Gianni Renzetti emerges from a sex scandal in danger of losing his position of CEO. He needs to rehabilitate his image and he needs a wife to do it. Jo is the girl next door and she knows she can’t handle him but she needs his money to rescue her beloved family home.

Can this very different pair contrive a marriage of convenience?

Can Gianni get over his conviction that love only hurts?

Can he learn to live with a crazy talking parrot ?

Can Jo live with his desire to keep secrets and his even stronger desire for her to make him her priority in life?

UPDATE (May 2022): Jo and Gianni’s story will be called “The Italian’s Bride Worth Billions“.

Excerpts From the Book

Labelled for life

Of course, his PA would have seen the photos in the newspaper and, momentarily, Gianni was embarrassed rather than powered by the anger that had exploded in him the instant he saw that grubby article.

Here he was, evidently, labelled for life by a moment of sexual idiocy. His wide sensual mouth compressed. Yet his strongest conviction was that his private life—for that read sex life—was an entirely confidential matter. Unfortunately, on this particular occasion, the lines had become blurred. Gianni had been set up and he had, regrettably, succumbed to temptation in a private room at a nightclub. That had resulted in attempted blackmail and the involvement of the police followed by a very sleazy spread of photos in a downmarket tabloid. When the extortion attempt failed, the story had been sold instead.

‘I feel like such a failure’

‘You’re in so much debt that even the sale of the lakeshore land wouldn’t turn the situation around,’ Gianni told her succinctly. ‘I suspect that your bank must be close to considering foreclosure.’

Jo only just contrived to suppress a shudder, but their bank had given her the same impression when she had had the temerity to ask for a new loan. Her family’s financial situation was dire. Insufficient money coming in and too many bills had sent the overdraft climbing the previous winter and she heaved a sigh.

‘I feel like such a failure,’ she muttered tightly.

‘Why would it have been mentioned?’

Frustration currented through Jo, putting her even more on edge. ‘I didn’t have an affair with Ralph and if you’d ever met Ralph, you would know that. Jane’s lying. She’s the one who had the affair that made Ralph break off their engagement.’

‘Isn’t it strange how you never mentioned any of this before?’ Gianni sliced in, his wide mouth flattening, his narrowed dark eyes hard and unyielding. ‘You never acknowledged that Ralph even had a previous engagement, and it wasn’t referred to at the funeral either—’

‘Why would it have been mentioned?’ It was Jo’s turn to interrupt, an edge of panic gaining inside her because she knew he wasn’t listening to her. ‘Ralph dumping Jane and her infidelity kept the gossipmongers busy for months and he was horribly embarrassed and hurt by the whole business. Nobody was likely to mention that broken engagement.’