The break would have come once Tara was settled in Italy. Alessio would have waited until his daughter had forged closer ties with his half of the family. He had married her to steal their daughter, Daisy thought, in an agony of grief and betrayal. Setting out to win her trust, he had no doubt planned to ditch her as soon as she became surplus to requirements. Meanwhile he could continue to meet up with Nina whenever he liked.
‘If it is the last thing I do in this lifetime, I will punish you for this,’ Alessio had sworn the very day he had found out that he was a father. How could she have allowed herself to forget that threat?
Tears streaming down her face, Daisy stumbled back into the villa, fighting to regain control of emotions which felt uncontrollable. Dully she wondered why Alessio had behaved as if he was jealous when surely he should not have cared less how she had lived in the years they had been apart. Maybe it had been a kind of crazy dog-in-the-manger possessiveness. Or maybe... just maybe he had seen the error of his ways and had raced off to see Nina tonight to break off that relationship. But then why would Nina have got into the Ferrari with him? she asked herself, ashamed of her eagerness to grasp at any explanation which might lessen the anguish of what she was feeling.
‘Daisy?’ a hatefully familiar voice murmured smoothly.
Daisy jerked and swivelled round. Strolling out of the drawing room with all the confidence of the mistress of the house, Bianca surveyed her and smiled with unconcealed satisfaction.
‘You look like a drowned rat,’ Bianca commented drily. ‘I gather you hit pay dirt and, of course, you can’t possibly want to be here when Alessio returns.’
With an immense effort, Daisy straightened her slight shoulders and walked past the sneering brunette into the drawing room. Her legs were trembling beneath her. But it demanded even greater discipline not to lay violent hands upon Bianca and throw her physically from the door of her brother’s house. Bianca was here to gloat; she simply had been unable to resist the temptation to have a firsthand view of Daisy’s devastation.
With an unsteady hand, Daisy reached for the brandy decanter and began pouring herself a drink, praying that alcohol would ward off the disorienting effect of shock and lessen the freezing coldness settling into her bones. ‘I want you to leave,’ she said without even sparing a glance at the other woman.
‘Don’t be childish,’ Bianca urged impatiently.
‘And before you leave I would like you to return your keys to this house. Now that your brother is married, I don’t think it’s appropriate for you to be walking in without warning whenever the fancy takes you,’ Daisy completed before she braced herself and drank down the brandy all in one go, trembling as the heat raced down her aching throat and warmed the chilled pit of her uneasy stomach.
Bianca stared at Daisy, a faint hint of disconcertion drawing her brows together. ‘I’m willing to drive you to the airport,’ she announced, loftily ignoring the invitation to depart. ‘You’re obviously in no fit state to get yourself there!’
The airport. It would be so easy to take advantage of that invitation to run away. Indeed such a speedy retreat from a painful crisis would have all the ease and familiarity of habit, Daisy conceded painfully, drawing in a deep, shuddering breath to steady herself. However, she had Tara’s feelings to consider. In addition, strange as it might seem, she wanted—no, she needed to confront Alessio this time. ‘I don’t require a lift to the airport, Bianca.’
‘There’s only one more flight to London tonight,’ the brunette warned sharply. ‘You haven’t got much time.’
‘I have all the time in the world,’ Daisy countered tightly, frowning as a faint sound from somewhere beyond the room momentarily pierced her concentration. She focused briefly on the ajar door, listening for a split second before turning back to Bianca. ‘I have all the time in the world,’ she repeated with conviction, ‘because I’m not going anywhere.’
Bianca studied her in contemptuous disbelief. ‘You can’t be serious! You can’t want to be here when Alessio gets back. How could you want to humiliate yourself to that extent? If I caught my husband in the act of an adulterous tryst with another woman, believe me, I wouldn’t be sitting humbly waiting for him to come home again!’
Daisy was rigid, her pallor pronounced. ‘But then what I do... and indeed what Alessio does... is none of your business, Bianca. You’re his sister, not his keeper.’
‘Alessio and I are very close!’ Bianca shot back at her in angry resentment. ‘And I want you out of his life for good!’
