CHAPTER NINE
WITH A GROWING sense of awe, Belle studied the laptop pictures of the latest London property details sent for their perusal by the consultant hired by Cristo. Cristo had told Belle simply to pick a house, as his penthouse apartment was too small to house her family. He had very little interest in what his new home would be like, having merely specified a room to house an office and sufficient space in which to entertain. Belle was staggered, not only by the sheer meteoric cost and superb appointments of the elite properties tendered to them, but also by the level of responsibility Cristo had entrusted her with.
At the same time, she would have been the first to admit that during the past weeks in Italy their relationship had changed out of all recognition. Most mornings she helped Cristo catch up in the office. After that they would spend the rest of the day exploring, eating out, swimming, generally just relaxing and often with Franco in tow. And equally often they would sit out until very late talking over guttering candles on the terrace where they usually dined. A dreamy expression clouded Belle’s eyes in tune with the increasing sense of security that she was feeling in her new life. Nothing seemed that daunting with Cristo by her side. No, not even his mother, Princess Giulia, who had arrived with his stepfather, Henri Montaldo, with very little warning only the day before. Belle’s mother-in-law had literally shrieked in infuriated horror once she finally grasped the identity of the woman whom her one and only child had married.
‘What are the children of this unscrupulous Irish woman to do with you?’ the princess, an imperious, ageless little brunette dressed in the latest fashion, had demanded in outrage of her son.
‘They are my family,’ Cristo had responded quietly and Belle’s chest had swelled with pride, for she knew what an achievement it was that he had now moved beyond his original feelings to regard her siblings in that just and unselfish light.
And the battle between mother and son had then switched to incomprehensible volleys of furious Italian while Belle offered Cristo’s stepfather, Henri, a mild-mannered man, coffee and tried to pretend that she wasn’t aware that his wife was undoubtedly engaged in attacking Belle’s late parent, Mary, for the reckless choices she had made in life.
‘Gaetano is Giulia’s one blind spot,’ Henri had remarked ruefully under cover of the argument raging back and forth between mother and son. ‘He was the love of her life.’
‘Yet you’ve been together...?’ Belle had begun awkwardly.
‘Since Cristo was a toddler,’ Henri had confirmed in the same even, accepting manner. ‘Don’t worry about this. Cristo will settle it. He knows how to handle his mother.’
By the time the coffee was being served, the argument had become a much less tense discussion laced with Henri’s soothing comments, and Belle swiftly recognised that Cristo both liked and respected his stepfather. Indeed by the time the volatile princess had departed, the older woman had recovered her mood to the extent of ruffling Franco’s black curly hair, remarking what a very handsome little boy he was and kissing Belle on both cheeks and welcoming her to the family. The threat of lingering bad feelings that Belle had feared might result from such an encounter had been successfully averted.
‘So, as you witnessed this afternoon, everybody gets embarrassed when it comes to family members,’ Cristo had remarked in bed the night before while she still lay boneless and weak with drowning contentment in the circle of his arms. ‘My mother has a very short fuse. She loses her head and throws scenes.’
‘But she calms back down again and she doesn’t hold spite,’ Belle pointed out lightly. ‘That’s a plus.’
‘I didn’t want her to upset you, bellezza mia,’ Cristo admitted. ‘It’s more than a quarter of a century since she divorced Gaetano and, let’s face it, what he did after that and who he did it with is none of her business.’
‘But at one time she obviously cared a lot for him,’ Belle mused, drowsily settling her head down on his smooth bronzed shoulder, breathing in the scent of him in a state of sublime relaxation. ‘And his infidelity and his lies must have hurt her enormously. A woman would’ve needed to be hard as a rock or wilfully blind like my mother to handle Gaetano without getting chewed up into little pieces.’
‘I’ll always be honest with you,’ Cristo declared, long tanned fingers skimming her tousled curls back from her brow as he looked down at her, dark eyes sexy gold below the stunning black of his luxuriant lashes. ‘I can promise you that much.’
That was a big promise and an even bigger temptation, Belle reflected sleepily. She knew she ought to ask him about the photo in his wallet but just at that moment when she felt deliciously happy and comfortable felt like the wrong moment and she kicked the idea back out of her head with relief. No man had ever made her feel secure the way Cristo did, she conceded blissfully. She would ask him some time soon and would no doubt quickly learn that she had been agonising over nothing. Perhaps he had had the photo for some reason and had simply forgotten he still had it...
Recalling that thought, Belle drifted back to the present to find Cristo on the pool terrace regarding her where she reclined in the shade with an abandoned book, his amusement unhidden. ‘You were a thousand miles away.’
‘So, I daydream sometimes,’ Belle parried, studying him with helpless appreciation: a lithe sun-bronzed god of a male, lean, powerful frame garbed in black jeans and a white tee. His breathtaking good looks still enthralled her but then she wasn’t the only one looking, she recognised with pleasure as Cristo’s gaze whipped with flattering appreciation over her bikini-clad curves. ‘Were you looking for me?’
