‘Look, can we at least go and sit down?’
He could see her struggling with the question, and for a few seconds he wondered what he would do if she refused—if this brand-new life she had apparently found had been a stepping stone for her to move out of his orbit. He cursed himself for not having been more relentless in his pursuit. As it stood, he had let her go, and in so doing had given her a window of opportunity to find herself a replacement.
‘I don’t see the point,’ Megan told him.
‘Why?’ Natural aggression flowed into Alessandro’s veins and he shoved his hands in his pockets. He could feel his resolve to take things easy disappearing fast, like smoke in a high wind.
‘Why would I sit down with you when I want you to leave?’
‘I should never have let you walk away!’
‘You didn’t let me walk away, Alessandro!’ Megan cried. ‘I walked away because I wanted to!’
‘Don’t say that!’
‘It’s the truth.’
‘No! The truth is that I…I would have finished with Victoria even if I hadn’t found out that there was a third party involved. Or should I say a third party who was trying to get involved. I would have finished with her because you were in my head and I wanted to be with you. So you see, Megan, the fact is that my choice would have been for you, but for a mistake in timing.’
‘I don’t believe you.’ Too many disappointments had taken their toll, and Megan looked at him bitterly.
‘Then what do you believe?’
She drew in one deep, unsteady breath, and her eyes didn’t waver as she looked at him, drawing deep from her reserves of courage because even now, after everything, looking at him still made her feel sick and giddy with love. He had said that he had flung himself into having fun, but that he hadn’t found the fun he’d thought he would. She believed him. He didn’t look like a man who had been out having a good time. In fact, he looked wrecked.
‘I think that you do still want me, Alessandro. But I’m not going to bother going down the road of trying to figure out whether what you want is a relationship or not. It doesn’t matter. You want me because you know that sooner or later you’ll get tired of me, and when that happens you’ll be free to move on.’
‘And what would you say if I told you that I don’t want to move on?’
Megan looked at his face, unusually hesitant, and then nodded towards the sitting room.
‘Ten minutes.’
Alessandro hadn’t realised how tense he had been until he exhaled a deep breath of relief and preceded her into the sitting room, removing his coat en route and resting it on a side table.
‘Where’s Charlotte?’ he asked.
‘Out.’
‘Is she going away somewhere?’
‘Why do you ask?’ He had made himself at home on one of the sofas, but Megan still found it hard to relax, and had remained by the door, her arms folded, her defences ready to slam into place at the slightest hint of trouble.
‘I noticed a suitcase by the door.’
‘That’s my case. I’m going away for the half-term week.’
‘Your case…’
His mind played with the notion that she might not be going away on her own. Until now he had had an arrogant faith in her dependability on him. Even when they had met again, had resumed their relationship, he had still known that however much she might have hankered for something more she had not been looking around. Now he wasn’t too sure. But he shut the door on that meandering, unpleasant thought.
‘Whatever you believed about my motivations,’ Alessandro said in a raw undertone, ‘you were wrong. I’ve tried to put you out of my mind but I can’t, and I want more of you than just an occasional relationship. I know that you’re still hankering for a country life, and I have realised that what you want has a pretty high priority in my life. So let’s do it, Megan….’
Megan held her breath while frantic hope beat inside her like a drum.
‘Let’s move in together. A house in the country. Wherever you want.’ He hadn’t felt dizzy like this when he had contemplated marrying Victoria. For some reason he felt like a man taking a plunge into waters unknown. ‘But let’s do it soon.’
CHAPTER NINE
ALESSANDRO looked at Megan over the Financial Times. She was sitting cross-legged on the sofa, absorbed in a cookery programme. A celebrity chef was giving her tips on how to cook a dish which he knew she would never attempt.
Their move to the country hadn’t been quite as dramatic as he had anticipated. She had wanted to still be able to travel to her work, and so they had moved to one of the leafier suburbs of central London, from which she could reach her school on the tube every day. The street was lined with trees, and he had got his people to hunt down the closest he could get to her dream house. It was Grade II listed, with the requisite white fence with roses, and original stained-glass features inside.
Two months ago he had seen this as a highly suitable arrangement. He would have her living with him and his work life would remain largely uninterrupted. His house in central London was empty, and although he had briefly contemplated selling it, he had quickly discarded the idea. It wasn’t as though he needed the money.
Now, two months on, he discovered that his work life wasn’t what it used to be. He enjoyed being with her, and didn’t care to think of her sitting on her own in the house, so he had found himself voluntarily ending his day at a reasonable time so that he could return home. He had even taken to delegating his overseas trips to one of his trusted company directors.
She had asked for none of that. In fact, he thought, looking at her rapt expression as she watched the television, she had demanded nothing from him. He should have been pleased with that, but increasingly he was finding that he wasn’t.
He also didn’t like the fact that she kept in touch with the loser he had seen her kissing on her doorstep the night he had asked her to move in with him.
It seemed that he was one of Charlotte’s friends, and occasionally a crowd of them went out after work for drinks. She made no effort to conceal the fact, and he believed her when she assured him, after some very light questioning, that the man was a nice person and a friend, and they’d both accepted that they were not suited for a relationship.
