Gianni's Pride Read online

  While she and Tam had never shared the sort of empathic link that Miranda had read some identical twins enjoyed, there was no way even her twin, who was never that interested in things that did not directly involve her, would not catch on soon.

  She directed her masochistically inclined thoughts from the imagined idyll Tam was enjoying on a Greek island with her bridegroom and concentrated on the man lying beside her. Now he was definitely raw—actually raw hardly covered the smouldering, in-your-face sexuality he exuded from every pore … The man she was looking at?

  There’s a man in my bed!

  Her horrified gasp was drowned out by the alarm clock that began to shrill. It stopped when she lobbed it at the strange man’s head and in a seamless motion, her sleepy contentment a dim memory, produced a stumbling exit from the bed modestly wrapped, in the best tradition of old movies, in most of the bedding.

  Eyes like saucers, clutching the quilt to her heaving bosom, she stared at the man lying there, trying not to think about the draught that was cooling her exposed bottom. The adrenalin in her veins was telling her to run, but to get to the door she had to get past the bed. Thoughts racing, hyperventilating dramatically, she glanced longingly towards the open door that connected with the next room, but her feet remained nailed to the spot as she was submerged by a massive wave of visceral, paralysing fear.

  Attack, they always said, was the best form of defence … Act like a victim, she had read somewhere, and you became a victim.

  ‘Don’t move an inch!’ Or what, Miranda? Her chin lifted, the defiance in her attitude an attempt to mask her fear as she played for time, waiting for her legs to move. ‘Or y-you’ll r-regret it!’

  He had to have heard the quiver of fear in her voice … but on the plus side he hadn’t made any attempt to move. If he had … Miranda’s glance slid down the long, lean length of the stranger. Even in his present recumbent position his physical superiority was pretty apparent. His lean body was heavily muscled, not an ounce of spare flesh masking the power and vitality of a man at the peak of physical fitness.

  He looked like the sort of fitness fanatic who could run marathons back to back without breaking sweat. He could swat her like a fly if he wanted to … Swatting was actually the least of her worries at that moment … Refusing to speculate on his intentions, she tried to breathe past the frantic pounding of her heart as, not taking her eyes off him, she surreptitiously reached out behind her for her phone. She could remember leaving it on the bureau the night before … Hadn’t she?

  CHAPTER TWO

  ONE hand pressed to his eye where the alarm clock she had lobbed as she exited the bed—not before he had got a glimpse of a lovely pert little bottom—had landed a glancing blow, Gianni looked at her through his uncovered eye and held up his free hand in a gesture of surrender. It did not take a genius to figure out what she was thinking.

  ‘Relax. This is a simple misunderstanding … a mistake …’ he soothed, making eye contact and experiencing a flicker of shock as he registered the quite extraordinary colour of her wide long-lashed eyes.

  Extraordinary enough to make him briefly lose focus—an event in itself for the ultra-controlled Gianni—the deep, dark green made him think of cool, quiet forests, and the tiny flecks of amber recalled dappled sunlight shining through the foliage as she stared at him as though he were a coiled snake about to strike.

  ‘You mistakenly climbed in through the window and mistakenly took off your clothes and mistakenly got into my bed … That’s a lot of mistakes.’ Mine might be not keeping my big mouth shut, she thought as, picking up some of the slack of the quilt that trailed on the floor, she threw it awkwardly over her shoulder. Her rear now concealed by a heavy fold of fabric, she continued to feel exposed, just not to the elements.

  Was the husky little rasp in her voice normal or a product of fear? Either way the tactile quality was extremely attractive, so much so that Gianni found himself curiously impatient to hear her speak again even if it was to hurl some more abuse.

  ‘When you put it like that it does sound bad,’ he admitted. ‘But I really am totally harmless.’

  Do not hyperventilate, Miranda!

  Struggling to maintain her hard-fought-for air of bravado, she sketched a tight little smile and thought, Sure you are … Anything less harmless than the man sprawled there like some sort of macho centerfold—after registering he was wearing nothing but an insubstantial pair of boxers she had kept her gaze above the waist—would have been hard to imagine.

