‘Silvio—’
‘Go back to sleep.’ The taste of regret made his voice gruff and he lowered her to the mattress and tucked the throw around her. Was she going to beg him to put her back in the escape chute?
But she didn’t.
Instead, her hand slid into his and Silvio tensed because it was so unlike Jessie to show weakness and he had no idea how he was supposed to respond. Ordinarily he was the last man to whom she would turn for comfort and the fact that she had reached for his hand told him that she must be desperate.
Without breathing, he looked down at their joined hands—saw the fragility of her pale, delicate fingers placed trustingly in his strong palm. After a moment’s hesitation he closed his fingers over hers and Jessie sighed softly.
‘I’m glad you’re home,’ she said sleepily, a smile hovering around her mouth as her eyes drifted shut again. ‘Are you going out again?’
Knowing that if she’d been fully awake she would have consigned him to hell, Silvio found it difficult to speak. ‘No,’ he said finally, his voice rough around the edges, ‘no, I’m not going anywhere, tesoro. You can sleep now.’
And she did. With the smile still on her face and her hand locked in his.
Trapped there, Silvio found himself forced to confront issues he didn’t want to confront.
Like the dangerous chemistry that drew them together.
And the fact that because of him, she’d lost the most important thing in her life.
Silvio stared down at her pale face and narrow shoulders and at the battered shoebox that she was gripping like a lifeline.
He wanted to open it to see what it was that she refused to be parted from, but he didn’t want to risk waking her. Neither did he want to intrude on her privacy because he knew how much that mattered to her.
The resolve hardened inside him.
He couldn’t undo what had been done. He couldn’t bring back her brother.
But he could take her away from the life she’d fallen into.
He could take her away from this hell that was all she thought she deserved, and give her something different.
He owed her that.
Chapter Four
‘YOU don’t have to take me shopping.’ It was another blow to her badly damaged pride that he’d suggested it. ‘It’s a luxury I can’t afford.’
‘You need clothes,’ Silvio said smoothly. ‘It isn’t a luxury, it’s a necessity.’
Unable to argue with that, Jessie shrank lower in the passenger seat of his Ferrari, averting her eyes from the stares. She felt as though everyone was a witness to her humiliation. ‘Just a couple of things, then. Maybe another pair of jeans. Do you have to drive this car? Everyone is looking.’
But she knew that the driver was every bit as conspicuous as his car. With his Mediterranean good looks and spectacular physique, Silvio drew covetous glances wherever he went.
‘You would have preferred a chauffeur-driven limousine?’ He pulled the car up on a double yellow line outside the most exclusive store in Knightsbridge and a uniformed man immediately sprang forward.
‘Mr Brianza.’ His voice oozed awe and respect and Silvio tossed him the keys and said something that Jessie didn’t catch.
‘I don’t
think they sell my sort of clothes here.’ Stepping cautiously onto the pavement, she glanced around her furtively, daunted by the throng of beautifully groomed women who strode past her in tailored skirts and vertiginous heels, all of them brimming with confidence. Gazing at one woman’s perfect straight hair, she fingered her tumbled dark curls self-consciously and then stiffened as Silvio took her arm.
‘Try not to look as though you’re expecting someone to assault you,’ he said mildly, guiding her towards the glass doors with a purposeful stride. ‘You’re with me now. No one is going to touch you.’
He was touching her, and the feel of his hand on her arm and the brush of his body against hers created a lethal assault on her senses that was as unwelcome as her disturbingly clear memories of nestling against him while she’d slept.
Instead of pushing him away and telling him she didn’t need him, she’d clung to his hand as a drowning man might have clung to a floating object in a raging river.