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Shamed by her instant surrender, she looked at him, the pull of sexual awareness impossible to deny, and something tugged at the edges of her memory. Oh, no! She silently groaned. Earlier she had smiled and said, ‘Come on,’ but he had never let her finish. Did he really think she had asked him to make love to her? In the next half-hour she had her answer.
‘Wait while I dress and we will continue our business discussion over a drink.’ Solo’s cold, mocking eyes flicked over her tense body and to where her small hands curled into fists at her sides before he added. ‘A whisky should hit the spot. It does not look as if anything else is on offer, except maybe a slap on the face,’ and he had the gall to laugh at her gasp of outrage.
‘I’m going to have a shower. I’ll meet you downstairs.’ Penny spun on her heel and marched out of the room, blinking rapidly to keep the tears of anger and humiliation at bay, and silently cursing the arrogant devil under her breath as she headed for her bedroom and locked the door behind her.
Her anger lasted until she had a shower, and stepped from the tiny en suite back into the room she had slept in all her life. She glanced at the cuddly toys arranged on top of a chest of drawers, oddly at variance with the opposite side of the room where a long desk took up all one wall, with her computer in the middle, and shelves of books above.
Suddenly the catastrophic events of the past two days hit her like a punch in the stomach. Her body aching in places she’d never known was possible, she sat down on the narrow bed and stared around. Her home was no longer hers to keep. James would never know the idyllic childhood she had enjoyed, the timeless sense of belonging. She wrapped her arms around her middle and, doubled over, she finally let the tears fall. How long she sat silently sobbing she had no idea until a knock on the door made her hiccup.
She heard the handle turn, and was glad she had locked the door. Quickly she rubbed her wet cheeks with a shaking hand. The last thing she needed was for Solo to find her red-eyed from weeping and naked but for a towel in a bedroom. She shuddered—whether in fear or remembered pleasure, she refused to acknowledge.
‘If you are not downstairs in five minutes, I’ll break the door down.’
‘Yes, all right,’ she snapped back, the cold determination of his tone telling her he meant it. Rising to her feet, she dashed into the bathroom and splashed her face and eyes with cold water. Returning to the bedroom, she withdrew clean bra and briefs from a drawer and a fine blue sweater, and slipped them on.
Solo Maffeiano was right about one thing, she admitted with brutal realism. Sex aside, she did have to talk to him. She stepped into her jeans and eased them up her legs.
Crossing to the mirrored dressing table, she snapped the fastener at her waist, and took a minute to brush her hair back behind her ears. She didn’t appear any different, she thought in surprise. Without make-up and with her hair loose, she still looked like a teenager. It was the bane of her life, and why very few people took her seriously. Well, that was about to change as far as Solo Maffeiano was concerned…
Penny pushed her feet into a pair of mules, then opened the bedroom door, a light of steely determination in her green eyes. It lasted until she walked into the kitchen and found Solo leaning against the bench, two cups and saucers arranged before him, and waiting for the coffee to percolate.
‘I thought you wanted a drink,’ Penny said, refusing to admit she had been surprised to see the sophisticated, super-rich Solo doing something so mundane as preparing coffee, or that the sight of his long body dressed again in black trousers and the cream sweater had the power to make her heart miss a beat.
Shrugging one wide shoulder, Solo turned to face her. ‘I decided against alcohol. I want you to have a clear head for our discussion.’ His grey eyes met and held hers. ‘So there can be no mistakes, or cries of foul later,’ he informed her with a tinge of sarcasm colouring his tone.
‘As if I would,’ Penny denied hotly. How dared he imply she was less than honest?
One dark brow arched sardonically. ‘This from a girl who once spent an unforgettable few weeks with me years ago, and then declared it was a mistake.’
Unable to hold his gaze, and without a ready answer, Penny pulled out a chair and sat down at the pine table before raising her head and glancing back at him. ‘I can assure you our business dealings will be strictly legitimate.’
A cynical smile twisted his hard mouth. ‘We will see,’ he said enigmatically, and, turning his back on her, he filled two cups with coffee as she watched. ‘Black with one sugar?’
