With the money from her house in Tom’s bank account, it had been no problem. Ellen Jones, whose father was a friend of Tom’s, ran a small gymnastics club in the nearby town of Newquay, and she had given Kelly a part-time job helping out at the club, and she paid her cash.
For three years Kelly’s life had worked fine. She glanced back at Annalou. She was gritting her little teeth, her whole attention concentrated on making the ‘biggest sand castle ever’ for Uncle Tom.
Kelly’s eyes squeezed shut in a spasm of pain. They had buried Tom yesterday. It was Tom who had shortened Anna Louise to Annalou. Yet they would never, ever see him again. She would never hear that deep Cornish burr in his tone as he comforted and cajoled her. Their lives would have to change…
Gianfranco hesitated, to control the pounding of the blood in his veins. It was Kelly, more beautiful than ever, her luscious body honed to perfection; even the cheap black dress she was wearing could not hide that. The neckline was low enough to reveal the upper curve of her breasts, and short enough to reveal her shapely legs. Her silver-blonde hair was longer, untamed, falling almost to her waist. He had given her everything, and she had betrayed him…
Silently he moved forward.
‘So this is where you are hiding, Kelly?’
After three years Kelly recognised the deep, accented voice instantly. Her eyes flew open, shock lancing through her. She stared; she couldn’t help it. He was standing not a foot away. An all-powerful male. His tanned face had a few more lines, but they only added to his dark, devastating good looks. He was dressed in perfectly tailored black trousers and a black roll-neck sweater. With his great height and broad-shouldered, virile body, that simply oozed sex appeal, he looked like some avenging angel—or devil—she realised as his eyes, black as night, roamed over her with unconcealed contempt. Goosebumps erupted all over her body and she reeled back against the rock as though blasted by the banked-down violence in his eyes.
‘You,’ she murmured—it was as if by thinking about him earlier she had conjured him up. Quickly she tore her gaze away from his and sought Annalou, who was sitting in the sand, her brown eyes turned quizzically up at the man.
‘Big man,’ Annalou said. ‘Do you want to make a sandcastle?’
Gianfranco glanced down, and immediately dropped to his haunches with lithe grace. ‘Anna, isn’t it?’ he said softly. And as Kelly watched the transformation on his hard, sculptured face was miraculous. He smiled at the child. ‘I love to make sandcastles, Anna.’ He reached out a none too steady hand to touch the fiery red hair surrounding the angelic-looking face. Two sets of identical deep brown eyes met and fused with each other. It was instant attraction.
Kelly saw Annalou grin, and she had to swallow the lump in her throat that threatened to choke her.
‘My name is Anna Louise Hope, but everyone calls me Annalou,’ she corrected him seriously.
Gianfranco shot a glance at Kelly that would have blistered paint. But the face he turned back to the child was gentle. ‘Then I shall call you Annalou,’ he said with a smile. ‘And you can call me Daddy.’
Go straight for the jugular, why don’t you? Kelly was struck dumb by Gianfranco’s blunt admission.
Annalou looked up at Gianfranco with wide excited eyes. ‘You my daddy?’ she began…then, glancing up at Kelly, ‘Mummy?’ she said. Only one word, suddenly unsure for the first time in her young life.
Narrowed black eyes lifted to Kelly. Gianfranco was watching her like a great black panther waiting to pounce. He scanned her ashen face and horrified eyes. ‘Tell her, Kelly,’ he drawled silkily.
Kelly could hardly string two coherent thoughts together, let alone a sentence, she was shivering in so much shock. Annalou hadn’t noticed the absence of a daddy in her life until she had started playschool after Easter. Kelly had told her he lived far away, and left it at that. Looking down at the man and the child, at the triumph on the face of the former, she realised with a sinking heart she had nowhere to go… She was trapped.
Bending her knees, she dropped in the sand beside Annalou. ‘Yes, sweetheart.’ She instinctively curved a protective arm around her shoulders. ‘This—’ She saw the derision in Gianfranco’s eyes, and stammered helplessly. ‘He—I mean, this man is your daddy.’
