Reckless Nights in Rome (18 page)

The door opened
behind her.

“I bet its cold
enough to freeze...” She turned.

Rosie, she
realised with a gasp of alarm, had been crying.

Before she
could ask what on earth was the matter, Nico, in his signature
designer suit and black cashmere coat stalked in firing
instructions into his Blackberry in Italian.

His face was
fierce.

Rosie, too
pale, stared at her.

Ice clutched
Bronte’s heart.

“What’s
happened?”

Nico finished
his call.

He removed his
coat and wrapped it around Rosie.

Then he pushed
her into a chair and turned to Bronte.

The pulse in
her throat roared in her ears.

Nico placed his
hands on her shoulders and she braced herself as his eyes stayed on
hers.

“Alexander has
been in a car accident.”

She shook her
head. Her heart jolted again to hammer in her ears. “No, no.”

Those dark eyes
never left hers for a second. “He is alive, Bronte.”

Nico wrapped
his arms around her and held her tight. His phone rang and he
snatched it with one hand and kept a hold of her with the
other.

Rosie stared
straight ahead, tears flowing unchecked down her pale cheeks.

“
Grazie,
grazie.”

He pressed
Bronte into a chair and crouched in front of her.

Those dark grey
eyes fixed on hers and she held on to him as her whole world fell
apart.

Fate couldn’t
do this to her again.

“He is
unconscious but stable in the emergency room of San Pietro
Fatebenefratelli Hospital in Rome. My jet is fuelling and will be
ready to leave as soon as we get to the airport.”

She blinked.
Her brain simply would not compute.

“What
happened?”

He shook his
head and took a breath.

“He was
stationary at a junction and a car hit his car that is all I
know.”

“He’s alive?
You’re certain?” Rosie’s voice was hardly a whisper.

Nico turned and
looked her dead in the eye. “Yes.”

Rosie pulled it
together and stood.

“Right, Bronte,
we need to get you packed.”

“But, I can’t
leave you here alone.” She was aware of Nico’s fingers massaging
the tension in her neck.

All business
now, Rosie handed Nico his coat and turned to her with a hint of
the old fire in her huge eyes.

“Of course you
can. I’ll stay here to look after the place and terrorise the
trainees. We’re ahead of schedule as per usual. You’re at the other
end of a phone, a laptop.” She gave Bronte a nudge. “You’re going
to Rome not Pluto.”

“Pack light,”
Nico instructed. “We can pick up anything we need there.”

His phone rang.
Bronte, eyes glued to his face watched him frown.

Fear gleefully
caught her throat as Rosie gripped her hand.

Nico ended his
call and his dark eyes filled with anxiety.

“They are
taking him for a CAT scan.”

Sheer
stubbornness willed back tears that threatened to flow. If she
started she’d never stop.

“Okay, okay,
right. I’ll pack.”

In the company jet Nico
tapped on his laptop.

A satellite
phone lay on the table between him and Bronte.

The latest
update was Alexander may have a detached retina. No word on whether
or not he was conscious. Anxiety attempted to bloom in Nico’s chest
and he stamped it down hard. There was no point in worrying until
they had something to worry about.

He flicked a
look at Bronte.

Not a word had
she spoken since they’d left the house. Not one tear had she shed.
In the car, through customs, she’d walked like an automaton. She
was quiet and biddable as she sat in the plane. Too quiet, he
decided. Wherever she’d retreated inside herself it couldn’t be
good for her.

Dressed in
black slim jeans and a sweater of grey cashmere, she sat with long
legs tucked under her. Her hair was tied back in a silver braid.
The beautiful face looked vulnerable and devastated. A glossy
magazine sat on her lap. An untouched notebook and pen lay on the
table.

She hadn’t
turned a page but simply stared straight ahead.

He imagined the
day’s events must have brought back dark and painful memories of
her parents’ car accident.

He almost
missed the shudder. A lightening vibration of her body that alerted
him to the fact she was clinging to her emotions by a thread.

Rising, he
signalled the steward and requested a blanket. With great care he
removed the magazine from Bronte’s nerveless fingers.

