Castellano's Mistress of Revenge Read Free

lashes, but he countered it by pushing her chin even higher. ‘I swore I would one day makeyou pay for what you did to me, Ava, and that day has come,’ he said. ‘This villa is mine and everything in it, including you.’
    She swallowed convulsively as she tried to pull out of his hold. ‘No… no !’
    His fingers bit into her flesh. ‘Yes and yes, ma belle ,’ he said. ‘Do you not want to hear my terms?’
    Ava fought for control of her emotions. She bit the inside of her lip, tasting blood and the bitterness of regret. ‘Go on, then,’ she said, dropping her shoulders slightly.
    His fingers relaxed their hold, his thumb moving in a slow caress over the pillow of her bottom lip until every nerve-end was tingling. Ava was mesmerised by his touch. It was so achingly gentle after his flaying words. She felt herself melting, the stiffness going out of her limbs, her body remembering how it felt to press up against his hard, protective warmth.
    After a moment he seemed to check himself. His hand dropped from her mouth and his eyes hardened to black coal again. ‘You will be my mistress,’ he said. ‘I will pay you an allowance for as long as we are together. But I would like to make one thing very clear from the outset. Unlike the way you manipulated Cole into marrying you, I will not be offering the same deal. There will be no marriage between us. Ever.’
    Ava felt her heart contract in pain at the bitterness in his tone. He had spoken the words like a business plan. But then, what had changed? Hadn’t he said much the same five years ago? No marriage, no kids, no commitment. And she had been foolish enough to accept it…for a time.
    Ava drew in a breath that scalded her throat. ‘You seem very convinced I will accept your offer.’
    â€˜That is because I know you, Ava,’ he said with a sardonic light in his gaze. ‘You need money and a lot of it.’
    â€˜I can find work.’ Pride pulled her shoulders back even farther. ‘I’ve been thinking of returning to modelling.’
    A determined look hardened his eyes to black ice. ‘One word from me and there’s not an agency the length and breadth of Europe who would take you on.’
    Ava wished she had the courage to call his bluff. But after a five-year hiatus in her modelling career at Douglas’s insistence she didn’t like her chances of being picked up by her old agency, let alone anyone else.
    â€˜I can find other work,’ she said with a defiant look.
    â€˜Not the sort of work that will pay you enough to regularly top up your sister’s bank account.’
    Ava felt her eyes widen. ‘You know about that?’
    He gave her an enigmatic look. ‘You know the saying—keep your friends close but your enemies closer. I am making it my business to find out everything there is to find out about you, Ava.’
    Ava felt as if he had pierced her heart with a long metal skewer. She felt the barb of it right to her backbone; it reverberated throughout her body, making her want to hug her arms around herself, to stop the pulse of pain. But somehow she stood firm, her eyes holding the black fire of his.
    â€˜Please keep Serena out of this,’ she said hollowly.
    â€˜There will be no need for her to know anything other than we are together again,’ he said.
    Ava wondered how the news would affect her sister. Serena had out of fierce loyalty never mentioned Marc’s name in her presence over the last five years. She had also kept the secret of Ava’s real relationship with Douglas Cole quiet, so quiet her husband, Richard, was to this day unaware of it. Serena had been too terrified Richard’s conservative family would be totally scandalised by her near-brush with a prison term that only Ava’s actions had rescued her from experiencing.
    But returning to Marc on the terms he had outlined was unthinkable to Ava. How would