Prince's Arranged Bride Read online

  ‘Mr Bussoni?’

  His gaze switched back to the screen.

  ‘Mr Bussoni, are you still interested?’

  There was just a hint of anxiety in the voice now, Alessandro noted with satisfaction. This contract obviously meant a great deal to her. He cast a look at the discarded stage costume…Something jarred. No, he realised. Everything jarred.

  ‘Only on one condition,’ he said, adopting a stern tone as he assumed the mantle of time-starved recording executive.

  ‘And that is?’ Emily said cagily.

  ‘That you come to supper with me after our meeting.’ Alessandro was surprised when a curl of excitement wrapped around his chest as he waited for her answer. ‘You may have questions for me, and there’s sure to be a lot we have to discuss,’ he said truthfully, satisfied that he had kept every trace of irony out of his voice.

  Emily let the silence hang for a while. Miranda would definitely have to be better by then, she thought crossing her fingers reflexively. ‘That’s fine,’ she confirmed evenly. ‘I’ll let the rest of the band members know—’

  ‘No,’ the voice flashed back assertively. ‘It only needs one person to take in what I have to say…and I have chosen you, Miss Weston. Now, are you still interested in progressing with this matter, or not?’

  ‘Of course I’m interested,’ Emily confirmed, suddenly eager to be free of a presence that was becoming more disconcerting by the minute.

  ‘That’s settled, then. I’ll write my number down for you. Perhaps you’ll be good enough to get in touch first thing…leave the address for our meeting with my secretary?’

  ‘Of course.’ She felt rather than heard him prepare to leave.

  ‘Until tomorrow, Miss Weston.’

  ‘Until tomorrow, Mr Bussoni.’

  Emily held her breath and tried to soak up information as the door opened, then shut again silently. The man might have three humps and a tail, for all she could tell, but her body insisted on behaving as if some lusty Roman gladiator had just strolled out of the room after booking her for sex the next day.

  After he’d left it took her a good few minutes to recover her equilibrium. And when she moved out from behind the screen everything seemed shabbier than she remembered it, and emptier somehow, as if some indefinable force had left the room, leaving it all the poorer for the loss.

  By early afternoon the next day, Emily had cancelled all her appointments for the rest of the week and was ready to take her sister back to their parents’ house.

  Drawing up outside the front door on the short gravel drive, she switched off the engine and tried for the umpteenth time to coax her twin into facing reality.

  ‘This man is different to anyone I’ve ever encountered before. It would be a real mistake to underestimate him, Miranda.’

  ‘He made quite an impression on you, didn’t he?’ Miranda replied, slanting a glance at her twin.

  ‘I didn’t even see him properly,’ Emily replied defensively. ‘And don’t change the subject. It’s you we’re talking about, not me.’

  After assuming a low-profile role in an orchestra for a number of years, Miranda had attracted the attention of a leading Japanese violin teacher. In order to fund the lessons Emily’s twin had started a band—a band that in the beginning had taken up only the occasional weekend; a band that was now taking up more and more of her time…

  ‘I only need this recording contract for a year or so,’ she said now, as if trying to convince herself that the scheme would work. ‘Just long enough for me to launch my career as a solo violinist.’

  Emily frowned. She wanted to help, but only when she was confident Miranda understood what she was letting herself in for. ‘Are you sure Prince Records understands that? They would have grounds to sue if you let them down.’

  ‘They won’t have any trouble finding someone to replace me; the boys are great—’

  ‘I’m still not happy,’ Emily admitted frankly. ‘I just can’t see what you’ll gain going down this route.’

  ‘Money?’ Miranda said hopefully.

  Emily shook her head as she reasoned it through aloud. ‘You’re not going to be able to honour a recording contract drawn up by a man like Mr Bussoni and put in the practice hours necessary to study the violin with a top-flight teacher like Professor Iwamoto.’

  ‘It won’t be for long,’ Miranda insisted stubbornly, unfolding her long limbs to have a noisy stretch. ‘I’ll cope.’

  Before Emily had a chance to argue Miranda was out of the smart black coupé and heading up the path.

