by Dani Collins
‘Well, one of us has to be.’ The twinkle in her eyes warmed his heart, dried the last of her tears.
‘È vero.’ He smiled back, brushing her hair away from her face. He wasn’t going to argue with her. ‘And I promise to be the best man I can possibly be.’
‘You already are that man, my love.’
‘And the best father.’
‘I have no doubt of that.’
‘I love you, Emma Ravenino.’
‘And I love you too, Leonardo. More than I can say.’
* * *
‘Emma?’
‘Mmm...?’
‘Stop staring at me.’
Emma shifted the position of her elbow. She had been gazing at Leo ever since he’d closed his eyes, studying the beautiful face she loved so much while she had the chance. Thick dark lashes fringed his closed lids. Two fine grooves between his brows indicated his tendency to scowl with scrutiny or impatience. Straight nose, perfectly drawn mouth, jawline covered in a dark shadow of stubble. She could still feel the burn of that stubble against her face. Against her breasts, against her inner thighs...
‘You are still doing it.’ His eyes flickered beneath lids that were still firmly closed.
‘So what if I am?’ Emma teased. ‘You can’t stop me.’
‘Hmm... Is that a challenge?’ The eyelids slowly opened. ‘Because you know I can’t resist one of those.’
‘So what are you going to do about it?’
‘Let me think.’ The lids half closed again. ‘Ah, yes, this...’
With a rush of movement she was in his arms, her breasts crushed against his naked chest, her lips crushed beneath his.
When the need for air eventually forced them apart, Emma gazed at him again with laughing eyes. ‘Okay, you won that, but only because you played dirty.’
‘Not half as dirty as I’d like to be.’ Leo’s leg slid between her thighs, his head moving to nuzzle her neck and shoulder, pushing aside her hair until his lips found bare skin.
‘Stop that, you.’ Reluctantly Emma shoved him away. ‘We really should get up, you know.’
‘I don’t see why. We can do whatever we want.’ Leo moved a strand of hair away from her face. ‘And right now I want to be in bed with my wife.’
‘But we have been here for hours. People will be wondering where we are.’
‘Who cares?’
‘Cordelia maybe?’ Emma swept her fringe out of her eyes.
‘Cordelia is too preoccupied with Taddeo to be worrying about anything else.’
‘I’ve met her, you know. Cordelia,’ Emma admitted softly.
‘You have? When?’
‘After I left you in the library. I started to feel a bit faint and she helped me into the salon.’
‘Cristo, Emma. Why didn’t you say? Why didn’t she come and tell me?’
‘Because I asked her not to. Begged her, in fact. I couldn’t face seeing you again. Not after...’
‘I’m so sorry, Emma.’ Leo cupped her face in his hands. ‘So sorry for all the hurt and pain I have caused you. For saying that hateful thing about your mother and her boyfriend...it was unforgivable.’
‘It doesn’t matter.’
‘Yes, it does.’ He dropped his hands, raking them through his hair, his anguish clear. ‘It matters that you were brave enough to open up to me about something so painful in your life and I threw it back in your face in a moment of selfish anger. It was despicable of me.’
‘Then I forgive you.’ Emma gazed at the storm in his eyes, instinctively wanting to take the suffering away.
‘I will support you in any way I can—you do know that? Do anything within my power to make amends. I’ll even try and get on with your mother, if that’s what you want.’ His lips twisted with a wry smile. ‘We could stick her on a desert island. Buy her a commune, whatever you think best.’
‘Hmm, I don’t think that would work. I’m not sure you have fully grasped the principles she lives by.’
‘Nor will I, until she loves you the way you deserve to be loved.’
Emma’s throat tightened. She reached for Leo’s hand, linking her fingers in his to bring it down on the covers between them. ‘Let’s just take it a day at a time and see what happens. Miracles don’t happen overnight.’
‘Some do.’ Leo moved their hands to her stomach, his eyes shining with love.
