Читать книгу The Best Of The Year - Modern Romance 2016 - Эбби Грин, Кейт Хьюит - Страница 31

CHAPTER NINE

‘I BELIEVE THE medication you received in hospital may have disrupted your birth control. Of course, no contraceptive pill is foolproof either. It’s an interesting conundrum,’ Mr Abramo remarked as if the development were purely one of academic interest. ‘Fortunately you’re in much better health than you were a month ago...absolutely blooming, in fact!’

Poppy’s smile felt stiff because she was still in shock. She was pregnant, one hundred per cent with no room for error pregnant and Gaetano was likely to go into even greater shock over that reality. One night, one bout of passion, one baby. Obviously, Gaetano would feel that he had been very unlucky. What were the odds of such a development? What would he want to do? How would he react? She was already praying that he would not hope that she might be willing to consider a termination.

While it was true that she hadn’t planned on a baby, she still wanted the child that was now on its way. Her baby and Gaetano’s, a little piece of Leonetti heritage that even Gaetano couldn’t take off her again, divorce or otherwise. A little boy, a little girl, Poppy wasn’t fussy about the gender. Indeed she was getting excited about the prospect of motherhood and feeling guilty about the fact. How could she dare to look forward happily to an event that would probably seriously depress and infuriate Gaetano, who preferred to plan everything and liked to believe that he could control everybody and everything in his life? The baby would be a wildly out-of-control event. And Gaetano had been frank from the outset that he did not want to risk a conception when they were planning to part. Having foreseen that scenario, he had set out to prevent that situation arising.

Before her conscience could claim her and stifle her natural impulses, Poppy paid a visit to a very exclusive baby shop in Florence where without the smallest encouragement she purchased an incredibly expensive shawl and a tiny pair of exquisite white lace bootees. When she emerged again, clutching a cute beribboned bag, she saw her pair of bodyguards exchanging knowing looks and, scolding herself for her mindless compulsion, made a hurried comment about needing wrapping paper for her gift.

When she returned to La Fattoria for lunch, Gaetano was still in Paris. But he might well have fallen asleep during the flight there, Poppy thought with a wicked little smile. Quite deliberately she had exhausted him. A sexually satiated tired male was unlikely to be tempted by the offer of sex on the side. She had kept him up half the night and had awakened him at dawn in a manner that he had sworn was the ultimate male fantasy. His response had been incredibly enthusiastic. But then Gaetano had remarkable stamina, she reflected sunnily. She ached all over. She ached in places she hadn’t known she could ache but it had all been in a good cause. Surely Serena could no longer be considered a threat?

Given the smallest excuse, Gaetano would have abandoned Serena at the airport. Her incessant flirtatiousness had begun to irritate him during the flight back. Raunchy jokes about bankers and the mile-high club had fallen on stony ground. Gaetano had partied on board when he’d acquired his first private jet but those irresponsible days were far behind him now that he was in the act of becoming the new CEO of the Leonetti Bank. He was quietly satisfied by the attainment of that long-held ambition but he had spent far more time choosing a gift for Poppy during a break between meetings than he had spent considering his lofty rise in status. Ironically now that he had that status it meant less than he had expected to him. His focus in life had definitely shifted in a different direction.

Poppy got sleepy in the late afternoon and went for a nap. She lay on the bed wondering about how best to share her news with Gaetano and tears prickled her eyes because she feared his reaction. He wasn’t likely to be happy about her pregnancy and she had to accept that. It would drive them apart, not keep them together. Fate had thrown them something that couldn’t be easily worked around.

* * *

Gaetano was strangely disappointed when Poppy didn’t greet him downstairs as Muffin did. Muffin hurled himself cheerfully at Gaetano’s legs, refused to sit when told and barked like mad. Muffin didn’t discriminate. Everyone who came through the front door received the same boisterous, undisciplined welcome. Dolores informed Gaetano that Poppy had gone up to lie down and concern quickened the long strides with which he mounted the stairs. Suddenly Gaetano was worrying about what the doctor might have told his wife about her health because taking forty winks in the evening was more Rodolfo’s style.