Daisy uttered a strangled laugh. ‘The same way you wanted rid of me the last time? You lied about Sophia Corsini and I swallowed your every lie whole,’ she condemned, bitter resentment flooding through her. ‘He never even went out with the wretched girl!’
Bianca flushed and then her jawline hardened, her mouth thinning as she made a recovery. ‘Where on earth did you get the idea that I lied about Sophia? Alessio may be my brother but even I have never tried to pretend that he’s the faithful type—’
‘I’m sick of listening to your poison,’ Daisy interrupted fiercely.
‘You just haven’t got the courage to face the truth. If you had any pride at all, you would be getting out before Alessio makes an even bigger fool of you! He doesn’t want you; he never wanted you!’ Bianca asserted in furious frustration. ‘All he ever wanted was his daughter! How can you try to cling to him even after I’ve given you the proof that he’s still involved with Nina!’
Without warning the door was thrust back noisily on its hinges.
Both Daisy and Bianca jumped, their heads spinning in unison. Alessio stood on the threshold, diamond-hard eyes blazing with outrage, his golden skin pale with anger.
‘Nina is waiting for you at her apartment, Bianca,’ Alessio breathed with chilling bite. ‘She’s most unhappy with the dramatic role you have assigned to her. She doesn’t appreciate being used as a weapon—’
‘I don’t know what you’re talking about!’ Bianca broke in, a mottled flush overlying her tautened cheeks.
‘Spurred on by you, Nina had no objection to causing a little minor mischief, but she draws the line at setting out to destroy my marriage. She’s already ashamed of the lies you instructed her to tell yesterday. You misjudged your partner, Bianca.’ Alessio’s grim gaze rested on his sister in harsh condemnation, his nostrils flaring with distaste. ‘She thinks your malicious games have got dangerously out of control... and, believe me, she’s not the only one!’
Every scrap of colour had now drained from Bianca’s complexion. She stared at her brother in mingled shock and embarrassment. ‘Alessio, you don’t understand,’ she began shakily. ‘I was only thinking of your happiness.’
Alessio crossed the floor, closed a determined hand round his twin’s elbow and practically dragged her out of the room with him.
Daisy’s knees wouldn’t hold her up any longer. She sagged down like a broken doll onto the nearest seat. From the hall, staccato Italian broke from Alessio, scorching anger powering every syllable, Bianca’s responses running from defensive to pleading to—finally—tearful. Throughout, Daisy’s temples pounded with tension. She couldn’t yet think straight but she could not miss hearing the resounding slam of the front door as Alessio saw his sister off the premises.
‘You’re soaking wet, piccola mia...’ Alessio gritted, crouching down until he was on a level with her, his vibrantly handsome features still dark and taut with fury, although there was a curious tenderness that bewildered her in the golden eyes that rested on her strained face. ‘You need to get out of those clothes before you catch pneumonia.’
Stiff as a little clockwork soldier, Daisy cloaked her gaze in self-defence. Springing upright, Alessio swooped down on her again and swept her up into his arms without another word. A startled gasp burst from Daisy. She was not in the mood to be soothed like a distressed child.
‘Nina wants to apologise to you but I told her that this wasn’t the right time.’
‘Apologise ... she wants to apologise?’ Daisy pressed in disbelief. ‘Alessio, if you don’t put. me down I’ll scream!’
In response to her challenge, Alessio merely tightened his arms round her as he started up the stairs. ‘Daisy...my relationship with Nina was never anything but casual. A prudent male thinks twice before he becomes intimately involved with the daughter of family friends.’ Thrusting back their bedroom door, he murmured grimly, ‘Nina’s ego was hurt when I married you and Bianca found her an easy target. But Nina, spoilt and self-centred as she is, has a conscience—’
‘I didn’t notice it yesterday when she was blowing kisses at you and spouting all that nonsense about Barry!’ Daisy retorted, tearing herself violently free of his hold as soon as he began to lower her to the bathroom carpet. ‘And I don’t know what kind of a story you’ve invented as a cover-up but it won’t wash because I wasn’t born yesterday! You were with Nina tonight!’