Stolen Bride

She tugged her hand away. ‘Well, don’t,’ she said, more sharply than she meant to. It was just silly, the way he was making her feel. Desperately, she cast around for something to say. Anything.

‘If I could choose,’ she said hurriedly. ‘If I was independent, then maybe I would go to England.’ She looked him straight in the eye and tried to ignore the way her heart was thumping erratically. ‘My nanny was English, and my uncle always used to listen to her. He said Sarah talked a lot of sense. Maybe if I went to her, he would listen again.’

There was a long silence, so long that she looked away and began to wonder if he had lost interest in the whole conversation. Maybe he was waiting for her to get out of the car.

Then he sighed, and she looked quickly at him. ‘What’s the matter? Don’t you think it’s a good idea?’

‘It stinks,’ he said simply.

Her eyes narrowed, but before she could say anything Finn went on, ‘Let’s get this straight, okay? Just so there’s no confusion. We are on the run from the Mafia and you think the only person they will listen to is some decrepit old nanny of yours who probably spends most of her days mumbling over her knitting?’

Cara thought of the last time she had seen Sarah. Even now her nanny wouldn’t be more than fifty, and her natural elegance was the kind that drew all eyes. Her jaw dropped at the picture Finn was drawing, but in the circumstances his conclusions were probably reasonable enough. She just had to get him to see her point of view. ‘You’re being over the top,’ she said as calmly as she could.

‘Over the top?’ he echoed. ‘Me? Uh-uh. There’s somebody in this car who has a screw loose, and it’s certainly not me. Not even a baby would think that your answer to Mary Poppins will be able to wave a magic wand and save you.’

Cara shrugged angrily. ‘Take me back to the church, then,’ she said recklessly.

He grabbed her other arm and gave her a little shake. ‘Are you crazy?’

She glared at him. ‘Do what you like,’ she snapped. ‘I’m perfectly sane. And so is Sarah. She’s the only one that stands any chance of making my uncle listen.’

He looked at her scathingly, and she burst out, ‘Well, she is! And for your information I don’t think she does much knitting.’

‘Probably past it,’ snapped Finn. ‘Isn’t there anybody else you know?’

‘No one,’ Cara said firmly. ‘She is our best bet, truly.’

‘So why wasn’t she at the wedding?’ he demanded.

Cara shrugged. ‘Uncle Pancrazio said she was too ill to come.’

Finn nodded. ‘That figures,’ he said drily.

Cara realised she was pleating a small square of her dress. ‘Would you lend me the money for a plane ticket to England?’ she asked at last, not daring to look up.

‘No,’ he replied, and her heart sank. ‘There’s no way you could get on a plane without being spotted and stopped by Luca’s men,’ he added. ‘I’m going to England. I have contacts there who may be of use. I’ll take you.’

‘In the car?’ she said blankly. ‘With you? All the way to England?’

He smiled mockingly at her. ‘I think you have the gist of the idea.’

‘On my own, with you?’ she added again, just to be quite certain.

‘Of course,’ he said casually. ‘It would be a business arrangement.’

Her head jerked up and she stared him straight in the face, her pulse suddenly thundering in her ears.

He gazed blandly at her. ‘But it would be to our mutual benefit... and even enjoyment, I hope.’

She licked dry lips. So that was it. She might have known there was a price attached. ‘You want me to...’ But she couldn’t say it. Couldn’t bring herself to put into words what Finn might be suggesting.

His fingers brushed her cheek. Her voice when it came seemed very old and far away. ‘Go to hell,’ she told him.

His fingers paused, then he tipped her face to his, his eyes darkening as he took in her exasperation. ‘I do believe,’ he drawled, ‘that you think I’m expecting you to go to bed with me.’

Her heart was jumping so much she felt like it was bouncing into her throat. ‘What other kind of a proposition would a man like you make?’ she asked.

His hand slid around the back of her neck and drew her closer. ‘Would you accept?’ he asked.

She sat upright, her nerves twanging at his tone and his touch. ‘What do you think I am?’ she asked miserably.

‘The question is,’ he corrected softly, ‘what do you think you are? Since the idea of you paying your way by going to bed with me wasn’t actually what I had in mind.’

A slow flush crept up her skin at his words, flooding her throat and then her face until she was crimson. ‘It never occurred to me that a man like you could have any other sort of proposition in mind,’ she said as bitingly as she could.

