‘And what would you say if I told you that I don’t want to move on?’
Megan looked at his face, unusually hesitant, and then nodded towards the sitting room.
‘Ten minutes.’
Alessandro hadn’t realised how tense he had been until he exhaled a deep breath of relief and preceded her into the sitting room, removing his coat en route and resting it on a side table.
‘Where’s Charlotte?’ he asked.
‘Out.’
‘Is she going away somewhere?’
‘Why do you ask?’ He had made himself at home on one of the sofas, but Megan still found it hard to relax, and had remained by the door, her arms folded, her defences ready to slam into place at the slightest hint of trouble.
‘I noticed a suitcase by the door.’
‘That’s my case. I’m going away for the half-term week.’
‘Your case…’
His mind played with the notion that she might not be going away on her own. Until now he had had an arrogant faith in her dependability on him. Even when they had met again, had resumed their relationship, he had still known that however much she might have hankered for something more she had not been looking around. Now he wasn’t too sure. But he shut the door on that meandering, unpleasant thought.
‘Whatever you believed about my motivations,’ Alessandro said in a raw undertone, ‘you were wrong. I’ve tried to put you out of my mind but I can’t, and I want more of you than just an occasional relationship. I know that you’re still hankering for a country life, and I have realised that what you want has a pretty high priority in my life. So let’s do it, Megan….’
Megan held her breath while frantic hope beat inside her like a drum.
‘Let’s move in together. A house in the country. Wherever you want.’ He hadn’t felt dizzy like this when he had contemplated marrying Victoria. For some reason he felt like a man taking a plunge into waters unknown. ‘But let’s do it soon.’
CHAPTER NINE
ALESSANDRO looked at Megan over the Financial Times. She was sitting cross-legged on the sofa, absorbed in a cookery programme. A celebrity chef was giving her tips on how to cook a dish which he knew she would never attempt.
Their move to the country hadn’t been quite as dramatic as he had anticipated. She had wanted to still be able to travel to her work, and so they had moved to one of the leafier suburbs of central London, from which she could reach her school on the tube every day. The street was lined with trees, and he had got his people to hunt down the closest he could get to her dream house. It was Grade II listed, with the requisite white fence with roses, and original stained-glass features inside.
Two months ago he had seen this as a highly suitable arrangement. He would have her living with him and his work life would remain largely uninterrupted. His house in central London was empty, and although he had briefly contemplated selling it, he had quickly discarded the idea. It wasn’t as though he needed the money.
Now, two months on, he discovered that his work life wasn’t what it used to be. He enjoyed being with her, and didn’t care to think of her sitting on her own in the house, so he had found himself voluntarily ending his day at a reasonable time so that he could return home. He had even taken to delegating his overseas trips to one of his trusted company directors.
She had asked for none of that. In fact, he thought, looking at her rapt expression as she watched the television, she had demanded nothing from him. He should have been pleased with that, but increasingly he was finding that he wasn’t.
He also didn’t like the fact that she kept in touch with the loser he had seen her kissing on her doorstep the night he had asked her to move in with him.
It seemed that he was one of Charlotte’s friends, and occasionally a crowd of them went out after work for drinks. She made no effort to conceal the fact, and he believed her when she assured him, after some very light questioning, that the man was a nice person and a friend, and they’d both accepted that they were not suited for a relationship.
Alessandro still didn’t like it. He wanted her exclusively to himself—by which he meant that he didn’t want her to look at another man, talk to another man, far less be buddies with another man. Whom she had kissed. It suggested to him that she wasn’t giving herself entirely to him and he couldn’t help wondering if there was a part of her still on the look-out. Had he hurt her so much that he had killed something between them? She was never anything but happy in his company, but niggling doubts were tearing him apart.
He flung the newspaper on the ground. ‘You’re never going to make that dish, Megan,’ he said, shutting the door on the disturbing drift of his thoughts.