‘Yes.’ Emma gazed back at him. ‘They do, don’t they?’
Pushing himself up against the pillows, Leo folded his arms across his chest. Bronzed skin, sculpted muscles, hard, dark nipples. So beautiful. ‘If you let me, I would like to try and give you some sort of explanation for my behaviour.’
‘No...really...it’s not necessary.’
‘Please, Emma, let me say this.’
‘Okay.’ She snuggled beside him. ‘If that’s what you want.’ But her teasing tone was met with a firming of the jaw, a swallow of the throat she could hear as well as see.
‘This is not an excuse, nowhere near, but the reason I was so intent on pushing you away was because I was convinced I could never be the man you wanted me to be. That I could never give you the happy ever after you deserved.’ The seriousness in his eyes broke her heart. ‘I thought I had to protect you.’
‘From what? I don’t understand.’
‘From me. From the man I was sure I was. Deep down. I thought that if I were to let you love me, if I allowed you into my heart you would see it for what it was.’
‘Which is?’
‘Something small and shrivelled and black.’ His mouth twisted with distaste.
‘No! Why ever would you think such a thing?’ Shock shadowed Emma’s gaze as she reached for his hand again, clasping it to her breast.
‘Because that’s what it felt like. I was so consumed with bitterness and hatred over losing Ravenino I was convinced it had become all I was. I took my mother’s betrayal and used it as a weapon, a protector, resolving to never let a woman close to me again. Then you came along and everything I thought I knew was thrown into doubt. You shook the very foundations of my ordered life.’ He gave a soft laugh.
‘And to make matters worse, I found out you had issues with your own mother. But instead of railing against her, you were still trying to build a relationship with her. I couldn’t understand why you would do that, why you would carry on letting her hurt you. Now I know it’s because you are a much better person than me.’
‘Not better, Leo, just different.’ Emma clutched his hand tightly to ward off tears, testing a watery smile. ‘Okay, maybe better.’
But Leo’s return smile only drew his features tighter. ‘You unwittingly showed how I had let my own mother’s mistake dominate my life. But I was still too stubborn to acknowledge that I was wrong, and you were right. That forgiveness is so much better than bitterness. That the dead weight I was carrying around inside me was of my own making.
‘So what did I do? I fought against you as hard as I could, distanced myself, tried to convince myself you meant nothing to me. For your sake as well as mine. But it was useless. No matter what I did, you were still there in my head, smashing through my defences, driving me crazy.’
‘Oh, Leo.’ Emma kissed the hand she held in hers, then moved her lips to his face, laying the softest of kisses against his mouth. But Leo edged away, determined to meet her eyes.
‘When you turned up today, out of the blue, I went into a kind of shock. And that was before you told me you loved me. It was like I couldn’t process the enormity of my feelings for you.
‘So I walked the streets in search of vindication, fully expecting the sense of loss to kick in, for the hostility and resentment I had nurtured for so long to take over. To validate the way I had treated you. But nothing happened. All I could think of was how I had hurt you. So I had to try harder.
�
��I went to the graveyard, sure that the graves of my mother and Alberto would trigger the old bitterness and anger. But still there was nothing. That’s when I realised the ache in my gut had nothing to do with Ravenino any more, and everything to do with you. I was about to go chasing after you when you found me. I can’t tell you how it felt to see you standing there. To know you hadn’t given up on me.’
‘We have Cordelia to thank for that. She told me I had won your heart. I didn’t believe her, but it at least gave me the courage to stay and ask you one last time.’
‘Then I owe her a great debt.’
‘We both do.’
‘But nothing compared to the debt I owe to you, cara. For being strong enough to smash through the walls of my stubbornness and fear and allow me to finally see the truth.’
Emma took a breath, ready to make a confession of her own. ‘You know I always thought you were still in love with Cordelia?’
‘Whatever made you think that?’ Leo’s brow furrowed in surprise.