  ‘Don’t be silly,’ Emily said, catching up with her sister at the front door. ‘The more successful the band, the less likely it is that this crazy idea of yours will work. I know the money would be great, but—’ The expression on her twin’s face made Emily stop to give her a hug. ‘I know you’re still pining over that violin we saw in Heidelberg.’

  ‘That was just a stupid dream—’

  ‘Well, I don’t know much about violins,’ Emily admitted, ‘but I do know what a sweet sound you produced on that lovely old instrument.’

  ‘Something like that would cost a king’s ransom anyway,’ Miranda sighed despondently. ‘And it’s sure to have been sold by now.’

  Emily made a vague sound to register sympathy while she was busy calculating how much money she could raise if she sold her central London apartment to the landlord who already owned most of the smart riverside block, and then rented it back from him. Miranda need never know. It was a desperate solution, but anything was preferable to seeing her sister’s opportunity lost. ‘If I can help you, I will,’ she promised.

  With a gust of frustration, Miranda hit the doorbell. ‘You do enough for everyone already. You won’t even let me pay rent—’

  ‘If I didn’t have you around, who else would keep the fridge stocked up with eye masks?’ Emily demanded wryly.

  Their banter was interrupted when the door swung open.

  ‘Girls—’

  Then another idea popped into Emily’s head. ‘I’ve got some investments—’

  ‘No!’ Miranda said, shaking her head vehemently. ‘Absolutely not.’

  ‘You’re not arguing,’ their mother said wearily, giving them both a reproving look.

  ‘Heated discussion, Mum,’ Emily said as she shut the door behind them. ‘Where’s Dad?’

  ‘In his study, of course.’

  Of course. Emily stole a moment to inhale deeply, taking in the aroma of a freshly baked cake coming from the kitchen, along with the gurgle of boiling water ready for tea.

  ‘You look tired,’ her mother said softly, touching her arm. ‘And as for you, Miranda—’ Her voice sharpened as if her maternal engines had revved to a new pitch. ‘What you need is a good dose of my linctus, and a hot cup of tea—’

  ‘Did I hear the magic words?’

  ‘Dad!’ the girls cried in unison.

  After giving them both a bear hug, Mr Weston linked arms with his daughters and followed their mother into the kitchen.

  ‘It will be easy for you, Emily,’ her mother asserted confidently, after Miranda had outlined her plan to secure the recording contract. ‘You’re not emotionally involved like Miranda. And you’ll run rings around this record company man when it comes to securing the best terms for Miranda.’

  Emily was surprised by her reaction to this vote of confidence. It was unnerving to discover that her mother’s assessment of the situation could be so far off the mark. Intuition told her that running rings around Alessandro Bussoni was out of the question. But her main worry was the strange way her heart behaved just at the thought of him joining them in the tiny house. The man behind the voice would fill every inch of it with presence alone, never mind the unsettling possibility that she might brush up against him—

  ‘Are you sure you’re all right with this, Emily…? Emily?’

  Finally the concern in her father’s voice penetrated Emily’s dream-state, and her eyes cleared as she hurried to r
eassure him. ‘Of course, Dad. Leave it to me,’ she insisted brightly, ‘I can handle Signor Bussoni—’

  ‘Italian!’ her mother exclaimed, showing double the interest as she unconsciously checked out her neat halo of curls. ‘How exciting. And when did you say he was arriving?’

  ‘Right now, by the looks of it,’ Emily’s father said as he peered through the window.

  CHAPTER TWO

  ‘OH, NO!’ Miranda gasped, looking to her sister for guidance.

  ‘Stay upstairs until he’s gone,’ Emily suggested briskly. ‘I’ll come and get you when the coast’s clear. Mum. Dad. Act normal.’

  ‘Yes, dear,’ her mother said breathlessly, exchanging an excited glance with her father.

  Don’t look so worried,’ Emily called after Miranda. ‘I promise not to turn anything down without your approval.’

  Exchanging quick smiles, the girls were just on the point of parting at the foot of the stairs when they stopped, looked at each other, and then swooped to the hall window.

  Standing well back from the glass, Emily ran a finger cautiously down the edge of the net curtain.

