bad leg. It was really hurting her now.

Twenty-six! Lorenzo frowned as he looked down

at her hands. No rings. "Why are you here on your

own?"

Jodie was beginning to feel she had had enough.

"Because I am on my own. Not that it is any business

of yours," she informed him.

"On the contrary, it is very much my business—

since you have seen fit to trespass on my land."

His land? Of course it would be his land; it possessed

exactly the same harsh, arrogant inhospitality as

he did.

"And what do you mean, you are on your own?"

she heard him demanding. "Surely you have a…a

husband, or a lover. A man, a partner, in your life."

Jodie winced, and then laughed bitterly. He didn’t

know about the still tender nerves he was brutalising.

"I thought I did," she agreed angrily, "but unfortunately

for me he decided he wanted to marry someone

else. This—" she gestured towards the landscape and

the car "—was supposed to be our honeymoon. But

now…" Just saying the words still hurt, but strangely

there was also a savage sense of relief in being able

to vent her emotions instead of having to keep them

locked inside her for the sake of others, as she had

had to do at home.

"Now what?" Lorenzo challenged her. "Now you

are travelling alone and looking for someone to replace

him in your bed? The coastal resorts are the

best hunting ground for that. Not the mountains."

Jodie drew in her breath in outraged fury. "How

dare you say that? I am most certainly not looking

for anyone, let alone someone to replace him. In fact,

that is the last thing I want to do," she found herself

adding. "I shall never let another man into my life to

hurt me. Never. From now on I intend to live by

myself and for myself." Bold words, but she meant

every single one of them!

Lorenzo frowned as he heard in her voice the passionate

intensity of her determination.

"You still want him so much?"

"No!" Jodie told him fiercely, without stopping to

wonder why he was asking such a personal thing. "I

Don’t want him at all — not now."

"So why are you here — running away?"

"I am not running away! I just Don’t want to be

there to see him marry someone else," she added defensively

when she saw the way he was looking at

her. "Especially when she’s all the things I’m not.

Exciting, glamorous, sexy…" Jodie lifted her hand to

her face to rub away the tears that had suddenly filled

her eyes. She had no idea why she was telling this

stranger all of this, admitting to him things she had

not even admitted to herself before.

"It is the man who determines whether or not a

woman is "sexy", as you put it," Lorenzo decreed

dismissively, as caught up in this strangely intimate

exchange as Jodie. "A skilled lover has it in his power

to create a full flowering of even the most tightly

closed bud."

A shock of tingling awareness quivered through her

belly as Jodie absorbed the meaning of his astoundingly

arrogant statement.

"Not that many young women are tightly closed

buds in this day and age," Lorenzo added sardonically,

as he watched the colour come and go in the

pale face that was so shadowed with tiredness.

"Modern women have claimed the right to their

own sexuality," Jodie responded fiercely. "They do

not—"

"It does not sound to me as though you have been

very effective in claiming yours," Lorenzo told her

derisively. "In fact, if I were to make an assessment

of it, I would guess that your experience is extremely

limited — otherwise you would not have lost your man

to another woman."

His sheer arrogant machismo both astounded and

infuriated her. But she was forced to admit that non

existent would have been a more accurate estimation

of her sexual expertise. Painfully she released the

pent-up breath his words had caused her to hold, in

shaky relief that he had not added to her existing humiliation

by somehow recognising that she was still

a virgin. Not by choice, though. All those months in

hospital, after the car crash in which her parents had

been killed and she had been so badly injured that at

one point it had been feared she would not survive,

had stolen a large chunk out of her life.

"Which, presumably, is why you are confusing

physical lust with love — a word, an emotion, your sex

has laid claim to and downvalued to the extent that

is now worthless," Lorenzo continued harshly.

"My sex?" Jodie took up the challenge immediately,

the gold-hued warmth of her eyes heating to an indignant

dark amber.

"Yes, your sex! Do you deny that women have now

become as much serial adulterers as they once

claimed only men could be? That their reasons for

marriage are based on their own selfish and shallow

emotions and needs — needs which in their eyes come

before the needs of anyone else, even the children

they bear?"

The bitterness she could hear in his voice momentarily

shocked Jodie into silence. But she rallied

quickly to defend her sex, pointing out, "If that is your

consistent experience of women, then maybe you are

the common factor — and the one to blame."

"I? So you believe that if a child is abandoned by

its mother, it is the child who is at fault? A novel

mindset — which only underlines what I have just

been saying!"

"No, that is not what I meant—" Jodie began.

But it was too late. He was ignoring her words to

demand autocratically, "What is your name?"

"Jodie. Jodie Oliver. What is your name?" she

asked equally firmly, not to be outdone.

For the first time since he had stopped his car she

sensed a momentary hesitation in him before he said

coolly, "Lorenzo."

"The Magnificent?" Jodie quipped, and then went

bright red as he looked at her.

Il Magnifico. That had always been Gino’s teasing

way of addressing him, claiming that it was no wonder

he had been so successful when he carried the

same name as one of Florence’s most famous Medici

rulers.

"You know the history of the Medici?" he shot at

Jodie.

"Some of it," she said neutrally, suddenly not wanting

any more argument with a stranger. She was beginning

to feel very tired and weak. "Look, I need to

get in touch with the car hire firm and tell them about

the car, but my mobile isn’t working. Could you possibly…?"

He must surely be going back through the

village she had driven through — there was nowhere

else to go. If he would take her there she might be

able to find a room for the night and telephone the

car rental people.

"Could I possibly what?" Lorenzo demanded. "Help

you? Certainly." She had just started to sag with relief

when he added softly, "Provided that you agree to

help me."

Instantly warning signals flashed their messages inside

her head, causing her to tense.

"Help you?" she repeated cautiously.

"Yes. I need a wife."

He was mad. Completely and utterly insane. She

was stuck on a deserted road with a madman.

"You…want me to help you find a wife?" she managed

to ask, as though it were the most natural request

in the world.

Lorenzo’s mouth compressed, and he gave her a

look of cold derision. "Don’t be ridiculous. No, I do

not want you to help me find a wife. I want you to

become my wife," he told her coolly.