Happy Mother's Day! (14 page)

‘And we have moved on since then,’ he continued furiously. ‘Or, rather, I was hoping we might have done. But it seems I have been wrong, my
freddo bella.
What am I supposed to think—if not that what I see is what I get? A woman who does not care for her man? A woman who does not know how to care?’

‘But why should that bother you, Gianluca?’ she questioned, her voice wobbling. ‘You really only ever married me because of the baby, didn’t you? Why, you’d never even have seen me again if I hadn’t been pregnant!’

‘But that was
your
choice, too, Aisling—remember? I don’t remember you longing to want to see me!’ He took a deep breath to control himself, but rarely had he been so on the brink of losing it. ‘Yes, the baby was the reason we married, but even if you
did
have my baby—do you really think I would have set up home with a woman if I found her boring? If I did not think there were areas of compatibility we could work on?’

She stared at him. ‘You mean, you think there are?’

His breath was coming in short, angry bursts and his eyes burned like hot coals. ‘Ah, Aisling—you drive the dagger so deep, don’t you? You think that I am responsible for everything,
sì?
You want only to shift the blame to me, so that you do not have to accept any responsibility yourself? Yet you ran from my bed that first night in Italywhen there was no reason for you to do so. You, the only woman I had taken there—and, yes, I admit it was probably because you
were
so damned enigmatic!’

Aisling blinked at him in sheer surprise. ‘I didn’t know that. And besides,
I … panicked—
‘

He gave an impatient wave of his hand. ‘Then, when I came to find you in London again—’

‘But you kept me waiting for weeks! You told me you were only there because you had business in London!’

‘You think I have no pride,
cara
—is that it?’ he demanded. ‘You think I will allow a woman to trample on my heart? So I took you to dinner and I took you to bedbut again, you could not wait to get away the next morning.’

‘But our pact—’

‘Pact be damned!’ he raged. ‘You make me feel like the stud! The gigolo!’

‘That was the last thing I intended!’ she protested.

He shook his dark head frustratedly, aware that his smooth fluency seemed to be deserting him—but then, he was not used to doing something as alien as articulating his feelings. ‘So we have the baby and we make the marriage. We live in the beautiful house and everything should be wonderful. I even agree that you should work if you wish to—because I know how important it is to you! Because I admire the way you have worked your way up from nothing to achieve everything that you have. I encourage you to go to Paris, because I think that is what you wantwhat you need to make you contented. If work is so important to you, then you should work—but it must be your choice and yours alone. I try to work out what makes you tick—because you refuse to tell me!’

‘Gianluca—’

‘But even that was not right,’ he raged as he cut through her protest with an impatient wave of his hand. ‘Because
I was not plaguing you with phone calls all day, leaving you free to concentrate on your job—you are still not happy!’

‘I felt excluded,’ she whispered. ‘As if you wanted to get me out of the way and sideline me.’

He shook his head with something approaching despair. ‘Ah, Aisling?’ he asked softly. ‘Why has it all gone so wrong,
mia cara?’

Aisling’s heart stilled and her breath caught in her throat, knowing that she was poised on an emotional tightrope. It was one of those moments where there was a chance—just a tiny one, but a chance all the same—of pulling back from the brink of disaster. Of retrieving something golden and precious from the mess they had made of it so far.

‘Because I’m scared,’ she admitted.

His eyes narrowed. ‘Scared of what?’

Of so many things—would it repel him if she told him? Would the cool image he had painted of her crumble before his eyes? And even if it did—oughtn’t she to take that risk? For she had discovered that a relationship could not be built on shaky foundations—and surely honesty, however painful, was the most secure basis of all.

‘Scared of being needy, like my mother. Scared of relying on a man and being left. Scared of not having a career to fall back on if that should happen.’

‘But you are
not
your mother!’ he objected quietly. ‘And I am not your father. Whatever happens, I would not leave you destitute.’

‘No. Of course not. I can see that now. But patterns of thinking are hard to break when they’ve been in you for a lifetime.’ She tried a smile but it felt more like a grimace. ‘You see the cool stuff is just all a show, Gianluca—a mask
I wear to conceal the ugly insecurities underneath. To hide so many things.’ She drew a deep breath now, recognising that she had come so far and she could not back down. That honesty meant just that. Had she really trampled on his heart, as he had claimed? Had she been so busy looking at the popular image of the rich playboy that she had not realised that
he
might be wearing a mask himself?

