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Sam, who had come to stand behind his wife, placed a hand on her shoulder. ‘Come on, sweetheart. Let’s leave them to it.’ As he took his infant son from her arms he looked directly at Erin. ‘Val didn’t want to do this.’ He glanced towards Francesco, nodded almost imperceptibly, and guided his wife from the room.
CHAPTER SEVEN
FOR several seconds after the door closed Erin did not move or react. The silence in the room screamed.
The only way she had survived their separation was by recognising that she no longer loved Francesco. That she never actually had. Real love, the sort that endured, was slow burning. It had nothing to do with the dark, sizzling heat and mind-numbing lust their marriage had been based on, but was about shared interests and mutual respect.
Mutual respect, she muttered through clenched lips. It was a necessary reminder. It would be perilously easy to allow chemistry to confuse her when every cell in her body was reacting to him standing there.
She could be sexually attracted to him—who wouldn’t be? But attraction didn’t equate with deeper feelings.
It equated with disaster!
Concentrate, she told herself, and don’t think about his mouth. Concentrate on what a total bastard he is and getting out of this room without making a total fool of yourself … that and breathe.
Yes, breathing would be useful. She tilted her chin and took a deep, steadying breath, schooling her stiff features into what she hoped was an expression of contempt.
‘This is a pretty low trick, Francesco, even by your standards.’
Eyes trained on her face, he gave a very Latin shrug. ‘I had no alternative.’
Before she had walked into the room he had been angry. Now she was here and he was still angry, but interwoven with the anger were tenacious threads of tenderness. Hands clenched, he ruthlessly subdued a sudden strong compulsion to cradle her in his arms. Under the hostility she looked so damned fragile!
The groove above his masterful nose etched deep as his eyes continued to rake her face.
Some might have considered the recent changes in her appearance were subtle, but not Francesco, who had every line and curve of her face committed to memory.
The alterations screamed at him. Her face was thinner, emphasising the delicate bone structure and making her eyes appear even bigger, and there was a haunted quality in their bright jewellike depths. Her skin still had that fabulous translucent quality, but there were fine lines of strain around her wide mouth.
Were these visible signs of strain the results of a difficult pregnancy? He had to clamp his teeth over the angry demands for information that hovered on his tongue.
Her lips twisted and Erin shook her head in weary disbelief. There wasn’t even a hint of apology in his manner. And you’re surprised? she taunted herself.
‘No alternative but to lie and cheat—now why aren’t I surprised?’ she drawled.
A flash of anger ignited the gold highlights deep in his dark eyes. ‘You would not take my calls, Erin.’
The way he said her name always had caused her stomach muscles to flutter. It still did, though as there was a lot of quivering going on it was hard to separate out the disturbing sensation from all the others.
‘You refused my request for a face-to-face meeting.’ The steel in his manner was more pronounced as his dark eyes narrowed in recollection.
‘Call singular,’ Erin countered coldly.
‘You can relax, Francesco I don’t want your money, if that’s what you’re worried about.’
Erin permitted herself a bitter smile as she wondered what her mother would say if she had heard this statement.
Far from responding to her scornful rejection of his fortune with any sign of visible relief, Francesco merely dismissed her.
‘Money? I have no interest in money. I have not been calling you every day to talk about money.’ His hands clenched at his sides as he struggled to contain his sense of outrage.
‘Every day! Now I know that’s not true,’ she told him, appalled at this outright and not terribly imaginative lie.
For the first week after she had returned to England she had fully expected him to turn up. She had pretty much lived in dread … well, about half the time had been dread. The shameful fact was the other fifty per cent of the time her feelings had more accurately fallen under the heading of eager, impatient even, sweaty-palmed, heart-thudding anticipation of opening the door and finding him standing there.
But as it turned out there had been no occasion for her to use her specially prepared speech, the one that made allowances for his feelings. It had been humiliating, but in the long run she had told herself a very important lesson.
She had made the mistake of assuming that he wanted their marriage to continue. That he wanted her. And he hadn’t even picked up a phone to ask her to come back, to say that he missed her.
