Interview with a Playboy

Their eyes met again, and she looked even more self-conscious.

Was it an act or not? There was something very alluring about that mix of wide-eyed innocence and hostile attitude. As if she could give as good as she could get—a wary kitten that might purr most agreeably if handled correctly.

As soon as the thought crossed his mind it irritated him! She was a member of the press—and there was nothing vulnerable about a journalist who was hungry for a story, he reminded himself firmly.

‘Don’t worry, Izzy, I won’t allow us to get too far off track,’ he grated mockingly.

The pilot’s voice interrupted them, to say they were starting their final descent and would be touching down in precisely fifteen minutes.

Isobel watched as Marco reached to pick up the rest of the papers he’d been working on earlier.

When his eyes had slipped down over her body she’d felt so hot inside that she could hardly breathe. And she felt foolish now…foolish for imagining for one moment that he was flirting with her.

In reality he was probably laughing at her. The little plain mouse who melted when he smiled at her.

The thought made her burn with embarrassment—because she had melted.

Acknowledging that fact even for a moment made her feel very ill at ease, and angrily she tried to dismiss it.

She was here to get a story, and she was totally focused.

As Marco put his work away into his briefcase the plane hit an air pocket, and a few sheets from a report slid across the polished surface of the table and fell onto the floor at her feet.

She bent to pick them up for him, and couldn’t resist glancing at the pages as she did. Unfortunately they were all in Italian, but she managed to catch the printed heading: ‘Porzione’.

She looked over at Marco as she handed it back to him. ‘What is that?’

‘Nothing that needs to concern you,’ he said, tucking it safely away into his briefcase.

Which almost certainly meant it would concern her, she thought sardonically. It was probably some poor unfortunate company that he was about to gobble up and spit out.

‘Don’t forget to fasten your safety belt,’ he said as he settled back into his seat.

‘No, I won’t. Thanks.’ She buckled up, and then glanced away from him out of the window.

Sitting opposite him like this was completely unnerving; there was just something about him that put all of her sensory nerve-endings on high alert.

Porzione—she tried to focus on practicalities, telling herself that she should remember the name and look it up on the internet later. OK, she wasn’t supposed to write about his business dealings, but that didn’t stop her doing a little research and maybe adding a line here and there about his ruthless takeover deals.

She tried to focus on that, and on the bright blue of the sky, on the sound of the engines as the powerful jet geared up for landing—on anything except that moment of attraction she had felt for Marco a little while ago.

It was her imagination, she told herself fiercely. She would never fall under the spell of a man who was a known heartbreaker. And she didn’t buy all that stuff that people spouted about desire overruling common sense. Maybe that happened to other people, but it wasn’t going to happen to her. She was far too practical for that; she always weighed everything up logically. Probably because she’d seen from her own childhood just what could happen if you fell for the wrong man.

Isobel’s mother had never really recovered from her divorce. She’d suffered from depression for a long time afterwards, with Isobel taking on the role of carer at some points. Once in a weak moment she’d even confessed to Isobel that she was still in love with her ex-husband.

How could you love someone who had treated you so badly? That confession had shocked Isobel beyond words. And she had always vowed that she would never allow a man to get her into that state, and that she would always be in control of her emotions.

She had pretty much kept to that vow. As a student at university she’d had a few boyfriends, but she’d always kept them at a distance—never allowing anyone to get too close and never getting into the whole casual sex scene. Instead she had thrown herself into her work. Coming from a single parent family, money had been tight. She’d had just one shot at getting her degree, and she’d been determined not to mess it up by getting sidetracked by a man.

After graduating she’d met Rob, and even though she’d liked him straight away she’d still kept her heart in reserve. Building her career had seemed more important. The thing about Rob was that he had seemed so safe and uncomplicated. He’d stayed around in the background, and little by little he had worked his way into her life. He’d gently told her that he didn’t mind waiting until she was ready to make love, and that he respected her and admired her. He had even said that he held the same moral codes as her. That he knew all about heartbreak as his mother had walked out on him when he was young.

