Enemies at the Altar (5 page)

‘No, you haven’t, have you?’ he said, still studying her intently.

Sienna picked up the wine he had poured for her earlier. ‘So, I take it we’re not going on a honeymoon?’ she said before taking a sip.

‘On the contrary,’ he said, ‘I thought we should go to Provence. It’s a perfect opportunity to pretend we are taking some time together. I want to see how the Chateau de Chalvy estate is being run. My father appointed a husband and wife team to manage it quite a few years back. I’d like to reacquaint myself with them.’

‘Why don’t you go on your own?’ Sienna said. ‘It’s not as if you really need me to tag along. I’ll only get in the way or say something I shouldn’t or dress inappropriately.’

‘Sienna, we are getting married tomorrow,’ he said with an expressive roll of his eyes. ‘People will think it highly unusual if within hours of the ceremony we go our separate ways. That’s not how newly married couples behave.’

‘But what about Scraps?’ she asked. ‘I can’t just leave him. I’ve only just got him to trust me. He probably won’t take food off Franco or Elena. He might starve or run away again.’ She narrowed her gaze at him pointedly and added, ‘Or get shot.’

Andreas let out a breath. ‘Is that mangy-looking mongrel really that important to you?’

‘Yes,’ Sienna said. ‘I’ve never had a pet before. I was
never allowed to have one because we always lived in a flat or other people’s houses. I’ve always wanted my own dog. Dogs don’t judge you. They love you no matter how little or much money you have and they don’t give a toss about whether or not you come from a posh suburb or a trailer park. I’ve always wanted to be …’ She suddenly checked herself. God, how embarrassing. What was she thinking, blurting out all those heartfelt longings as if she was a soppy fool?

Andreas was looking at her quizzically. It was the sort of look that suggested he was seeing much more than she wanted him to see.

Sienna lifted a shoulder in an indifferent shrug as she took another sip of her wine. ‘Now that I think of it, maybe Elena could toss him a bone or two,’ she said. ‘I won’t be able to take him with me when I leave in six months, anyway. Best not to get too attached.’

‘Why won’t you be able to take him with you?’ Andreas asked, frowning slightly.

‘I want to travel,’ Sienna said. ‘I don’t want to be tied down. I’ll have enough money by then to go where I want when I want. It’s what I’ve always dreamed of doing. Having no responsibilities other than to please myself. That’s what I’d call the perfect life.’

‘It sounds rather pointless and shallow to me,’ he said. ‘Don’t you want more for your life than a never ending holiday?’

‘Nope,’ Sienna said. ‘Give me nine to five partying any day, as long as someone else is paying for it.’

A muscle worked like a hammer at the side of his mouth, while his eyes had gone all hard and glittery. ‘You really are a piece of work, aren’t you?’

‘That’s me,’ Sienna said, draining her wine glass
before holding it out to him. ‘Can you pour me another one?’

Andreas threw her a disgusted look. ‘Get it yourself,’ he said and strode out of the
salone
, snapping the door shut behind him.

The following morning Elena arrived earlier than usual to help Sienna prepare for the ceremony. She bustled about like a mother hen, gushing about how beautiful Sienna looked as she dressed in a slim-fitting cream dress, the purchase of which had hit Andreas’s credit card a little more heavily than Sienna cared to think about.

‘Signor Ferrante is going to be … how you say?’ Elena said. ‘Knocked out by you,
sì
?’

Sienna gave the housekeeper what she hoped passed for a convincing smile. ‘I’ll be glad when this bit is over,’ she said, smoothing a hand over her abdomen. ‘My stomach feels like a hive of bees.’

‘Wedding jitters,’ Elena said reassuringly. ‘It happens to every bride.’

Sienna didn’t feel like a bride. She felt like a fraud. She thought of her twin sister preparing for her big day with Emilio and she felt a twinge of something that felt very much like pain. When she was a little girl she had dreamed of a white wedding with all the trimmings: a church filled with fragrant flowers, with bridesmaids and flower girls and a cute little ring-bearer. She had envisaged a horse-drawn carriage and footmen just like Cinderella. She had imagined a handsome husband who would look down at her as he lifted back her veil with such love and adoration that her heart would swell like a balloon.

But then her dreams and reality had always had a problem socialising.

‘Come,’ Elena said. ‘Franco has brought the car around. It’s time to leave.’

