In the Italian's Bed: Bedded for Pleasure, Purchased for Pregnancy / The Italian's Ruthless Baby Bargain / The Italian Count's Defiant Bride

‘A phrasebook?’

‘For when you come to visit me at my home in Rome.’ Rocco waved away Eric’s protests as he opened a travel itinerary along with two first class tickets. ‘When Bella left—when I was on my own—every week you rang me, every week there was a letter, and every time I came back to Australia to check on my business here not once did I sleep in a hotel. You, my friends, were always there. Now it is time for you to eat at my table—for you, Eric, to take your wife to what is surely the most beautiful city in the world,’ Rocco finished, wiping tears from his eyes as he told the couple the true value of their friendship.

Well, nothing was going to top that!

‘Here, Dad.’ Emma found she was biting on her lips as she handed her father her gift. An oil painting, it was of the beach scene from their house at late afternoon. Normally in her paintings Emma always left faces blank, so the people who bought her pieces were able to place themselves in the image—it was the signature mark of her work. Except in this one, amongst the families and children playing on the beach, unmistakably there were her parents, smiling and relaxed as they walked hand in hand along the beach they had loved for so long.

It had taken her days to paint.

But it had been weeks of thought that had drained her.

‘It’s lovely, darling.’ Eric gave her a suitable smile as he studied her work for, oh, around ten seconds, before kissing her cheek.

‘You and Mum are there…’ Emma pointed to the figures in the scene.

He pulled on his glasses and peered more closely. ‘So we are!’ Eric beamed, then took his glasses off and kissed her on the cheek again. ‘Thank you, darling.’

He put the painting down on the floor beside the mountain of other presents, then peeled open the gift Jake and Beth had bought, crowing in delight at a bottle of champagne Emma could have sworn she’d given them as a gift when the twins were born, and holding up the two department store champagne glasses that accompanied the bottle as if they were made of the finest crystal.

‘That’s for you two to share,’ Jake said, and smiled, ‘when the party’s over. Happy birthday, Dad!’

Emma found she was biting hard into her lip as her mother oohed and ahed, kissing Jake and telling him he was so thoughtful. Her fingers were clenched, and in an effort not to say anything, not to spoil things, Emma actually sat on her hands, telling herself she was being unreasonable. Her father had been delighted with her present. She was just being sensitive, that was all, because Rocco was nodding at the lovely champagne and Zarios was busy with his mobile phone. She was surely just being childish. But was she the only one who could see the glaring disparity between how she and Jake were treated? Blinking back sudden pathetic tears, Emma was glad of the diversion of her own phone bleeping. Picking it up from the table, she frowned slightly when she saw that she had a message from Zarios.

Don’t sulk!

She suppressed a smile as she texted back.

Do you blame me?

As she hit ‘send’, the sound of his phone bleeping at the opposite end of the table sent a fizz of excitement through her—especially when she saw that he was texting again.

I liked it.

She was about to text back her thanks, but she had another incoming message.

I want you.

Two spots of colour burnt on her cheeks as her phone bleeped again, and Zarios told her exactly how much he wanted her. She was blushing like an eighteen-year-old—felt like an eighteen-year-old as her mother’s frown scolded her for spending so long on her phone.

‘Could you get some more orange juice, Emma?’

‘Of course.’

She fled to the kitchen, embarrassed yet exhilarated, as jumpy as a cat. She trembled as she pulled open the door of the fridge. It wasn’t just that he was sexy—though he was, Emma thought, gulping icy air from the fridge—it was that smile, that lazy smile that just made the world pause, and the intensity of his eyes when they held hers.

And instinctively he had known how much her father’s dismissal of her work, however unwitting, had hurt her.

Never had a man read her more skilfully.

It was as if he’d versed himself in her thoughts—like an extension to her mind.

He got it!

Got the crazy make-up of her family and the fact that they could make her smile, make her laugh, even as they drove her round the bend.

‘Need a hand?’

He didn’t wait for an answer. His hot palm was between her legs, running lazily the length of her thigh, and she rested her head on the freezer door to steady herself, simultaneously revelling in his touch and tensing at the thought of anyone walking in.

