Dante's Stolen Wife (3 page)

“As is The Inferno.”

“Lazzaro!” Nonna lifted a trembling hand to her throat. “How can you say such a thing?”

He stooped beside her chair. “I’m sorry to hurt you, Nonna, but I don’t believe in The Inferno. I think it’s a very sweet, very romantic fairy tale to rationalize allowing a passionate nature to overcome common sense. Sev used it to justify blackmailing a top jewelry designer into leaving our main competitor. Marco wants to use it in order to coax a Dantes employee into his bed. And Primo used it as an excuse to steal his best friend’s fiancée. The Inferno doesn’t exis—”

To Marco’s shock, Nonna did something he’d never seen her do before. She slapped Lazzaro, stopping his words. Tears flooded her eyes. “Not another word,” she ordered in Italian, before drawing a shaky breath. “Marco is right. This woman is not your soul mate. If you had felt The Inferno for her, you could not say the things you have here today. You mock and dismiss what you have never experienced. How dare you assume you know more about what happened between your grandparents and brothers than those of us involved. How dare you accuse us of lying.”

Lazz’s jaw tightened. “Not lying. Merely attempting to rationalize irrational emotion.”

“Is what you feel for Caitlyn rational?” Marco demanded.

Lazz slowly rose to face his brother. Nonna’s slap had left its mark. A light streak of red kissed the curve of his jaw. “Of course it is. Emotional attraction is quite rational. And I’m attracted to Caitlyn physically and intellectually, as well as emotionally. But I’m not going to try and pretend that what I feel for her is due to some family curse.”

“Blessing,” Marco and Nonna corrected in unison.

He dismissed that with a wave of his hand. “What I’m feeling are the normal sensations men and women have experienced toward one another since Adam and Eve first bumped into each other in the Garden of Eden.”

“You’re in love with Caitlyn Vaughn?” Marco questioned tightly.

“Are you?” Lazz shot back. “You met her once. Spoke to her for all of five minutes. And now you’re trying to tell me that she’s…what? Your Inferno bride?”

Anger flared anew. “Not trying. I am telling you. You’ve deliberately kept us apart. You had no business doing that.”

Lazz waved that aside. “Oh, please. You go through women faster than Nonna’s pan forte. All I did was save her from heartache.”

“While taking her for yourself.”

To Marco’s fury, his brother simply smiled. “Now that Nonna’s brought me the ring I requested, I plan to propose to her tonight. It’s up to her whether or not she accepts. Considering how alike she and I are, I think we’ll suit very well. Oh, she probably won’t accept right away. It’s much too soon and much too fast. But if nothing else, it will cement our relationship until she does agree to my proposal.”

“Please, Lazzaro,” Nonna interrupted. “If you persist in following this path, you will regret it for the rest of your life.”

“And I’ll make sure of it,” Marco added.

Lazz lifted an eyebrow. “What do you plan to do? Tell Caitlyn I have a twin? I’m sure she’ll find that very interesting, but hardly life altering. Tell her it was you in the lobby on her first day of work? She and I have been dating for six weeks. Do you really think she’ll care after all this time?” He shook his head. “It’s too little, too late. She’s committed to me now. Go find someone else to charm.”

“Caitlyn is meant for me and you know it. Why else would you have worked so hard to keep us apart?”

For the first time a hint of temper sparked to life in Lazz’s eyes, belying his legendary control. “You think all women are meant for you, Marco. You always have, which explains the scar I carry. Don’t you remember? It’s because of that day, we created a ‘
no poaching
’ rule.”

“I haven’t forgotten, even if you have.”

“There wasn’t anything between you and Caitlyn, therefore I can’t be guilty of poaching.” Lazz folded his arms across his chest, his stance hard and firm. “Face facts, Marco. This is the one woman you can’t have, which is probably why you want her. Well, you’re too late. You’re just going to have to find a way to deal with losing. Caitlyn and I suit each other and you’re on official notice to back off. Besides, considering how vindictive
The Snitch
has gotten these past six weeks, chances are excellent they’ll get hold of this story, if you don’t stop pushing, and run with it. I don’t think the Romanos would be happy reading about another Dante scandal. Do you?”

