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“I see.” Carlo pushed back in his chair, wondering if it was possible to be any angrier with his ex-wife. “Ignore what Jane has said, Anna. She will, of course, be joining me. She is my guest, and I expect it of her.”
“Si, sir.” Anna disconnected the call, and returned to preparing the feast. It was right that Jane was home. She was no guest at Villa Vista. She was its mistress. She belonged to the home as well as the furnishings. If Anna had her way, Jane would be staying.
* * *
Carlo paused outside Jane’s door, his face dark as he waited for his temper to cool. “What is it?” Jane pulled her bedroom door inwards, a book clasped in her fingers.
He made a noise of frustration and walked past her. “Anna says you do not want to eat with me.”
Jane gaped at him, her eyes wide as he prowled across the room. Slowly, she marked the corner of her page and laid the book down on the dressing table. “She does, does she?” Traitor, Jane thought inwardly. Though she knew Anna would have had the best of intentions, her interference was incredibly unwanted.
“I know you will not want to offend her. She has gone to a lot of effort to create your favourite meals for our dinner.”
Jane nodded slowly. “And I appreciate it. I will come to the kitchen when I’m hungry and help myself.”
Carlo’s scowl deepened. “Are you so afraid of me that you cannot sit across a table?”
Jane ground her teeth. “I am not afraid of you in the slightest.” Only the way her body responded to his, but that was something completely different altogether.
“Good. Then you will eat with me.”
Jane felt like she was being handled by a master manipulator. “No, I won’t.”
“Then you are afraid of me.”
“Not at all. Why does this matter so much to you?” She turned it back on him, her arms crossed over her slender chest.
“Because it is dinner. You need to eat. I need to eat. So why not eat together?”
“I can count on one hand the number of times we had dinner together when we were married, that’s why,” she responded, her temper spiking. “Do you want to know why Anna and I get on so well? Because I helped myself to food from the kitchen almost every night that we were married. While you were off God knows where and with whom, I spent time with your housekeeper.”
Carlo would not justify his absence to his wife. “I always came to you after.”
“After what?” She asked hotly, remembering the fear she’d experienced during their marriage. That he was out making love to other women, while she pined for him from the luxurious comfort of his Villa.
“When I got home,” he corrected. “You did not complain while we were in bed.”
She lifted a hand in the universal sign of ‘stop’. “We’ve proved that point already. You can let it go.” She gnawed at her lower lip. “In bed, I have no self-control. I’m weak where you’re concerned and I guess I always will be. That doesn’t mean I want to feel that way. That doesn’t mean I like you now. That I want anything to do with you.”
He nodded grimly. “And yet here we are.”
“I don’t even know why I’m here,” she groaned.
“Because you’re in danger, cara. And if you know anything about me, you know that I will keep you safe. If it means taking a bullet for you, I will do it.”
Jane’s heart turned over at his statement. Her whole body felt oddly contorted. “Why?” She asked, finally, her expression blank of comprehension.
“Because you were my wife.”
“I was your wife,” she agreed angrily. “I’m not now. I’m no longer your problem.”
His smile was loaded with emotion. “Believe it or not, I never considered you a problem.”
Jane closed her eyes. “Please don’t.” His anger she could meet, for her own anger surely matched it. But his kindness would be her undoing. Desperate to end their conversation, she blinked up at him. “I’ll have dinner with you.” Please, just go now, she urged silently.
He did, but it made no difference. She still felt absolutely miserable.
At least when she joined him for dinner later that evening, she had managed to boss her emotions back into line. After a soak in the enormous bath, she’d pulled on one of the outfits
