Page 2 of Modern Romance Collection February 2025, 5-8

Romano caught a glimpse of his glowering features reflected back from one of the antique mirrors and his scowl grew deeper.

Why the hell had his half-sister chosen to bring that infernal woman here, when she knew how much he disliked her? He could feel his muscles bunch, his body becoming iron-hard and tense. Why make someone like Kelly Butler godmother to a Castelliari child when she had always been the most unsuitable of Floriana’s friends? Hadn’t the stubborn redhead already caused enough trouble with her interference? With her stubbornness and her insolence?

And hadn’t that trouble been compounded by the way she had made him feel? By the shameless sexuality she had exuded, which had licked at his body and soul with a taunting heat, made worse by the fact that she had been forbidden to him…

His turbulent thoughts were interrupted by a distant sound. A muffled banging, which was barely audible above the banshee scream of the storm. At first he thought it might be a stray branch, dislodged from a tree, which had hurled itself against the door, and better left until morning to investigate, when the wind suddenly dropped and he heard it again, more clearly this time.

A voice.

His forehead creased.

A woman’s voice.

Turning away from the blaze of the fire, he pulled open the heavy door to the howling gale, unprepared for the vision who stood in front of him. At first he barely recognised her as the light from the castle spilled out onto the courtyard, bathing her in a golden halo. Her hair was plastered to her head and her shoulders were hunched in a useless attempt to resist the onslaught of the driving rain. But then she looked up and said his name—said it in that soft, witchy voice of hers—and he could do nothing about the sudden thickness which gathered in his throat, nor the unwanted stab to his groin. His gaze raked over her with unwilling hunger and he swallowed. He had forgotten how tiny she was.

‘Get inside,’ he bit out.

Obediently she nodded, stumbling over the threshold into the hall. As he shut the door on the forbidding night, he found himself thinking he’d never known her quite so compliant. Or so vulnerable. There was no rebellious challenge on her heart-shaped face tonight. Her rain-streaked cheeks were pinched as she stared up at him, but in the firelight her eyes were as bright as he remembered them. Green eyes, he thought. Green with promise. Even when wet with rain, they were the eyes of a sorceress.

He wanted to ask her why the hell she’d turned up so early but she was shivering so violently that instead he jerked his head in the direction of the fire. ‘Stand over there and take off your damned coat,’ he ordered roughly.

Her teeth were chattering so much that she could barely get the words out, but she tilted her chin to stare at him defiantly andthiswas more like the Kelly he knew.

‘Y-you haven’t lost any of your bossy instincts, I s-see!’ she declared.

‘Quit the analysis and concentrate on what you’re supposed to be doing—or ratherundoing,’ he snapped back. ‘Which are the buttons of your coat.’

But her ungloved and presumably frozen hands seemed incapable of accomplishing even that simple task and Romano gave an impatient click of his tongue as he moved towards her.

‘Shall I?’ he growled.

Her nod was grudging, the recalcitrant set of her lips achingly familiar. ‘If you want.’

If he wanted? Romano gave a short laugh. What he wanted was something quite different.

For her to be as far away from him as possible. Out of sight and out of mind.

Oh, yeah?

Wasn’t the truth something much more fundamental? Something carnal and urgent, which flared up inside him like a sudden fever, despite the pathetic and sodden image she presented? Wouldn’t he have liked her lying beneath him, that soft and petite body opening up to welcome him?

And hadn’t she always had that effect on him?

He remembered the clumsy pass she had made when she was barely eighteen years old. His obvious shock that his sister’s friend could have been so glaringly obvious how much she desired him had fuelled his worst prejudices about women and made him worry about her influence on Floriana. He had rejected her swiftly—some might even have said cruelly—but he’d needed to do that. Because hadn’t he been appalled at just how much he had wanted her, despite her unsuitability and the fact that she had been out of bounds? Because no way would he have contemplated having sex with the eighteen year old best friend of his little sister, no matter how great the temptation.

His breathing shallow, he slid open the buttons of her sodden jacket and slipped it from her shoulders, taking great care to keep all contact with her body to a minimum. But even the featherlight brush of his fingertips against her shoulders felt like wildfire rippling over his skin. ‘Didn’t it occur to you to wear something waterproof and warm?’ he demanded huskily as he hung the dripping garment on a nearby coat-stand. ‘Or did you think the fashion police would be watching your every move?’

‘I wasn’t expecting the weather to be quite so foul, if you must know!’

‘You think the sun always shines in Tuscany, do you, Kelly?’ he questioned sarcastically.

‘Not when you’re around, that’s for sure! It probably wouldn’t dare to show its face. Anyway…’ She glanced around, her hair resembling a rapidly forming halo of fire as the heat began to warm her curls. ‘Where’s Floriana?’

‘Let’s get you dry first, shall we?’ he clipped out impatiently.

‘You’re making me sound like a dog who’s just jumped in a puddle.’

‘A dog would show more gratitude.’

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