  He oozed sinister sexuality and was probably insane to boot! A predatory man had climbed into her bed … She shuddered—had he touched her …?

  Her stomach responded violently to the lurid images forming in her head. ‘God, I think I’m going to be sick!’ she groaned suddenly as she dropped her chin to her chest, the blood draining abruptly from her face.

  Her voice made even this prosaic statement sound seductive! ‘I’m getting that a lot.’

  The dull metronome thud thud of her blood as it pounded against the delicate membrane of her inner ear drowned out his dry words.

  What had Lucy said before she left …? I hope you won’t be bored. I’m afraid nothing interesting ever happens here. What would her employer call this—a slow Friday morning?

  ‘This is all an innocent mistake.’

  She inhaled a deep sustaining breath and lifted her head, fixing the intruder with a look of loathing. ‘Do you say that to all the women you try to molest?’ Amazingly her voice was steady, if on the shrill side.

  Miranda’s fingertips brushed the phone before she heard it fall onto the polished boards—damn! Her teeth clenched, she fought down the panic she felt closing like a fist around her windpipe. I will not be some crime statistic. I’ll survive. ‘I’m going to leave now.’ Once I regain control of my limbs.

  ‘I’m not stopping you.’ People feared his tongue, words written and spoken were his thing, and Gianni had rarely encountered a situation where he did not have the perfect response, but then up until now he’d never been viewed as a potential rapist. He found himself falling back on repetition.

  He watched her eyes flicker around the room like a trapped animal seeking an escape route. ‘I’ve told you, this is simply a misunderstanding—a mistake.’

  ‘Yes, your mistake.’ How come her voice was working and her legs were not? The other way around would have been much more convenient. ‘You disgusting sleaze!’ How come I am saying the sort of things almost guaranteed not to placate a dangerous lunatic? ‘I know self-defence.’

  He could see her shaking from here, her eyes didn’t leave his as she watched him, but she had guts, this redhead. Terrified, she still came out fighting. Gianni felt a stab of admiration as he pulled himself into a sitting position.

  The action caused the petrified redhead to take a hasty step backwards.

  Gianni, who did not like scaring women, produced a smile and struggled to channel harmless and innocuous—not so easy when you were a powerfully built six feet four and practically naked—as he studied the woman hiding behind the quilt she had dragged off the bed, along with half the blanket and sheets that now lay crumpled at her feet, and tried to figure out the best way to defuse the situation.

  She was petite and slim and probably younger than Lucy. Though it wasn’t always easy to tell, she had the sort of face that looked perennially young—good bones, he decided, studying her delicate heart-shaped face dominated by a pair of enormous green eyes set above a neat little tip-tilted nose. Noticing that she had a kissable mouth that would be soft and lush when it wasn’t curled into a scared snarl was not going to defuse anything, but it was impossible not to. It was the sort of thing any man could not fail to notice.

  ‘There’s absolutely no need to freak out this way.’

  He actually had the cheek to sound vaguely impatient. Her trill of laughter emerged husky from her bone-dry throat. If ever a situation called for major freaking, this was it!

  ‘I’m not freaki
ng.’ She had gone beyond freaking!

  ‘This isn’t what it looks like.’

  ‘So what the hell is it?’ she snarled, looking so spooked that he was afraid she’d do something crazy like jump through that open window if he made a move to leave. Then, accident or not, her beautiful broken neck would be his fault.

  ‘Look, there’s a bathroom next door with a really sturdy lock on it. Why don’t you go in there, lock the door and we’ll sort this out?’

  Not the sort of suggestion you might expect a potential rapist to make … Miranda did not lower her guard, but her anxiety levels dropped from red to amber. ‘How do you know that the bathroom has a lock?’

  Thoughts continued to chase one another in frantic ever-decreasing circles around her head. Was this all part of some sinister plan? Was he playing with her …? Had he cased the joint while she slept? And what about the dogs? Lucy had said they barked at strangers.

