Harlequin Presents--July 2021--Box Set 1 of 2

by Natalie Anderson

  His frown deepened and he tossed the sheet aside and stood, and it took every bit of willpower she possessed not to lower her gaze to the perfection of his male body. ‘Is something wrong?’

  ‘My sister is unwell. She’s been admitted to hospital. I have to get back to support my mother.’

  ‘I’m sorry to hear that.’ He stepped into his jeans and zipped them up, then came over and took her by the hands. ‘Give me half an hour and I’ll come with you.’

  Emmie pulled out of his hold. ‘No, that’s not necessary.’ She straightened her tote bag across her shoulder and gave him a tight smile. ‘My goal in coming here to see you in your own environment was to get to know you better. I think I’ve achieved that, and so now I need to get back to the job you’re paying me to do. Finding you a wife.’

  Matteo’s face froze as if every muscle had been paralysed. He stared fixedly at her for a long moment. ‘Thank you for taking the trouble to come.’ Somehow Emmie suspected there was a double entendre lurking in his curt response.

  ‘Thank you for having me.’ Two could play at that game. ‘Will you thank Valentina for me? It was a lovely meal last night.’ Emmie moved towards the door. ‘I just have to get my overnight bag from my room... I’ve already packed.’

  Would the housekeeper be surprised that Emmie hadn’t spent the whole night in the room she had prepared for her? Or perhaps Valentina was used to a bit of female-guest bed-hopping. No doubt Emmie wasn’t the first woman Matteo had bedded here. He was a virile man in the prime of his life—every intimate muscle in her body could vouch for that.

  ‘I’ll take your bag down for you,’ Matteo said in a firm tone that quickly dispensed with any notion of her arguing with him.

  ‘Fine. That’s...kind of you.’

  * * *

  A short time later, Matteo carried Emmie’s bag down to her hire car and placed it in the boot. He knew she had a valid excuse for leaving earlier than he had expected, but it still niggled him that she might have decided to leave early in any case. She had planned to stay three days and was leaving after only one. How could he not feel short-changed, especially after last night? He’d been looking forward to spending more time with her, and not just in bed. There were things he wanted to show her on the estate, and he wanted to tell her some of the history of the place that went back centuries.

  He opened the driver’s door for her, aching to touch her before she got behind the wheel, but somehow summoning up the self-control not to. The lines of their ‘relationship’ were blurry enough. Maybe this was the right way to go—let her leave without any hint of regret on his part.

  It stirred a memory of the day his mother had left. But back then he had bawled and begged her to stay, his gut had hollowed out, his chest so tight, as if a clamp had been on his ribs, his eyes streaming, nose running, hopes fading. But, of course, his mother had not changed her mind. She had driven away down the driveway without once looking back.

  ‘Drive safely,’ Matteo said, closing the door for Emmie.

  She started the car and pressed the button to lower the window. ‘I’ll be in touch with some potential dates. And I should have your personality profile results back early next week. That will make things a lot easier.’

  He arched one eyebrow. ‘What? You don’t know me well enough by now?’ He injected his tone with a hint of mockery.

  A flicker of something passed across her face, and then her lips pressed together. ‘Thank you again for your hospitality.’ Her voice was as polite and formal as a robot’s and just as impersonal.

  Matteo stepped back from the car and turned back to the villa. He was damned if he was going to watch her drive away.

  But he would see her again. He would not leave things so up in the air between them, not after last night. Emmie was upset about her sister and needed some time to be with her family. But, once the time was right, he would present her with a proposal she could not possibly refuse.

  CHAPTER NINE

  EMMIE SAT BY her sister’s bedside while a naso-gastric tube fed Natty essential nutrients to keep her organs from failing. Her sister was shockingly thin, little more than a skeleton tightly wrapped in greyish-hued skin, with bruises all over her body, sores where she had been picking at herself, her nails bitten down to the quick.

