The Italian's Love-Child

by Sharon Kendrick

  She opened her mouth to say, Only if I’m in bed by nine, but, in light of the tension which seemed to be shimmering between them, she thought better of it. And why the hell was she automatically going to refuse? Had she let her career become so dominating that it threatened to kill off pleasure completely?

  ‘Dinner is tricky because of the hours I work, I’m afraid, unless it’s a very early dinner and, as we’ve only just finished lunch, I don’t imagine we’d be hungry enough for dinner.’ She opened the door wider. She was only doing this because he had once been kind to her, she told herself. And then smiled to herself as she thought what an utter waste of time self-delusion was. Why not just admit it? She didn’t want him to go.

  ‘So you’d better come in and I’ll make you some coffee instead.’

  The innocent invitation caught him unawares and something erratic began to happen to his heart-rate even though he was registering—rather incredulously—that she had actually turned down his invitation to dinner.

  Her eyes glittered him a warning. ‘But I don’t have long.’

  ‘Just throw me out when you want to,’ he drawled, in the arrogant manner of someone who had never been thrown out of anywhere in their lives.

  He closed the door behind him with a certain sense of triumph, though he could never remember having to fight so hard to get a simple cup of coffee. ‘These houses were not built for tall men,’ he commented wryly as he followed her along a low, dark corridor through into the kitchen.

  ‘That’s why a woman of average height lives in it! And people were shorter in those days.’

  The kitchen was clean and the room smelt fresh. An old-fashioned dresser was crammed with quirky pieces of coloured china and a jug of copper-coloured chrysanthemums glowed on the scrubbed table. From the French doors he could see the sea—grey and angry today and topped with white foam. ‘I love the Hamble,’ he said softly.

  ‘Yes, it’s gorgeous, isn’t it? The view is never the same twice, but then the sea is never constant.’ She studied him. ‘What’s it like, coming back here?’

  He stared out at the water, remembering what it had been like when he had first sailed into this sleepy English harbour, young and free, unencumbered by responsibility. It had been a heady feeling.

  ‘It makes you realise how precious time is,’ he said slowly. ‘How quickly it passes.’ And then he shook himself, unwilling to reflect, to let her close to his innermost thoughts. ‘This house is…’ he searched for just the right description ‘…sweet.’

  Eve smiled. ‘Thank you. It’s the old coastguard’s cottage. I’ve lived here all my life.’

  ‘It isn’t what I was expecting.’

  She filled the kettle up. ‘And what was that?’

  ‘Something modern. Sleek. Not this.’ And today she was not what he expected, either. His pulse should not be pounding in this overpowering way. He tried telling himself that he liked his women to be smart and chic, not wearing baggy clothes with spots of paint all over them, and yet all he could think about was her slender body beneath the unflattering trousers, and his crazy fascination for the flirty pink varnish on the toes of her bare feet.

  Eve made the coffee in silence, thinking that he seemed to fill the room with his presence and that never, in all her life, had she been so uncomfortably aware of a man. Maybe, subconsciously, she was unable to make the transition from starstruck adolescent to mature and independent woman. Maybe, as far as Luca was concerned, she was stuck in a timewarp, for ever doomed to be the inept waitress with a serious crush. Her heart was thundering so loudly in her ears that she wondered if he could hear it. ‘How do you like your coffee?’ she asked steadily.

  ‘As it comes.’

  But the kettle boiling sounded deafeningly loud, almost as loud as her heart. She turned and looked at him. He was leaning against the counter, perfectly still, just watching her. And something in his eyes made her feel quite dizzy. ‘So?’ she questioned, in a voice which sounded a million miles away from the usual way she asked questions.

  He smiled. ‘So why am I here?’

  ‘Well, yes.’

  He let his gaze drift over her. ‘I couldn’t help myself,’ he said, with a shrug, as if admitting to a weakness that was alien to him.

  Eve stared back at him. She tried telling herself that she wasn’t like this with men. She worked with men. Lots of them—some of them gorgeous, too. Yet there was something different about Luca—something powerful and impenetrable which didn’t stop him seeming gloriously accessible. Sensuality shimmered off him in almost tangible waves. He was making her feel vulnerable, and she didn’t want to be.