  ‘Did you hurt the dogs? Because if you have … they’re rescue animals and …’

  ‘I know, they’ve had a bad time.’ Aunt Lucy had typically taken on the most tortured, hopeless canine souls she could find. ‘The dogs are fine,’ he soothed, thinking, For animals that their owner refuses to discipline. ‘Just yell Lucy, she’ll vouch for me.’ He raised his own voice and bellowed. ‘Luce!’

  Taken by surprise, Miranda blinked. ‘You know Lucy?’ That had to be good, didn’t it?

  Gianni tilted his head in confirmation and raised his voice in another bass bellow. ‘Lucy!’ Before adding in a conversational tone, ‘I really had no idea she had a visitor.’ His dark brows twitched into a sable line of irritation—where was Lucy? If his yell hadn’t roused her it had to have woken Liam. ‘Luce!’

  ‘She isn’t here.’ She stopped, trying to conceal a stab of dismay as she thought, Way to go, Mirrie! If he didn’t already know you were alone, he does now. And he might indeed know Lucy, but he was still pretty much an unknown quantity and one not to be trusted.

  His dark brows twitched into a straight line above his hawkish nose. ‘She’s away?’ He released a hissing sound of annoyance through his clenched teeth and thought, Just my luck. When was the last time Lucy left this place?

  ‘But she’ll be back any minute.’

  The tremor in her voice brought his scrutiny to her face. His dark eyes held understanding as he lifted his broad shoulders in a shrug.

  The action made her unwillingly aware of the movement of muscles under the satiny surface of his dark skin. He had the sort of body that would have an artist reaching for a pencil. He had the sort of body that she could imagine incited a less artistic and much more hands-on response!

  ‘Look, I’m sorry I scared you … It came as quite a shock to me too to find I was sharing.’

  ‘I’m not scared,’ she lied. Unable to stop her eyes straying to the fuzz of dark hair sprinkled across his magnificent pectoral muscles, she swallowed. The man might look as if he were posing for some cheesy calendar, but he exuded an earthy, raw quality that was not cheesy so much as downright disturbing. ‘How did you get in?’

  ‘I let myself in with the key. Lucy keeps one above the door on a ledge … Yes, I know, crazy when she’s gone to all the trouble of installing a state-of-the-art security system, but she works on the theory that nobody would ever look in such an obvious place, and in answer to your previous question I know about the bathroom lock … I know where the key is kept because I’ve been here before …’

  ‘Before? Are you her boyfriend?’

  The suggestion drew an unexpected laugh, deep, throaty and attractive. ‘I’m family.’

  This time it was Miranda who almost laughed. She might just have swallowed boyfriend, though that would beg the question of why he’d climbed into this bed and not the one in the roomy, pretty master bedroom at the front of the house.

  Actually it was not hard to see this man, with his Mediterranean colouring and bold eyes, and Lucy Fitzgerald together as a couple, she mused as she studied his rather too perfect profile … Individually either would stop conversations when they walked into a room. Together they would definitely cause an earth tremor … but family? No way, she decided. Lucy, with her cut-glass accent, was fair-skinned with incredible blue eyes and masses of ash-blonde hair that looked natural. This man, with his bold black eyes, ebony hair and bronzed body, was dark and not just in colouring. There was something elemental and primitive about him … volatile … dangerous.

  ‘Family?’

  He tilted his dark head in acknowledgement. ‘I arrived late and I didn’t want to disturb anyone so … I use this room when I stop over, even though I’ve had the odd concussion when I’ve forgotten to duck.’

  He looked sincere, the story sounded genuine, but then she had continued to believe in Santa Claus right up to the moment her more sophisticated twin had disillusioned her a good two years after her contemporaries. Repressing her natural instincts towards annoying gullibility, she struggled to retain a protective level of scepticism. ‘If you say so …’

  ‘You’re a tough audience, you know that, don’t you? Did you see the photos downstairs?’

  Miranda, who had registered the large collection of framed photos on the dresser in the dining room, maintained an uncommunicative silence, but began to consider the possibility he might actually be telling the truth about the relationship.

  ‘You noticed them?’

  She tipped her head in wary acknowledgement. ‘So what are you—her brother?’