‘I decided you could never love me because your heart still belonged to her.’
‘Tesoro mio.’ Leo touched her cheek with his free hand. ‘I agreed to marry Cordelia out of duty, then made the mistake of thinking I should honour the agreement, even when I lost the principality. My pride was hurt, I’ll admit, but I never loved her.’
For a moment they just stared into one another’s eyes, the spilling of confessions laying them bare.
‘You know I would never have accepted that description of your heart, even if you couldn’t love me.’ Emma’s solemn words broke the silence. ‘I have seen your kindness and generosity time and again, even when you have tried to hide them from me. The way you have helped Beatrice and her family. The respect you show your staff, the employees of your companies. The charities you support.’
‘Supporting people financially is easy.’ The backs of his fingers smoothed over her chin, down her neck. ‘My mistake was thinking I could do that with you. That that would be enough. And when I found it wasn’t, that I wanted all of you, not just your company, your body, your lovely face across the table from me at breakfast, but your heart and your soul as well—then I knew I was in deep trouble.’
‘Darling Leo.’ Emma gazed at him. ‘You have all of those things. Plus my undying love. Now and for ever.’
‘Then I have so much more than I deserve.’
‘I love you, Leo, so very much.’
‘And I love you. So much more.’
Enveloping her in his arms, Leo lowered his head, finding her lips to deliver the sweetest, most tender kiss in the world.
EPILOGUE
‘DO YOU THINK we should go and rescue them from our son?’ Behind him, Leo could hear Emma moving around the room, collecting up their belongings.
He looked out of the bedroom window to where the small group had settled themselves under the shade of an ancient oak tree. A rug had been laid out, the remains of an impromptu picnic scattered around them, and baby Carlo was being tossed in the air by his doting uncle. Even though Leo couldn’t hear it, he knew his son would be chuckling uncontrollably. Leo loved that chuckle. It was the most joyous sound in the world.
Joining him, Emma rested her chin on his shoulder, sliding her arms around his waist.
‘No, let’s leave them to it.’ Leo squeezed her hands. ‘They look like they are having fun. Besides, it’s good practice for Taddeo.’
‘No! What...? You mean...?’
‘Sì, cara, it’s true.’ He turned to smile at his wife. ‘Taddeo told me this morning. Cordelia is pregnant.’
‘How wonderful!’ Emma’s face lit up. ‘A little cousin for Carlo! I’m so pleased!’
They both watched as Carlo was passed to Cordelia, who confidently straightened his little sun hat, redid the ties, then kissed him on the nose.
‘So we could have the next Conte di Ravenino in the making?’ She posed the question lightly, but Leo could sense the tinge of anxiety.
‘We could indeed. And there’s no need to look like that, amore mio. I have fully accepted that Taddeo is the rightful Conte, and his son will carry on the line.’
‘No regrets?’ Her gaze searched his face.
‘None whatever. How could I when I have you and Carlo? You are so much more precious than any piece of land or title.’
Emma smiled, touching her finger to his lips. They had been living at the Castello on and off for almost nine months now. Carlo had been born here. But they both knew their stay was only temporary. And despite Leo’s reassurances, a little bit of Emma still worried that he would find it hard to leave.
‘Do you think Taddeo will cope on his own? Without you to support him?’
Leo shrugged. ‘I’ll still be available if he needs me, but it’s time he stood on his own two feet. And you know what, I think he’ll be fine. The accident was the best thing that could have happened to him.’
‘Leo!’
‘I mean it. It seems to have finally knocked some sense into him.’
‘I’m not sure he’d see it like that. But he told me himself that he feels much more confident now. Ready to rule.’
‘About time. But if he dares to use that phrase on social media, I will kill him.’
‘Don’t be such a grouch.’ Emma laughed. ‘He’s very grateful, you know, for everything you’ve done while he’s been recovering.’
‘I know. But it’s time to hand over the reins now. We have our own lives to get on with. And to be honest, I can’t wait.’