‘Well, if you’re willing to consider it, I am,’ he drawled. ‘What exactly did you have in mind? Instalment payments?’

Her hand made a sharp cracking sound on his cheek before she had consciously thought of retaliating.

But before she could withdraw her hand his fingers enclosed her wrist and he was staring at her, his eyes inky pools. ‘You count yourself so little,’ he said harshly. ‘And other people even less. Do you really think I am the kind of man who would blackmail a woman into bed?’

The look in his eyes was too searing, too probing. She twisted away from him and looked in silence at the woods. ‘I don’t know what kind of a man you are,’ she admitted at last. ‘Except that you must be crazy to be helping me like this.’

‘Did your family make you this suspicious?’ he asked softly. ‘This jumpy?’

‘It’s none of your business,’ she replied. ‘I don’t want to talk about it.’

She knew without looking that he was leaning towards her, moving close. Too close for comfort. She pressed herself against the door and turned to face him. ‘Don’t touch me!’ she yelled in sudden panic. ‘Don’t you dare!’

‘What would you do if I did?’ he demanded. ‘Have a fit of the vapours?’

She gasped as if he had slapped her, but he continued, ‘Don’t you want to know what I was going to suggest? Or are you planning on running up that road all on your own? Because I guarantee you won’t get very far.’

She tore her eyes away from him and stared at her hands. ‘What was your proposition?’ she asked in a small voice.

‘I want some inside information about your family,’ he said. ‘I’m writing a new book, and you’re perfectly placed to tell me all sorts of things I would never be able to find out otherwise.’

Her heart sank. ‘You’re barking up the wrong tree,’ she said dully. ‘I keep telling you. You’ve got it all wrong about my family.’

He shrugged. ‘I’m willing to take the risk,’ he said. ‘Provided you tell me what you know.’

‘But I don’t know anything,’ she burst out. ‘Truly.’

He shrugged. ‘Then I’m the loser. But I’m willing to take that chance. I’ll take you to England, and when we get there you can tell me what you know. Is it a deal?’

She lifted her hands helplessly. ‘You’re just...’

‘Is it a deal?’ he repeated.

Cara dropped her hands and sighed. ‘How long do you think the journey will take?’ she asked.

He shrugged. ‘Three, maybe four days. Maybe less.’

Four days on her own with a man she had never met before. She looked into his blue, blue eyes and felt herself beginning to flush a deep red. ‘It’s... impossible,’ she said. ‘I don’t even know if I can trust you.’

For one split second he looked absolutely exasperated, then he calmly leant over her once more and pushed the door open. ‘Give my love to Luca, won’t you?’

CHAPTER TWO

CARA looked at the woods, sunk in shadowy silence, the sun glinting through the trees, then at Finn. ‘I don’t have much choice, do I?’ she asked softly.

‘You made your choice back there in the church,’ he said quietly. ‘Now you have to decide whether to go on or back down.’

She gazed steadily into his face, the nodded. ‘Okay,’ she said as decisively as she could. ‘I’ll come.’

‘Attagirl.’ He smiled encouragingly, and to her astonishment she felt herself beginning to smile back.

‘Right, come on,’ he said briskly. ‘Out of the car.’

‘Out?’ she echoed. ‘But we’re in- the middle of nowhere!’ Suddenly she looked at him with new eyes, their previous conversation doing nothing to stop the panic spattering through her veins. ‘What are you going to do?’ she whispered. ‘You’re not—’

‘A part-time rapist?’ he supplied softly, a look in his eyes she couldn’t quite interpret. ‘Or maybe a mad axe murderer?’ He shook his head. ‘No, these days I seem to get my kicks out of ruining Mafia weddings.’

‘My family hasn’t got anything to do with the Mafia,’ she said hotly. ‘I keep telling you.’

Finn looked disinterestedly out the window. ‘If you say so,’ he said calmly. ‘Maybe I’ve got this all wrong, after all. Maybe I should just drop you off here. And then you can go home, explain everything in that wonderfully persuasive way you have, and everything’ll be hunky-dory.

‘Your uncle will be terribly understanding, of course, and Luca...’ He paused. ‘Well, Luca will probably just have a couple of aspirin and a lie-down in a darkened room and then forget all about it.’

‘Leave my family out of this,’ she snapped.

He leant towards her. ‘Honey, I would love to leave your family out of this. But I don’t think that’s quite what they have in mind. The sooner we get to England and I get some protection for you, the better.’