Annalou wriggled from under Kelly’s arm and threw herself at Gianfranco. ‘You really are my daddy.’ And with childish logic added, ‘Uncle Tom had to go to heaven, so he has sent you.’
Gianfranco closed his arms around Annalou, and held her hard to his broad chest. ‘Something like that.’ Gianfranco slashed a look of utter hatred over the top of the child’s head at Kelly, and, leaping smoothly to his feet with Annalou still in his arms, he added, ‘But, unlike your Uncle Tom, I am going to stay with you forever.’ He made his promise softly, with a kiss on the child’s smooth cheek that Annalou happily returned.
Lifting his proud head, his narrowed eyes studied Kelly’s stricken white face with a kind of grim satisfaction. ‘Isn’t that so, Mummy?’ He demanded her compliance, the derision in the deep, dark drawl obvious to Kelly, but lost on the child.
Kelly staggered unsteadily to her feet; she had turned even paler as the full horror of what he had said sank in. She had escaped Gianfranco once, but he would never make the same mistake again. At least not where his child was concerned. As for her… She was probably just as dispensable now as she had been three years ago.
‘Mummy?’ Annalou’s small face was turned towards her, her expression expectant, waiting for her mother’s confirmation of the wonderful news.
Suddenly, Kelly was overwhelmed with the most horrible feeling of guilt, mixed with a deep-rooted fear for the future. But she could do nothing but agree…
Hours later, the sandcastle built and marvelled over, Kelly had been unable to avoid taking Gianfranco back to her home. Tom had left her the house in his will, along with his money—which was actually what was left of hers! He had lived on his pension, and it had stopped at his death. Kelly had been worrying over what she was going to do, but now that worry was replaced with a much greater fear. Annalou was too young to notice, but Gianfranco had made it obvious by each look and gesture in Kelly’s direction that he was biding his time until they were alone, and then all hell would break loose.
‘Read a story, Daddy,’ Annalou said, now bathed and safely tucked up in bed. She turned away from where Kelly stood to Gianfranco, at the opposite side of the bed. ‘Please.’
Kelly felt a swift stab of jealousy at how quickly her daughter had fallen under Gianfranco’s spell. But then she glanced across at him, his black hair dishevelled, his dark eyes smiling down at the little girl. Kelly doubted any female from three to ninety-three could resist his seemingly effortless charm. He was lounging on the bed, one arm around Annalou, the other holding the book, one long leg stretched out on top of the coverlet, his other foot on the floor. The fabric pulled taut across his muscled thighs was enough to make any woman groan, and to Kelly’s dismay she was no exception…
Her hands turned into tight fists at her sides. She had to get out of here; the tension that had simmered between Gianfranco and her all afternoon was driving her mad and her nerves were at screaming pitch. ‘Goodnight, sweetheart.’ She leant over and pressed a kiss to the downy cheek, making sure to avoid any contact with Gianfranco, and, straightening up, she added, ‘I’ll leave Daddy to tuck you in.’
She almost ran out of the bedroom and stumbled back down the stairs. Walking into the kitchen, she eyed the table, a grim smile curving her lips. They had eaten beans on toast for dinner—hardly Gianfranco’s style, but Annalou’s favourite. Quickly she set about cleaning up. She washed the dishes, wiped down the benches—anything to keep busy so she did not have to think. But she could not control her thoughts so easily. Finally, with nothing left to do, she wandered back into the living area and across to the picture window that filled almost the whole wall. She stood still as a statue and gazed out over the sand and sea.
She had been so happy—perhaps not happy, she amended, but certainly content here. It had been an old barn, converted quite simply with the front door at one end opening into one large living area, and a kitchen, utility room and rear door at the back. A staircase up the side of the wall led to a galleried landing with two bedrooms and a bathroom. It stood on its own on the outskirts of the small fishing village, and had originally been rented out as a holiday home. Tom had stayed here once and then bought it.