The woman blinked at her and Annah wanted to curl up and die of embarrassment because she knew at once who this was. The olive skin, dark hair, and liquid brown eyes were instant giveaways. She was an older, female version of Luca—and Ethan.
‘Annah?’
‘Yes.’ She hesitated. ‘Mrs Cavallari?’
The woman smiled. ‘Yes. But call me Eva, please. I hope I’m not intruding?’
‘Of course not,’ Annah said quickly. ‘I’m, um, sorry to have mistaken you for Celeste.’
‘You’re not having any problems with her, I hope?’
‘Oh, no. She’s been wonderful. She’s just a little...’
‘Eager to please?’ Eva supplied.
Annah’s shoulders relaxed. She gave a little laugh. ‘Yes. Very.’
Eva said, ‘Well, I just wanted to see that you’ve settled in all right—and apologise for my absence yesterday. You must have thought me terribly rude.’
Annah shook her head. ‘Not at all. I’m sorry you weren’t well.’
‘It was just a migraine. They come and go.’
Stepping back, Annah opened the door wider and smiled. ‘Would you like to meet your grandson?’
Eva’s eyes suddenly glistened. She nodded. ‘I would like that very much.’
Annah called to Ethan. When he emerged from the bedroom, Eva placed a trembling hand over her mouth and Annah could see she was fighting back tears. A lump rose in Annah’s throat. Eva Cavallari was not the cool, aloof woman she’d expected. Meeting her grandson clearly meant a great deal to her. For the first time since their arrival, Annah felt glad that she and Ethan were here.
After the introductions, Eva invited them to join her for afternoon tea in the garden and arranged for two staff members to carry down a large wooden chest. She helped Ethan lift the lid and his eyes goggled. The chest was filled with old, beautifully preserved toys.
‘These belonged to my boys,’ Eva explained to Annah, a hint of melancholy in her smile. ‘I could never bring myself to give them away.’
Ethan, thinking Christmas had arrived early, played happily on the lawn while his mother and grandmother sat in the shade of a gazebo.
Out of the blue, Eva said quietly, ‘You must wonder what kind of woman I am to have stayed married to a man like Luca’s father.’
Annah looked at her and tried to contain her surprise. ‘It’s really none of my business,’ she said, even though the question had entered her thoughts.
Eva’s lips quivered. She pressed them tightly together. After a moment, she said, ‘I’m so sorry, Annah. For what Franco did. If I had known...’
Hearing the anguish in the older woman’s voice, Annah reached across the table and laid her hand on Eva’s. ‘What’s done is done,’ she said gently, speaking the same words she’d repeated to herself many times in recent days. ‘The best we can do now is focus on the future.’
Eva put her other hand over Annah’s and offered a grateful smile. ‘I wish my son were as forgiving as you, my dear.’
Annah frowned. ‘He doesn’t blame you for his father’s actions, surely?’
Eva sat back, her gaze settling on Ethan as he ran across the lawn holding aloft a wooden toy aeroplane. ‘Not for this, perhaps. But Luca has been angry with me for many years. He thinks I should have left his father and taken him and Enzo with me when they were young.’ She paused, shook her head. ‘Franco was not the kind of man you walk away from. He would never have let me take the boys, and I would never have left them.’ She smiled sadly. ‘I thought if I stayed I could protect them. In the end, in different ways, I lost them both.’
Annah’s heart twisted with sympathy. ‘I’m so sorry about Enzo.’
Eva looked at her in surprise. ‘Luca told you?’
‘Not the details. Just that his brother died three years ago.’
Eva nodded. Her gaze sought out Ethan again, as if the sight of him brought her comfort. ‘Ethan looks so much like Luca and Enzo did when they were little.’
As if sensing the women’s attention, Ethan turned and bounded across the grass towards them. Annah’s heart swelled with love. She couldn’t begin to imagine the kind of pain Eva had suffered, losing her youngest son.
Ethan leant against the side of his grandmother’s chair. ‘What should I call you?’