  She could feel the slow burn of a flirtation which felt too intense, and yet not intense enough. Part of her was regretting ever having asked him into her house, where the walls seemed to be closing in on her, and yet there was some other, wild, unrecognisable part of her that wished that they could dispense with all the social niceties and she could just act completely out of character. Take him upstairs and have him make love to her, just once. That was what he wanted; she knew that.

  But life wasn’t like that, and neither was she.

  ‘Explain yourself, Luca,’ she commanded softly.

  There was only one possible way to do that and it wasn’t with words. He moved towards her and noticed that she mutely allowed him to, her eyes wide with a mixture of incredulity and excitement. As if she couldn’t quite believe what he was about to do. But she made no move to stop him, and he could not stop himself. He brushed his fingertips over the strong outline of her jaw with the intent preoccupation of someone who was learning by touch.

  He felt her shudder, even as he shuddered, and then he caught her in his arms, his breath warming her face, his lips tantalisingly close to hers.

  ‘What do you think you’re doing?’ she gasped.

  ‘I am about to kiss you,’ he said silkily. ‘Surely you can recognise that, cara?’

  ‘You mustn’t.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘Because…because it’s inappropriate!’ she fielded desperately. ‘We hardly know each other!’

  ‘Have you never kissed a man who is nearly a stranger?’ he murmured. ‘Isn’t there something crazy and wonderful about doing that?’

  Nearly a stranger. There was something so forbidding about that comment, and she tried to focus her mind on it, but all she could feel was the fierce heat of his body and it was remorselessly driving all rational thought from her head. She pushed her hand ineffectually at his chest. ‘That’s beside the point, and besides—how do you know I don’t have a boyfriend?’

  He gave a low laugh. ‘You should not have boys in your life, Eve—there should be only men. And there is no one.’ He drifted a careless fingertip to trace the outline of her lips. ‘Even if there is, he is nothing to you. For you do not want him, cara. You want me.’

  It was ruthless, almost cruel, but it was true. She did.

  He read the invitation in her widened, darkened eyes and brought his mouth crushing down on hers, and as her own opened in sweet response he felt desire jackknife through him with its piercing, flooding weight.

  ‘Oh,’ she sighed helplessly. ‘Oh!’

  He smiled against her lips, sensing capitulation, and Eve dissolved, her fingers flying up to his shoulders, her nails biting into his flesh as she felt her knees begin to buckle and threaten to give way. She could taste her breath mingling with his and her body melting against his as he pulled her hard against him.

  Vainly, she fought for control, for some kind of sanity. ‘Luca, for God’s sake—’

  He lifted his head and looked down at her, his dark eyes almost black as they burned into her. ‘What?’ he whispered.

  ‘This is crazy. Mad. I just don’t do this kind of thing!’

  ‘You just did,’ he pointed out arrogantly. ‘And you want to do it again.’

  Yes, she did. She had given him the bait to play masterful and he had taken it and she liked it. Maybe too much. She wonder
ed if he was masterful in bed and the hard, luminous brilliance in his dark eyes told her that, yes, he probably was. But would he give as well as take?

  ‘You do.’ He laughed as he felt her move restlessly against him. ‘Oh, yes, you do.’

  It was a statement, not a question and she didn’t answer, just pressed her hips against his and she felt him jerk into hard life against her, heard the almost tortured little moan he made.

  ‘Signore doce in nel cielo!’ he groaned. He couldn’t remember the last time it had felt like this. And although he couldn’t work out why it should feel that way—and why with this woman—at that moment he didn’t care. Deliberately he circled his hips against her, so that she could feel the rock-hard cradle of him.

  The tight band of wanting inside her snapped, exploded into a need so fervent that Eve was swept away by it. She ran her fingers through his hair while he kissed her, his lips moving from mouth to cheek, to neck and back to her mouth again, and she was transported into a whole new land. A place where nothing mattered other than the moment, and the moment was now.