‘Zarios…’ She turned to face him, to warn him off with a brittle expression, to tell him this was neither the time nor the place—but he’d beaten her to it. He was smiling down at her, pulling out cartons from the fridge and feigning such utter innocence that if her thighs hadn’t been on fire she’d have sworn she’d imagined the whole thing.

Zarios had been confused by her parents’ reaction to the painting—had been confused by the gift as well. From the way Lydia had spoken, and from the information he had gleaned over the years, he had assumed Emma’s hobby had simply been indulged by Lydia and Eric.

But with one glance he’d seen her talent.

A real talent that should be nurtured and applauded, not tossed amongst a pile.

He was lying, and they both knew it, when he tried to say the right thing. ‘I know how it looked out there,’ Zarios said as he picked up some jugs from the bench, ‘but they are proud of you!’

‘I think you’re talking to the wrong sibling.’ She snipped open the juice and poured it into the jugs. ‘They’re proud of the one with the real job and the fancy car—the one who gives them grandchildren…’

‘You’re incredibly talented.’

‘That doesn’t always sell paintings!’ She hadn’t meant to say anything, but the financial pressure Jake had heaped on her fledgling business was just too much to bear, and unwittingly, just as her mother did when stressed, Emma put down the carton and massaged her temples for a moment.

‘Business not going too well?’

‘Just a few money worries at the moment; it will pick up,’ she said, doing just that to the juice. But his hands caught hers, making them let go of their contents.

‘Tomorrow?’ Zarios said, stunned by the comfort saying that single word gave him.

‘Tomorrow,’ she agreed, taking a deep breath, and then another rapid one, as he deeply kissed the nape of her neck. He kissed it so hard that when she fled to the loo moments later she could see the bruise he had left, which had her pulling out her ponytail and arranging her hair to hide it. She had been angry with him at the time, and yet was surprisingly grateful later.

Grateful, because when everyone had gone, when the chopper had long since lifted into the sky, and her parents had read through the cards for the hundredth time and all that was left was the tidying up, it was almost impossible to fathom what had taken place.

She checked her phone for the hundredth time, willing a text to appear, telling herself it didn’t matter that there wasn’t one—he was at a christening; he’d told her he’d speak to her tomorrow…

Later, having undressed for bed, exhausted, she brushed her teeth, and then, lifting her hair, saw again the smudge of purple bruise. She shivered, running her fingers over the only tangible evidence of what had taken place. Emma clutched the memory of it to her like a hot water bottle as she curled up in the same bed Zarios had slept in last night, slid under the weighty warmth of a duvet that still held his scent and let memories caress her exhausted body.

Remembered the bliss of being in his arms.

Willed sleep to come so that soon she could greet the morning.

CHAPTER FOUR

‘COME with us, darling,’ Lydia said again, as Emma read the morning paper. ‘We’re going to drive along the coast and have a long, lazy lunch…’

‘I really can’t, Mum.’ Emma shook her head. ‘I haven’t been at the gallery since Thursday.’

‘Surely one more day off won’t hurt?’ Lydia pushed.

Oh, but it would. A buyer had been in twice the previous week, looking at her paintings, and Emma knew that a closed sign on her shop too many days in a row would soon temper his interest. And then there was Jake to deal with.

She jumped with nervous excitement as her phone shrilled, dismayed and panicked to find that it was just Jake—wanting to know her answer, wanting to know what time she was getting away so that they could talk.

‘I need to be at the shop.’ Emma filled her cup from the pot and added sugar. ‘Anyway…’ she smiled as her dad walked in and pinched Lydia’s bottom ‘…you two don’t need me sitting in the back seat spoiling your fun. You’ve got a trip to Rome to plan!’

‘I can’t believe Rocco was so generous!’ Lydia clapped her hands in delight at the prospect. ‘I just can’t believe he did that.’

‘I can…’ Eric slathered butter on his toast. ‘He’s always wanted to show us his home town, and I think, with his retirement coming up and everything…’ he paused for a pensive moment ‘…he’s probably wondering how he’ll fill his time.’

‘I know how I’d fill it!’ Lydia shook her head in wonder. ‘He should be off on a cruise. The women would be lining up for him, with his pots of mon-ey…and he’s a nice man, too,’ Lydia added, more as an afterthought.

