Innocent Wife, Baby of Shame

by MELANIE MILBURNE

  Keira felt a shiver scuttle up her spine like a suddenly startled mouse. ‘So…’ she moistened her lips ‘…what has that got to do with me?’

  ‘It has everything to do with you,’ he said and, stretching out an interminable pause, added, ‘I have been paying your brother’s private school fees ever since.’

  Keira swallowed back her rising panic. ‘You wouldn’t go as low as to involve Jamie in this…would you?’

  He gave her a cool impersonal smile. ‘Not only have I been paying the rather extortionate boarding school fees of your brother, I have also paid out in full the loan your father took out to cover your university fees.’

  ‘No…No!’ she gasped.

  He gave her one of his inscrutable looks. ‘What do you think?’ he asked. ‘We have rather a score settle to, do we not? If I cannot get you to cooperate by other means, what choice do I have but to use coercion?’

  ‘It’s not coercion, it’s blackmail.’

  ‘Whatever.’

  She gritted her teeth. ‘I can’t believe you would use Jamie to get at me.’

  ‘I have already offered to pay his university and halls of residence fees for whatever course he chooses to study,’ he said, as if she hadn’t spoken. ‘Your parents are, of course, very grateful.’

  ‘You sick bastard,’ she sniped at him. ‘How else have you ingratiated yourself into my family?’

  ‘You have always been at war with your parents but over the last couple of months I have come to realise that it probably has more to do with you than them. They have tried hard to bring you up in a decent and loving environment but you constantly kick back against their every attempt to get close to you.’

  Keira felt as if he’d punched her in the middle of her stomach. In the past he had always demonstrated his understanding of how alienated she felt from her strait-laced parents. He had consoled her on so many tearful occasions when she had ranted and raved about the way her father could never give her a compliment without some pithy comment attached. Her mother had been no better, constantly criticising her for everything, including her choice of career. It hurt to think Patrizio had joined their camp when for that precious time while they had been together he had been her greatest ally.

  ‘If I say our reconciliation will continue for as long as the boys need it to in order to make their last weeks of school as enjoyable and pleasant as possible, then it will do so,’ he said into the silence, which was throbbing with tension. ‘As far as I see it, you do not have any other choice.’

  She sent him a caustic look. ‘Have you informed your mistress that you won’t be available for another couple of weeks or do you plan to sleep with her as well as with me?’

  He held her defiant glare. ‘This evening was an aberration,’ he said. ‘It is not unreasonable for ex-lovers to feel some residual attraction for each other. I think that now that we have dealt with it, it will go away.’

  ‘You used me like a whore.’

  His top lip tilted insolently. ‘If that is how you behave, what else do you expect?’

  She flung herself out of the car, slamming the door as hard as she could and stomping towards the house with short angry strides. ‘I am not going to put up with this,’ she said. ‘So I slept with another man? So what? That doesn’t make me a tramp.’

  He caught her by the arm and turned her to face him. ‘You are exactly as my nephew described you,’ he bit out. ‘A filthy little slut who—’

  Keira only realised she had slapped his face when she heard the sound of her palm connecting with his cheek. She stood in heart-thumping shock as the red imprint of her hand gradually spread across his lean jaw.

  His fingers bit into her upper arms, his eyes blazing with a hatred so intense she felt scared that he might return the action and slap her back. She shrank away from him, wincing as she physically prepared herself, her eyes closing as she waited for it to happen.

  Patrizio dropped his hold as if she had burned him, his voice coming out as a scratchy rasp. ‘You surely do not think I would retaliate in such a way, Keira?’

  She couldn’t speak, choking sobs were filling her throat and she bent her head, hugging her arms across her chest.

  He let out a vicious curse and gathered her to him, his arms encircling her. ‘I cannot believe you have such an appalling opinion of me,’ he said in a voice she could hardly recognise as his. ‘What sort of man do you think I am?’

  She blubbered into his shirt front. ‘I wouldn’t blame you if you did. I hate myself.’

