Blackmailed For Her Baby (Bought For Her Baby Series Book 4)

by Elizabeth Power

  ‘It means “to associate with”,’ Libby informed him, swallowing to ease a sudden constriction in her throat as she tried not to notice the dark denim pulling tightly across his lean hips, not at all happy having this conversation in front of Giorgio.

  ‘Ah, that I understand! Well, yes, if what we did this afternoon is having an association, then…’ He gave an expressively Continental shrug, his sensual mouth moving in grim acceptance.

  ‘Then you can certainly tell her that she has nothing to fear!’

  ‘Scusi?’ Now his frowning bewilderment was aimed directly at her. ‘I think,’ he expressed with sudden heart-stopping intent, ‘that we had better continue this conversation outside.’

  More than relieved to do so, Libby jumped up. ‘I’ll be back in a minute, sweetie,’ she promised Giorgio, kissing the top of his head, her heartbeat resuming as a thunderous tattoo as she followed Romano to the door.

  There was no one around when they stepped into the subdued light of the landing.

  ‘Now. Would you care to tell me why you’re suddenly acting as though I’m your arch enemy?’ Romano invited, his tone interrogative.

  ‘I’m not. I…’ Libby swallowed to ease the sudden contraction of her throat. What could she say? That she wanted him—loved him!—too much just to be one in a long line of willing females to be notched up on his bedpost? That there was too much at stake to have a crazy, abandoned affair with him and make things even more difficult than they already were? ‘I told you…I don’t do commitment.’ Every syllable was a wrench at her heartstrings, having to turn him away from her like this. But she had to, she thought achingly, imagining how awkward it could get if she was to put herself in a position where—once he had tired of her, as he surely would—it would be embarrassing or even untenable to come back here. And she needed to come back here—and keep coming back—if she had any hope of building a long and trusting relationship with Giorgio. ‘This afternoon…I was in shock…because of what Teodoro said. Because of Luca…’

  She saw a muscle jerk at the side of that strong jaw, watched some unfathomable emotion cross his harshly sculpted face.

  His arm, lifting to the wall just above her shoulder, caused her breath to lock tight.

  If he touched her…Even now she could feel her body’s response to him in the way her nostrils craved to fill her lungs with his familiar scent, and in the way those most intimate parts of her ached for the sobbing pleasure those lips and hands had wrung out of her back there on Capri. If he touched her she would be lost! she thought.

  But, grim-mouthed, he simply nodded, ebony lashes coming down over those incredibly dark eyes as he dropped his arm, leaving her feeling absurdly bereft.

  ‘You’re right,’ he agreed succinctly. ‘It shouldn’t have happened, if that’s what you’re trying to tell me. It’s a complication both of us can do without. I should have known better than to take advantage of you while you were in such a vulnerable state. But you can rest assured, cara: it won’t happen again. You have my word on that.’

  He had agreed to it? Just like that? Libby thought, wondering why she was left feeling as if she had been snubbed. After all, it was what she wanted, wasn’t it?

  ‘And now, if you’ll excuse me, I have other matters to which I must attend.’

  He meant confronting Sophia, Libby realised, shaking herself back to her senses to place urgent fingers on his arm as he made to move away.

  ‘Don’t tell her what I told you today,’ she begged. ‘About what happened in the past. Or what I said just now about why she over-reacted. If you do, you’ll just give her reason to despise me more than she already does.’

  She met the probing darkness of his eyes, felt that fierce chemistry that was as molten as the crater of Mount Vesuvius enveloping her with its heat until she wanted to lean into him, know again, despite everything she had just said, the almost unbearable ecstasy of his kisses.

  ‘I’ll do what is necessary,’ he said.

  The days that followed were relatively uneventful. It was a silent torment, though being close to Romano and acting as if they hadn’t shared the greatest intimacy that it was possible for a man and a woman to share, because Romano never referred to it again.

