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‘Kerry…what the—?’
‘You’re not allowed to look,’ she murmured sweetly.
His imagination racing straight to an erotic interpretation of that declaration, Luciano smiled and allowed her to turn him round and back him until his thighs brushed the edge of the bath. Without hesitation, Kerry then planted her palms on his muscular chest and thrust with all her might to off-balance him.
Taken entirely by surprise, Luciano could find nothing to grip to regain his balance and he went backwards into the copper tub with a gigantic splash. As he vented a savage expletive at the sheer shock of the freezing cold water and his eyes shot open in disbelief, he found Kerry staring down at him with a look of scornful satisfaction in her gaze.
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‘Another Ballybawn invention, Luciano. The water is pumped up from the lake. My great-grandfather firmly believed that his longevity derived from his daily refreshing dip in lake water. Unfortunately since then the pipes have silted up a little but, to be frank, you deserve to bath with pond-scum!’
‘Santo cielo!’ Luciano heaved himself up out of the slimy green water with a shudder for if there was one thing he could not bear it was to be less than clean. ‘If you think this is funny—’
‘It wasn’t meant to be.’ There was fierce condemnation in Kerry’s eyes. ‘It was my answer to the kind of relationship that you just had the cheek to offer me! How could you try to use my attachment to my grandparents and what used to be their home as a means of persuasion? You’re wasting your time because I won’t ever sink so low that I become some woman you sleep with when you feel like it—’
‘That was not what I suggested!’ Luciano launched back at her in a blistering rage as he snatched at a towel to wind it round his magnificent bronzed length. ‘Whether I like it or not, your grandparents are involved in what happens between us and the onus is on me to make some provision for them—’
‘Having evicted them, your sudden concern for them comes rather late in the day!’
‘Don’t let your pride come between you and your common sense.’ Brilliant golden eyes hard, Luciano made that warning with icy clarity. ‘You won’t get a better offer than the one I’ve just put on the table.’
‘But I’m not up for grabs or offers,’ Kerry proclaimed with furious distaste. ‘Last night was a mutual mistake. So, you decide what you want to do with Ballybawn and leave me out of it. Right now, I just work here!’
‘Is that a fact? If you just worked here by now I would’ve sacked you for screaming at me like a shrew, so don’t attempt to hide behind that cop-out!’
‘Oh, so you would have sacked me…you never could stand the smallest criticism,’ Kerry could not resist asserting, watching him go rigid at that less than tactful reminder. ‘But you’re great with the threats. Only you’re wasting your time threatening me because I’ve already lived through the worst you can do—’
‘Kerry—’ In the act of fighting an angry desire to carry her bodily back to bed solely in the hope of silencing her, Luciano snatched in a deep restraining breath.
‘—the day Grandpa came out of that court room humiliated and ashamed of the level debt had sunk him to! You could afford to show compassion. That you didn’t should have been my warning. But one way or another, I will look after my grandparents and I don’t need you to do it for me.’
Angry that his generous attempt to make amends had been tossed back in his teeth, Luciano dealt her a cool appraisal. ‘To date, you haven’t contrived to look after them very well, have you?’ he pointed out drily.
At that crack, Kerry turned white. ‘You have a point. Obviously I was wrong to respect Grandpa’s right to be treated as if he could manage his own affairs.’ Spinning on her heel, her eyes filled with guilty conflict, she paused halfway across the bedroom to pick up the breakfast tray. ‘By the way, there’s a half-bath in the cloakroom on the ground floor. From now on, please just treat me like a housekeeper—’
‘Per meraviglia! You can’t act as though last night never happened—’
‘Oh, I won’t do that,’ Kerry countered tightly. ‘I’ll just remind myself that you’re not the guy I once thought you were and I don’t think I’ll be tempted to cross the boundary lines again.’
As the door shut in her wake, Luciano swore with savage frustration. He had been too honest with her and he had hurt her pride, but he refused to lie and it would have been a lie to pretend that the clock could be turned back. He would never forgive her for her lack of faith in him five years earlier.
