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Her heart twisted. ‘Yet you’ve achieved success beyond most people’s wildest dreams. Surely the lessons of your childhood should make you proud of who you are now, despite hating some aspects of your upbringing?’
‘I detested all of mine,’ he said with harsh finality. ‘I wouldn’t wish it on my worst enemy.’
The savage edge of pain in his voice made her shiver. She opened her mouth to ask him, but he surged to his feet.
‘I don’t wish to dwell in the past.’ That half-smile flashed on and off. ‘Not when I have a sunset as stunning as this and a wife to rival its beauty.’ He plucked the glass from her hand and pulled her up.
Tucking her head beneath his chin, he enfolded her in his arms, one around her waist and the other across her shoulders. Eva knew it was a signal to drop the subject, but she couldn’t let it go. Not just yet.
She removed his shades and stared into his slate-coloured eyes. ‘For what it’s worth, I gave away my country-club membership to my best friend, I hated boarding school, and I couldn’t ski to save my life so I didn’t even try after I turned ten. I didn’t care about my pedigree, or who I was seen with. Singing and a family who cared for me were the only things that mattered. One helped me get through the other. So, you see, sometimes the grass may look greener on the other side, but most of the time it’s just a trick of the light.’
Several emotions shifted within his eyes. Surprise. Shock. A hint of confusion. Then the deep arrogance of Zaccheo Giordano slid back into place.
‘The sunset, dolcezza,’ he said gruffly. ‘You’re missing it.’
* * *
The feeling of his world tilting out of control was escalating. And it spun harder out of sync the more he fought it.
Zaccheo had been certain he knew what drove Eva and her family. He’d been sure it was the same greed for power and prestige that had sent his father to a vicious and premature death. It was what had made his mother abandon her homeland to seek a rich husband, turn herself inside out for a man who looked down his nose at her son and ultimately made Clara Giordano pack her bags and move to the other side of the world.
But right from the start Eva had challenged him, forced him to confront his long-held beliefs. He hadn’t needed to, of course. Oscar Pennington’s actions had proven him right. Eva’s own willingness to marry Fairfield for the sake of her family had cemented Zaccheo’s belief.
And didn’t you do the same thing?
He stared unseeing at the vivid orange horizon, his thoughts in turmoil.
He couldn’t deny that the discovery of her innocence in bed had thrown him for a loop. Unsettled him in a way he hadn’t been for a long time.
For as long as he could remember, his goal had been a fixed, tangible certainty. To place himself in a position where he erased any hint of neediness from his life, while delivering an abject lesson to those who thought themselves entitled and therefore could treat him as if he were common. A spineless fool who would prostrate himself for scraps from the high table.
He’d proven conclusively yesterday at his wedding reception that he’d succeeded beyond his wildest dreams. He’d watched blue-blooded aristocrats fall over themselves to win his favour.
And yet he’d found himself unsatisfied. Left with a hollow, bewildering feeling inside, as if he’d finally grasped the brass ring, only to find it was made of plastic.
It had left Zaccheo with the bitter introspection of whether a different, deeper goal lay behind the burning need to prove himself above the petty grasp for power and prestige.
The loneliness he’d so offhandedly dismissed had in fact eaten away at him far more effectively than his mother’s rejection and the callous disregard his father had afforded him when he was alive.
Impatiently, he dismissed his jumbled feelings. He didn’t do feelings. He achieved. He bested. And he triumphed.
One miscalculation didn’t mean a setback. Finding out Eva had had no previous lovers had granted him an almost primitive satisfaction he wasn’t going to bother to deny.
And if something came of this union sooner rather than later... His heart kicked hard.
Sliding a hand through her silky hair, he angled her face to his. Her beauty was undeniable. But he wouldn’t be risking any more heart-to-hearts. She was getting too close, sliding under his skin to a place he preferred to keep out of bounds. A place he’d only examined when the cold damp of his prison cell had eroded his guard.
He was free, both physically and in guilt. He wouldn’t return to that place. And he wouldn’t allow her to probe further. Satisfied with his resolution, he kissed her sexy, tempting mouth until the need to breathe forced him to stop.