She’d felt sympathy for him when he told her that. And she’d started to trust him. Looking back, she supposed he’d become almost like a best friend. When he’d kissed her there had been no explosions of passion, but he’d made her laugh and he’d made her feel safe. And when he’d proposed to her it had seemed like the most natural thing in the world to say yes.

But Rob hadn’t been the safe, reliable guy she had believed him to be. All those things he’d told her about fidelity being important had been lies. And when she’d caught him in his lies he had turned nasty—had told her that she’d driven him to it, that she was frigid.

Just thinking about it now brought a fresh dart of pain. It only went to show that no matter how careful you were there were no guarantees against heartache.

She closed her eyes for a few moments. At least she had found out her mistake before she had married him.

They were slowly starting to lose altitude, and the plane was juddering as currents of air hit it.

She’d been right all along: the best thing was to concentrate on a career, on being independent.

She opened her eyes and to her consternation found herself looking directly into Marco’s dark, steady gaze. Immediately she felt the tug of some unfamiliar emotion twisting and turning deep inside her.

What was that? she wondered angrily. Because it wasn’t desire. Even if he did have the sexiest eyes of any man she had ever met.

Hastily she looked away from him. Thoughts like that did not help this situation, she told herself angrily.

They were going through light, swirling clouds now. Then suddenly she could see the vivid sparkle of the Mediterranean beneath her, and ahead the shadowy outlines of the coast.

There were mountains rising sharply, and large swathes of forest.

Lower and lower they came, the engines whining softly, until Isobel thought that they might land in the sea. But just as she was starting to panic they skimmed in over a white beach and she saw a runway ahead.

A few minutes later they had touched down smoothly. And with a roar of the brakes they taxied to a halt.

‘We are a bit early, but there should be a car outside to pick us up in five minutes,’ Marco said casually as he unfastened his seat belt and stood up.

Isobel also got to her feet, and then wished she hadn’t as she suddenly found herself too close to him in the confined space.

As he reached for his briefcase she sidestepped him so that she could open the overhead compartment and get her bag.

‘Wait—I’ll do that for you,’ he offered, glancing around.

‘No need. I’ve got it.’ Hurriedly she opened the compartment, but the next moment a case slid out smacking into her shoulder.

‘Are you OK?’ Marco caught it before it could do any further damage, and swung it to the floor.

‘Yes…’ She grimaced and put a hand to her shoulder. ‘I think so.’

‘Let me look at you.’ To her consternation, Marco put a hand on her arm and turned her to face him.

‘No, really—I’m fine!’ It was the weirdest thing, but the touch of his hand against her other arm made it throb more violently than her shoulder.

‘It’s torn your blouse.’ Marco said as he looked at her. ‘And you’re bleeding.’

She glanced down and saw that he was right; there was a small crimson stain on the pristine white of her linen blouse. ‘It’s OK—it’s only a scratch. I’ll be fine.’

‘It seems to be a bit more than a scratch. Do you want me to look at it for you?’

The mere suggestion was enough to make her temperature shoot through the roof of the plane. ‘I most certainly do not!’

Her prim refusal amused him somewhat. ‘Izzy, the cut is just fractionally below your collarbone. You will only have to unfasten the top three buttons of your blouse—it’s hardly a striptease.’

The words made her skin flare with heat. ‘It’s fine… Really… I…’

He completely ignored her. ‘Michelle, will you bring the first aid kit, please?’ he called over his shoulder to the woman who had served them their drinks. Immediately she disappeared down to the bottom of the plane to comply. ‘Now, let’s have a look.’ He turned his attention firmly back to her.

‘Marco, I said I was fine—’ She froze as he reached for the top button on her blouse and started to undo it.

Her heart was beating so loudly now that she felt it was filling the whole aircraft.

‘Marco, I can do it myself!’

