday in Venice. They got engaged within two days.
Two of her books have won the Romance Writers of America RITA® Award: Song of the Lorelei in 1990, and His Brother’s Child in 1998, for the Best Traditional Romance category.
You can visit her Web site at www.lucy-gordon.com.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CHAPTER TWELVE
CHAPTER ONE
‘LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, here we are again with your favourite TV programme, Star On My Team, when the famous—and sometimes the infamous—ha-ha!—team up with you to win fabulous prizes…’
Sitting backstage, Angel prayed for the burbling introduction to be over soon. In fact, she thought, please let the whole mindless business be over. Just as her marriage was over, and only awaited a decent burial.
The presenter was getting into his stride.
‘On my right, Mr and Mrs Barker, and their famous team member—’He named the star of a minor soap opera. Watching the backstage screen, Angel saw him enter, flashing his teeth and grandstanding to the audience.
Nina, her personal assistant, surveyed her with critical approval.
‘You look perfect,’ she said.
Of course she did. Angel always looked perfect. That was her function. Long blonde hair, large, dark-blue eyes, slender figure encased in a tight gold dress, cut teasingly low. Masses of glittering, tasteless jewellery. Bling, bling!
‘And now, the lady I know you’re impatient to see—’
Not as impatient as I am to finish this, she thought wryly, while trying to remain good-tempered. Time to get out there. Big smile!
‘The one we’ve all been waiting for…’
Especially since my husband plastered my face all over the front pages, trying to divorce me on the cheap. Never mind. Smile!
A look in the mirror, a final adjustment of her dress to ensure that her assets were displayed to advantage, mouth widened just so far, no further. And now for the last walk to where the lights beckoned and the cameras preyed on her. It felt like a walk to the guillotine.
‘Here she is. The beautiful, the fabulous—Angel!’
She’d done this a hundred times before, and it should have been easy, but as she emerged and the applause washed over her, something terrible happened. The lights seemed to dim, and suddenly her mind was filled with darkness and panic.
Please, not now! I thought those attacks were over!
Mercifully, the dreadful moment passed swiftly. She could cope again, just.
She advanced on the suicidally high heels, hands outstretched, voice tuned to a note of artificial ecstasy to greet the presenter.
Her fellow contestants were Mr and Mrs Strobes. She’d met them in the hospitality room before the show and it had been an endurance test.
‘We’re so sorry about your divorce,’ Mrs Strobes had said. ‘We think it’s just terrible the way he threw you out.’
‘Parting was a mutual decision,’ Angel had hastened to say.
But what was the point, with Joe flaunting his new companion at every party and nightclub?
The audience was agog to see her, so she smiled and waved, turning this way and that so that they shouldn’t be disappointed. She could almost hear the comments.
‘A right sexy little piece—a bit of all right.’
That was what her husband had wanted from her. For him she’d been a ‘right sexy little piece’ for eight years, and suddenly eight years felt like a very long time.
The show started. The questions were ridiculously easy, but even so she gave a performance of racking her brains, giggling at her own ‘ignorance’. They wanted ‘dumb blonde’ so that was what she would give them.
The soap actor on the other side seemed to be genuinely dumb, and Angel’s team was soon in the lead. The clincher came when the host burbled, ‘And now, Angel, here’s a real tough one for you. Who painted the Sistine Chapel? Was it a) Maisie the Mouse, b) Michelangelo, or c) Mark Antony?’
She did her bit, putting her dainty fingertips to her mouth and giving an ‘Angel’ giggle.
‘Ooh, dear! I don’t know. I never studied music.’ Roars of laughter from the audience. ‘Could you repeat the question, please?’
He did so and she gave a little squeal.
‘You always give me the hard ones. I’ll have to guess. Michelangelo.’
‘Michelangelo is right, and you have won.’
Cheers, applause, her team mates bouncing with joy. It would be finished soon. Cling to that thought.
At last it was over and she could escape. Nina was waiting for her with the car, so that she could make a speedy escape from all the prying eyes.
Nina had been with her for eight years, secretary, maid, gofer and good, solid friend. She was a little younger than Angel, plain, funny, and a rock to cling to.
When they were on their