  He gave her a little shake and, holding her from him, looked down at her. ‘Stop this nonsense right now, Keira. I would never lay a finger on you. You are safe with me. You do realise that, don’t you?’

  Not safe enough, Keira thought as she looked into that dark fathomless gaze. Her bottom lip quivered uncontrollably as he held her, his body so close she could feel the warmth of it seeping into the cold loneliness of hers. ‘Yes…I do know that…’

  ‘You are overwrought and tired,’ he said, leading her towards the house. ‘I should have realised this evening would test your limits. Your brother knows you very well. It must have been hard to maintain the charade in front of him.’

  She brushed at her eyes with the back of her hand and sniffed. ‘I hated lying to him like that,’ she said. ‘I feel so…so…tainted…’

  Patrizio frowned as he reached past her to open the door. ‘I feel bad about lying to my nephew too, but what else can we do?’ he asked. ‘The headmaster is threatening to expel them both. We have to do whatever we can to get them through this final stage of school. If they fail their exams it will influence their career choices. Doors that close now will almost certainly close permanently.’

  ‘I know,’ she said, giving another little sniff.

  He closed the door once they were inside and handed her his handkerchief. ‘Here,’ he said with a wry smile. ‘This might be better than your sleeve.’

  Keira pressed her face into the lemon-scented folds of his handkerchief. ‘You must think me a total emotional wreck,’ she said once she’d dealt with her streaming eyes and nose. ‘Lately I seem to do nothing but cry.’

  ‘I think you are a bit like me. We are thrown a little off course by being forced to confront our past. It is an unusual situation, no?’

  ‘Yes,’ she said, releasing an unsteady breath. ‘Yes, it is…’

  Patrizio carved a rough pathway through his hair with one of his hands. ‘I am ashamed of how Bruno spoke to you this evening. I know a lot of young men have one rule for themselves and another for the women in their lives, but I had no idea he had such double standards.’

  ‘Yes, well, I can see where he got his role model from,’ she responded before she could stop herself. ‘You have had numerous one-night stands but I have only had the one and it was with a close friend.’

  ‘You think that somehow makes it better, do you?’ he asked, his brows snapping together in anger. ‘That you opened your legs for a friend rather than a total stranger?’

  She held his glittering gaze with an equanimity she was nowhere close to feeling. ‘So what if I did? It was one mistake. It probably only lasted three or four minutes, if that.’

  ‘So you are starting to remember that night, are you?’ he asked with a disdainful tilt to his mouth.

  She had to drop her gaze from the accusing inferno of his. ‘No…I just think it’s a little unfair to judge me by different standards.’

  ‘I did not betray our marriage vows,’ he reminded her coldly. ‘That was you.’

  Frustration and guilt made her voice rise to a shriek as she lifted her eyes to his once more. ‘I didn’t do it on purpose!’

  His dark gaze stripped her of what little dignity she had left. ‘Yes, you did,’ he said with contempt burning in his eyes as they held hers. ‘You could have chosen no better way to destroy my love and respect for you than by giving yourself to another man whilst legally married to me.’

  Keira blinked back bitter tears.
‘You’re never going to forgive me, are you?’ she asked brokenly. ‘I could wear a hair shirt for the next fifty years but still you would not be able to overlook that one fall from grace.’

  His eyes mercilessly raked her from head to foot. ‘You will fall again, I am sure of it,’ he ground out contemptuously. ‘You did earlier this evening, begging for it with your body on fire for the release it craves.’

  ‘Which you didn’t deliver.’ Keira knew she shouldn’t have said it and certainly not in that taunting tone, but it was too late.

  His dark-as-night eyes glittered with steely purpose as he pulled her towards him. ‘That can easily be remedied,’ he said and sent his mouth crashing down on hers.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  IF KEIRA had had more time to prepare herself for the heat and fire of his mouth she would never have responded so passionately, or so she thought in self-recrimination later. Her mouth burst into hot tongues of flame as soon as his came into contact with hers, her whole body starting to pulse with the desire that had been lurking just underneath the surface of her tingling skin for hours.