As Gaetano entered the bedroom, Poppy, roused by Muffin’s barks, pushed herself up on her elbows and smiled, tousled red hair falling round her sleep-flushed face.

‘I exhausted you last night,’ Gaetano assumed with a wolfish grin of all-male satisfaction as he stood at the foot of the bed. ‘I wondered what you were doing in bed and started worrying about what Mr Abramo might have said but that was before I remembered that you had another very good reason to need some extra rest.’

‘It’s the heat. It makes me feel drowsy.’ Butterflies danced to a jungle beat in her tummy while she studied him.

In his beautifully tailored designer suit, Gaetano was a vision of masculine elegance and sex appeal. He was gorgeous with dark stubble outlining his strong jaw line and those intense dark eyes below his extraordinary lashes. Her breasts tingled and heat simmered low in her pelvis.

‘It’s weird because I’ve only been away a few hours...but I missed you,’ Gaetano confided in a constrained undertone. ‘What did Mr Abramo have to say?’

Poppy tensed and swung her legs off the side of the bed so that she was half turned away from him. ‘He had some news for me after the tests,’ she told him tautly.

‘What sort of news?’ Gaetano prompted, shedding his jacket and jerking loose his tie while wondering if she would consider him excessively demanding and greedy if he joined her on the bed.

‘Unexpected news,’ Poppy qualified tightly. ‘You’re going to be surprised.’

‘So, go ahead and surprise me,’ Gaetano urged, unsettled by her uncharacteristic reluctance to meet his eyes and shelving the sexual trail to force his brain to focus.

‘I’m pregnant.’ She framed the words curtly, refusing to sound apologetic or nervous, putting it out there exactly like the fact of life it was.

‘How could you possibly be pregnant?’ Gaetano shot at her with an incredulous frown. ‘If it had only just happened, it would be too soon to know and the one and only other time...it isn’t possible...’

‘It is possible. I fell ill that same day and I missed taking my pill. Mr Abramo also believes the drugs I was given could have interfered with my birth control,’ she told him flatly.

‘You got pregnant on our wedding night?’ Gaetano queried in astonishment. ‘From one time? What are you? The fertility queen?’

‘You didn’t use a condom,’ she reminded him.

‘There shouldn’t have been a risk.’

‘If you’re having sex there’s always a risk,’ she pointed out ruefully. ‘The odds weren’t good that night because I ended up in hospital. In any other circumstances we’d probably have got away with it.’

‘Pregnant,’ Gaetano repeated, expelling his breath on a long slow hiss as he paced over to the windows, the taut muscles in his lean behind and long, powerful legs braced rigid with tension. ‘You’re pregnant.’

Although there was little expression in his dark, deep drawl Poppy took strength from his lack of anger and his ability to joke. Gaetano was dealing with it, wasn’t he? He was good in a crisis, very cool-headed and logical and what they had right now was undeniably a huge crisis. A baby nobody had counted on was on the way, a baby she would nonetheless love and protect to the best of her ability.

Gaetano was still feeling light-headed with shock. A baby! He was going to be a father? Dio mio...he was in no way prepared to be a parent. Having a child was a massive responsibility. It had proved a challenge too much for his own parents and even Rodolfo had struggled with the test of raising Gaetano’s good-for-nothing father. How the hell would he manage? What did he have to offer a child?

‘Gaetano?’ Poppy probed in the tense silence.

He swung round and raked long brown fingers through his cropped black hair in a gesture of frustration. ‘A baby... I can’t believe it. That’s some curve ball to be thrown.’

‘Yes,’ Poppy agreed stiffly. ‘For both of us.’

‘In fact it’s a nightmare,’ Gaetano framed, shocking her with that assessment, which was so much more pessimistic than her own.

Poppy stiffened but fought not to take that comment too personally. ‘Not much I can do to change your outlook if that’s how you feel.’

‘I don’t like the unexpected, the spontaneous,’ he admitted grimly. ‘A baby will turn our lives upside down.’

‘But there’s a positive side as well as a negative side,’ Poppy murmured.

‘Is there?’ Gaetano traded in stark disagreement. ‘We had a divorce planned.’

