Coercion to Love (7 page)

‘Grandmothers, Terri, are specially made to love little children,' she gravely informed her uncertain charge. Some children are lucky enough to have two grandmothers, while some have none at all, but you, darling, have this one, who looks very nice to me.'

Terri turned her frowning gaze on the poor subject under discussion. It was turning out to be a day of days for her, Cass noted ruefully. First she is kidnapped, then she wakes up in a strange room with an even stranger woman sitting beside her bed. Then she finds out she has a daddy, then a grandmother, when really she had been quite content without any!

Are you nice?' the blunt child demanded of Mrs Valenti.

The old lady smiled, real amusement lightening her brown eyes. 'Oh, I do hope so,' she confided. 'I have  had no complaints so far from my other grandchildren.'

You've got more than just me?' Terri took a hesitant step towards this brand new phenomenon. Three,' her grandmother announced. 'Two boys, and a little girl who looks just like you.'

Two more steps brought Terri beside the old lady's chair. 'Can I see her?'

Thank you,' Carlo murmured under cover of Terri's side bringing Cass's head swinging around in his direction. Their faces were disconcertingly close. Close for her to see the fine black shards flecking the brown iris. He wasn't smiling, but his mouth was more soft than she had seen it before, soft enough to draw her gaze down to it as he added quietly, 'It was more than—fair of you, in the circumstances.'

He had the most beautiful features, she was thinking hazily. His tanned skin smoothly stretched over the Roman shape of his bones. Everything about him was smooth, sleek, elegant, even the way the hairs grew in a subtle arch across his brows.

She was staring again, and flushed when she realised it.

'You're welcome,' she mumbled, mimicking Terri's trite remark of earlier. Then stood up quickly, her bright head tilted at a haughty angle which utterly denied that short but unnerving trip into intimacy.

'Who do the other children your mother mentioned belong to?' she asked him as he came up straight beside her.

'My sister, Louisa,' he said, sliding his hands into his trouser pockets. 'She lives with her husband in South America so my mother has few chances of seeing them...

‘As you can see-----' his glance slid over to where his mother was carefully lowering herself back into her chair while holding Terri's attention with her soft voice '—she is not strong. She had an accident some years ago which has left her severely weakened. From living a very busy and active social life, she is now content to spend her time here. I would prefer it,' he then added carefully, 'if our—battles were restricted to when she is not around to witness them.'

'Please, Miss Marlow, do sit down!' Mrs Valenti suddenly became aware of her manners, inviting Cass to take the seat to one side of her. 'And you, Teresa, will sit on the other side of me, please?'

The child obeyed, her fascination with this new being by far outstripping her until now unimpressed view of her father.

As if by tacit agreement on all sides, the light tea was enjoyed with a lessening in the hostility, both Cass and Carlo for the moment content to watch and listen to the easy way with which Mrs Valenti charmed her granddaughter, holding her attention by asking her questions about herself and listening intently to the serious little replies she received.

'I have been upstaged, I think,' Carlo murmured drily as he offered to refill Cass's coffee-cup.

'By a past master at it, I should imagine,' she smiled, then was immediately serious again. This whole thing was slipping too quickly away from her own control. It had been one thing dealing with an undeserving father, but it was quite another having a real live grandmother to contend with also. 'Signore-----' she began carefully.

'Carlo, please,' he inserted. 'My mother will be offended by such formality from someone she considers family.'

'I am not family, signore' Cass declared in a driven whisper. She flashed him a look. He was smiling lazily at her, refusing to be drawn by her anger. 'We are not even friends, come to that,' she added. 'We are on opposing sides of the fight, remember.'

'So we are.' Those dark Italian features looked almost Satanic as he flashed her a wide white grin. Her heart missed a beat, this damned acute awareness she was experiencing of him another battle she was having to fight against. 'But for now we will call a truce, I think. For the bambino's sake. For my mother's sake. So sheath your sharp claws, Cassandra.' A tanned hand came out to cover her own. 'We will fight again later.'