  She felt the full force of his arousal against her as he held her tight in his arms, his tongue delving deeply to conquer hers. She whimpered with the sheer delight of having him so out of control, so intent on having her again in spite of how he felt about her.

  He kissed with such passion, each determined thrust of his tongue reminding her of the hot hard surge of his body in hers. Her body prepared itself; the silky scented dew of arousal made her legs soften with surrender as he manoeuvred her towards the sumptuous lounge.

  He pressed her down to the carpet at their feet, his hands beginning to remove her clothes, each stroke or glide of fabric along her skin a sensuous caress under-girded with urgency.

  She gasped out loud when his mouth closed over one tight nipple, his tongue rolling and curling until she was writhing with pleasure beneath the weight of his body. Her legs tangled with his, her hips lifting off the carpeted floor to feel more of his potency where she so desperately needed it.

  Patrizio might not love her any more but this was one way she could show how much she loved him, Keira thought as she caressed his back and shoulders with her hands, her body aching to be possessed by his.

  He lifted his head from her breast and met her passion-glazed eyes. ‘Tell me you want me, Keira,’ he commanded as he began stroking her intimately.

  ‘I want you…’

  ‘Louder.’

  ‘I want you.’

  His eyes glittered with triumph. ‘Say my name. Say it, Keira, say who it is you want.’

  She was almost sobbing with desperation as his fingers moved rhythmically against her swollen point of need. ‘I want you, Patrizio…Oh, God, I want you so much…’

  She shuddered as her orgasm rolled through her in wave after wave of release, each nerve and sinew in her body trembling with the aftershocks. She was boneless, a melted pool of femininity in his arms.

  She opened her eyes to meet his, the dark unreadable depths of his gaze making her belly quiver with uncertainty.

  ‘Who were you thinking of when you came?’ he asked.

  She frowned at him. ‘W-what sort of question is that?’

  He cupped her right breast in his hand, his eyes like a laser beam on hers. ‘I want you to think of me and only me this time,’ he said. ‘Do you understand? Me. Not your childhood sweetheart, but me.’

  Keira gave a choked gasp as he moved down her body, his mouth leaving hot moist kisses all over her flesh, from breast to trembling thigh. She knew what was coming and her whole body shivered in anticipation. The first intimate glide of his tongue against her lifted her back off the floor; the second had her clinging to him with claw-like fingers, her breathing becoming rapid and uneven as he subjected her to the most erotic assault on her senses possible. She gasped, she panted, she screamed with the sheer force of it, her entire body feeling as if an earthquake had passed through it.

  She had barely come back down to earth before he was thrusting deep inside her, hard, hot and heavy, his low-pitched grunts of pleasure as he set a frantic rhythm making her body tingle all over again. She clung to him as he rocked against her, her senses spinning out of control all over again as he brought her closer and closer to the edge of reason.

  His mouth coming down on hers smothered her moaning cries of ecstasy. She felt his body bucking with the force of his own release, the soft pads of her fingers feeling the lift of his flesh as he gave a whole-body shiver of reaction.

  His breathing was still choppy as he propped himself up on his elbows to look down at her. ‘Did Merrick ever make you come three times in a row?’ he asked.

  Keira closed her eyes, the twin blades of pain and shame slicing at her insides. ‘Stop it, Patrizio…please.’

  ‘Look at me.’

  She scrunched her eyes tighter. ‘No.’

  ‘Look at me, damn it!’ he growled as he grasped her by the upper arms.

  She looked at him with tears shining in her eyes. ‘Why are you spoiling the special thing we just shared?’ she choked. ‘You’re making it feel so tawdry and cheap.’

  He lifted himself off her in one fluid movement, tucking in his shirt and re-zipping himself as he looked down at her with flinty disdain. ‘That is because what we just shared is tawdry and cheap,’ he said. ‘It was just sex. Good sex, I am prepared to admit, but, as for being special—no.’