Eva bent her head down. ‘Can you say nonna?’
‘Nonna,’ he repeated, and he and his grandmother beamed at each other.
Annah’s heart gave another fierce squeeze. She thought of her own mother, who’d visited her grandson once when he was tiny and shown little interest in him. Yet here was Eva, patently thrilled to acknowledge her grandson.
Luca was right. Ethan was half-Sicilian. Half-Cavallari. Luca and Eva were his family and they wanted to be a part of his life. How could Annah deny him their love? She couldn’t. No more than she could ever withhold her own love from him.
Which meant she didn’t have a choice. She and Luca had to find a way to make this co-parenting thing work.
Luca prowled down the marble hallway towards the dining room, his dark, edgy mood not improved by the knowledge that his thirty-six-hour absence would not have done him any favours with Annah.
He glanced at his watch and grimaced. After not returning at all the previous night, he had called Victor and asked him to inform Annah and his mother to expect him by seven-thirty this evening at the latest.
It was now nine o’clock.
He reached the dining room and found it empty. Cursing under his breath, he spun on his heel and encountered Victor.
‘Drawing room,’ Victor said before Luca could open his mouth.
‘Both?’
‘Yes. Enjoying a digestif, I believe.’
Great. Two potentially unhappy women to pacify. He blew out a big breath, tempted to retire to his room and face the music tomorrow. But no. He owed Annah an explanation. And he needed to see her tonight. Reassure himself that all his efforts to earn her trust thus far hadn’t been totally negated.
When he walked into the drawing room, she and his mother looked surprisingly cosy sitting on a gold velvet chesterfield sofa, large snifters of brandy on the low table in front of them. They stopped talking and looked at him. He scrutinised Annah’s face, but her features were impassive, her mood impossible to read.
‘I apologise for missing dinner,’ he said stiffly. He crossed to the drinks cabinet and poured himself a whisky. The silence behind him spoke volumes. He turned to face them, feeling rather like a man standing in front of a firing squad. He dropped into an armchair, looked at his mother and tried for a civil tone. ‘Are you feeling better?’
‘Yes. Thank you.’ Her gaze moved over his face for a moment. ‘You look tired, Luca.’
He took a slug of whisky. He was tired. Exhausted, in fact. He and Mario had spent thirty-plus hours orchestrating a sting operation to catch an employee fencing stolen goods through one of the company’s warehouses—exactly the kind of illegal activity he was determined to stamp out. Several more hours had been devoted to dealing with the authorities and their endless layers of bureaucracy.
But suddenly all of that seemed like too much to explain. ‘I’ve been working,’ he said succinctly.
‘I realise. But must you work so hard?’
His temper snapped. She knew why he worked the hours he did. Because his father—her husband whose side she’d stood by for over thirty years—had left behind a godawful mess that Luca was trying his damnedest to clean up. ‘Your concern for my welfare is about twenty years too late, Mother.’
Annah gasped. ‘Luca!’
It was the first thing she’d said since he’d walked into the room, and the reproach in her tone darkened his mood further.
Dammit. He didn’t want her seeing him like this, at his worst. This had been a mistake. He knocked back his whisky, snapped
his tumbler onto the table, and stood. ‘Forgive me. I’m clearly not in a socialising mood.’
He stalked out of the room and started up the stairs.
‘Luca.’
Annah’s voice floated up to him. Abruptly, he stopped and turned. She walked up, pausing two steps below him, and he let his gaze travel down her body and up again. In white jeans and a simple apple-green top, she looked beautiful and fresh—the perfect counterpoint to all the ugliness he’d dealt with over the past thirty-six hours. Since he’d last seen her she’d caught the sun. Or maybe the brandy had put the glow in her cheeks.
A kick of lust lent his mood a dangerous edge. ‘Leave me,’ he growled. ‘I’m not the best company right now.’ He turned his back on her and continued up the stairs, hoping she had the sense to heed his warning.
‘Luca.’
