The Italian's Love-Child

Yet there were times when she caught him looking at her with a hot and hungry look in his eyes which made her think that perhaps he did. Though it was different for men, she knew that. They responded automatically to a woman sometimes—though, considering her current state of swollen ankles and swollen belly, she might simply have imagined it.

And now he said he would demand nothing of her. Did that mean that he expected her to make the first move? And how could she—so lumberingly and unattractively pregnant—make an overture towards him which he might then reject? Or maybe he wouldn’t demand because he didn’t want her in that way, not any more.

‘You’re having second thoughts?’ he mused.

‘I haven’t even got through the first ones yet.’

He laughed then and it was the laugh that did it. To have the ability to make a man like Luca laugh surely meant something. She loved him and she was expecting his baby and he had offered to marry her. What was not to accept? What was to make her cling onto what she had here—a job which had become increasingly unimportant when compared to the enormity of bringing new life into the world?

She smiled. ‘What type of wedding did you have in mind?’

CHAPTER ELEVEN

AS IT was, with all the arrangements to be made, it was close onto a month before the wedding could take place, and by then she was almost up to the limit of when it was safe to fly.

There was a licence to be obtained, a dress to buy and a simple reception to be organised.

Though her choice of wedding dress was strictly limited by her physical dimensions.

‘You look lovely,’ sighed Lizzy.

‘Liar! I look like a whale!’

‘Well, you don’t, and even if you did—who cares, when you’re getting married to Luca?’ sighed Lizzy. ‘He obviously loves you whatever you look like!’

Eve didn’t like to disillusion her. What would have been the point? She had taken Lizzy up to London with her, where, armed with a ridiculous amount of money, she had persuaded a hot, up-and-coming young fashion designer to try to work magic with her appearance. The result was a coat-dress, cleverly cut to disguise the bump, in fine cashmere of the softest, palest ivory. An outrageous hat had been made to match. ‘It’ll naturally draw the eye to your face,’ said the designer. ‘Which is just glowing with pregnancy!’

A bouquet which was luscious and extravagant enough to cover the bump completed the ensemble. In fact, the whole outfit was an illusory one, thought Eve as she twirled in front of the floor-length mirror. Something made to look like something it wasn’t—and maybe an accurate reflection of the marriage itself.

Still, she had agreed to go through with it, and she would do so with all her heart.

The day after she had accepted Luca’s proposal she had gone into work and told them. And unfortunately someone had phoned the local press.

EVE IS THE APPLE OF ITALIAN’S EYE! reported the South Hampshire daily.

‘In a way, I admire you,’ Clare told her, a touch enviously. ‘Giving all this up for love. And marriage.’

And Eve didn’t have the heart to disillusion her, either.

On her final broadcast, she explained that she was getting married and moving to Rome.

‘Why, you looked positively wistful when you said that, cara,’ drawled Luca, who had watched the show. ‘So was that genuine, or just good acting?’

Did he think of her as an actress, then? Able to hide her emotions behind a veneer of professionalism? And if so, wasn’t that a skill which might prove useful in the ensuing months?

The wedding took place in the Hamble, in the yacht club where she had first seen Luca. A girl of about the same age as Eve had served them champagne and Dublin Bay prawns and Eve thought how heartbreakingly young she looked.

It was a small affair with Lizzy and Michael, and Kesi as bridesmaid, and Luca’s sister Sophia had flown over, leaving her husband with her baby back at home. Eve had felt nervous about meeting her, but she was strung out with nerves anyway, and thought how faraway her voice sounded during the ceremony.

She felt strange, as if it were all happening to someone else, as if she were in a bubble which protected her from the rest of the world. And although her heart ached with love and longing, the vows they exchanged seemed to have no real meaning because they didn’t really mean anything. Certainly not to Luca.

It was ironic in a way that she, who had always considered herself a very modern woman, should be entering into a very old-fashioned marriage of con

venience.

Luca took her in his arms afterwards, briefly brushing his lips over hers in a kiss which didn’t mean anything either, for there was no promise in it. Not for them the usual passion of the newly-weds, only restrained by social niceties, just a perfunctory kiss to make it look as everyone thought it should look.

‘You look very beautiful,’ he murmured.