The Italian's Wife Read online

  The Italian's Wife

  Lynne Graham

  Synopsis:

  Abandoned by her boyfriend and family after the birth of her son, Holly

  Sansom collapses in the street. Rio Lombardi, M.D. of Lombardi

  Industries, comes to her rescue.

  Rio insists that Holly stay at his luxurious home, and proceeds to

  lavish her and her baby with all that money can buy. But Rio's emotions

  are caught off guard by Holly's natural charm and indifference to his

  wealth. In fact, Holly would make a perfect wife....

  3

  We're delighted to announce that is taking place in Harlequin Presents.

  This month, in THE ITALIAN'S WIFE by Lynne Graham:

  You are invited to the wedding of Rio Lombardi and Holly Sansom.

  When Holly, a homeless young woman, collapses in front of Rio Lombardi's

  limousine,

  he feels compelled to take her and her baby son home with him. Holly

  can't believe it

  when Rio lavishes her with food, clothes...and a wedding ring....

  Coming in July: A Mediterranean Marriage

  The Italian's Bride by Diana Hamilton

  4

  If you purchased this book without a cover you should be aware that this

  book is stolen property. It was reported as "unsold and destroyed" to

  the publisher, and neither the author nor the publisher has received any

  payment for this "stripped book."

  ISBN 0-373-12235-7

  THE ITALIAN'S WIFE

  First North American Publication 2002.

  Copyright ©2001 by Lynne Graham.

  All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or

  utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by any

  electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented,

  including xerography, photocopying and recording, or in any information

  storage or retrieval system, is forbidden without the written permission

  of the publisher, Harlequin Enterprises Limited, 225 Duncan Mill Road,

  Don Mills, Ontario, Canada M3B 3K9.

  All characters in this book have no existence outside the imagination of

  the author and have no relation whatsoever to anyone bearing the same

  name or names. They are not even distantly inspired by any individual

  known or unknown to the author, and all incidents are pure invention.

  This edition published by arrangement with Harlequin Books U.S.A.

  ®and TM are trademarks of the publisher. Trademarks indicated with ®are

  registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office, the

  Canadian Trade Marks Office and in other countries.

  Visit us at www.eHartequin.com Printed in U.S.A.

  5

  When Rio Lombardi finally heard the apartment door open, his handsome

  mouth quirked and he sprang upright. Christabel was in for a surprise.

  A breathless series of giggles and an urgent whisper which he didn't

  catch sounded from the hall, making him frown. Evidently, his fiancée

  had a friend in tow. That was the trouble with surprises, Rio

  acknowledged in exasperation: their very nature made them unreliable. He

  should've warned her that he might make it back to London a day early.

  Surrendering his fantasy of sweeping Christabel straight off to bed for

  a passionate reunion, Rio crossed the spacious lounge to announce his

  presence and make polite social chitchat instead.

  But the hall was already empty. A pair of kitten-heeled turquoise shoes

  and a pair of diamante-studded black satin mules lay abandoned on the

  carpet. Frowning a little at the suspicion that his fiancée might not be

  sober again, and now also wondering if he was about to break in on some

  cosy girly get-together, Rio strolled down the corridor to the bedroom.

  He'd intended to knock on the door but it was wide open and the sight

  which met his eyes was so shocking, so utterly unbelievable to him, that

  his lean hand froze in mid-air.

  Halfway out of her dress, Christabel was kissing... another woman, also

  half out of her dress. Paralysed to the threshold, Rio stared, his

  dark-as-midnight eyes totally refusing to accept what he was seeing.

  They were drunk, fooling about, he started to tell himself; maybe they

  6

  had realised he was in the apartment and were playing some stupid

  tasteless joke on him, But they were locked together, breast to breast,

  hip to hip, Christabel's glossy blonde hair mingling with the brunette's

  darker tresses as they touched each other with the unmistakable

  eagerness of lovers. He was so revolted by that acknowledgement that for

  an instant he felt physically ill. Christabel, his woman, his lover, his

  bride-to-be...

  Christabel drew back with a husky, sexy laugh, her fabulous face flushed

  with excitement, and only then did the two women realise that they had

  an audience poised in the doorway. Rio recognised the brunette as one of

  Christabel's friends: Tammy something or other, another fashion model,

  also another man's wife.

  For a split-second nobody moved or spoke. Aghast, Christabel and Tammy

  gaped at him, and then the brunette loosed a strangled moan of horror

  and fled into the connecting bathroom, noisily slamming and locking the

  door behind her.

