His Innocent's Passionate Awakening

by MELANIE MILBURNE

  But then they came to the hospital.

  Artie had forgotten about the hospital. Hospitals. Busyness. Crowds. People rushing about. Patients, staff, cleaners, security personnel. The dead, the dying and the injured. A vision of her mother’s lifeless, bruised and broken body flashed into her brain. A vision of her father in the Critical Care Spinal Unit, his shattered spine no longer able to keep him upright.

  Her fault. Her fault. Her fault.

  She had destroyed her family.

  Artie gripped the edges of her seat, her heart threatening to pound its way out of her chest. ‘I can’t go in there. I can’t.’

  Rosa parked the car in the visitor’s parking area and turned off the engine. ‘You’ve come this far.’

  ‘It was a mistake.’ Artie closed her eyes so she didn’t have to look at the front entrance. ‘I can’t do this. I’m not ready.’

  I will never be ready.

  ‘What if I call Luca to come out and get you?’

  Artie opened her eyes and took a deep breath and slowly released it. Luca was inside that building. She was only a few metres away from him. She had come this far, further than she had in ten years. All she had to do was get to Luca. ‘No. I’m not giving up now. I want to be with Luca more than anything. But I need to do this last bit on my own. You can go home and I’ll talk to you in a few days once we know what’s happening with Luca’s grandfather.’ She released her tight grip on the car seat and smoothed her damp palms down her thighs. ‘I’m ready. I’m going in. Wish me luck?’

  Rosa smiled and brushed some tears away from her eyes with the back of her hand. ‘You’ve got this.’

  * * *

  Luca opened his eyes when he heard the door of his grandfather’s room open, but instead of seeing a nurse come in he saw Artie. For a moment he thought he was dreaming. He blinked and blinked again then sprang out of the chair, taking her by the arms to make sure she was actually real and not a figment of his imagination. ‘Cara? How did you get here? I can barely believe my eyes.’

  She smiled, her eyes bright, her cheeks flushed pink. ‘Rosa brought me. I wanted to be with you. I forced myself to get here. I can’t say it was easy. It was awful, actually. But I kept doing the slow breathing thing and somehow I made it.’

  Luca gathered her close to his chest, breathing in the flowery scent of her hair where it tickled his chin. He was overcome with emotion, thinking about the effort it must have cost her to stare down her fears.

  For him?

  Fears she had lived with for ten years and she had pushed through them to get to his side. To be with him while he faced the very real possibility of losing his grandfather. He wasn’t sure how it made him feel...awed, honoured, touched in a way he had rarely been touched. He was used to having entirely transactional relationships with people. He took what he wanted and they did too.

  But Artie had given him something no one had ever done before—her complete trust.

  ‘You were very brave, mia piccola. It’s so good to have you here.’ He held her apart from him to smile down at her, a locked space inside his chest flaring open. ‘I still can’t believe it.’ He brushed his bent knuckles down her cheek. ‘Nonno will be so pleased to meet you.’

  Her forehead creased in concern. ‘How is he? Did you get to speak to him before—?’

  ‘Yes, he’s in Theatre, or maybe in Recovery by now.’ Luca took both of her hands in his. ‘I’ve missed you.’

  ‘I’ve missed you too.’ Her voice whisper-soft, her gaze luminous.

  He released her hands and gathered her close again, lowering his mouth to hers in a kiss that sent scorching streaks of heat shooting through his body. She pressed herself closer, her mouth opening to the probe of his tongue. Tingles went down the backs of his legs, blood thundered to his groin, rampant need pounding in his system. Her lips tasted of strawberries and milk with a touch of cinnamon, her little gasps of delight sweet music to his ears and fuel for his desire. A desire that burned and boiled and blistered with incendiary heat right throughout his body in pummelling waves. How could one kiss do so much damage? Light such a fire in his flesh?

  Because it was her kiss.

  Her mouth.

  Her.

  Luca lifted his mouth off hers to look down at her flushed features and shimmering eyes. ‘If we weren’t in my grandfather’s hospital room, I would show you just how much I’ve missed you right here and now.’