  He took her sarcasm at face value. ‘No, her nephew.’

  ‘Nephew?’ She gave a derisive hoot. ‘You’ve obviously never even met Lucy.’

  ‘You base that on what?’

  ‘Well, let me see, for one she’s younger than you, and English and you … I don’t know what you are! But I think you heard she was away, thought you’d see if there was anything worth taking, saw me asleep and—’

  ‘Could not resist the temptation …?’

  Miranda felt the colour scoring her cheeks deepen.

  ‘While I don’t like to boast, it has been known for a woman to voluntarily share my bed,’ he admitted mildly. ‘As for my relationship with Lucy, she is my aunt, and, like her, I’m half Irish. My other half is Italian, hers is English. Lucy is two years younger than me and she is my aunt. Grandad Fitzgerald had three wives and ten children. My father was his oldest and Lucy, who came thirty years later, his youngest.

  ‘Look at the photos,’ he suggested. ‘You’ll see me in at least two of them … not flattering likenesses but …’ Holding her eyes the way he would a spooked horse, he put his feet on the floor and added in a soft voice, ‘If I was going to lie I’d come up with a much more convincing story, cara.’

  Miranda maintained her defensive pose. He looked no less dangerous but on the other hand he had a point: his story was just lame enough to be true …

  Gianni produced a smile that Miranda struggled not to respond to.

  ‘Sling me that shirt and pants, would you? They’re on the chair.’ Actually they were on the floor. He ran a hand down his hair-roughened chest before letting it rest on his ridged and muscled belly. ‘I’m feeling slightly self-conscious here.’

  Now that was a lie!

  Miranda, whose eyes had followed the movement of his hand from his broad chest to his washboard-flat stomach, lifted her gaze abruptly. Anyone more relaxed about being scantily clad in front of a stranger would be hard to imagine. She, on the other hand, was painfully conscious of her state of undress and even more painfully conscious of his!

  Not totally convinced by his story, but no longer feeling he represented a physical threat to her, she kicked the shirt his way, waving her foot in agitation as it caught on her bare toe. Danger gone, her embarrassment was kicking in big time.

  Gianni bent forward and picked it up, flashed what Miranda recognised as a grin of practised charm her way and shrugged it on. ‘I’m Gianni Fitzgerald, by the way.’

  Miranda ignored both the unspoken invit
ation to introduce herself and the hand he extended her way. She had less success ignoring the ripple of muscle beneath his satiny skin that accompanied his every action.

  After a pause Gianni shrugged. ‘So where is Lucy, and when is she actually due back?’ He arched a sardonic brow. ‘Or is that classified?’

  ‘She’s in Spain.’ Miranda aimed her response to a point over his shoulder. At least he was putting on some clothes, which was a good thing. The bad thing was that standing there with her modesty covered by the bedding left her feeling no less vulnerable than before.

  Standing on one leg, a very long, muscular and hair-roughened leg—not that she was looking—somehow he made the action as he thrust the other into the leg of the crumpled jeans she had kicked across look effortlessly elegant. Prone to clumsiness, she had always envied coordinated people.

  ‘Why has she gone to Spain?’

  If her employer had wanted to tell this Gianni, presumably she’d have told him. Respecting Lucy Fitzgerald’s right to her privacy, Miranda said vaguely, ‘She might be back in a month.’ Actually it was vague—the arrangement had been left pretty open-ended, with Miranda assuring the other woman that she could stay as long as she was needed.

  Gianni dragged a frustrated hand through his hair and slid his second leg into the jeans, tugging them up over his narrow hips, zipping the fly, but leaving the leather belt threaded through the loops hanging loose.

  His bronzed chest lifted as he sucked in a deep breath and released it slowly. Lucy being absent was not a possibility he had taken into account. He’d been relying on lying low here to give Sam the breathing space she had begged. ‘We have a problem.’

  ‘We?’ Miranda shook her head at the inclusion; she had enough problems of her own without being included in those of a total stranger.

  CHAPTER THREE

  ‘DADDY, I want a drink …’

  Daddy …? Miranda’s head turned in the direction of the crabby childish voice.