The elevator doors slid smoothly open and they were met at the Ferraro private entrance to the hotel by Emilio and Enzo. The car was right there, Enzo holding the door open. Vittorio and Emilio both looked carefully around before Vittorio helped her to slide onto the cool leather of the back seat. He slipped in beside her and Emilio closed the door. Only then did she realize that Enzo wasn’t driving. He was in the front seat and they had a driver she didn’t recognize.
She glanced behind them to see Emilio entering the passenger side of a second car. When they pulled out of the parking lot, Grace realized they were following a lead car. That had never happened before. When she looked up at Vittorio’s set features, she decided not to ask any questions until they were home. Maybe he wouldn’t answer. Maybe she’d lost her chance to be a part of him, but she was determined that when they reached his home she was going to try—and not because his family was amazing and she’d give anything to be part of it, but because she was certain Vittorio Ferraro was the most extraordinary man she’d ever meet and she would forever regret being a coward if she didn’t give what had been growing between them a chance.
She stayed quiet, looking down at her hand, the one on which she spent an inordinate amount of time wiggling her fingers to celebrate the fact that she could. Physical therapy was painful, but she rejoiced in the ability to finally work at getting better. More, Vittorio sat in the room with them, watching, and more than once, when she thought she might throw up because the pain was too much, he had stood up and simply snapped, “Enough.” No one ever dared contradict him and her shoulder was immediately iced, and she could breathe her way through the pain enough to let it recede.
The more she sat there quietly on the ride back to the house, his warmth enveloping her, feeling safe and secure because he took care of her when she was unable to, the more she realized how much she wanted that. How many men would actually give her that kind of relationship without being totally controlling? Vittorio had never once made her feel as if he was controlling her. He made her feel as if she was the most precious, treasured woman in the world and he was determined to watch over her.
Without thinking she moved closer to him, fitting under his shoulder. His body was always warm and the moment she moved close, he put his arm along the seat and then curved it around her shoulders. That felt good. He hadn’t done that in what seemed a very long while. She rested her head against his chest without looking at him. She was afraid of what she might see if she did. She didn’t want the mask he wore around others. She wanted the true intimacy he had given her, the real Vittorio, the real man. He had offered her that man and she’d been so afraid she’d rejected him.
“What’s wrong, gattina?”
His soft inquiry nearly stopped her heart. She hadn’t heard that voice in over a week—the one that was for her alone, the one that sent desire dancing down her spine or heating her sex to a welcoming liquid honey. He hadn’t called her his special nickname for her, either. She hadn’t realized how much she wanted either until that moment.
He touched her face and she realized it was wet. Tears tracked down her cheeks. She turned her face into his chest and he fit the back of her head into his palm, saying nothing else until the car slowed and then stopped. That simple gesture had felt intimate and caring as well, as if he offered her silent comfort and yet didn’t want to call attention to the fact that she was crying. She detested making a spectacle of herself in front of his bodyguards, or anyone for that matter. She liked to stay out of the spotlight.
The house was a mixture of more than one style of architecture. Its nine thousand square feet stretched out in three clearly different sections, rather like welcoming arms. At the very center of the house was a tall turret held up by the structure itself, stone and white square pillars. Beneath the high turret was an open patio with a stone floor and two sets of glass doors that opened into a dining room from one and a sitting room from the other. The tower was surrounded by long, narrow, multipaned windows that opened outward.
Elongated arms or wings extended out on either side of the elegant turret. The drive allowed the family car to circle to a sheltered entry extending out from the right-side wing. It was covered, but more importantly, secluded, preventing anyone, even someone with a pair of powerful binoculars or a scope on a rifle, from seeing the members of the family or their guests exit the car and enter the house.