  ‘Oh, boy,’ she murmured, watching the tall, darkly clad figure unfold his impressive frame from the heavily shaded interior of a sleek black car.

  ‘You said Herman Munster,’ Miranda breathed accusingly.

  ‘I said he might have been Herman Munster for all I could see of him,’ Emily corrected tensely.

  ‘Looks like you were both wrong in this instance,’ their father commented dryly.

  Alessandro felt a frisson of anticipation as he double-checked the address his private secretary had passed on to him that morning.

  He wasn’t used to waiting, and eighteen hours was far too long in this case.

  But then he wasn’t used to speaking to someone hiding behind a screen either, or accepting anyone’s terms but his own—which was how he now found himself getting out of a rented Mercedes outside a perfectly ordinary semi-detached house in North London.

  He smiled a little in amused acceptance. He couldn’t recall a single instance of being turned down by a woman, let alone agreeing to a time of her choosing for an audience as begrudging as this one. His sharp gaze took in the small rectangular lawn, freshly mowed, and then moved on to the splash of vivid colour provided by a pot of petunias to one side of the narrow front door. For someone who moved between palaces, embassies or the presidential suite in some luxury hotel when he was really slumming it, this chance to sample suburbia was a novelty…No. A welcome change, he decided as he swiped off his dark glasses.

  Behind a snowy drift of net, the Weston family watched Alessandro Bussoni’s progress towards the house in awe-struck silence.

  ‘He’s absolutely gorgeous,’ Miranda murmured. Their distracted mother barely managed a weak gasp of, ‘Oh, my!’

  ‘Go, before he sees you,’ Emily suggested urgently, having already turned her back on the window.

  ‘But your make-up,’ Miranda said, hopping from foot to foot, torn between going and staying.

  Emily’s hand shot automatically to her face. ‘What about it?’

  ‘You’re not wearing any,’ Miranda exclaimed with concern.

  ‘Can’t be helped. He’ll still think I’m you. Why shouldn’t he? Anyway, you’re not wearing any make-up,’ Emily pointed out.

  ‘Only because I’m sick.’

  ‘Well, there’s no time for me to do anything about it now,’ Emily said firmly. ‘I’ll be fine. Don’t worry about me.’

  ‘Sure?’ Miranda asked hopefully.

  ‘Sure,’ Emily said briskly, hoping no one had noticed that her hand was shaking as it hovered over the doorknob.

  ‘I’m going to change,’ Miranda shouted, on her way up the stairs. ‘Then I’m taking over from you.’

  ‘No!’ But even as Emily’s gaze raked the empty landing to call her sister back she knew it was too late. Sucking in a deep, steadying breath, she seized the doorknob tightly and began to turn…

  ‘You go and wait in the lounge, pet.’

  ‘Dad—’

  ‘Go and compose yourself,’ Mr Weston urged gently, refusing to let go of her arm until Emily allowed him to steer her away from the door. ‘You look like you could do with a few minutes. I’ll keep him busy until you’re ready.’

  ‘You’re an angel,’ Emily whispered, reaching up on tiptoe to give her father an affectionate peck on the cheek. But a moment alone was all it took her to realise that she couldn’t go ahead with the charade after all, and she rushed upstairs to find her sister.

  The twins waited motionless, hardly daring to breathe as they stood just inside the door to Miranda’s bedroom. It felt as if the conversation downstairs had been going on for ever while their father satisfied himself as to their visitor’s identity and then invited him into the house, but at his signal they started down the stairs.

  Emily was dressed in her customary relaxing-at-home-uniform of blue jeans and a simple grey marl tee shirt. Her well-buffed toenails, devoid of nail varnish, were shown off in a pair of flat brown leather sandals, while her long black hair was held up loosely on top of her head with a tortoise-shell clip.

  In complete contrast, Miranda had somehow found enough time to coat the area around her large green eyes with copious amounts of silver glitter, add blusher to her cheeks and staggeringly high platform shoes to her seemingly endless legs.

  Surely there could be no mistake, Emily thought, giving her twin the final once-over before they reached the sitting room door. Signor Bussoni would immediately presume it was Miranda he had seen on stage. ‘Relax,’ she whispered, taking hold of her twin’s wrist. ‘It’ll be all right.’

