Happy Mother's Day!

‘Gianluca—’

‘I shall come to you tonight,’ he said softly. ‘And if you want me, then you must leave your door open. That is your choice. If it is shut, I shall not come to you again.’

Oh, why didn’t he seal his intent with a kiss? she wondered desperately. Why talk about it in those hard, cold terms as if it was some kind of takeover bid? Because that was exactly what it was. First her baby, and now her body—of course he wanted them both.

But Aisling wasn’t stupid. She wanted him, too—with a fierce hunger which frightened her. A need which was born out of the heart as much as the body. She was afraid of where all this was going to lead—but she forced her mind to draw back from the dark, torturous routes of her imagination.

Why project into an unknown future? She might get hurt, yes—but she suspected she was going to get hurt anyway and only a fool would deny herself as much pleasure as possible in the meantime.

But there was no need to be a walkover. Keep him guessing. In the past she had given in to him all too easily—surely the only way to keep his interest alive was to not be a sure bet? Hadn’t he once told her that himself—that the thing about her which appealed to him was the fact that she was so enigmatic?

‘I’ll give it some thought,’ she said coolly.

Oh, but she was awesome, he thought—with reluctant admiration. Like a cold and brilliant diamond. He gave a soft laugh. ‘Just one more thing, Aisling.’

She swallowed, her heart beating so fast that she could barely get the word out. ‘What?’

His eyes flickered to the tight pony tail. ‘If I come to you tonight,’ he said softly, ‘be sure to let down your hair.’

CHAPTER TWELVE

‘I GUESS you must be thinking about going back to work,’ said Gianluca abruptly.

‘Work?’ echoed Aisling blankly as she looked up from spooning some mashed banana into Claudio’s sweet little mouth. She dabbed the edges of its rosebud shape with a napkin, and smiled lovingly at her baby. Feeding him always took longer than she thought it would—in fact, everything seemed to take longer. Why did no one tell you that having a baby could be such an absorbing and timeconsuming job?

And it wasn’t just the feed itself which took time, but the fact that she seemed to want to study Claudio intently to see whether he might have grown an extra centimetre overnight.

And when she wasn’t studying him, she found herself just as tempted by a sneaky scrutiny of his father. Did Gianluca have any idea of just how sexy he looked when he was fresh out of the shower and had just thrown on an old pair of jeans and a sweater? she thought longingly. Save it until later, she told herself. Until you’re in bed. Don’t give yourself away with your wistful yearnings.

At least in bed she didn’t have to pretend—because she had discovered that sex had other kinds of uses than pleasure. She could use it to air all those emotions she usually kept hidden away. In bed, she could dare to love him with her lips and her body—even if she dared not use the words he had no requirement for.

‘Yes, work,’ said Gianluca, in an impatient kind of voice. He subjected her to a cool, questioning scrutiny. ‘You were adamant about continuing your career when you agreed to come out to Italy, weren’t you, Aisling? As I recall, it was your number one worry—’

‘I wouldn’t have said it was my number one—’

‘Perhaps not,’ said Gianluca, overriding her objection as if she hadn’t spoken. He could see her frown of confusion—but what the hell did she expect? That he hadn’t noticed the way she behaved? Spending her days like some kind of efficient robot and only coming to flesh-and-blood life in his arms at night? She might try to disguise her dissatisfaction with her life here, but he could sense her edginess—that wary way she had of looking at him sometimes. He could not deny that she had thrown herself wholeheartedly into motherhood, but anyone could see that there was something lacking in her life. He narrowed his eyes. ‘I take it you do want to go back?’

Had he noticed her e-mailing Suzy to get all the latest updates, then? Aisling wondered. Or scouring the financial pages of the international newspapers she had requested because she was terrified of being left behind—of being properly isolated in every sense of the word? Or had he just tapped into her own insecurity—that with her immersion into motherhood she was becoming so unlike the person she had been that she didn’t even recognise herself, these days.

And that was dangerous. Because aworld dominated by an undemonstrative husband in this lazily beautiful setting was lulling her into a false sense of security—and surely her career was her ticket to freedom if it all went disastrously wrong. If she relied on Gianluca to be the kind of husband she longed for him to be—waiting for some change of heart which would never come—then she risked losing everything she had ever worked for. Just like her mother.

Wasn’twork her one solid island in a swirling sea of uncertainty? Something she could rely on when everything else around her seemed so temporary. Even the peace she experienced in this heavenly idyll of a place seemed fragile, as if reality might shatter it at any moment.

Yes, she felt cosseted and protected by Gianluca—but only in a superficial and very physical sense. As if he would move heaven and earth to ensure the comfort of the woman who had borne his child. But emotionally, there was nothing. He was remote. Watchful. Restrained.

And he was working again, wasn’t he? Sometimes from home, true—but more often than not driving into his offices in Rome. He was mixing in the glossy world of business and takeovers, while she was changing into a dull little housewife who surely he would find increasingly less attractive?

‘Of course I want to go back to work,’ she said quietly.

Gianluca poured himself a cup of coffee. Should he have been surprised at her agreement? Disappointed, maybe? His mouth hardened. Of course not. Circumstances might have changed, but Aisling had not—and underneath it all she was still the ice-cool, ambitious businesswoman she always had been.

‘So we might as well hire a nanny, mightn’t we?’ he said smoothly, dropping a cube of sugar into his cup ‘N-nanny?’ she echoed.

He gave her an unfathomable look. ‘Sì, cara. With two working parents, there’s no other solution, is there?’ And he bent his head and began to read the business section of his newspaper.

Aisling stared at his dark head, feeling as if she’d just been wrong-footed—like a defendant in court who had just been tripped up by the prosecution. How tense he seemed this morning. Almost as if he wanted to pick a fight with her. ‘Gianluca,’ she questioned hesitantly. ‘Is something wrong?’

His smile was bland as he looked up at her. ‘Why should anything be wrong, cara? We have a healthy baby and have proved we can exist in relative harmony for most of the time. You have met many of my friends and you all seem to like one another. We argue intelli