‘At least you don’t have any difficulty saying my name any more.’ His dark eyes locked with hers and his lips twisted into a lazily attractive smile. For a panic-stricken moment she thought he was going to move on to the next button, but thankfully he didn’t. He dropped his hands. ‘Go ahead, then… You unfasten the buttons.’

‘I’ll do it later.’

‘It’s two little buttons, Izzy… Are you scared of me?’ His eyebrow rose mockingly.

‘No! Why would I be scared of you?’ Angrily she reached up to comply—she was damned if she was going to let him think she was scared of him!

He noticed that her hands were trembling. He’d never had this effect on a woman before. He frowned as he saw the shadows in her eyes as she looked up at him… What was she so scared of? he wondered curiously.

‘There! Happy?’ She glared at him.

‘I wouldn’t go that far.’ He said the words derisively, and noticed how she blushed even more, but this time she looked more humiliated than shy. He frowned and wished for some reason that he hadn’t said that.

OK, she was a bit of a Plain Jane, and nowhere in the league of the women he usually dated, but there was also something…interesting about her.

Curiously he reached out and lightly stroked his hand over her collarbone, pushing the blouse back further until he could see the wound.

She wasn’t prepared for the touch of his fingers against her skin; it sent a dart of sensual pleasure racing through her unlike anything she had ever experienced before. Horrified by her reaction to him, she could only stare up at him in consternation.

In the stillness of the cabin it was almost as if time stood still.

Marco smiled as he saw the flare of desire deep in the depths of her green eyes. Now he knew why she looked so scared…she definitely wasn’t as immune to him as she’d been pretending all afternoon. That amused him…and for some strange reason even pleased him.

He noticed how she moistened her lips nervously, could see her breathing quickening by the rise and fall of her chest.

He wondered how it would feel to kiss her…

As soon as the thought crossed his mind he dismissed it. She was a journalist, for heaven’s sake…one of a breed he despised! They were hard-bitten, uncaring, trouble-stirring… He could go on for ever listing the reasons he hated the press.

His gaze moved away from her lips and back to the cut on her collarbone. ‘It’s not deep—so that’s good.’

The stewardess arrived with the first aid box and handed it over to him.

‘Thanks, Michelle. Are the steps down yet?’

‘Yes, sir. We are ready to disembark.’

Marco found a tube of antiseptic cream and some cotton wool and handed it over to Isobel. ‘That should fix you up until you get to the house.’

‘Thanks.’ Isobel was still trying to pull herself together.

What on earth had just happened? she wondered anxiously. Her heart was pounding as if she had run a long-distance marathon, and she felt shaky and hot inside.

And the worst thing was that feeling of pleasure that had blazed inside her just from the lightest brush of his fingertips. That had never happened to her before with anyone. And the fact that it had happened so easily, with such a casual touch, with Marco was horrifying.

That had to be in her imagination…

Numbly Isobel followed Marco from the plane. They seemed to be in the depths of the countryside. There was a vineyard to her left, and the regimented rows of vines stretched up as far as the purple haze of the mountains. Straight ahead of them there was an aircraft hangar, which was the only building in the vicinity.

Heat shimmered in a misty, watery illusion—like a stream running across the Tarmac.

That heat haze was like her attraction to Marco, Isobel told herself firmly. It looked real, but it was just an illusion—nonexistent. Just because you thought you could see something it didn’t mean it was really there.

She glanced over towards him. He was holding the jacket of his suit casually over one shoulder, and he looked extremely relaxed—every inch the Mediterranean millionaire, completely at home amidst the rugged terrain. She would have liked to describe him as pretentious, with his company jet behind him and his staff bringing the luggage out for him, but in all honesty he looked too casually indifferent for that.

She remembered the gentle touch of his fingers against her skin, remembered the heat in his eyes, and her stomach flipped.

What the hell was the matter with her? Hastily she looked away again. He was Marco Lombardi, one of the most notorious womanisers on the planet, and she couldn’t afford to forget that even for a minute.