‘You’re incorrigible!’ Eric laughed, but his expression was serious. ‘He’s a very nice man who happens to still be in love with his ex-wife.’

‘Then he needs to get over her!’ Lydia said, unmoved. ‘You know I love you, Eric, but I wouldn’t wait thirty years.’

‘She wouldn’t wait thirty minutes!’ Eric winked at his daughter, peeling off the front and sports pages of the newspaper, as he always did. ‘Have you had a good weekend, darling?’

‘I had a great time,’ Emma enthused. ‘Everyone did!’

‘You’re sure?’ Lydia checked. ‘Did you hear anyone actually say that?’

‘Everyone had a ball…’ Emma’s voice trailed off as she turned the page, everything freezing as Zarios’s face suddenly stared out at her from the newspaper. He wasn’t alone.

He was with Miranda.

The regular Monday gossip column, telling what had happened with the rich and famous over the weekend, was causing more than a vague stir of interest as Emma read the words below the photo.

The rumoured break-up of drop-dead gorgeous financier Zarios D’Amilo and his model girlfriend Miranda Deloware (pictured yesterday, wearing an exquisite Kovlosky gown), seems to be just that: a rumour.

Appearing together at the christening of Elizabeth Hamilton (see p42) there was no mistaking that they were very much a couple. A source close to the pair hinted there might soon be the sound of wedding bells.

Sorry, gals…it would appear Zarios is very much spoken for.

‘I thought as much…’ Lydia tutted as she peered over Emma’s shoulder. ‘Any woman would be mad to get involved with him.’

‘That’s not what you said on Saturday.’

‘I hadn’t spoken properly to Rocco then. Zarios is the incorrigible one! He’s got the morals of an alley cat, ap-parently; he’ll say anything to get a woman into bed. Really, I can see why Rocco’s hesitant to just hand everything over to him.’ She stabbed at his image in the paper. ‘Zarios doesn’t know the meaning of the word commitment.’

Somehow Emma managed to be normal.

Somehow she managed to kiss her parents goodbye and thank them for a wonderful weekend as they headed off for their drive along the coast.

She wasn’t even angry as she clipped on her seatbelt and headed for her own long drive home, still hoping that he’d ring, that her phone would bleep and it would be Zarios, offering some sort of an explanation.

Pulling up at her flat, Emma felt her heart leap as she saw him standing at her door, glad—so glad—that she hadn’t rung and blasted him with accusations.

He gave a very thin half-smile of acknowledgement as she parked her car, then walked towards him, and Emma felt her heart sink at the grim expression on his face.

‘Hi.’ Refusing to be needy or jealous, refusing to let him know she’d even seen the newspaper, Emma let him into the hallway then up the steep steps towards her flat. She certainly wasn’t going to make this easy for him—if he was still with Miranda then he could tell her so without assistance!

‘I’ve been waiting for you…’ He couldn’t meet her eyes; he followed her through to the kitchen. ‘May I?’ He gestured to the sink and Emma frowned as he poured himself a glass of water and downed it in one gulp. For someone who had had so much practice in breaking women’s hearts, he sure looked nervous. ‘As I said, I’ve been waiting for you.’

‘Well, I’m here now!’ Emma kept smiling, deliberately kept smiling, even though her heart was shrivelling. Just yesterday she’d been in his arms. Little more than twenty-four hours ago she’d been foolish enough to glimpse a future with Zarios in it—and now she knew, just knew, he was about to break her heart.

What an idiot she was to believe him.

What a blind, trusting fool.

‘Your brother asked me to come…’

‘My brother?’ Emma frowned. What on earth did Jake have to do with all this? Unless he’d been asking Zarios for money…Emma’s blood chilled at the very thought.

‘He’s at the hospital…’ Zarios ran a tongue over very pale lips. ‘We thought it better that I came and told you rather than the police…’

‘The police…’ Tiny needles prickled at her scalp, along her arms. Her eyes shot to his, seeing the very real anguish there. ‘What’s he done?’ Frantic images dotted her mind. Oh, she’d known Jake was worried—in deep trouble, perhaps—but from the serious note in Zarios’s voice, from the grey tinge to his skin and his reticence, Emma knew that this was serious. ‘What’s happened to Jake?’

‘It’s not Jake.’

