Bought by Her Italian Boss(15)

The thought disturbed him. Was that how he'd been conceived? In a fit of  blind passion that completely disregarded the impact to the woman in  question?

By the few accounts Vito had from his adoptive parents, his mother had  been deeply infatuated, if far too young and naive for a thirtysomething  gangster with a pitiless determination to get whatever he wanted. He  had wanted Antoinietta Donatelli. He had seduced her. His family had  always sworn up, down and sideways that Vito wasn't a product of rape.  No, he was the product of a man taking advantage of a woman who didn't  have nearly the worldliness needed to resist him.

Not unlike Gwyn, who didn't take lovers strictly for the pleasure of physical release.

Because, he suspected, no man had given her a release like that. He  probably shouldn't have, but her animosity had been eating at him. That  remark about buying women and her resistance toward him on every level  had been grinding away at his control. When she had called herself  "cheap" for wanting to sleep with him, something feral in him had  snapped, demanding that he show her how good they would be together.

Cheap? It was unique and precious, beyond even what he had imagined it could be. Disconcertingly powerful.

And honest.

Her reaction now, so taken aback by her own abandonment, told him how  thoroughly he had owned her in those moments. He thrilled to it, but it  caused a shift inside him. Something he wasn't fully prepared to  examine, fearing he was making a rationalization to justify getting what  he wanted: her.

But the way she'd ignited in his arms made thinking of anything except possessing her impossible.

* * *

They seemed to have left the paparazzi far behind and circled back  toward the house. As soon as they were inside, Gwyn went straight  through to the small patio outside the back door, where the cool  afternoon breeze off the water gave her the first proper breath she'd  taken since coming apart at Vito's touch.

She went down the steps to the pool deck where she stared out over the  lake, blood cooling, hands curled around the rail to ground her back  into harsh reality. Why had she let that happen? And what did it mean  for the rest of this pantomime they were acting? Would they become  lovers in every way, not just a one-sided grope that only proved his  superiority over her?

That was the part that devastated her. She could give herself orgasms if  she wanted them. But despite all the ways he'd turned out to be  different from the urbane Italian gentleman she'd fantasized about, she  was even more in thrall than ever. Would she become his lover?

She couldn't imagine finding the will to say, No.

Vito came outside with two wineglasses and a corked bottle. He  wordlessly poured and offered her one, not speaking until she took hers.

"Salute," he said, gaze trying to catch hers.

She couldn't do it, too aware of how intimate things had been between them. Too vulnerable to him.

"I keep making you angry because it seems the only way to keep you from  falling into despair," he said, as though explaining the answer to a  riddle.

"Something else for my own good?" She snapped her gaze up to his.

He smiled faintly. "Whatever works."

She released a shaken sigh, finding his statement not exactly  comforting, but oddly bolstering. He wasn't toying with her for fun, but  trying to help her in his backhanded way.

She couldn't deny that his lovemaking had, for a few minutes, completely  wiped away her anxiety over her nightmare of a life. Now everything was  flooding back and she would be very thankful if he did something  annoying. Despair hovered like a rain cloud looking to move in and burst  over her.

He set his glass on a table and shrugged out of his new jacket, a  vintage cut in light wool with leather patches at the shoulders. It was  gorgeous on him, very debonair, but the dove-colored shirt beneath was  equally smart, clinging to his muscled shoulders, buttons open in a V  that showed his throat and collarbone and a few dark chest hairs.                       
       
           



       

He slung the jacket negligently over the back of the nearest chair,  attention shifting to his phone. With a flick of his thumb across the  screen, he paraphrased from something he was reading. "The spa is  claiming they had no knowledge of the photos, but the press has found  the same connection my team discovered this morning. Your masseuse is  related to one of Jensen's employees. I'll take you to lodge a formal  complaint with the police when we return to Milan so they can look at  pressing charges for invasion of privacy."

"Charging the masseuse doesn't put the blame on Kevin, though, does it?"

"He has worked very hard to keep his hands clean, but we'll get there.  It's early days yet." He picked up his glass and sipped, continuing to  read his emails.

Days. It hadn't even been two full ones, but she'd already gone further  with him than most of the men she'd dated for months. She was in so much  trouble if that was a precursor of what was to come.

Pensively sipping the pale gold of the wine, she wound up exclaiming a very sincere, "Oh, that's very good!"

Not that she was any sort of connoisseur, but Travis always brought wine  when she cooked and he didn't punish anyone with cheap stuff. She'd  been enjoying trying bottles here in Italy and hadn't found a bad one,  but this surpassed anything in her price range.

Vito glanced up, offering what looked like a very genuine smile for a  change. "It's the private reserve from my great-grandparents' vineyard.  One of my cousins runs it and doles the bottles out to family every  year. We could make a fortune, but it's too good to sell."

"Do you-" Gwyn forgot what she was going to ask as a flash of movement caught her eye.

Was that a little boy? He touched his lips to signal her to keep quiet  as he climbed the rail that bordered the pool terrace then darted behind  an oversize terra-cotta planter.

Vito followed her gaze and glanced backward at the empty landscape, then brought his alert frown back to her. "What's wrong?"

She started to say, "I saw a little boy-"

Before she could get the words out, the boy was barreling straight for Vito's legs.

In the same moment, Vito's expression hardened. He plunked his glass  down and spun in a fluid motion, like he knew exactly what was coming.  He crouched, grabbed, then threw the boy high into the air as he  straightened, then caught him firmly and held him nose to nose.

"You little gremlin. I ought to throw you into the pool."

"Do it!" The boy's laughing eyes brightened with excitement. He splayed  out his arms and legs, ready to fly through the air into the still, blue  water despite being fully dressed.

"I won't," Vito told him, hitching the boy's wiry figure onto his arm so  they were eye to eye. "That's your punishment for trying to push me in.  No swimming at all. Say hello to Miss Ellis," he said, indicating her  with a nod. "This is Roberto. He has all of his mother's sass and twice  his father's disregard for danger."

"I was going to come in with you," the boy excused, curling his arm  around Vito's neck and pressing his cheek to Vito's with open trust and  affection. He was speaking perfect English but could have been Vito's  son, his looks were so patently Italian. He turned his attention to Gwyn  and pronounced what sounded like a coached speech. "It's nice to meet  you. Welcome to our home." He offered his small hand for a shake, making  it a firm one.

"It's a beautiful home," Gwyn said, ridiculously charmed, even though he  couldn't have been more than five. "I'm very pleased to meet you, too."

Roberto gave her a stare reminiscent of Vito's most delving look.

"Are you American? Mama is Canadian and sometimes people think she's  American, but your accent is different. You sound like our housekeeper  in Charleston."

"Good ear," Gwyn said with a bemused smile. Honestly, he had more  sophistication than some thirty-year-old executives she had met.

"Did you drive here yourself? Where is your father?" Vito asked, giving the boy a little bounce.

"He won't let me drive," Roberto said with a disgruntled scowl, then  pointed to the top floor. "He's putting Bianca in her bed. She fell  asleep in the car. She has a cold."

"He brought both of you? How is your mother?"

"So pregnant," a woman said, coming out the back door of the house.

Lauren Donatelli was very pregnant, but carried it beautifully on her  tall frame, glowing and graceful as she came down the short flight of  steps onto the pool terrace, nary a waddle in her step.                       
       
           



       

Gwyn recognized her from photos she'd seen in the Charleston news  several years ago, along with the odd image published in the company  newsletter where Lauren invariably stood next to Paolo looking warm and  approachable despite how aloof and distant her husband always seemed.