Far from backing off, Marco chose to approach, determined to take on anyone and anything that threatened the bond that had formed that morning in the lobby. It didn’t matter that he’d only spoken to Caitlyn for five short minutes. It could have been five seconds. The instant they’d touched, their fates were sealed. He couldn’t explain it. Before it had happened to him, he’d have called it insane, just as Lazz did. But the connection that occurred that day compelled him to find Caitlyn. To take her for his own. To make her his in every way possible.

And he would.

Marco went toe-to-toe with his brother. “You let me worry about the Romanos and
The Snitch
. As for Caitlyn…Would you care to put your faith in her affections to a small test? Why don’t you give me a clear field tonight and we’ll see which of us ends up going home with the lady.”

If Nonna hadn’t stepped between the two of them, Marco didn’t doubt Lazz would have hit him. “Don’t mess with her, Marco. Final warning. Back off.”

“And I’m warning you, Lazz. The Inferno is real. And I won’t let any man take my woman from me.” He leaned in past his grandmother to give weight to his words. “
Not even my own brother.
”

“Late, late, late!”

Caitlyn flew to the mirror for a final check, throwing a swift, desperate glance toward the clock. Five minutes. The car arrived in five minutes. Why, oh, why had Lazz chosen tonight of all nights to change the time they were to meet?

She perched her reading glasses on the end of her nose and checked the note he’d sent a final time. He must have been in a hurry when he wrote it because she barely recognized his handwriting. It seemed bolder and less precise, more…
passionate
. And how amusing was that after her conversation with the girls? Now, where were they to meet? On the balcony of Le Premier for moonlight drinks. She shoved her glasses into her hair with a smile. How romantic.

Pausing in front of the mirror, she examined her reflection a final time. She’d dressed with extra care for the Dantes’ anniversary party, choosing a floor-length gown in softest lilac and applying a touch more makeup than usual. She stared at the mirror, slightly stunned at how different she looked when she wore something other than her more mundane business attire. The makeup added a hint of glamour and sophistication, while the halter top drew attention to her shoulders and bustline. Even the sweeping skirt gave an illusion of magic and romance, floating around her like wisps of fog. Then she grinned. Her reading glasses, however, were another story.

She carefully removed them from where she’d tucked them into her upswept hair and tossed them onto her bed beside her purse. She’d have to remember to grab them before she left or she’d be depending on Lazz to read anything put in front of her tonight.

Thinking of Lazz caused her smile to falter a shade. She knew Britt and Angie believed he planned to propose sometime this evening, but they couldn’t be more wrong. Her friends weren’t aware that matters between her and Lazz simply hadn’t progressed to that point. Her chin firmed. Until now.

Thanks to her lunchtime conversation she’d decided the time had come for a change. She wanted Lazz to make love to her, something she’d hesitated to agree to up to this point. But after some long, hard consideration, she decided she needed to know, once and for all, whether their connection went deeper than the lighthearted romance they currently shared.

She needed to know if Lazz had any
Zorro
in his soul.

Turning away from the mirror, she checked the clock once more and gave in to panic. She hated, hated, hated being late. Thanks to a last-minute change in Lazz’s plans for the evening, she’d have to run to avoid that horror. Thank goodness for the car he told her he’d send or she wouldn’t have had a hope of making it to the hotel on time. And she wanted to make it on time, to wallow in every minute of the promised romantic rendezvous before the start of his grandparents’ anniversary party. Snatching up her purse, she hurried outside to the waiting car and a night that she hoped would change her entire future.

The instant she entered the hotel lobby, a uniformed employee approached. After confirming her identity, he escorted her along a corridor that ran parallel to the ballroom and gestured her through an archway that opened onto the starlit darkness of a large balcony overlooking downtown San Francisco. She paused for an instant so her eyes could adjust, then instantly realized she didn’t need her eyesight. Another sense kicked in, a keen awareness of someone’s presence just off to her left. An odd fever began to sizzle through her veins, flaring to life in a way that caught her by surprise. She hadn’t experienced anything like this since…

She inhaled sharply. Since the morning she’d stepped through the front doors of Dantes and first met Lazz.