  Emmie fought back tears, her chest so tight she could barely breathe. How could she not feel responsible for the illness that ravaged her younger sister’s body and mind? How could she not feel guilty that it was her cancer that had torn apart her family, throwing poor little Natty into the grip of a deadly condition even more deadly than Emmie’s? Over the last couple of months, there had been some improvement in Natty’s condition. Not much improvement, only a smidgen, but still, anything was better than nothing.

  But now this heartbreaking backward step...

  It was hard to cling on to hope that her sister would one day turn a corner, that this dreadful illness would somehow lose its grip on her and allow her to live a more normal life. It was so sad to think that, like her, Natty was infertile—not from chemo, but from years of malnutrition, particularly as it had started in young adolescence.

  Emmie knew anorexia was a mental health condition, that Natty’s starved brain caused the disordered thinking that perpetuated her disease. But she was still angry at her sister for not responding to the costly treatment she had been given over the years. Time was running out; her sister’s ravaged body could not take too much more. It intensified Emmie’s feelings of powerless and guilt for her part in her sister’s illness.

  Their mother, Gwen, sat on the other side of the hospital bed, looking a decade older than she should. Her blonde hair was streaked with grey, her skin was sallow, her eyes hollow with dark circles below and there were deep lines on her face that hadn’t been there the last time Emmie had seen her.

  ‘Has Dad been in yet?’ Emmie asked in a low voice.

  Her mother shook her head, her shoulders slumping. ‘You know what he’s like. He finds hospitals too upsetting.’ The disdain in her voice was unmistakable. ‘And do you think I don’t too? But here I am, week after week, month after month, year after year, wondering if it will ever come to an end.’ Gwen brushed at her eyes with the back of her hand, her chin trembling as she fought back tears.

  Emmie came round the other side of the bed and knelt down beside her mother’s chair. She took her mother’s hands in her own and gently stroked them. ‘Oh, Mum, you’ve had to deal with so much pain and stress, it’s so unfair.’

  Her mother sniffed and looked at Emmie through watery eyes. ‘Do you think it’s my fault? I wasn’t a good enough mother?’

  ‘Stop it,’ Emmie said, squeezing her mother’s hands. ‘You heard what the psychologist said during that session we had. That mother-blaming stuff was what they thought in the past, but they don’t now. It’s a mental illness and not at all your fault.’

  Gwen sighed so deeply, her shoulders went down another notch. ‘It’s hard not to blame myself when both my daughters have been so ill. I keep thinking I must have done something wrong during my pregnancies. Was it something I ate or drank? Chemicals I consumed in processed food? Not enough exercise? Too much? The guilt never goes away.’

  Tell me about it.

  Emmie had been accompanied by guilt every day of her life since her diagnosis. Had she done something that had caused her cancer? Had that one cigarette she’d tried when she was fourteen triggered rogue cancer cells in her body? Had the sip or two of vodka at a party when she was sixteen done it?

  The one thing she did know was that her illness had caused unbearable stress to her parents and in consequence her sister. Natty hadn’t coped with the long absences of their mother during Emmie’s hospital stays. She hadn’t coped with their father’s emotional distance, or his constant criticism over her not doing her homework or her chores. It had been too much for quiet, overly sensitive Natty
, whose life had spun so quickly out of control that she’d controlled the only thing she could—her eating.

  ‘I guess that’s how most loving mothers would feel...’ Emmie said. Not that she would ever know that feeling now. Motherhood was an impossible dream, a shattered dream. She would never have a child of her own. IVF with a donor egg was an option but she would never see aspects of herself or her sister or parents in a tiny baby’s face in the way biological parents did.

  Gwen grasped Emmie’s hand. ‘Darling, thank you for being with me. But you said you were in Italy. What for? You never mentioned going on holiday when we spoke a couple of weeks ago.’

  ‘It wasn’t a holiday. I went for work.’

  Her mother looked at her expectantly, obviously wanting more information. Emmie was reluctant to give too much away. There was client confidentiality, for one thing, and then there was the agreement between her and Matteo that what happened in Umbria stayed in Umbria. But as long as she didn’t reveal his name, Emmie comforted herself, her mother would never find out who he was.

