Italian Boss, Ruthless Revenge

Fool! Fool for forgetting who she was—and he had forgotten.

Holding her, making love to her, kissing her, tasting her, he’d lost himself, lost his mind…For a few blissful hours he had forgotten about everything—Luca, Antonia, the baby, Malvolio…

Lazzaro’s face hardened.

She’d lied to him—she still hadn’t told him that Roxanne was her cousin, and as for being a virgin!

Lazzaro snapped his fingers at a waitress, jabbed at his cup for her to refill it.

Well, she might have won this round, but the game wasn’t over—a fool he’d be no more.

‘Good morning!’ His deadpan face didn’t even change as she staggered into the dining room—utterly business as usual, he was looking through his schedule and tapping away on his laptop as a very untogether Caitlyn rather shakily poured coffee and picked at a croissant.

‘Jeremy will drive you back to Melbourne. I have a few things I want to finalise here and I will get the helicopter back—I also need to see to a few things back at the office…’

‘I’ve rearranged our flights.’ Somehow she managed to sound efficient. ‘Our plane to Rome now leaves at ten. So we need to be at the airport by eight. Do you want me to meet you at the office?’

Lazzaro shook his head. ‘Buy a gift for my sister—then you’ll need the rest of the day for yourself, to pack, pay bills, whatever…’

So he did acknowledge that she actually had a life? Small comfort, though, when she knew she was being got rid of.

‘Jeremy and I will pick you up around six-thirty—we can stop at the hospital on our way to the airport.’

‘Fine…’

He watched her fumble with her pastry. He could see the bewilderment in her eyes and it angered him—what the hell did she expect? Breakfast in bed?

‘Lazzaro!’

Antonia’s vibrant greeting caught them both unawares. Caitlyn was just about to sit herself down in the rather opulent waiting room of the private maternity hospital to catch up on some notes while Luca visited his sister before they headed to the airport. In fact, the only reason Caitlyn hadn’t stayed in the car with Lazzaro’s chauffeur was the fact that she knew Malvolio was still safely at the hotel, and there would be no chance of banging into him. But—looking radiant, pushing a crib along the carpeted corridor from the nursery towards her room—it turned out Antonia was the one who greeted them.

‘It is so good to see you—meet your nephew!’

‘Shouldn’t you be in bed?’ Lazzaro frowned, barely giving the infant a glance.

‘I was just fetching Luca from the nursery.’

‘Don’t the nurses do that?’ Lazzaro asked, but Antonia just laughed.

‘So, what do you think of your new nephew?’

If it had been anyone, anyone else, Caitlyn wouldn’t have been able to resist peeking into the crib and staring at the newborn. Only her eyes were on Lazzaro, watching every flicker of his reaction as he stared down—and she could see the grief stamped on his face even though he smiled, could see the bob of his Adam’s apple as he swallowed while staring at the baby.

‘He’s beautiful…’ His voice was soft, but raw, his hands bunched into fists as if he was fighting with an instinct to touch him.

He looked so lost and wretched that Caitlyn was fighting with instincts of her own, tempted to wrap her fingers around his closed ones, to support him somehow in this difficult time—only that wasn’t in Lazzaro’s strange rule book, Caitlyn reminded herself. Discretion was the key—and communication outside the sheets taboo.

‘Mum says he’s the image of you and Luca when you were born.’ Antonia was looking at Lazzaro too, her kind, weary face etched with worry, and Caitlyn’s heart went out to her. She was sure this was just as impossible for her too.

‘Where’s Marianna?’ Lazzaro dragged his eyes away from the infant. ‘Malvolio said she was at the hospital with you.’

‘She is—she’s with Mum…come on.’

‘She’s already here?’ Lazzaro didn’t even attempt to keep the appalled note out of his voice. ‘But how?’