Poppy lost colour and screened her eyes. A nightmare? That had been a body blow but that his second comment on their situation should refer to their divorce was even tougher. But what had she expected from him? A bottle of champagne and whoops of satisfaction? It could have been a lot worse, she told herself urgently. Gaetano could have lost his temper. He could have tried to imply that the pregnancy was somehow more her fault than his. But then possibly he hadn’t reached that stage yet. After all, he was still pretty much stunned, studying her with brilliant dark eyes that had an unusually unfocused quality. We had a divorce planned. He had gone straight for the jugular.

‘But, obviously I couldn’t possibly leave you to raise my child alone,’ Gaetano completed without skipping a beat. ‘Looks like we’re staying together, bella mia.’

Poppy stiffened at his bleak intonation. ‘So, you’re suggesting that we should forget about getting a divorce now?’

‘What else would I suggest?’ Gaetano asked very drily. ‘You’re carrying the next generation of the Leonetti dynasty. Nobody expects you to do that alone, least of all me. Even though I had two parents they did a fairly rubbish job of raising me. To thrive, our child will need both of us and a stable home to grow up in.’

‘But it’s not what we planned,’ Poppy reminded him while anger simmered like a pot bubbling on the hob beneath her careful surface show of calm.

There was nothing to be gained from losing her temper, she told herself fiercely, but his practical approach was downright insulting. Yes, she agreed that ideally a child should have both parents and a steady home but at what cost? If the parents themselves made sacrifices that resulted in unhappiness how could that be good for anyone? Poppy did not want an unwilling husband and reluctant father by her side. That was not a cross she was prepared to bear for years knowing that it wouldn’t benefit anyone. If that was the best Gaetano had to offer, he could keep it and the wedding ring, she thought painfully. She wanted more, she needed more than a man who would only keep her as a wife because she had fallen pregnant.

‘We couldn’t possibly make a bigger mess of our marriage than my parents did,’ he pointed out wryly. ‘We can only try our best.’

‘As a goal, that just depresses me, Gaetano,’ Poppy admitted.

‘How? We’ll continue on as we are now but at least we won’t be living a lie for Rodolfo’s benefit any longer.’

‘No, you won’t need to live a lie any longer,’ Poppy agreed tightly as she walked towards the door.

‘Where are you going?’

Powered by a furious mix of anger and pain, Poppy ignored the question and stalked up the stairs to the next floor where the luggage was stored. From the room used for that purpose she grabbed up two cases.

From his stance on the landing, Gaetano stared at her in bewilderment. ‘What on earth are you doing?’

‘Your nightmare is leaving you!’ Poppy bit out squarely.

‘I did not call you a nightmare,’ Gaetano argued vehemently.

‘No, you called the baby I’m having a nightmare, which was worse,’ Poppy countered fiercely. ‘This baby may be unplanned and a big unexpected surprise but I love it already!’

‘Dio mio, Poppy!’ Gaetano exclaimed as she yanked garments out of the built-in closets in the dressing room, hangers falling in all directions. ‘Will you please calm down?’

‘Why would I calm down? I’m pregnant and my husband thinks it’s a nightmare!’

‘I didn’t mean it that way.’

‘And you seem to believe that I have no choice but to stay married to you. Well, here’s some news for you, Gaetano... I can have a baby and manage perfectly well without you!’ Poppy slung at him from between gritted teeth. ‘I don’t need you. I deserve more. I don’t intend to stay married to a guy who’s only with me because he thinks it’s his duty!’

‘That’s not what I said.’

‘That’s exactly what you said!’ Poppy slammed a case down on the bed and wrenched it open. ‘Well, this particular nightmare of yours is taking herself off. There’s got to be better options than you waiting for me.’

Standing very still, Gaetano lost colour and watched her intently. ‘There probably is. But I want very badly for you to stay.’

‘No, you don’t, not really,’ Poppy reasoned thinly. ‘You think our baby would be the icing on the cake for Rodolfo but you don’t want to be married and you don’t want to be a father.’