Their eyes locked, and Carenza bit her lip. ‘Why do you want me to get out of the car?’ she asked steadily.

‘Because we need to do something about that dress,’ he replied. ‘It’s just the tiniest bit of a giveaway, don’t you think?’

She stared at Finn for a long moment, her thudding pulse subsiding. Then with an effort she nodded and got out of the car. She stood by the door, uncertain, watchful as he got out on his side with an easy grace.

There was something about him that drew the eye, that made her want to look at nothing else, but when he turned and glanced at her over the top of the car, she felt herself beginning inexplicably to blush.

He was coming around to her side, and she turned to meet him, beginning to attempt a smile and then instinctively freezing as she noticed the knife in his hand.

He waggled it at her and she stepped back, wondering whether she should try to run. The strange thing was, she didn’t feel frightened of him. But maybe he really was a crazy man. Madmen often seemed charming, didn’t they? Perhaps he was someone with violent delusions. She took another step back and felt the car hard against her.

‘What...what are you doing?’ Her voice was wobbly, but she couldn’t help it. She forced herself to lift her chin and look him straight in the eye.

‘Here,’ he said impatiently, turning the knife around and handing it to her, handle first. ‘Take it.’

She looked at it blankly as her fingers curled around it, noting mechanically as the tension eased out of her body that it was just an ordinary penknife, and then stared at him. ‘What do you want me to do with it?’ she asked.

.He moved his hands irritably. ‘I don’t know,’ he retorted. ‘But you have to do something with that dress of yours. Cut those frilly bits off, cut it shorter, anything. I don’t care, but make it look more like a normal dress.’

She gazed at the creased white silk and then at him. ‘I can’t cut this up,’ she whispered. ‘It’s a work of art. It was made by Elsa Schiapparelli in nineteen thirty something. The hand-stitching alone—’

His jaw clenched and he took a step towards her. ‘I don’t care if it was made by Elsa the lion in Born Free, just do something with it!’

She looked into his lean, lightly tanned face and bit her lip. ‘Maybe I could borrow some of your clothes,’ she said at last.

He slapped his forehead with his hand. ‘You know,’ he said softly, ‘I thought I had everything for this trip. The penknife that has so many attachments I’m sure there’s a fold-up bicycle among them, an idiot-proof camera, a well-respected credit card. And you know what? I left all my dresses at home. Isn’t that extraordinary?’

Cara ripped the flowers from her hair and threw them on the ground. She wanted to stamp on them, she was so suddenly, furiously angry. ‘You are the most impossible man I have ever met,’ she stormed. ‘You just walk in and steal me from my wedding as though you had ice water in your veins, and now you are acting like an outraged duchess at the idea of me wearing one of your shirts.’

Finn’s mouth opened and then closed with a snap. Without another word he yanked open the boot and tore out a grip. ‘Okay,’ he said. ‘So sometimes you’re allowed to have better ideas than me. But we’ve wasted enough time. It’ll be dark soon, and I want to get moving.’ He smiled. ‘I keep thinking I hear a fleet of Mercedes thundering up the road, with Luca at the head doing his impersonation of Vlad the Impaler.’

A thin chill went down her spine as she thought of how terrifying Luca could be when he was angry. She looked straight into Finn’s face.

‘What’s the matter?’ he demanded.

‘You don’t look particularly scared at the idea of being chased by Luca,’ she said softly.

He shrugged. ‘He hasn’t caught me yet,’ he replied quietly. ‘And in any case, I’m more worried about you.’ He looked at the sky and then at her. ‘At least I stand no chance of him deciding to marry me.’

‘It’s not funny,’ she said shortly.

‘I’m not laughing,’ he replied. ‘But I’d appreciate it if you got a move on.’

Cara stepped towards him, then turned around. In a voice as impersonal as she could make it, she said, ‘You’ll have to undo me. I can’t reach all the catches.’

There was a short sigh and then silence, but she knew that he was standing right behind her. It wasn’t the feel of his body heat, or the soft brush of his breath on the nape of her neck, but something about his presence she simply couldn’t explain. Something she had never before experienced. And as his fingers began to free each cunningly hidden hook and eye, fleetingly touching her skin, she drew in a sharp breath.

‘What’s the matter?’ he asked softly, ‘did I stick a pin in you by mistake?’

‘No,’ she replied unsteadily.

‘There,’ he said, his voice almost too controlled as he freed the last hook.

