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‘Sh-shock,’ she proffered shakily.
He groaned something in Spanish and brushed her hair back from her cheekbone with a not quite steady hand. ‘I was terrified of losing you. When you said you wanted out I saw my whole world falling apart. There was nothing I would not have done to keep you. And I seemed to have no hold on you but the baby.’
‘And you were prepared to use that—’
‘Sí… I never thought that I could love anyone the way I love you.’
Bella threw her head back, her green eyes clinging to the blaze of his possessive golden gaze. ‘I fell in love with you in the container.’
Rico cursed as he collided with the gearstick in his attempt to drag her into his arms. Bella giggled and climbed out of the car, watching him make it round the bonnet to her in record time. He swept her up into his arms and kissed her passionately as he carried her back into the house.
Between kisses he talked all the way up the stairs. ‘When you collapsed outside the farmhouse I was like a man possessed. I knew I was in love…or that I thought I was in love. But I had no idea that you felt the same way. You are so different from every other woman I know. I was afraid to tell you how I felt in case you laughed…’
‘I wouldn’t have laughed,’ Bella whispered, all choked up from realising that he was vulnerable too.
‘I am eleven years older. I feared that you might become bored with me.’
‘No chance.’
‘I couldn’t take my eyes off you the first time I saw you. You didn’t even notice,’ he complained.
‘Rico, try being poor and smashing up a Bugatti. I was in shock, and then you started calling the police—’
‘And you fell asleep in the limo…as if I wasn’t there!’
‘Strikes me your ego needed a little challenge.’ She dropped her voice an octave and boomed in mocking mimicry, ‘“I have known women to take tremendous risks to make my acquaintance.” What do they do—abseil down the walls of the bank and kick their way in through the windows?’ She giggled.
Rico lowered her onto the bed. ‘You might as well have done. You came into my life and turned it upsidedown. You fascinate me.’
‘You fascinate me too.’ She reached up to him, found his mouth again and yanked him down to her.
They made love slowly, luxuriating in every sweet sensation.
‘Am I allowed to buy you things now?’ he asked afterwards. ‘Festoon you with jewellery?’
‘I want a Porsche,’ Bella said out of sheer badness. His black lashes dropped over his too expressive eyes, but his sudden tension said it all for him. ‘No problem. You pass an advanced driving test and I’ll buy you one.’
‘Just you wait,’ Bella told him.
Bella watched Rico swing their daughter up in his arms as he came through the hall. Jenny wrapped her little arms round his throat in a death grip and hugged him, making excitable ‘da-da’ sounds. He had clearly been affectionately attacked by their wolfhound before he’d even got in the door: there was a large, muddy paw-print on his jacket. Bella grinned as he looked up and their eyes connected over Jenny’s dark, curly head-smug green into slightly tense gold.
‘You passed…?’
‘I passed.’
‘Congratulations,’ It sounded rather forced. He couldn’t help it. The thought of her in a Porsche, empowered by an advanced driving test or otherwise, still brought him out in a cold sweat, she assumed.
Having put Jenny down for a nap, she suggested, ‘I’ll take you for a spin, shall I?’
‘You’ve already bought it?’ Rico breathed, looking shattered.
‘It’s in the garage.’
Hector was out for his evening stroll down the drive. He waved. Rico had bought his London house for their use and renovated it. The court case which had put their kidnappers into prison was thankfully long behind them now and Hector had decided to rent a cottage on the estate.
When he wasn’t playing honorary grandpa for Jenny’s benefit, he was fully occupied with thinking up economies for Rico to make at Winterwood. And Rico would listen with that little smile of his and marvel that he had never had such ideas himself. It was just one of the reasons why Bella loved him so much.
Rico peered into the garage with a fixed smile which quickly fell away. ‘That’s a Volvo estate!’
