“You’re doing all the giving,” she whispered. “I want to give a little, too.”

      “How? Like this?” He dipped his head and once again touched his mouth to hers. “Or had you something more intimate in mind…like this?” He slid his finger in a straight, sure line past the pearls at her throat and, cupping a brazen palm over her breast, teased her nipple with his thumb.

      A sharp, sweet arrow of sensation speared the length of her and found its target between her legs, leaving her embarrassingly damp. Aghast, she stammered, “Only if it’s what you want.”

      He put her from him as if he suddenly found her repugnant. “Sorry, Corinne, that’s not a good enough reason. The day—or night—has yet to come that I take a woman to my bed because she feels she owes me her body.”

      Catherine Spencer, once an English teacher, fell into writing through eavesdropping on a conversation about romances. Within two months she’d changed careers, and sold her first book to Mills & Boon in 1984. She moved to Canada from England thirty years ago, and lives in Vancouver. She is married to a Canadian and has four grown children—two daughters and two sons (and now eight grandchildren)—plus three dogs. In her spare time she plays the piano, collects antiques, and grows tropical shrubs.

      You can visit Catherine Spencer’s website at www.catherinespencer.com

       Recent titles by the same author:

      THE GIANNAKIS BRIDE

      THE ITALIAN BILLIONAIRE’S CHRISTMAS MIRACLE THE GREEK MILLIONAIRE’S MISTRESS THE FRENCH COUNT’S PREGNANT BRIDE BERTOLUZZI’S HEIRESS BRIDE THE ITALIAN’S CONVENIENT WIFE

      SICILIAN MILLIONAIRE, BOUGHT BRIDE

      BY

      CATHERINE SPENCER

      CHAPTER ONE

      TERSE AND ENIGMATIC, the letter sat on Corinne Mallory’s dressing table, held in place by a can of hair spray. Hardly a fitting resting place, she supposed, for correspondence written on vellum embossed with an ornate gold family crest. On the other hand, considering her initial response had been to decline its autocratic summons, it was a miracle that she hadn’t tossed the whole works in the garbage.

      But the name at the end of the typed missive, signed in bold, impatient script, had given her pause. Raffaello Orsini had been married to her dearest friend, and Lindsay had been crazy about him, right up to the day she died. That alone had made Corinne swallow her pride and accede to his wishes. Whatever the reason for his sudden visit to Canada, loyalty to Lindsay’s memory demanded Corinne not refuse him.

      Now that she was just two short hours away from meeting the man face-to-face for the first time, however, she wasn’t so sure she’d made the right decision. What did one wear to an invitation that smacked more of a command performance than a request?

      Eyeing the limited contents of her closet, she decided basic black was probably the most appropriate choice. With pearls. Dinner at the Pan Pacific, Vancouver’s most prestigious hotel, called for a touch of elegance, even if the pearls in question weren’t the real thing, and the black dress made of faux silk.

      At least her black pumps came with a designer emblem on the instep, a reminder of the time when she’d been able to afford a few luxuries.

      A reminder, too, of Lindsay, a tiny woman full of big dreams, who hadn’t believed in the word “can’t.”

      We’ll buy some run-down, flea-bitten old place in the right part of town, and turn it into a boutique hotel, Corinne. I’ll take care of housekeeping and decor, and you’ll be in charge of the kitchen.

       We’ll need a fairy godmother to accomplish that.

      Not us! We can do anything we set our minds to. Nothing’s going to derail us.

       What if we fall in love and get married?

      It’ll have to be to men who share our vision. She’d flashed her dimpled smile. And it’d help if they were also very, very rich!

       And if they’re not?

      It won’t matter, because we’ll make our own luck. We can do this, Corinne. I know we can. We’ll call it The Bowman-Raines Hotel, and have a great big old BR emblazoned over the front entrance. By the time we’re thirty, we’ll be famous for our hospitality and our dining room. People will kill to stay with us….

      But all that was before Lindsay went to Sicily on holiday, and fell in love with Raffaello Orsini who was indeed very, very rich, but who had no interest whatsoever in sharing her dreams. Instead he’d converted her to his. Forgetting all about creating the most acclaimed hotel in the Pacific northwest, she’d moved halfway around the world to be his wife and start a family.

      And the luck she’d believed in so fiercely? It had turned on her, striking her down at twenty-four with leukemia, and leaving her three-year-old daughter motherless.

      Swamped in memories, Corinne blinked back the incipient tears, leaned closer to the mirror to sweep a mascara wand over her lashes and tried to remember the last time she’d worn eye makeup. Far too long ago, judging by the finished effect, but it would have to do, and really, what did it matter? Whatever the reason for his sudden visit, Raffaello Orsini certainly hadn’t been inspired by a burning desire to evaluate her artistry with cosmetics.

      Downstairs, she heard Mrs. Lehman, her next-door neighbor and baby-sitter, rattling dishes as she served Matthew his supper.

      Matthew hadn’t been happy that his mother was going out. “I hate it when you go to work,” he’d announced, his lower lip trembling ominously.

      With good reason, Corinne had to admit. She frequently missed tucking her son into bed, because her work too often involved late nights and time during his school holidays. It was the nature of the beast and much though she’d have preferred it otherwise, there wasn’t much she could do about it, not if she wanted to keep a roof over their heads and food on the table.

      “I won’t be late, and I’ll make blueberry pancakes for breakfast,” she promised. “Be a good boy for Mrs. Lehman, and don’t give her a hard time about going to bed, okay?”

      “I might,” he warned balefully. Although only four, he’d recently developed an alarming talent for blackmail. He was becoming, in fact, quite a handful. But Corinne hoped tonight wouldn’t be one of those nights when she arrived home to find Mrs. Lehman exhausted from fighting to get him to bed, and Matthew still racing up and down the stairs every fifteen minutes and generally raising mayhem.

      I should be staying home, Corinne thought, the familiar guilt sweeping over her as smoothly as the black dress slid past her hips. But the letter pulled at her, and even though she could have recited it word for word from memory, she picked it up and scoured it yet again, as if the writer’s reason for sending it might be hidden between the lines.

      Villa di Cascata

      Sicily

      January 6, 2008

      Signora Mallory:

      I shall be in Vancouver later this month on a matter of some urgency recently brought to my attention and which I wish to discuss with you in confidence.

      I have reservations at the Pan Pacific Hotel and would appreciate your joining me there for dinner on Friday, January 28, a date I trust you find convenient. Unless I hear otherwise, I shall send a car for you at seven-thirty.

      Kindest