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She was exactly like his mother, before she’d had a forbidden love ripped away from her because of the conception of a baby. A child born to be treated with nothing but scorn because the child was to blame. The reason her love had abandoned her. Had been driven away...
He wouldn’t cause another woman’s unhappiness.
Raffaele disposed of the condom in the bin and opened the door, moved through it. His feet were taking him back to her. He needed to tell her—fix this. Protect her.Himself.
He walked back into the bedroom.
Everything stood still. Stopped.
She was gone.
Naked, he moved through the hallway, went back to the lounge, opened every door, flicked every switch, turned on every light. He paused only for a moment to pull on his underwear before jogging out onto the terrace. He moved to the concealed door, yanked it open, took the steps to the floor beneath two at a time.
She was nowhere.
Gone.
He ran to the elevator at the end of the corridor. He jabbed at the buttons. His gut demanded he go and knock on every door. Wake up whoever was inside and demand if they housed her.
But he wouldn’t.
The lift arrived. He threw himself inside and hit the buttons. All of them. He dragged his fingers through his hair. If she had a room...if she was still in the hotel...he would find her. He had to tell her.
With each stop of the elevator he stepped outside, searched the quiet halls on every floor with his eyes. The emptiness was so loud his ears ached.
The lift doors pinged for the last time and opened to an empty reception area. His chest heaved. He strode forward. Stood still in the centre of the grand foyer. Raised his head to the chandelier and stained-glass ceiling and took in the hotel’s hugeness.
His hotel.
Twenty floors. Four hundred and thirty-seven rooms. Fifteen more hidden rooms adjoining secret stairs and hidden exits. Possibly hundreds of occupants in the entire hotel...thousands of names...
He wanted to roar. Demand her presence. But he did not know her name, this anonymous woman who might have a piece of him growing inside her.
The image of a boy no more than five flashed in his mind. Alone. Kicked out of his house by his mother, screaming for him to get out. Telling him that she didn’t want him. That she never had. Lonely and afraid, the little boy had left. Because he didn’t know how to make his mother happy. How to keep the fridge full. How to make herwanthim.
His child would never be unwanted.
It would always be aware of who it was and where it came from.
His child would not only survive—it would thrive. Withhisname and the empire he’d built around it. His child would know it had a place in this world. His child would be protected.
If she was pregnant.
Whatever it took—however long it took—he would find her...
CHAPTER THREE
Six weeks later...
RAFFAELEGRIPPEDTHECONTROLS. The view before him was a patchwork quilt of dull green, with black shadows of gnarly trees dotting the hills and dips of the English countryside. Ancient woodlands, shaped and bent by the coastal winds at his back, bowed to him as he flew past. His helicopter sliced through the lavender streaks of a determined sun, turning the grey mist lingering in the air into a display of contrasts.
For six weeks she’d lived in his head.
Finding her had been more difficult than he’d expected because she hadn’t used her real name to book into the hotel.
She’d used her birth name.
Flora Campbell. Abandoned into the care system at fourteen weeks old. Remained in the foster system until two farmers adopted her and whisked her away to a dairy farm straddling the borders of two villages housing only a few thousand people.
