The Billion-Dollar Bride Hunt by Melanie Milburne

CHAPTER SIX

MATTEOWASFURIOUSwith himself for not realising Emmie might discover Abriana’s and Gabriel’s graves when he’d left her to make her way back to the villa. Her inquisitive nature, especially in finding out everything she could about him, should have been warning enough but he had ignored it.

But, strangely, there was a part of him that had wanted her to discover the secret pain of his past. Not that he felt any better for revealing it to her. If anything, he felt worse. Emmie would no doubt want to talk more about the tragedy and it would bring it all back—the harrowing guilt. It was a gnawing pain inside him, a constant reminder of how he had failed to keep safe those under his care and protection.

And now, his late father had demanded he commit to another marriage and risk the same happening all over again. But he couldn’t walk away from the estate and see it pass into a stranger’s hands. He had to do everything in his power to keep it in his possession—it was the price he must pay for having failed to keep his wife and child safe. He owed it to them to honour their memory.

Could Emmie be the answer? The thought was growing deeper roots in his brain. She claimed she wasn’t looking for love. That her focus was her business, not finding happiness for herself. A marriage of convenience between them could work if he could convince her to agree to it. Their mutual attraction was undeniable and increasingly irresistible. But he would have to be patient in talking her round. He didn’t want to pressure her but surely, she could sense the connection that had developed between them? He wondered if that was why she had been trying to keep her distance since they’d kissed at her house in London. Unless he was misreading the signals, the temptation to explore the chemistry between them was as tempting to her as it was to him.

And he was determined to act on it.

Valentina informed Emmie through a combination of sign language and broken English that dinner would be served in the smaller of the two dining rooms on the ground floor, overlooking the lake. Emmie changed into a dress and scooped up her hair up into a makeshift bun and applied some light make-up. On her way downstairs, she stopped to look at some of the art work, some of which included portraits of Matteo’s ancestors. She could see the likeness, particularly in what appeared to be his grandfather Giorgio’s portrait. She recalled Matteo’s baby son’s full name, and that Giorgio had been included in it. Did that mean Matteo had had a special connection with his grandfather? One he hadn’t had with his father?

Emmie walked further along the gallery with an even deeper understanding of Matteo’s reluctance to lose the estate, notwithstanding it being the final resting place of his wife and child. This was the home of his ancestors, the place where they had lived and loved for hundreds of years. She had found it devastating to move from her childhood home and she had only lived there for seventeen years. How much worse to lose the home that contained so many centuries of history, so many memories?

Emmie came to a door at the end of the gallery that was slightly ajar and her curiosity soon got the better of her. She gently pushed it open and stepped inside to find a library with floor-to-ceiling bookshelves, a mezzanine level and a wooden ladder for access to the higher shelves. There was a beautiful antique desk in polished walnut set in front of tall windows draped with heavy velvet curtains in a deep red the same colour as one of the roses she had smelled that afternoon.

Emmie moved closer to the desk and ran her fingers along the polished surface. She sat on the studded leather chair and swung it from side to side, wondering why Matteo had no photos or sentimental artefacts on his desk as so many people did. There was only a laptop and a blank notepad and a collection of pens and a glass paperweight.

‘Looking for more of my secrets?’ Matteo’s deep voice at the door startled her into standing upright, her cheeks instantly flooding with heat.

‘I’m sorry. I was just having a look around. It’s a beautiful room...so many books. Some of them must be so old. Have you had them valued? There might be first editions in that collection and they’re worth a fortune.’ Emmie knew she was rambling, desperate to fill the silence, desperate to avoid the censure and cynicism of his gaze.

‘Yes, well, it will be a pain to have to move them if I am unable to fulfil the terms of my father’s will in time.’ He glanced around the room before bringing his gaze back to hers. ‘But, all being well, it won’t come to that.’

Emmie moved out from behind the desk. ‘Your situation is...complicated. I can see that now. I understand your reluctance to marry again but this time around might work out brilliantly. Lots of cultures rely on arranged marriages and using a dating agency is a little like that. Matching people who are most likely to fall in love.’

‘I’m not interested in falling in love. All I’m interested in is fulfilling the terms of my father’s will.’

‘But surely you could do both?’ Emmie said. ‘You shouldn’t rule it out. Love can strike when you least expect it.’

Matteo came to where she was standing and her senses reeled at the force of energy he brought with him. Sensual energy, a dark, brooding energy, that sent livewires of awareness flickering across her skin. She had to hyper-extend her neck to keep eye contact and her stomach swooped at the deep blue of his glinting eyes.

‘And has love ever struck you?’ His voice was low and deep, and caused a riot of sensations to flutter in her core.

Emmie disguised a swallow, her pulse hammering, her heart racing. ‘No. I haven’t been in love before...’

