Secret Heirs And A Forever Family

She must have believed him because the lock clicked and he opened the door and sat in the passenger seat before she could change her mind. ‘Darcy,’ he said.

‘Whatever it is you want to say,’ she declared fiercely, ‘I don’t want to hear it. Not right now.’

She’d been crying. Her face was blotchy and her eyes red-rimmed and he realised that he’d never seen her cry—not once—she, who probably had more reason to cry than any other woman he’d known.

He wanted to take her in his arms. To feel her warmth and her connection. To kiss away those drying tears as their flesh melted against each other as it had done so many times in the past. But touching was cheating—it was avoiding the main issue and he needed to address that. To face up to what else was wrong. Not in her, but in him. Because how could she have ever trusted him completely when he kept so much of himself locked away?

‘Just hear me out,’ he said, in a low voice. ‘And let me tell you what I should have told you a long time ago. Which is that you’ve transformed my life in every which way. You’ve made me feel stuff I never thought I’d feel. Stuff I didn’t want to feel, because I was scared of what it might do to me, because I’d seen hurt and I’d seen pain in relationships and I didn’t want any part of that. Only I’ve just realised…’ He drew in a deep breath and maybe she thought he wasn’t going to continue, because her eyes had narrowed.

‘Realised what?’ she questioned cautiously.

‘That the worst pain of all is the pain of not having you in my life. When you walked out of my office just now I got a glimpse of just what that could be like—and it felt like the sun had been blotted from the sky.’

‘Very poetic,’ she said sarcastically. ‘Maybe your next girlfriend will hear it before it’s too late.’

She wasn’t budging an inch but he respected her for that, too. If it had been anyone else he wouldn’t have stayed or persisted or cared. But he was fighting for something here. Something he’d never really thought about in concrete terms before.

His future.

‘And there’s something else you need to know,’ he said softly. ‘And before you look at me in that stubborn way, just listen. All those things I did for you, things I’ve never done for anyone else—why do you think they happened? Because those thunderbolt feelings never left me either, no matter how much I sometimes wished they would. Because I wanted our baby and I wanted you. I like being with you. Being married to you. Waking up to you each morning and kissing you to sleep every night. And I love you,’ he finished simply. ‘I love you so much, Darcy. Choose what you do or don’t believe, but please believe that.’

As she listened to his low declaration of love, Darcy started to cry. At first it was the trickle of a solitary tear which streaked down her cheek and ended up in a salty drip at the corner of her mouth. She licked it away but then more came, until suddenly they were streaming her face but the crazy thing was that she didn’t care.

In the close confines of the car she stared at him through blurry vision and as that vision cleared the dark beauty of his face no longer seemed shuttered. It seemed open and alight with a look she’d always longed to see there, but never thought she would. It was shining from his eyes as a lighthouse shone out to all the nearby ships on the darkest of nights. ‘Yes, I believe you,’ she whispered. ‘And now you need to hold me very tightly—just to convince me I’m not dreaming.’

With a soft and exultant laugh Renzo pulled her into his arms, smoothing away the tangle of curls before bending his head to kiss away the tears which had made her cheeks so wet. She clung to him as their mouths groped blindly together and kissed as they’d never really kissed before. It was passionate and it was emotional—but it was superseded by a feeling so powerful that Darcy’s heart felt as if it were going to spill over with joy, until she suddenly jerked away—tossing her head back like a startled horse.

‘Oh, I love you, my beautiful little firecracker,’ he murmured as she dug her fingers into his arms.

‘The feeling is mutual,’ she said urgently. ‘Only we have to get out of here.’

He frowned. ‘You want to go back to Sussex?’

She flinched and closed her eyes as another fierce contraction gripped her and she shook her head. ‘I don’t think we’re going to make it as far as Sussex. I know it’s another two weeks away, but I think I’m going into labour.’

It was a quick and easy birth—well, that was what the cooing midwives told her, though Darcy would never have described such a seismic experience as easy. But she had Renzo beside her every step along the way. Renzo holding her hand and mopping her brow and whispering things to her in Italian which—in her more lucid moments—she knew she shouldn’t understand, but somehow she did. Because the words of love were universal. People could say them and not mean them. But they could also say them in a foreign language and you knew—you just knew—what they meant and that they were true.

