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Tilly could imagine that. He had an effortless chicness about him that was completely ingrained. It wasn’t an affectation. He didn’t have to try. He was both masculine, wild, untamed and...handsome. Nothing about him screamed ostentation, yet he exuded power and wealth.
‘And you?’ he surprised her by asking.
Tilly almost lost her footing, but she righted herself before he felt the need to intervene. ‘What about me?’
Out of nowhere she thought of Cressida. Cressida who was so visibly similar to her that Tilly had thought she was looking into a mirror the first time they’d met. Their red hair was long, their eyes green, their skin a similar colour—though Tilly’s tanned more easily. They were both of medium height, and though Tilly was naturally more curvaceous, Cressida had bought breast and rear enhancements two years earlier, making their figures almost matching.
‘I gather you’ve made an art form out of living fast and loose?’
Tilly frowned. As always, a whip of sorrow for the billion-dollar heiress flayed her. True, Cressida’s lifestyle was a masterpiece in modern-day debauchery, but Tilly somehow just understood her. And there was a lot more to the glamorous fashionista than partying. If only she’d let anyone see it.
‘Not really,’ she heard herself say. ‘The papers don’t always give me a fair shake.’
Now it was Rio’s turn to slow. He angled his face to study her profile. ‘Papers make up stories, but photos never lie.’
Her heart thumped hard against her chest. Had he seen photos of her? Could he tell the difference? For, as much as she and Cressida were uncannily similar, they were not the same person, and it was easy to see the differences when you set your mind to looking.
Though Tilly had an answer ready for that. She wasn’t wearing more than the bare minimum of make-up, and Cressida was never papped without a full face. Even her morning coffee run was completed in full glamour style. It was completely plausible to explain away the slight differences in their appearance by claiming a lack of cosmetic help. At least to a man, surely?
‘I think people look at photos of celebrities and see what they’re looking for,’ she said softly. ‘I could leave a nightclub at three in the morning, stone-cold sober, arm in arm with a guy I’ve been friends with for years, and the next thing you know I’m drunk and three months pregnant with his baby.’
She rolled her eyes, her outrage at such misreporting genuine. She’d personally placed enough calls to Art’s solicitor, lodging complaints and libel suits, to know how frequently Cressida was photographed and lambasted for something that was perfectly innocent.
‘Am I to feel sorry for you now?’
She lifted her face to his, her expression showing mutiny. ‘I don’t want sympathy.’
‘I can see that.’
She stepped over a jellyfish, marooned elegantly against the sand, its transparent body no longer capable of bobbing in the
depths of the ocean.
‘So you are not a wild, irresponsible party girl, then?’ he asked, his voice rich with disbelief.
Tilly shook her head, thinking of Cressida. She was everything Rio accused her of, and yet Tilly couldn’t stomach the idea of him looking at her and seeing Cressida.
‘I’m not just a party girl,’ she said after a beat had passed. ‘Honestly, I’m more comfortable somewhere like this. Somewhere away from the cameras and press. Somewhere I can just be by myself and read.’
Read? Hardly Cressida’s favourite pastime, but no matter. He wasn’t ever going to discover that fact for himself, was he?
‘It is hard for you to be alone when you’re in London?’
‘Yes,’ she said. But impersonating Cressida was wearing thin. ‘When did you buy this island?’
His eyes bobbed out to sea, chasing something invisible and transient on the horizon.
‘I recently acquired it,’ he said silkily, tweaking his response slightly to fit the facts.
‘And now you’re selling it?’
He nodded. ‘We’ve covered this.’
Her lips pulled downwards. ‘It just doesn’t make sense.’
‘On the contrary—it makes perfect sense. I own an island I do not need or want. Your father desperately wants an island of this size, within easy boat distance of the mainland, and he is prepared to pay the price I have stipulated. Provided you do not go back and report that the volcano is about to explode, I will no longer own Prim’amore in a matter of weeks.’
There was more to it. Tilly could almost feel the words he wasn’t saying; they were throbbing beneath her fingertips. But she needed patience to massage them to the surface.