‘Including the fact that I love you,’ she declared softly. ‘Deep down, I think I’ve always loved you—but I’ve done such a good job of hiding it that I don’t think you’re ever going to believe me.’

As she spoke, as emotion trembled her voice and softened her features, the mask of which she had spoken seemed to dissolve before his eyes.

Suddenly Gianluca could see what it must have cost her to have admitted that and he could also see what had been left behind in its place—a look of tenderness and passion, devotion and love—shining out brighter than any star viewed from a rooftop restaurant. And it melted his heart.

When he had heard she was pregnant, Gianluca had marvelled at how quickly life could change. That it could be transformed in a heartbeat—by life, by death and by love. Everyone knew that deep down, but most people chose to ignore it. They carried on with their lives, blinkered and unseeing. It was easy to forget that the important things were all around if only you had the courage to reach out for them.

Something had happened when he had first held his newborn son and Gianluca was experiencing something similar now. It
was
love. Like something which had always been just around the corner and out of sight—only
now it had stepped out into the daylight at last, dazzling and transforming.

And along with the breathtaking leap of his heart came the feeling of liberation. That just as Aisling had opened up her heart to him—he was free to do the same. Having Claudio had taught him that expressing emotion did not make a man weak—indeed, that love could empower you with a strength which made you feel you could conquer the world.

Gianluca had been protective of his emotions because women had always wanted more from him than he had been prepared to give, but for the first time in his life he had met someone who had not pushed him for emotional commitment or declaration. And love given freely was so much more powerful than love which was demanded.

He felt infused with the same kind of power which could make an eagle soar over unimaginable heights. ‘You may not believe me when I tell you that I love you, Aisling,’ he said fiercely. ‘But believe me when I tell you this,
mia bella … bella
—that I will spend the rest of my life showing you just how much I do.’

Afterwards, Aisling couldn’t remember which of them had moved first—whether he had crossed the room or she had. Or maybe it had just happened like osmosis—one flowing into the other without really trying. Just two people with aching hearts who had found a healing remedy in each other.

‘S
O WHAT’S
it like working with your wife, Signor Palladio?’

Gianluca smiled at the reporter. ‘I’ve worked with her before. It’s how we met.’ And then he shook his head to negate any more questions before climbing into the back of the limousine beside Aisling.

The car gathered speed and she snuggled in next to him. To huge international fanfare, they had signed on theVinoly hotel that very morning and were now going home to the vineyard, to where Claudio was waiting for them.

‘I can’t wait to see him,’ Aisling murmured.

He smiled. ‘Me, neither.’

‘Though I feel a little guilty sometimes, caro,’ she admitted softly. ‘For leaving my child.’

‘All women seem to feel that guilt,’ Gianluca observed thoughtfully as he traced his finger around the sensual curves of her lips. ‘But you work such limited hours—it’s a perfect arrangement.’

It was indeed. Secure in Gianluca’s love, Aisling had been able to make the decision about what her working future would entail, and it had been deliciously easy. She
wanted her family—her precious little family—to be the number one priority.

So she had sold her share of the business to Suzy—and acted as Gianluca’s part-time Human Resource Consultant in Italy. It suited them all very well—though the press found it endlessly fascinating that such a famous bachelor should have embraced such a close partnership with his wife, and with such enthusiasm.

Aisling adored her new life—with her darling Gianluca and adorable baby. Sometimes she woke up in the morning feeling as though she were still in a wonderful dream of living in the soft, Umbrian countryside and experiencing its simple values and community closeness. But she and her successful husband were able to pick up their metropolitan existence any time they liked.

In order to appease all their disappointed friends who hadn’t been invited to the wedding, they were throwing a huge house-party at the vineyard this weekend and people were flying in for it from all over the world.

‘Just find us a hunk like Gianluca!’ Suzy and Ginger had begged.

‘I’ll try,’ Aisling had promised, laughing—knowing deep down that there was no other man in the world who could hold a candle to him.

Gianluca was watching her as the fields passed by in an emerald blur. ‘Happy?’ he murmured.

‘Blissfully.’ She turned to him as he began to unclip her hair with that look of sexy intent which had her stomach dissolving with anticipation.

‘So, why,’ she giggled as it began to spill down over her smart work-suit in a way which made her feel quite
decadent—which was exactly what he intended her to feel, ‘wouldn’t you let me cut it when I wanted to?’