Andreas was waiting at the foot of the stairs when Sienna came down. He hadn’t been sure what to expect. He had wondered if she would appear in her signature torn denim or a ridiculously short skirt or even bare feet. He hadn’t been expecting a vision in designer cream satin that was so stylish and yet so elegantly simple it quite literally took his breath away.

Her silver-blonde hair was up in a classic French roll that showed off her swan-like neck to perfection. Her make-up was understated but somehow it worked brilliantly to showcase the luminosity of her flawless skin. Her grey-blue eyes had a hint of eye shadow and her lashes were long and lustrous with mascara. Her model-like cheekbones were defined by a subtle sweep of bronzer and her lips adorned with a glisten of pink-tinted lipgloss.

The only thing she lacked was jewellery.

An elbow of remorse nudged him in the ribs. He should have thought to buy her something but he had assumed she would spend up big all by herself since he had given her carte blanche on the credit card he had issued her with.

‘You look magnificent,’ he said. ‘I don’t think I’ve ever seen you look quite so beautiful.’

‘Amazing what a bit of money splashed around can do,’ she said in a flippant tone. ‘You don’t want to know what this dress cost. And don’t get me started on the shoes.’

He took her hand as she stepped from the last stair, a smile tugging at the corners of his mouth. ‘At least you’re wearing them,’ he said. ‘I was wondering if you might go without.’

‘Watch this space,’ she said with a wry twist of her mouth. ‘These are what I call car-to-the-bar shoes. They’re not meant for walking unless you want to end up with seriously deformed toes.’

Andreas was aware of Elena and Franco hovering in the background, looking suspiciously like the proud parents of the bride. In the space of a week Sienna had charmed them, along with the feral dog. She certainly had a way about her that was unlike any other woman he had associated with before. But then she was very good at fooling people into believing she was all sweetness and light, when underneath that friendly façade was a cold and calculating little madam who—like her mangy dog—could lash out and bite when you were least expecting it.

Andreas turned to Franco. ‘Give us a few minutes, there’s something I have to give Sienna before we leave.’

‘Sì, signor.’

‘Come,’ Andreas said to Sienna, leading her by the hand towards his study. ‘I have something for you.’

‘God, my feet are already killing me,’ Sienna said, click-clacking beside him.

‘This won’t take long,’ Andreas said, closing the door once they were inside the study.

‘Have you bought me a present?’ she asked with bright interest in her eyes.

Another sharp elbow of guilt nudged him. ‘No,’ he said. He opened the safe and took out the box that contained
a pearl and diamond necklace and matching droplet earrings. ‘These are just on loan.’

‘They’re beautiful,’ Sienna said, peering at them for a moment before straightening. ‘But if you bought them for your ex, then forget about it. I’d rather go without.’

Andreas lifted the necklace off its bed of maroon velvet. ‘These belonged to my mother,’ he said. ‘She wore them on her wedding day.’

She looked at the jewels without touching them. ‘I’m not sure your mother would appreciate me wearing her jewellery.’ She raised her eyes to his. ‘It seems a bit … tacky, given the circumstances, don’t you think?’

Andreas rolled his thumb over one of the pearls as he looked at her. ‘Every Ferrante bride has worn them,’ he said. ‘They are a family heirloom.’

‘Oh … well, then,’ she said, turning her back to him. ‘That’s different. I wouldn’t want to break with tradition or anything.’

Andreas fastened the necklace around her neck, his fingers fumbling over the catch as his skin came into contact with the silk of hers. ‘You smell nice,’ he said. ‘Is that a new perfume?’

‘If you wanted me to stick to a budget then you should have said so,’ she said, turning around to scowl at him.

Andreas handed her the earrings. ‘I think you’ve shown remarkable restraint,’ he said. ‘But then it’s early days yet.’

She clipped on the earrings, still giving him the evil eye as she did so. ‘There,’ she said once she was done. ‘How do I look?’

‘Breathtaking,’ he said.

‘Good,’ she said. ‘It’s not every day a girl like me
gets to marry a billionaire. I want to make the most of every single minute of it.’

Andreas held open the door, his jaw set in a tight line.
Not if I can help it
, he said beneath his breath as she sashayed past him.