‘Sì.’ Cristo hesitated. ‘I’m flying the rest of your family here this afternoon.’
Brow furrowed in surprise, Belle sat up. ‘What are you talking about?’
‘I’ve been warned that the story about Gaetano and his children by your mother will be published tomorrow, so I’m taking your grandmother and the children out of harm’s way and over here where no one will bother them.’
Thrown off balance by that terse explanation, Belle exclaimed, ‘When did you decide to do that? My gran as well? They won’t want to come at such short notice, for goodness’ sake.’
‘Bruno’s bored stiff at home over the summer and counting the hours. I Skyped him and he believes he will like the Umbrian landscape,’ Cristo supplied with a decided hint of one-upmanship.
‘You Skyped him?’ Belle gasped in complete disconcertion.
‘I alerted your grandmother to the situation last week. She’s now only awaiting your call to reassure her that they won’t be intruding on us,’ Cristo completed.
‘But she never said a word when I last spoke to her...’ Belle’s voice trailed away, for she could scarcely recall what she had discussed with the older woman during that call and would have been the first to admit that her concentration hadn’t been what it was of late. More and more her entire world seemed to be defined by the closed little world she inhabited with Cristo, where nothing else seemed to matter very much.
‘She didn’t want to worry you, so will you ring her and assure her they’re all welcome and that we have plenty of space for them?’ Cristo prompted. ‘The experience of having the paparazzi on the doorstep would be traumatic for the children.’
Pale and dismayed at the threat of her family being exposed to that kind of rude and humiliating attention, Belle was propelled straight off the lounger and back indoors.
When she phoned her grandmother, Isa was her usual calm and logical self. ‘Whatever happens we’ll weather it the way we’ve weathered everything else. You don’t have to bring us to Italy,’ she declared staunchly.
‘I’m dying to see you all again. I know it’s only been a few weeks but it feels more like months,’ Belle confided truthfully. ‘And Franco keeps on asking for you all.’
‘Newly married couples need privacy and five children and a granny are going to put quite a dent in that,’ Isa forecast ruefully.
‘You’re family—that’s different,’ Belle protested. ‘And I’ve missed you all so much.’
And that was true, regardless of her contentment with Cristo, she acknowledged. In fact her time away from the family had already taught her how much she had taken their presence for granted before her marriage and how much she had since missed the warm hurly-burly of their home and her grandmother’s soothing support.
With her family’s coming visit confirmed, Belle went off to consult Umberto about where everyone was to sleep and discovered that Cristo had already spoken to him on the subject the week before. Isa suffered from arthritic knees and sometimes found stairs a challenge and Belle was further disconcerted to learn that a room downstairs that opened out on a seating area on the terrace had already been set up for the older woman’s occupation.
‘When did you organise the room for Isa?’ Belle asked Cristo curiously as she came to a halt in the doorway of his office.
‘As soon as I knew she was coming, bellezza mia. My grandmother also preferred ground-floor accommodation,’ Cristo told her quietly.
Belle collided with his spectacular dark heavily fringed eyes and her heart hammered behind her breastbone. ‘Is your grandmother still alive?’
‘No. She died the summer after I graduated but she was very much a part of my life when I was younger,’ Cristo admitted.
‘How does your brother Zarif feel about the news article that’s about to be published?’ Belle asked worriedly. ‘I know how worried you were about the effect it might have on him.’
‘Zarif never panics and he believes that such a juicy story was always going to escape into the public domain. He says he’ll ride it out.’
In receipt of that assurance, Belle felt a little of her tension evaporate. She wanted to ask Cristo if he now felt that he had married her for nothing. After all, he had married her to bury that story and the safeguard hadn’t worked. ‘That’s good.’
Cristo sprang upright, his attention pinned to Belle’s pensive face, the sparkle in her eyes and the ripe curve of her mouth. ‘You’re happy your family’s coming to stay, aren’t you?’
Belle cast off her insecurities and a grin relaxed her mouth. ‘Yes. I’ve missed them a lot.’
‘I really didn’t appreciate how close you all were. Growing up, I was strictly an only child. I first met my half-brothers when I was a teenager and only then because my stepfather argued in favour of it.’
Within hours, Cristo received an emailed copy of the article that was to be published in a leading tabloid newspaper the following day.
‘You’ve been immortalised in print!’ Cristo growled from the doorway of the bedroom where Belle was putting a pile of fashion magazines in place for her younger sister, Lucia. A dark flush had overlaid his hard cheekbones and his eyes were bright with anger.
Belle whirled round to study him the instant she glimpsed the papers that he was angrily burnishing. ‘I beg your pardon?’