She turned quickly. ‘Finn—’ She was so close to him, he was almost embracing her. ‘Why...’ She swallowed. ‘Why are you doing this, really? Why did you step in like that?’

He said nothing, but his arms closed about her, and he held her hazel eyes with his. It seemed the most natural thing in the world to rest the palms of her hands on his shirt. She could feel the play of his muscles under the cotton, and wondered what his chest looked like without... She shook her head. This was ridiculous. Why couldn’t she get a grip on reality? It must be some sort of emotional reaction to everything that had happened, she thought. But she didn’t pull away. Somehow, inexplicably, she didn’t want to.

His fingers brushed her cheek. ‘You are a very beautiful woman, Cara,’ he said softly.

‘That’s not an answer,’ she accused, determined to hang on to the last shreds of her self-control, in spite of the fact that it felt so right, so comforting, to be held by him.

There were a few faint freckles on his high cheekbones. ‘What sort of answer would you like?’ he murmured, taking the pins from her carefully styled dark gold hair and watching it cascade thickly down her back.

‘A sensible answer,’ she said, trying hard and failing to look away.

‘Like this?’ he asked, as he bent his head and kissed her.

Her body tautened at the feel of his lips on hers, coaxing, flattering, not at all like Luca’s. She pulled away at that thought, but Finn’s hands were warm on her back and, astonished at herself, she relaxed.

His lips pressed harder, became more demanding, his fingers trailing down her spine, and Cara reached up to touch his hair, the palm of her hand sliding over his jaw, the faint roughness of his cheek. This was an experience she wanted to go on forever.

And then he stopped. His hands dropped to his sides and he looked at her and smiled grimly. ‘Some wedding this is turning out to be.’

It was as if he had broken a spell. Her face flaming, she pulled back, and he let her go. ‘I don’t know why I let you do that,’ she snapped, snatching away her hands.

His fingers imprisoned one of her wrists and he lifted it to his mouth, kissing the pulse point, holding her once more with his eyes.

‘Let me go,’ she demanded, knowing he could feel the blood thundering through her veins.

‘I wouldn’t move too fast if I were you, princess,’ he remarked. ‘That dress is staying up now by sheer willpower.’

‘I said, let me go,’ she snarled.

With a little smile he dropped her hand, and after a mock bow, he turned and walked to the edge of the trees.

Cara breathed out in one gusty sigh. Making sure he had his back to her, she let the dress drop to her feet. She ran to his suitcase, her high heels wobbling perilously in the soft earth. With a muttered oath, she kicked them off, knelt and flipped the catches on the case, then began rummaging desperately through his clothes.

‘There’s a Hawaiian shirt and a pair of shorts at the bottom,’ said Finn.

She looked up to find him staring at her. ‘Go away!’ she screamed.

‘Cara,’ he said gently. ‘We’re not exactly in the fitting rooms of Saks Fifth Avenue. Get the damned clothes and get in the car.’ Blushing furiously, she did as he said, pulling on the shirt and running to the passenger seat as he stuffed the dress, the wreath and her shoes into his case.

‘Attagirl,’ he said, sliding into the driving seat and taking a good look around. ‘Just getting dusk now. It’ll be fully dark in a few minutes, and with luck no one will notice us at all on the autostrada.’

Cara stared at him, the memory of what they had done suddenly becoming horribly real. ‘Luca’s men will see us get on,’ she whispered. ‘They’ll be watching for us when we go through the toll booth.’

He glanced at her. ‘We’re not going through the toll booth,’ he said at last, starting the car and driving onto the road.

‘But there is no other way,’ she objected.

Finn shook his head. ‘This road leads to the con-struction site for the new section of the autostrada,’ he said equably. ‘I was looking at it yesterday, funnily enough, and it’s just about completed. We just get on it, drive along till we hit the main autostrada and then, voilà.’

‘Are you French?’ she asked after a short pause, thinking for the first time of that strange lilt to his otherwise perfect English. ‘Because you are certainly mad.’

‘Irish American, actually,’ he said mildly.

‘Even worse,’ she replied glumly, shrugging irritably as he glanced sidewise at her.

‘Have you any better ideas?’ he inquired.

She shook her head.

‘Well, then,’ he said. ‘At least this one has the advantage of surprise. No one will be expecting us to use this route, and when we get on the autostrada we just keep on it till we hit the French border.’