He discerned frustration in her voice. And hurt. Tamping down his guilt, he strode past the study and on to his room. If she had any sense of self-preservation, she’d know better than to follow him into any room that contained a bed. He shoved the door open, flipped on the light, and swung around, forcing her to slam to a stop in front of him.
Panting a little, she stood on the threshold and glared. ‘Don’t you dare shut that door in my face.’
He flared his nostrils. Shut the door, a voice in his head commanded. But it was too late. The devil was already rising in him. He stood back and motioned her into the room with a flourish of his hand. ‘Be my guest.’
She walked past him, then stopped in mid-stride.
Luca raised an eyebrow. ‘Changed your mind?’
She swung around to face him, turning away from his massive four-poster bed. Her cheeks glowed bright pink. ‘Isn’t there somewhere else we can talk?’
‘I’m not in a talking mood.’ He trailed his gaze slowly over her figure, deliberately stoking his hunger so it would show on his face—a fair warning to her to get the hell out while she still had the chance.
She didn’t budge.
‘Last chance, cara,’ he said in a low voice, his hand braced on the edge of the door. ‘Staying or going?’
CHAPTER SEVEN
ANNAH STOOD HER ground despite the jittery sensation in the pit of her stomach and the inner voice warning her to flee.
Luca’s eyes might be glittering with wolfish intent, but he wasn’t going to do anything. Not with his son sleeping down the hall and his mother downstairs. This was just a scare tactic to avoid a conversation he didn’t want to have.
She crossed her arms over her chest. ‘I’m not going until we’ve talked,’ she said, putting a slight emphasis on the word talked in case he mistakenly thought she had other ideas.
He shrugged. ‘Suit yourself.’
And then he closed the door and crossed to another, leaving her to follow.
Annah felt a ping of relief. Like the guest bedroom, this room probably had an adjoining sitting room. Somewhere they could sit and have a conversation. She wanted to know why he’d spoken to his mother the way he had. She still had a lot to learn about Luca, but she didn’t believe he was a cruel man. Neither did she believe he would cancel his plans to spend time with their son without good reason. But she couldn’t excuse his absence, or his behaviour, unless she understood what was going on with him.
He pushed open the door, and she followed him into the next room and then stopped short. It wasn’t a sitting room. It was the biggest walk-in wardrobe she’d ever seen. So big there was even an island in the centre populated with drawers and cubby holes stacked with shoes and neatly folded clothes. She lifted her gaze and blinked at long rows of hanging designer suits and shirts.
‘I thought you wanted to talk.’
Luca’s dry-voiced remark jerked her attention back to him. She hovered uncertainly against the wall, close to the doorway, and tried to stop her eyes from widening as Luca began to unbutton his shirt.
She swallowed and then cleared her throat. ‘Why did you say something so hurtful to your mother?’
He paused on the last button and looked up. ‘I am not having a discussion with you about my mother,’ he said flatly. And then he peeled off his shirt and tossed it into a laundry basket.
Annah pressed her palms against the wall behind her and tried to control where she looked, but her eyes slid helplessly downwards, roving over powerful shoulders, strong arms, and a broad chest that was a true masterpiece of hard muscle and taut skin with a fine dusting of dark hair over impressive pecs.
A wave of heat crashed through her. She forced her eyes up. He was watching her and she suddenly felt exposed, as if he could see on her face just how badly she wanted him. He moved towards her, his dark eyes burning into hers until she felt the heat sizzling all the way down to her pelvis.
He planted his hand on the wall beside her head, between her and the doorway. With lazy movements, he lifted his other hand and wound a tendril of her hair around his forefinger. ‘Do you ever think about that night in London?’ he murmured.
She thought about saying no, but he’d know she was lying. ‘Yes,’ she admitted after a moment. ‘Do you?’
‘More often than you can imagine.’
His answer made her heart stutter. She sucked in a breath. This was dangerous. Reckless. Like playing with fire and hoping she wouldn’t get burnt. ‘I... I should go,’ she croaked.
