Baby Out of the Blue

by Anne Mather

  A glance at the louring sky made her pick up her pace, scurrying to avoid the blur of rain already washing over the city. With luck her train would be on time and she’d get home at a reasonable hour. Two of her colleagues had returned to work today, so she didn’t have to stay back.

  Carys looked forward to the luxury of some quiet time with Leo then a long luxurious soak and a good night’s sleep.

  Resolutely she avoided the knowledge that she’d probably spend another sleepless night tossing and turning.

  She’d made it through the day in a state of numb shock, working like an automaton, except when the sight of a tall darkhaired man, or an unexpected call, froze the blood in her veins.

  She’d expected him to come after her. If not last night when she’d left him high and dry, then today.

  He knew where she worked. He knew far too much. Why had he left her alone?

  Foreboding crept through her. He was biding his time.

  It could only be Leo he wanted. Her precious boy. What else would drag Alessandro here from Italy?

  The realisation was like a knife at her neck. A man with Alessandro’s resources could get anything he wanted.

  If he wanted Leo…

  Carys had no illusions that he was here for anything else. For Alessandro, last night had simply been about the chance for hot sex.

  Absence from his wife must be wearing on him.

  Bile rose in Carys’ throat, a savage, scouring bitterness. Shame flooded her and she ducked her head.

  She hadn’t even remembered he was tied to another woman! The overwhelming reality of his presence had blasted Carys back to a time when she’d been his, body and soul. When she’d believed he was hers. Before he had married his blue-blooded heiress.

  Carys tasted salt on her tongue as she bit her lip.

  Distress filled her at how close she’d come to compounding her stupidity in an act that would shatter her principles.

  She hadn’t been able to meet her eyes in the mirror this morning, recalling her uninhibited response to him.

  Fury, disbelief and disappointment filled her. At him for using her as a convenience to assuage his physical needs. For not being the honourable man she’d once thought him. At herself for abandoning her pride and principles in letting him sweep her into his tempestuous embrace.

  Carys squared her shoulders. She’d played the fool for the last time. Besides, he’d relinquished all rights when he—

  A pair of massive mirror-polished black shoes blocked the pavement before her. Carys side-stepped to skirt the man, but with one long stride he moved too, forcing her to stop.

  Her gaze climbed a pair of bulky legs in pin-striped trousers so beautifully tailored they almost tamed the rampantly muscled solidity of the man. Neat shirt, dark tie, perfectly fitting jacket and a swarthy face topped by pepper and salt hair. Gold winked in the man’s earlobe as he turned his head and Carys stared, sure she’d seen him before.

  ‘Scusa, signorina. This way, please.’

  He extended one arm, gesturing towards the kerb.

  Carys turned to see a limousine with tinted windows drawn up beside her, its back door open.

  Her pulse sped up to thunder in her ears. A sprawl of long masculine limbs filled her vision of the interior and her heart rate spiked. The last thing she wanted was to share such an intimate space with Alessandro Mattani.

  ‘You’ve got to be kidding,’ she muttered, automatically stepping back from the road.

  The large Italian moved closer, shepherding her towards the vehicle. Resolutely she planted her feet on the pavement, refusing to budge.

  She looked around, hoping to find the street filled with people, but the few she saw were racing for cover as big fat drops of rain spattered the pavement. There was no one to interfere if Alessandro’s goon tried to manhandle her into the car.

  ‘Why don’t you get in before you both get soaked?’ asked a cool voice from the back of the limo.

  Outraged dignity came to her rescue. ‘And if I’d prefer to get drenched than share a car with you?’

  ‘I’d say it was very selfish of you to force Bruno to suffer the same fate just for the sake of your pride.’

  Her eyes rounded. Pride? Alessandro thought this was simply about pride?

  The man beside her moved, closing in beside her, and Carys darted a glance at him, wondering if she had any hope of getting away. He was built like a rugby player, all dense-packed muscle. Right now he had that grim, blank-eyed set to his face that she’d seen on the super-tough minders of the rich and famous.

