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‘Who else? I’m here because I don’t trust the bastard. Now that Luca is cutting all ties with him—’
Certain she had misheard, she cut him off. ‘He’s what?’
‘Luca is ending their association. He told him at their meeting earlier.’ His eyes narrowed as he took in her shock. ‘I assumed he’d told you.’
She shook her head, hundreds of thoughts fighting for space in her head. ‘Luca stopped discussing business with me a long time ago. Were you never part of their business dealings?’
His face contorted into something ugly. ‘Francesco Calvetti is scum. I would sooner have made a deal with the devil. The terms would have been friendlier.’
‘So you’re only here to watch Luca’s back?’
‘Why else?’
Luca had cut his ties with Francesco...?
She remembered the look on Francesco’s face at the casino, when he and Luca had been interrogating that poor man. What she remembered from that brief moment she had been in the office, before Luca had frogmarched her out, had been the cold cruelty she’d observed in Francesco’s eyes. It had been in marked contrast to the thoughtfulness she had seen in her husband’s.
Francesco enjoyed using threats and violence, whereas Luca used them only because he felt it necessary. There was a big difference.
It shouldn’t make any difference to how she felt about him, but it did.
‘I need to get back to Luca,’ she murmured, her eyes fixed on her husband and the buxom woman jabbering away in his ear.
As she made to walk off, Pepe called after her, ‘Have you seen your friend since you returned?’
‘Who? Cara?’
He nodded. His position and the angle of the light above him highlighted the silvery scar that ran across his left cheek.
‘Not yet.’ Cara’s continued elusiveness concerned her. It was unlike her tender-hearted friend to be so evasive...
A thought occurred to her.
‘Was it you who stole the data from her phone?’
He cast his eyes about, looking anywhere but at her.
Jaw clenched, she shook her head. It was inconceivable Cara would have let Luca within ten miles of her, but Pepe...
‘Cara is the sweetest, nicest person in the world. If you’ve hurt her, I swear I’ll make you live to regret it.’
With a parting ‘You don’t know what you’re talking about,’ Pepe disappeared into the crowd of revellers.
Grace took a deep breath to clear her head. Right now, she would have to put her friend to the back of her mind. As selfish as she knew it to be, she had more pressing worries to deal with.
She headed back into the throng and wove her way towards Luca. She could not quite hide the fear that Pepe’s analysis was accurate. Was Luca still holding interviews for the role of his mistress?
Judging by the way the woman at the bar was leaning into him, it appeared so.
As she closed in on him her stomach roiled.
Watching her husband flirt with other women was surreal. First the assistant in the boutique and now this tanned, pneumatically boobed creature.
When they had been married—properly married, that was—she had often noticed women eye him up but that had been the extent of their interest. She and Luca had been practically glued at the hip. If another woman had tried to garner his attention he wouldn’t have noticed or cared.
As she drew closer she realised any flirting was one-sided, a feeling confirmed when he looked up and she saw the dullness in his eyes.
That look made her heart lighten and relief spread its tentacles through her. The woman could be flirting with a brick wall for all the attention Luca was paying her.
Deliberately, she stepped between them.
‘Excuse me!’ The woman spoke with a broad cockney accent. Able to look closely at her, Grace recognised her as a glamour model, a favourite of the British press.
‘I’m sorry,’ she said lightly. ‘That was incredibly rude of me. I’m Grace, Luca’s wife.’ A glass of champagne had been placed on the bar. Without missing a beat, she picked it up and downed it.
‘Oi. That was mine.’
‘Really?’ She feigned ignorance. ‘I do apologise. I thought Luca had ordered it for me. Please, let me get you another one.’
‘No, don’t bother.’ The model pursed her lips together and stuck her clutch bag under her arm.
‘Lovely to meet you,’ Grace called as the model sashayed off to the dance floor, where a whole heap of rich men were congregated.
Luca stared at her, his lips twitching, before raising his chin and taking a swig of his champagne. ‘Marking your territory?’
‘You should be thanking me for getting rid of her.’ Her fake bonhomie faded away. She had to ask, ‘Unless you were auditioning her for the role of your mistress?’
