The Italian's Secret Baby

Roman, his hand braced on the head-rest of her chair, straightened up but didn’t break eye contact. ‘A very nice ear,’ he said, his voice doing almost as much damage to her nervous system as his warm breath had. ‘I could eat it.’

‘You really don’t have to do this, you know.’ She could barely hear her own voice above the clamour of her thudding heart. ‘Do?’

The circles of colour that appeared on the apples of her cheeks looked feverishly bright against her marble pallor.

‘Say…stuff. I really don’t expect it, you know, just because we slept together once,’ she assured him earnestly. ‘All right,’ she conceded, ‘twice. But you can’t really count the last time.’

Her reassurance wiped the smile right off his face. ‘You can’t…Why?’ A nerve clenched hard in his lean cheek as he brought his hand along the side of her jaw. ‘Did you have your fingers crossed?’

Scarlet felt the heat rush to her cheeks. She glanced over her shoulder, aware that their conversation was a little personal for so public a place.

Their new seats were directly adjacent to a group of men who all wore rugby kit; the noise they were making made it unlikely they were going to hear anything she said. One of their number she had exchanged a few words with earlier caught her eye and winked.

Scarlet responded to his, ‘Hello, lovely girl,’ with a grin and a wave before turning back to Roman.#p#????#e#

‘It’s not going to happen again,’ she declared in a fierce undertone.

While she spoke he maintained an expression of polite disbelief that made her want to hit him.

‘Because you don’t want it to?’ he suggested in a light conversational tone.

‘I’ve not given it much thought.’ Lies didn’t get much bigger or more improbable.

‘Sure you haven’t, as in you’ve not thought about much else.’ He shook his head, the cynical twist to his wide, sensual mouth becoming more pronounced as he looked across at her miserable face. ‘Grow up, Scarlet,’ he advised tautly. ‘There’s absolutely no way we could share a bedroom and nothing happen,’ he imparted simply.

The thing was his confidence was fully justified. ‘That might be true,’ she admitted bitterly. ‘But I’m not sharing a bedroom with you so we won’t find out!’

‘I’ve already explained the sleeping arrangements to my parents.’

‘Then you’ll have to unexplain them.’

‘I can’t do that.’

‘Why not?’

‘Because they expect an engaged couple to sleep in the same bed.’

She stilled and lost what little colour she had. ‘What did you say?’

‘You heard what I said, Scarlet.’

‘Why would your parents think we were engaged?’ she enquired in a deceptively mild tone.

‘Because that’s what I told them.’

She loosed an incredulous peal of laughter. ‘Have you lost your mind?’ she exploded.

Roman’s dark lashes lifted and his eyes glittered with an anger to match her own. ‘If I have the blame can be laid directly at your door. Mixed signals don’t cover it,’ he declared. ‘You introduced this ridiculous no-touch policy while at the same time you look at me with those big hungry eyes. It’s enough to send the sanest man born round the bed.’

‘I do not have hungry eyes!’

His brows lifted. ‘Sure, and you just hate making love with me. The screams are actually a sign of how much you hate it.’

‘I don’t scream!’ she choked.

‘Like a banshee, but I like a woman who can let herself go.’

‘You,’ she told him in a voice that quivered with outrage, ‘are crude and vulgar. A woman would have to be mad to marry you.’

‘And are you?’

She stilled, her wide eyes fixed on his face. ‘What do you mean?’ she asked hoarsely.

‘Are you going to marry me, Scarlet?’

‘I thought it was a done deal,’ she remarked bitterly.

He gave a sardonic lopsided smile but didn’t reply.

‘You’re thinking of Sam?’ she suggested.

He opened his mouth as if to say something, then closed it again. When he did speak he appeared to be choosing his words with care. ‘I think he would approve. A proper family…maybe a brother or sister.’

She heard the rather worrying sound of slightly hysterical laughter. ‘You want a baby?’

He looked mildly surprised. ‘Don’t you?’ he returned.

‘Yes,’ she heard herself reply. ‘Eventually,’ she added, trying to retrieve the situation. ‘I’m sure you’d get the same answer from most women.’