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‘Marriage to Nassif will unite our countries, just as they should have been five years ago, if you’d married Alif.’ Her father sat once again behind his desk, the formidable ruler he’d become slipping back into place. The glimpse of the father she’d known long ago, gone. Or was it just her wishful thinking? She’d foolishly been hoping her father would be pleased to see her after five years. How wrong could she be?
Kaliana’s knees weakened and she wished she could slump to the floor as past hurt, past pain and heartache collided with the panic of what her father had planned. What he expected her to do without question. ‘But Nassif is so much older than me.’
‘That is true,’ he said slowly, his response to her objection so obviously rehearsed. ‘Now that his wife has passed away, he wants to make you his wife.’
Kaliana backed away, needing the roar of panic in her head to stop, needing the wild spinning of her mind to cease. ‘No. I will not marry him.’
Sweat prickled on her forehead. Nausea rose and the need to turn and run became almost irresistible. But she couldn’t run. Somewhere deep inside her, the duty her mother had implanted so innocuously into her from a young age resurfaced. Took over.
She wanted to run. But she couldn’t. She had a duty to do. Duty to her family. Her kingdom.
Deep down, she’d always known her father had allowed her time away, allowed her time to heal the pain of her broken heart. But now that reprieve was over. It was time for her to do the right thing. Do the duty she’d been born to.
But marriage to Nassif? She shivered with sickening revulsion. Marriage to anyone would be bad enough, but to her late fiancé’s vile uncle? Unthinkable.
Her father watched her without saying anything. He didn’t even flinch when, with a great shuddering breath that could lead to tears if she let it, she looked at him. Imploring him to understand. Imploring him to tell her he’d find someone else.
Someone else. The words wandered around her mind like mist on an autumn morning in London, shrouding all other thoughts. What if she did marry someone else?
Spurred on by the idea, the desperate thought that this was the solution, she moved back towards him. ‘I can’t marry Nassif, Father.’
‘Ardu Safra is facing financial ruin. Whilst you have been in London things have become very bad here.’
‘Why didn’t you tell me?’
‘It is for me to deal with. I was counting on your marriage to Alif to make things right.’ The sharpness of his words only just hid his panic, the seriousness of the situation.
‘There were problems even then?’ she asked, saddened to think she’d been happy and free in London, while her mother and father had carried this burden.
‘Yes. And now I must ask that you make a marriage with Nassif.’ His voice had hardened. Was that to hide his shame that things had got so bad in the country he ruled? Guilt raced through her, forming a potent cocktail, mixing with her fear. A cocktail that made her almost physically sick.
‘Father, no. Not Nassif.’
‘He is a very wealthy man.’ Her father looked at her, no longer the strong ruler but a man who looked broken and defeated. A man who was depending on her. Her heart wrenched. ‘And he is willing to invest in Ardu Safra.’
She shook her head in protest, but the straight line of her father’s mouth warned her it was in vain.
‘Your marriage will bring the finances you should have brought with your marriage five years ago.’ She knew that gritty determination in his voice. He would get what he wanted. One way or another. And he wanted to save Ardu Safra by marrying her off to a wealthy man.
But did that man have to be Nassif?
A solution barged into her mind, making any further words almost impossible. Her heart thudded loudly. Dare she risk telling him? Risk his anger? And, worst of all, his disapproval of her. ‘No. I can’t do it.’
‘Imagine the shame your mother will face.’ He believed he held the ace cards, but she wouldn’t allow him to emotionally blackmail her. He wouldn’t use the close relationship she and her mother had always shared. He wouldn’t do that to her any more.
‘This isn’t about Mother,’ she said flatly, glaring at him, that wilful streak of hers beginning to take over as the solution to her problem grew in possibility. Like the sun as it rose over the mountains of the desert. Becoming bigger and stronger with each passing minute.
‘And the people of Ardu Safra? Will you stand by and allow them to wallow in poverty and hunger because you won’t do your duty? Because you won’t make a marriage to bring wealth back to our kingdom?’
Damn it, he did hold the ace cards. All of them. And he played them well. Too well.
‘Don’t, Father,’ she snapped.
‘How will your charities view you when they know who you really are? That you turned your back on the country of your birth? Its people?’ He stood once more, realising she was retreating, on the verge of accepting defeat. His threat to reveal her true identity, even though he’d helped her keep it secret, all he needed to use.
‘That’s not fair.’ How had she thought he was a fair man?