  He seemed to settle into a manner of urbane aloofness, born, she decided, out of his controlled yet very real need to have her. He had known what it was like to take her with him beyond the heights of any physical experience she had ever dreamed possible, and was as ridden as she was, she guessed—though for far less emotional reasons—to know that mind-blowing pleasure again. But like her, he didn’t dare risk doing anything that could jeopardise the fragile relationship that already existed between her and his family, and having a brief fling with the mother of his adopted charge, and who he probably still believed was a gold-digger, would certainly have done that.

  Sophia, too, had assumed, if not a friendlier attitude towards her, then most certainly a more tolerant one, since that night they had come back from Capri, and Libby wondered exactly what Romano had said to her. From the raised voices she heard sometimes on passing a room when he and his mother were together, it was becoming increasingly apparent that Sophia Vincenzo and her eldest son didn’t get on, but, as Libby never actually caught anything that was being said, she couldn’t even begin to speculate as to why.

  Being with Giorgio, though, was pure bliss, and at least went some way to alleviating the tension that seemed to rend the air between her and Romano whenever his uncle was around. And Romano seemed to have made it his business to be around a lot.

  He’d turn up at unexpected moments, such as when she was teaching Giorgio a new swimming stroke, sitting on the sun bed, listening to him reciting a poem he had recently learned in Italian—which helped her increase her own knowledge of the language—or hitting a tennis ball back and forth to him on the impeccably kept court.

  Then he would come and join in, adding an extra dimension to their relaxation with his charm and laughter, encouraging Giorgio with a role model’s praise and easy smile, while Libby found herself stimulated by him at every level.

  Because of Romano, she realised, Giorgio’s life had benefitted immensely from the paternal influence he might otherwise have been denied, because she was sure that Marius Vincenzo would have had as little patience with an energetic child as she knew he had had with his reckless and impetuous younger son, and she was becoming more and more grateful that Romano had been around to take control.

  It didn’t take any working out, either, that it was because of his influence that Giorgio’s sharp brain and questioning mind was being stretched to its fullest potential. Romano seldom answered a question without inviting his nephew to consider his own solution first, and never denied him a wish without explaining his reasons for any denial. Consequently, Giorgio had all the potential to grow up a well-adjusted and intellectually stimulated child.

  ‘He’s been much better over the past couple of weeks,’ Romano expressed one day when they had taken a picnic to a spot just outside one of the local villages and were walking back through the narrow street to the large 4 x 4 that he usually drove around the estate. He didn’t add ‘since you’ve been here’, but Libby knew that that was what he meant. ‘We won’t know whether his schooling improves until the new term begins, but he’s certainly happier in every other way.’

  ‘I’m glad,’ Libby said, unable to help adding resolutely, ‘And I’m going to make sure he stays that way.’

  She felt the glance Romano sliced at her but she didn’t respond, calling out to Giorgio, who was cycling along the dusty path ahead of them, to keep his hands as well as his feet firmly on the bike. He promptly obeyed, though too late to take proper evasive action when a little white dog that had raced out from one of the houses ran barking up to him, causing Giorgio to swerve, straight into a stall of meticulously stacked fruit.

  ‘Oh, no!’

  As Giorgio toppled one way and the bike and a whole torrent of oranges and lemons went the
other, Libby rushed towards him with Romano hot on her heels.

  ‘I’m here. It’s all right! It’s all right, Giorgi!’

  Scooping him up into her arms, Libby cradled him to her breast, feeling the love surge through her as he sobbed convulsively, ‘Mamma,’ his little arms going automatically around her neck.

  It was the first time he had turned to her when he could have chosen Romano. Her hand cradling his head, she glanced over his shoulder and saw Romano squatting there beside her. He had allowed it to happen. He had reached Giorgio first and he could have picked him up, but he had held back. Why? For her sake? For Giorgio’s?

  A lump as big as the orange she could see lying at his feet seemed to clog her throat. Her eyes, locking with his, were swimming with emotion.

  Dear heaven! I love him—so much, she thought. I love him—and he doesn’t have a clue.

  Shaken and embarrassed by the intensity of her feelings, she clutched Giorgio closer, laying her cheek against his silky-soft hair.