He had remembered, Penny thought, astonished. ‘Yes,’ she murmured, taking a deep breath to steady her nerves, and when Solo placed a cup and saucer on the table, and held out the other one to her, she managed to take it with a firm hand. Then she took a deep swallow of the reviving brew, and waited.
Penny watched Solo pick up his cup and drain it in one go before placing it back on the table, and could hardly believe that not so long ago she had been naked on a bed with the man. He was so firmly in control, whereas she felt like a nervous wreck.
He swung a kitchen chair next to hers around, and straddled it, his arms resting on the bowed-back. Involuntarily Penny’s green gaze dropped to where his legs were spread over the chair, the fabric of his trousers pulled taut across his muscular thighs, and felt a swift curl of heat in her belly.
‘Right, Penny. Haversham Park, and what is to be done with it,’ Solo said crisply.
Penny lifted her head, embarrassed at where her wayward thoughts were leading, and, fighting down the blush that threatened, she said equally crisply, ‘Firstly, to satisfy my curiosity. How did you acquire a share of my home? I still cannot get my head around the fact my father sold it to you without telling me.’
For years Solo had thought Penny must have been in on the deal he’d made with her father, a deceitful little gold-digger, but now he wasn’t so sure. Her dismay at finding she had lost half her home was obviously genuine. But then she had always been a consummate liar. She had led him to believe their marriage had been a foregone conclusion, when all the time she had been waiting for her boyfriend to return. But it left him with the tricky question of what to tell her. The truth wasn’t an option; he had no intention of appearing a bigger fool over Penny than he already had.
That last Saturday four years ago, he had formally asked her father’s permission to marry her, and had told Julian obviously he had no intention of developing the land around what was his future wife’s family home. Julian was disappointed, and hinted he needed money. So as a form of compensation, or, to put it more cynically, the price of his bride, Solo had parted with a large amount of cash and Julian had insisted Solo take a half-share in the house in return.
Solo had had to leave in a hurry, and so he’d been delayed in asking Penny to marry him. When he had returned six days later, he’d been glad he had. Penny had not been around, but Solo had signed the deed with her father while waiting for her.
Then, with Veronica’s information that Penny had been at the vicarage with her friend Jane, he had gone looking for her and found her with Simon. Fury did not begun to cover how he had felt at the time. Rejected and robbed in one week was not something he had ever contemplated happening to him. But it had reinforced the belief he had developed in his youth that women were not to be trusted, with his mother and grandmother as prime examples.
Remembering the fiasco now made his teeth clench. For once in his life he had let his guard down and as far as Solo was concerned the whole damn family had taken advantage of the fact to con money out of him. A half share in a house they had no intention of leaving or selling was of no use to Solo. He had been well and truly tricked.
‘Well?’ Penny said, the long silence praying on her already-taut nerves.
His eyes flickered, the pupils hard and black, dilating with what looked like anger. For a moment he stared at her, and then suddenly he smiled, his expression bland.
‘As you know I bought some acreage from your father with a view to developing it. Your father was quite happy with the price I paid, but he had a very expensive wife in Veronica.’
‘Tell me about it,’ Penny muttered dryly.
One dark brow elevated sardonically. ‘Yes, exactly. Anyway, I had a feasibility study taken on the profitability of the project, and it wasn’t viable. Your father was disappointed, because he needed more money. Veronica had very expensive taste, though not particularly good, judging by what she has done to the house.
‘Knowing Veronica, I felt some sympathy for your father when he approached me and offered me a half-share of the house as collateral for a rather large sum of cash for an alternative investment he had in mind. I agreed because I felt a little guilty that we were not going ahead with the original project.’
‘How very altruistic of you.’ Penny said scathingly. ‘But that does not explain why he never told me.’
‘He was a proud man, maybe he was hoping to invest and make a profit.’ Solo shrugged his broad shoulders indifferently. ‘Perhaps he was hoping to remedy the situation before anyone knew. But I am sure he would have told you eventually. Even you must admit he couldn’t possibly have expected to die so soon.’