  'H-heavens...what a fright you gave me...' Christabel faltered,

  frantically yanking up her dress to cover her bare breasts, her face now

  pale and stiff as marble, her wonderful green eyes glittering with

  fearful anxiety. 'Please...you mustn't misunderstand what you just saw,

  Rio-'

  'Misunderstand?' Rio could never recall it taking more effort to speak

  one word levelly. Initial shock and disbelief were giving way to rage

  and an unfamiliar sense of appalled bewilderment that only stoked the

  rage higher.

  'We were just mucking around. Don't be old-fashioned about this...'

  Christabel urged in the charged silence as she moved closer and made a

  little pleading movement with her manicured hands.

  Rio could not take his eyes off her. Christabel Kent, the world-famous

  supermodel and media darling who wore his

  engagement ring, her Nordic fairness and endless legs a legend in the

  fashion and beauty market. Perfect face, perfect body.

  'OK...I'll come clean,' Christabel continued feverishly. 'So I was

  missing you dreadfully and I like a change occasionally-'

  'A change? You make it sound like it's nothing-'

  'It isn't...it's just sex!' his fiancée interrupted, reaching for the

  lean, powerful hands coiled into fierce fists of self-restraint by his

  sides. 'Nothing for you to worry about or even think about, because if

  you don't like it I swear it won't ever happen again!'

  Rio backed out of her reach. In his mind's eye he could still only see

  one image: Christabel wrapped half-naked and excited round another

  woman. Just sex? He felt betrayed. He felt incredulous. He felt

  something he wasn't used to feeling: foolish,

  'All right...you're shocked and furious and I understand and I'm reallyr />
  sorry!' Christabel was panicking at his lack of response. 'I'll make it

  up to you-'

  'What with? An offer to join the two of you?' Rio derided between

  clenched white teeth.

  Christabel looked up at him, green eyes gleaming with sudden relief

  lightened by a shard of seductive amusement. 'Would you like that, darling?'

  Violence coursed through Rio in a molten wave and a shudder of angry

  revulsion passed through him. If she hadn't been a woman he would have

  knocked her through the wall and if that was an old-fashioned reaction,

  tough! Yet her stupidity in assuming that his contemptuous question

  might have been a serious hint that all would be forgiven if he got a

  piece of the same action freed him from that first binding shock.

  'I'll give you time to move out of here,' Rio breathed

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  with raw clarity. 'I'll deal with cancelling the wedding arrangements-'

  'You can't be serious!' Christabel gasped in stricken horror. 'We're

  perfect together!'

  Rio swung on his heel and strode back down the corridor, Christabel

  pursuing him every step of the way, pleading with him to calm down and

  think again. In the hall, she shot between him and the front door to

  prevent his departure.

  'If you tell people about this, my career will be ruined!'

  Christabel's career had been built on her clean, wholesome image. No

  risque" lingerie assignments, no media coverage of Christabel whooping

  it up like a ladette in the clubs, no bad-ass boyfriends. Christabel

  liked to pose for off-the-record interviews with fluffy animals and talk

  about how mad she was about children, not to mention how crazy she was

  about the man she was to marry and how much she was looking forward to

  giving up work to be a full-time wife and mother...

  Rio reached out and lifted her bodily out of his path. 'Dio mio...I

  won't be talking-'

  That fear overcome, Christabel cried in desperation. 'Then why can't you

  forgive me? Tammy means nothing to me. It's not like she was another man

  or I'm in love with her. I love you, Rio-'

  She loved him? Had she ever loved him? Or had she loved his enormous

  wealth most of all? His sculpted mouth tightening, he recalled that

  Christabel had expensive tastes that far outran even her own healthy

  earning power. Within a week of his marriage proposal she had confessed

  to a string of outstanding bills and had told him how hopeless she was

  with money. Impressed by her honesty, he had felt hugely protective

  towards her and had cleared her debts without even thinking about what

  he was doing.

  Yanking himself free of her clinging hands in growing disgust at what

  her every reckless word revealed about her character, Rio left the

  apartment and made it into the lift. He raised one of his hands and

  watched it shake in disbelieving outrage. Balling his fingers back into

  an aggressive fist, he punched the steel wall with the full force of the

  rage and the pain splintering through him, the savage pain he had been

  struggling to deny. He had loved her, he had really loved her and wanted

  to marry her.

