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At that moment Imma turned and smiled at him, her eyes bright with eagerness and pleasure at her part in the adventure, and he felt his heart jump, his body responding to her sudden and thrilling abandonment of the normal expected preliminaries.
Well, perhaps not all of them.
Remembering that this was supposed to be a seduction, he lifted her hand to his mouth, feeling her pulse dart under the skin like a minnow in a pond.
‘Will this thing make it to the mainland?’ he asked softly.
‘The mainland?’ she repeated.
He held her gaze, his eyebrow curving upward at the question in her voice.
He and Ciro had accepted that Buscetta would never countenance Vicenzu courting Imma. Plus, the second brother falling in love with his other daughter was so implausible it would almost certainly hint at some kind of plot, so they’d decided that it would be better to present him with a fait accompli.
His shoulders stiffened. Of course before he’d even thought about how he was going to make that happen Ciro, being Ciro, had already proposed to Claudia and started the process of arranging the paperwork for their marriage.
But seducing a woman was not something Vicè consciously did—normally it just happened. He had no idea how to cold-bloodedly reproduce that organic process, so he’d left it to the last minute—like he did everything else in his life.
Not that he’d told his uber-efficient brother that.
Arriving at the wedding, he’d decided to seduce Imma and then use his reputation as leverage for their marriage. It would be a delicate balancing act. She’d know he wouldn’t be Cesare’s choice for her husband. But nor would her father want her to be viewed as just another notch on Vicenzu’s bedpost. And obviously his plan wouldn’t work if they kept their liaison private, which was why he needed it to play out in public.
And where better to find maximum publicity than at his celebrity-studded hotel with its inbuilt entourage of photographers?
‘I thought I was taking you back to mine,’ he said.
‘To the Dolce Vita?’ She looked confused. ‘I thought you wanted to go somewhere private.’
Good point, he thought, his shoulders tensing.
It was a rookie error—except he wasn’t a rookie. As Ciro had so pointedly remarked earlier, this was supposed to be his area of expertise.
Glancing out of the window, he felt his pulse slow as he realised he’d made another error in assuming he was calling the shots. Imma might not be planning to go back to his hotel, but they were clearly not just flying in circles so...
‘I do,’ he said. He let his gaze linger on her face. ‘And I should have realised that totally rules out my hotel. But ever since you walked into that church behind your sister I haven’t been able to think straight.’
Watching her chew at her lip, he felt his heart kick against his ribs.
‘I’m guessing you have somewhere in mind,’ he said softly.
He felt her fingers move against his and, glancing down, was almost shocked to see her hand entwined with his. Holding hands was not his thing, but his parents had always done it and his ribs tightened as he pictured his mother sitting alone at the wedding. That was another crime to chalk up to Cesare Buscetta’s relentless greed.
But as he felt the ever-present trickle of anger start to rise and swell he pushed the memory away. His anger would wait. Right now he needed to focus on the task in hand.
Closing his grip around her fingers, he gently pulled her closer. ‘So where are you taking me?’
No doubt Imma had some favourite boutique hotel in mind—somewhere quiet, intimate—and actually that might work for him. They could lie low until he had her eating out of his hand, and then he could discreetly tip off the paparazzi.
He felt her gaze on his face.
‘Papà has a villa on Pantelleria...’
Pantelleria. Unlike most people in the world, he’d heard of the island—but, like most of the population, he’d never set foot on it. Why would he? It was basically a black volcanic speck in the Mediterranean between Sicily and Tunisia.
‘Right...’ He nodded, holding his easy smile in place. ‘Your father isn’t going to have a problem with that?’
She hesitated, her face tensing a little as though she was weighing up what to say next.
‘He bought it as a kind of hideaway, somewhere to get away from work—only he’s not very good about handing over the reins, so he never really goes there. But Claudia and I love it. It’s just so beautiful—and very private.’