That was true enough, Penny thought sadly. Veronica and her father had spent every summer in the south of France, while Penny had stayed home and looked after James. Veronica had always flashed the photographs around to all and sundry of the villa and yacht they’d leased.
‘You’re probably right.’ There was a connection tugging at the edge of her brain, something that she was missing. But with a sigh she gave up. There was no sense in dwelling on what she could not change. ‘So you buy me out or we sell,’ she said flatly, getting back to the point of the talk.
‘No,’ Solo’s steel-grey eyes met hers. ‘There is another choice. In your case it’s the only choice.’
‘That sounds ominous,’ she said, trying for a lightness she did not feel. ‘In fact it could almost be construed as a threat.’
‘Not a threat, a promise. I promise to restore Haversham Park, and pay all your debts, plus your expenses, and you and James can stay here. In return…’
For a split second hope sprung in her heart. ‘You turn most of it into a hotel and leave us with an apartment or something,’ she finished for him, thinking with relief that it was an incredibly generous offer.
‘Not quite.’ Hard eyes stared down at her. ‘It stays a private home, you will still run the place, but we share it.’
‘Share!’ she exclaimed, jumping to her feet. An unpaid housekeeper was what he meant, and Penny could imagine nothing worse than sharing a house with Solo, having to see him parade his girlfriends in front of her. ‘No way.’ She could not bear the idea and she did not question why.
Rising to his full height, Solo let his strong hands fall on her shoulders; she tried to shrug him off, but his hold tightened.
‘So impulsive,’ he opined hardly. ‘But allow me to finish. We get married and you stay here but as my wife for as long as I want you.’
‘Your wife?’ She almost choked.
‘Yes,’ Solo said flatly. ‘Then when we part the place is yours free and clear.’
Her stunned gaze lifted up to his. He had to be joking… His grey eyes stared back cold and implacable, and there was a ruthlessness about his hard, handsome features that told her he was not. The colour drained from her face; she could hardly breathe. Solo was a man who always got what he wanted—she should have remembered that.
A hollow laugh escaped her. Well, he’d already had her, to put it crudely; what had she got to lose? ‘Why?’ Penny demanded stonily. ‘What earthly benefit will it be to you?’
‘What do you think? After what we did earlier, how can you ask that?’ Solo looked at her, his smile filled with arrogant amusement. ‘Or perhaps like most females you are fishing for compliments.’ He shrugged slightly, his powerful shoulders lifting beneath the fine cashmere of his sweater, his handsome face expressionless.
‘I don’t mind humouring you. You were exquisite at eighteen, and the years in between have been very good to you. You have matured into a stunningly beautiful woman.’ Blatantly he let his eyes drop to her high, full breasts clearly outlined by her blue sweater. ‘My hobby is collecting perfect works of art, and to my utter astonishment I discovered you were one of that rare breed of woman, pure in body, if not mind.’ he inserted cynically. ‘I intended to be your lover four years ago, but you denied me, and I don’t take denial easily. I figured you owed me, and today I collected,’ he declared dangerously, and Penny erupted into angry speech.
‘I owe you. You have some gall. I don’t know how you did it but you have already stolen my home—what more can you want?’
‘You,’ he told her inexorably, his fingers biting into her shoulders. ‘I was surprised to realise I was your first lover, so naturally I intend to hang onto you for as long as I want you.’ His eyes glittered with ruthless disregard and Penny could not believe the colossal arrogance of the man.
She tilted her head back, a light of battle in her gaze. ‘That is the most disgusting, chauvinistic statement I have ever heard. You can’t own a woman like an object,’ she flared back.
‘I don’t want to own you for ever. A temporary wife was what I had in mind,’ Solo said mockingly, and she shrugged in an attempt to dislodge his restraining hands.
Penny shook her head. ‘This is surreal. I don’t believe I am having this conversation.’