  ‘I was visiting a client at his villa in Umbria.’ Emmie filled in the silence. ‘A high-end client. He’s in rather a hurry to find himself a wife.’

  ‘Sounds intriguing. What’s he like?’

  Emmie wondered what her mother would say if she told her that only hours ago she had been in bed with him. That even now she missed him as if a part of her had been left behind in Italy. She had relived every moment of their night together since, her body tingling all over as each erotic scene played out in her mind. ‘He’s a widower. He lost his wife and baby eight years ago.’

  ‘Oh, how terribly sad.’

  ‘Yes...’ Emmie got up from the floor and forced a smile. ‘But he’s keen to marry again and it’s my job to find him a suitable partner.’

  Gwen smiled back. ‘You bring happiness to so many people, sweetie. I’m so proud of you.’

  But Emmie wasn’t able to bring happiness or healing to her family, and that plagued her constantly. Her parents were bitter enemies, her sister was creeping closer and closer to death’s door and Emmie was unable to do anything to help.

  ‘Thanks, Mum.’ Emmie bent down to drop a kiss on the top of her mother’s head. ‘I’m proud of you too.’

  * * *

  A few days later, Emmie finally got the results of Matteo’s personality profile. It didn’t reveal much more than she had already surmised. He was a man who preferred his own company to that of others. He was goal-and achievement-oriented and he had strong personal values. He thought before he spoke, he reflected before he acted, he was not driven by emotions but by logic. He sought organisation and efficiency, and took pride in doing any job he set out to do and doing it to the best of his ability. But he wasn’t without sensitivity and emotional intelligence—the feedback showed a broad band of those qualities, although it wasn’t his primary strength.

  Emmie went back through her database and selected the female clients she thought would be most suitable for him. She ended up with four on her shortlist but she felt none of her normal excitement about finding a match for a client. In fact, she was jealous that someone else would experience the passionate press of his lips on theirs. Someone else would experience the magic of being in his arms, the mind-blowing magic of making love with him.

  Jealousy was an emotion she had never experienced before, or at least not in this context. Sure, she was jealous when she saw young women pushing prams, or stroking their bulging tummies during pregnancy. How could she not be envious of a state that fate had decided she would never experience? Every time she saw a baby or a young child, her heart would ache as if it had been pierced with an arrow. Several of her happily married clients had come in with their new babies and Emmie had cuddled and cooed over those precious little bundles, displaying an acting ability that was worthy of an award. No one would ever guess how gut-wrenching it was for her to smell a new-born’s beautiful smell, to look down into their little, scrunched-up pixie faces, to listen to their cute little snuffles and sighing noises, knowing she would never give birth to her own child.

  Emmie reached for her phone to call Matteo and organise some potential dates but, just then, Paisley popped her head round the door.

  ‘Guess who’s come to see you?’ She waggled her eyebrows and added, ‘Your favourite client.’

  Emmie’s heart stumbled like a foot missing a bottom step. ‘He’s not my favourite but he’s certainly my most difficult.’ Difficult to resist, difficult to forget, difficult to put out of her mind. She had replayed their night together so many times, her body aching for him like it had never ached before. He had triggered desires and needs in her she had no way of satisfying now. Not without him. Self-pleasure was an option, of course, but it would be a paltry substitute now she had experienced the explosive fire of his touch.

  Matteo entered her office a moment or two later, his dark-blue gaze meeting hers. ‘How is your sister?’

  ‘A little better, thank you.’ Natty had marginally improved now that she’d had some intravenous nutrition, but how long she would stay that way once she went home was anyone’s guess.

  ‘Still in hospital?’

  ‘Yes, she will be for another week or so.’ Emmie waved at the chair in front of her desk. ‘Please, sit down. I was about to contact you with some potential dates now that I’ve read your personality profile. You received a copy of the report via email?’

  ‘Si.’

  ‘Did anything surprise you in it? Anything you didn’t already know about yourself?’

  ‘No.’