Her heart in her mouth, she stared down at the email he’d printed out, spread flat on the table beside her. The headline ‘Ravelli’s Secret Irish Family’ spelt out the facts and shock reverberated through Belle when she saw the number of photos in the spread, not least the one of her clad in her wedding gown, which looked rather as though it might have been taken by a camera phone outside the chapel on the day. The main picture, however, was of her pregnant mother and her siblings taken at a local fair shortly before Franco’s birth. There was even a small snap of her grandmother.
‘So, the story really is going to be printed... I’m so sorry. I know how you felt about this,’ Belle breathed heavily.
‘But how dare they publish a photo of you?’ Cristo demanded in a raw undertone, stabbing the offending item with a blunt forefinger. ‘Smearing you with Gaetano’s sleaze as if you had anything to do with your mother’s choices!’
Disconcerted by the focus of his rage, Belle swallowed hard. ‘Who was it who talked to the press?’
‘Gaetano’s former driver.’
Belle was hurriedly reading the article, noting with relief that her grandmother was referred to as ‘well-respected’ and that she was merely mentioned as Mary’s ‘recently married’ daughter. ‘Luckily nobody seems to have made the connection that I got married to a Ravelli,’ she remarked in astonishment. ‘In fact there’s no reference to you at all—’
‘Isn’t there?’ Frowning in surprise at that news, Cristo bent to scan the blurred newsprint. ‘Well, that’s something at least.’
‘And it doesn’t say anything that isn’t true. I mean, Gaetano was married throughout most of their affair and my mother wasn’t the only woman in his life at the time.’ Belle breathed in deep, colliding head-on with his burnished gaze and feeling her tummy flip in response. ‘You know, I think the article could have been a lot nastier in tone than this is.’
‘I just don’t like you being soiled with Gaetano’s sleaze,’ Cristo admitted in a roughened undertone while he ran an admiring finger along the softened line of her generous mouth. ‘But I suppose you’re right and if Zarif can handle the fallout, we certainly can.’
Almost of their own volition her lips parted and she laved his fingertip with the tip of her tongue. His lashes lowered, his semi-screened eyes flashing burning gold and scorchingly light against his bronzed skin as he hauled her into his arms and covered her mouth hungrily with his own. Excitement flared through Belle’s slender body like a storm warning and the instant surge of desire stirred a sharp ache between her thighs.
‘I want you,’ Cristo ground out against her swollen lips, arching her into him with an imprisoning hand splayed across her hips, ensuring that she was fully aware of his arousal.
Belle lifted an unsteady hand to his lean dark face and her fingertips traced a hard masculine cheekbone in a helpless caress. ‘Well, I’m not doing anything else...’ she whispered teasingly, hot as an inferno inside her own skin and literally weak with longing.
He took that invitation with a thoroughness she could only appreciate. Lifting her in his arms, he took her back to their bedroom. Her heated bare skin revelled in the brush of the cool, crisp linen on the bed when he tossed the sheets back. She was excited by the crushing weight of her lover and his forcefulness as he stretched her arms above her head, her wrists gripped between the fingers of one strong hand, and ravished her mouth erotically with his own. Between the sheets, Cristo was dominant and she rejoiced in that aspect of him. Her heart thundered in her ears as he stroked and teased the tender tissue between her thighs, her slender spine arching in helpless delight as he took advantage of the welcome offered by the honeyed dampness of her sensitive flesh.
When Cristo flipped her over onto her knees, a sound of surprise was wrenched from her and then, before she could say or do anything, he was driving into her hard and fast, stretching her with shocking fullness, every entry and withdrawal perfectly timed to deliver the maximum possible pleasure. Insane excitement roared through Belle like a hungry fire, burning up every thought in the heat of the flames. She was out of control, lost in sensation, a slave to the delight. Her body raced to the climax it craved and she cried out in pure ecstasy, hearing his answering groan. Afterwards she collapsed in a heap on the bed, her muscles like jelly, her breath still hissing in and out of her gasping throat as she struggled to reason and speak again.
‘Did I ever tell you how fantastic you are in bed, bella mia?’ Cristo husked, pulling her back against his hard, damp body, his broad chest still heaving from the exertion of their encounter.
‘Maybe you’ve mentioned it once or twice.’ A smile as old as Eve curved Belle’s reddened mouth because it made her feel good that he could think that even in the light of his much greater sexual experience.
Black hair wildly tousled, Cristo rubbed a stubbled jaw across a slim, smooth shoulder and murmured earthily, ‘I can’t keep my hands off you...you’re killing me.’
Belle laughed softly and curved round him, every possessive urge in her body thrumming on full charge. She was happy, so happy that the horrible newspaper article hadn’t rocked their relationship as she’d once feared, but still a sense of unease niggled in the back of her mind. The moment she looked for it, that tiny little seed of doubt about Cristo and Betsy refused to stay buried any longer. She wanted, no, she needed to know the truth, which she was convinced would be entirely non-threatening in reality.
‘Why do you carry a photo of your brother’s wife in your wallet?’ Belle lifted her head to ask, the question as bold and instinctive on her lips as it was in her mind.