‘Because …’ Gianluca lifted a long dark strand of hair away from her face and wound it round and round his hand so that it brought her face right up close to his and she could feel the warmth of his breath. ‘Because your long hair was always the one factor which defied your practical nature, and I’ve decided that I would miss it, cara.’

‘But … but I thought you hated the chignon!’ she protested breathlessly.

‘No.’ He began to drift his lips across the silk satin of her mouth. ‘I just didn’t like what it represented. Little Miss Uptight. Now I enjoy the contrast of your different looks.’ And these days she presented him with so many that he was spoilt for choice.

His own Aisling.
Cara bella.

Wife. Mother. Soul mate.

Claiming His
Pregnant Wife

KIM LAWRENCE

Though lacking much authentic Welsh blood,
Kim Lawrence
—from English/Irish stock—was born and brought up in north Wales. She returned there when she married, and her sons were both born on Anglesey, an island off the coast. Though not isolated, Anglesey is a little off the beaten track, but lively Dublin, which Kim loves, is only a short ferry ride away.

Today they live on the farm her husband was brought up on. Welsh is the first language of many people in this area, and Kim’s husband and sons are all bilingual. She is having a lot of fun, not to mention a few headaches, trying to learn the language!

With small children, she thought the unsocial hours of nursing weren’t too attractive, so, encouraged by a husband who thinks she can do anything she sets her mind to, Kim tried her hand at writing. Always a keen Mills & Boon® reader, she felt it was natural for her to write a romance novel. Now she can’t imagine doing anything else.

She is a keen gardener and cook, and enjoys running—often on the beach because, since she lives on an island, the sea is never very far away. She is usually accompanied by her Jack Russell, Sprout—don’t ask, it’s a long story!

Don’t miss
A Spanish Awakening,
the exciting
new novel by Kim Lawrence, available in
April 2011 from Mills & Boon
^®
Modern
^™
.

F
RANCESCO
R
OMANELLI
had pulled into the outside lane of the motorway when the mobile phone in his pocket began to vibrate again. An impatient grimace furrowing the smooth olive-toned skin of his high, intelligent forehead, he studiously ignored it. However, the interruption did cause his attention to briefly stray to the empty passenger seat where another phone lay, this one switched off.

It was about the only thing that had survived his blitz, when he had gone through the home they had briefly shared and removed every item that had even remotely reminded him of his broken marriage and his wife. Or so he had thought.

If his diligent housekeeper hadn’t been so thorough in her war against dust he would have remained ignorant of the phone’s existence, and, more importantly, ignorant of its explosive contents.

Which was presumably just what his wife had intended.

What else was he meant to think?

Francesco’s jaw clenched as he fought to contain the sense of molten outrage that threatened to overwhelm him every time he thought of the situation he now faced. In fact, he had thought of little else for the past four days and was now digging pretty deep into his reserves of self-restraint!

After the events of the previous months it seemed darkly ironic, he reflected, releasing a self-derisive grunt, that this time last year he had been complaining to his twin brother that his life had become too predictable!

At the time Francesco had just split from his current lover. It had been a civilised parting of the ways, much as their arrangement had been. Normally considered pretty perceptive, Francesco hadn’t seen it coming. However, with the wisdom of hindsight he realised that the writing had been on the wall when she had asked him where he thought their relationship was going.

Francesco had been forced to admit that he did not see it going anywhere specifically.

It had not crossed his mind at the time that she would have any problem with his admission. Why would it? The lady in question, a corporate lawyer who was as smart as she was beautiful, had gone out of her way at the outset of their relationship to warn him that she had no time in her life for emotional entanglements. So it had come as some surprise to Francesco to hear her say, ‘Nothing personal, Francesco, I’ve actually never had better sex, but with my body clock ticking I can’t afford to waste my time with a man—even one as lovely as you—who is commitment-phobic.’

Francesco had not been offended by her comments or lost any sleep over them, but they had made him wonder …'Do you think I’m commitment-phobic?’ he later asked his twin.

Rafe’s response was tactful. ‘Of course not, but maybe if you put as much effort into your personal relationships as you do work?’

‘That’s the problem. I
don’t
have to put that much effort into work … some days,’ he admitted. ‘I find myself hoping that there will be a disaster just so that I can fix it … there’s
just no buzz. My life is totally predictable. There are no real challenges—nothing to get the adrenaline pumping.’