‘You will have to marry someone, Kaliana. A man with great wealth. A man able to rule by your side when the time comes.’ He paused, letting the image of her future permeate her mind. ‘This is your country. Your people.’
Marry someone. That was what he’d said. Again, the other less hideous option rushed into her mind. That was it. She would find her own husband.
‘Then I will find someone else.’ The words tumbled out in a panic and she knew she was in danger of losing the control she was fighting to keep on her emotions. ‘I will find a man to marry who can bring the finances needed to Ardu Safra.’
Her father looked at her, scowling, but before he could shut down her idea she spoke again. ‘I cannot and will not marry Nassif.’
She expected him to be angry. Braced herself for his wrath, but it didn’t come. He looked as stunned as she felt.
He shook his head in disbelief. ‘You really think you can find a man, one wealthier than Nassif, willing to marry you and take on the demands of being husband to a princess?’
‘Yes, Father, I do.’ Now her panic changed direction. How could she ever achieve that?
‘Very well, I will prepare for a wedding.’
‘What?’
‘On the day of your twenty-sixth birthday you will be married.’
‘But that’s...’ She paused to calculate, her mind too numb to function. ‘October. The beginning of October. Only four months away.’
He nodded solemnly. She wanted to rail against him, but he’d changed. There was something different about him. Something that tugged mercilessly at her heartstrings. Something that once again hinted that the father she’d loved as a child, the man she wished he could be, lingered beneath his tough exterior.
But she wasn’t about to let go of the chance he’d given her. ‘And if I haven’t found a husband by then?’ Inside she was a wild rush of panic. She could do this. She had to do this.
‘You have until September,’ her father solemnly said. ‘Find a suitable husband by then or marry Nassif on your twenty-sixth birthday.’
CHAPTER ONE (#ufca395e5-9edd-59b3-8c7c-4074cc7408b6)
Early June
RAFFAELE CASELLA COULD hardly control his frustration. Even as he’d flown back from Sicily to London, he hadn’t been able to halt the flow of anger. The irritation. His father, alarmingly calm after his cancer diagnosis, had hammered home the stark reality of the situation the family was now in.
The Casella name could end. And with it the possession of land and wealth which had been handed from one Casella generation to the next. With appalling timing, his twin brother, Enzo, had chosen that very day to admit his marriage to Emma was in jeopardy, after a fertility test had proved he was unable to father children—Casella heirs. His father had panicked, turning immediately to Rafe, putting the duty of providing the next generation squarely on his shoulders. Now he was the only one who could ensure the Casella land and wealth stayed exactly that.
Rafe had fought to control his anger, his shock, throughout the discussion with his father and Enzo. Reminding himself the old man was ill, holding it all in, thinking instead of the father he’d spent his life trying to please, but failing at every turn. Enzo, the first-born twin, was the son who had always achieved that honour, even when he’d betrayed Rafe in the most heartless way, tearing apart a family already living under the cloud of tragedy.
The Casella name would end if he, the second-born twin, the spare heir, didn’t marry and have children. The biggest crisis the Casella family had faced for three generations now loomed over them.
Rafe was in the spotlight, its brightness harsh and unyielding. Inescapable. He was the only one who could save the Casella name, and with it the family fortune. Pressure bore down on him. His future was mapped out, demanding he take a route that involved a marriage he’d never intended to make. Children—or, more precisely, a son to continue the Casella name—something he’d never wanted.
He had no choice. Either that or stand by and watch their cousin Serafina and her greedy husband, Giovanni Romano, take everything, ending the Casella dynasty.
Rafe couldn’t allow that. Not when part of that dynasty was the one piece of land which meant more to him than anything else. His mother’s land. The place he and Enzo, along with childhood friend Franco, had once played happily. It was a place full of memories of his mother. Memories he’d treasured since her death when he and Enzo had been only teenagers. For those olive groves alone, Rafe would do anything. Even marry. Even become a father. It was far more than ensuring nobody else, other than a Casella, owned Pietra Bianca. For Rafe it was about keeping his mother’s memory alive.
The thought of Giovanni at the ancient olive grove slammed into Rafe as he ordered a second whisky. A surge of anger raced through him, almost blocking out the subtle tones of the gentle piano music weaving through the bar of the exclusive London hotel.
There was no way Giovanni Romano was having anything to do with Pietra Bianca.