He said the words as if they were a lover's promise, and Cass snatched her hand away, glaring at him as he  smoothly came to his feet. 'If you have satisfied your doubt , Teresa-----' he turned his attention on his daughter' —I have something to show you, if you would come with me?' Tentatively, he offered her his hand.

Terri didn't look too sure. 'What is it?' she demanded suspiciously, then, because she couldn't help it, 'Will I like it?'

'I acquired it especially for you,' he answered drily, 'so I do hope you will like it,'

It took a moment, but curiosity eventually won out over the reserve Terri was putting up against him. She scrambled down from her chair to join him, her hand slipping into his as they walked off together.

Cass watched them go, her attention locked on the battle of emotions going on inside her. One part of her wanted to run after them so that she could shield Terri from the man who had caused her mother so much pain, but the other, less bitter side of her nature could see the vulnerable desire to love and be loved in the way Terri gazed curiously up the length of her father's shape as she walked beside him.

They disappeared from view, and a sigh broke from Cass's lips as she turned back to the table.

A silence fell, with neither Mrs Valenti nor Cass seeming able to find anything light to say to each other. Cass took refuge in her cup of coffee, sipping at it while she pretended an intense interest in their surroundings.

'They look well together,' Mrs Valenti eventually broke the long silence.

'Yes,' Cass quietly agreed.

'I see nothing of her mother in Teresa's outward appearance.'

'No.' Cass's mouth went wry at the relief Mrs Valenti could not erase from her voice. 'My sister was a true platinum blonde with skin as fair as mine. Terri most definitely takes after her father in looks,' she added drily.

The older woman looked assessingly at her. 'Then you must also see, Miss Marlow,' she continued carefully, 'how criminal it was for your sister to have kept the child's existence a secret from my son?'

About them spread the remains of a pleasantly shared tea, enjoyed beneath the warmth of a sun shining golden in a pure azure sky. Cass glanced at Mrs Valenti, and saw with a sinking heart that her lined face had lost its warmth. She had been putting on an act for the benefit of the other two, but now it seemed the mask was off and in its place the kind of hard-eyed intention which set the tension buzzing between them.

'Maybe my sister was convinced that your son would not wish to know,' she suggested, knowing she could say more, but wouldn't. That was for Carlo Valenti and his guilty conscience to do.

Momentarily startled by the reply, Mrs Valenti then shook her head. 'No,' she denied, 'I cannot believe that. My son has always behaved with care and consideration towards others. If your sister led you to believe that Carlo would not wish to acknowledge his own child, then she Med,' she said firmly. 'If Carlo had been aware of her situation, then I can state—without question—that he would have done his duty towards both mother and child!'

'Well, I question it,' Cass retorted, green eyes flashing a look which Mrs Valenti's son had already begun to read as ominous. 'It's fine for you to sit there informing f your version of the truth, knowing you have your son within easy calling distance to verify everything you say. But my sister is d-dead, Mrs Valenti.' Her voice broke on the word, and she swallowed thickly. 'Liz can't speak, can't lie, can't come back and defend herself against people like you who think they can sit in judgement on her when really they know nothing—nothing! But I'm here,' she warned. 'And for as long as I can draw air inside my body, I shall protect Terri from people like you and your son—and anyone else who would intend to hurt her!'

'We have no wish to hurt the little one!' Mrs Valenti looked at Cass in horror, her old face gone white as a sheet.

'You hurt her every time you think badly of her mother!' Cass cried, coming angrily to her feet. 'What will happen if I leave Terri in your care, signora?’ she challenged hotly.

'Every time she does or says something you don't quite like, will you blame it on her mother's influence? Will you deride Liz at every opportunity you get—deprive Terri of the God-given right to openly love her own mother?'

'No!' the older woman denied, taken aback by Cass's fierce attack.

'I see you've let the tiger loose, Mamma,' a grim voice drawled from the terrace doorway.

Cass swung around to find Carlo leaning against the open door-frame, tanned arms folded across his white-shirted chest. And her flashing eyes darkened with anxiety as she searched the space around him for Terri.

'She is with Maria—thank God,' he said grimly. 'For your voices could be clearly heard right across the valley!'

Sheer relief sent Cass sinking heavily back into her seat.