  ‘It’s only a graze,’ she soothed when she had ascertained there was no damage done, rubbing his sand-streaked knee. ‘I think the oranges came off worst.’ They seemed to be surrounded by them, as well as lemons and limes, and a showering of dark red peaches too. ‘Now do you understand why Uncle Romano and I were telling you to be careful?’ A tear-stained little face moved up and down against her shoulder. ‘And why Uncle Romano said your little bike’s quite big enough for you for the time being?’ That didn’t produce quite the same response, but neither did he argue against it. Instead, he wound his arms more tightly around her and prepared to enjoy stringing out the last of his sobs.

  Watching them, Romano marvelled at how Giorgio had taken to her and, more surprisingly, how easily Libby had slipped into motherhood.

  Heaven knew, his own experience of mothers had been tainted to say the least. He certainly had never known the sort of tender feeling from Sophia that he was witnessing in Libby now. Her love for the little boy positively shone out of her. But it had been made clear to him from the start by Sophia—if not in words then with every action and gesture—that he wasn’t, and never had been, wanted.

  Suddenly he was stabbed by an acute sense of loss—of sudden irrational jealousy and realised it was that lack of maternal affection he was mourning. That bond he could see already building between Giorgio and Libby.

  He had wanted to prove himself right. That when he had asked her to come here it was merely for a trial he believed would end when it became clear that she was thoroughly unsuitable to be with Giorgio. That her being here wasn’t helping his nephew at all. But Giorgio’s eating and sleeping habits, his temperament and his spirits, had improved unquestionably over the past couple of weeks, which presented him with a dilemma he wasn’t yet ready to think about as he began helping the fraught-looking stall owner to retrieve her fruit.

  Giorgio’s birthday arrived with the new junior bicycle that Romano had promised him and a remote controlled model aeroplane from Libby. Angelica baked him a cake in the shape of a giant hedgehog, while Sophia spoiled him with such a multitude of gifts that one could barely walk on the sitting-room floor for torn wrapping paper.

  Improving as he was, to both Libby’s and Romano’s delight, he had even requested having a few of the children from the village to share his day.

  Consequently, by late morning the pool was alive with at least a dozen children, the grounds ringing with excitement, the like of which, Libby suspected, hadn’t been witnessed since Luca was a boy.

  ‘Were you indulged in such a shameless fashion?’ she asked laughingly of Romano, who was on his way from grabbing a sandwich from the party tent that had been set up to take a call in his study, a reminder to Libby that, whatever the occasion, this high-octane entrepreneur always had his finger on the pulse of his billion-pound empire.

  ‘No,’ was all he said somewhat tersely, striding past her into the house, leaving her slightly bemused and wondering if she—or someone else—had upset him in some way.

  The day was a success and, with Giorgio tiredly happy and tucked up in bed, Libby was just retrieving some of the toys and floats the children had used in and around the pool, when her attention was caught by the tap of light footsteps over the patio.

  Scrambling up, expecting to see Sophia, Libby froze, a brightly coloured inflatable suspended from one hand.

  ‘I am sorry,’ the woman from those home videos expressed in sexily husky Italian. ‘I heard a sound and thought it was Romano. He must be inside.’ In a white silk top and matching trousers that accentuated her olive skin, she was already moving away, but suddenly turned back to Libby with a dawning smile on her bright and heavily glossed lips. ‘I’m sorry.’ She laughed this time, and in English said, ‘I thought you were one of the maids!’

  A natural mistake, Libby thought, since she was out here helping to clear up in her cut-off combats and flip-flops—alone as it turned out at that particular moment. Nevertheless, she couldn’t help feeling at a disadvantage, especially when those dark and beautifully made-up eyes ran over her own cosmetic-free and naturally weary features after a day entertaining twelve children, and she was very aware of the long orange stain down the front of her white T-shirt from when an over-active five-year-old had knocked a drink over her earlier.

  ‘So you are Blaze, Giorgio’s absentee mother, si?’

  Libby bit down hard against the pain that thoughtless description gave rise to. Or was it thoughtless? she wondered, pushing a fiery red strand that had come loose from her pony-tail back behind her ear.