Sienna had thought her marriage ceremony to Brian Littlemore had been a bit on the sterile and impersonal side but it had nothing on the clinical detachment of the service Andreas had organised. The vows were nothing like the ones she had composed in her girlish dreams. They were stilted and formal and she’d even been forced to say the O word. Obey.

She was fuming by the time it was almost over. Her lips felt as if they’d been stitched in place. Her teeth were half a centimetre down from grinding and her back was rigid with tension.

‘You may kiss the bride.’

The words jolted her out of her simmering fury. ‘I don’t think—’

Andreas drew her closer, one of his hands in the small of her back, the other holding the hand that had not long ago received the slim gold band that now bound her to him as his wife. ‘Relax,
ma chèrie
,’ he said in an undertone. ‘This one is for the cameras.’

‘What cam—?’

A flash went off but it wasn’t from any lurking cameras. It was a flare inside Sienna’s brain that almost took the top of her head off. As soon as Andreas’s lips touched down on hers she felt a tectonic shift of her equilibrium. The world seemed to tilt on its axis.

His lips were firm and yet soft.

Warm and yet dry.

He tasted of … she wasn’t quite sure. It was something she had never tasted before and yet it was incredibly addictive.

She wanted more.

She
craved
more.

Her hands went to the front of his chest. She could feel his heart thudding beneath her palm. It mimicked the erratic rhythm of hers. He felt warm and male and vital. He felt strong and capable and arrantly potent.

His tongue stroked along the seam of her lips, a bold and commanding stroke that didn’t ask permission for entry, but rather
demanded
it.

She opened to him on a soft little whimper, her stomach dropping in delight as his tongue deftly found hers. She felt the stirring of his arousal, the hot, hard length of him swelling against her as his mouth wreaked sensual havoc on hers. She moved closer, an instinctive, almost involuntary shift against him that evoked a husky-sounding groan from his throat as he deepened the kiss even further.

‘Ahem …’ The celebrant cleared his throat. ‘I have another ceremony in five minutes.’

Sienna stepped out of Andreas’s hold, her heart still galloping like a racehorse on steroids. Her mouth was tingling, every nerve alive with feeling, her lips swollen and sensitive from the pressure of his. She ran the tip of her tongue over them and tasted his hot male potency. Her stomach gave another tripping movement as she looked up at his darkly hooded gaze …

A flash went off but this time it was the surge of the paparazzi.

‘Looks like it’s show time,’ Andreas said grimly and,
taking her hand in his, led her towards the pack of journalists and photographers.

Sienna’s emotions were in such turmoil she didn’t want to examine them too closely. She had responded with such wantonness to Andreas. She had forgotten everything but the feel of his mouth on hers. The whole world had ceased to exist in that heart-stopping moment when he had kissed her with such fiery passion and intent. She had felt the primal rhythm of his blood through the surface of his lips. She hadn’t wanted the kiss to end. Her insides were still trembling from the sensual onslaught of being in his arms.

It was at least an hour before they could escape. Her face felt stiff from all the fake smiling. Her head was aching and her feet were throbbing by the time they got back to where Franco was waiting for them in the car.

‘That went remarkably well,’ Andreas said once the partition between the driver and the passenger section was closed.

‘You think?’ Sienna bent down to prise off her shoes. ‘Ouch! I’ve got blisters.’

‘Elena will probably have an intimate dinner set up for us back at the villa,’ he said. ‘She’s a hopeless romantic so just go along with it.’

‘She reminds me of my flatmate Kate back in London,’ Sienna said, closing her eyes and flinging her head back against the headrest in bone-aching fatigue. ‘She thinks you’re going to fall in love with me before the end of this and beg me to stay with you for ever.’

‘I hope you put her straight on that.’

‘I did,’ she said flatly. ‘She forgot to factor in the fact that I wouldn’t stay on even if you paid me.’

Andreas gave a mocking laugh. ‘If the price was right you’d stay.’

Sienna turned her head on the headrest to glare at him. ‘Even you don’t have enough money to buy me, Rich Boy,’ she said. ‘And, just for the record, I am
not
going to obey you.’

He gave her a supercilious smile. ‘You just promised to do so in front of a legally appointed celebrant.’

‘I don’t care,’ she said, throwing her head back and closing her eyes again. ‘I am
not
going to bend to your will.’

‘So what was that kiss all about?’ he asked.