VITTORIO'S RUNAWAY BRIDE (The Vittorio Series) (19 page)

Logan loosened his tie as he got out of the car, anxious to get inside the house where he knew Shelby was waiting.
 
It had been a long, hard day full of conference calls and meetings and he hadn’t even been able to squeeze in a few minutes to escape to the Penthouse and spend time with his wife.
 
He liked the idea of having her so close he could see her during the day and thought he
would
even be able to manage a couple of intimate lunch hours throughout the week.
 
It would satisfy Shelby’s need to be with him more often
,
as well as his own desire to spend more time with her, but it would also go a long way in relieving the tension that came with running a corporation as huge as Vittorio Enterprises.

The only problem he’d foreseen was that Shelby would be disappointed more often than not when he wasn’t able to get away as much as she
would
like him to.
 
But the truth was, she
had
been blissfully happy with the few stolen moments and the occasional hour he could spare, and it had been Logan himself who
became
dependent on seeing her during the work day.
 
The first thing he
did
when he got to the office was check his calendar to see whether he could wheedle out of a meeting or appointment or even reschedule altogether.
 

Of course, all of their time wasn’t spent between the sheets because of the time constraints, but he sure as hell took advantage of it if he was able to grab an hour or two.
 
Sometimes, they did nothing more than have lunch together or sit on the sofa and talk.
 
And sometimes, the really special times, were spent quietly watching Shelby work her magic with a canvas and brush.

But today had been doubly rough, not just because he’d been so busy but because one of his meetings had cut out twenty minutes earlier than expected and he’d raced back to the office and up to the Penthouse Suite only to find she
had
already gone home.
 
Now all he could think about was holding her in his arms and letting the softness of her body melt away the stress of the day.
 
He needed to feel his mouth on hers, to taste her, touch her
.  E
ven more than his next breath, he needed to bury himself inside his wife and show her how much she meant to him.

That’s why he was so disappointed when he was greeted at the door by Alba instead of receiving the enthusiastic welcome he always got from Shelby when he walked through the door.
 
His disappointment was shoved aside to be replaced by concern when he was informed that Mrs. Vittorio was up in her room with a headache and had asked that dinner be served an hour later than usual so she could sleep it off.
 
Logan hurried up the stairs, peeling off his tie and jacket as he went and tossing them both on a chair in their sitting room as he passed through it on the way to their room.

“Shelby?”
 
h
e said hesitantly when he entered the bedroom and found the bed empty.

Logan shut the door behind him, his eyes bouncing around the room as if he
had
never seen it before.
 
Both the lamps on their matching nightstands
were
switched on, but a filmy piece of turquoise material had been draped over each one
, giving
the room a romantic glow.
 
The covers on the bed
were
turned down
,
and even from where he was standing
,
he could see that the cotton sheets had been exchanged for silk ones.
 
An exotic scent filled the room and he could hear the soothing strains of his favorite classical music filtering through the built-in speakers.
 
His eyes moved in response to a soft rustling off to his left
. 

Shelby was poised in the doorframe of the bathroom dressed in a short, filmy nightie that was even more sheer than the material she’d placed over the lamps.
 
The only other thing she wore was a soft, sexy smile that made his gut tighten.
 
Her long mane of hair fell in waves over her shoulders, shimmering like wildfire.
  Blood rushed to his head, did a rapid u-turn, and
then
raced due south to pool in his loins.

Logan couldn’t move, couldn’t breathe, couldn’t do anything but stare at his wife as she sauntered across the room and started unbuttoning his shirt.
 
She looked up at him from
beneath
her lashes with that same sexy smile and it wasn’t just the stress of the day that melted away, but the world and everything in it as well.

“I’ve drawn you a nice hot bath,” she purred.
 

“A…bath?”

“My poor darling,” Shelby said as she pushed his shirt over his shoulders and let it drop to the
floor
.
 
“I can tell you’ve had a rough day, but I promise it will only get better now that you’re home.”
 
She reached for his belt,
looking
quite pleased with herself when
Logan drew
in a ragged breath.
 
“I have it all planned out,” she continued in a sultry voice.
 
“First I’m going to bathe you,” she lowered his zipper, “then I’m going to make love to you,” she guided his slacks over his hips, “and then we will enjoy the wonderful meal Alba has prepared for us.
 
How does that sound?”

Like
I have
died and gone to Heaven
, Logan thought as Shelby finished undressing him then took his hand and led him towards the bathroom.
 
He’d always preferred the convenience of showering rather than going to all the trouble of drawing a bath.
 
But that was before Shelby climbed into the tub with him and took over the task of bathing him.

Shelby leaned into him, feathering kisses along his strong jaw line to his ear.
 
