Riccardo's Secret Child (17 page)

‘I wondered when you would get back to that,' Riccardo said.

‘I'm just making conversation, Riccardo. If you don't want to talk about it, then don't. It's all the same to me.'

‘Caroline never managed to domesticate me, no. I look back now, and perhaps I can say in all honesty that she tried. Tried and failed.' He thought of his ex-wife and realised that for the first time he was glad that she had found happiness with another man. She had deserved it. ‘I wasn't open to making sacrifices,' he murmured, more to himself than to his rapt audience, ‘and, of course, making sacrifices is what a good marriage is all about. I found her twittering
around me irritating after a while. I also found it hard to conceal my irritation.'

‘Which is why she became more and more withdrawn,' Julia pointed out softly.

‘Yes, she did. And the more withdrawn she became, the more irritated and impatient I became. In the end, it was a vicious circle. We barely spoke, and when we did we never seemed to get anywhere with the conversations.' He shrugged and sighed. ‘Two people who started out with the best of intentions and just came unstuck somewhere along the way. But that was no reason for her to keep Nicola a secret from me.'

‘No, no, it wasn't,' Julia agreed, and he shot her a brooding look from under his lashes.

‘You were in on the scheme. How can you sit there and calmly agree with me?'

‘I was not
in on the scheme
,' Julia retorted, closing her fork and spoon on her empty plate and taking a sip of wine. ‘You seem to think that I was living here and party to every little decision Caroline and Martin made. I wasn't. I was renting my own flat on the other side of town and, whilst I didn't agree with their decision to keep you in the dark about your daughter, I didn't feel there was much that I could do, and I suppose I had my own life to think about.'

‘You had no opinions on me?'

‘I didn't
know
you, Riccardo! I only knew you from what Caroline told me and I was too busy with my own life to become involved in what was going on in my brother's! When they died…' Julia's voice faltered ‘…I realised that I had to make a decision and I decided to do what I had always thought they should have done. I decided to get in touch with you.'

‘And are you pleased that you did?'

Julia picked up the faintest, fleeting shadow of innuendo
in his question. He was referring to far more than whether she was pleased that Nicola now had contact with her real father. Or so she imagined.

He toyed with some pasta on his fork and looked at her with a darkly inscrutable expression.

‘Of course I am,' she answered jumpily. ‘Nicola deserves to know you and she always has, even if she was denied the chance. I can see that you'll make a wonderful father. You're kind and thoughtful with her, and caring…' Her words were drying up in her throat as he continued to watch her, his dark eyes not once straying from her face, which was getting pinker by the minute.

‘And if we leave Nicola out of the equation,' he said softly, ‘are you still pleased that you contacted me?'

‘Well…I…it's always nice to get to know different people…' Julia said weakly.

‘Because I am.'

‘You are?' She could only give in to her fascinated trance.

‘I am. When we first met, I told you that you weren't my type of woman. I was wrong. You are very much my type of woman.' He swallowed a mouthful of wine as he appraised her flustered face. ‘I made love to you once and I intend to make love to you again. Because I still want you and that's why your Roger stockbroker will not be calling you and neither will you be calling him.' His voice was perfectly calm. Calm and reasonable, for all the world as though they were discussing the weather. ‘Your body is for my enjoyment only.'

‘For your enjoyment!'
Julia gasped, ashamed to admit even to herself that his Italian possessiveness had turned her body to water and set in motion a thousand sweetly
seductive images in her head. ‘What we did was a mistake, Riccardo!' she said in a shaky voice. ‘And I'm not after a casual affair!'

‘Then tell me what you
are
after.'

J
ULIA
stared at him, pinned to the chair by his dark, brooding gaze. This was a terrible mistake, but then she had known that it would be. They couldn't exist under the same roof, sharing meals and conversations, while he kept her movements under check and began a slow process of seduction. She was too weak when it came to dealing with him. She just wanted too much, much more than he was capable of giving, and surrendering to their mutual lust was not a good enough reason for her to yield.

But she could feel her body burning under his stare, quivering with desire.

‘We should clear up,' she mumbled, pushing back her chair and stumbling to her feet. Her hair fell over her eyes and she feverishly brushed it away then picked up her dirty crockery and headed for the sink, making sure not to look at him.

So much for tactics, Riccardo thought, following her every movement across the kitchen and breathing in her discomfort. So much for the subtlety of the master seducer. He had barged right in like a bull in a china shop and left her dithering and withdrawing at a rate of knots.

But God, he couldn't stop himself! She made him behave like a schoolboy.

He swiftly cleared the remainder of the table, while she huddled protectively by the sink, washing dishes with her head lowered; then he picked up a tea towel and began drying.

The atmosphere between them was crackling with tension.

‘Have you got around to telling your mother about my moving in?' Riccardo asked, and Julia looked at him with troubled eyes.

‘What?'

‘Your mother. Have you told her that I have moved in?'

‘No. Ah, I didn't…I haven't had the opportunity as yet.' She returned to the fork in her hand, washing it more carefully than was required. She could smell the clean, tangy, masculine scent of him, filling her nostrils, and she edged a little away from his arm next to hers.