  ‘Luca!’

  It was a strangled little cry. A pleading. A prayer. A need which matched his. He had thought that she might try to resist him and he was taken aback by her eagerness. With an effort he dragged his lips from the pure temptation of hers, his breathing ragged, his normal sang-froid briefly deserting him. For this was wild and sweet and instant and unexpected. Like being driven by a terrible aching hunger and stumbling upon a feast.

  He captured her face between his hands, his eyes burning into her. ‘Your bed?’ he demanded. ‘Take me there—now.’

  Dear Lord! Her blood was on fire—any minute now and she would go up in flames. She felt strength and weakness in equal measures, overwhelmed by a desire which banished everything other than the need to have him close to her, as close as it was possible for a man and woman to be.

  But it was not right. It could not possibly be. How did he see her—as one of those women driven only by some kind of carnal hunger? And, more importantly, how would this make her feel about herself?

  With an effort she tore herself away from the temptation of his arms. ‘No. Stop it. I mean it. I can’t.’

  He stilled, his eyes narrowing in question, feeling the deep, dark throb of frustration. He steadied his breathing. ‘What?’ The word came out as hard and clipped as gunfire.

  ‘I shouldn’t have done that. I’m sorry, Luca. I got carried away.’ His face was like stone, but she guessed she couldn’t blame him. She had behaved like the worst kind of woman—she had led him on and left him wanting, and left herself aching into the bargain.

  ‘You certainly did.’

  ‘It’s just…hopeless, isn’t it?’

  He arched her a look of imperious query. ‘Hopeless?’

  She shrugged her shoulders as if in a silent request that the sudden icy set of his features might melt, but she met no answering response. ‘Of course it’s hopeless—you live in Rome, I live in England.’

  His laugh was sardonic. ‘I thought we were going to spend the afternoon in bed,’ he drawled. ‘I wasn’t planning to link up our diaries for all eternity!’

  She stared at him. ‘How very opportunistic of you!’

  ‘Only a fool doesn’t seize opportunity when he is presented with it.’

  And only a fool would give him house-room after a statement like that.

  ‘I think you’d better leave, don’t you?’ she said, in a low voice.

  ‘I think perhaps I had.’ The black eyes were lit now, sparking with angry fire. ‘But perhaps I could give you a word of advice for the future, cara.’ He drew a deep, unsteady breath. ‘Don’t you think it unwise to lead a man on to such a point if you then change your mind so abruptly? Not every man would be as accepting of it as I am.’

  She stared at him incredulously. ‘What are you saying?’ she demanded. ‘That I have no right to change my mind? That “no” sometimes means “yes”?’

  ‘That is not what I am saying at all,’ he ground out heatedly. ‘I mean that a lot of men might have attempted to persuade you to change your mind.’

  ‘Well, they wouldn’t have succeeded!’

  ‘Oh, really?’ The black eyes mocked her, challenged her. ‘I think you delude yourself, Eve. I think we both know that if I had continued to kiss you, then your submission would have been inevitable.’

  ‘Submission?’ she demanded incredulously. ‘Submission? Tell me, just which century do you think you’re living in?’ She stared at him furiously. ‘Words like that imply some kind of gross inequality. When I make love with a man, I don’t submit, and neither does he! It’s equal. It’s soft. It’s gentle—’

  He gave a short laugh. ‘You make it sound like knitting a sweater!’

  Her cheeks flamed as she instantly understood the implication behind his words. That it would not be soft and gentle with him, and her pulses leapt even as she steeled her heart against him. ‘Just go. Go. Please.’

  ‘I am going,’ he said, in a voice which was coiled like a snake with tension, though not nearly as tense as his aching body. ‘But something like this cannot be left unfinished.’

  Oh, but it could!

  His eyes glittered. ‘Goodbye, cara,’ he said softly.

  She watched him go with a terrible yearning regret, standing as motionless as a statue as she heard his footsteps echoing over the flagstones in the hall, her body stiff and tense like a statue’s—and when she heard the front door slam behind him she should have felt an overwhelming sense of relief.