It was an emotional moment when they put Luca Lorenzo Sabatini to her breast and he began to suckle eagerly, gazing up at her with black eyes so like his daddy’s. And when the midwives and the doctor had all left them, she glanced up into Renzo’s face and saw that his own eyes were unusually bright. She lifted her hand to the dark shadow of growth at his unshaven jaw and he met her wondering gaze with a shrug of his powerful shoulders. Was he crying?

‘Scusi,’ he murmured, bending down to drop a kiss on his son’s downy black head before briefly brushing his lips over Darcy’s. ‘I’m not going to be a lot of use to you, am I—if I start letting emotion get the better of me?’

And Darcy smiled as she shook her head. ‘Bring it on,’ she said softly. ‘I like seeing my strong and powerful man reduced to putty by the sight of his newborn baby.’

‘It seems as if my son has the same power over me as his mother,’ Renzo responded drily. He smoothed back her wild red curls. ‘Now. Do you want me to leave and let you get some rest?’

‘No way,’ she said firmly, shifting across to make space for him, her heart thudding as he manoeuvred his powerful frame onto the narrow hospital bed. And Darcy felt as if she’d never known such joy as when Renzo put his arm around her and hugged her and Luca close. As if she’d spent her life walking along a path—much of the time in darkness—only to emerge into a place full of beautiful light.

‘It’s not the most comfortable bed in the world, but there’s room on it for the three of us. And I want you beside me, Renzo. Here with me and here with Luca.’ And that was when her voice cracked with the emotion which had been building up inside her since he’d told her he loved her. ‘In fact, we’re never going to let you go.’

EPILOGUE

KICKING OFF HER shoes and flopping onto the sofa with a grateful sigh, Darcy frowned as Renzo handed her a slim leather box. ‘What’s this?’ she questioned.

He raised his brows. ‘Isn’t the whole point of presents that they’re supposed to be a surprise?’

‘But it isn’t my birthday.’

‘No,’ he said steadily. ‘But it’s Luca’s.’

‘Yes.’ The box momentarily forgotten, Darcy looked into her husband’s ebony eyes and beamed. Hard to believe that their beautiful son had just celebrated his first birthday. A year during which he’d captivated everyone around him with his bright and inquisitive nature, which at times showed more than a glimpse of his mother’s natural stubbornness.

Today, with streamers and balloons and a bit too much cake, they’d held a party for all his little friends in Sussex—while the mothers had each sipped a glass of pink champagne. Confident in her husband’s love, and freed from the shame of the past, Darcy had started to get to know people—both here in Sussex and in their London house, as well as the beautiful Tuscan villa where they spent as many holidays as they could. Invitations had started to arrive as, for the first time in her life, she’d begun to make friends. Real friends—though her best friend was and always would be her husband. She looked at him now with bemusement.

‘Open it,’ he said softly.

She unclipped the clasp and stared down at the necklace. A triple row of square-cut emeralds gleamed greenly against the dark velvet and there was a moment of confusion before she lifted her eyes to his. She remembered how, just after Luca’s birth, he’d gone to see Drake Bradley and persuaded the blackmailer to tell him where he’d pawned the diamond necklace. He’d got Drake’s confession on tape of course and, with the threat of prosecution and prison very real, Renzo had surprised everyone by refusing to turn him in to the police. Instead, he’d given Drake a chance—offering him a job working on the site clearance of one of his new projects in England. Employment Drake had eagerly accepted—possibly his first ever legitimate job and one which, against all the odds, he excelled at. For ever after, he treated Renzo with the dedication and loyalty a badly beaten dog might display towards the man who had rescued him.

Keep your friends close… Renzo had whispered to her on the night when the diamond necklace was back in his possession, after she’d finished remonstrating with him for putting himself in possible danger. But his expression had been rueful as she had held the dazzling diamond neckpiece as if it were an unexploded bomb.