Wrapping her in
the blanket, he lifted her in his arms and knew he’d done the right
thing when she turned into his chest with an earth shattering sob.
The steward moved before them to the rear of the plane and opened
the door to a bedroom suite. He folded down the bedspread, asked if
they wanted anything else and then closed the door.

Nico laid her
on the double bed and Bronte turned on her side to curl into a
tight ball. He unzipped flat boots of polished black leather and
eased them gently off her feet. His jacket, tie and shoes followed
before he lay down and took her in his arms.

Bronte he
realised moments later cried with as much fervour as she made love,
with passion, energy and with her every part of her heart. The
storm raged and his heart ached for her and the ruination of his
Armani shirt.

“I can’t bear
it. I can’t bear losing him like this.” She sobbed into his
chest.

With deep shaky
breaths, she rolled onto her back and sniffed, blinking at the
ceiling. Nico took the opportunity of the lull to grab a couple of
face towels from the en-suite. Lying on his side next to her he
propped up on an elbow and wiped saturated cheeks.

“He is very
much alive,
cara
. Hang onto that until we see him.”

Drenched
emerald eyes, huge with distress, met his.

“Nico, he
thinks I’m angry with him because he won’t listen to me.” She
swallowed audibly. A fat tear rolled into her hairline. “But I’m
not angry.”

“Good, he will
be pleased to hear it.”

She fixed her
eyes on the ceiling.

Her bottom lip
trembled and she bit down hard on it as her eyes flooded.

“I’m so
scared.”

He frowned,
rubbing the abused lip with his thumb.

“
Cara
mia
, we will not panic until we need to. Let us take it one
step at a time.”

Blinking
rapidly, Bronte turned to him as if seeing him for the first time,
her eyes now bright and focused.

“You are
absolutely right.” She sat and swiped her cheeks. Her attempt at a
smile broke his heart. “God, I must look a mess. I need to get a
grip.”

He cupped her
face between his hands and forced her to look at him.

“You look
beautiful. The love you have for your brother is beautiful.”

And reminded
himself this was neither the time nor the place for his libido to
spark.

So he contented
himself with a burning kiss on that soft vulnerable mouth.

Bronte couldn’t
remember landing or being rushed through customs or the drive
through Rome’s hectic traffic to the hospital.

She focused on
putting one foot in front of the other and held her breath as a
smiling nurse opened the door to Alexander’s room. The woman was
smiling. That was a good sign. Right?

They entered
the room and the bleep, bleep of a heart monitor rang too loud
inside her skull.

Her eyes clung
to the still form lying in the bed.

A sob caught in
her throat.

Alexander’s
face, his poor face was swollen, battered and bloody.

Nico’s strong
arm around her waist steadied her.

Her brother’s
left arm was in a sling. The other had fluids dripping into a
vein.

Heart in her
mouth, Bronte placed a hand tentatively on his leg.

“Alexander?”

Alexander’s
good eye opened and he focused on her.

“Hey, baby
face. Those tears better not be for me.”

Relief hit her
too hard and she threw herself into Nico’s arms and did cry like a
baby.

He didn’t
appear to mind as he stroked her hair.

“You look a
mess, my friend.”

Alexander
narrowed his eye at the intimate body language of his best friend
and his sister.

“Airbags, two
of them.”

Bronte plucked
tissues out of a box and blew her nose, her head pounding in
reaction to the release of adrenalin.

“You look
bloody awful.”

Alexander
winced as he attempted a smile through his split lip.

“You don’t look
so hot yourself. Wound yourself up good and proper, didn’t you?
Typical.”

Stung and for
form, purely because he expected it, Bronte glared at him.

“We didn’t know
if you were dead or alive.”

Nico smiled,
ran a hand down her hair.

“I will leave
you two to it and speak to the doctor.”

Outside Alexander’s
room, Nico leaned back on the wall, pinching the bridge of his
nose.

He heaved a
sigh of relief.

Close families,
they loved, they fought, but always they stood together.