  Keira felt his words like a stake going through her heart. How could he be so cruel? Even though shame coursed through her as she fumbled her way back into her clothes, she wasn’t going to give him the satisfaction of grinding her pride to powder beneath the heel of his shoe. She had made love with him because she loved him. He could cheapen it all he liked but she would always treasure every moment she spent in his arms.

  But then she wasn’t the only person who had been in his arms lately, she reminded herself painfully. Somehow she couldn’t see him describing his intimate moments with the elegant Gisela Hunter in such crude terms.

  ‘I probably should have asked you this earlier, but I am assuming you are still on the pill?’ he said into the simmering silence.

  Keira felt her fingers momentarily stall on the fastening of her bra and hoped he hadn’t noticed. She adjusted her clothing and lifted her chin to meet his steady gaze. ‘I happened to notice you’ve dropped your safe sex standards,’ she said with a cutting edge to her voice. ‘I hope I’m not going to get some nasty little infection passed on from one of your many girlfriends.’

  His mouth tightened. ‘If anyone should be concerned about being infected, it should be me,’ he returned coolly.

  She gave him a caustic glare. ‘You’re such a bastard.’

  ‘You did not answer my question,’ he reminded her. ‘Are you currently using a reliable method of contraception?’

  She rolled her lips together, trying to avoid his gaze. She had stopped taking the low dose pill weeks ago. She didn’t even know where the packet was now.

  ‘Keira?’

  ‘Um…yes.’ She stumbled through her reply. ‘I’m covered.’

  His dark gaze held hers. ‘If there is any doubt in your mind, you need to tell me now,’ he said. ‘If you were to conceive a child, it would be very hard to…’He paused, as if wondering whether to continue.

  ‘Go on, say it,’ she put in bitterly. ‘Don’t spare my feelings, Patrizio.’

  ‘I am not sure what you are referring to. I was merely going to say—’

  ‘I know what you were going to say,’ she said through tight lips, her eyes flashing with resentment. ‘You were going to say it would be hard to prove paternity, weren’t you?’

  ‘As far as I am aware, a simple test can give us that information if we need to do so,’ he said. ‘But no, I was not going to say that at all.”

  Keira felt herself backing down. ‘Oh…well, then…sorry…I thought…’

  ‘I was going to say it would be hard to justify going through with
a divorce if we conceive a child,’ he said. ‘Don’t you agree?’

  She looked at him in wide-eyed surprise. ‘Are you mad?’

  ‘Not mad, just thinking of the child caught in the middle,’ he said.

  ‘A baby is not part of a marriage repair kit,’ she said. ‘If anything, a child would put even more stress on a relationship that’s going nowhere. Besides, imagine the emotional damage to a child growing up with parents who despise each other. That is tantamount to abuse.’

  ‘What would you do if it happened?’

  ‘You mean if I got pregnant?’

  He nodded.

  She swallowed as she tried to remember when she had last had a period and her heart began to hammer with panic as she did the sums.

  Surely it hadn’t been that long?

  She had been sick with the flu, which had disrupted her cycle.

  That was it, surely. Besides, coming off the pill could make things go a little haywire, she reasoned. There was no way she could have…

  She shrank back from where her thoughts were heading. ‘It’s not going to happen, Patrizio,’ she said, wondering if it already had. The only trouble was, how on earth was she going to tell him? Panic rushed through her until her head began to spin with it. She hadn’t had a period for two months, which meant…She gulped in shock. Oh, God, how would she even know for sure whose child it was?

  Patrizio frowned at her subdued tone and slumped posture. Her face was milk-white, the tiny dusting of freckles sprinkled over her nose standing out in stark relief from the pallor of her skin.

  His chest felt tighter than it should, as if his heart had swollen to twice its size. He was finding it harder and harder to maintain his anger towards her. He had even begun to wonder if what Jamie had hinted at was true. Perhaps Keira didn’t remember anything because nothing had actually happened—it was, after all, Merrick’s word against hers. Patrizio wasn’t sure of the motivation behind such an action, although he suspected jealousy would be way up there somewhere. Merrick had been a constant presence in Keira’s social life until he had come on the scene and swept her off her feet.