  ‘Then why are you shaking?’ Miranda remarked perceptively.

  ‘Girls? What’s keeping you? You’ve got a visitor.’

  ‘We’re coming now, Dad,’ Emily called back, hoping she sounded more confident than she felt. She had no idea what she was up against, and had nothing to go on but that disconcerting voice. For all she knew it might be Herman Munster hiding behind that impressive physique and those super-sleek clothes.

  ‘Come on, love. What’s the hold-up?’ Popping his head round the door, her father drew her into the room. ‘Your mother will have tea ready in about fifteen minutes,’ he said. ‘You two know each other,’ he added, with an expectant smile.

  Emily felt as if her powers of reason had vanished. Her mind’s eye wasn’t simply unreliable, it was positively defective, she decided, gazing up into a man’s face that was almost agonising in its perfection. Thick ebony-black hair, cut slightly longer than was customary in England, was swept back and still tousled from the wind. Conscious he would think her rude, she forced her gaze away, only to discover lips that were almost indecently well formed and the most expressive dark gold gaze she had ever encountered.

  Restating his name with a slight bow, Alessandro viewed the two sisters standing one behind the other. ‘Miss Weston,’ he murmured.

  Lurching forward in response to Emily’s none too subtle prompting, Miranda extended her hand politely. ‘Delighted to see you, Signor Bussoni,’ she said, letting out an audible sigh when Alessandro raised her hand to his lips.

  ‘And I you,’ he said in a voice as warm as the sunlight that had tinted his skin to bronze. ‘But, forgive me, it is the other Miss Weston I have come to see.’

  ‘The other Miss Weston?’ Miranda squeaked, looking helplessly behind her to where Emily was standing rigid, wishing the ground would swallow her up.

  ‘Indeed,’ Alessandro said in a voice laced with humour. ‘You did invite me, Miss Weston,’ he said, looking straight at Emily.

  Shock rendered both sisters speechless, and for a moment no one moved or spoke. If their own parents couldn’t tell them apart, how could Signor Bussoni? Emily wondered tensely. She breathed a sigh of relief as her mother breezed into the room.

  ‘Ah, Signor Bussoni, what a pleasure it is to have you in our midst.’

  ‘The pleasure is
all mine, I assure you,’ Alessandro said, inclining his head towards the older woman in an elegant show of respect.

  ‘I see you’ve met my girls.’ Looking from Emily to Miranda, she clearly couldn’t contain herself another moment. ‘Have you heard Miranda play yet?’ she said expectantly. ‘The violin,’ she prompted, when Alessandro stared at her blankly. ‘Her interpretation of the Brahms” Violin Concerto” is second to none, you know. She won a competition with that piece.’

  Emily’s face flared hot as she realised that her mother was completely oblivious to the tension building around her.

  ‘The violin?’ Alessandro’s face betrayed nothing but polite enquiry, but beneath the surface his mind was working overtime. Had he been hoist by his own petard? His plan had seemed audacious enough, but this family appeared intent on embroiling him in something even more ambitious. He glanced again at the girl her mother had called Miranda. Her provocative clothing and extravagantly made up face marked her out as a showgirl…but apparently she was a classical violinist. And then his gaze switched to the fresh-faced beauty he had come to see…the angel with the faintly flushed cheeks and the incredible jade-green eyes who masqueraded as a showgirl by night…To say the contrast intrigued him was putting it mildly. But what the hell was he getting himself into? Taking another look at Emily, he found he could not look away. He would have carried right on staring, too, had it not been for her sister’s protestation providing him with a distraction.

  ‘Oh, Mother, really,’ Miranda said now, looking at Emily to back her up.’ Signor Bussoni doesn’t want to hear about all that—Emily, say something.’

  Emily, Alessandro mused, running the name over and over in his mind and loving its undulating form, its perfect proportions, its old English charm…Emily, Emily—Her mother fractured his musings with terrier-like determination.

  ‘Emily won’t stop me telling Signor Ferara all about your wonderful talent, Miranda. If no one speaks of it, how will you ever play that violin you so loved in Heidelberg?’