He touched an
envelope in his pocket. Then there was the other type of family,
dangerous, destructive and cruel. A hard ball of bitterness burned
in his throat. The day of reckoning for his family was fast
approaching.

But first he
would ensure Alexander had everything he needed. Then he would look
after Bronte.

He moved to the
nurse’s station to speak to the doctor.

“For God’s sake, you’re
not bloody sleeping on the floor,” Alexander told his sister in a
tone dripping with disgust as Nico entered the room.

The nurse
checking Alexander’s blood pressure spoke to Nico in Italian.

“She said the
patient must remain calm. He is not calm.”

Bronte huffed
out a breath and caught Nico’s bland look.

“Okay, okay,
I’ll go. But I’ll be back first thing in the morning.” Then she
frowned, her expression full of sympathy for her brother. “I can’t
find a spot that’s not bruised to kiss you.”

“How about my
ass,” Alexander muttered under his breath.

Bronte’s eyes
narrowed dangerously and Nico whipped an arm around her waist.

“I will
telephone in the morning,” he told Alexander.

“Yeah, right.
Nico?” Alexander’s good eye blinked and he gave his friend a
crooked grin. “Thank you for bringing her.”

Leaning back against
the wall of the lift, Bronte muttered something about a boot up the
ass.

Nico watched
her out of the corner of his eye. She still looked pale, but her
spirit had returned he noted as his lips twitched.

“You can hardly
blame him,
cara
. You buzzed around him like a hornet.” He
tapped her chin as it came up. “Do not even think of taking it out
on me. Unlike Alexander, I am able to give as good as I get.”

Bronte kept
quiet remembering exactly how he gave as good as he got.

A black chauffeur
Bentley purred to the kerb as they exited the building.

Nico opened the
door and she slid inside.

“Where are we
going?” she asked.

With interest,
she watched the bright lights of Rome whiz past.

“To my
apartment.”

Surprised, she
looked at him. “Not a hotel?”

“No, I have a
place in the City.”

The car whisked
them through the colourful metropolis. At night Rome always
reminded her of a fantasy. A beautiful, vibrant and magnificent
city with its ancient buildings lit up as were the wide expanse of
beautiful parks. People were always in a hurry in Rome. They walked
fast, talked fast and drove like lunatics. And that thought brought
her back to Alexander. Her brother had had a lucky escape He would
need plenty of rest and recuperation.

Bronte
shivered. It was as cold here as in England. Although why she’d
expected it to be warmer she had no idea.

The sense of
being out of control, that fate again may test her by taking
another loved one, had drained away leaving her numb and strangely
disoriented. Tension rolled from her shoulders, up her neck and
into her mind.

A wave of
memories of her last visit to Rome washed over her. Her parents
walking hand in hand as her father pointed out immense statues.
They’d enjoyed people watching in a cafe in Via Cola di Rienzo. Her
mother raising an eyebrow while giving her daughter a secret little
smile as an attractive man passed by. They’d done the usual tours;
The Coliseum, The Trevi Fountain, The Spanish Steps and the Piazza
Della Republica.

An intense
feeling of loss, a sadness she’d buried deep in her psyche crept
into her lungs. Bronte’s eyes stung and her throat closed. She
found she couldn’t swallow. She missed them and the life they’d had
together so damn much.

What would they
think of her brazen behaviour with Nico? She couldn’t begin to
imagine what her mother would think of her asking a man she’d known
for less than thirty-six hours to give her a screaming orgasm.
Where had her self-respect gone? Where had the real Bronte Ludlow
gone?

What the hell
was she doing going to his apartment? A hotel would be better, she
would have her own space to think, to feel real again.

She was aware
of his dark eyes on her, watching her. The atmosphere in the car
had changed too, become tense, edgy even.

The car cruised
to a stop in the Prati district outside a smart apartment building.
Nico wrapped an arm around her waist, guiding her inside. A lift
whisked them up to the top floor. The penthouse and why was she not
surprised? It was so Nico.

He unlocked
double doors into a palatial open plan expanse with glazed walls
surrounded by wide balconies.