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‘But Paolo …’
‘Paolo was about nine then and running around getting into trouble.’
‘This man, Stefano Arrigi, took us in. He mentored me.’ He shrugged. ‘Said he saw something in me that he’d never seen in anyone else, and I worked hard. He had no family. When he died I was twenty-one and he left his small construction business to me.’
‘And now the business is known all over the world …’
He nodded again with no apparent pride. Just quiet modesty.
Alicia’s heart ached for the young man he’d been. She understood because she too had suffered a similar fate, albeit not ending up on the streets, thank goodness. But somehow she knew that he wouldn’t appreciate her baring her soul, and she still felt far too vulnerable to reveal any more about herself. But it gave her an insight into his complex character and when he stood to lead her inside, clearly done with talking, she knew that, despite her best efforts, she had just fallen even harder in love with him.
When they returned to their suite the following Sunday evening from a group wine tasting trip to the beautifully leafy area of Stellenbosch, Alicia picked up a piece of paper that gave the details of a medical unit that was going to be in the hotel for the rest of the conference. She looked at him warily. ‘What’s this about?’
Dante stood apart from her, arms folded. ‘While I thought you were off sightseeing all last week, I found out from Patricia that you were acting as an impromptu Florence Nightingale …’
He seemed almost angry. And Alicia had no idea why. It seemed like, no matter what she did, she’d end up annoying him somehow. They’d shared a comparative truce for the rest of the week but all weekend he’d been dark and brooding.
‘You don’t have to go to the expense of this. I don’t mind looking after the odd child with sunburn or someone with a tummy upset—’
He lifted a hand and ticked off fingers. ‘Or a child with
a sprained ankle, or a man who can’t sleep, or the receptionist with cramps, or—’
‘OK, OK, stop.’ She held up her hands, aghast that he knew this. ‘If I’d known you’d mind so much I wouldn’t have offered to help.’
Dante’s head whirled with the way the whole anatomy of this relationship—this situation, he corrected angrily—had changed utterly. Alicia had endeared herself not only to his close friends, the O’Briens, but to everyone else too, it seemed. Buchanen’s wife, who had arrived towards the end of last week, was in raptures over the fact that she and Alicia shared the vocation of nursing. He couldn’t move for people stopping him and telling him how great she was, how sweet she was, how kind she was.
And it was killing him. Because he knew what she was. The facts were stark. Until that baby was born, the jury was out on Alicia and Melanie Parker. And he would be the biggest prize fool to forget it. Because he knew he was in danger of succumbing, believing in the myth. He’d seen the myth before and it had revealed a very ugly truth. This was when he had to be most vigilant.
He could cope with the fact that Alicia was what she was because he was equipped to deal with a woman like her. But he was angry with her dogged persistence in maintaining this. façade. He forced himself to cool down. Years before, it had affected him, but not any more. He was in control now. No matter what happened. All he was interested in was sating his physical hunger, which burned through him like a bushfire.
He strolled towards her and tipped her chin up. ‘Oh, I don’t mind, Alicia. I just don’t like sharing you around … that’s all.’
His possessiveness should have excited her but it didn’t, because the dark coldness in his eyes hinted at an emotion that began and ended with physical desire. He didn’t want her to stop because he cared about her … foolish girl.
Tears pricked the back of her eyes as he claimed her mouth and the familiar sensations washed through her body. Nothing had changed. He still didn’t trust her, he still thought that she and Melanie had concocted some plan to extort money … and after the end of next week she would be gone, back home.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
‘I WANT you to come back to Italy and stay with me in Rome.’
Alicia felt dizzy when Dante said the words. They were so far removed from what she would have expected to hear.
And lying on her back, naked, with Dante propped up on one arm beside her, also naked and visibly aroused, was not the best place to be when he said that.
It was the end of the second week. The following evening they were due to fly back to Europe from Cape Town. The negotiations were over and they had been a great success. Buchanen had signed the contracts in a big press conference along with Derek and Dante just yesterday. Work was due to start on the sports stadium within the next year.
That morning they’d travelled down to a luxurious hideaway hotel in a small town called Arniston Bay on the stunningly picturesque Garden Route. Alicia hadn’t questioned Dante’s impetuous decision, made when one of the South African staff in the hotel had offered to fly them down there on the tiny private hotel jet.
She’d grabbed at the chance to be alone with him. And all day Alicia had existed in a haze of self-deluded, fuzzy fantasy. She and Dante had explored the white, white sands and rolling dunes and had swum in the dark blue sea.
And now he was asking her to stay on, to come back and keep indulging in the dream? Her head said, That way lies madness and pain, but her heart just said, Go.
‘But …’ she struggled to try and make sense of what he was saying ‘… why would you want that?’
‘Because what we have is good …’ Here he ran a hand up over her belly to cup her breast.
Immediately it tightened and her breathing changed. She pulled his hand down. ‘But—’
