by Abby Green
And yet as his eyes remained glued to Cara’s, in some sort of sick fascination, he registered her cheeks flushing, and she gripped his sleeve tighter. She spoke louder now, as if to hammer it home, to leave him in no doubt as to the veracity of her claims.
‘You can believe me or not, Vicenzo, but the fact is that I am pregnant and the baby is yours.’
He was looking down at her, his face carved from granite, eyes so harsh and forbidding that Cara couldn’t believe she’d ever seen any lightness or tenderness in their depths. And then suddenly something flashed to their right from the lobby area. Cara flinched. Then another flash came, swiftly followed by a dozen more. They both looked.
‘Dio!’
Vicenzo let loose with another expletive just as Cara realised what was happening. They’d been caught by the paparazzi. She’d seen them loitering by the entrance of the hotel but hadn’t really registered them, too nervous and distracted by the confrontation ahead of her.
Cara felt Vicenzo throw her hand off his sleeve, and in the same instant she sensed him about to reach to grab her arm again—no doubt to haul her off somewhere else and accuse her of orchestrating this too. She slid out from under his hand and pushed desperately through the shouting crowd, their questions causing her stomach to heave and her legs to turn to jelly.
‘Mr Valentini, is it true? Are you two having a baby? What’s her name?’
Stifling the panic rising in her throat, Cara pushed through the crush and finally made it to the door, terrified of Vicenzo catching her at any moment. She jumped into the first cab she saw outside the entrance. Breathing hard as it pulled away, she looked back just in time to see Vicenzo burst through the hotel entrance, looking after the cab, fury written all over his face.
Cara turned away and miserably gave her address to the driver before she closed her eyes. What had she just done? The preceding moments rushed back in all their glory, his presence no longer there to act as some sort of hazy filter for her words and actions. Sudden hot tears smarted behind her eyelids, and she pressed a fist to her chest to try and keep down the emotion that was threatening to rip through her.
She couldn’t believe that she’d let him get to her so much that she’d revealed everything—the true extent of her vulnerability and inexperience that night. And in doing so, not only telling him about the pregnancy, she’d thrown the door wide open to allow him back into her life, to devastate her even beyond what he’d already done… Because one thing was for sure: she didn’t expect for one second that Vicenzo Valentini would walk away from this.
CHAPTER FIVE
VICENZO slammed a fist into the palm of his hand. The lobby was going crazy behind him, as hotel staff tried to eject the photographers. Cara Brosnan was delusional if she thought she could threaten him with this pregnancy. And yet her fantastic claims—what she had just told him—she’d been a virgin—she hadn’t slept with Mortimer—all reverberated sickeningly in his head… Was it possible? Everything in him wanted to say no! But the suspicion was fast becoming a distinct possibility.
Just then the hotel’s revolving door hissed behind him, and he felt a hand slap his shoulder. He turned to see his friend standing there.
Caleb jerked his head back towards the hotel. ‘Maggie is trying to control the Chinese whispers. Care to tell me who that was and why there’s a media scrum back there?’
Vicenzo shook his head. As much as he admired and respected his friend, he couldn’t begin to articulate this out loud.
Caleb laughed softly, ‘A word of warning, my friend. Those redheads are dangerous. I should know. From the minute I set eyes on Maggie she turned me upside down and inside out.’
Vicenzo fought to bring his seething anger under control and smiled as urbanely and carelessly as he could. ‘Believe me, this is nothing like you and Maggie.’
Caleb just looked at him and lifted a brow, and as Vicenzo led the way back into the hotel he felt that tightening feeling in his chest again—except this time it didn’t seem to be going away.
Cara returned to her building the following evening after another fruitless day of job hunting. She’d gotten up that morning with the nausea even worse than usual—no doubt as a result of her impetuously stupid actions of the night before. She’d been jumpy all day, half expecting Vicenzo to spring out of somewhere and throttle her.
