Coercion to Love (2 page)

The mosquitoes were beginning to bite. Cass swatted one as it landed on her arm, and went back inside, smiling to herself as she pulled the shutters closed. She was going to enjoy the next two weeks without having to look over her shoulder all the time. And that, she told herself firmly, was a promise!

A promise she found very easy to keep as the days drifted lazily by with no sign that Carlo Valenti had discovered their whereabouts. Between them, she and Terri developed a routine which simply consisted of spending most of the day down on the crowded beach before coming back to the apartment in time to shower and eat a light meal before the child fell happily exhausted in to bed. Terri's skin grew more tanned and healthy as time went on, and Cass was pleasantly surprised to find her own skin taking on a soft golden hue with the careful help of a high-factor cream.

'I wish we could stay here for ever and ever,' Terri sighed contentedly several days later as they were coming back from their day on the beach.

"So do I,' Cass smilingly agreed, realising with a jolt that she actually meant it! She might hate and despise Carlo Valenti, but she had learned to love his beautiful San Remo over this last week.

Giuseppe was busily filling the petrol tank of a beautiful creamy white Ferrari when they arrived around the corner which brought the garage into view. A tall dark-haired man wearing a pale blue shirt and buff-coloured casual trousers was leaning against the shiny bodywork of the car chatting lightly to Giuseppe as they waited for the tank to fill. The garage owner glanced up and saw them, and sent them his usual smiling greeting.

'Ah,' he called. 'Miss Marlow and the bambina. You had a nice day, heh?'

They had paused beneath the shade of a huge old olive tree to check the road before trying to cross it. The afternoon heat was oppressive today. Terri was pulling heavily on her hand as usual. A bee was buzzing annoyingly around the tangled mass of Cass's bright red hair. And Cass was more interested in getting out of the heat than anything else as she lifted her gaze to smile at Giuseppe just as the man with the white Ferrari swung around to face them. Cass glanced absently at him then away again, the female in her vaguely registering his lean, dark Italian looks. Then something went click in her brain, and she stiffened, the ice-cold feel of dread slewing everything inside her to a shuddering, grinding halt.

The world stopped moving. She forced herself to look at him again, praying desperately that she was wrong and knowing wretchedly that she was right. She had lived for too long with that face etched on her memory to mistake it when she saw it. The way he wore his straight black hair swept negligently away from his lean-boned face. His eyes, dark  brown and as hard as pebbles. The long smooth line of his Roman nose. His mouth, thin and cruel with a tendency to wear a sardonic curl to one corner. She knew every detail of that face as intimately as she knew her own, had spent hours staring at it via the photographs she had ripped out of various newspapers. Hating him, despising him for what he had done to her sister.

And it was most definitely him. Carlo Valenti.

She couldn't move, couldn't breathe, the cold, hard breath of fate holding her trapped in the horror of her own making, and for long, slowly moving seconds they just stood there staring at each other across the width of the dusty road, his own shocked amazement at finding her here in his own San Remo of all places registering in the astounded expression on his face.

Giuseppe murmured something in Italian, his tone matching his puzzled frown at the suffocating tension suddenly assailing them all.

'Cass?' Terri whispered anxiously, moving closer to her as the strange tension got to her also.

'It's all right,' she murmured, but her voice was low and thick, too restricted by the horror she was experiencing to give much comfort.

The child's movement made Carlo Valenti's dark lashes flicker, and he shifted his gaze down to the little girl. Instantly something blazed into violent life in him, and sent the air wrenching from Cass's lungs on a pained whimper.

It was recognition, instant and possessive.

'My God,' he breathed at last, his stunned gaze lifting back to Cass. 'My God. It is you.'

Yes, she thought emptily, it's me all right. Living in a fool's paradise.

'You were supposed to stay in London for another week at least,' she heard herself say stupidly.

‘Business demanded my early return,' he informed her as though it were her God-given right to know.

Cass even managed to smile at it, acknowledging the way both of them had been caught completely unarmed by the unexpectedness of the situation. He smiled too, causing her to catch her breath as those eyes so like Terri's glinted ruefully at her.