  ‘It’s Libby—and unfortunately I haven’t been able to be around,’ she uttered, trying not to let the woman see how her tactless remark—whether intended or otherwise—hurt. ‘But that’s all going to change from now on, Magdelena.’ She even managed to smile as she said it. ‘It is Magdelena, isn’t it?’

  Black velvety brows drew together before those glossy red lips smiled back broadly. ‘So Romano has mentioned me!’

  Libby didn’t disillusion her as her nostrils caught a waft of exotic perfume. Yet another reminder of how perfectly groomed this lovely young woman was, while at that moment, despite the camera shoots, the catwalks and the exotic world that she usually inhabited, Libby felt as though she looked like the back end of a bus!

  ‘This change you mention…’ Magdelena viewed her from beneath her long, mascara-swept lashes, unable to contain her curiosity. Or her suspicion, Libby surmised.

  Straightening up from retrieving a tennis ball and popping it into the large plastic box she was balancing on her hip with the other toys, she said, ‘I intend to play a very large part in his life.’

  ‘Really?’ A bird darted low across the pool, skimming the water, its shrieks like mocking laughter as it took off across the shrubbery and into the gathering dusk. ‘That’s good. You will find him a very responsive little boy. Prone to tantrums sometimes.’ Magdelena grimaced. ‘But then, that’s six-year-olds, isn’t it? But overall he’s very good, if you know how to bribe him into doing what you want him to do. It has taken me some time, but I’ve learned.’

  With every word she spoke, Magdelena was rubbing in the fact that she hadn’t been there, Libby realised, resenting this very striking young woman who seemed to be taking immense pleasure from knowing more about Giorgio than she did.

  ‘Yes, well, bribery’s never been my strong point,’ she told Magdelena pointedly, repositioning the box that seemed to be getting heavier by the second. ‘I prefer to use the art of gentle correction and reward to guide a child.’

  A dusky-skinned shoulder moved subtly beneath a thin white strap. ‘You’re his mother—although I didn’t even realise Romano’s brother had had a wife until Romano told me. I must say, they kept that very quiet. I’ve never known anyone like the Vincenzos for guarding their privacy. Or their family name,’ she added in a way Libby felt sure was designed to let her know that—supermodel or not—she certainly fell short of the qualifications that were needed to earn
any long-term respect within the Vincenzo household. ‘I must admit that, when I first met Romano, I thought that Giorgio was some poor innocent foisted on the family because of some…indiscretion. Some unfortunate liaison on the part of the younger brother.’ Which was true, Libby thought. Or the unfortunate-liaison bit was at least, as far as her late husband’s family were concerned! ‘I thought that everyone here—’

  ‘Magdelena!’

  The deep masculine voice slicing through the dusk startled both women. Now two pairs of female eyes were riveted on Romano’s approach.

  The lights had come on around the grounds, reflecting in the pool and casting eerie shadows over the walls of the castle, lending an almost satanic excitement to the features of the man who owned it.

  ‘I didn’t realise you were here.’ He was addressing Magdelena in his own language. He looked—and sounded—angry, Libby thought, puzzled, feeling his dark presence turning her susceptible bones to liquid. Magdelena’s too, she didn’t doubt. Because, dressed to kill in an impeccably tailored dark suit, white shirt and tie, clean-shaven, his black hair gleaming in the subdued light, he exuded an air of such untrammelled masculinity it was hard to imagine him doing anything else right then but making love. ‘Why didn’t you come inside?’

  Magdelena looked agitated, Libby thought, feeling almost sorry for the woman as Romano, reverting to English, remembered his manners sufficiently to introduce them both rather curtly.

  Keys jangled as he removed them from his trouser pocket and, without waiting for Magdelena to say anything, dictated, ‘Wait for me in the car.’

  Looking suitably chastened, Magdelena grabbed the keys he was holding up and without so much as a “Nice to have met you” to Libby, made a piqued departure back across the terrace.

  ‘What are you doing? I told you one of the servants would clear all this up.’ A movement of his head towards the pool area brought the fresh, vital scent of him impinging on her nostrils. ‘There is no need for you to do it.’