  Her cheeks went a delightful shade of pink. ‘I’ve sent Rosa back home. It’s okay for me to stay with you, isn’t it?’

  Luca smiled. ‘I can think of nothing I’d like more. My villa is only half an hour from here.’

  She stroked his face with her fingers, sending darts of pleasure through his body. ‘Thank you for helping me move past my fear. I know it’s still early days, and I know I’ll probably have lots of setbacks, but I feel like I’m finally moving in the right direction.’

  Luca tucked a loose strand of her hair back behind her ear, feeling like someone had spilled warm honey into his chest cavity. ‘I’m so proud of you right now. The first steps are always the hardest in any difficult journey.’

  Artie toyed with the open collar of his shirt, her eyes not quite meeting his. ‘I found it helped to shift my focus off myself and put it on you instead. I knew you wanted me with you and I wanted to be with you too. So, so much. That had to be a bigger driver than my fear of leaving the castello. And thankfully, it was.’

  Luca framed her face in his hands, meshing his gaze with hers. ‘Once Nonno is out of danger, I am going to introduce you to everything you’ve only dreamed of until now.’

  She wound her arms around his neck and stepped up on tiptoe to plant a soft kiss to his mouth. ‘I can hardly wait.’

  * * *

  A short time later, Luca’s grandfather was wheeled back into the room. Artie held on to Luca’s hand, feeling nervous at meeting the old man for the first time. She had met so few people over the last decade and had lost the art of making small talk. But she drew strength from having Luca by her side and basked in his pride in her for making it to the hospital. Something had shifted in their relationship, a subtle shift that gave her more confidence around him. He might not love her but he wanted her with him and that was more than enough for now.

  It had to be enough.

  Her love for him might seem sudden, but wasn’t that how it happened for some people? An instant attraction, a chemistry that couldn’t be denied, an unstoppable force. Luca didn’t believe himself capable of loving someone, but then, she hadn’t believed herself capable of being able to leave the castello. But she had left. She had found the courage within to do so. Would it not be the same for him? He would need to find the courage to love without fear.

  Nonno groaned and cranked one eye open. ‘Luca?’

  Luca moved forward, taking Artie with him. He took his grandfather’s hand in his. ‘I’m here, Nonno. And so is Artie.’

  The old man turned his head on the pillow and his sleepy gaze brightened. ‘Ah, my dear girl. I’m so glad to meet you in person. I hope you’ll be as happy with Luca as I was with my Marietta.’

  Artie stepped closer. ‘Buongiorno, Signor Ferrantelli. It is so lovely to meet you face to face.’

  The old man grasped her hand. ‘Call me Nonno. You’re family now, sì?’

  Family. If only Nonno knew how short a time she would be a part of the Ferrantelli family. Artie smiled and squeezed his hand back in a gesture of warm affection. ‘Yes, Nonno. I’m family now.’

  * * *

  An hour or so later, Luca drove Artie to his sprawling estate in Tuscany a few kilometres from the town of San Gimignano, where fourteen of the once seventy-two medieval towers created an ancient skyline. The countryside outside the medieval town was filled with sloping hills and lush valleys interspersed with slopes of grapevines and olive groves and fields o
f bright red poppies. Tall pines stood like sentries overlooking the verdant fields and the lowering sun cast a golden glow over the landscape, the angle of light catching the edges of the cumulous clouds and sending shafts and bolts of gold down to the earth in a spectacular fashion.

  Artie drank in the view, feeling overawed by the beauty to the point of tears. She brushed at her eyes and swallowed a lump in her throat. ‘It’s so beautiful...the colours, the light—everything. I can’t believe I’m seeing it in real time instead of through a screen or the pages of a book or magazine.’ She turned to him. ‘Do you mind if we stop for a minute? I want to stand by the roadside and smell the air and listen to the sounds of nature.’