As she approached her apartment now, though, the hairs stood up on the back of her neck. The door was ever so slightly ajar. In that moment she knew she’d prefer to catch a burglar in the act rather than face the person she knew was waiting for her. And she knew there was no point trying to run. She felt his ominous presence in every fibre of her being and, with her heart thumping, she pushed open her door.
Vicenzo Valentini stood by the threadbare couch in a wide-legged, dominantly powerful stance. Dark jeans hugged hard thighs, and a dark polo shirt and well-worn brown leather jacket made him look devilish and so gorgeous that she felt winded. She couldn’t speak as she stood on the threshold and took him in. She didn’t even bother to formulate the question as to how he might have got in.
He looked at her with no discernible expression. Only a muscle twitching in his jaw told her he was far from happy. He held out a white piece of paper and asked, almost conversationally, ‘Why is Sebastian Mortimer blackmailing you?’
The letter.
‘How dare you snoop through my private things?’ Panic flooded Cara, galvanising her, and she marched over to snatch it out of his hand. But Vicenzo caught her arm and held the letter well out of reach.
‘Why is Sebastian Mortimer blackmailing you?’ he repeated with a steely tone.
‘Because I didn’t sleep with him,’ Cara spat out. She tried to jerk her arm away from his grip but he wouldn’t let her go. She held herself tensely and glared up at him, feeling horribly exposed; if he still doubted her word about that then he still didn’t believe she’d been a virgin. This man was so dangerous to her now, in so many ways, but she had to defend herself. His misconception of her character was so bad that she knew even if he believed her explanation about Mortimer she’d remain in the gutter in his eyes. She had nothing to lose.
‘He paid off Cormac’s debts without my knowledge and came to me presenting it as a fait accompli. He hoped that I’d show my gratitude by…’ She swallowed the bile. ‘By becoming his live-in mistress.’ She shuddered lightly as she remembered how close he’d come to forcing himself on her.
Vicenzo still held Cara’s arm, and absurdly she felt somehow protected. It confused her in the midst of the shock at seeing him here and his obvious disbelief.
‘The thought didn’t appeal then?’
She shook her head mutely, trying to gauge what was going on in that dangerous mind of his. She glanced at the letter. ‘He’s threatening to revert the debt back into my name if I don’t change my mind.’
Vicenzo’s face was like stone. ‘He was obviously confident enough of your response, however, to pay in advance.’
Cara stung at his quick condemnation—a repetition of what he’d said to her on that morning two months ago. The truth was that Sebastian Mortimer was an arrogant sociopath who had an inflated notion of his own attractiveness. As Cormac’s confidant, he’d been aware of Cara’s vulnerable position and had counted on it, assuming she’d go along with his plans. When she hadn’t, he’d turned nasty in an instant.
‘Well,’ she bit out painfully, ‘he didn’t get the response he expected.’
Vicenzo frowned suddenly, and his hand tightened. ‘Did he hurt you?’
Cara sucked in a breath at the way he suddenly bristled. She couldn’t halt the awful memory of Mortimer coming closer and closer, the panic as she’d tried to placate him, her search for an escape route in the face of his huge overweight bulk coming ever nearer. And then he’d reached her, his mouth in a lascivious grin…
She willed the memory down and shook her head hurriedly. ‘No…He…the concierge came to the door. I was able to get rid of him before anyth
ing happened.’
Vicenzo looked at Cara carefully. She was avoiding his eye, but to his surprise in that moment he didn’t doubt that the terror he’d seen cross her face was real, as if she’d been reliving something. He quelled the protective surge that came from nowhere rational. But on the back of that came the heavy sinking weight of realisation—he believed her. And that was largely because he’d finally had to concede last night that he also believed she’d been a virgin. The signs he’d ignored that night couldn’t be denied.
And yet why hadn’t she taken what Mortimer had offered? He felt her quiver lightly under his hand and his natural cynicism asserted itself. He welcomed it almost with relief. She must have believed she’d hook a bigger fish—after all, what else had she been doing in the club that night? And he, like a prize fool, had been it…
Cara realised that her breath was coming swift and fast. Her body’s reaction to seeing Vicenzo again was disturbing. She finally pulled free of his grip and put some distance between them, standing near the kitchen area. Defusing the reaction in her body with all her strength, she said, ‘And before you accuse me of it, I had nothing to do with that media circus last night. Someone in the ballroom must have tipped them off.’
