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Not that she wanted him to cater to any need. Certainly not that insistent need that was making its presence felt as she attempted to smile for Gianni’s sake, despite the fact that he was barely paying attention to her.
The housekeeper had found him a box of toys—apparently left over from her grandchildren’s visit—and Gianni, content from a spaghetti lunch, was fully engrossed in it. Free from Rocco’s presence, she had time to think.
Marriage. To Rocco.
For Gianni’s sake.
Wasn’t that what she’d wanted three years ago, even in her darkest moments when she’d feared she and Rocco might not settle their differences? For her child not to be denied its parent, the way she’d been?
So why did she feel this void inside her, as if something was missing? Besides a relationship with Gianni, Rocco was offering her career back. Another chance to fulfil the promise of both a profession and family, the way her mother had neve
r been able to do.
For as long as she could remember, her mother’s bitterness at what she’d deemed her unfulfilled potential at a career had been blamed on Mia. It was the reason she’d resisted the urge to jump straight into a family with Rocco when they’d first got engaged, despite the subtle pressures.
Fate—and a particularly heated bout of lovemaking where she couldn’t remember whether they’d used protection or not—had found a way to settle things once and for all.
She had a son she’d never known she could love this much.
Rocco had the son and heir that he’d not so secretly craved. His grandmother had the offspring from her only grandchild. In essence, everyone would get what they desired if she married Rocco.
So what was stopping her?
Because you want more. She hid a grimace as the answer echoed in her heart.
No, she couldn’t want more because more was dangerous.
My parents abandoned me when I was a child...
Mia’s gaze swung to her son; she watched his profile, a younger version who would one day grow into the same formidable man his father was.
Could she deny him a chance to grow under his father’s care?
No, she couldn’t. She knew first-hand the anguish that would bring.
But marriage?
Her fingers shook, and she folded her arms to hide the trembling. It didn’t mean anything, she assured herself. She would merely be another occupant underneath the roof of the sprawling villa in Palermo where Rocco lived with his grandmother.
Her lips twisted.
Most likely Rocco wouldn’t even notice her presence, as absorbed as he’d become in his son in so short a time. Again that hollow inside her shifted, widened. Much as she wanted to dismiss it, Mia knew it wasn’t that easy.
Once upon a time Rocco Vitelli had been the centre of her world.
Goodness, she’d even fancied herself in love with him. And, as evidenced, he still had sexual appeal she couldn’t easily evade. But she had resisted him...
As she watched her son, her resolve slowly hardened.
She could do this.
That sexual weakness had been a temporary aberration, thrown up by the unsettling reality of coming face to face with Rocco after all this time. There were more important things to focus on. Gianni’s emotional well-being. Her career.
And when the appropriate time passed, she would be free. She slowly breathed out. This was her decision, and she would make it work. Retracing her steps from where she’d paced to the window to stare out into the vast manicured garden, which seemed almost too good to be true in a property in Central London, she stopped beside her son.
Unable to stop herself from touching him, she ruffled Gianni’s hair.
He looked up, a smile breaking on his face as he held up a toy. A red racing car. Mia smiled back, her heart filling with love all over again. If anything good came out of this, she prayed, let it be that Gianni would receive everything she’d been denied. To not experience the isolation she’d been forced to endure in her own childhood with a mother who’d laid all her hardships at her daughter’s feet.
