Italian Mavericks: A Deal With The Italian: The Italian's Deal for I Do / A Pawn in the Playboy's Game / A Clash with Cannavaro. Elizabeth Power
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guarded, impenetrable expression that seemed to be his friend’s de facto look of late descended over his square-jawed face. “I’ve been over Serena for a long time.”
“You think so?”
Stefan stared him down. “You think you’re in control of your little situation in there?”
No. He decidedly was not. But he was about to fix that.
* * *
The deliberate twist of the key in the lock of the apartment door echoed excessively loudly in Olivia’s ears after the loaded silence in the car coming home. The explosive look on Rocco’s face as they’d driven through the relatively quiet streets of Manhattan made her wonder if she’d taken her exercise in distraction a bit too far.
He stood back for her to enter, his long, lean body taut, his face so blank that adrenaline pounded through her in a disconcerting rush. Hadn’t she done her job? She’d really gotten into her role as fiancée. Even Stefan had seemed to enjoy himself... And she hadn’t thought about tomorrow’s press conference even once, which was an added bonus.
The door slammed shut. She winced and turned to face him.
“What the hell was that?” he growled, his stance open-legged and aggressive.
She touched her fingers to her throat. “I was having some fun. This really is a ridiculous situation, Rocco. Stefan wasn’t going to believe it was love at first sight for one second. I was trying to make it believable.”
His long strides carried him to her so quickly the room seemed to sway around her. He stopped mere inches from her, the heat pulsing from him so intensely she felt it singe her skin. “You weren’t trying to make it believable. You were trying to drive me nuts. Stefan thinks I’ve lost it.”
She bit her lip, her gaze skipping away from his. “I’m sorry. I might have taken it a bit too far.”
“A bit too far?” Incredulity dug a furrow across his brow. “You had your hand on my crotch.”
Heat rushed to her cheeks. “I said I went too far. I’ve apologized.”
His gaze bored into hers. “Sorry isn’t an effective response for what I’m feeling right now, tesoro. I am way past the line.”
Of what? Her throat went dry, her stomach clenching in a knot. “You lied to me. You told me you weren’t attracted to me that night in Navigli when you clearly were.”
“For a reason.”
Her hands clenched by her sides. “Because you think I was with Giovanni.”
“Because you were with Giovanni.”
She made a sound in the back of her throat. “Do you really know your grandfather so little you think he would have been having an affair with a woman young enough to be his granddaughter?”
“He was not in his right mind.” A muscle ticked in his jaw, a flare of fury firing in his eyes. “He was off in some...fairy-tale land of late. Doubtless you perpetuated that.”
Her head pounded with fury. “You are so wrong, you know that? So laughably wrong. And you know what else? You deserved that tonight, Rocco. And more, if I were to be honest. You can’t even admit the truth to yourself about how you feel.”
He stared at her, long and hard, his face contorting into an expression that made her want to head for the door and run. “Here I am, then, Olivia,” he rasped, his gaze impaling hers. “About ten showers away from finding your payback amusing. And that is the truth.” A muscle in his jaw ticked wildly. “You want to finish what you started? Put your hand back where it was, cara. In fact, put more than your hand there.” His voice softened to a low purr. “I dare you.”
The heat, the potent attraction that had been smoldering, building, between them all night wrapped itself around her like a shroud, seizing her lungs. Despite what he thought of her, despite what he’d done to her that night in Navigli, her body wanted him to finish what he’d started. Badly.
She raised her gaze to his. Dark color stained his high cheekbones, everything about him hard, masculine challenge. He would be spectacular in bed. All that intensity caged in an outrageously good body. She could almost taste how good he would be.
She nearly did it, too. Because numbing her brain as to what lay ahead just a little bit longer was high on her agenda. Then her rational brain kicked in. Short-term avoidance wasn’t going to help her in reality. She stepped back, removed herself from all that heat and called it a brush with insanity.
“No, thank you, Rocco. I’m finally starting to learn the rules of your game, and I decline. This year is going to be hard enough without introducing sex into the mix.”
She watched him process her response. The emotion that flickered through his volatile gaze. Watched him firmly slam a lid on it. “I tend to wholeheartedly agree. But push me again like that, Olivia, and I won’t be responsible for my actions, deal or not. Count on that.”
A shiver rocked through her. She turned and walked into the bedroom before the madness escalated. She should be focusing on the day ahead, figuring out how she was going to get through it rather than allowing herself to become hopelessly distracted with Rocco.
Not that anything could prepare her for returning to the life she’d left behind. Nothing ever could.
NEW YORK DURING Fashion Week was a frenetic exercise in seeing and being seen. Anyone who was anyone in the fashion world descended on the city like a swarm of locusts ready to make their mark. Press coverage was massive, celebrity sightings in an already star-encrusted city even more frequent and thousand-dollar bottles of Cristal ran like water in the dozens of warm-up parties held across the metropolis.
There was, however, no partying going on at the Mondelli suite at Fifteen Central Park West on the afternoon of the Italian fashion house’s show, Olivia’s first appearance on a runway in over twelve months. The show, combined with the details of planning the society wedding of the year, had Olivia hurtling close to the edge. She was wearing the face of Medusa. Rocco was afraid if he touched her, she would snap in half.
She stood, hands on jean-clad hips, in the salon, blue eyes shooting fire at him. “I told you I don’t care,” she muttered in response to his question about the wedding color scheme. “Maybe we should make it a black-and-white theme—the light and the darkness.”
“Perfetto,” he murmured. “You would be the darkness and I would be the light.”
“As if.” She shoved the guest list back at him. “I told you. Violetta, Sophia, my mother and my father. That’s it. And my father is not walking me down the aisle.”
“Why?”
“Because he has his own family now, and who knows if he’ll be able to take the time off work. He works long hours for the transit company.”
Rocco frowned. “So I’ll send him some money to cover the week. Maybe he and his family can even make a vacation out of it.”
“You will not.” Heat flared in her eyes. “He hasn’t wanted anything to do with my mother and me for years. Leave him alone.”
“Let’s talk about your mother, then. If you’ve forgiven Giovanni and her for the affair, why the animosity?”
“Forgiving her for the affair has nothing to do with my general feelings for my mother.”
“Which are?” He lifted a brow. “I’m going to be meeting her tonight. Maybe you should give me a heads-up as to what I’m walking into.”
“Like you did with Stefan?” She shook her still-damp hair back over her shoulders.