A smile built across her mouth. “I can feel you,” she whispered into the darkness. “I can’t see you, but I can feel you.” She slowly turned until she faced him, or faced where she’d have bet a month’s salary he stood. “Well? Aren’t you going to say anything?”

“I’ve been waiting for you,” he simply replied.

J
ust that one comment, and yet Caitlyn’s nerve endings fired to life with a fierceness that stunned her. She shivered in reaction. They were the same words Lazz had used when she’d first met him in the lobby of Dantes. How many times had they spoken since? How many times had they been together in other settings, if not quite this ripe with romance? And yet, just that one sentence succeeded in knocking her totally off-kilter.

Perhaps it had to do with his voice. It sounded deeper than all those other times. Huskier. More passionate than she’d ever heard it, and fused with blatant desire. Every feminine instinct she possessed responded to that unspoken command, urging her to go to him. To surrender. To give herself as completely and fully as only a woman can.

She took an impulsive step in his direction. This was the man she’d met all those weeks ago. The man who’d roused her from sleep and ignited emotions she never even realized she possessed.

“Where have you been?” she asked.

He stepped from the shadows and approached. If he found her question peculiar, he didn’t let on. If anything, she suspected he understood precisely what she asked.

“Does it matter? I’m here now.” He held out his hand.

“I have a question to ask you.”

She didn’t hesitate, but slipped her hand into his.
Yes!
A small voice whispered inside her head, acknowledging the rightness of his touch. Even more remarkable, she felt a surge of desire so strong and overwhelming that she couldn’t think straight. Elation filled her. Here was the perfect man for her, a man who mirrored her own ideals. Practical. Safe. Successful. And powerfully alluring. All the building blocks for a successful relationship.

“What question did you want to ask?” she managed to say.

“Do you trust me?”

If he hadn’t spoken with such intensity, she would have laughed. “Of course I trust you.”

“Then kiss me.”

She resisted the seductive lure, curiosity getting the better of her. “I don’t understand. What in the world’s gotten into you?”

“I’m trying to make a point. To prove that what we felt when we first touched was real. That the fantasy can become reality. That you’re a woman who deserves to be swept off her feet, not just tonight, but every night.”

She felt the color drain from her face. “You heard. You were in your office at lunchtime. You overheard what Britt and Angie said.” Oh, God. What she’d said—that she was waiting for Zorro. “You heard us, didn’t you?”

He inclined his head. “I did.”

“I’m so sorry. I—”

“Don’t apologize. It was important for me to know.”

Lazz closed the distance between them and stopped her words in one easy move. Lowering his head, he cupped her face between his hands and kissed her. And with that kiss he sent her tumbling to a place she’d never been before.

He’d kissed her any number of times over the past six weeks, but it had never been anything like this. The first taste came slow and delicious, a slide of lips mingling with a whisper of tongue, combined with a bone-melting sensuality that Lazz had kept hidden from her until now. It had all the newness of a first kiss, which she found as strange and bewildering as it was utterly enchanting.

She sank into the embrace, opening to him, engaging in an escalating thrust and parry that caused a delicious friction to thrum through her veins. Why had she hesitated all these weeks? Why had she held him at arm’s length? This is what she wanted. This is want she needed. If Lazz had kissed her with such sweet aggression right from the start—as she’d half anticipated after their first meeting—she would have tumbled into his bed on their first date.

He drew back ever so slightly. “Better?”

“Like night and day,” she confessed. Her brows drew together. “But I don’t understand. Why didn’t you kiss me like this sooner?”

“I’m kissing you like this now.”

His hands swept along her jaw before tracing the length of her neck and tripping across her bared shoulders. She shivered beneath the teasing caress, and he smiled knowingly, his expression containing a suggestive, blatantly male quality. The air hitched in her lungs and then escaped in a small gasp as his hands continued their descent, exploring her curves with undisguised enjoyment. He gazed down at her as he drew her close once again, joining them together in seamless perfection.

His face eased into a slight blur thanks to her farsightedness, but she could still tell that his eyes never left hers as he held her, consuming her with their intensity. And then the color changed, burnished with brilliant sparks of amber and brown and a hint of green. In all the weeks they’d been together, she’d never seen the expression they currently displayed, a heady combination of passion, longing and determination. Nor had she ever reacted this way when he held her, as though she’d been lost and had finally found her way home.