  Emmie forced a stiff smile. ‘A lot of my clients are quite surprised. They find it helpful to understand how they come across, what personality traits or ways of relating to people might be getting in the way of them finding a partner—that sort of thing.’

  ‘Have you had yours done?’ His gaze was unwavering on hers.

  ‘Yes, as a matter of fact I have.’

  ‘And?’

  Emmie moistened her suddenly parchment-dry lips, the penetrating beam of his gaze making her feel as if she were under a microscope. Could he see how much his presence stirred her senses into overdrive? Could he sense how hard and fast her pulse was beating? ‘And what?’

  ‘Were you surprised by what you found out about your personality?’

  ‘Yes and no.’

  A lazy smile tilted his mouth. ‘Let me guess what it said.’

  She pressed her spine more firmly back into her chair, desperately trying not to look at his mouth. The mouth that had kissed hers and set it on fire, leaving smouldering embers in her body that his mere presence now fanned into leaping flames. ‘Go ahead.’

  His chair creaked as he changed position, one ankle crossing over his bent knee in a relaxed pose. ‘You’re warm and compassionate and like helping people. You rely on your gut rather than your head when you decide about something. How am I doing so far?’

  ‘Not bad.’ Rather brilliantly, actually. But there were things he could never know about her and she was going to keep it that way.

  His smile broadened and her heart tripped and flipped. ‘You’re observant and dedicated with strong personal values. You don’t enjoy the company of people who show little regard for other’s feelings.’ His eyes darkened and his gaze dipped to her mouth before he added in a deeper, huskier tone, ‘You’re a very sensual person, passionate and fiery, although you try to hide it.’

  Emmie tried to ignore the hot flutter of desire between her thighs, tried to ignore the way her lips were tingling, aching to feel his mouth upon them. She pushed back her chair and stood, folding her arms across her chest, fixing him with a cool stare. ‘Mr Vitale, I think—’

  ‘Mr?’ His dark eyebrows rose cynically and he stood from his chair and strode over to where she was standing. ‘Surely, after our time in Umbria, we have moved past such formalities, si?’
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br />   His deep baritone was a caress that glided down her spine and left a warm pool of longing in its wake.

  Emmie had plenty of time to move out of his reach but found herself unable to move a muscle. She was spellbound by the glint in his eyes, mesmerised by the sensual energy that passed like a current between their bodies. Her gaze drifted to his mouth and her stomach swooped and her pulse raced. She caught the citrus notes of his aftershave, the sharp lemon and lime drugging her senses. ‘We agreed that what h-happened in Umbria stayed in Umbria. We—we need to forget about it and move on.’ Her voice wasn’t as steady as she’d hoped, and nor was her heartbeat—it was going at a hit-and-miss pace.

  Matteo placed a gentle finger beneath her chin and lifted her face so her eyes meshed with his. He was close enough for her to see the black, bottomless depths of his pupils and the tiny flecks of different shades of blue that made his irises look like a mysterious labyrinth. ‘I haven’t forgotten a moment.’ His thumb began a slow stroke of her lower lip, setting every nerve in her mouth on fire.

  Emmie tried to disguise a gulping swallow but the sound was clearly audible. ‘It shouldn’t have happened. I shouldn’t have let it happen.’

  His brows snapped together. ‘You regret it?’

  She chewed at one edge of her mouth. How could she regret the most amazing experience of her life? It was right up there with the day she’d been declared cancer-free. But how could she allow herself to take it any further? It would be stepping outside the parameters she had set for herself. Other people’s happiness was her business now, not seeking her own. ‘No. I don’t. It was...wonderful, amazing, unforgettable...but it can’t happen again.’

  ‘Why can’t it?’

  Emmie’s brain was scrambled by his proximity, addled by his touch, dazed by the desire she could see gleaming in his eyes. She was supposed to be able to resist him. She was supposed to avoid tricky emotional entanglements, because that was the only way to appease the guilt she carried around how her cancer had ruined her once-happy family. But as soon as Matteo stepped into her presence a tidal wave of longing swept her up and carried her into a fantasy world where she promised herself, just one more time.