‘Maybe there’s a life-changing surprise around the corner, Francesco,’ his brother suggested, looking amused.

‘Dio mio,
I hope so.’

What did they say? You should be careful what you wish for because it might come true!

Maybe, Francesco speculated darkly, life-changing scenarios were like buses—after a long drought when they did come they came thick and fast!

And they rarely took the guise you anticipated.

In his case in the space of a few months he had suffered the devastating loss of his twin brother in tragic circumstances and, while still coming to terms with that loss, had discovered love at first sight was not merely confined to the pages of romantic fiction.

Though maybe marrying the person you fell in love with within five days should be!

As Francesco looked down at the brown finger on his left hand that was encircled by the heavy gold band his grip tightened on the steering wheel. His upper lip curled contemptuously:
love!
It hadn’t been love, he told himself grimly. It had been a combination of lust and blind infatuation.

Some people might have suggested that his reaction to the letter that had arrived a week earlier from Erin suggested something more than infatuation or lust. But they didn’t understand the extent of his problem with failure, and wasn’t that essentially what divorce was?

Admittedly, walking out of the office two minutes before an important meeting without telling anyone where he was going, getting onto a plane and heading for England with the
intention of explaining to his wife in person that he would
never
give her her freedom was a pretty strong reaction to the suggestion of failure.

But he would have explained to these doubters that failure was a word that had never been in his vocabulary. Failure was something that happened to other people. His premise in life had always been that if you wanted something badly enough you made it happen, you fought for what you wanted.

The plane had been landing when the thought had hit him. Why should he even try and fight for her? He didn’t want her.

What would I want with a woman who doesn’t trust me?

Francesco knew that Erin might even construe his arrival as the first move to reconciling their relationship, and that just wasn’t going to happen. She was the one in the wrong.

The one he had expected to come crawling back.

His gaze shifted back to the empty passenger seat. When the phone had surfaced the information it contained had changed everything.

Who made the
first move
was suddenly no longer important. There was no decision to make; divorce was quite simply no longer an option. If Erin had been halfway adult she would have realised this, too.

The situation required immediate action. Cool, clearheaded action.

Francesco’s dark glance slewed once more towards the phone.a muscle along the angle of his jaw clenched as he wrenched his straying attention back onto the road ahead. At this moment he felt neither cool nor clear-headed.

But he did feel grimly determined.

It was sobering to acknowledge how close he had been to throwing the phone away. Fortunately something had made him switch it on before he had done so.

Erin had one message.

His steelily determined eyes fixed on the road ahead, Francesco recalled the moment when he had heard the polite voice on the machine apologise, and explain that the date of Mrs Romanelli’s next antenatal appointment had been brought forward a week.

His normally sharp, analytic mind numb, he had replayed the message three times before it had finally clicked.

He was going to be a father!

A man was meant to feel elation and joy at such a moment, but Erin had robbed him of that. Just as it now appeared increasingly likely she had planned to rob him of his child. He wondered how he would ever be able to forgive her for that.

Had she ever been going to tell him?

Even though over the last few days he had analysed the situation from every angle countless times, weighing up the possible explanations for her silence, no matter how hard he tried he still couldn’t come up with any halfway adequate excuse.

He had even given her the benefit of the doubt and accepted that she might not have known that she was pregnant when she had left, but she must have known for weeks now.

Weeks during which she hadn’t made any attempt to contact him except with that one letter expressing her wish to divorce as soon as possible. Erin had made a definite choice
not
to tell him he was going to be a father. The knowledge stuck in his throat like bitter bile.

She had taken a unilateral decision as though he were irrelevant. Even if she had decided they had no future together there were things to discuss … arrangements … options! Not that there was more than one option as far as he was concerned. Francesco was firmly of the belief that there was only one way to bring up a child, especially his, and that was with two parents.

And it wasn’t as if she had had to contact him. He had tried to contact her and given her every opportunity to tell him, but had simply been given the runaround, fobbed off by her wretched, manipulative mother.

Did Erin really imagine for one moment that she could have his baby without him finding out? The hard laugh that was drawn from his throat was cut off as the phone in his pocket began to ring again—whoever was trying to contact him was not giving up—and with a sigh of irritation he indicated to leave the motorway.

Erin had been surprised when Francesco’s cousin Valentina had contacted her and invited her to spend the weekend at the country home where she and her English husband Sam ran a stud farm.