There was a car approaching. She could hear the low, throaty murmur before she saw it, and then a limousine pulled up from around the side of the aircraft hangar and a chauffeur jumped out to open the passenger doors for them.

CHAPTER FOUR

THE road from the airstrip out to Marco’s villa was a narrow, winding path that seemed to hug the side of the mountain, and every now and then as they rounded a corner there were sheer perpendicular drops down towards the Mediterranean. It was so spectacular that Isobel found herself holding tight to the edge of the seat as vertigo started to set in.

She didn’t know what was more nerve-racking—the drive, or the fact that as they rounded corners her body seemed to keep sliding against Marco’s. She wished she’d sat opposite to him now, but he’d advised against it, saying that she would see the view better facing forward and also that it helped to ward off any feelings of travel sickness.

Isobel didn’t usually get travel sick, but she had to admit that these roads would test the strongest constitution.

‘You were right about the coastline being dramatic,’ she said as they rounded another corner and she took in an even more amazing view. They were winding their way downwards now, and she could see glimpses of golden beaches and villas tucked away behind lush tropical greenery.

‘Yes, it’s a lovely part of the world.’ He flicked a glance over at her, noticing with amusement how she was desperately trying not to allow her body to fall against his as the car rounded a particularly narrow bend. For a moment his gaze moved lower. She’d left the top buttons of her blouse unfastened and had folded the collar over—probably so that it hid the stain and the tear in the material. But the small change made all the difference to her appearance; her curves were shown to better advantage and she looked less staid…almost sexy.

His phone rang, and impatiently he reached to answer it. He really had more important things to think about than a pesky reporter.

Marco was speaking in French, Isobel realised distractedly, and he was completely fluent, by the sounds of it. ‘How many languages do you speak?’ she asked him as soon as he had ended the call.

‘Five. It helps in business.’

‘Really? Wow!’ She couldn’t help but be impressed. ‘I wish I could speak a second language, never mind a fifth! I did French for years at school, but I still struggle to have a conversation in it.’

‘You’ll have to practise while you are here,’ he said with a shrug. ‘It’s just a matter of usage. When you have to speak it every day it starts to get easier.’

The limousine turned off the road, and Isobel tried to turn her attention away from him and back to what was happening. But it was hard. Because—she hated to admit it—she found him quite fascinating.

Electric gates folded back, allowing them to enter, and they drove along a wide sweeping driveway lined with giant palm trees. The gardens were very well tended. It was probably a full-time job for a team of gardeners, she thought as she looked out at the tropical shrubs and flowers blazing amidst lawns as smooth as a bowling green. They rounded a corner and suddenly a huge sprawling white mansion opened up before them.

It was built on two levels, and encircled by open verandas that looked out over an Olympic-size infinity pool, its blue waters seeming to merge perfectly with the colour of the Mediterranean.

‘Nice house,’ Isobel remarked. ‘Are you sure it’s big enough for you?’

Amusement glinted in the darkness of his eyes. ‘You know, now you come to mention it, I suppose it is a bit on the small side.’

They pulled to a halt by the front door, and she reached for the door handle and got out before the chauffeur could come around to open it for her.

The heat of the late afternoon was heavy and silent; the only sound was the swish of waves against the shore beneath them. Isobel turned her head and saw a path leading down to a private beach. She also noticed the oceangoing yacht moored at the end of a long jetty.

‘Is that another of your toys?’ she asked Marco as he stepped out from the vehicle behind her.

He followed her gaze down towards the sea. ‘It’s a working toy. I use her for business, but also for pleasure. Sometimes it’s good to unwind out at sea, away from everything and everyone.’

For a moment as she looked up at him she thought she saw a glimpse of sadness in the darkness of his eyes, as if at times he needed the solace of being alone out at sea. Then he turned and smiled at her, and she realised that the idea was ludicrous. Marco, international jet-set playboy, would never need solace! What was she thinking?

‘Come on—I’ll show you up to your room.’ He turned away from her and led her into the house.