‘How do you think she will react? It never occurred to me that mothers might be a bit protective about their daughters living with a man.'

‘You're Nicola's father; it's an unusual situation but Riccardo, I don't think this situation…can…is going to work out. I…'

‘Why not?'

‘Because…' Her voice trailed away into silence and she could feel his eyes on her, running over her flustered face and along her body.

‘Because I have told you that I still want you?' Riccardo asked silkily, abandoning all his efforts to put her at her ease and not charge in. He wanted her to admit her attraction to him. It wasn't enough seeing it in her eyes. He wanted to hear it as well, wanted her to break down and confess that she couldn't resist him. He wanted her to come to him and the only way that was going to happen was if she was truthful, with herself and him. ‘Would you rather that I had not said anything? Even though you must have felt it, must have seen it in my eyes whenever I looked at you.' He could feel himself getting hot under his collar as she clung to her stubborn silence. Dammit! This was taking
English reticence too far! ‘And you're going to have to deal with this because I'm here now and I won't be going away.'

‘You'll go away if I tell you to!' Julia bit out, her grey eyes flashing as they met hers. ‘This is
my
house, in case you've forgotten!'

‘Your house in which
my
daughter lives!' He knew that it was a low trick, bringing Nicola into the equation whenever he needed a winning card, but not all things in life were fair and playing by the book had never been one of his strong points. ‘If it had not been for you, your brother and my ex-wife, this situation would never have arisen! Like it or not, you will just have to accept some of the responsibility for my being here in the first place!' A more convoluted argument it would have been hard to find, but he stood his ground, challenging her with a hard, unyielding stare.

‘I won't tolerate you being here if you're going to make things awkward for me,' Julia told him unsteadily. She slipped off the daffodil-yellow washing-up gloves and draped them over the side of the sink, then she dried her hands on the small towel on the counter and sidled away from him, still watching him from under her lashes as though afraid that he might strike unexpectedly.

‘In other words,' Riccardo mocked, turning around to look at her and folding his arms across his broad chest, ‘I should just go along with the pretence that we're no more than, what…acquaintances? Two people who happen to be accidentally living under the same roof because of a third party? Tell me, do we converse at all or should I abide by strict guidelines that I never get too personal?' There was biting sarcasm in his voice that made Julia cringe.

‘Of course we can be polite to one another—'

‘Polite!' He gave a crack of hard laughter and walked towards her. ‘We made love and yet you expect us both to
behave like polite strangers when we're in each other's presence?'

‘I…I wish you wouldn't keep bringing that up,' Julia stammered.

‘There are a lot of things you seem to wish.' He stopped in front of her. It took supreme will-power to fight down his natural urge to say what needed to be said and hang the consequences. ‘Look,' he sighed and raked his long fingers through his hair, then stuck his hands in his pockets, ‘we're standing here arguing. I do not want to argue with you. Why don't I make us both a cup of coffee and we can go into the sitting room and discuss this like two adults?'

‘You mean you're prepared to stop bullying me?'

‘Is that what you think I'm doing?'

Julia hated herself for melting whenever he came close to her, whenever he spoke, whenever he so much as glanced in her direction. How could she be rational and logical when he made her feel as if she was walking along the edge of a cliff in a strong wind?

‘Isn't it?' Julia asked, sticking her chin out and refusing to go weak-kneed.

‘I don't bully,' Riccardo said, briefly looking away.

‘No, you just carry on shouting until you get your own way.'

‘Now you make me sound like a toddler. Throwing a temper tantrum if he doesn't get some sweets.' His voice was so disarmingly rueful that Julia felt herself beginning to smile, only to dimly remember the cause of their argument.

He could move from rage to charm, from aggression to humour so seamlessly that he never failed to take her by surprise. Was that how she had so carelessly managed to fall in love with him? Because her defences couldn't with
stand the complexity of his personality? Every other man she had ever met seemed one-dimensional in comparison.

‘Now, you go and wait for me in the sitting room and I shall bring some coffee in. And you have my word that I won't raise my voice or bully you. Deal?'

‘Why do I trust you even less when you're being nice, Riccardo?'

‘Because you're suspicious.' He held his hands up in mock-surrender. ‘I will be as good as gold.'

Julia headed for the sitting room, vaguely aware that she had somehow been manoeuvred, and then sat on the sofa, her legs curled up beneath her. God, he might drive her crazy, scare the hell out of her when she thought of the damage he could do to her heart, but every pore in her body felt alive when he was around. It just wasn't fair!

He came in a few minutes later, carrying a circular tray on which were two cups, the glass jug of percolated coffee and a small jug of milk. ‘I waited tables when I was at university to earn some money,' he said, resting the tray on the table and sitting on the sofa. ‘Are you impressed?'

‘
You waited tables?
I'm not impressed, Riccardo, I'm surprised,' Julia said, diverted by this revelation. She watched as he poured her a cup of coffee and handed the cup to her.

He shot her a gleaming look over his shoulder as he leaned to pour himself a cup. ‘Did you imagine that I would never do anything so menial as waiting tables?'

