Read Online Her Last Night of Innocence by India Grey - Free Book Online Page A

remembering how he had planned to spend the rest of the night. In bed with her. Seducing her into telling him everything he so badly wanted to know. But he had underestimated her, he realised now. He had assumed she would fall into bed with him at the merest hint of an opportunity, like any one of the scores of women across the square who were no doubt searchingthe Casino for him right now. The fact that she hadn’t was intriguing, as well as surprisingly painfully frustrating.
    He thrust his hands in his pockets, gritting his teeth against the throbbing in his head—and in other, more basic parts of his anatomy. ‘I’m going away for a while.’
    She had moved across to the bed again and was leaning forward, unzipping the case she’d just finished packing. Her hand stilled. ‘Oh? Where to?’
    ‘A chalet in the Alps. It belongs to a friend.’
    His voice was rough in the quiet room. From a long way off he could just about hear the sounds of the party in the Casino—the pulse of the music and the muffled sound of a lot of voices raised to speak over it. Suddenly he was profoundly glad to have escaped.
    To be here.
    Slowly she lifted her head and looked up. Her eyes were wide, the blue almost swallowed up by the darkness at their centre.
    ‘You’re going tonight?’
    He nodded, not letting his gaze move from hers. Not able to. ‘I’m going now.’
    Her tongue darted out and moistened her lips. ‘Alone?’
    It was barely more than a whisper, and it felt like a caress. Cristiano felt desire slam into him with all the force of a head-on collision. The air between them throbbed with sudden possibility.
    ‘I hope not,’ he said softly.

Chapter Four
    I T WAS a starless night.
    Sitting in the low passenger seat of Cristiano’s expensive sports car, Kate bit her lip and stared out into the darkness, trying to stop the convulsive tremors that gripped her
    The car’s headlamps lit the empty road ahead, but beyond them there was nothing but velvet blackness. She had no idea where they were, or exactly where they were going. There was no north star to use as a compass, no moon to light the way.
    It seemed crushingly symbolic.
    The surge of hope she had felt when he’d told her about his memory loss had completely ebbed away now, leaving a hollow despair in its place. At first she had been overwhelmed with relief that there was a reason why he had forgotten her, that it wasn’t that she just hadn’t been significant enough for him to remember. It had all seemed so wonderfully simple—as if someone had handed her the missing part of the jigsaw, the vital clue that made sense of the last four years. She had barely hesitated for a heartbeat when he asked her to go with him.
    But it wasn’t simple at all.
    She was nothing more than a stranger to him now. The crash hadn’t just stolen a few hours from his memory, it had also robbed him of the ability to trust. If she told him what they’d shared that night he’d think she was one of those grasping fantasists he’d described in the hotel room, not only demandingmoney and fame but something more sinister and exploitative.
    Demanding his heart.
    She clasped her hands together in her lap to stop her fingers nervously pleating the blue satin dress she hadn’t even thought to change out of. At that moment he looked across at her. The greenish light of the high-tech instrument panel gave his perfect face a chilling remoteness which seemed to reinforce her worst fears.
    ‘OK?’
    She nodded quickly, struggling to find something harmless to say. ‘It’s a very impressive car.’
    Alex would adore it, she thought with a stab of anguish.
    ‘It’s the latest Campano sports model,’ Cristiano said tonelessly, slowing down as a lorry appeared in front of them. ‘I’m testing it for Silvio so I can casually mention it in every interview I do at the start of the racing season.’
    He was meant to be testing it anyway, he thought wearily, although the way he was driving it