‘Is that what you want?’ he challenged in a husky voice.
She pushed her head back against the wall. He was so close she could angle her chin and press her mouth against his throat if she wanted to. All these years later, she still remembered how it felt to kiss his skin. The heat of him against her lips. What it was like to explore his body with her unskilled mouth and make him shudder and groan. A longing rose, so powerful it made her chest ache. Her clitoris throb. ‘No,’ she whispered. ‘It’s not what I want.’
His eyes smouldered and then he pulled her against him and captured her mouth in a hot, urgent kiss.
Annah’s insides caught fire. Leaning into him, she kissed him back and let her hands slide over his shoulders and torso, relishing his taste and the delicious feel of smooth skin over hard, powerful muscle.
God, how she wanted him.
And if the hard ridge pressing against her belly was any indication, he wanted her just as much.
The knowledge intensified the ache between her thighs, and a little whimper of need climbed her throat. As if he understood, his hands went to the front of her jeans and deftly undid them. When he slipped one hand inside her knickers, she gasped against his mouth.
‘I’ve dreamed of touching you like this,’ he said roughly, his fingers stroking between her sensitive folds while his lips trailed across her jaw and down her neck. ‘Do you remember how it was, cara?’ he growled against her throat. ‘How good we were together? How you came apart in my arms?’
‘Yes,’ she breathed, clutching his shoulders, gasping her pleasure as she writhed against his hand and shamelessly pushed her most sensitive part against his palm. It didn’t take much more—only the slide of his fingers inside her—to have her climaxing in a hot, wet rush.
A low moan poured from her throat, matched by a deep growl of satisfaction from Luca.
And then their mouths melded again, their kissing growing more heated, more frantic. Luca pushed her top up, freed one of her breasts from its lace cup, then dipped his head and covered her already taut nipple with his mouth.
Annah gasped, the hot wire of need tightening at her core again. Her hands went to the waistband of his trousers, fingers fumbling as she worked at the belt and zipper and then finally freed his glorious erection. She closed her hand around the silken length and he sucked in his breath.
‘I want this inside me,’ she whispered boldly.
It was all the encouragement he needed. With a few swift movements he yanked off her knickers and jeans, getting rid of her
shoes at the same time, then dispensed with the rest of his own clothing. After reaching into a drawer, he sheathed himself with a condom and then lifted her up as if she weighed nothing.
Annah wrapped her arms and legs around him as he thrust into her, driving deep, and it seemed as if her body and soul gasped in unison. It felt so right, so perfect, as if he were the only man who could ever make her feel this wonderful.
He kissed her, their tongues entwining as he pounded into her and they came together, a great shudder racking Luca’s powerful body. Annah clung to him, shivery aftershocks pulsing through her limbs, and he held her against him as their heartbeats returned to normal.
‘My God...’ Luca’s voice was hoarse. Slowly, he withdrew and Annah lowered her legs. He glanced down at his sheathed member. ‘Let me take care of this,’ he murmured and moved away, going to his en suite bathroom, she presumed.
Legs trembling, Annah closed her eyes and sagged against the wall, taking a moment to get her breathing under control. When she opened her eyes again, she startled at the sight of her reflection in a tall mirror on the opposite wall.
Shock reverberated down her spine. Good God. She looked like a wanton hussy. Top pushed up. One breast hanging out of her bra. The rest of her as naked as the day she was born.
A chill scuttled over her skin.
What was she doing?
Behaving like a trollop while her little boy slept at the other end of the hallway, that was what!
Hastily, she sorted out her bra and top and then pulled on her knickers and jeans.
‘Annah?’
She straightened at the sound of Luca’s voice, a mix of desire and dismay streaking through her when she saw he was still naked. She tried hard not to look at his beautiful body. ‘I think I should go,’ she croaked and, giving him no chance to respond, grabbed her shoes and fled, praying she wouldn’t run into Celeste or Victor or—heaven forbid—Eva on the way back to her room.
* * *
The Sicilian's Secret Son Page 9