‘I guess you wouldn’t get a lot of pleasure out of wearing this now?’

Darcy had shaken her head. ‘Nope. Too much bad history. And I’m no big fan of diamonds, you know that.’

The next day Renzo had returned the piece to the charity, telling them to auction it again. And he hadn’t mentioned jewellery since.

Until now.

‘Renzo,’ Darcy whispered, her gaze dazzled by the vivid green fire of the emeralds. ‘This is too much.’

‘No,’ he said fiercely. ‘It isn’t. Not nearly enough. If I bought up the contents of every jewellery shop in the world, it still wouldn’t be enough. Because I love you, Darcy. I love what you’ve given and shown me. How you’ve made me the man I am today, and I like that man much better than the one I was before.’ His voice dipped, his gaze dark as the night as it blazed over her. ‘And didn’t I always say you should have emeralds to match your eyes?’

Very wet eyes now, she thought, but she nodded as he kissed away her tears. And the jewels were suddenly forgotten because, when it boiled down to it, they were just pretty pieces of stone. The most precious thing Darcy had was her love—for her son and for her husband. And the chance to live her life without shame and without secrets.

‘Come here, mia caro,’ she whispered, practising her ever-increasing Italian vocabulary as she pulled him down onto the sofa next to her.

‘What did you have in mind?’

‘I just want to show you…’ she smiled as her fingertip stroked his cheek until she reached the outline of his sensual mouth, which softened as she edged her own lips towards it ‘…how very much I love you.’

Engaged for Her Enemy’s Heir

Kate Hewitt

Surrendering to the Italian billionaire

When ruthless Rafael Vitali learns the woman in his bed is the daughter of his sworn enemy, he can’t get her out of his penthouse quick enough. But when Allegra reveals she’s pregnant, Rafael seizes the opportunity to assert his control. He insists Allegra move to Sicily…as his wife!

Allegra’s night of abandon with Rafael shattered the life she once knew. His claim over her body, and their unborn child, is undeniable, but giving him a claim over her fragile heart is beyond foolish—yet the temptation he poses is wildly, wickedly irresistible…

To my lovely editor, Victoria.

Thank you for all your help with this one!

CHAPTER ONE

IT SEEMED AS if a funeral was just a chance for people to get drunk. Not that Allegra Wells had personal experience of such a thing. She’d stuck to sparkling water all evening and now stood on the sidelines of the opulent hotel ballroom in Rome where her father’s wake was being held and watched people booze it up. She could have felt bitter, or at least cynical, but all she could dredge up was a bone-aching, heart-deep weariness.

It shouldn’t be this way.

Fifteen years ago it wouldn’t have been.

She took a slug of water, half wishing it was alcohol that would burn its way down to her belly and make her finally feel something. Melt the ice she’d encased herself in for so long, so that numbness had become familiar, comforting. She didn’t even notice it most of the time, content with her life back in New York, small as it was. It was only now, surrounded by strangers and with her father dead, that she felt painfully conscious of her isolation in the world she’d always viewed at a safe distance. The father who had turned his back on her without a thought.

Her father’s second wife and stepdaughter Allegra knew, at least by sight. She’d never met them but she’d seen photos when, in moments of emotional weakness, she’d done an Internet search on her father. Alberto Mancini, CEO of Mancini Technologies. He was in the online tabloids often enough, because his second wife was young and socially ambitious—at least she seemed to be, from everything Allegra had seen and read online.

Her behaviour at the funeral, wearing black lace and dabbing her eyes with artful elegance, didn’t make Allegra think otherwise. She hadn’t spared Allegra so much as a glance, but then why would she? No one knew who Allegra was; she’d only known about the funeral because her father’s lawyer had contacted her.

Around her people swirled and chatted, caught up in their own intricate dance of social niceties. Allegra wondered why she stayed. What she was hoping to find here? What did she think she could gain? Her father was dead, but he’d been dead to her for fifteen years, or at least she’d been dead to him. No messages, no letters or texts or calls in all that time. Nothing, and that was what she grieved for now, not the man himself.