The world began to move again, birds twittering lazily in the shaded branches of the tree, the bee buzzing, the light breeze kicking up the dust from the road. The sun shone brightly down on the bodywork of the Ferrari, and Carlo Valenti relaxed suddenly, leaning back against the car and folding his arms across his chest.

'Well, well, well,' he drawled, getting a hold of himself far quicker than Cass could manage. 'So the lamb has walked right into the lion's lair.'

‘I’m no lamb for the slaughter, Mr Valenti,' she disclaimed, lifting her chin to defy a taunt she knew held more than a little truth to it. 'Don't make the mistake of comparing me with my sister.'

Liz had been the meek little lamb. She had allowed this man to use her, then leave her flat when the going got tough. Cass was made up of an entirely different stuff.

'You are quite right, of course,' he entirely agreed, using those eyes, narrowed against the sun, to slice over her in derisive contempt. 'There is no comparison. At least Elizabeth could give the appearance of being an angel when necessary, while you, Miss Cassandra Marlow, look and are, nothing but a-----'

'Don't you shout at my aunt Cass!' All of a sudden Terri was thrusting herself on the scene. 'And my mummy is only an angel 'cos she's dead!' The shrill statement wobbled a bit, and Cass tried to gather the angry little girl to her, but she was having none of it, pulling away so that she could stand free, legs planted firmly apart, hot and angry face turned up to challenge this stranger Who had dared to deride her mother's name and shout at her aunt Cass all in one breath. 'I don't like you!' she shouted across the road at him. 'You look like somebody I know, and I don't like you!'

A damning recognition of herself in him, Cass noted on a violent shudder.

He had begun to straighten slowly the moment Terri squared up to him, his eyes fixing in real fascination on his hostile daughter. 'I am sorry you think that, little one,' he murmured quite gently, 'because I mean neither of you any harm.'

Terri ignored him, turning to Cass and holding out her small hand. 'C'mon, Cass,' she instructed firmly, 'let's go,' almost as if she were the adult and Cass the child. 'We don't have to talk to him if we don't want to. He's bad, I just know he is.'

Out of the mouths of babes... thought Cass grimly as she took the proffered hand but made no attempt to move from the spot. Unlike Terri, she wasn't so naive as to believe he would let them walk away just like that.

'Now why should you think that, Teresa?' There was an odd thickness to Carlo's voice that forced Cass to acknowledge that he was finding this no easier than she was. 'You don't even know me, so how can you decide if I am bad or not?'

Terri frowned at this piece of good logic, her free hand going up to rub her dusty face. 'You're trembling, Cass,' she mumbled. 'He frightens you, doesn't he?' she said,  then burst into tears.

Cass wasn't surprised by the sudden outburst. But she knew Carlo Valenti was. Tern's bouts of bravery were usually followed by tears. Still struggling to gather her scattered wits together, Cass bent to scoop the poor little girl into her arms.

'It's all right, poppet,' she murmured soothingly, 'Carlo isn't bad.' She used his first name deliberately, hoping the familiarity would help ease Tern's fears. Whatever else Cass wanted, she did not want the child living in fear of anyone. 'He's just surprised to see us here, that's all.'

'What did I do?' Suddenly he was standing right in front of them, big and lean, his handsome face taut with concern. 'What did I say to hurt the child?'

'Nothing,' she replied flatly, thinking, It's me who's done the hurting by trying to put off the inevitable.

'You—snarled a bit, that was all, and Terri is very protective of me.' She hugged the sobbing child closer. 'If you'll excuse us, Mr Valenti, I think I'll take her inside so I can-----'

'No.' The refusal came hard and gruff, any hint of softening in the man gone in that instant. 'No,' he said again. 'This time there will be no clever escape, Cassandra Marlow. No chance to slip by me. You will both come with me right now,' he announced, 'or the child comes with me alone. The decision is entirely up to you.' And, before Cass realised what he meant to do, he had reached across and plucked the sobbing child from her arms.

'Oh! You can't do that-----!' Drenched in sudden panic, she made a flailing attempt to grab Terri back from him, one set of trembling fingers curling around the rock-solid muscle of a male forearm while the others held on for dear life to a fistful of Tern's T-shirt.