‘I imagined that you would not have had to. Caroline said that—'

‘I came from a lot of money? You and my ex-wife seem to have had quite a lot of conversations about me.'

‘I guess there was a lot of stuff she needed to get off her chest.' Julia shrugged and hoped that this would not lead
to another surge of anger over his ex-wife's dubious politics concerning their daughter, but he seemed relaxed.

‘My family is very wealthy; I would be the first to admit it.' He sat back and stretched out his legs. ‘But I never felt that I had the right to use their wealth when I was perfectly capable of supporting myself. I did a number of jobs when I was at university, including bartending and holiday work at a building company. Now, that is what I would call hard work. Lifting bags of cement and heaving bricks.'

Julia imagined him bare-backed under the summer sun, body glistening with sweat as he heaved bricks, and her cheeks pinkened at the violently erotic image her mind conjured up. He would have been the sort of workman that women paused to wolf-whistle rather than the other way around!

‘I worked my way through university as well,' she admitted. ‘Although that was largely from necessity.'

‘What did you do?' There seemed no end to his curiosity. He wanted to find out everything he could about this woman, every little detail of her life.

‘I worked at the check-out tills at the supermarket in the evenings. It was fun. The people were a good laugh. And I worked in shops.' She smiled at the memory and sipped her coffee.

‘So we have more in common than you admit,' Riccardo murmured and he sensed her tense, but he would just have to break through that tension. Either that or remain politely distant until the time came for him to leave with his daughter. And he was not going to remain politely distant.

‘We should be able to share this house quite amicably,' he continued.

‘You know why we can't, Riccardo.'

‘I know why we might not be able to…'

‘It's the same thing.' Julia rested her cup on the table
and drew her knees up, circling them with her arms as she looked at him.

‘It is very far from being the same thing,' he told her conversationally. ‘If I thought we couldn't share this house because our personalities were incompatible then I would never have moved in. But I don't. The reason we might not be able to share this house is because I am honest about the way I feel, while you persist in holding on to a lie.' His voice was quite calm, as were the dark eyes resting on her flushed face. Persuasively calm.

‘Why do you have to insist on reducing everything to a personal level?' Julia pleaded.

‘Because, whether you want to admit it or not, the personal level exists between us. I can feel it throbbing in the air whenever we're in the same room, I can feel it down the end of the line whenever you're on the phone! Why pretend otherwise?' When she didn't answer he shook his head impatiently. ‘You never answered my question.'

‘What question?'

‘The one I asked you earlier. You told me that you weren't after a casual affair. So what
are
you after, Julia? Love, marriage and fireworks? Romance with all the frills and a happy-ever-after ending?' His mouth twisted cynically and Julia blinked rapidly as tears tried to push their way through from under her eyelids.

This was why they had to be polite to one another! Because every time feelings entered the equation a Pandora's box was opened and they came up against the same, immovable brick wall.

‘I thought you were immune to such dreams?' he pressed on ruthlessly. ‘I thought you had rebelled against your mother's nagging for you to settle down, have two children and spend the rest of your life playing the housewife.'

‘I'm just not interested in having a casual affair.' Her
mouth was set in a stubborn line and she began to stand up, to run away from the conversation, but his hand descended on her wrist, forcing her to remain where she was.

‘You've had affairs in the past, haven't you? You're not a virgin!'

‘I haven't
had affairs
in the past! You make it sound as though I've led a life of debauchery! I had a couple of boyfriends, yes, but that's it!'

‘So why is it so different this time?' he asked, jerking her towards him, his eyes grim.

Because I'm in love with you,
Julia wanted to throw at him. Because I can't just have uninvolved
fun
with you! I want too much.

‘Maybe I'm just getting older,' she said, her breath catching painfully in her throat. ‘I don't want to waste any more time with someone who isn't meant for me. So it doesn't matter about physical attraction or about whether you want me or I want you. I might want you, Riccardo…' Saying it hurt but she had to, or else he would pursue her. Challenges for a man like Riccardo were fine, just provided none of them got away. If they did then he would chase them to the ends of the earth and back, but if she mentioned commitment and marriage he would back off. She looked at him without flinching. ‘I just don't want what you have to offer.'

‘Are you sure about that?' he murmured lazily. He began to gently caress the tender back of her wrist with his thumb and Julia's eyes widened.

‘Very sure,' she replied hoarsely.

‘How can you say that,' he chided softly, ‘when you haven't sampled all I have to offer? It is very small-minded to reject something when you haven't first tried it.'

‘I don't think…tha…that that refers to sexual experimentation,' Julia whispered. He was no longer holding her
wrist, yet still her arm refused to move. It lay there, leaden and impassive, inviting him to run his forefinger from elbow to wrist, making her shiver.

He mesmerised her, and the devil knew it. She could hear it in his smoky voice and see it in the slow smile.

‘You want a routine courtship and a white wedding,' he drawled softly, ‘but take it from me, there's more to life than marriage. What we have is bigger than both of us…why fight it?' He shifted until he was close to her, then he very gently smoothed her legs flat so that she was lying on the sofa and staring up at his darkly sexy face.