The Man Who Risked It All
‘Thanks for the excuses,’ Lexi murmured tautly. ‘Shall I do the sail now?’
Franco shook his head. ‘We don’t need it. I’ve spotted somewhere to anchor.’
As he turned the boat towards land Lexi spun in the circle of his arms and saw the heat misted cliffs soaring up in front of them: a spectacular sight. The colour of the ocean darkened to deep green as they sailed into a tiny cove cut out from the rockface. Franco cut the engine, then instructed her to take the wheel while he headed aft to let down the anchor.
Silence suddenly engulfed everything. The Miranda swayed gently beneath her feet. She watched Franco walk towards her, then come to a stop, and even with the sun beating hotly down on her Lexi felt a chill cover her flesh when she looked into his face.
‘OK, here it is.’ He was not going to hang around with this now. ‘Marco stopped being my friend in San Remo, when he told me he’d slept with you the night I had to leave you alone to deal with some business for my father in Milan.’
CHAPTER ELEVEN
FRANCO watched Lexi’s face and saw exactly what he had expected to see. First came the confused frown, then the dawning shock of utter disbelief. Then came the question—he was waiting for the question.
‘You believed him?’
‘Si,’ he confirmed.
‘But—why?’ she breathed in bewilderment.
‘He was very convincing.’
‘And the closest thing you had to a brother,’ Lexi offered thickly. ‘While I was just your summer distraction who stupidly got pregnant?’
‘He told me this before you found out you were pregnant.’
Lexi dipped her head and closed her eyes, reliving the way Franco had gone cold towards her. She felt the pangs of her own hurt all over again, because she’d believed that he’d become bored with her as his friends had told her he would. Then Claudia had sent her proof of the bet and within twenty-four hours her mother had died, sending her life into free-fall. Quite pathetically, she recognised now, she’d turned to Franco for support and he’d let her. He’d supported her right through the coming weeks while she buried her mother and learned that Philippe had spent her money. Then to top it all off she’d realised she was—
She pulled in a deep, painful breath. ‘You thought the baby was Marco’s.’
Franco ran a set of tense fingers through his hair. ‘I thought it could be possible,’ he admitted. ‘I’d always been so careful with you, so it made sense.’
‘Did you tell him what you suspected?’
‘No,’ he answered.
‘Why not?’ Lexi demanded. ‘If you believed I’d been to bed with him, was carrying his child, why didn’t you tell him? Why take responsibility for me onto yourself?’
‘You needed me, not him—’
‘Oh, well, thanks for being so noble, Franco! Thanks for marrying me and turning the next four months into the worst days of my life!’
He couldn’t argue with that. He had married her and made her a life a misery. He’d made his own life a misery. He hadn’t wanted to be near her but he hadn’t wanted any other man near her either—especially not Marco.
‘I was in love with you.’
‘Oh, don’t feed me that old chestnut,’ Lexi condemned in trembling disgust. ‘I was the bet you all wanted to win that summer—the jolly joke you all had at my expense!’
‘It started out like that.’ He finally admitted it. ‘But that lasted only as long as it took me to get to know you.’
‘Bed me, you mean.’
‘No,’ he denied.
‘Yes!’ Lexi insisted, throwing herself past the wheel and down into the galley because she had a horrible fear she was going to be sick. She heard Franco follow her down there. ‘I don’t know how you managed to live with yourself afterwards,’ she tossed at him angrily as she bent to grab a bottle of water out from the fridge. And she was trembling, white as a sheet and hating him—hating him all over again.
‘I didn’t live with myself,’ he said.
Flinging round to face him, she hated it too that he was standing there looking and sounding so damn calm while she was falling apart! ‘How is it that I got all the punishment while Marco remained your very best buddy?’ she lanced at him. ‘It did take two of us to cheat on you, after all!’