Sweet pleasure rippled through him at hearing those words, filling him near to bursting. He pinned her beneath him, ready yet again to show her exactly how much she meant to him with his body.
God, he loved her so much. More than he had loved any other woman in his life, including Lucia. If all went as he planned, this woman would soon be his wife. Mother to Matty and their future children, the woman who would be by his side for the rest of his life.
He needed to find a ring and do this right as soon as possible.
It was the least she deserved.
Chapter Thirteen
Carolyn Leonard saw the first photo of the woman who ruined her marriage early on a Thursday morning. Looking through the newspaper, she stopped at the article covering the annual fashion gala that had been held at the Met last night. She scanned the photos of all the beautiful people in the fashion industry who were in attendance as she sipped from her first cup of coffee, sitting at the kitchen table. More than a few faces she recognized. Plenty of stars were there, though some of those featured she didn’t recognize.
One face popped out at her. The face of her worst nightmares. The woman who lured her husband into a quick but messy affair that resulted in said woman being fired as their nanny.
Paige fucking Stewart.
Rage boiled inside of Carolyn as she stared at the picture. The skinny, ugly redhead was on the arm of Matteo Renaldi, CEO of Renaldi Accessories. The dress she wore was gorgeous, the necklace with a fat diamond dangling from it looked expensive.
Carolyn wanted to tear her apart, rip every single stupid red hair from the girl’s head—she hated her that much.
After wadding the newspaper into a ball, she tossed it, then grabbed her cell phone, Googling Matteo Renaldi’s and Paige Stewart’s names together. A list of photos from the previous evening popped up, every one of them enraging her further. The complete adoration on Paige’s face as she gazed up at the handsome, rich-as-hell Matteo and how he looked at her as if he was madly in love.
Carolyn snorted. More like lust—just like her husband and what he felt for the stupid, simpering bitch. Oh, fine, the kids had loved her, but she thought Paige Stewart was a wimp. A suck-up.
A whore.
Her husband had sniffed around their ugly nanny like a dog in heat for months. Carolyn had ignored it at first—what man could resist a younger woman living under his roof? She laughed it off as some sort of innocent crush, though deep down inside, she worried. And after a while, she started to suspect there was more going on. Just like last time.
The man she married was an absolute pig, no matter how much she tried to ignore it.
When she confronted Paul, he denied everything, trying to convince Carolyn that she was crazy. Why would he be so stupid as to have an affair with a woman who lived in their house, for the love of God?
His logic was sound, but he was a man who’d been led by his dick more than once, and she knew it. So she’d spied on Paige, noticed how overly sweet she was to their children, working her best to win them completely over, and figured the girl was trying to move in on her territory. Why, she wanted to steal both her husband and her children, and Carolyn refused to let the bitch win.
So she lay in wait, ready to catch the two of them in a compromising position.
She hadn’t waited long.
Ever since that one time she caught her husband with his hands all over Paige, Carolyn had suspected Paul of fooling around with an endless string of women. Not that she ever caught him. The bastard was too sneaky for that. His phone was clean, his credit cards had no unusual activity, no records of him chatting with anyone suspect, no spending money on another woman. Nothing.
But she knew. Deep down in her heart, she knew he was still doing her wrong, she just couldn’t prove it. It was all Paige’s fault. She pushed the downward spiral of her husband further. Taught him that it was easy to fool around with another woman, and he’d become addicted.
She hated Paige Stewart with every fiber in her being. The girl had ruined her marriage. Ruined her children for any other nanny. Why, they still said they missed Paige and wished she would come back. It had been months, they’d been through three nannies since then, and her brats still weren’t satisfied unless they had Paige fucking slut Stewart as their nanny once more.
Carolyn was going to make that bitch pay.
“Whatcha doing, sweetheart?” Her husband sauntered into the kitchen, a big smile on his face, acting as if everything was right in his world. Asshole. She couldn’t remember the last time they’d had sex, yet he looked like he’d just gotten freshly laid.
“Reading,” Carolyn mumbled, not in the mood to talk. She watched as he poured himself a cup of coffee and grabbed a bagel, tearing it apart so he could slip it into the toaster. The kids were already at school, he should be at work, yet he was still here. Up in her business, annoying the shit out of her. “Why aren’t you at work?”