Her hand flew to her mouth as she thought of Beth, the twins…‘What the hell has he done?’

‘It isn’t Jake, Emma…’ Zarios swallowed hard. ‘It’s your parents.’

‘My parents?’ She shook her head. Nothing he was saying was making sense. ‘What are you talking about? I just left them.’

‘There was an accident on the beach road…’

She was already turning for the door, desperate to get to them, only Zarios was pulling her back.

And she knew why—knew as he pulled her into his chest what was coming next. Only she didn’t want to hear it. Struggling like a frantic cat in his grasp, she was desperate to get away, to flee, to run, rather than be held and face the truth.

‘Emma, they were killed outright.’

CHAPTER FIVE

HIS arms were the only thing that stopped her falling as everything in her world went black.

In the horrible shrinking vortex which she’d entered, for a moment there was nothing. No sound, no thought, no gravity. Just a spinning sensation of doom that coated each cell in its rapid black welcome, then expelled her to another side—a side where, no matter how she pleaded and wept to go back, there was no escape.

On the most horrific day of her life he was there beside her, this strong pillar of support. In fact, Emma was so bewildered that she didn’t even realise till much later how much she must have leant on him that day.

And that evening, too.

She had let him drive her back to her parents’ home and there lead her to her bed, where she had woken just that morning when everything had been so normal. He had sat on the chair beside her whilst she had drifted in the twilight zone between rest and sleep to a place of vague awareness, and somewhere between darkness and dawn she remembered.

‘Miranda…’

‘Shhh…’ The loose lips of a liar might once have soothed her, but she was beyond comfort now, beyond pain—beyond anything, really.

‘Are you two back together?’

‘We’ll talk in the morning.’

‘Are you back together?’

The endless silence before he spoke was louder than his words.

‘Emma, it’s complicated….’

‘Yes or no?’

There was the longest pause. ‘Yes.’

Which still didn’t answer her question. It was unfathomable to her that after the most breathtaking lovemaking, after all that had been said, he could within a matter of hours simply walk away.

‘Is she pregnant?’ It was an arrogant question, but it was all she could think of, all that could rationalise such a rapid demise.

‘No.’ Zarios looked her in the eyes and lied. Lied because they had to be over. Lied because he wouldn’t do it to his child—could never let it be said, even to himself, that it was the only reason he was with its mother.

‘Miranda and I have been together a long time—four months,’ Zarios added. And Emma suddenly felt as if her mother was in the room with her, recalling the sun-drenched evening and how they had laughed. The perfect answer was there for the taking, but she chose not to use it. ‘Emma, what happened that morning…’

He closed his eyes; she could see his face screwed up in concentration as he tried to find the words, but rather than wait for his paltry summing up, she found words for him.

‘Was just a bit of fun.’

He frowned before he opened his eyes again. Clearly her response was the last thing he’d been expecting, but Emma was hurting so badly that there was plenty to go around, so instead of humiliating herself, instead of letting him think she’d once wanted him, she told him otherwise. She was more than willing to grate off a piece of her raw bruised heart and let him sample the pain—let him take a sip of the humiliation he’d force-fed her.

‘Emma, you know that’s not the case.’

The acrid bitter taste of humiliation was choking her. She had lost not just her parents that day, but the man she’d glimpsed loving, too.

‘Oh, come on, Zarios, my mother would never have forgiven me if I hadn’t at least attempted to flirt with you.’ She stared through the darkness towards him. ‘The great Zarios D’Amilo, coming to my house for a party. My business almost in tatters. It would have been almost criminally irresponsible for me not to at least try…’ And there it was, the tiniest swallow in his olive throat that told her that maybe, just maybe, he believed her. It was enough to make her go on. ‘So you went back to Miranda—oh, well, you can’t blame a girl for trying. Anyway, you know how the saying goes—rich men are like buses; if you miss one, there will be two more following shortly behind.’

Silence hissed in the air. Emma knew she had gone too far, but it was too late to attempt retrieval, and right now she simply didn’t care.

‘Just leave, Zarios.’

‘You shouldn’t be on your own.’

‘Then I’ll ring someone I want to have here.’

‘Well—’ his voice was crisp and businesslike, but the contempt in his eyes would surely stay with her for ever ‘—I’m glad we both understand each other.’