“Now it’s
my
turn to take care of
you
, my love,” she whispered.
 

“
Madre di Dio
,” he muttered when she straddled his thighs and let the cloth slip out of her hands.

Shelby couldn’t quite suppress the happy giggle that bubbled up in her throat as she left the doctor’s office and stepped out into the bright sunshine.
 
She’d suspected it for a few weeks now but had been too afraid to take another home pregnancy test only to have it prove she still hadn’t conceived.
 
But this morning, Logan had unwittingly given her the perfect excuse for making a doctor’s appointment when he commented that she looked a little pale and asked if she was coming down with a bug.
 

“I have been feeling a little run down,” she admitted.

He’d looked at her from across the breakfast table then pulled out his cell phone and set an appointment for later that morning.
 
Shelby had felt such a rush of love for him at that moment she wanted to cry.
 
He was taking care of her, just as he always had, and she adored it that Logan felt this need to protect her from anything that could harm her, including something as minor as a flu bug.
 
 
 
 
 

“I can cancel a few appointments and take you,” he said as soon as
he
hung up.

“I’m not completely helpless, you know.
 
Cancelling appointments means you
will
have to try and squeeze them in somewhere else or work late one day this week.
 
I think I can handle finding the doctor’s office by myself, and I promise to call you if there
is
anything seriously wrong.”

“Are you sure?
 
Because I could…”

“I’m sure,” she’d jumped in.
 
“Now, go finish getting ready for work while I grab your briefcase from the study.”

Even though he hadn’t tried to change her mind about letting him drive her to the doctor’s office, she could tell he wasn’t very happy about it.
 
Regardless of her assurance it was nothing but a bug, Logan would worry about it until she called to let him know everything was okay.
 
The problem now was that she didn’t want to call him because she wanted to see his face when she gave him the good news.
 

Shelby climbed into her car and sat there for a few minutes with her hand pressed against her belly.
 
A baby
.
 
No, not just a baby
…
Logan’s baby, the one he’d planted inside of her the night he
came
home to find her waiting for him in that skimpy little nightie.
 
Well, she giggled out loud, the sales lady had been right about one thing…her husband hadn’t been able to keep his hands off of her.

She fired up the engine but didn’t head back home as she
had
planned.
 
Logan would no doubt be too busy to talk to her if simply showed up at his office, but if she went to the Penthouse suite and called to let him know she was there
,
maybe he could find some time to come up and see her.
 
Even if he could only get away for a few minutes, it would still be better than having to wait until he got home this evening.
 
Shelby was still floating on a cloud when she pulled onto the highway leading to Vittorio Enterprises.

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
                                       
***

Logan leaned back in his chair, the grim expression on his face leaving no doubt in either of his brother’s minds how disturbed he was by the information they
had
just laid before him.
 
After attending the charity ball with Shelby over two months ago and making it quite obvious to anyone who was watching, namely Alicia Delatorre, that he was very much in love with his wife, he would have bet his vast fortune there would be no more trouble from that quarter.
 

He
was
even more convinced Alicia had given up her pursuit of him when she stopped calling and showing up announced at his office.
 
That was before Gianluca and Dante had requested a meeting this morning and proved just how wrong he’d been to let his guard down.

“We have a little problem,” Dante informed him after he and Luca had seated themselves in front of Logan’s desk.

“Since when do either of you come to me when there is a
little
problem?”

“Since in involves Alicia Delatorre,” Luca replied as he tossed a file in front of Logan.
 
“That is a report from a private investigator we hired two and half months ago to keep an eye on
her
.
 
And these,” he tossed a manila envelope on top of the file, “are photographs taken by the investigator
,
along with several Vittorio Enterprises security disks for the same time period.”

Logan’s brows drew together.
 
“Why are you having Alicia followed?
 
She has not attempted to contact me at all since the charity ball
.  E
ven then she did nothing more than nod her head to acknowledge me when Shelby and I first arrived.”

“It was Simon’s idea,” Dante told him.
 
“He told us about her visit to the office and how obsessive Alicia had become
.  He
asked if we believed a woman like that would stop hounding you simply because she had seen how happy you are with Shelby.”

“
We concluded
it was not likely,” Luca
added
.

Logan glanced from one to the other.
 
“So all of my brothers banded together and decided to have her followed without bothering to ask whether or not I approved?”

“We did not want to concern you unnecessarily if our suspicions were unfounded,” Dante replied.
 
“Perhaps we were wrong not to bring this to your attention before now, but we were right to have kept a close watch on her.”

As much as Logan loved his brothers and appreciated their efforts to keep Alicia from complicating his life, he wasn’t at all happy about being left out of the loop.
 