A cynical light gleamed in his gaze. ‘And why is that, do you think?’ He ran an idle finger down the curve of her cheek, setting spot fires in her flesh.

‘I—I’m too busy finding love for my clients...’ Emmie was annoyed her voice was so whispery and her heart rate so erratic and her resolve to resist him so absent. She was acting like a love-struck schoolgirl in front of a much-adored celebrity. The sheer magnetism of him overwhelmed her, bewitching her into a mesmerised trance. She couldn’t drag her gaze away from his mouth, the sculptured perfection of it, the firm lines of his top lip and the fullness of his lower lip that hinted at a potent, bone-melting sensuality.

Matteo sent the pad of his thumb across her bottom lip in a spine-tingling stroke. ‘You have such a beautiful mouth...’ His voice had lowered another semitone. ‘I keep thinking about how it felt to kiss you that evening at your house.’

Emmie wasn’t aware of moving but suddenly she was pressed against him, chest to chest, thigh to thigh, her gaze locked on his, her heart threatening to punch its way out of her body. ‘Matteo...’ She could barely get her voice to work, barely think straight—all she wanted was to feel his mouth press down on hers. It was a burning need inside her, a fervent need that would not be tamed any other way. ‘Kiss me.’ She could hardly believe she had spoken her need out loud, even if it had only been a whisper—a desperate whisper.

The smouldering heat in his gaze intensified, as if the fire he had stirred in her flesh had travelled to his. His thumb passed over her lower lip once more, slowly, torturously slowly, making her flesh tingle with increasing want. A want so agonisingly intense it consumed her, controlled her, overpowered her.

‘I’ve had a burning desire to do so almost from the first moment I met you and every moment since.’ His warm breath mingled with hers in the intimate space between their mouths.

Emmie stood on tiptoe and laced her hands around his neck, worried he might change his mind and pull away. Her breasts were crushed against the hard wall of his chest, her thighs pressed into the firmness of his, her senses doing cartwheels as she felt the stirring of his erection against her body. Desire rippled through her in a torrent, a flash flood of fiery heat that left no part of her unaffected. Her inner core pulsed with longing, a deep, throbbing pulse that turned her to molten liquid. ‘Then do it. Do it now. Kiss me. I want you to.’ She didn’t care that she was close to begging—all she cared about was feeling his sensual mouth pressed to hers again, feeling the desire he felt for her against her lips.

He gave a low groan deep in his throat and then his mouth came down on hers, his lips firm, urgent, masterful, demanding. Emmie responded with the same urgency, hungry for the exquisite taste of him, the incendiary heat and fire of his mouth sending shock waves through her body. Delicious, shuddering shock waves that awakened every nerve in her flesh.

Emmie murmured her approval against his lips. His tongue stroked the seam of her mouth in a spine-loosening movement and she welcomed him in with a whimper of pleasure. His tongue touched hers and an explosion of sensations shot through her, sending waves of heat to her core. He deepened the kiss, stirring her into a fervent response that was so erotic, so electric, so exciting, it set her pulse madly racing.

One of his hands came up to cup her face and the other went to the small of her back, bringing her body closer to the hot, hard heat of his growing erection. Emmie whimpered again in excitement, relishing the feel of his aroused flesh against her. Nothing could have prepared her for the magic of his explosive kiss, the potent power of his lips and tongue making every cell of her body shout in rapturous joy.

Matteo angled his head to shift position and another guttural groan came from his throat, his lips firmer, more demanding, signalling an escalating need so similar to the one pounding through her flesh. One of his hands went to the back of her head, his fingers clutching a handful of her hair, not roughly, but not gently either, just somewhere delightfully, thrillingly, in between. Ripples of pleasure ran down her spine, her inner core throbbing with the need for his erotic, intimate possession.

‘Are you okay with me doing this?’ He spoke just above her mouth, the movement of his breath like a caress on her sensitised lips.

‘More than okay,’ Emmie said against his lips. ‘It’s just a kiss, right?’ She wanted more, much more, but didn’t know if it was wise to take things that far. She had for so long ignored her body’s needs. They hummed occasionally, in the background, but she had taught herself to ignore them. But now, in Matteo Vitale’s arms, she caught a tempting glimpse of what making love with him would be like—thrilling, mind-blowing, earth-shattering.

If she succumbed to the temptation, nothing would be the same again. She would not be the same.

Matteo framed her face with his hands, his gaze searching. ‘Is it?’

Emmie stroked her hand down the length of his lean jaw, her soft skin catching on his light stubble, sending another wave of shivering sensations down her spine. ‘You’re a very attractive man, and I’m only human, but anything more than a kiss or two is probably not wise under the circumstances.’ She removed her hand from his face but he captured it and held it against his chest instead, his eyes smouldering.

‘Because?’ he prompted.