‘I do want to be married to you.’ Gaetano flung back his shoulders and studied her with strained dark eyes. ‘And I know that I can learn how to be a good father. I meant that the situation of being unprepared for a child was a nightmare. I’m not good with surprises but I can roll fast with the punches that come my way. And believe me, watching you pack to leave me is a hell of a punch.’

The firm resolution in that response surprised her. She paused to roughly fold up a dress before thrusting it into the case, sending an unimpressed glance at his lean, darkly handsome face. She wasn’t listening to him, she told herself urgently. She had made her decision. It was better for her to leave him with her head held high than to consider giving him another chance...wasn’t it?

‘Is it? Are you really capable of changing your outlook to that extent? Accepting being married without feeling that you’re somehow doing me a favour and settling for second best?’ she queried with scorn. ‘Accepting our child as the gift that a child is?’

‘I know that I was difficult when I married you.’ Gaetano compressed his lips on that startling admission. ‘I’m not easy-going but I am adaptable and I do learn from my mistakes. Dio mio, bella mia...my attitude to you has changed most of all.’

‘How?’ Poppy prompted, needing him to face up to the major decision he was trying to make for both of them. She didn’t want Gaetano deciding that they should stay married and then changing his mind again because he felt trapped by the restrictions. She had to know and understand exactly what he was thinking and feeling and expecting. How else could she make a decision?

His wide sensual mouth twisted. ‘I don’t want to discuss that.’

‘Why not?’

‘Because sometimes silence is golden and honesty can be the wrong way to go,’ he framed grudgingly. ‘And knowing my luck, I’ll say the wrong thing again.’

‘But you should be able to tell me anything. We shouldn’t have secrets between us. How has your attitude to me changed?’ Poppy persisted, curiosity and obstinacy combining to push her on.

Gaetano glanced heavenward for a brief moment and then drew in a ragged breath. ‘I asked you to pretend to be engaged to me because I thought you would be a huge embarrassment as a fiancée.’

Shock gripped Poppy in a debilitating wave only to be swiftly followed by a huge rush of hurt. ‘In what way?’

‘I was the posh bloke who made unjustified assumptions about you,’ Gaetano admitted, his deep voice raw-edged with regret. ‘I assumed you’d still be using a lot of bad language. I expected you to be totally lost and unable to cope in my world. In fact I believed that your eccentric fashion sense and everything about you would horrify Rodolfo and put him off the idea of me getting married, so that when the engagement broke down he would be relieved rather than disappointed...’

Gaetano had finished speaking but his every word still struck through the fog of Poppy’s shell-shocked state like lightning on a dark stormy night. She felt physically sick.

Gaetano had watched the blood drain from below her skin and fierce tension now stamped his lean dark features. ‘So that’s the kind of guy I really am, the kind of guy you get to stay married to and the father of your future child. I know it’s not pretty but you have earned the right to know the truth about me. Most of the time I’m an absolute bastard,’ he stated bleakly. ‘I tried to use you in the most callous way possible and it didn’t once occur to me to wonder how that experience would ultimately affect you...or Rodolfo.’

Poppy wrapped her arms round her slim body as if she were trying to hold the dam of pain inside her back from breaking its banks. She couldn’t bear to look at him any longer. He had seen from the outset how unworthy she was to be even his fiancée and he had planned to use her worst traits and the handicap of her poor background as an excuse to dump her again without antagonising his grandfather. In short he had handpicked her as the fake fiancée most likely to mortify him.

Poppy cringed inside herself. His prior assumptions appalled her, for she had not appreciated how prejudiced he had still been about her. Shattered by his admission, she felt humiliated beyond bearing. He had seen her flaws right at the beginning and had pinned his hopes on her shaming him. How could he then adapt to the idea of staying married to her for years and years? Raising a child with her? Taking her out in public?

‘The moment I picked you to fail was the moment that I sank to my all-time personal low,’ Gaetano confessed in a roughened undertone. ‘I got it horribly wrong. You showed me how wrong my expectations were. You proved yourself to be so much more than I was prepared for you to be and I became ashamed of my original plan.’

‘But you didn’t need to tell me this once we went as far as getting married,’ she whispered brokenly, backing in the direction of the door, desperate to lick her wounds in private.

