Kate Walker - Secret Love-Child

So what the hell had driven her away, leaving only that appalling note behind?

‘What happened to you, Lucia?’

‘I—’

She opened her mouth to speak, then closed it again, looking from his face to that of the sleeping baby and then back again. And the way that she had lost all colour from her face until her skin looked bloodless pushed him forward into the room, holding out his hand to her to help her up.

‘There is a sitting room just through here—we can talk there. That way we will hear Marco if he stirs.’

‘Thank you.’

Did she know what it did to him when she looked up into his face like that, with those soft blue eyes so wide and clear? And the touch of her hand in his had a kick that tightened every nerve in his body, sending stinging electrical sparks running up his arm straight to his heart so that it jerked in instinctive reaction.

Just who was this woman who had been his wife? Still was, on paper. It seemed as if in the single day since she had come back into his life she had been half a dozen diverse characters, none of whom he recognised from the Lucy he had first met. The Lucy he had married. Here and now she was like a completely different person from the hard-faced creature who only yesterday had flung in his face her certainty that she would walk away with a large proportion of everything he possessed.

That, and Marco too.

The nanny’s sitting room was a small, comfortable area off the main nursery. There was a settee and armchairs, a tiny kitchenette at the far side of the room. Lucy followed him silently into it, not hesitating or pulling away, though her head turned back towards the cot where the baby lay.

‘You will see him again,’ Ricardo told her gruffly.

‘You promise?’

When she looked at him like that he would promise her anything. But that was the way he had been caught before, when he had let what he had believed was her innocent beauty lure him into her bed.

It would do no harm to promise this much. She would see Marco again; he could guarantee that. Any more would depend on what she told him now.

‘I promise,’ he said and watched some of the tension seep from her body, the tight mouth loosening, the way she held her shoulders easing.

‘Thank you,’ she said again and the faint tentative smile that accompanied the words caught on something raw deep inside and twisted hard.

‘Save your thanks,’ he muttered roughly, ‘until I’ve done something to deserve them. Would you like a drink? Coffee?’

‘Some water, perhaps.’

A drink would be a good idea, Lucy acknowledged. Her voice had croaked embarrassingly on her words. If she had to tell him the whole of her story, she was going to need some help.

She did have to tell him, she knew that. There was no going back now. For better or for worse, everything had to come out.

‘Your water.’

Ricardo’s voice sounded harshly from close by, startling her eyes open so that she looked up and straight into his darkly watchful face, seeing herself reflected, tiny and palefaced in the polished blackness of his eyes. Blank, unreadable eyes. Eyes that gave nothing away.

And suddenly it was as if she had slipped back through time, back to the moment when she had first arrived at this villa after their wedding. The speedboat had ferried them from the shore across to the island and as they’d stepped ashore she had slipped and almost lost her footing. Immediately Ricardo had moved forward and caught her before she could fall, swinging her up into his arms and carrying her along the wooden jetty that led to the wide stone steps up to the house. As he’d lifted her over the threshold into the villa itself he had suddenly looked down into her eyes, his own deep and dark and totally inscrutable, revealing nothing at all about his thoughts or his feelings.

‘Welcome home, wife,’ he had said.

Then, as he had let her slip to the floor, he had pressed the palms of his hands, big and warm and strong, to the front of her dress, below which the baby she was carrying—the baby that would eventually become Marco—was as yet just a tiny curve to her belly.

‘Welcome, mother of my child.’

It had been in that moment that she had realised that she had fallen desperately, irrevocably in love with this man who was now her husband. But only her husband of convenience, married purely for the sake of that baby.

As the mother of his child, she was welcome in his home. As the mother of his child, his home became her home. But only as the mother of his child. For herself, and in herself she had no place here at all.

‘Lucia—your water.’

Cold moisture beaded the sides of the glass Ricardo held out to her and as she took hold her fingers slipped, sliding up against his hand where he held it. The contrast between the coldness of the glass and the warmth of his skin was a shock, startling her and making her nerves fizz as if a bolt of electricity had shot up her arm.

And from the way that those dark eyes burned into hers it was obvious that Ricardo had felt it too. Just for a moment as their gazes locked she felt that he was about to say something—she could almost feel the words in the air. But then he apparently had second thoughts and stepped away again to move to the door and check on Marco. The baby was still sleeping soundly so Ricardo turned back, pushing his hands deep into the pockets of his trousers as he leaned against the wall.

‘So,’ he said flatly. ‘The truth…’

Which was guaranteed to tighten Lucy’s throat even more.

Lifting the glass to her mouth, she took a swift, deep gulp of the cooling water as she tried to collect her thoughts. She wished that Ricardo would move somewhere else or that he would come and sit down. Standing there, so tall and lean and dark, he seemed to tower over her oppressively, dominating the room and tightening every one of her muscles just to look at him.

‘Why…’ Her throat clenched and she had to take another gulp of water. ‘Why did you bring me here?’

The look he gave her said that that was a question that didn’t need answering but all the same he drew in a long, deep breath and then looked her straight in the eyes.

‘I wanted to see you with Marco—how you would react. How you would be when you met him for real.’

So she had been right. He had been testing her. The atmosphere she had sensed in the room earlier had been real and not the product of her overheated imagination.

‘And what did you find out?’

‘That you lied.’

It was the last thing she had expected but as she opened her mouth to refute the accusation he ignored her attempt at protest.

‘You lied in that note you left when you said you wanted your freedom—at least when you said you wanted your freedom from Marco. So something else took you away. You said you were sick—what was wrong?’

‘I wasn’t exactly sick…’ Lucy hedged. ‘It was more like a…a breakdown.’

She had his attention now. Those dark eyes couldn’t have burned any stronger, or been more fixed on her face.

‘A mental breakdown?’

If there had been any hint of shock or horror in his voice then she might not have been able to answer him but the truth was that his tone was completely controlled, totally matter-of-fact. So much so that it was only just a reaction.

‘Yes…’

She nodded, keeping her eyes locked with his. That steady black gaze never wavered, never moved. Instead, it stayed fixed on her, probing deeper and further with every breath that she took.

‘You were depressed.’

‘You could say that.’ Lucy’s voice was shaky, her weak attempt at laughter even more so. She knew from his quick frown that her laughter seemed out of place but she just couldn’t hold it back. Depressed seemed such an inadequate word for what she had been through. She had barely known who she was or what she was doing. And the world had seemed like a dark, empty cavern, one that she couldn’t find her way out of, no matter how she’d tried. ‘Though depressed sounds like the way you’d describe it if you lost a job or your dog died.’