‘Me too.’ Emma gazed up at his handsome face. Grey eyes stared back at her, clear and bright. Shining, not with doubt or regret but with love. It was time to stop worrying.
‘Speaking of which, what time are we flying back to Milan?’ She crossed back into the room, where an array of Carlo’s adorable baby clothes were spread on the bed. ‘I need to get on with this packing.’
‘Staff are employed for that job.’ Leo walked behind her. ‘I need my wife for far more important activities.’
‘Such as?’
‘Well, if Carlo is being entertained elsewhere it seems a shame to waste the opportunity.’
‘Leonardo Ravenino, you are incorrigible.’ Her stern voice didn’t fool either of them. ‘I’m sure you must have matters of state to discuss with Taddeo before we leave.’
‘The state can wait.’
‘Another quote for social media?’
‘Ha!’ Laughing, Leo smothered her in his arms, pressing the length of his body against hers. So tall and strong, taut muscles beneath warm flesh. Closing her eyes, Emma moulded herself against him.
‘Oh, I nearly forgot.’ Leo loosened his hold. ‘I saw something in the press this morning that will interest you.’ He moved into the bedroom, searching around. ‘Where did I put it? Ah, here it is.’
He held up a newspaper in his hands and the two of them exchanged a glance. It was a copy of the Paladin.
‘Not another reporter getting into terrible trouble by submitting the wrong article?’ Emma came to stand beside him.
‘No, not this time. Although that didn’t turn out so badly in the end, did it?’ Leo turned to face her, love shining in his eyes.
Sitting them on the edge of the bed, he turned over the pages until he found what he was looking for, a report on a recent G7 conference on homelessness. ‘Here, listen to this: “World leaders agreed that much more needed to be done, both nationally and internationally. The charitable foundation Read All About It was cited as an excellent example of an innovative approach to raising both awareness and funding.”’
‘Ooh, that’s great publicity for us.’ Emma took the newspaper from his hands to read it for herself. ‘I’ll make sure the team know about this.’
‘Never mind the publicity.’ Leo stopped the hand that was reaching for her phone. ‘How about taking a minute to give yo
urself some praise? What you have achieved is incredible. I am so proud of you.’
‘Thank you.’ Emma reached to touch his lips with her own. ‘I’m proud of myself too. Though technically it was your idea.’
‘But you made it happen.’
‘Yes, I did, didn’t I?’ She rested her head on his shoulder.
‘And you don’t regret not working for the Paladin any more?’
‘No, of course not!’ Emma sat upright, turning to take Leo’s face in her hands. The face she loved so much. The newspaper slid to the floor. ‘How could I possibly regret anything now that I have you and Carlo? My life has never been more perfect. It never could be.’
It was true. Finally Emma felt like she belonged. Not the lost child trying to fit in with her chaotic family in the wilds of the countryside. Not in London, struggling to make ends meet, or trying to prove herself at the offices of the Paladin. But with Leo, as a wife and a mother. And not only that but she had a career she loved too and the full support of a husband to make it happen. No longer Emma Quinn but Emma Ravenino, she finally knew who she was.
‘I’m so glad.’ Leo removed her hands, kissing her knuckles. ‘I would hate to think I might have to start trying to make it up to you again. You know where that leads.’
‘Mmm...yes, I do.’ Emma felt herself being lifted up onto the bed, gently laid back across the pillows. ‘It’s a penance I have to bear.’
‘And can I say you do it with great fortitude.’ Leo lay down beside her, putting his arms around her again, drawing her to him, lightly kissing her forehead, her cheeks, her lips.
‘Thank you. I do my best.’
‘Ti amo, mia bella Emma.’
‘And I love you too, Leo. Always and for ever.’
Emma had just enough time to say the words before Leo’s mouth was on hers again. For a moment they both caught the light in each other’s eyes before the power of the kiss took over, and their lids closed in surrendered bliss.
* * * * *
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