Slowly his eyes drifted over her and her skin heated where his eyes touched. His mouth twisted in a menacing smile. ‘Believe it, cara,’ he commanded just before his mouth settled with deadly accuracy over hers.
CHAPTER FOUR
WHO said lightning could not strike twice? Penny thought inconsequentially as Solo pulled her hard against him, and, from ravishing her mouth, he moved to the soft curve of her ear. Already she could feel the swift flush of heat that signalled her instant arousal, but, now she knew what he could do to her, her body’s anticipation was a hundred times more intense. She turned her head to try and escape, but his mouth hungrily followed the elegant curve of her throat, his hands sliding up under her jumper and the wisp of lace that covered her breasts. She moaned as his long fingers expertly teased the hard bud of her nipples, an unbearable spasm of excitement lancing from her breast to the apex of her thighs.
‘Why fight it?’ Solo demanded with sibilant softness. ‘The choice is yours.’ Slowly he moved his large hands down to span her narrow waist, his eyes locked onto her dazed green. ‘Marry me, or I keep my share in the house. It will make a nice country base when I visit my London office.’ Solo living in her home! Penny’s mind boggled as he continued, ‘And I would prevent you from selling until you go bankrupt and I snap up your share for peanuts. I don’t mind either way, your choice.’
She gazed up into his hard face, saw the icy determination in his cold eyes. ‘You actually mean it,’ she said after what seemed like a lifetime had slipped by. In a way it had, she thought—her life, if she agreed to his outrageous suggestion. ‘But what about love in a marriage?’ She had to ask; was he really so unfeeling?
‘Love is a lie, simply another word for lust believe me. But I never lie about sex.’
‘Sex.’ Penny looked at him with angry eyes. He couldn’t have made it clearer he didn’t believe in love. ‘That is all this is about for you. Never mind this is my home, and my brother’s—my life.’ Fury mingled with an aching sense of loss.
‘And possibly a baby, unless you happen to be on the pill,’ Solo cut in bluntly.
‘Oh, my God!’ Penny exclaimed, the colour leeching out of her face. She had had unprotected sex. ‘You—you—bastard,’ she said, hitting out at his chest. ‘Where was your common sense, your condoms?’ she cried. A man like Solo should carry a permanent supply. ‘How the hell do I know where you have been? You could have sentenced me to death.’
A violent change came over his features. He grasped her flailing hands in one of his and his other arm tightened around her waist. ‘Stop right there.’
His eyes narrowed, a thin white line circled his tight lips, and a muscle in his jaw beat against his bronzed skin. She wasn’t quite sure what had happened, she only knew he terrified her.
‘I am not such a bastard as to put a woman’s life at risk.’ Solo was furious, because Penny was right, he should have used protection, he always had before. Only this woman staring up at him with her huge green eyes had the power to make him forget, and he bitterly resented the fact.
‘So you say.’ She swallowed hard. ‘But…’
‘But nothing.’ His eyes glittered with cruelty. ‘I have the medical proof. But you were never the shrinking violet; quite a tease, as I recall. You might have hung onto your virginity, but there are other forms of sex equally as dangerous.’
Penny stared at him in disbelief. ‘You think… I…’ She was lost for words.
‘Not so nice when the shoe is on the foot.’ Solo mangled the English saying.
‘The other foot,’ she corrected unthinkingly.
‘Whatever.’ His voice hardened. ‘But we are straying from the point. You agree to marry me and you get the house. Obviously there will be a pre-nuptial. But any child I keep.’
She stared at him. His expression was unreadable, his jaw hard, his eyes steely grey. He meant every word. He let go of her hands, and they fell limply to her sides. Fear made her knees weak, and she was grateful for his supporting arm, but she knew better than to let him realise it. She lowered her eyes to fix blindly on his chest. If he sensed the slightest weakness, he would take advantage of it. She didn’t know how, but he was that kind of man, a predator, and she was his prey, and he had caught her.
Penny thought of James, and any child she might have. It was a real possibility—it was the middle of her cycle, and, the way her luck had been running lately, almost inevitable. Glancing up through the thick fringe of her lashes, she could not deny Solo was a devilishly attractive, virile man.