  ‘Per favore, signorina.’

  Drops splattered his jacket as the rain fell faster. He didn’t bat an eyelid, just watched her with the stony countenance of a man ready to deal with anything.

  She’d bet five feet six of female, hampered by heels and a skirt, would be the work of a moment to overpower.

  ‘Don’t let his looks fool you, Carys,’ came a laconic voice from the limo’s interior. ‘Bruno has a weak chest. He’s just got over a bout of bronchitis. I wouldn’t like him to have a relapse. And you wouldn’t want that on your conscience.’

  Carys blinked, catching the merest flicker of expression on the security man’s face. A smile? Surely not.

  Movement to one side caught her eye, and she turned to find Alessandro had slid to the edge of the seat and was regarding her with a peculiarly unreadable expression.

  ‘His wife would flay me alive if I brought him home with pneumonia.’

  Despite her anger, Carys felt her lips twitch. Once, long ago, Alessandro’s dry wit had been one of the things that had drawn her to him. She’d almost forgotten that, her memories skewed by those final, unhappy days when banter and teasing had been absent between them.

  ‘I would have thought blackmail was more your style,’ she jeered. ‘Or threats, rather than an appeal to my conscience.’

  Rain trickled into her collar, but she stood ramrod straight. This man was dangerous.

  A shrug of those lean shoulders and he said something in Italian that made Bruno move away to give them space. Carys barely had time to register the chance for escape when Alessandro’s voice curled around her, silkily smooth. ‘I regret last night, Carys. It wasn’t planned.’

  He paused, awaiting a response that she steadfastly refused to give. If that was his idea of an apology he had a lot to learn.

  Alessandro’s eyes narrowed as she stood rigid under his scrutiny. Something glittered in that forest-dark gaze that sent shivers of trepidation running through her. Despite his earlier light-hearted words, his stare sizzled. She guessed his deadpan expression disguised an anger almost as great as her own. Now she looked more closely, she read tension in his shoulders and grim mouth.

  Too bad. She tilted her chin up, wishing she had a long aristocratic nose like his so she could look down it.

  ‘But if that’s the way you’d prefer to do this,’ he purred, ‘then I can oblige.’

  She’d opened her mouth to say she preferred to have nothing to do with him, when his next words forestalled her.

  ‘I’m sure the hotel management would be interested in the security camera footage of the lobby outside the presidential suite last night, and in the lift. If they cared to check the recording they’d find it…illuminating.’

  ‘You wouldn’t!’ Shock hammered her like a physical blow, sucking out her breath. That tape would show her emerging from his suite in the early hours looking like…like…

  ‘Wouldn’t I?’ His stare was unnervingly blank. ‘I’m sure they frown on staff providing personal services to guests.’ His tongue dripped with hateful innuendo and Carys burned with frustration and fury. Her hands clenched around the shoulder strap of her bag.

  ‘I wasn’t providing a service, you—’

  ‘It doesn’t matter what you were doing, Carys. All that matters is how the evidence appears.’ He leaned back with a smug glimmer in his eyes.

  Evidence. It sounded so formal.

  It would b
e formal if anyone decided to check the recording. Formal enough to get her the sack.

  Her heart dived and she shivered, but not from the rain’s chill. She needed this job. How else could she support Leo? Good positions were hard to find for someone with limited qualifications.

  Would Alessandro make good on his threat?

  Once she’d thought she’d known this man. Had trusted him. Had even believed he was falling in love with her.

  What a naïve innocent she’d been.

  She’d learned the hard way not to trust her judgement with him. Better to assume him capable of anything to get his own way. He’d already made a fool of her once.

  He was her enemy, threatening the life she’d begun to build, her independence, even, she feared, her child.

  ‘What do you want?’ She didn’t care that her voice was scratchy with distress, despite her attempt to appear calm.

  ‘To talk. We have unfinished business.’

