The Unwanted Wife (Unwanted #1)(22)
“What did he do to the dog?” he gritted out, sounding like he was chewing nails.
“I never knew for sure,” she confessed. “Mom said Sheba went to a new family and was happy with them. But I don’t know…I always feared that he took her back to the pound.” Despite her best intentions, tears of long-remembered pain flooded her eyes, and she tilted her chin in an effort to appear casual. “I couldn’t sleep for the longest time afterward, imagining how confused Sheba must have been, and on the really bad nights I pictured them taking her into the vet’s operating room to be put down, because even though I loved her, she really wasn’t cute or clever or all that special. If she went back to the pound, I don’t think she would have gone to another home.”
“You mustn’t think like that,” he admonished.
“I know. Never mind, it’s so far in the past that the wound healed long ago. Not even a scar.” The way he looked at her told her that he didn’t believe a word of it.
“You were eleven?”
She nodded and dropped her eyes, uncomfortable beneath his burning regard. “Didn’t your mother die when you were eleven?” Everybody knew that her mother had committed suicide. She had been found by a servant, and the news had been leaked to the press within the hour. One of the unfortunate by-products of coming from a family such as hers was the complete lack of privacy and respect from the press. Her mother’s suicide had become fodder for the masses and her funeral a three-ring circus. It had made Theresa very cagey around the media and she tended to stay as far removed from the limelight as possible.
Her marriage to Sandro hadn’t made that easy—not when his family history was almost identical to hers and his glamorous sisters were always being hounded by the paparazzi.
“About two weeks after I lost Sheba,” she admitted, and he inhaled sharply, a muffled curse word dropping from his lips. “So, you see, I soon had bigger things to worry about than poor little Sheba’s fate.”
“I think I see a lot more than you want me to, Theresa,” he stated cryptically, and she raised her eyes back up to his only to be confounded by the tenderness and understanding she saw there. He handed the book back to her, and she took it with a nod, making sure to avoid all contact with his large hands. He noticed the evasion and, while his eyes narrowed, he chose not to say anything about it.
“So how casual is this business thing?” she asked, changing the subject abruptly, getting up carefully, not wanting another revealing wave of dizziness in front of him.
“Extremely casual,” he responded quietly, choosing not to challenge the blatant subject change. “Jeans, T-shirt, and a jacket will do.”
“You mean I had my hair done for nothing?” She frowned, rather disgruntled that she wouldn’t be showing off her new look in the best possible setting.
“I hardly think it was for nothing,” he protested with another one of those rare, breathtaking smiles of his. “I think the result was well worth the effort. I loved your long hair, cara, but this new chic, sleek little cut…Words fail me. You look…” He shook his head and in a quintessentially Italian gesture, raised his fingertips to his lips and kissed them to signify his approval. For some reason that struck Theresa as funny, and she stifled a giggle with her hand. Her eyes were iridescent with laughter, and he stood for a long moment, staring at her, before he cleared his throat.
“Go on, Theresa,” he prompted gently. “Meet me down here in half an hour?” She nodded at the question in his voice.
Sandro remained closemouthed about where they were going, ignoring Theresa’s increasingly desperate pleas for information. It was highly unusual for him not to tell her what to expect. He usually drilled information into her, what their hosts liked and what he wanted her to talk about. He always seemed afraid that she would mess up somehow, but he was markedly different this time. He was relaxed, and every time Theresa asked about their eventual destination, he told her not to worry about it. She peeked at his handsome profile, hating his nonchalance in the face of her edginess. He was dressed even more casually than she was, wearing name-brand sweatpants that had definitely seen better days, battered sneakers of the same brand, and a jacket to match the pants.
“Stop staring,” he growled, keeping his eyes glued to the road ahead. “You’re making me nervous.”
Yeah right! Mr. Nerves of Steel, who handled the powerful Ferrari with grace and confidence, was nervous. She didn’t believe that for a second. She pursed her lips and diverted her eyes to the rapidly darkening horizon beyond her window. They had been driving for nearly forty minutes, and Theresa had no clue where they were. She tilted her head back and closed her eyes for a few moments, feeling like the past few weeks of uncertainty were catching up with her.
“We’re here.” Sandro’s voice jerked her out of her doze sometime later, and she stretched before sitting up to take stock of their surroundings. The car was already parked in the driveway of a huge house. The place made their, not immodest, house seem like a garden cottage. There were five other sleek and expensive sports cars parked in the driveway, and every light, both inside and out of the house, seemed to be on.
Theresa unbuckled her belt and was out of the car before Sandro could even move. She stood with her hands braced on the roof of the Ferrari and stared up the immense house in unabashed curiosity. She was aware of Sandro, rummaging about in the space behind the front seats before climbing out of the low-slung car with feral grace and rounding the bonnet to join her on the passenger side of the car.