Once she had loved him with all her heart, and she felt moisture glaze her eyes, and she blinked it away. Now she was numb with pain, hating him for what he was making her do.
‘I’ll be your lover,’ she offered, her voice shaking, and she kept her eyes lowered. She couldn’t marry him, not without love.
‘No, I can get a lover anywhere, but you may be pregnant. It is marriage or bankruptcy.' His free hand curved around the nape of her neck, and he tilted her head back, forcing her to meet his gaze. ‘Yes or no?’
There was no choice. Even if she could persuade him to accept her offer of lovers, what would she tell James? Plus if there was a child, she would rather be married, and if they ever divorced there would be more financial support for any children.
‘Yes, all right. I will marry you.’
‘A very wise choice, Penny.’ His silver eyes flared with what looked like triumph into hers. ‘I knew you would see sense,’ he concluded with arrogant self-assurance.
It was the arrogance that did it. From feeling like crying, Penny felt like screaming, anger bubbling up inside, and in that instant Penny changed her mind. His dark head bent, he was going to kiss her, but she placed a small hand on his chest. ‘No, wait a minute, I’ve changed my mind.’
She cried out as his hand tightened on her neck. Contempt raw and violent blazed in his pale eyes. ‘Already you are back to playing games.’ Hauling her against him, he added, ‘But no more, Penny.’
‘No, you don’t understand.’ The colour surged in her cheeks. ‘I want to marry you.’ She looked defiantly into his eyes. ‘But if there is a baby it has to be brought up and educated in England, here at Haversham Park with me.’
Something flickered in his eyes, and his heavy lids fell, masking his expression. ‘I accept, Penelope,’ he said, his deep voice not quite steady.
For a second Penny wondered if he was laughing at her, and if she had just made the biggest mistake of her life, then he kissed her, and it wasn’t in the least amusing. He was taking her mouth with a hungry, raw possession, and she didn’t care, because if he had been gentle with her she thought she would have cried, unable to stand the pretence. This way it was simply sex…
‘Penny,’ he groaned her name, his lips softening, gentling on hers.
Maybe not so simple as she was transported back in time to the first time they’d met, in this same kitchen, to their first kiss. She placed her hands on his broad chest, and responded with the same helpless longing.
She whimpered as he slipped his hands under her sweater and she felt his fingers hot on her naked flesh. She looped her arms around his neck. His mighty chest heaved, and then he took her hands from his nape.
‘Not yet,’ Solo said softly. ‘I have too much to arrange.’
All Penny wanted to do was arrange his gorgeous body naked on the kitchen table and, with a guilty flush of colour at her erotic thoughts, she stepped back, avoiding his gaze.
‘You said James was on holiday.’ He reached out and cupped her face between his palms. ‘When is he due back?’ he demanded, staring down into her beautiful face.
‘Eight days or so,’ she murmured.
‘That should be fine—and Brownie?’
‘It’s her bingo night. I drive down to the village and collect her about ten. Why the sudden interest?’ she asked.
He looked into her eyes and smiled. ‘Because you and I are going to Italy in the morning. With James away and Brownie here to look after the house, it is perfect timing. So pack a bag, and then let’s have something to eat. I’m starving.’
‘Italy! I can’t go to Italy.’
Solo placed a kiss on her brow and set her free. ‘You can and you will, but for now do as I say. I need the laptop from my car, and I’ll use the study.’ Slanting her an almost boyish grin, he left her standing in the middle of the kitchen totally confused…
Penny sliced carrots and wished she were slicing Solo’s neck. What had she done? What did she actually know about the man she had agreed to marry other than she hated him? Solo was a very private man. The first time they were together all she had known about him was that he was a wealthy businessman, and he lived in Italy. She had asked about his family, and he’d told her he was an only child and his parents were long gone, and he had no relatives. Her young heart had filled with compassion and she had kissed him, thinking how awful to be so alone in the world. Now she wasn’t so sure, if it weren’t for James she wouldn’t be in this mess…