The entrance hall was palatial; it had a huge, sweeping circular staircase, and vast windows that towered above her like the windows of a cathedral. It was all very modern and new in design. ‘How long have you lived here?’ she asked curiously as she followed him upstairs.

‘About two years now.’

‘So you bought the house just after your divorce?’ She was finding it difficult to keep up with him because he was striding along the corridor at quite a pace.

‘Around that time, yes.’ He opened a door and then waited for her to catch up with him, so that she could precede him into the room.

Her eyes widened. It was decorated in shades of cream and turquoise, and was probably the largest and most luxurious bedroom she had ever been in. The bed alone looked as if it would sleep about twelve people, and there was a walk-in closet that was as big as her entire bedroom at home. The skirt, jeans and the few tops that she’d brought with her were going to look very lonely in there, she thought wryly.

‘If this is supposed to be the spare bedroom, the master bedroom must be awesome,’ she said as she glanced out of the folding glass doors at the veranda and the spectacular view of the sea.

‘Come and have a look, if you want,’ he invited. ‘I’m right next door.’

She looked over and caught the gleam of mischief in the darkness of his eyes. She found herself blushing. ‘Eh…no, thanks. I think my article can do without that particular piece of information.’

‘Well, don’t say I didn’t offer.’ He laughed. ‘OK, I’ll leave you to settle in and I’ll see you downstairs for dinner in shall we say…?’ He glanced at his watch. ‘About an hour?’

‘Yes…an hour is fine by me.’ Isobel tried to sound confidently upbeat about the prospect of dining with him but her nerves were jangling. She really didn’t want to have dinner with him, in fact she’d rather have hidden away from him up here until morning—but that was ridiculous. She had to spend time with him in order to get to know him and gather all the information she needed for her article. What on earth was wrong with her? It was just work, she reminded herself sternly.

As Marco left the room the chauffeur brought her suitcase in. Then she was left alone.

For a while she wandered around, investigating her surroundings. The en suite bathroom was completely mirrored, and it had a Jacuzzi hot tub positioned so that you could lie and look out on the veranda and the view of the sea. Maybe she’d do that later. Her shoulder was still a little sore, so it might help. But for the time being she decided to make do with bathing the wound and putting on some more antiseptic. As she pulled her blouse back to examine the damage in the mirror, the memory of Marco’s hand touching her skin suddenly flared from nowhere. Hurriedly she blanked the memory out. Why did she keep thinking about that?

What she should be concentrating on was her article.

Deciding to busy herself before dinner, she got her pen and notebook and went to sit outside on the veranda.

It was about six in the evening, but the day was still warm and a delicious little breeze rustled through the palm trees. For a while she just sat there admiring the view, thinking back over the day.

Let’s see, what do I already know about Marco? she mused. Apart from the fact that he’s a ruthless wheeler-dealer.

On impulse, she took out her phone and decided to look on the internet for the name of the company that she had seen on his papers today. What was it…? Porzione…

She typed the name into a search engine and waited, but there was nothing except a charity for disabled children. She glanced at it brief ly. It also supported families with premature babies, and did some very good work counselling couples dealing with the death of a child, but it was clearly nothing to do with Marco. Maybe she’d spelt it wrong. She was about to close the box, but before she did so something made her type Marco’s name into the mix.

Immediately his name flashed up on screen as the founder and director of Porzione, and she sat back in her chair. Why would Marco have founded a children’s charity?

Curiously she typed in Marco’s name followed by just the word charity, to see what else came up. To her surprise his name was associated with a very long list of charitable organisations.

Strange how that was never mentioned in the media—but then judging by the way she’d had to search for his name it seemed he liked to keep a low profile. And of course, stories about charities probably didn’t sell as well as stories about his love-life.

A curl of guilt stirred inside her. Why hadn’t she discovered this before? She drummed her fingers against the arm of the chair as she thought about her findings. A lot of big businessmen donated to charity, she told herself sensibly. And just because Marco donated money to good causes it didn’t make him a good person. It was probably some kind of tax dodge, anyway.

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