The discrepancy bewildered her. She didn’t understand it, any more than she understood what had gotten into Lazz. But whatever had transformed him, she hoped it never went away. If she had any doubts about their relationship before tonight, they dissipated beneath that one single kiss.

“All of this is because you overheard my conversation at lunch?” she asked, dazed.

He didn’t deny it. “You want Zorro? I can give him to you. You want to be swept away? I can do that, too.”

“Oh, Lazz.” For some reason he flinched, possibly from the compassion in her voice. “I don’t want you to change who you are. I just want you to be yourself.” In truth, his extravagant promises shook her. Men who sold fairy tales went the way of Cinderella’s carriage at midnight. Poof. She had no desire to be stuck holding a pumpkin like her grandmother.

“Believe it or not, I am being myself.”

Her mouth curved into a slight smile. “You’re Zorro at heart?”

“More than you can possibly imagine.”

She didn’t bother arguing with him. She’d spent enough time with Lazz to know that he wasn’t Zorro. Zorro’s brother, perhaps, but he struck her as too dispassionate and analytical to embody the mysterious swashbuckler, no matter how much she might wish it otherwise.

“I can live without Zorro,” she reassured him. “At least I can if I have you.” She tightened her arms around his neck. “Like this.”

“You can, on one condition.”

“Name it.”

“That you come away with me. Right now. Tonight.” He stopped her automatic refusal with a single shake of his head. “Listen to me, Caitlyn. I know you, the real you. You may cling to facts and figures and charts and graphs because they seem safe and familiar and logical. But you don’t want safe or familiar or—God forbid—logical in a lover. You long for a man who sees beneath the surface, who realizes that you have the soul of a romantic and fulfills all your most passionate fantasies.”

She stared at him, stunned. It was as though he’d looked inside her heart and read her deepest secrets. She’d spent a lifetime doing the “right” thing. Following the rules and toeing every one of the lines her grandmother had laid down for her. Just once she wanted to step over a line. To take a risk. And now here was Lazz, a man she was wildly attracted to, offering the chance to do just that.

“Where do you want to go?” she asked, inching closer to that line.

“Forever, Nevada.”

She blinked. “You want to go to Nevada. Tonight.” At his silent nod, she stared at him in confusion. “But why? If you want to spend the night together—”

He stiffened. “Go on.”

For some reason she reddened. “I know we haven’t…Yet. But we don’t have to go all the way to Nevada for that.”

He relaxed enough to laugh. “There are other reasons to go there.”

She lifted an eyebrow. “You want to see a show? Gamble?”

“No,
cara
. I want to marry you.”

Marco could see he’d shocked her. She stared at him, her eyes huge and dark with disbelief. “Marry me!”

He spoke from the heart. “From the moment I saw you, I wanted you. I knew you were the one.”

“But these past six weeks—”

He’d anticipated that question when he’d planned the evening. “What would you have done if I’d tried to sweep you away that first day?”

“Run like hell.”

“And now, after six weeks?”

“I’m not running,” she conceded. “But I am stunned. This isn’t something we should leap into blindly.”

“You want me.” He didn’t phrase it as a question.

“I can’t deny that.” She sank against him and pressed her cheek to his shoulder. The silken strands of her hair brushed against the line of his jaw, and he inhaled the heady fragrance. “But
marriage
? So
soon
?”

“Waiting isn’t going to change my feelings for you.”

“But it will give us time to get to know each other better.” She pulled back a few inches. “Be practical, Lazz.” Then she laughed. “What am I saying? Other than myself, you’re the most practical person I’ve ever met.”

Every time she used his brother’s name, he longed to correct her, to demand that she see him…him, not Lazz. Soon she would. But first he had to get her to Nevada. All the arrangements he’d set into motion tonight hinged on that single point. The note he’d sent asking her to meet him a full hour ahead of the time she’d originally arranged to meet Lazz, the timetable of car and plane, the excuses Nonna would offer his brother regarding Caitlyn’s failure to appear at the party—they all depended on his ability to charm one simple agreement from the woman before him.

