He came around to her side of the bench and dug his hands into her hips.
‘Every. Single. One.’
* * *
‘This place is so beautiful.’ She stared out at the rolling hills of the countryside, her eyes clinging to the fruit orchard in the foreground before moving on and landing on the glistening ocean. ‘I don’t know how you can ever leave.’
‘Business,’ he said simply. ‘My office can’t actually function for that long without me.’ He thought of the emails his assistants had been forwarding and grimaced. ‘I have to get back.’
Emmeline sighed. ‘Today?’
‘Now,’ he agreed.
Or soon, he amended, sitting on the spot of grass beside her. After three days in the countryside he wasn’t sure he could put off the reality of life for a moment longer. He wanted to, though.
‘But it’s so nice,’ she said again, tilting her head to look at him.
She rested her cheek on her knees, which were bent against her chest, and he had to fight against reaching out and touching her. It was his ‘go to’ impulse now, and he suspected he might need some kind of ‘Emmeline patch’ to get through a day in the office without her.
How had he ever thought her ordinary and dull to look at? She was so breathtakingly beautiful that he derided himself for not having noticed. It didn’t matter what she wore—these past three days she’d gone around in old shirts of his and she’d looked sexier than any woman he’d ever known.
No, she was simply Emmeline.
He saw every expression that crossed her face—including the slight flicker of regret that shifted her lips downwards now.
‘You can stay here,’ he said quietly. ‘I can come back on the weekend. If you’d prefer it...’
‘No.’
The response was instantaneous. How could she stay away from him? Her addiction was firmly entrenched. She couldn’t remember a time when his body hadn’t taken over hers.
‘We’ll come back some other time.’
She stood a little jerkily, wiping her hands across her knees.
He followed her and got to his feet, then caught her around her waist. ‘I’m glad we came here.’
‘Me too.’
Her smile was bright, but there was something in her expression that he didn’t like. An uncertainty he wanted to erase.
Only he had no idea how.
He’d spent three days with her but he hadn’t uncovered a single secret. Instead, he’d got to know her body intimately. He’d become acquainted with every single one of her noises, every single movement her body made that signalled pleasure, need, desire, an ache. He’d learned to read her body like a book, and yet her mind was still an enigmatic tangle of uncertainty...
* * *
‘You seem nervous.’
She flicked her gaze to him, wondering at his perceptive abilities. ‘I guess I am.’
Her smile was tight. Forced. Anxious.
Pietro slowed the car down, then pulled off to the side of the road. Emmeline’s gaze followed a young child skipping down the street, his mother walking behind, her arms crossed, her eyes amused.
‘What is it?’
Emmeline shifted her gaze from the child—his mother was next to him now, her smile contagious.
‘Honestly?’
‘Si, certamente.’
‘It’s stupid.’
‘I doubt it,’ he said reassuringly, his voice low and husky.
The statement was a balm to her doubts. Still, she hesitated before she spoke.
‘What happened back there...’ She bit down on her lip and cast a glance over her shoulder, towards the road they’d just travelled at speed. ‘The closer we get to Rome, the more it feels like a fantasy. Like it never really happened. Like it won’t happen again.’
‘How can you say that?’ he asked, a genuine smile of bemusement on his face. ‘I was there. It happened. It happened a lot.’
Pink spread through her cheeks and she looked away, uncomfortable and disconcerted. ‘But it doesn’t feel real, somehow.’
He expelled a soft sigh. ‘It was real.’
She nodded, but her uncertainty was palpable. ‘I guess it’s just...the last time we were in Rome everything was still so weird between us.’
His laugh caressed her skin.
He pulled back into the traffic, his attention focussed ahead. ‘A lot’s happened since then.’
And it had—but the fundamental truth hadn’t changed, except in one crucial way. It was weighing on him more and more, heavy around his neck. Knowing that her father was dying and that she had no idea was an enormous deceit now. They’d crossed a line; they were lovers.
But Pietro wasn’t overly concerned. Of the many things he excelled at, one of his strengths was managing people and situations. He just had to manage this situation tightly. Starting with his father-in-law.
CHAPTER NINE
‘YOU DO NOT sound well,’ he drawled down the phone, wondering at the sense of anger he felt towards this man he’d always admired and respected. A man he loved. A man who had helped him remember himself after the despair of losing his own father.
Col’s cough was a loud crackle. ‘I’m fine. The goddamned nurse is here, taking my temperature.’
‘Rectally?’ Pietro’s response was filled with impatience. He softened it with a small laugh. ‘Because you sound cranky as all hell.’
‘I am. I’m a damned prisoner in this room.’ Another cough. ‘How’s my girl, Pietro? Are you looking after her?’
Again, a surge of annoyance raged through Pietro’s chest. ‘She doesn’t appear to need much looking after. Emmeline is stronger than I’d appreciated.’
Col’s laugh was broken by a wheeze. ‘Ah. I see you’ve come up against her stubborn side. Try not to judge her too harshly for it. She inherited that from me.’
‘Mmm...’ Pietro nodded, rubbing his palm over his stubble. He should have shaved. The pink marks of his possession had become regular fixtures on Emmeline’s skin.
‘Is there a problem?’ Col’s question was imbued with the strength that was part and parcel of the man.
‘Si.’
‘What is it? She’s happy, isn’t she? You told me you’d look after her...’
‘She’s happy,’ Pietro agreed, thinking
