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She moved aside to make way for the next guest and took a glass of champagne from a passing waitress. Raising the glass to her lips, she drank more quickly than normal—but the quick hit of fizzy wine made rebellion begin to simmer inside her as she walked towards the reception. Why should she allow herself to be intimidated by Dante D’Arezzo when she was strong enough to stand up to him? She was an independent woman, wasn’t she? Not some little mouse. If she ran into him at the recept
ion—and that was a big if, since she intended to stay as far away from him as possible—then she would stonewall him, just as she’d managed to do outside the church today.
She looked around. Guests were beginning to file into the vast banqueting hall which had been laid with individual tables. The golden and white room was hung with chandeliers, blazing splintering light over the heirloom crystal and silver. Here there were more pillars, all woven with ivy and spring flowers, and Justina had the sense of having walked into an enchanted glade where anything could happen.
She found her name on the seating plan, pleased to discover that she was sandwiched between a brigadier-general—which meant that he would probably be about eighty—and a Lord Aston, who she’d never heard of. But her main source of pleasure came from the fact that she was nowhere near Dante. At least Roxy had been diplomatic enough to seat them on opposite sides of the room.
She made her way across the shiny floor of the banqueting hall towards her table, but her extra-high heels and her cheongsam dress meant that all her attention was focussed on making the journey without mishap. She wasn’t really paying attention to the other guests who were taking their places, and it wasn’t until an olive hand reached over to pull out her chair that some internal warning system began to sound.
Justina froze with a terrible sense of inevitability as she looked down into the brilliant dark gaze of the man she had once thought would be her husband.
CHAPTER TWO
HER HEART RACING with fury and an unwanted kind of excitement, Justina stared into Dante’s dark face—wishing she could wipe that supercilious smile from his lips. ‘What the hell are you doing here?’ she said viciously, and an
emerald-decked redhead sitting opposite jerked up her head in surprise.
‘Do keep your voice down, Justina,’ he said. ‘This is an aristocratic wedding where name-calling will almost certainly not be tolerated.’
Justina could have shaken him. Or punched against that solid wall of a chest. Or...something. Something which involved stamping her foot like a child and demanding that he be removed from her proximity as quickly as possible. As it was, she could do little except sit down in the chair which he was now pulling out for her. Because he was right. This was the wedding of one of her oldest friends and she could hardly cause a scene by demanding that she be moved to a different seat, could she?
He had risen to his feet and was helping her into her chair, his fingers briefly brushing over her shoulders before he slid into the vacant chair beside her.
She turned to look at him, careful to keep her voice low even though she could feel her nerve ends screaming in response to that unexpected touch of his hands. ‘I’m surprised you even know the meaning of the word “tolerate”,’ she said. ‘How did you manage to get here before me when I was on the first bus?’
‘I drove.’
Justina nodded. He’d driven. Of course he had. Could she really imagine him obediently trooping onto the transport provided like everybody else? He was the ultimate control freak, and whatever happened it always had to be on his terms.
She sucked in a deep breath. ‘What I don’t understand is why you happen to be sitting here?’
‘For exactly the same reason as you, I imagine. Waiting for the wedding breakfast to begin, and with it the opportunity to toast the bride and groom and wish them many happy years of wedded bliss.’
‘Please don’t wilfully misunderstand me, Dante. That’s not what I meant and you know it.’ Reluctantly Justina’s eyes focussed on the hard planes of his face, which were softened only by the sensual curves of his lips. She saw the faint shadow at his jaw which always appeared, no matter how often he shaved.
Why did he have to be so damned sexy? she thought. And why was her traitorous body reacting so hungrily to him as she breathed in his warm and earthy scent?
‘I looked at the table plan and your name was nowhere near mine. I was just celebrating my good fortune at such a sympathetic placement and now I find you next to me. So how did that happen, Dante?’
‘Simple. I changed the names,’ he said unrepentantly.
Justina glared at him. How could she have forgotten his high-handedness? That way he had of just blazing in and taking whatever it was he wanted as if the world was just one giant boardroom? ‘You can’t turn up at a posh society wedding and start rearranging the seating!’
‘I just did.’ He sat back in his seat and glittered her a lazy smile. ‘And since no one else has a problem with it I suggest you go with the flow and enjoy yourself.’
‘Enjoy myself? With you beside me? That’s a joke, right?’ She bent to put her bag on the floor, mainly in an attempt to disguise the sudden tremble of her fingers. ‘If I wanted to spend the afternoon in the company of a snake I’d head for the nearest pit.’
Dante saw the mutinous look on her face as she lifted her head again and for a moment he almost smiled. How could he have forgotten her outrageous defiance—the only woman in the world who had not deferred to his wishes? Who had been determined to get her voice heard and insisted that her career was just as important as his.
For a while he had enjoyed their delicious battle of wills, with the subsequent make-up sessions which had been all about red-hot passion. Until he’d been forced to realise that she meant what she said. That her objections had not been some sustained sexual tease and that she had no intention of compromising her lifestyle after their marriage. She was a singer and a performer, she’d told him, and she’d been given opportunities which came along all too rarely. She’d told him she couldn’t—no—she wouldn’t turn them down. She’d also smilingly had the nerve to tell him to stop being such a dinosaur and to respect how important her career was. But behind her smile had been the definite glint of steel, and that had unsettled him. He remembered being furious and then—surprisingly—hurt. Until he’d forced himself to be grateful for his lucky escape. Because her attitude did not bode well for a long-term relationship with someone like him.
His thoughts cleared and he found himself looking into clear amber eyes which were framed so exquisitely by her dark lashes. He waited until their wine had been poured and then let his gaze linger on her bare left hand.
‘So. No wedding band. I note that you have not been as fortunate as your bandmate in the matrimonial stakes,’ he observed.
Pausing midmouthful of wine, Justina almost choked with indignation. ‘The matrimonial stakes! It’s not some kind of horse race!’
‘No?’ He shrugged. ‘But it is a race, all the same. Most women like to be in a permanent relationship by the time they’re your age because they are thinking about the inevitable ticking of their biological clock. What are you now, Justina? Thirty-one? Thirty-two?’