Rafe swigged the fiery liquid back and banged the empty glass down on the bar. During the last heated words he and his brother had shared, Enzo had made it clear that, despite everything that had gone on between them, he expected Rafe to step up. Expected him to save the Casella fortune. Proving his twin was as mercenary, as motivated by wealth, as their father.
‘Damn you, Father,’ Rafe muttered as he glared at the offensively empty glass. ‘And damn you, Enzo.’
Rafe pushed his hands through his hair as he thought of Serafina and Giovanni claiming the Casella fortune. No. That could never happen. Irritation tipped over to anger and Rafe called over the bartender, watching him with narrowed eyes, his thoughts elsewhere, as another glass of whisky was poured.
Picking up the glass, Rafe raised it to his reflection in the mirrors behind the bar. To his future. Marriage. Fatherhood. The things he’d never wanted, now his only option.
Rafe looked down into the amber liquid in the crystal tumbler, still questioning the wisdom of marriage. The ice-cold shock which had hit him as his father had made his expectations clear was still frozen inside him, the whisky unable to thaw it.
His father had always considered Enzo the true heir, expecting his first-born son to marry, produce the new generation and claim it all. Rafe was, as always, merely the back-up plan. An extra card in his hand.
A card he was now forced to play after Enzo’s marriage was crashing on the rocks so spectacularly. Divorce seemed the only option. Poor Emma. Rafe tried to push the sympathy away. She might have been his first love, but she was now Enzo’s wife. Enzo and Emma’s betrayal had gone far deeper than just killing his love for her.
Rafe swirled the whisky in the glass, brooding into it as if it held the answers to the nightmare he now lived. He had no wish for marriage. No need for emotional complications. How was he to find himself a wife? And one that would bring the kind of prestigious advantages to the marriage he required and the son the Casella family required? Did he really have such little choice that he had to accept a marriage deal arranged by his father?
Anger chased the whisky through his body. Was he to parade himself like a stud horse? That stung his male pride as much as being the standby heir.
‘Champagne.’ The husky voice of the woman joining him at the bar caught his attention, dragging him from his despair, her accent intriguing him as she made her demand to the bartender. Despite the weight of his problems, he was captivated in a way he hadn’t been for a long time.
Rafe studied her in the mirrors behind the bar and, despite the rows of optics, saw the woman was as attractive as her voice. There was an air of sophistication about her. She radiated confidence, drew him ever closer. Making him want more than a curious glance in the mirror. Making him want to get to know her. Effectively sealing his fate.
Attraction surged through him and he reluctantly admitted he’d go as far as to say she was the sexiest woman he’d seen in a long time. She was tall and slender, wearing a tight-fitting pale gold silk blouse, sleeves folded up past her elbows and open low at the front. Her dark shoulder-length hair was pulled back away from her face, accentuating her vivid brown eyes, her brown eye make-up making them appear as black as coal. Her full lips were pressed together into a sulky but sexy pout.
She was utterly gorgeous.
Watching her shouldn’t have turned him on, but it did. A lick of hot lust, reminding him just how long it had been since he’d lost himself in the oblivion of a beautiful woman, fired through him. It would also be something he’d never be able to do again once he married. His marriage might not be for love, or any kind of sentiment, but his morals wouldn’t allow for such betrayal as infidelity.
He knew how that felt. All too well.
Rafe nodded to the bartender, who swiftly brought over two glasses and a bottle of champagne, placing them on the bar between him and the woman. With a quick glance at the label, Rafe satisfied himself his usual standards had been catered for with nothing but the best and moved closer to the sexy woman.
‘I don’t recall inviting you to join me.’ She turned, leaning one slender arm on the bar, cutting off any polite introductions he could have made as she glared up at him. That lick of lust just became a savage kick.
He conjured up an image of the kind of woman his father might suggest as a suitable wife and knew she’d never be a match to this sassy, sophisticated woman before him. He took in the brunette’s long bronzed legs, the tight-fitting skirt skimming above her knees and the sexy gold sandals on delicate feet with red painted nails.
This woman oozed confidence. She was strong. Independent. And, with a body like that, she would fill his nights with hot pleasure. There was no way a woman like her would agree to a marriage purely for convenience.
This was a woman who undoubtedly played as hard as she worked. Exactly the kind of woman he was drawn to. He knew instinctively this woman would match him in every way.