But even as he reminded himself of that truth, he also found himself wondering for the first time whether he might have expected too much from her. She had only been twenty-one, unsure of herself and, in spite of their engagement, a lot less certain of him than he had ever appreciated. In fact, he had pretty much ignored her insecurity over Rochelle except when it affected his own comfort. After all, what male did not receive a vicarious thrill from having two attractive women vying for a share of his attention? He winced at that belated moment of truth with himself.
Furthermore, what had been the chances of Kerry crediting that he was innocent of theft when all the Linwoods, including her domineering father and employer, had judged him guilty? Or, perhaps even more to the point, how much loyalty could he have expected her to offer him when she had been deliberately led to believe that he had embarked on a fresh liaison with her stepsister?
Kerry was much too busy to have the time to dwell on her thoughts. With a dozen visitors due to arrive at ten for a tour of the castle followed by morning tea, she had plenty to do. But she felt hollow inside as if Luciano had ripped everything out and thrown it away. Wishful thinking had blinded her to the passage of time and the intrinsic complexity of the male she was dealing with. When had she allowed herself to forget Luciano’s cold, contemptuous attitude towards her in London?
Five years ago she had misjudged Luciano, and last night he had taken her virginity before suggesting a de-meaning joke of a continuing relationship: no commitment, no future, only humiliating dependency while he controlled virtually every aspect of her life. She tried to imagine living at Ballybawn, working for him, reliant on his goodwill but also sharing his bed when he was in Ireland. Agonised but angry hurt cut through Kerry, because he could not have made a more offensive offer had he tried. It would just be a convenient arrangement for casual sex. Scarcely a proposition likely to appeal to a woman who had once hoped to marry him. Yet again, Kerry was being forced to face the reality that Luciano was still very, very angry with her and now she was also realising that he might well be set on levelling the score. That he had just succeeded beyond his wildest dreams was a truth that she hoped to have the strength to keep to herself.
An hour later, sluiced clean of lake water but still unamused by the recollection, Luciano discovered that he could not even charge his laptop in the library because the lead would not plug into the elderly electrical socket. He was in the act of turning the air blue with Italian invective when he glanced up and froze in astonishment at the sight of the crowd of strangers watching him from the doorway.
Kerry stepped forward. ‘This is Mr da Valenza, the new owner of Ballybawn Castle.’
She had brought in a bunch of tourists to gape at him as if he were a zoo animal! He couldn’t believe she was doing that to him! What was more, Luciano recognised with raw incredulity, the visitors were awarding him a concerted look of disapproval as if nobody other than an O’Brien had the right to own the castle. Much as if he had not been there, Kerry went on to talk about the woodcarver responsible for the bookshelves and draw attention to the superb plasterwork ceiling before leading the group out again. Luciano frowned as he studied the same shelving and ceiling, noting for the first time and with some surprise that, although in need of professional attention, both were indeed worthy of note.
Kerry only breathed again when she was back in the corridor. At their entry, Luciano had looked up, lean, dark, handsome features impatient, golden eyes bright with annoyance below black spiky lashes. Her heart had jumped as though he had squeezed it, and so powerful and instantaneous had been the surge of tormented longing inside her that she had felt dizzy. In remembrance, she trembled and almost lost the thread of her speech in the next room. A little subconscious voice that she would have done anything to silence whispered that perhaps she had been too hasty in rejecting his proposition. How, after all, did she attach conditions when she had given herself so freely only hours before? But if Luciano could not even leave the vague possibility of a future open, what point was there in risking such hurt again?
But wasn’t she already hurt? To be plunged from happiness back down into despair and regret and self-loathing again? Last night she had not required reassurance, for she had believed in her heart that Luciano was on the way back to being hers again. How much more gullible could a woman be? To place sexual desire on a level with caring? To ignore the obvious fact that what she had once withheld, he had smoothly persuaded her to surrender?