Vicenzo allowed his unpalatable thoughts to be diverted momentarily, and quirked an incredulous brow as he stepped forward. Cara took a hasty step back towards her tiny adjoining kitchen.
‘What? No little whispered words before you came in to drop your public bombshell?’ He shook his head. ‘Sorry, I don’t buy it for a second. You orchestrated the whole thing because you’ve now seen a way to claim the ultimate prize for yourself. After all, even if Allegra had married your brother, her inheritance is only a slice of what I own. You’re a smart girl. You would’ve figured that out the minute you knew who I was. You must have congratulated yourself on your gamble to keep your virginity for the highest bidder—or was it just that Mortimer disgusted you physically and your brother’s death necessitated the need to dispose of it quickly? Perhaps,’ he drawled, clearly not finished, ‘you were planning on going to back to Mortimer if you didn’t find a more attractive, wealthier protector?’
Everything in Cara seized at his insulting words. She felt so dizzy for a second she thought she might pass out. Anger and pain, pure and white-hot, surged upwards. ‘You absolute—’
‘Ah-ah.’ He stopped her, coming even closer.
His presence was huge and threatening, and yet Cara realised she didn’t feel physically threatened—not the way Mortimer had made her feel. This was a very different threat, and it had a lot to do with the way her body seemed to be full of tiny fiery magnets, all wanting to go in one direction: towards him. And it killed her.
He stopped a few feet away, his face hard and implacable, taut with the distaste he obviously felt to be here, facing her again, when he’d believed that he’d washed his hands of her. It made something very vulnerable within Cara ache.
‘The story of a Valentini heir is already all over the press here and in the Italian news. It’s going to be impossible to deny without creating an even bigger storm.’
‘And why would you want to deny it? It’s true.’ Her voice rang with bitterness—her own bitterness for having created exactly this situation. While on the one hand she wanted nothing more than to laugh it all off—tell him she wasn’t pregnant—she was. And she felt inordinately protective of this tiny being. She had to take responsibility for her actions, and to deny the truth of her pregnancy here in front of the father was anathema to her.
Vicenzo looked away for a second and ran an impatient hand through his short hair, leaving it dishevelled. When he looked back his eyes were utterly ruthless, utterly cold. ‘Do you have proof?’
Hurt sliced through her again, but she nodded warily. She’d kept her doctor’s note of when the baby was most likely due, the lists of what foods to avoid, what supplements to take, the date of her first hospital appointment. She went to her bag, which she’d dropped on the tiny chipped table, and dug out the piece of headed paper.
With her slim back to him for a moment, Vicenzo took in the flat properly for the first time. It was…shocking. Damp climbed one wall like an insidious mottled disease. The window looking out onto a dark alley was cracked, with a whistle of a breeze coming through. Mangy curtains. Her motive for coming after him was glaring, and the fact that he’d provided her with that motive stung bitterly.
Cara straightened and turned, coming back to him holding out a piece of paper. He willed down his reaction to the flat. Her pale face, with freckles standing out starkly, made her look vulnerable and impossibly young.
He took the piece of paper and his eyes flicked over the words. All apparent proof that she was indeed pregnant. It didn’t take him long to work out that the due date tied in all too perfectly with that night in London. The headed paper looked genuine, and the writing was in a typical doctor’s illegible scrawl, dated almost a week ago. He could seek out the doctor, get further proof, but a sinking feeling told him it wasn’t necessary. The very real possibility that he was facing impending fatherhood was making him slightly numb.
Cara crossed her arms and said tightly, ‘See? So, unless I ran straight to another man’s bed—which I didn’t…’ She took a quivering breath, the full import of this moment hitting her suddenly. ‘The baby is yours.’