  He didn’t wait for her to assent but slid back across the wide leather seat, making space for her.

  Unfinished business.

  That was how he described one little boy?

  Her throat closed convulsively as the fight bled out of her. She couldn’t ignore Alessandro. She had to face him and hope against hope she could retain some control of the situation.

  She tottered forward on numb legs and entered the limousine, her wet coat sliding along a leather seat that looked and smelled fresh from the factory.

  Only the best for the Conte Mattani.

  Under no circumstances would she, an ordinary single mum with not an ounce of glamour, be classed as the best. Alessandro had made that abundantly clear in Italy.

  Her heart bumped against her ribs. Had Alessandro decided her little boy was a different matter?

  The limo door shut with a quiet click and she sagged back, shutting her eyes. She was cold to the bone.

  There was no escape now.

  Moments later the front door closed and the vehicle accelerated. Belatedly she remembered to do up her seatbelt. A swift sideways glance told her Alessandro wasn’t happy, despite having got her where he wanted her.

  The proud, spare lines of his face seemed austere and forbidding silhouetted against the city streets. He looked as approachable as some ancient king, brooding over judgement.

  The flicker of unease inside her magnified into a hundred fluttering wings. She was at a disadvantage to him in so many ways.

  His silence reinforced that she was here at his pleasure.

  Carys flicked her gaze away, not deigning to ask where they were going. Two could play the silent game. It would give her time to marshal her resources.

  As she stared straight ahead, trying to control her frantic, jumbled thoughts, she found herself looking through a smoky glass privacy-screen at the back of Bruno’s head.

  Recognition smote her.

  ‘He was on my street. Last night!’ Carys leaned forward to make sure. There was no mistaking the bunched-muscle silhouette of the minder’s neck and shoulders, or the shape of his head.

  As she’d walked up the ill-lit street to her block of flats in the early hours, she’d faltered, her heart skipping as she noticed a brawny man in jeans and a leather jacket just ahead. He looked to be waiting for someone. But as she’d hesitated he’d turned to stroll away in the opposite direction.

  Nevertheless, she’d scurried inside as fast as possible. Her street was peaceful by day, but the shopping strip a few blocks away had been attracting unsavoury characters at night.

  ‘Bruno, your bodyguard. He was outside my home.’

  She swung round to find Alessandro watching her steadily. His lack of response infuriated her.

  ‘You’re not even bothering to deny it!’

  ‘Why would I?’ His brow furrowed in a hint of a frown that, annoyingly, didn’t detract from his handsome looks.

  ‘You had him follow me?’ Already Alessandro had pried into her personnel records. Now his stooge had been scoping out her home. He had no qualms about invading her privacy.

  ‘Of course.’ He stared coolly as if wondering what the fuss was about. ‘It was late. I had to make sure you got back all right.’

  His explanation took the wind out of her sails and she slumped in her seat, her mind whirling.

  ‘You were trying to protect me?’

  Something indefinable flickered in his eyes. ‘You were out alone at an hour when you should have been safely home.’

  At least he didn’t mention her state of disarray. Even in a pair of shoes borrowed from the staffroom, and with her shirt buttoned again, she’d felt as if the few people she’d met on her journey took one look and knew exactly what she’d been up to in the presidential suite.

  Alessandro made her sound like a teenager in need of parental guidance. Not a twenty-five-year-old woman supporting herself and her son.

  Yet it wasn’t indignation Carys felt rise like a tide inside her. It was warmth, a furtive spark of pleasure, that he’d cared enough to worry about her safety.

  In the old days she’d been thrilled by the way he’d looked after her, showing what she’d thought was a strongly protective nature.

  Until she’d discovered her mistake. What she’d seen as caring had been his way of keeping her isolated, separate from the rest of his life. It had been a deliberate tactic to ensure she didn’t know how he used her.

  The lush melting warmth inside her dissipated as a chill blast of reality struck right to the bone.