‘Me, too.’

It was Zarios who had the final word.

‘I wouldn’t waste your time on your artwork, Emma. After your performance in the summerhouse you should try your hand at acting. For a minute there I actually believed you were different.’

CHAPTER SIX

PRIVATELY Emma had often wondered how Jake would cope in a real crisis—the answer had surprised her.

He had dealt with everything—and not just the prac-tical—had offered endless support as Emma struggled just to function. He had dealt with the rapid sale of her parents’ house when, two days after the funeral, a generous offer had come up to buy it, furnishings and all. And Jake had offered wise counsel when, on a particularly unbearable night, she’d confided to him what had happened with Zarios.

‘You’re best out of it, Em…’ He had held her hand and said all the right things. ‘Whatever he’s got going on with Miranda is just to keep the board of directors happy—it will be over in a few weeks.’

And he had been right.

Two weeks before the board’s decision and Zarios was again in the newspapers—but for all the wrong reasons.

She’d read about him—unable to help herself—with a morbid curiosity, scanning the magazines and newspapers.

D’Amilo Financiers shareholders were bracing themselves for the announcement, its share price hovering as the financial world held its collective breath and awaited details on the company’s new direction. For a while Zarios had managed to behave. Emma had winced at every photo of him walking hand in hand with Miranda, hopping on a plane and joining her in Brazil on a photo-shoot. His spin doctors had been working overtime, almost managing to convince the world that Zarios D’Amilo had changed—that this leopard now wore different spots.

Till last week.

No comment had been offered from Camp Zarios when Miranda had been dumped at the eleventh hour, just two weeks short of his father’s retirement. The papers were ablaze with the scandal, the share price had tumbled, and even the gossip magazines wavered in their dogged devotion to Zarios.

After all, Emma thought, her lips curling in distaste as she’d read on, what reputable magazine could favourably report on a man who would end a relationship when he found out Miranda was unable to bear children?

Zarios, as Miranda had tearfully revealed to the enthralled media, having sold her story for a record sum, had wanted a child, an heir, and had refused to commit to marriage until she became pregnant. Tests had recently revealed that she was infertile, and there were photos of the two of them coming out of the specialist fertility department at a top Melbourne hospital—Zarios looking boot-faced, Miranda in floods of tears.

And, Emma had noticed with loathing, he wasn’t even holding her hand.

Jake had been right—she was best out of it. And then suddenly her brother had changed his mind.

Arriving at her door a couple of nights ago, grey and ashen, suddenly Jake had insisted that she went to Zarios for help.

Emma felt nauseous at the mere recollection of the desperate conversation she had shared with her brother that night.

‘You hit Beth?’ she had asked, appalled at her brother’s confession.

‘I pushed her…’ Jake was as irritated as Emma was horrified. ‘And she fell. I was just trying to get past and she was in the way. Look, Em…’ in an attempt to soften her, Jake reverted to her childhood nickname ‘…how can I walk in now and tell Beth I’ve lost the house? She’s already threatening to leave. Surely Zarios owes you after what he did to you? You can sweet-talk him into a loan.’

‘He’s not going to pay off your gambling debts.’

‘Tell him it’s for you! Tell him that your business is in trouble—tell him anything, just keep me out of it. He’d never agree for me. He knows our parents’ house had been sold, that the money’s practically in the bank—it’s just till Mum and Dad’s money comes through.’

‘Even if he did give me a loan, which is highly unlikely, what are you going to tell Beth? How are you going to explain it in a couple of weeks’ time, when you have to pay me back?’

‘Things will be calmer then,’ Jake said. ‘If I tell her now, she’ll walk. She’ll take out a restraining order and I won’t see the kids.’

‘What if I go with you and speak to the bank? Maybe if you can sign a guarantee that the money’s coming.’

‘The guys I’m dealing aren’t going to wait for the bank to make up their mind, Em. I need…’ Jake gulped as he told her the appalling figure—he needed nearly one million dollars by the close of business tomorrow. ‘Every day that passes it goes up more…’

Those poor kids…Emma almost wept as she pictured Harriet’s and Connor’s innocent, trusting faces. Poor Beth, too. God alone knew what she must be putting up with.