Vicenzo looked at her sharply, as if he’d heard something in her voice, and Cara did feel a little strange suddenly—as if everything was coming from far away. She heard him say something unintelligable, and before she knew it she was sitting at the table, Vicenzo putting a glass of water in front of her.
‘Drink that.’ His voice was gruff, scraping across her exposed nerves. His every movement was a further indication of his distaste at being there. Hoping he wouldn’t notice the tremor in her hand, she took a sip and then put the glass down with a clatter. She forced herself to look up to where he was standing, far too close, literally towering over her. It was too much. She scooted out of her seat and quickly walked to where she could stand behind the mismatching armchair in the far corner, unaware of how hunted she looked.
Vicenzo stuck his hands deep in his pockets and said tersely, ‘You could have lied about dates to the doctor. How can I be sure that you carry my baby?’
As soon as he spoke his words had a curious effect on Vicenzo. A surge of something deeply primal struck him suddenly: his baby; his seed. An assertion of his own manhood. And even before Cara answered, as he saw the expressive look of outrage cross her face, he felt that same sinking feeling he’d felt just moments ago. It was becoming annoyingly familiar. As much as he wanted to reject it, in that instant he believed that she was carrying his child. To his chagrin he couldn’t articulate why he was so certain, and it irritated him intensely. He despised not being able to rely on concrete facts. But the instinct was overwhelming.
Cara shook with emotion, and restrained her urge to fly across the room and smack that supercilious look off his face. ‘I’m not even going to dignify that question with an answer. If it’s any consolation you can’t know how much I’m cursing my decision to go and confront you.’
She kept her eyes on his but awfully, betrayingly, could already feel that emotion and anger turning into something much more vulnerable under his steely glare.
‘I just…’ She hated the naked hesitancy in her voice. ‘I’m having a baby as a result of what happened—of what you did—’
He stepped forward, barely leashed anger reaching out like crackling electricity. ‘What I did? There was two of us in that bedroom that night. Do I have to remind you that you walked away? And then all but ran back—straight into my arms? There was no force or even cajoling on my part.’
He took another step, and Cara regretted putting herself in the corner of the room. Bitterly regretted that moment when she had gone back to him in the street. And hated being reminded of it—of how coolly he’d stood there, as if he’d known that she would turn around and come back. H
ow he must have been laughing inside.
Vicenzo tried desperately to reject his instincts, to apply logic to this situation. ‘Do I also need to remind you that I used protection? And let’s just say that I don’t recall any… malfunction.’
Cara coloured. How would she know? She certainly hadn’t had the depth of experience he’d had. She was suddenly reminded of that intensely exquisite moment, when she’d felt the gush of his release within her. She frowned even as her treacherous body melted inside, down low.
‘Look, are you sure? I mean, how can you be so sure…?’
Everything in Vicenzo reacted to her husky plea. And to the fact that he’d just felt the strongest need to have her admit that it was all a big joke. That she hadn’t been a virgin. That she hadn’t made love with such natural abandon that he’d believed—Ruthlessly he shut his mind down.
He was shamed to recall that at the zenith of his orgasm with Cara he’d experienced a minor blackout—the pleasure had been so intense. And then afterwards he’d not even checked to see if the protection had indeed been intact because he’d been so incensed. That hitherto unexposed chink in his armour was something he couldn’t fully articulate to himself.
And yet, now, holding the very evidence on a piece of paper in one hand, he had to finally admit that he had been less than careful that night. It nearly killed him, the possibility that he could have fathered a child. His determination not to have a family had been born of a vow made long ago. Even his father had known not to make that demand of Vicenzo after everything that had happened in their family. But then, he reminded himself grimly, his father had been depending on Allegra to fulfil that role…
Until now. And now this woman, Cara Brosnan… His belly tightened. She had something that he couldn’t fight. Vicenzo could think of countless women he’d been involved with who would be more welcome facing him right now. He could deal with their hard, brittle shells, their blatant avarice. Cara was different. She was more dangerous.
