A Shadow of Guilt(7)

‘But that’s ridiculous, you should to get paid regardless.’

Valentina laughed harshly and forced herself to look at Gio. ‘Yes, call me old-fashioned but it is customary to be paid for services rendered. However, your aunt seems to feel that in light of the unfortunate turn of events, she’s absolved of the duty of payment.’

‘That’s crazy …’ Gio raked a hand through his hair, fire entering his belly. He was fixing on something, anything, he could do by way of helping Valentina and he knew it. The anger at his aunt’s heavy-handed and bullying tactics was a very easy target to focus on.

He started to stride back towards the main function room and then he heard behind him, ‘Wait! Where do you think you’re going?’

Gio turned around. The sight of Valentina standing just feet away with a stray lock of glossy silky hair caressing one hot cheek sent something molten right into his gut. He was shocked all over again that it was her, here, and he was captivated, momentarily forgetting everything.

He felt as if he’d been existing in a fog and had suddenly been plunged into an icy pool. Everything was bright and piercingly clear, the sound check of the band nearby almost painful in its intensity.

And something was happening in his body. After five years of strict sensory denial, it, too, was surging to life. Blood was rushing to every vein and artery. Becoming hard.

Valentina was oblivious to this cataclysm going on in Gio’s body. She pointed a finger at him. ‘I asked you where you think you’re going?’

Gio sucked in a breath and felt dizzy—as if someone had just spiked the air around him with a mind-altering drug. He struggled to focus on what she’d asked and not on the lush curve of her mouth, the perfect bow of its shape. He hadn’t even been noticing women for so long and now this—it was like an overload on his senses.

‘My aunt …’ he managed finally, focusing carefully on the words. ‘My aunt, I’ll tell her she can’t do this to you.’

He turned again, as much to put some distance between himself and Valentina as anything else but wasn’t prepared for when a hand gripped his arm, pulling him around. She was suddenly too close. Gio all but reeled back and Valentina dropped her hand and looked him up and down scathingly. ‘You’re drunk.’

He could have laughed. He knew very well that after the shock of seeing this woman again he was no more drunk than she was.

Gio forced control on his wayward body, but he was tingling all over. He still felt the touch of her hand like a brand.

‘I’ll go to my aunt and tell her she—’

‘No, you won’t,’ Valentina interjected hotly. ‘You’ll do no such thing. I do not need you to fight my battles for me, Corretti.’

Something snapped inside Gio and he gritted his jaw. ‘It’s Gio, or have you forgotten you once called me that?’

Valentina’s face was carved from stone. ‘No, I haven’t forgotten, but apparently you’ve forgotten why I’d never call you that again.’

The cruelty of that statement nearly felled Gio but he stayed standing. ‘No,’ he said faintly, ‘I haven’t forgotten.’

Their eyes were locked, amber with hazel. For a moment there was nothing but simmering emotion between them, so strong and tangible that when one of the band members started to walk out of the room they’d been rehearsing in, he took one look at the couple locked in silent combat and retreated back inside, closing the door softly.

‘I’ll pay you—I’ll cover whatever my aunt should be paying you.’

Valentina reared back, her hands curled into tiny fists, two spots of hectic colour on her white cheeks. ‘You?’

Gio steeled himself.

‘I wouldn’t take your filthy money if it was offered to me on a silver platter.’

Of course, he conceded bitterly, she would have nothing to do with him, or his money, no matter how hard he’d worked for it.

Valentina pointed a finger at her chest then and Gio swallowed hard and fought not to let his eyes drop to those provocative swells underneath the plain white shirt. ‘I am a professional and I’ve been hired to do a job and that’s what I’m going to do. I will not let your aunt jeopardise my reputation by running out now. And I will not take your guilt money, Corretti.’

Guilt money. The words fell on him hard. This time Gio didn’t correct her use of his name. For the first time he saw the bright sheen of tears in her eyes and something inside him broke apart. The memory of her stoic back that day by the graveside was vivid. But he couldn’t move or say a thing. She wouldn’t welcome it.