  ‘I’m perfectly capable of looking after myself! I was doing it long before you turned up.’ Carys wrapped her arms around the faux-leather bag on her lap and turned away.

  She was proud of what she’d achieved. When she’d arrived in Australia she’d been a mess, her heart in tatters, her confidence shattered. Even her destination of Melbourne was unplanned. She’d been too distraught to do more than turn up at the airport and board the first available flight home.

  Now she’d built a new life for herself and Leo. She was working hard to achieve the financial security they needed.

  ‘Is that so?’ Scepticism dripped from each syllable as he held her with a glacial green stare. ‘You really think that the best neighbourhood to bring up a child?’

  Her fingers, busy fiddling with the zipper on her bag, froze. Every muscle tensed.

  Now they’d come to the crux of the matter.

  She waited for him to accuse her of being a bad mother, to demand his rights and push his case. Yet he remained silent, only his lowered brows hinting at displeasure.

  ‘The flat is sunny and comfortable. And affordable.’ It went against the grain to hint at her lack of funds, but no doubt he knew about her precarious finances.

  Despite working right up till she went into labour, Carys had used all her meagre savings in the months after Leo’s birth. If it hadn’t been for the money her father had sent long-distance, she wouldn’t have been able to support them. When the going had got really tough, she’d even thought of moving to be with her dad. Till she imagined his horror at the idea.

  Only now, with her job at the Landford, could she make ends meet, though most of her wages went on childcare and rent and there was precious little for other necessities.

  ‘And the location? Your neighbourhood is becoming a hub for drug dealing and prostitution.’

  He didn’t bother to hide his disapproval. If she hadn’t been wearing a thick coat, his coruscating glare would have scraped off layers of skin.

  ‘The reports are exaggerated,’ she bluffed, refusing to admit he’d tapped into her own fear. That the cosy nest she’d created for her son grew less desirable by the week.

  Only days ago there’d been more syringes found in the park and another bashing in the street. Carys had decided that, despite the friends she’d made locally, she’d look for somewhere else to bring up Leo.

  ‘If you say so.’ His tone implied boredom.

  Carys was puzzled. This was his opportunity to weigh in with c
omments about her inability to care for Leo. To make a case that she shouldn’t have sole custody.

  Yet Alessandro seemed totally uninterested. Had she got it wrong? Hope rose shakily in her breast.

  But if he wasn’t here for her little boy, what did he want from her?

  Alessandro tamped down the fury he’d felt ever since receiving this morning’s report. Fury that Carys should live in such a neighbourhood. That she’d hooked up with a man who obviously refused to take care of her and her child.

  That he, Alessandro, had let her get under his skin enough to be concerned for her!

  He cursed himself for a fool. She’d walked out on him, moved on from whatever relationship they’d had. He should do the same. Dignity and pride demanded it.

  He would, he vowed, once he knew all he needed to about those blank months.

  Yet that sense of intimate connection still hammered at him. It was stronger even than the cool logic around which he built his life.

  Despite her antipathy and her child by another man, Alessandro couldn’t banish the possessiveness that swamped him when he was with her. It consumed him.

  Never had he experienced such feelings.

  His fists tightened as his temples throbbed. Flickers of images taunted him. Whether remnants of last night’s erotic dreams or snippets of memory, he didn’t know.

  He wanted to hate her for the unaccustomed weakness she wrought in him. Yet the bruised violet smudges under her eyes snagged his attention. It had taken more than one sleepless night to put them there.

  His belly clenched as he took in her pallor and the way her worn coat dwarfed her. Last night he’d seen she was tired, but he’d been too overwhelmed by his own cataclysmic response to register what looked now like utter exhaustion.

  He’d been impatient to solve the riddle that had haunted him so long. Too busy losing himself in her lush curves and feminine promise to admit the extent of her vulnerability.

  That vulnerability clawed at his conscience. He should never have unleashed the beast of sexual hunger that roared into life when she was near.