  ‘Sure.’ Luca stopped the car and came around to open her door. He took her hand and helped her out of the car, a smile playing at the corners of his mouth, creating attractive crinkles near his eyes. ‘It’s an amazing part of the country, isn’t it?’

  ‘It sure is.’ Artie stood beside him on the roadside and lifted her face to feel the dance of the evening breeze. She breathed in the scent of wild grasses and sun-warmed pine trees. Listened to the twittering of birds, watched an osprey ride the warm currents of air as it searched for prey below. A swell of emotion filled Artie’s chest that Luca had helped her leave the prison of her past. ‘I never thought I’d be able to do things like this again.’

  Luca put an arm around her waist and gathered her closer against his side. ‘I’m proud of you. It can’t have been easy, but look at you now.’

  She glanced up at him and smiled. ‘I don’t know how to thank you.’

  ‘I can think of a way.’ His eyes darkened and his mouth came down to press a lingering kiss to hers. After a few breathless moments, he lifted his mouth from hers and smiled. ‘We’d better get going before it gets dark.’

  Once they were back in the car and on their way again, he placed her hand on the top of his thigh and her fingers tingled at the hard warmth of his toned muscles beneath her palm. ‘Thank you for being so sweet to Nonno,’ he went on. ‘He already loves you. You remind him of my grandmother.’

  Artie basked in the glow of his compliment. ‘What was she like? Were you close to her?’

  His expression was like the sky outside—shifting shadows as the light gradually faded. ‘I was close to her in the early days, before my father and brother drowned. Their deaths hit her hard and she lost her spark and never quite got it back.’ His hands tightened on the steering wheel, making his knuckles bulge to white knobs of tension. ‘Like my mother, being around me reminded her too much of what she’d lost. I was always relieved when it was time to go back to boarding school and even more so when I moved away for university.’

  Artie stroked his thigh in a comforting fashion, her heart contracting for the way he had suffered as a young teenager. She was all too familiar with how grief and guilt were a deadly combination. Destroying hope, suffocating any sense of happiness or fulfilment. ‘I can only imagine how hard it was for all of you, navigating your way through so much grief. But what about your mother? You said she lives in New York now. Do you ever see her?’

  ‘Occasionally, when I’m there for work.’ His mouth twisted. ‘It’s...difficult being with her, as it is for her to be with me.’

  ‘I don’t find it hard to be with you.’ The words were out of her mouth before she could stop them. She bit her lip and mentally cringed as heat flooded her cheeks. Next she would be blurting out how much she loved him. Words he clearly didn’t want to hear. Love wasn’t part of their six-month arrangement. Romantic love wasn’t part of his life, period.

  Luca glanced her way, a smile tilting the edges of his mouth and his eyes dark and warm. ‘I don’t find it hard to be with you either.’ His voice was low and deep and husky and made her long to be back in his arms. To feel the sensual power of his body, the physical expression of his need, even if love wasn’t part of why he desired her. But she realised now her desire was a physical manifestation of her love for him. A love that had awakened the first time his lips touched hers, waking her from a psychological coma. A coma where she had denied herself the right to fully engage in life and relationships. Locking herself away out of fear. But she was free now, freed by Luca’s passion for her and hers for him.

  ‘Will I get to meet your mother? I mean, is that something you’d like me to do?’ Artie asked.

  A frown formed a double crease between his eyes. ‘I’m not sure it will achieve much.’

  ‘But what if I’d like to?’

  He flicked her a brief unreadable glance. ‘Why do you want to?’

  Artie sighed. ‘I lost my mother when I was fifteen. It left such a hole in my life. I can barely watch a television show or commercials or movies with mothers in them because it makes me miss my mother all the more.’

  ‘You have no need to be envious of my relationship with my mother,’ Luca said in a weighted tone.

  ‘At least you still have her.’

  There was a protracted silence.

  Luca released a heavy breath. ‘Look, I know you are only trying to help but some family dynamics are best left alone. Nothing can be changed now.’

