The Multi-Millionaire's Virgin Mistress

‘You were never a fool. Maybe young and ambitious, but never a fool.’

‘I was a fool to let you walk away from me.’ His dark, mesmeric eyes held hers, and Megan felt her heart swoop. This was hardly the conversation she had envisaged, but she was liking it, and hungry to discover where it would lead.

‘I thought…’

Alessandro paused, travelling back to a time when he had figured he knew all the answers. From the fluctuations and vagaries of living hand to mouth he would have a life over which he could exercise control—a life which would leave no room for the unpredictable. Megan had been unpredictable. That had been his plan.

‘I thought…’ He refocused on her. ‘I thought that you weren’t what I needed. I…I grew up seeing my parents struggle with poverty. It was their constant companion. I was determined never to find myself caught in the same trap, and I thought that the only way to avoid it was to accumulate enough power and wealth to make me invincible. Only then could I be happy. I was wrong. Power and wealth don’t bring happiness, and the idea of being in control of every aspect of your life is an illusion. And thank God for that. The thing is, I forgot the one thing I should have had branded in my head from my parents. They might have been broke but they were happy. You were always there, Megan, at the back of my mind and in my heart, and now…’

He shook his head, as if mystified by the inaccurate assumptions he had made. ‘I can’t live without you,’ he told her simply. ‘I tried to wrap it all up in something that made sense and I didn’t stop to think that when it comes to you—’ this time he smiled crookedly ‘—it’s all about winging it. It’s not supposed to make sense.’ He took her fingers in his hand and idly played with them. ‘I know you want to talk about us…maybe tell me that you’re having second thoughts about this situation…’

He didn’t dare say what else he had thought—that maybe she might want to tell him that he had messed her around just a little too much, that living with him had perhaps opened up her eyes to the fact that she valued her freedom more than she valued his continual presence in her life as a man who refused to commit any further than he thought strictly necessary. Maybe—and this had been the darkest fear of all—she had wanted to tell him that she would rather work on the loser who would probably stick a ring on her finger after the second date than stay around for the man who had resolutely refused to.

Megan was guiltily aware that when it came to second-guessing her motivations he wasn’t precisely on cue, but that confession about his childhood had left her breathless. She had only ever had snippets of information about his background, and in a strange way she felt as though a barrier had been breached.

‘I don’t want to lose you,’ Alessandro told her urgently. ‘You think I’m a bad bet, but I’m not. I’m…’ A good bet? Having pretty much told her that he only wanted her around so that he could get her out of his system? Was there a brain cell in his head? ‘I’m in love with you, and you can’t even think of leaving me.’

‘You’re in love with me?’

‘I think I always have been.’

‘You’ve never, ever said…’ Megan was trembling as she looked at his starkly vulnerable face. She felt a lifetime of love swell inside her, and she touched his cheek as if discovering it for the first time.

‘Like I said, I was a fool.’ He trapped her hand in his and held it tightly. ‘I never stopped to ask myself how it was that work became secondary the minute you appeared on the scene. You make me lose focus.’

‘And that’s a good thing?’ Megan asked tremulously.

‘It’s a very good thing. It’s the best thing I’ve ever known.’

‘Are you sure?’

The look he gave her answered that question, and she smiled, her face lit up with joy.

‘Because I love you too. I never stopped. Why do you think I agreed to move in with you? It went against reason, but you make me feel…helpless….’

‘And that’s just the way I like it,’ Alessandro told her with immense satisfaction. There was a lot more that he wanted to tell her, and he knew that he would, in time. For the moment he was content to revel in the perfection of the moment. ‘But I’d like it even more if you tell me now that you’ll be my wife.’

‘Yes!’ She drew his head towards her and kissed him, and only when she at last opened her eyes once again did she remember why she had needed to talk to him. How on earth could she have forgotten something that had consumed her for the past three days?