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‘Kathy…?’
As she recognised that unforgettable dark-timbred drawl shock flooded Kathy’s taut length. She turned her head on the thin pillow, her apple-green gaze alight with astonishment. Sergio Torrente was poised several feet away just staring at her with sombre dark-as-night eyes.
‘Are you okay?’ he breathed tautly.
‘No…’ She squeezed out the word and it got tangled up in her vocal cords, and the next thing she knew she was sobbing as though her heart would break. In recent months, rigid self-discipline had prevented her from giving way too often to unproductive thoughts. His actual presence, however, was much more challenging at a moment when her defences were down and her emotions were out of her control. ‘Go a-away!’ she told him chokily.
In answer, Sergio made an unexpected move that had all the hallmarks of spontaneity. He smoothed her tangled hair off her damp brow and gripped her trembling hand in his. ‘I can’t leave you alone. Don’t ask me to do that again.’
Kathy made use of the hanky he had produced for her use. ‘How did you find out I was here?’
‘Right now that’s not important. I’ve already talked to the doctor. No doubt the staff has done their best, but you are lying unattended on a trolley in a corridor,’ Sergio murmured in a wrathful undertone. ‘That is not an acceptable level of care.’
‘It’s a small hospital and there’s nothing more they can do for me at present,’ Kathy mumbled unsteadily.
His hold on her fingers tightened. ‘I have an air ambulance on its way and an obstetrician waiting to take charge. Please let me help.’
Kathy did not even have to think about how to respond to that offer, because in terms of treatment it was superior to anything else immediately available to her. Her spirits also received an immediate boost from the obvious fact that he placed as much importance on the safe birth of their child as she did. ‘All right.’
His lean, darkly handsome features were tense and he made no attempt to hide his surprise. ‘I thought you’d make me sweat through every possible argument.’
‘All I care about is what’s best for my baby,’ Kathy admitted tightly. ‘At this moment our differences don’t matter.’
Everything moved very quickly after that. Attended by paramedics, she was stretchered onto the air ambulance. For the first time in months, she found herself actually worrying about what she looked l
ike and she couldn’t get over how silly and superficial she was being. How could she waste energy worrying that her eyelids and her nose might be pink and swollen? Or wondering if her large tummy equalled Mount Everest while she was lying flat? At best, she knew she had to look tired and tousled like most heavily pregnant women after a more than usually trying day. Even Sergio was a touch less perfect than usual, she reasoned in desperation. He had loosened his silk tie, dishevelled his black hair with impatient fingers and a blue-black shadow of stubble was beginning to define his stubborn jaw line and strong, sensual mouth. But he still looked totally amazing to her.
Just then he frowned with concern, visually questioning her lingering appraisal.
Cheeks reddening, Kathy shook her head to indicate that there was nothing wrong and shut her eyes tight. But the image of the guy she loved stayed with her. She loved him to bits, hated his guts for all sorts of reasons, as well, but she was still as possessed by a bone-deep longing for him as a starving woman sighting life-giving food. She knew he was bad for her, knew too big a dose of him was dangerous, but he was in her blood and in her mind and, no matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t shake free of his influence over her.
In what seemed to her a remarkably short space of time, and with impressive efficiency, she was transported to the opulent comfort of a private London hospital. There she was given an ultrasound scan.
‘I’d like to stay,’ Sergio said flatly.
An objection was brimming on her lips and a glimpse of his taut profile warned her that that was exactly the response he expected from her. She swallowed back her protest because he was doing everything within his power to help and excluding him yet again seemed unfair. As she steeled herself to have her tummy exposed another thought occurred to her and she tugged at the sleeve of his jacket to get his attention.
Sergio angled his arrogant dark head down to her.
‘We’re having a girl,’ she whispered.
Fine ebony brows drawing together, Sergio lifted his head and stared at her before comprehension sank in. Suddenly and entirely unexpectedly, a smile curved his wide sculpted mouth.
When the procedure commenced, she realised that she need not have worried about baring her swollen belly because Sergio’s fascination was wholly reserved for the images on screen. A shot of the baby’s face made him marvel out loud in Italian and reach for her hand. ‘Awesome,’ he finally murmured in roughened English. ‘She is awesome.’
Tears dampened her eyes and she blinked them back fiercely. Some tests were carried out and a foetal monitor was attached to her, before she was finally slotted into bed in a luxurious private room. The obstetrician soothed her worst fears by telling her that babies born after the thirty-fourth week of gestation had a high rate of survival and less chance of suffering long-term complications. Even so, there were no guarantees and the longer her baby stayed in the womb the healthier she was likely to be. With Kathy still at risk of going into labour, the treatment plan was bed-rest and hydration.
Minutes after leaving with the obstetrician, Sergio reappeared.
‘I thought you’d gone,’ Kathy commented.
‘Per meraviglia…I hope that’s a joke.’ Astute dark-as-night eyes rested on her. ‘But it’s not a joke, is it?’
Kathy sidestepped that issue, for she had not intended to annoy him. ‘Well, now that we’re on our own, at last you can tell me how long you’ve known where I was living.’
‘I found out today at the same time as I heard you had been hospitalised.’ Lean bronzed features bleak, Sergio studied her from the foot of the bed. ‘I was last in the chain. Nola—whoever she is—contacted Bridget Kirk, who decided to pass the news on to Renzo Catallone.’
‘Bridget told Renzo?’ Her brows pleated in surprise. ‘I didn’t even know they’d met.’