‘You’ve always been honest with me. I’m trying to give you the same respect.’

‘Only a couple of months ago you had no respect for me!’ Poppy condemned with embittered accuracy.

‘That changed fast,’ Gaetano fielded, moving a step closer, wanting to hold her so badly and resisting the urge with a frustration that coiled his big hands into fists. ‘I learned to respect you. I learned a lot of other stuff from you as well.’

Feeling as though he were twisting a knife in her heart, Poppy voiced a loud sound of disagreement and snapped, ‘You didn’t learn anything...you never do. You’re dumb as a rock about everything that really matters from giving Muffin a second chance at life to raising our child!’ she accused. ‘How could I ever trust you again?’

Poppy stalked out of the door and he fought his need to follow her. He didn’t want her racing down the stairs and falling in an effort to evade him. ‘Muffin trusts me,’ he murmured flatly to the empty room. Muffin? Muffin who couldn’t even tell him and Rodolfo apart? Admittedly, Muffin wasn’t the sharpest tool in the box.

Gaetano groaned out loud. Maybe he should have kept on pretending to be a better man than he was but Poppy would only have found him out in the end. Poppy had a way of cutting through the nonsense to find the heart of an issue and see what really mattered. Just as Gaetano had finally seen what really mattered. Unfortunately that single instant of inner vision and comprehension had arrived with him pretty late in the day. He wasn’t dumb as a rock about emotional stuff. He simply wasn’t very practised at it. It wasn’t something he’d ever bothered with until Poppy came along.

Poppy pelted out into the cool night. She needed air and space and silence to pull herself back together. The garden was softly lit, low-sited lights shining on exotic leaves and casting shadows in mysterious corners. Her face was wet with tears and she wiped her cheeks with angry hands. Damn him, damn him, damn him! What he had confessed had wounded her deeply. She loved Gaetano and he had always been her dream male. Handsome, brilliant, rich and glitzy, he had met every requirement for an adolescent fantasy. Now for the first time she was seeing herself through his eyes and it was so humiliating she wanted to sink into the earth and stay hidden there for ever.

He had only remembered the highly unsuitable bold girl with the potty mouth, and eccentric clothes, who could be depended on to embarrass him. And being Gaetano, who was never ever straightforward when he could be devious, manipulative and complicated instead, he had hoped to utilise her very obvious faults to frighten Rodolfo out of demanding that his grandson marry. And ironically, Rodolfo himself had set Poppy up for that fall by advising Gaetano to marry ‘an ordinary girl’. And just how many ordinary girls did a jet-setter like Gaetano know?

None. Until Poppy had stumbled in that night at Woodfield Hall, to demand his attention and his non-existent compassion.

An embarrassment to him? No conventional dress sense, a dysfunctional family, no idea how to behave in rich, exclusive circles. Well, nothing had changed and she would never reach the high bar of social acceptability. Poppy shuddered, sick to her stomach with a galling sense of defeat and failure. She had never cared about such things but evidently Gaetano did. Even worse, Gaetano was currently offering to stay married to his unsuitable bride because she was pregnant.

She sat down on one of the cold stone seats sited round the table and her face burned hot in spite of the cool evening air when she remembered what had happened on that table only the day before. Gaetano was like an addiction, toxic, dangerous. He had gone from infuriating her to charming her to making her fall very deeply in love with him. And yet she had still never guessed how he really saw her. The gardener’s daughter with the unfortunate family. It hurt—oh, my goodness, it hurt. But he had been right to tell her because she had needed to know the truth and accept it before she could stop weaving silly dreams about their future. So, how did she stay married to a male who had handpicked her to be an embarrassment?

The answer came swiftly. In such circumstances she could not stay married to Gaetano. Regardless of her pregnancy, she needed to leave him and go ahead with a divorce.

‘Poppy...’

Poppy stiffened. He must have walked across the grass because she would have heard his approach had he used the gravel paths. She breathed in deep, stiffening her facial muscles before she lifted her head.

‘Should I have kept it a secret?’ he asked her in a raw undertone.