  So why the hell did she feel like kicking her foot very hard against the wall?

  CHAPTER FOUR

  ALTHOUGH he wasn’t due to fly back until the following morning, Luca changed his ticket and returned to Rome early that evening and remonstrated with himself for the whole two-hour journey. What in the name of God had come over him? What had he been playing at? Coming onto her with all the finesse of some boy just out of high school, acting like some hormonally crazed adolescent.

  He stared out of the window, the dull ache in his groin still nagging at him, perplexed by the intensity of need she had aroused in him.

  He could have clicked his fingers and had any number of beautiful women and—far more importantly—she was most definitely not his type. So why her?

  Because she had at first been chilly and offhand with him—studying him calmly with those intelligent grey-green eyes? Because she had answered him back? And then resisted him? Had all these combined to make Eve Peters into a woman he had never before encountered?

  Unobtainable.

  He was home in time to shower and change, and on impulse he took Chiara out. He hadn’t seen her in a long while and she was eager to tell him about her new film. It was late, but she agreed instantly to have dinner with him, and yet her suppressed excitement acted like a cold shower to his senses and he began to regret the invitation the moment he had made it.

  Her black hair fell like a sultry night to a waist encased in silver sequins and he thought of Eve in her paint-spattered T-shirt, and glowered at his menu. She flirted outrageously with him all night and laughed at all his jokes and gazed at him as if he were the reason that man had been invented.

  The paparazzi were waiting when they left the restaurant and in the darkened light of the taxi Luca narrowed his eyes at her suspiciously.

  ‘Did you tell them where we were eating?’ he demanded.

  She shook her head. ‘No, caro—I promise you!’

  He didn’t believe her. Women said one thing and meant another. They plotted and they schemed to get what they wanted. She tried to drape her arms around his neck. He could smell expensive scent and he found it cloying.

  Gently, he pushed her away.

  ‘I will drop you off at your apartment,’ he said tersely.

  ‘Oh, Luca!’ Her voice was sulky. ‘Must you?’

  He thought of Eve. Of the melting taste of her lips and the way she had exploded into life in his arms. Th
e cool, composed exterior masking the surprisingly hot and sensual nature which lay beneath, of which he had seen only a tantalising glimpse. He sighed as he stared out at the bright lights of night-time Rome and realised that he must have her.

  Should he send flowers? Few women could resist flowers. But then her job probably provided her with plenty of bouquets, so that they would be nothing out of the ordinary.

  No, definitely not flowers.

  ‘Goodnight, Chiara,’ he said gently.

  The car drew to a halt, and the actress flounced out.

  ‘Take me home—and quickly!’ he shot out, and the car pulled away again.

  Eve tried not to think about Luca at all, though it took a bit of effort.

  She never underestimated the cruelly dissecting power of the camera for it picked up on just about everything and then magnified it tenfold. A kilo gained made you look like a candidate for the fat camp and a spot seemed to dominate your face like a planet. And not just the external stuff, either. Doubt and insecurities became glaringly obvious under the lens. If you lost your nerve and your confidence, the audience stopped believing in you and started switching off, and once that happened, you didn’t have a job for long.

  So she tried to put Luca Cardelli out of her mind by analysing it and putting it into context. It wasn’t as if it was anything major, after all. She had simply met a man she had once been mad about, and she was mad about him still. It just happened that he was living in another country, was the wrong kind of man to fall for, and had made a pass at her, clearly expecting her to fall into bed with him at the drop of a hat.

  Thank heavens she hadn’t.

  She decided that she needed to get out more. Meet more people. Spread her wings a little.

  She signed up for an afternoon course in French and decided that the next time the crew went out for lunch on Friday, she would join them. And she would take Kesi out for the day on Sunday.

  But when she arrived home from work a few days later there was a postcard sitting on the mat, its glossy colour photo providing welcome relief in between all the boring bills and circulars. She liked postcards, though people never seemed to send them much any more—she guessed that was the legacy of travel becoming so much more accessible and unremarkable, and the advent of the email, of course. But there was a magic about postcards which electronic stuff somehow lacked.