The child began yelling at the top of her voice, her little fists pummelling into any place she could hit on the hard-packed frame now holding her in an effort to get free. Giuseppe stepped forward, concern clouding his brown face. 'Signore...' he began uncertainly.

A barrage of Italian hit the garage owner's ears which sent him stumbling back several steps, his gaze sliding over to Cass with a look which accused her of murder.

'What did you tell him?' she demanded over Terri's shrill cries.

'Exactly who it is I hold in my arms,' he bit out harshly, grimly holding the struggling child while her desperate blows continued to rain all over him. Eyes like black onyx impaled Cass with a bitter challenge. 'Are you prepared to deny that this child is my daughter?'

On a gasp, Cass glanced sharply at Terri, hoping she was too busy yelling to have overheard what he had just said, knowing it was no use denying his angry challenge when people only had to look at the two of them together to know immediately where Terri sprang from. For all Cass's strong blood-tie with the child, she could not say the same thing. There wasn't an ounce of Marlow visible in her sister's daughter.

God, she asked herself wretchedly, what have you done, coming here?

'Please give her back to me!' she begged him. 'She's frightened enough as it is, without you making her think you're going to run off with her!'

'In the car,' he said grimly. 'You can have her back when we are all safely in the car.'

'But...' Fear was crawling between the fine layers of her skin, and she glanced huntedly around her, looking for someone—anyone—who would come to her rescue. But there was only Giuseppe standing there, staring at her as though she were a criminal. 'M-my—our things...' she mumbled helplessly. 'I—I have to get s-some things from the flat...'

'Get in the car, Miss Marlow,' Carlo Valenti instructed immovably, ignoring everything else.

Beaten, Cass turned and walked across the dusty road, and climbed into the low-slung car, dizzily aware that there was precious little else she could do at this moment.

He handed Terri to her the moment he had struggled in beside her, face set as he slammed his door shut. The engine fired, and with a growling surge of power they shot forwards, the accompanying sound of the central locking system clicking into place sending a cold shiver shooting down Cass's spine.

"Fasten your seatbelt!' he barked at her.

'With Terri in this state?' she choked. The poor thing had driven herself into such a sobbing frenzy that she was even fighting Cass now!

'Her name is Teresa’ Carlo grated. 'Please use it instead of that awful slang version. I dislike it intensely!'

'When I want your opinion, I'll ask for it!' Cass threw back, struggling to fasten the stupid seatbelt around herself while hanging on to a near-hysterical child. 'I can't believe you made a grab for her like that!' she added shrilly. 'Have you no sense?'

"The point needed to be made... Dio’ he muttered, bringing the car to a sudden halt, then twisted around to snatch the seatbelt out of her fumbling fingers to fasten it himself. His hand inadvertently brushed against Cass's breast, and it didn't take an idiot to know she wasn't wearing anything beneath her thin T-shirt.

Cass in turn sucked in a sharp breath, shocked by the hot frisson that skittered over her skin. Her cheeks wanned. He cursed, and Terry wailed all the louder because the tension inside the car was so great that it was in danger of exploding all around them.

'I hate you,' Cass mumbled thickly.

‘The feeling is entirely mutual,' he clipped, grimly settling himself back in his own seat.

‘I hate you too,' hiccuped another voice.

'If I were you, I would be too busy hating myself for making such an awful noise,' Carlo informed his hostile daughter.

His unsympathetic scorn had the effect of stopping the tears, and Terri sat up on Cass's knee so she could stare at him with more curiosity than fear now. 'I still don't like you,' she informed him bluntly.

As if against his own advice, his hand jerked up to gently touch the child's hot and tear-stained cheek. 'No,' he murmured gruffly, 'I don't suppose you do.'

'Cass doesn't like you either.'

'No,' he sighed, letting the hand fall away to return his attention to the car, setting them moving again with his expression even blacker.

'Did my mummy like you?' Her in-built perception took both adults' breath away.

Carlo's foot slipped off the accelerator, making the powerful car jerk and shudder. 'Yes,' he answered through tautly clenched teeth, 'your mamma liked me.'

Terri frowned, trying to puzzle that one out. She had grown up being used to a united front. Where Liz loved, Cass and Terri invariably loved also, and vice versa. This man seemed to be an exception to the rule.