  ‘But that’s what I thought about my fear of leaving the castello,’ Artie said. ‘I lost years of my life by giving in to my fears, allowing them to control me instead of me controlling them. I never thought I could do it, but you helped me see that I could. Maybe it’s the same with your relationship with your mother. You shouldn’t give up on trying to improve the relationship just because it’s been a little difficult so far. What you went through as a family was horrendously tragic. But you still have a family, Luca. You have your mother and your grandfather. I have no one now.’

  Luca reached for her hand and brought it up to his mouth, pressing a soft kiss to her fingers. ‘You have me, cara.’ His voice had a note of tenderness that made her heart contract.

  But for how long? Six months and no longer.

  And then she would be alone again.

  * * *

  A short time later, Luca drove through the gates of his estate and pulled up in front of the imposing medieval villa.

  Built like a fortress with four storeys, a central dome and several turrets, it was surrounded by landscaped gardens with a tinkling fountain at the front. ‘Don’t be put off by the grim façade,’ he said, turning off the engine. ‘I’ve done extensive renovations inside.’

  ‘I try never to judge a book or a person by their cover,’ Artie said. ‘Not that I’ve met a lot of people lately, but still. Hopefully that’s going to change.’

  Luca’s eyes glinted. ‘I’m not sure I want to share you with anyone just yet. This is our honeymoon, sì?’

  A shiver coursed down Artie’s spine and a pool of liquid fire simmered in her core. She sent him a shy smile. ‘So, we’ll be alone here? Just you and me?’

  He leaned closer across the gear shaft and, putting a hand to the back of her head, brought her closer to his descending mouth. ‘Just you and me.’

  CHAPTER TEN

  ARTIE WOKE THE next morning to find her head tucked against Luca’s chest and his arms around her and her legs tangled with his. One of his hands was moving up and down her spine in a slow stroking motion that made her pelvis start to tingle. His hand went lower, to the curve of her bottom, and every nerve in her skin did a happy dance. Her inner muscles woke to his touch, instantly recalling the magic of the night before and wanting more. Would she ever tire of feeling his hands on her body? His touch was gentle and yet created a storm in her flesh. A tumult of sensations that made her ache for closer, deeper, more intimate contact.

  Luca turned her onto her back and leaned on one elbow to gaze down at her. He brushed some wayward strands of her hair back from her face, his eyes darkly hooded, a lazy smile tipping up one side of his mouth. ‘Well, look who’s been sleeping in my bed.’ His voice had a sexy early-morning rasp to it that
made something in her belly turn over.

  Artie traced a straight line down his strong nose, a playful smile tilting her own mouth. ‘I don’t know that I did much sleeping.’ Her finger began to circle his stubble-surrounded mouth and chin. ‘Unless I was dreaming about you making love to me...how many times was it?’

  His eyes darkened. ‘Three.’ He stroked her bottom lip with his thumb, a small frown settling between his brows. ‘I would have gone for four or even five but I didn’t want to make you sore. This is all so new to you and...’

  Artie smoothed his frown away with her finger. ‘New, but wonderful.’ She looked deep into his eyes, holding her hand against his prickly jaw. ‘I didn’t think it would be so...so wonderful. Is it always like this?’

  Luca held her gaze for a long moment, his eyes moving between each of hers before lowering to her mouth. He released a soft gust of air, his lopsided smile returning. ‘No. It’s not always as good as this.’

  ‘Really? Are you just saying that to make me feel good?’

  He picked up one of her hands and turned it over to plant a kiss to the middle of her palm, his eyes holding hers. ‘I’m saying it because it’s true. It feels...different with you.’

  ‘In what way?’

  He interlaced his fingers with hers, a contemplative frown interrupting his features. ‘I can’t explain it. It just feels different.’

  Artie aimed her gaze at his mouth rather than meet his eyes. ‘Is it because of my lack of experience? I must seem a bit of a novelty to someone like you who’s had so many lovers.’

  He tipped up her chin and his eyes met hers, and something shifted in the atmosphere. A new, electric energy, a background hum, as if each and every oxygen particle had paused to take a breath.