Alessandro still didn’t like it. He wanted her exclusively to himself—by which he meant that he didn’t want her to look at another man, talk to another man, far less be buddies with another man. Whom she had kissed. It suggested to him that she wasn’t giving herself entirely to him and he couldn’t help wondering if there was a part of her still on the look-out. Had he hurt her so much that he had killed something between them? She was never anything but happy in his company, but niggling doubts were tearing him apart.
He flung the newspaper on the ground. ‘You’re never going to make that dish, Megan,’ he said, shutting the door on the disturbing drift of his thoughts.
‘I know, but I live in hope that I might be inspired.’ Megan turned to him and grinned. ‘It’s crazy to have your chef prepare stuff all the time when I’m perfectly capable of cooking. Well, at least of using a recipe book. Now and again.’ She went across to him on the sofa, which was a long, very deep, squashy one, quite unlike the cold leather furniture in his Chelsea house.
He was wearing low-slung casual trousers, the ones that had a delicious habit of slipping down his hips, revealing the tightly packed muscles of his torso. Familiarity with his body had done nothing to diminish her craving for him, and she ran her hands over his chest, curling against his body and sighing with pleasure when he pushed his hand under her tee shirt and absentmindedly began caressing her breast. Her nipple predictably tightened into a tight, responsive bud, and she feverishly yanked off the tee shirt, laying herself open to his hungry, dark eyes.
If nothing else, the one thing she knew for sure was that he was greedy for her. Their lovemaking was intense and deeply, deeply satisfying. Right now she wanted him to suckle her nipple,
to slip his hand under her panties to where she was hot and wet for him, to send that wonderful fire racing through her veins until she felt giddy and wonderfully out of control.
So much was so good, and this most of all. Two months of pure happiness—although in her quiet moments Megan wondered. He had committed so much, but not once had he even hinted that his commitment might go further. Something held him back. He had never, even in moments of great passion, when every barrier he possessed came tumbling down as his orgasm shuddered through his big body, uttered those three words, I love you. Sometimes she figured that there was enough love in her for both of them—although she never let on what she felt, and nor did she ever ask anything of him, mindful of that trait of emotional self-sufficiency which he had found so appealing in Victoria.
Other times, however, there was a dark, destructive voice that reminded her that they might be living together but he still hadn’t got rid of his house in Chelsea. She hadn’t asked him why that was, and she occasionally wondered whether it was because the bigger part of him, the part that wasn’t all wrapped up in touching her, was conscious of the fact that they probably wouldn’t remain together. Why ditch his house when he thought he would move back into it sooner or later?
In accepting his offer to move in with him Megan had resigned herself to a life always lived for the moment. With that in mind, she made sure to carry on with her social life, ignoring his frowning disapproval whenever she announced that she would be getting back late. She had also found a firm friend in Stuart, who had slipped into the spot Robbie had held, as a male confidant in whom she had absolute trust. She made sure that she hung on to him—also in the face of Alessandro’s frowning disapproval.
In that uncertain place she occupied she would give up a lot, but not everything.
‘That feels good.’ She sighed, and parted her legs, inviting him to do what he wanted.
Instead, she felt his hand smooth her thigh and resolutely tuck her legs neatly together—which made her sit bolt-upright, because Alessandro, unpredictable in so many ways, was always completely predictable when it came to sex.
‘What’s the matter?’ She drew her legs up and wrapped her arms around them.
‘Bad news, I’m afraid. I have to go away on business for a couple of days.’
The surge of bitter disappointment reminded Megan of just how much she had invested in what they had. She had begun to take for granted his daily presence in her life, never once questioning how it was that a workaholic had suddenly become so domesticated. But things would change, and she wondered whether this was the start of it.
‘Don’t be silly.’ She forced a smile. ‘Why is that bad news? I do understand that you have an empire to run, you know. As a matter of fact…’ she thought quickly, making sure to wriggle out of the box labelled clingy, which was anathema to Alessandro ‘…it’s been ages since I met up with all my friends…’
‘Ten days.’
‘Ten days? Are you sure?’
Oh, Alessandro was sure, all right. She had gone out for a pizza, and amongst their number had been the good friend whatever-his-name-was. Alessandro had chosen not to actively store that information in his brain.
He was growing more irritable by the second. Was he mistaken, or did she sound pleased that she was going to be having a bit of time to herself? He decided to test the water. Yes, he had to be away for two nights—which could easily be extended to four, because there was always a bank of clients with whom he could usefully meet—but really, he wanted to hurry back to her.
‘Actually, it’s more like four nights. New York.’
To Megan, four nights sounded like eternity.
‘Lucky you!’ she trilled. ‘I’ve always wanted to go to New York! I don’t suppose there’s much point asking, but try and take some pictures!’
‘You could come with me.’ He had never asked a woman to go on a business trip with him—even a business trip which he had only contrived to lengthen on the spur of the moment.
‘No chance. School.’
Alessandro scowled. ‘A few days away wouldn’t result in a generation of drop-outs.’
