An Invitation to Sin(5)

‘Tell that to your pulse rate. It's revving like the engine of my Ferrari.'

‘I thought you were trying to prove to the board you're responsible?'

‘I'll use a condom. Does that count?'

Appalled by how much she wanted to laugh, Taylor locked her hand in the  front of his shirt, feeling hard male muscle against the backs of her  fingers. ‘I don't think that's what they have in mind. You don't want to  take this risk and neither do I. We have to get back to the wedding  before the bride comes.'

‘If I have my way you'll come before the bride.' Laughing wickedly, he  delivered a slow, sensual kiss to the corner of her mouth. ‘Some things  are worth taking a risk for and you, Taylor Carmichael, are definitely  one of those. You are sexy enough to make me forget all about being  good-' his hand was buried in her hair and his mouth was on her neck  ‘-and it really turns me on to know that underneath your icy, composed  exterior you are still a bad, bad girl.'

Taylor closed her eyes but that simply intensified the crazy swirl of  feelings so she opened them again. ‘You're wrong. That isn't who I am.'  It couldn't be. ‘I don't want this.'

‘You're crushing me, dolcezza.' He was kissing her jaw and she could  hear the smile in his voice. ‘Think of my poor, delicate ego.'

Nothing about him was delicate. Not the powerful shoulders, nor the  rock-hard biceps. He was all muscle and masculinity and Taylor was so  desperate for him her whole body ached. ‘I don't want you.'

‘Yes, you do. You want me as much as I want you but you're determined to deny your true self.'

‘I'm not denying anything.' Panicking, she shoved at his chest. ‘Enough!  Damn it, Luca-get away from me.' In the past two years she hadn't even  looked at a man and suddenly here she was, pressed against the hardness  of him, her body melting against the heat of his. The chemistry was off  the scale and it terrified her. Of all the men she could have found  herself with, he was the most dangerous of his species. ‘I'm not that  person any more. I've changed.'                       
       
           



       

‘That person? What person? You mean the woman who embraced her life without apology?'

‘The woman who screwed up her life by trusting men like you,' Taylor  snapped, ‘and I'm not doing it again so stay away. I mean it, Luca. If  you want to live up to your reputation then go ahead, but I'm not going  to let you take me down with you.'

‘Why are you so ashamed of yourself?'

‘I'm not ashamed-' she spoke so quickly she stumbled over the words ‘-but I've grown up.'

‘Grown-ups accept their mistakes instead of running from them.'

Hers haunted her.

The threatening messages never ended.

Her heart was pumping as she backed away from him. ‘Good luck with your  future. I hope you manage to convince the board to trust you before you  give in to the worst part of yourself and blow it completely.'

‘Ah, but that's the difference between us, angelo mia.' Reaching for the  bottle of champagne again, he leaned his hips against the fountain,  effortlessly sophisticated and insanely sexy. ‘I consider it to be the  best part of myself. The fact that no one else appreciates it is their  problem, not mine.'

For a brief moment she felt a flash of envy that he was so indifferent  to what people thought and then the urgency of her situation propelled  her into action and she jammed her feet into her shoes, the movement  parting the seam of her dress as far as the waist. Gripping it with her  hand, she held the two sides together and hurried through the shadowed  corridors of the maze, grateful for the high hedges that concealed her  from prying eyes.

If a photographer had been hiding in the maze, or even another guest-one  of Luca's disgruntled women-it would have looked awful and no amount of  explaining would have worked.

She would have ruined everything before she'd even started filming.

The thought of how close she'd come to doing just that made her feel sick.

Weak with relief that her reputation was still intact, she pulled her phone out of her bag and texted the designer one-handed.

Ready to be sewn back into my dress. Meet me by the maze.

Luca let her go, that exercise in self-restraint costing him dearly in  terms of physical discomfort. He shifted slightly and decided he didn't  dare leave the maze until his hormones had settled down.

Lifting the champagne to his lips, he paused as he spotted a woman approaching down another greenlined tunnel.

‘Luca, there you are!'

Cursing under his breath, he lowered the bottle of champagne. ‘Paula!'

‘It's Portia.'

‘That's what I said. The maze distorts sound.'

Her eyes were a little less warm than they'd been earlier. ‘Were you hiding from me?'

‘I didn't trust myself around you,' Luca said smoothly. With the taste  of Taylor still on his lips, he felt no inclination to take her up on  her less than subtle invitation. ‘Last night should not have happened.  You're a beautiful woman but I need to behave myself.'

Her eyes narrowed and she stared down the path where Taylor had recently  disappeared. ‘Really? So you're telling me women are off the agenda  today?'

Something in her tone made Luca wonder if she'd seen Taylor but he  decided that wasn't possible. No one could have sneaked up on them  without him noticing.

‘Sadly, yes. What we shared was very special-' he pulled out one of his  stock phrases ‘-but I can't risk anything else at this point which is  killing me because last night was one of the best of my life.'

‘All right. If that's the way it has to be then so be it.' She looked at  him for a long moment, as if she were working something out. ‘You're  never going to forget me, Luca Corretti.'

‘Of course I'm not.'

‘And you'll never again forget my name.'

‘It's your own fault for being beautiful-I take one look at your face and my memory goes.'

Three minutes, Luca thought idly, glancing to the place he'd last seen  Taylor and missing the jealous glint in the woman's eye. That was how  long it would take him to forget her.

Forty-eight hours later Taylor sat in the back of a limo as she was  driven to the docklands for filming to begin. She'd spent the entire  previous day locked in her hotel room checking every online newspaper  and gossip column for pictures, terrified that her momentary lapse with  Luca might have been captured on camera. When she realised she'd got  away with it she'd been weak with relief.

From now on she was going to keep well away from men like Luca Corretti.

Never again would she do something that gave a man power over her.                       
       
           



       

But even as she thought that, she knew that her response hadn't been  driven by stupidity but by a raw attraction so strong nothing could have  prepared her for it.

And it wasn't just his physical appeal that had caused her downfall, it  had been something else. Something layered beneath the surface of  masculine perfection. An honesty that presented a stark contrast to the  atmosphere of falseness that had hovered over the wedding. Yes, that was  it. Luca Corretti embraced everything he was. He took what he wanted  without explanation or apology and that was-she struggled to describe  it-refreshing.

She felt a twinge of envy and dismissed it instantly. She didn't want to  be like Luca, a slave to her emotions. Her life had been so much  happier since she'd been in control.

‘We'll be there in ten minutes, Miss Carmichael.'

The voice of her driver came through the intercom and excitement buzzed  through her. She couldn't wait to be back on a film set. She was going  to throw herself into her work and forget about her narrow escape. And  forget about Luca.

Blocking out disturbing memories of that kiss, Taylor leaned her head  back against the seat, finally able to think back to the wedding and  laugh. What a crazy day. She still couldn't believe that Luca's brother  Matteo had run off with the bride before she'd made it as far as the  altar. Bad behaviour was obviously in the DNA, but she was grateful for  that because all the attention that had been focused on her had  immediately switched to the Corretti family.

She shook her head at the irony of it.

And Santo Corretti had been worried about her causing a scandal.

As the car approached the docklands area, she noticed the pack of  photographers pressed against the security fence and her heart sank.

There were so many of them, no doubt all waiting for her to screw up on her first day and give them a nice juicy headline.

Was it going to be like this all the time?

Her phone buzzed with a text and she checked it quickly, her heart rate doubling when she saw it was from Rafaele.