What if she
had
discovered she was being watched by this private investigator and that Vittorio Enterprises was footing the bill?
 
She
would
think it was Logan’s doing
,
and who knows what Alicia would make of that?
 
Besides, he didn’t care if she was spying on him as long as she kept her distance as she’d been doing.

“I am sure the report will make for very interesting reading,” he said indifferently, “but I have no desire to know how Alicia Delatorre spends her days, nor do I care to look at pictures of her.
 
So, if one of you would be kind enough to give me a brief summary, maybe we can all get back to our jobs.”

“Very well,” Dante said, “you can look through everything later if you wish.
 
The reason Alicia left you alone for nearly a month after Shelby returned was because she flew off to join her husband in the south of France.
 
She came back to the states alone and immediately started asking questions about your marriage.”

“The investigator told you this?”

“No, this was before we hired him.
 
I caught wind of it from one of my…female companions
,
so I asked a few others who run in the same circles as Alicia and they all said the same thing.”

Logan didn’t bother to ask how many
female companions
Dante had, but he would venture to guess there were at least half a dozen.
 
“So she wanted to find out if my marriage was shaky, that is not surprising and hardly a reason to hire an investigator.”

“If that was all she wanted to know then I might not have even mentioned it to Simon.
 
It wasn’t
you
that Alicia was gathering information about.
 
Logan, she was asking questions about Shelby.”

Logan’s stomach knotted.
 
“What kind of questions?”

“The kind that make you worry about what she is up to,” Luca said.

“Things like whether she works,” Dante added, “and if she has any activities outside the home, what kind of car she drives, where she gets hair done, her favorite place to shop and…”

“I get it,” Logan snapped, then immediately apologized.
 
“I do not mean to take it out on either of you, but the woman is unbalanced and what you
discovered makes
me very concerned for Shelby’s welfare.
 
If Alicia manages to catch her alone and feed her lies about having an affair with me…”

“That is why I approached Simon about it,” Dante said.
 
“I know you confide in him more than the rest of us and thought he could tell us more about this woman and whether she was a threat to Shelby.
 
It made him uneasy to know Alicia was asking about Shelby, but even more so because he knew she had stopped chasing after you.
 
It made no sense unless…”

“Unless she was planning some sort of attack on Shelby,” Logan finished for him.
 
“It will do her no good,” he said confidently.
 
“If she is looking for dirt on Shelby, I assure you she will not find any.”

“There is more,” Luca cast a sidelong glance at Dante.
 
“We felt it was necessary to tell Grady about it since he is head of security here.
 
With Shelby spending so much time in the Penthouse Suites, we wanted him to make sure there was someone posted by the elevator to make sure no one but you gained access.”

“
Mio Dio
,” Logan shook his head in disbelief.
 
“You honestly believe Alicia is capable of physically harming Shelby?”

Luca drew in a deep breath before relaying the worst of it.
 
“The investigator alerted us first, and Grady confirmed it after reviewing security tapes on the days Shelby went to the Penthouse.
 
Alicia has been following Shelby, and not just when she leaves the house to come here, but to other places as well.”

“What other places?”

“Any place, every place your wife goes.”
 
Dante watched as a storm began to brew behind his brother’s eyes but did nothing to try and calm him.
 
“You are angry, and rightly so.
 
If Shelby was my wife, I would be furious if I knew someone was following her around.
 
Maybe it is all harmless and Alicia will grow tired of this game, but approaching Shelby with a mouthful of lies is not the only thing that could lead to trouble.”

“
Madre di Dio
,” Logan ground out, “what could possibly be worse than that?”

“The private investigator we hired,” Dante explained.
 
“It is a double edged sword, Logan.
 
If Alicia discovers he is in the employ of Vittorio Enterprises, she may want to extract revenge, or her warped mind may construe it as a sign you desire her and want to know if she has taken another lover.
 
But if
Shelby
finds out and we have not let her know the reasons for having Alicia followed, she may wonder if you are simply trying to make sure your lover and your wife do not cross paths.”

“Then I will tell her,” Logan said grimly.
 
“But first, I shall have a nice long talk with Alicia Delatorre about the consequences of her actions if she does not leave Shelby alone.
 
You said Grady provided you with security disks, does that mean he
h
as seen Alicia here at Vittorio Enterprises?”

Luca nodded.
 
“She follows Shelby here
,
but since she cannot get into the private section of the underground garage, she parks outside.
 
Most days, she sits in her car for awhile then leaves and returns just before five o’clock when you and Shelby usually leave.
 
S
ometimes, she comes inside the building and just stands there staring at the portrait of you that hangs in the lobby.
 
Occasionally, Alicia wanders through the building and has even been up to the Executive floor,
al
though she has made no attempt to see you.”