‘True. But I can’t.’ There was an edginess to his mood that was transmitting itself to her.
‘Who are you going to go out with?’
‘Oh, just a few friends. Probably a pub.’
That said nothing. Alessandro’s mood deteriorated and later, when they made love, there was an aggression that only stopped a little short of savagery.
He told her that he would call. Every day. Megan told him that there was no need, that she would be fine. She was determined to show him self-reliance.
He left for the airport with the ridiculous notion that he had stupidly dug himself a hole by telling her that he would be away at least two days longer than he needed to be.
It left him a hell of a lot of time to wonder whether she would be going out and chatting with the guy she seemed determined to hang on to even though she must know that it just wasn’t on. At least not in his world.
He couldn’t concentrate. He repeatedly told himself that it had been a stupid idea to try and tease a response out of her by absenting himself from the scene. And she didn’t seem herself when he called her.
Alessandro, who had an office in Manhattan, in one of the seriously tall buildings that dwarfed the street below, swung round in his chair and glared out of the floor-to-ceiling sheet of glass that separated him from a twenty-storey free fall.
He had just got off the phone to her, and although the time difference might have excused her subdued and downright weird response to hearing his voice, he had the sickening feeling that something was wrong.
On the spur of the moment he snatched up the telephone again, drummed his fingers restlessly on the desk as the telephone exchange did its business and connected him through to the landline at the house once again.
It took for ever for her to take the call, making him wonder what he had been interrupting and throwing him into an even darker mood.
‘What’s the matter?’ he delivered tightly, cutting to the chase.
‘Matter?’ Several thousand miles away, Megan swallowed hard as she bought some time. Of course she should have known that Alessandro would have caught her change of mood. Even when he wasn’t looking at her he still seemed capable of reading her like a book.
‘Something’s wrong. What is it?’
‘Nothing. Well…actually, nothing’s wrong, as such, but…but we need to talk…when you get back…’
‘Talk? Talk about what?’ Alessandro had bad experiences with Megan’s need to talk pronouncements, and he was getting a bad feeling now. Suddenly all the meetings he had lined up faded into inconsequence. He would leave New York immediately. He would buy a bloody jet if he had to in order to accomplish that.
‘Don’t worry, Alessandro…it can wait.’
‘Are you sure?’
‘Absolutely.’
Wait? She just wished it could wait for ever. She held up the little plastic stick with the prominent positive pregnancy line stamped on it like the decisive hand of fate. A bit of sickness, tenderness in her breasts…It hadn’t occurred to her that she might be pregnant until the evening Alessandro had left for New York. She had visited Charlotte for dinner, and after a second dash to the bathroom because she’d felt a little queasy had had the idea planted in her head, when her friend had jokingly asked whether there was ‘a bun in the oven’.
Naturally they had been using contraception. Alessandro had taken care of that. But there had been a couple of times when lust had overridden care. And, thinking back, when had she seen her last period anyway? She had always had irregular periods. That absence, in the great scheme of things, hadn’t been noticed.
‘Don’t worry about me,’ she told Alessandro now. ‘You have fun over there in New York.’
‘Have fun? I’m here on business, Megan. What the hell do you imagine I’m getting up to?’
‘I have no idea,’ Mega
n said waspishly. ‘It’s your concern!’ Tears were gathering at the back of her throat. ‘Anyway, I’ll see you when you get back, in a couple of days.’ At which point she hung up.
He would probably be furious at that, she thought. He would see it as a gesture of defiance—which it hadn’t been.
His reaction to the phone call, however, was taking second place to the dilemma raging inside her. All the doubts she had shoved away had crept out of their hiding places and were wreaking long-overdue havoc.
The minute Alessandro found out about this pregnancy he would insist she marry him. After all this time Megan knew him well enough to know that he was a man who was not afraid of committing for the right reasons. Or at least the right reasons for him. For reasons that made sense. Hence his engagement to Victoria. She had made sense. Hence his living with her. It made sense to expunge her by having her rather than fight it. A baby would necessitate marriage. That, to him, would make sense, because no child of his would be born out of wedlock.
Megan could envisage the Victorian speech even as she sat with the phone in her hand, staring at it.
Did she want to be married to a man who didn’t love her? She had agreed to move in with him because she hadn’t been able to envisage life without him, because at the back of her mind there had been a thread of hope that she would eventually be able to win him over. But would she be able to face a lifetime knowing that he had married her for the wrong reasons? Connected by a child and in a position where walking away might become an impossibility?
For the first time since she had started her job Megan took the next day off work.
With the silence of an empty house around her, she had time to really sit down and take stock. Alessandro disliked emotional roller-coaster rides. She had been too much for him seven years ago, and she had tried very hard not to make any demands of him since she had moved in with him. She had never questioned his movements and had maintained her independence. Fat lot of good all that had done when he was about to be flung onto the craziest roller-coaster ride of his life. She wondered whether he would resent her for having catapulted him into a situation he would never in a million years have wanted with her. Thinking about that made her feel even sicker than she already felt.
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