He knew she was upset. His dark eyes were lingering on her, probably picking up on the dampness round her eyes even though she had quickly stopped crying. He noticed too much, knew too much about women. ‘No,’ she said heavily. ‘It was better to tell me. I don’t like you for it and it’ll be hard to live with what I now know but you can’t build a relationship on lies and pretences.’

Gaetano stilled in the shadow of the trees, his white shirt gleaming, his spectacular bone structure accentuated by the dim light. ‘Don’t leave me,’ he framed unevenly. ‘Even the idea of being without you scares me. I wouldn’t like my life without you in it.’

Poppy couldn’t imagine Gaetano being scared and she imagined his life would be a lot more normal and straightforward without her in it. Their child deserved better than to grow up with unhappily married and ill-matched parents. A divorce would be preferable to that. She would give Gaetano as much access as he wanted to their child but she didn’t have to live with him or hang round his neck like an albatross to be a good parent. They could both commit to their child while living separately.

‘I can’t stay married to you,’ she told him quietly. ‘What would be the point?’

‘I’m not good with emotions. I’m good at being angry, at being passionate, at being ambitious but I’m no good at the softer stuff. I lost that ability when I was a kid,’ Gaetano admitted grittily. ‘I loved my parents but they were incapable of loving me back and I saw that. I also saw that in comparison to them I felt too much. I learned to hide what I feel and eventually it became such a habit I didn’t have to police myself any more. Emotion hurts. Rejection hurts, so I made sure I was safe by not feeling anything.’

Involuntarily, Poppy was touched that he was talking about his parents in an effort to bridge the chasm that had opened up between them. He never ever talked about his childhood but she would never forget his determined non-reaction when his dog had died, his stark refusal to betray any emotion. ‘That makes sense,’ she conceded.

‘The only woman I ever loved after my mother left was my grandmother.’

‘I thought at some stage you and Serena...’

‘No. I walked away from her because I felt nothing and I knew there should be more.’

Poppy bowed her head, wondering why he was trying to stop her from walking away from him.

‘I’m not quite as dumb as a rock,’ Gaetano asserted heavily. ‘But I was all screwed up about you long before we even got to the wedding. Unfortunately marrying you only made me ten times more screwed up.’

‘Screwed up?’ Poppy queried, shifting uncomfortably on her hard stone seat.

‘I got really involved with the wedding.’

‘Yes, that was a surprise.’

‘I wanted it to be special for you. I became very possessive of you. I assumed it was because we hadn’t had sex.’

‘Obviously,’ Poppy chimed in because he seemed to expect it.

‘In fact I was really only thinking in terms of sex.’

Poppy sent him a rather sad smile. ‘I know that...it’s basically your only means of communication in a relationship.’

‘You’re the only woman I’ve ever had a relationship with.’

Poppy stared at him, green eyes luminous in the light. ‘How can you say that with your reputation?’

‘All those weeks after your illness when I didn’t touch you but we were together all the time...that was like my version of dating,’ Gaetano told her darkly. ‘The affairs I had with women before you went no further than dinner followed by sex or the theatre followed by sex or—’

‘OK... I’ve got the picture,’ she cut in hurriedly, her gaze clinging to the dark beauty of his bronzed features with growing fascination. ‘So...your version of dating?’

‘I wanted to get to know you—’

‘No, you were on a massive guilt trip because I fell ill. That’s why you didn’t sleep with me again and why you spent so much time entertaining me.’

‘I’m not a masochist. I spent so much time with you because I was enjoying myself,’ Gaetano contradicted. ‘And I didn’t touch you again because I didn’t want to be selfish. I thought you would be happier if I made no further demands.’

Poppy sent him a withering appraisal. ‘You got it wrong.’

‘Poppy...let’s face it,’ Gaetano muttered heavily. ‘I got everything wrong with you.’

Her tender heart reacted with a first shard of genuine sympathy. ‘No, the sex was ten out of ten and your version of dating was amazingly engaging. You made me happy, Gaetano. You definitely win points for that.’

‘I bought you something today and it wasn’t until I bought it and realised what it symbolised that I finally understood myself,’ he framed harshly, pulling a tiny box from his pocket.

