Castellano's Mistress of Revenge Read Online Free

and placed it beside the earrings and rings.
    She straightened and, giving him a challenging look, slipped off her shoes, kicking them to one side before she reached for the zipper at the back of her skirt. She told herself she had stood undressed in front of hundreds of people before while she had been modelling. This would be no different; besides, he had seen it all before. Her body was no secret to him. He knew every curve and contour and every secret place.
    The tension in the air was palpable.
    Ava slid the zipper down, the metallic sound thunderous in the crackling silence. The fabric slipped to the floor and she stepped out of its circle, her fingers going to the hem of her pull-on top.
    Marc’s eyes followed her like a night-vision searchlight. She felt the heat of it scorch her flesh as her top joined her skirt on the floor. She stood before him in a black, French, lace push-up bra and knickers, her chin high, her right hip tilted in a model-like pose. ‘I bought these myself,’ she said with a defiant look.
    His lips flickered, his dark eyes gleaming. ‘Prove it.’
    Ava clenched her teeth, fighting to keep her cool. He wanted her to fall apart, she had to remember that. He wanted her pride any way he could get it. ‘I don’t have the receipt any more, so I am afraid you will have to take my word for it,’ she said, pushing up her chin to disguise its wobble.
    â€˜Your word?’ His top lip lifted in a mocking curl. ‘Since when should I take as gospel the word of a gold-digger?’
    â€˜I am not a gold-digger,’ she said with quiet but steely dignity.
    The timer on his watch beeped, informing her the minute was up.
    Ava felt her stomach slip as Marc’s gaze hit hers. ‘Well?’ he said.
    She had never felt so naked and exposed in her life and yet she was still wearing more than most people wore on the French Riviera beaches she could see from the villa windows.
    â€˜How much are you going to pay me?’ she asked, knowing it would be exactly the question a gold-digger would ask, but she was beyond caring. Serena was more important than her pride at this point. What her sister had suffered recently was far worse than anything Marc Castellano could do to her.
    He named a sum that lifted her brows. ‘Th-that much?’ she asked in a croak.
    He gave her an imperious smile, the black holes of his pupils flaring with passionate promise. ‘I am going to make you earn every penny of it, Ava. I don’t suppose you have forgotten how good we were together, hmm?’
    Ava felt her cheeks flame with colour. She remembered everything: every touch, every kiss, every incendiary caress and every earth-shattering orgasm that had left her quaking in his arms time and time again. ‘You want some sort of medal for being able to perform an act that humans, even the most base of animals, have been doing for centuries?’ she asked with a cutting look.
    He suddenly snagged one of her wrists and pulled her up against him, his chest to her pounding chest and his strong, immovable thighs to her weak, trembling ones. ‘Don’t push me too far, Ava,’ he said in a low growl. ‘I am this close,’ he held up his index finger and thumb a pinch distance apart, ‘to walking out of here and leaving you to face your sugar daddy’s creditors.’
    Again Ava desperately wanted to call his bluff. She would have if it hadn’t been for Serena. A vision of her shattered sister, holding the ultrasound picture of the baby she had lost, was the only thing that stopped her. ‘All right,’ she said on an expelled breath. ‘I’ll do it.’
    Marc’s hold loosened, but he didn’t release her. Instead his thumb found her thundering pulse, stroking over it in a rhythmic motion that was as powerful as a drug. ‘I will release a Press statement for tomorrow’s papers,’ he said into the silence. ‘We will begin