“You had practical,” he argued, “and it didn’t make you any happier than it made me. It’s not what I want and it sure as hell isn’t what you want, either.”

“Okay, I admit it,” she confessed with a sigh. “I’d like more than practical.”

“Then, come with me.”

She teetered on the brink of surrender. “What about your grandparents’ anniversary party?” She shook her head. “Let’s not rush this. We can go to Nevada another time. We should be here for their special night.”

“I already told Nonna about my plans in case you agreed, and we have her and Primo’s complete approval. She’ll make our excuses to the rest of the family.” And with luck, keep Lazz running in circles until far too late. “Say yes, Caitlyn,” he coaxed. “You want to be swept away and that’s what I’m offering to do.”

Before she could marshal any further arguments, he kissed her again. There was nothing new or tentative about this one. This kiss was a taking, powerful and physical. A demand. A seduction. A union. Never again would she mistake him for another man. Even if Lazz were to walk out onto the balcony this very moment and gather her into his arms and kiss her, he’d leave her wanting. Leave her with a bone-deep dissatisfaction coupled with an awareness that she belonged to another.

“Trust me, Caitlyn. Take a chance.”

She stared at him in a total daze and he barely managed to suppress a smile. She looked like he felt. If he’d had any doubt at all about his plans for the next twenty-four hours, they’d vanished the minute she’d joined him on the balcony. From the instant they’d touched, a certainty took hold. They belonged together. He’d never been more positive of anything in his life.

“I’d like to go to
Forever
with you.” She shook her head as though clearing it, and her hair slipped from its elegant knot to swirl about her shoulders. “But not to marry you,” she hastened to add, fumbling with the pins she’d used to anchor the weighty length.

“We’ll see.”

“I’m serious, Lazz. No marriage.”

“So am I, Caitlyn.” He took the pins from her and dropped them into his pocket before stealing another kiss and practically inhaling her soft moan. “I want you for my wife.”

He didn’t give her an opportunity to argue, but escorted her from the balcony and out of the hotel. He’d ordered the car that had brought her to Le Premier to wait for them right outside the door so they’d have it instantly available to drive them to the airport. He’d also arranged for the corporate jet to be standing by for their trip to Nevada.

He didn’t want to risk any delays that might give Caitlyn an opportunity to have second thoughts. Once they were married, he’d deal with the inevitable fallout when she discovered his true identity. But right now, he’d bind her to him with the most sacred commitment of all.

The instant they were airborne, he handed her a flute of a particularly fine sparkling wine from the Franciacorta territory in Italy. The lights in the cabin were dim and the seats wide and plush. They’d lifted the armrest separating them and sat joined at the hip with Caitlyn closest to the window. Outside the aircraft, the moon and the stars peeked in at them. He leaned toward her and kissed the dampness from her lips, all the while struggling to keep his hands to himself until a more appropriate time and place.

“Comfortable?”

“Mmm. I can’t remember the last time I felt this good.”

“I think I can improve on that.”

“Not possible.”

Without a word, he slipped an arm under her knees and swiveled her so her spine rested against the wall of the cabin and her feet were cushioned in his lap. He slipped off her high heels and let them drop to the floor. Then he wrapped his hands around the arch of her foot and began to massage her feet. He watched in amusement as she tightened her grip around her champagne flute and closed her eyes on a breathless sigh.

“I think I’d like to revisit your previous offer,” she said.

His laugh rumbled softly. “I assume you’d like to make a counteroffer?”

“Absolutely.” She peeked at him from beneath her lashes. “If we get married, will this be part of our evening ritual?”

“Anything you want,
cara
.”

“Why didn’t you explain this particular advantage before now? All these weeks of working together and you never—Oh, that reminds me.”

She switched to business mode with such ease he figured it had to come from long practice. Slipping her feet from his lap, she set aside her champagne and rifled through her purse for her PDA. “And where did I stick my reading glasses?” she muttered. “Oh, damn. I left them on the bed, after all. Listen, I nearly forgot to tell you. The Reed account called about setting up a meeting for Thursday. I wondered if I could borrow Lassiter—”