‘Uncle Pancrazio is a very powerful man,’ she told him. ‘And so is Luca. They have contacts everywhere, and they’re not going to stop until they find us.’

‘You think we should give up?’ Finn asked softly.

Cara clasped her hands together tightly. ‘I don’t know why you stepped in like that this afternoon,’ she began. ‘I don’t believe it was anything to do with your stupid book. But maybe you should just drop me off here and get away on your own. The risk is too great for you. I...I’ll go back to my family and apologise.’

‘And marry Luca,’ Finn added softly.

‘He probably won’t want me now,’ she said shakily. ‘Anyway, I can stand up for myself. Don’t bother about me.’

Finn screeched to a stop among the piled-up building materials on the road site. Cara put her hands out to stop herself from hitting the windscreen, then looked at him. ‘What did you do that for?’ she demanded.

Finn was glaring at her, and she sat up straight. ‘Well?’ she asked, trying hard and failing to stare him down.

‘If you think I went through all that this afternoon just so you could turn yourself into some sort of sacrificial virgin on my behalf,’ he snarled, ‘you better think again.’

‘It’s the only reasonable way out,’ she said furiously.

‘All this talk of escape to England is just so much hot air. There’s no way they’re not going to catch us.’

He stared hard at her. ‘Just tell me, once and for all,’ he said grimly. ‘Do you or do you not want to marry Luca?’

Cara moved her hands impatiently, pleadingly. ‘Of course I don’t want to marry him. I told you the truth. I just got led along by degrees until I found myself right on the edge of the chasm. But the price you’ll pay for pulling me back is too great.’

‘What do you think your family will do if they catch us?’ His voice was soft, almost conversational, as if he was discussing the outcome of a local election.

She looked at her lap. ‘I don’t know,’ she said dully.

He reached over and tipped her chin. ‘Cara, that’s the first time you’ve tried to lie to me, and you’re not very good at it. We both know that we’ve gone too far to back down. If you went back now, your life wouldn’t be worth living.’

‘At least I would be alive,’ she replied bitterly. ‘You have to get away. You’ve risked enough.’

A slow smile spread over his face as he looked at her.

‘What?’ she demanded. ‘What are you smiling at?’

‘You,’ he replied, putting the car into gear and beginning towards the distant ribbon of lights that marked the autostrada. ‘You’re a very brave woman, Cara, but I think I’ll take a rain check on your offer.’

‘It’s no use arguing with you, is it?’ she asked softly.

‘No,’ he replied. ‘Not this time. And do me a favour, will you?’

‘What?’ she asked.

He flicked her a glance. ‘Do up your damn seat belt before I have a nervous breakdown.’

It was almost fully dark, and there was no moon. Cara pulled off her tights and pulled on Finn’s shorts. They were impossibly big on her, but with luck the shirt would hide the bagginess. She glanced at Finn, tensing as he slowed down.

‘What’s the matter?’ she asked.

‘There are cars guarding the slip road,’ he said. ‘Your family is more thorough than I gave them credit for.’ He glanced at her and squeezed her hand. ‘But maybe we can still get through. Get in the back, on the floor.’

Without a word, she did as he said. Finn drove steadily towards Luca’s men. He wound down the window, and she held her breath. There were shouts and then Finn answered. ‘Would you believe it,’ he yelled in perfect Italian. ‘Three pairs of lovers on this stretch of Godforsaken road, and none of them were our birds. I’m going to take a turn on the autostrada, see if they’ve managed to escape the net.’

Cara lay on the floor behind his seat, her fists clenched, waiting for the angry shouts to come, the gunshots, willing Finn to accelerate, get the hell out of this crazy place. But he just kept going smoothly on.

‘It’s all right,’ he said at last, slipping into English as if it were the most natural way in the world to speak to her. ‘You can come out now.’

Warily she risked a quick look out the window. She could see nothing except the swift passing lights of cars. They were on the autostrada. Stiffly she got up and climbed into the front seat. ‘You have the luck of...’ She shrugged helplessly.

‘The Irish?’ he supplied, smiling into the darkness.

‘Of the devil!’ she retorted.

‘Why are you so cross?’ he asked mildly.

‘I am not cross!’ she snapped.

‘Of course not.’

There was silence, and she looked at the cars going by. For the moment, at least, she was free.

‘You could have got yourself killed back there,’ she said at last.

He shrugged. ‘Perhaps. But there are worse fates.’