'I thought we agreed not to bring my mother into our—battles,' he reminded her curtly.

'You forgot to tell your mother the ground rules,' Cass muttered, shaken by her own carelessness. If Terri had overheard them. If she'd...

'I do believe, Mamma-----' straightening, he came towards them '—that I did set certain—ground rules—for this meeting before I would allow it to take place. Here, drink this.' He handed Cass a fresh cup of coffee, and it was only as she took it from him that she realised just how badly she was shaking. 'And one of the most specific points I did insist upon-----' he returned his attention to his stiff-faced mother '—was no derogatory remarks about the mother of my daughter!'

"She may be your daughter,' Cass inserted angrily, 'but she is still legally in my charge—and will remain so as long as you people persist in trying to bully me to get your own way!'

'Bullying or no,' Carlo inserted, 'I do, most succinctly, get your meaning at last, Miss Marlow. Which is not so surprising, I suppose, since you have been trying to hammer it home to me with a hatchet since we first collided with each other!'

'Well, I suppose that's something.' She sipped at the strong hot coffee in an effort to stem the angry tears she knew were glittering in her eyes.

'And in so being,' he continued, 'if you have finished biting every Valenti head off you can snap at, may I suggest that we adjourn to my study where once again we will attempt—and please do note the word attempt-----' he made sardonically clear '—to find some

compromise to this—mess—which will be agreeable to both of us?'

Terri may need me,' Cass confessed, resenting his tone.

"Teresa-----' he used the name pointedly '—is quite content helping Maria with her baking, and my mother will no doubt join them to help hold the child's attention while we—talk.'

A questioning glance at his mother brought the old lady struggling to her feet. But it was only as Cass saw her reach for her walking-sticks that she realised just how feeble her physical health was, and she instantly felt  as she watched her move laboriously away. 'I should't have lost my temper with her,' she murmured.

'No,' he agreed, 'you should not. But I do accept there was provocation. My mother, you see, protects her family as fiercely as you do your own.'

'Point taken,' Cass conceded.

'Good.' His fingers closed around her arm. Startled by the hot spark of electricity which shot between them, Cass flinched, almost upsetting the cup of coffee in her hand. 'That's what temper does for you,' he taunted softly as he drew her to her feet.

'Oh, shut up,' she muttered, pulling away from him, more troubled by her reaction to his touch than the taunt. Her arm was still tingling as she followed him into the house, the odd sensation spreading out to encompass the rest of her body.

In his study again, this time he invited her to sit in one of the deep leather armchairs set by his desk while he moved around to place himself in the chair behind.

Unlike the modern suite of rooms she and Terri had been allotted, the study was furnished on more traditional lines, with a deep red carpet covering the floor and the furniture old and fine enough to be antique.

'I think I can immediately put this meeting on the right footing by doing something about—this...' The manila file appeared on the top of the desk again. 'If I am willing to destroy this file and withdraw the—threats I made earlier, will you reconsider your refusal to discuss Teresa's future with me?'

Cass looked at the file, bit down hard on her bottom lip, and began to sift through quickly what he had said in search of the hidden catch. Whatever was inside the file—lies or not—she would do almost anything to see it gone.

'Destroying that file does not remove the fact that you actually compiled it,' she pointed out, 'and nor does it remove the fact that you were willing to pay my sister to rid yourself of any responsibility she had a right to expect from you.'

Something violent flashed in his eyes, irritation at her stubbornness, Cass suspected, feeling her pulses quicken as she held on to that look, demanding acknowledgement of that one point if nothing else. She was not about to pull her punches with him. She knew his sins, and he knew she knew. The file or not, Carlo Valenti was the one who had sinned against her family, and not the other way around.

His hard gaze shifted to the manila file, then he sighed almost defeatedly and said, 'I can, if you will allow me, to explain my own side of all of this.'

Her bright head shook. 'Not if you're going to slander my sister again,' she said. 'Because I just refuse to listen.'

He smiled at that, a grim half-cut of a thing which played at one corner of his attractive mouth. 'Damned if I do and damned if I don't, Miss Marlow?' he murmured.