‘I think you will find it is you who is being invited to join me,’ he taunted. Sparks of sexy annoyance shot out at him from her eyes, sending that savage lust roaring straight to his groin. He clenched his jaw against the kind of need he hadn’t felt for a long time. The kind of need that right now would chase away the shock of all he’d discovered. All he must do.
‘And how do you come to that conclusion? You were very clearly drinking whisky when I arrived,’ she goaded him, leaning her head to one side, her diamond earrings sparkling and winking at him.
He smiled. She’d noticed. Noticed him. ‘That is true.’
‘I was the one who ordered champagne.’ Her accent deepened. He’d never met a woman like this. For the last six years he’d consciously avoided complicating his life with female company. He’d used the alternative energy business he’d worked hard to set up, instead of joining his father and Enzo in the family business, to keep him from his homeland. Sicily held too many bad memories. The kind that wrote over any good times. Here in London, or at his other base in New York, he didn’t have to remember.
He didn’t have to face the past. It didn’t have to shape who he was.
Then all that had changed with his father’s illness. He’d been forced to return to Sicily. Forced back into his brother’s life. The twin who’d destroyed Rafe’s planned future as though it was nothing more than paper. The only two women he’d got close to had been lost. His mother and then Emma. Damn it, he’d lost Emma to his own brother. And now the final insult was that Rafe had no choice but to step up to the mark and do his duty, to help his father and his brother keep the Casella fortune.
Rafe pushed his troubles aside. This wasn’t the time for them. Not when this woman was exactly what he needed right now. A distraction he wanted to lose himself in—completely.
‘You didn’t order champagne. You demanded it.’ The stunned look on her face at being reprimanded made him smile. This was going to be a very entertaining evening. Precisely what he needed.
Tonight, he wanted to lose himself. Completely and with this woman. From the way she was looking at him, eyes swirling with desire as much as annoyance, he knew it was only a matter of time until he did just that. A sizzling sexual attraction drew them inexplicably to one another and he had no intention of severing it. Instead, he would meet it head-on.
‘I did no such thing.’
‘I didn’t hear a please,’ he taunted her, watching the gold flecks in her dark brown eyes shine brighter with fury. ‘And I am yet to hear a thank you.’
Beneath her dark complexion he noticed she had the good grace to blush. She sighed, her breasts rising with the deep breath in, snagging his attention, ratcheting up his lust, tightening the binds of attraction.
Silence fell between them as the bartender poured two glasses of champagne, placing the bottle back in the cooler, before attending to other guests. She took hers and, still without a word of thanks, turned her attention away from him.
‘Sorry. It’s been a bad day,’ she said quickly. ‘A bad week. Two weeks, in fact.’
He watched her once more in the mirror as she sipped her drink, before putting the glass on the bar and tracing one long slender finger around the rim absently. Her thoughts far away from him. From this bar.
‘That’s both of us then.’
Her gaze met his in the mirror. They remained like that, gazes locked, drawing them together, keeping them linked. It was powerful. Hard to resist. But he had no intention of doing that. This beauty who’d exploded into his world was exactly the antidote he needed after this morning’s meeting with his father.
‘It might have just got a little better.’ She tilted her head on one side, still watching him in the mirror. Again, the sparkle of diamonds hanging from her ears caught his attention as she openly flirted with him. Teased him.
Champagne. Diamonds. Who was this enigma of a woman who’d gate-crashed his private moment?
‘Shall we agree to dismiss today? To live for now? This moment and nothing else?’ He spoke to her reflection, not sure where his questions had come from.
He was the last person who would condone shirking duty for personal needs. But this woman’s demeanour, her confident sexiness and charm, sparkling brighter than her diamonds, must be affecting him more than he knew.
She picked up her glass, raising it up to his reflection in the mirrors, her gaze intently holding his. In that hypnotic way a woman could seduce a man with just one look, he knew he was lost.
Tonight, he was hers.
‘I will drink to that,’ Kaliana said as she tried once again not to notice how incredibly sexy she found this man. Her friend and flatmate, Claire, had told her she needed to let go of the past. Get out there and have fun. Be the woman she really wanted to be.
So she’d thrown caution to the wind and headed out to do just that, planning to meet up with her friends as soon as they all finished work. But she’d never expected this. Not just the man himself, but an undeniable need to be with a man she didn’t even know. And in a way she’d never experienced.
He was just the distraction she needed after today’s call from her father, reminding her that two weeks had passed since she’d agreed to find a man wealthy enough to save her kingdom. And save herself from a marriage to a brutal bully.