  Santo cielo, he might have given his children a mother who thought

  three-in-a-bed sex was a wonderful thrill! A woman who had contrived to

  hide her true nature from him so successfully that the sheer shock value

  of what he had witnessed and heard would linger with him for a very long

  time.

  Just sex? Hadn't he been enough for her? Obviously not. As his

  bodyguards reared up from their seats in the ground-floor reception

  area, their surprise at his unexpected reappearance patent, Rio was bund

  to them, his darkly handsome features rigid and ashen pale. Outside, he

  drank in deep of the frosty night air before crossing the street to his

  limo. Had Christabel been lying back and thinking about other women in

  his bed? Had even her pleasure been faked? Had the eager desire she had

  shown for his lovemaking all been part of one giant con to ensnare a

  very rich husband? How could he have known so little about a woman he

  had been with for almost two years?

  'Your hand's bleeding, boss. Are you OK?'

  Rio angled a cursory glance down at his bruised and bleeding knuckles

  before meeting the troubled dark eyes of Ezio. The stockily built older

  man had been on his security team since Rio was a student and knew him

  too well.

  'Si...' But right at that moment Rio did not know when he was ever going

  to feel normal again. Like Saverio Lombardi, billionaire head of one of

  the proudest, oldest

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  families in Italy and the driving force behind Lombardi Industries, one

  of the biggest, most successful companies in the world. He felt

  humiliated, sick and less than a man for the first time in twenty-nine

  years of existence.

  How was he to explain this fiasco in acceptable terms to his vulnerable

  mother? Alice Lombardi was literally counting the days to her son's

  wedding and was pitifully eager to cradle her first grandchild in her

  arms. She was a sick woman, crippled by arthritis, further weakened by a

  series of debilitating illnesses. Every week she survived was a literal

  gift from God and her poor health permitted her precious few pleasures

  in life. Now there would be no wedding, no prospect of a baby to fill

  the empty nursery, no bright and chatty daughter-in-law to occasionally

  enliven her dull, pain-filled days...

  He had never openly acknowledged the reality before but he needed a wife.

  'Tammy means nothing to me...it's not like she was another man.' The

  insidious and seductive echo of Christabel's husky voice made Rio's

  hands clench into ferocious fists. No, he could not, would not forgive

  her, not for the sake of his own powerful libido, not even for the sake

  of the mother he adored. Christabel, the woman he had loved beyond

  belief, was a total sham. What did that say about his judgement? He had

  believed he knew his fiancée through and through, yet he had not even

  penetrated the surface of that calculating immoral mind of hers. He

  could not have chosen worse had he decided to marry a total stranger. He

  might as well stop and ask the first woman he met to be his bride...

  With a harsh and bitter laugh at that insane idea, Rio Lombardi poured

  himself a large brandy from the bar in the back of the limo.

  Holly was cold, hungry and scared.

  It was barely one in the morning and the whole of the rest of the night

  hours still stretched ahead of her. For how long had she been walking?

  Her back and her legs ached and her vision was blurring with exhaustion

  but where could she possibly stop for the night that she would be safe?

  She had sat around in a train station for most of the day, moving seats

  every so often, striving not to attract the attention of anyone

  official, until the crude heckling of two youths had forced her to take

  refuge in the cloakroom. While she had been trying to freshen up there,

  her jacket, which had had her purse in the inside pocket, had been

  stolen. Her own fault for taking her jacket off, leaving it carelessly

  d
raped over Timmie's buggy and turning her attention away for a minute.

  No point approaching a policeman, not when awkward questions would be

  asked and an address requested. Her purse, which had had her last few

  pounds in it, was gone and that was that. Like so much else that had

  happened to Holly since her arrival in London so full of naive hopes

  seven months earlier, it was just one more kick when she was down, one

  more piece of bad luck in a run of bad luck that seemed endless.

  As she paused to check that her eight-month-old son was still wrapped up

  snug against the chilly air, she shivered violently and fingered the two

  battered carrier bags that now contained all that she possessed in the

  world. She had to be the ultimate loser and failure, she decided

  wretchedly. Useless at everything, not even able to put the shabbiest

  roof over Timmie's head and look after him as he deserved. Here she was

  out walking the streets, homeless and penniless, next door to being a

  beggar...

  Yet just twenty-four hours earlier she really had tried so hard to pick

  up her sagging courage and get a grip on her

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  problems. She had gone to the Social Security office to report that her

  landlord had tried to break into her room twice during the night and

  that she was terrified of him.

  'We've never had any complaints about him before,' the woman behind the