Emmie moistened her lips with the point of her tongue, her stomach swooping when his gaze followed the movement. ‘I need to maintain a professional distance in order to do what you’re paying me to do.’ She tugged her hand out from underneath his and stepped back. ‘I came here to find out everything I can about you so I can match you with the perfect partner.’

‘Allowing me to kiss you is part of your research, si?’ There was a sardonic light in his deep-blue eyes.

‘No, it is not.’ Emmie could feel her cheeks heating and turned away to regain her composure. She picked up the paperweight from his desk and tested its weight in her hand. ‘Why don’t you have any photos of your wife in the villa?’ She put the paperweight down and turned and faced him. ‘I’ve looked in most of the rooms and there’s nothing. Only portraits of your ancestors.’

‘We didn’t have that sort of relationship.’ He moved across the room to straighten a couple of books on the bookshelves, his back turned towards her.

‘Describe your relationship with her.’

Matteo turned to face her, his expression grim. ‘It wasn’t intimate.’

‘Did you share a room? A bed?’

‘No.’

Emmie frowned. ‘Why not? You were husband and wife.’

He gave a movement of his lips that was one-part smile, three-parts grimace. ‘I didn’t think it was wise or indeed fair to encourage her feelings for me.’

Something tightened around Emmie’s heart—a painful tug of invisible stitches. ‘She was in love with you?’

A shadow moved through his gaze and his jaw tightened. ‘So she said, but I could not return her feelings. I liked her, cared about her, but as to love, that sort of love...’ He gave a one-shouldered shrug. ‘It’s not an emotion I’ve felt for her or for anyone.’

‘Would you recognise it if you did?’

A cynical smile slanted his mouth. ‘Romantics such as yourself would say so, would they not?’

‘But what do you think?’

Matteo came back over to her and lifted her chin with the end of his index finger, locking his gaze with hers. ‘I think you ask a lot of questions that you would not answer yourself.’

Emmie’s heart began to thump, her breath stalling in her throat. ‘I think I would recognise it if I fell in love with someone.’ Her voice came out scratchy.

His hand cupped one side of her face, his eyes still unwavering on hers. ‘What do you think you would feel? Describe it for me.’

Emmie sent her tongue across her lips again, her pulse racing so fast she felt light-headed... Or maybe that was because she was mesmerised by the deep, rumbling tone of his voice, the warm cradle of his hand against her face, the proximity of his tempting body and her own body’s craving, driving need for more of his touch. Never had she been so aware of a man. Aware of every nuance of his expression, every soft, warm waft of his breath against her mouth.

‘Having never been in love, I can only go on what other people have said. That you just know with a certainty that this person is the only one for you. You know it like it was written in stone. That it was meant to be from before you were even born. That this person is the one who completes you, complements and fulfils you in a way no one else can do.’

His gaze was unwavering. ‘So, you believe there is only one perfect partner for each person?’

Emmie eased out of his hold and made a point of putting some distance between them. ‘What I tell my clients to concentrate on is being a perfect partner themselves rather than expecting to find someone who is perfect for them. Working on yourself first is key. Too many relationships fail when one partner shines a light on the other’s imperfections without examining and working on their own.’

Matteo gave a rueful movement of his lips. ‘Wise words.’ He picked up a pen from his desk and stroked his fingers along its slim barrel, his forehead creased in a frown.

Emmie studied him for a long moment, wondering if he was thinking about his late wife. ‘Were you overly critical of Abriana?’

He put the pen down and met her gaze head on. ‘Not at all.’

‘But she was critical of you.’ Emmie didn’t phrase it as a question.

‘And why shouldn’t she have been? She wanted me to fall in love with her the way she had fallen in love with me.’ His lips twisted into another grimace. ‘It’s not a comfortable feeling, knowing you’ve broken someone’s heart.’

‘But you were honest with her from the get-go? I mean, you didn’t say things you didn’t mean to get her to marry you once you knew she was pregnant?’

‘I was brutally honest.’

Emmie could well believe it. ‘And you were absolutely certain Gabriel was your child?’

‘Absolutely.’

‘You asked for a paternity test?’

‘No.’

Emmie raised her brows. ‘Why not? How well did you know her? She might have been—’

‘I didn’t ask, but she insisted on having one done so there was no question over paternity.’

‘I guess, given your forensically trained mind, she felt she had to.’

‘Perhaps.’

There was a silence that was so thick Emmie could almost hear the tiny dust motes moving through the air.

Matteo moved to the door, his expression inscrutable. ‘Come. Valentina will be waiting for us with our dinner.’

Emmie followed him out of the library, conscious of him walking by her side down the long, wide corridor...conscious of the brush of his arm against hers...conscious of the taste of him still lingering in her mouth. And conscious of the needs he had awakened that still hummed in her flesh.