It crossed her mind that Valentina did not know that she and Francesco had split up. She didn’t want anyone running away with the idea she felt as though her heart had been ripped out and in her most casual tone she had asked, ‘You do know that Francesco and I … that we’re not together?’

‘Yes, I know, and I’m really sorry,’ replied the Italian woman. ‘But it doesn’t mean we can’t still be friends, does it?’

Erin had been reluctant to accept the invitation, but Valentina had been so enthusiastic about seeing her that in the end Erin had felt it would be churlish to throw her kindness back in her face.

Erin had arrived the previous evening and Valentina had explained that the other weekend guests were not expected until today. She glanced at her watch and wondered if anyone had arrived yet.

It was the distinctive sound of horse hooves that drew Erin to the window of the sunny sitting room. Outside in the courtyard almost beneath her window a groom was having
problems holding the leading rein of a black, snorting stallion that was dancing on his hind legs.

The first time she had seen him, Francesco had been sitting astride an animal not unlike the one outside. There had been more dust and sweat, but the creature had possessed that same untamed quality … so
had his rider.

A haziness clouded Erin’s cornflower-blue eyes as her thoughts, as though responding to the tug of some invisible magnet, drifted backwards.

She could hear the sound of a horse’s hooves clicking on the worn cobbles as it trotted up the steep incline she had had to get off her bike to ascend.

The relief that had rushed through her at the time had been tempered by caution. She was a woman alone. And whose stupid fault was that?

The manager at the hotel had tactfully advised caution when she had explained her intention of hiring a bike to explore the area. When he had realised that none of her three companions was accompanying her he had abandoned tact and expressed his outright disapproval of her plan.

‘Signorina,
it is not a good idea for a woman to travel alone. It is easy to get lost.’

Erin smiled politely, waved her maps at him, and ignored his well-intentioned, and, as it turned out, pretty damned good advice.

She could have explained that she
wanted
to be alone, she absolutely
needed
to be alone; she doubted he would have understood. She didn’t really understand herself how women whose company she enjoyed at home could try her patience so totally on holiday. How she had ever imagined they had a lot in common was an even greater mystery!

The fact was if she didn’t escape her friends, she might end up telling them what she thought of them, which, although tempting, was out of the question.

They were nice people at home. It was only on holiday they turned into monsters who talked incessantly about their tans and looked at her as though she were insane when she suggested taking a picnic and hiking to the next village.

However, being alone lost its appeal pretty quickly when you found yourself lost with a flat tyre, a burnt nose and aches in muscles you hadn’t known you had.

Panic was there just under the surface. A stray thought like,
I’ll be a government statistic of tourists who disappeared without trace,
and it would come rushing to the surface.

Well, she wasn’t alone anymore.

Erin lifted her hand to shade her eyes from the glare of the strong evening sun. With the sun behind him the figure in the saddle appeared as a dark silhouette outlined by a corona of golden light.

The man saw her and slowed his mount as they approached. The wild-eyed animal, nostrils flared, pawed the ground. Erin, with a mental image of those hooves coming crashing down on her unprotected head, took several hasty steps backwards.

The precaution proved unnecessary as without any apparent effort the rider controlled his animal with nothing more than a soft murmur in fluid Italian and brought it to an abrupt halt.

The horse stood there quivering and the rider sat astride him for what seemed like an age just staring down at Erin until she became frustrated by her inability to see his expression.

Dry-mouthed, she watched warily as he finally kicked his booted feet free of the stirrups and slid off the back of the horse. He patted the creature’s quivering flank, sending up a
puff of dust, and casually relinquished the reins. The animal pawed the ground restlessly but did not take the opportunity to escape.

Erin, her feet seemingly nailed to the ground and her body reacting at a basic and humiliating level to the undiluted raw sex this stranger exuded from every dusty pore, wondered if the horse, too, was held in thrall as she was.

As he straightened up to his full height it immediately became clear that what she had imagined was an illusion of height created by his vantage point on top of the towering animal was in fact reality!

This man was seriously tall. Tall she could deal with, but the rest was more of a problem! The animal and its master had a lot in common—namely they were both magnificent and indisputably dangerous.

The danger should have repelled her but instead it made her heart beat faster, releasing a flood of adrenaline into her bloodstream. She sucked in a shaky sigh, too awed in that moment to be sensibly wary of this large stranger who exuded a predatory, seductive quality that would normally have had her running for the hills.