Brunetti's Secret Son

Outwardly, her body froze a few steps into the restaurant. But inside, her heart kicked into her stomach. Hard.

‘Romeo.’

She realised she’d said the name rattling through her brain aloud when he turned slowly and pinned her with those brooding hazel-gold eyes. That impossibly rugged jaw she’d thought she’d blown out of all proportion tightened as his gaze raked her from head to toe and back again. His prominent, cut-glass cheekbones were more pronounced than she remembered and his hair was longer, wavier than it had been five years ago. But the man who stood a dozen paces away was no less dynamic, no less captivating than the man who’d sat across from her in the café that memorable day.

If anything, he commanded a more overpowering presence. Perhaps it was because they were so far away from the place they’d first met, or because her mind was turning itself inside out to decipher exactly why he was here. All the same she found herself bunching a fist against her heart as if that would stop its fierce pounding.

‘I’m not certain whether to celebrate this moment or to condemn it,’ he rasped in a tense, dark voice.

‘How did you... How did you find me?’

One eyebrow spiked upwards. ‘That is what you wish to know? How did I find you? Were you attempting to stay hidden, perhaps?’ he enquired silkily.

‘What?’ Her brain grew fuzzier, her heart racing even faster at the ice in his tone. ‘I’m not hiding. Why would I want to hide from anyone?’

He approached slowly, his eyes not leaving her face, nor his hands the deep pockets of his overcoat. Even though it was early June, the weather remained cool enough to require a coat, and he wore his as a dark lord wore a cape, with a flourish that demanded attention. ‘We haven’t seen each other in five years and your first request is to know how I found you. Pardon me if I find that curious.’

‘What would you have me say?’ She licked lips gone dry as he took another step closer until she had to crane her neck to see his eyes.

Mesmeric, hypnotising eyes.

So like his son’s.

The blood drained from her face and thinking became difficult. She’d imagined this scene countless times. Had imagined how she would say the words. How he would take it. How she would protect her son from even the slightest hint of rejection, the way she’d done when her parents had transmitted that same indifference they’d shown Maisie all her life to her beloved son.

But words wouldn’t form in her brain. So she stared at him, her thoughts twisting and turning.

‘Hello, perhaps? Or, how have you been, Romeo?’

She caught his chillingly mocking tone and stiffened.

‘Why would I? I seem to recall waking up to find myself alone in a hotel suite rented by an anonymous stranger. You didn’t bother to say goodbye then, so why should I bother to say hello now?’ she replied.

His nostrils flared then and a memory struck through her jumbled thoughts. They’d been caught up in one of the few short bursts of conversation in his suite. She’d unwittingly let slip the fraught state of her relationship with her parents, how lonely and inconvenient she felt to them, as if she were an unwanted visitor sharing a house with them.

His nostrils had flared then, too, as he’d admonished her to be grateful she had parents at all—strangers or otherwise. That observation had rendered her silent and a little ashamed, not because she’d hated being chastised, but because she’d seen the naked agony in his eyes when he’d said that. As if the subject of parents was one that terrorised him.

Maisie pushed the memory away and struggled to stay calm when he finally released her from his stare and looked around.

‘What do you do here when you’re not dabbling in being a restaurateur?’ he asked.

She bristled. ‘I’m not dabbling. I own this restaurant. It’s my career.’

‘Really? I thought you were a high-powered lawyer.’

She frowned. Had she told him that in Palermo? Back then she’d been newly qualified and working on exciting cases. Back then her parents had finally, grudgingly, accepted her career choice. She would even go as far as to consider that for the first time in her life she’d achieved something they were proud of, even if they hadn’t quite been able to show it in the warm, loving way she’d seen her friends’ parents exhibit.

Of course, they hadn’t been thrilled that she’d announced soon after that she was taking a whole month off to travel Europe.

Despite her having the full support of her bosses to take the time off, her parents had advised her against the trip. Their utter conviction that stepping off the career ladder, even briefly, would ruin her life had finally confirmed how much they rued bringing a child, bringing her, into their lives.