‘So what are your ground rules?’ His voice was low and disconcertingly expressionless as he pushed the words past his even, clenched white teeth, but at least it gave her the impetus to drag herself free of the sensual vortex that had held her immobile for a few shaming moments.
This was what she had been trying not to think about: the fact, inescapable and shameful, that after all that had happened she was still disastrously attracted to Roman... No, attracted was an insipid word to describe her physical response to him, which in the past she had thought of as a form of temporary insanity.
Except it wasn’t temporary!
She had been avoiding it by focusing on the practicalities involved with bringing him into Jamie’s life. The irony of this scenario was wedged like a lead weight against her breastbone. He clearly resented her being in control when in actuality she had not felt less in control...at least of her own body for...well, actually ever since she had left his hotel room more than five years ago.
As the pounding in her head stepped up its painful tempo her aggravation and seething frustration exploded into speech. ‘I really wish you wouldn’t take everything so personally, Roman! I’m not trying to make a point, but actually, if you want to look at it that way, they are my rules.
‘If you want to be any part of Jamie’s life...’ She paused, wondering if he actually knew what he wanted in practical terms, but not sure she actually wanted to know. ‘I’m genuinely not trying to be awkward. I’m—’ Her waving hand gesture and helpless shoulder shrug begged his understanding. When there was no crack in his stony façade she shook her head. ‘I’m trying to avoid a difficult situation. He is only four and I don’t want him confused, so you can’t rush him. He needs to get to know you before we tell him who you are.’
Roman’s head reared back as though she’d struck him. ‘You’re protecting him from me?’
The same way his mother had tried to protect him and Rio from their father.
‘You need to be patient, Roman.’ She sighed. ‘You can’t expect him to just...’
‘Love me.’
A short, strained silence followed this interruption.
‘That wasn’t what I was about to say,’ she said quietly. She gnawed gently on her full lower lip, the action causing his eyes to drift in that direction, pausing on the lush plumpness that bore the imprint of her teeth. ‘I just wanted to warn...’ He stiffened and she held up both hands. ‘Oh, for heaven’s sake, this is like walking on eggshells! This is hard enough without you being so damned touchy. I’m just trying to say—if you’ll let me?’
Their eyes connected and after a short pause one corner of his mouth lifted. ‘Go ahead...’ He opened his hand in invitation.
‘I’m just trying to warn you not to expect too much too soon. We haven’t really discussed just how we’re going to do this, but I don’t want you to have unrealistic expectations.’
‘You’re trying to warn me not to expect him to love me on sight. I’m not an idiot, Marisa.’
‘I think we should take things slowly.’
A nerve clenched in his lean cheek. He’d waited five years, he told himself; a few more days would not matter.
‘In a few months when—’
‘Months!’
Marisa lowered her gaze, seeing no point in pushing things any further. ‘Let’s just play it by ear, shall we?’ His silence was better than an argument and she decided to interpret his grim expression as a yes. ‘He’s playing outside—this way.’ She gestured to the open door to their left.
For a split second she thought he was not going to react to her invitation, and she allowed herself a little sigh of relief when he did.
Conscious of his towering presence, in every sense of the word, she led the way through the doorway to the rear of the house past what had once been a dairy and was now a boot room. She unlatched the closed portion of the stable door that led out to the kitchen garden, where gravel paths wove their way through a geometric arrangement of raised beds bursting with a variety of leafy green vegetables, herbs and soft fruit, each bordered by neatly trimmed box hedging.
‘That one is Jamie’s garden,’ she said with a proud smile as they passed one of the raised beds that stood out from the other well-tended beds with their straight lines and leafy growth because there were no straight lines in sight, just patches of seedlings poking their way through the ground in artistic swirls, and seed packets tied to sticks fluttering in the breeze.
She turned her head to explain to Roman how much Jamie loved to watch things grow and his fascination with creepy-crawlies, and caught a look on his lean face as he followed her gaze and registered the swirls of green, that brought a lump to her throat and an ache of unexpected empathy to her heart. She looked away quickly but was left with a feeling that she had suddenly intruded on a very private moment.
When she turned back, the mixture of longing and loss was gone as he righted a wooden marker that said trees, the wobbly letters in green marker pen sloping, the s back to front.
‘He calls broccoli trees,’ she explained as he straightened up and dusted his hands