Poppy studied the fancy logo of a world-famous jeweller with surprised eyes and opened the box. It was a ring, a continuous circlet of diamonds that flashed like fire in the artificial light. She blinked down at it in confusion.

‘It’s an eternity ring,’ Gaetano pointed out very quietly.

A laugh that wasn’t a laugh at all was wrenched from Poppy. ‘Kind of an odd choice when before you came home and I made my announcement you were set on eventually getting a divorce,’ she pointed out.

‘But it expresses how I feel.’ Gaetano cleared his throat in obvious discomfiture. ‘When you talk about leaving me, it tears me apart. Because somewhere along the line, somehow, I fell in love with you, Poppy. I know it’s love because I’ve never felt like this before and the idea of losing you terrifies me.’

‘Love...’ Poppy whispered shakily.

‘Never thought it could happen to me,’ Gaetano confided in a rush. ‘I didn’t want it to happen either. I didn’t want to get attached to anyone and then you came along and you were so perfect I couldn’t resist you.’

‘P-perfect?’ she stammered in a daze.

Gaetano dropped down on his knees in the dew-wet grass and reached for her hand. He tugged off the engagement ring and threaded on the eternity ring so that it rested beside her wedding ring. ‘You’re perfect for me. You get who I am, even with my faults. The money doesn’t get in the way for you, doesn’t impress you. You keep me grounded. You make me unbelievably happy. You make me question my actions and really think about what I’m doing,’ he bit out. ‘With you, I’m something more, something better, and I need that. I need you in my life.’

Her lashes fluttered. She could hear him but she couldn’t quite believe him, there on his knees at her feet, his hand trembling slightly in hers because he was scared, he was scared she wouldn’t listen, wouldn’t accept that he really loved her. And that fear touched her down deep inside, wrapping round her crazy fears about Serena and the terrible insecurities that had sent her running out of the house and sealing them for ever. Suddenly none of that existed because Gaetano loved her, Gaetano needed her...

‘I love you so much. I couldn’t stand to lose you and my first thought when you told me you were pregnant was, “She’ll stay now,” and it was a massive relief to think that even though you didn’t love me you would stay so that we could bring up our child together.’

‘I do love you,’ Poppy murmured intently, leaning forward to kiss him.

‘You’re not just saying it because I said it first?’ Gaetano checked.

‘I really, really love you.’

‘Even though I don’t have a single loveable trait?’ he quoted back at her quick as a flash.

‘You grew on me like mould,’ Poppy told him deadpan.

Gaetano burst out laughing and sprang upright, pulling her up into the circle of his arms. ‘Like mould?’ he queried.

Poppy looked up into his beautiful eyes and her heart did a happy dance inside her. ‘I like cheese,’ she proclaimed defensively.

‘Do you like your ring?’

‘Very much,’ she told him instantly, smiling up at him with a true sense of joyful possessiveness. ‘But I like what it symbolises most of all. You didn’t want to let me go, you wanted to keep me.’

‘And I intend to keep you for ever and ever. Anything less than eternity wouldn’t be enough, amata mia.’

‘The baby was a shock, wasn’t it?’ She sighed, walking back towards the house with him hand in hand.

‘A wonderful one. Our little miracle,’ Gaetano said with sudden rueful humour. ‘It took one hell of a baby to get in under my radar, so I’ll be expecting a very determined personality in the family.’

Gaetano halted at that point to claim a kiss. And Poppy threw herself into that kiss with abandon. He pressed her back against a tree trunk, his body hard and urgent against hers and a rippling shudder of excitement shimmied through her slender length.

‘Let’s go to bed,’ she suggested, looking up at him with bold appreciative eyes.

‘We haven’t had dinner yet and a mother-to-be needs sustenance,’ Gaetano told her lazily, trailing her indoors and out to the terrace where the table awaited them.

But neither of them ate very much. Between the intense looks exchanged and the suggestive conversation, it wasn’t very long before they headed upstairs at a very adult stately pace, which broke down into giggles and a clumsy embrace as Poppy rugby-tackled Gaetano down onto the floor of their bedroom. By the time they made it to the bed and he had moved the suitcase she had left there they were kissing passionately and holding each other so tightly that it was a challenge to remove clothes. But they managed through kisses and caresses and mutual promises to make love with all the fire and excitement that powered them both and afterwards they lay with their arms wrapped round each other, secure in their love and talking about their future.

* * *

Poppy glanced out of the front window and saw her children with Rodolfo. Sarah was holding his hand and chattering, her little face animated below her halo of red curls. Benito was pedalling his trike doggedly in front of them, ignoring the fact that the deep gravel on the path made cycling a challenge for a little boy.

Sarah was four years old and took after her mother in looks and her father in nature. She already knew all her numbers, was very much a thinking child and tended to look after her little brother in a bossy way. Benito was two, dark of hair and eye and as lively as a jumping bean. He was on the go from dawn to dusk and generally fell asleep during his bedtime story in his father’s arms.

Sometimes, or at least until she looked at her expanding family, Poppy found it hard to credit that she had been married for five years. Gaetano might have been a late convert to family life but he had taken to it like the proverbial duck to water. He adored his children and rushed home to be with them and it was thanks to his persuasion that Poppy was carrying their third child. Third and last, she had told him firmly even though she liked the way their family had developed. In retrospect she was glad they hadn’t waited and that Sarah had taken them by surprise and not having too big a gap between the children meant that they could grow up with each other.

But, at the same time, Poppy was also looking forward to having more time to devote to her own interests. She had taken several landscape designer courses over the years and was planning to set up a small landscaping firm. She had redesigned the gardens at La Fattoria to make them more child-friendly and had already taken several private commissions from friends, one of which had won an award. The gardens at the London town house and at Woodfield Hall both bore her stamp and when she wanted to relax she was usually to be found in a greenhouse tending the rare orchids she collected.

Gaetano was CEO of the Leonetti Bank and when he travelled, Poppy and the children often went with him. He put his family first and at the heart of his life, ensuring that they took lengthy breaks abroad to wind down from their busy lives. Poppy’s mother, Jasmine, had made a good recovery and was now training as an addiction counsellor to help others as she had been helped. She lived in Manchester with her sister but she was a frequent visitor in London, as was Poppy’s brother. Damien, backed by Gaetano, had recently started up a specialist motorcycle repair shop.

In fact there wasn’t a cloud in Poppy’s sky because she was happy. Sadly, Muffin had passed away of old age the year before and he had been replaced by a rescued golden Labrador who enjoyed rough and tumble games with the children.

‘Guess who...’ A pair of hands covered her eyes while a lean, hard body connected with hers.

Poppy grinned. The familiar scent of Gaetano’s cologne assailed her while his hands travelled places nobody else would have dared. ‘You’re the only sex pest I know,’ she teased, suppressing a moan as the hand that had splayed across her slightly swollen belly snaked lower and circled, sending sweet sensation snaking through her responsive body.

Gaetano spun his wife round and she reached up to wind her arms round his neck. ‘Sorry, I slept in this morning and missed seeing you.’

‘You were up with Benito last night when he had a nightmare, amata mia,’ he reminded her. ‘That’s why I didn’t wake you.’

Poppy teased the corner of his wide sensual mouth with her own, heat warming her core. She wanted to drag him to the bed and ravish him. Her hunger for him never went entirely away. He shrugged off his jacket and stared down at her with smouldering dark golden eyes. ‘Share the shower with me...’

‘Promise not to get my hair wet,’ she bargained.

‘You know I can’t.’ An unholy grin slashed Gaetano’s lips. ‘Sometimes you get carried away. Is that my fault?’

‘Absolutely your fault,’ his wife told him as she peeled off her dress.

Gaetano treated her to a fiercely appreciative appraisal. ‘Did I ever tell you how amazingly sexy you look when you’re pregnant?’

‘You may have mentioned it once or twice—’

‘Sometimes I can hardly believe you’re mine. I love you so much, amata mia,’ Gaetano swore passionately, gathering her up into his arms with care and kissing her breathless.

‘I love you too,’ she said between kisses, happiness bubbling through her at the sure knowledge that she was going to get her hair very wet indeed.

* * * * *