The father she’d lost a long time ago, whose death now made her remember and ache for all she’d missed out on over the years. Was that why she’d come? To find some sort of closure? To make sense of all the pain?

Allegra’s mother had been furious that she’d been attending, had seen it as a deep and personal betrayal. Just remembering Jennifer Wells’s icy silence made Allegra’s stomach cramp. Interactions with her mother were fraught at the best of times. Jennifer had never recovered from the way her husband had cut both her and Allegra out of his life, as neatly and completely as if he’d been wielding scissors. Although it hadn’t felt neat. It had felt bloody and agonising, thrust from a life of luxury and indulgence into one of deprivation and loneliness, trying to make sense of the sudden changes, her father’s absence, her mother’s tight-lipped explanations that had actually explained nothing.

‘Your father decided our marriage was over. There’s nothing I could do. He wants nothing to do with either of us any more. He won’t give us a penny.’

Just like that? Allegra had barely been able to believe it. Her father loved her. He swooped her up in her arms, he tickled her, called her his little flower. For years she had waited for him to call, text, write, anything. All she’d got, on and on, was silence.

And now she was here, and what was the point? Her father was gone, and no one here even knew who she was, or what she’d once been to him.

From across the room Allegra saw a flash of amber eyes, a wing of ink-black hair. A man was standing on the sidelines just as she was, on the other side of the room. Like her he was watching the crowds, and the look of contained emotion on his face echoed through Allegra, ringing a true, clear note.

She didn’t recognise him, had no idea what he’d been to her father or why he was there—yet something in him, the way he held himself apart, the guarded look in his eyes, resonated with her. Made her wonder. Of course, she wouldn’t talk to him. She’d always been shy, and her parents’ divorce had made it worse. Chatting up a stranger at the best of times verged on impossible.

Still she watched him, covertly, although she doubted he noticed her all the way across the room, a pale, drab young woman dressed in fusty black with too much curly red hair. He, she realised, was definitely noticeable, and many women in the room were, like her, shooting him covert—and covetous—looks. He was devastatingly attractive, almost inappropriately masculine, his tall, muscular form radiating energy and virility in a way that seemed wrong at a funeral, and yet was seductively compelling.

They were here to commemorate death, and he was all life, from the blaze of his tawny eyes to the restless energy she felt in his form, the loosely clenched fists, the way he shifted his weight, like a boxer readying for a fight. She was drawn not just to his beauty but to his vitality, feeling the lack of it in herself. She felt drained and empty, had for a long time, and as for him…?

Who was he? And why was he here?

Taking a deep breath, Allegra turned and headed for the bar. Maybe she would have that drink after all. And then she would go back to the pensione where she’d booked a small room, and then to the reading of her father’s will tomorrow, although she hardly thought he’d leave her anything. Then home to New York, and she’d finally put this whole sorry mess behind her. Move on in a way she only now realised she hadn’t been able to.

She ordered a glass of red wine and retreated to a private alcove off the main reception room, wanting to absent herself as much as she could without actually leaving.

She took a sip of wine, enjoying the velvety liquid and the way it slipped down her throat, coating all the jagged edges she felt inside.

‘Are you hiding?’

The voice, low, melodious, masculine, had her tensing. She flicked her gaze up from the depths of her glass and her eyes widened in shock at the sight of the man in front of her. Him.

It was as if she’d magicked him from her mind, teleported him across the room to stand here like a handsome prince from a fairy-tale, except there was something a little too wicked about the glint in his eye, something too hard about the set of his mouth, for him to be the prince of a story.

Was he the villain?

Too stunned to form a coherent response, or one of any kind, Allegra simply stared. He really was amazingly good-looking—dark hair cut slightly, rakishly long, those glinting, amber eyes, and a strong jaw with a hint of sexy stubble. He was dressed in a dark grey suit with a darker shirt and a silver-grey tie, and he looked a little bit like Allegra imagined Mephistopheles would look, all dark, barely leashed power, the energy she’d felt from across the room even more forceful now, and twice as compelling.

‘Well?’ The lilt in his voice was playful, yet with a dark undercurrent that snaked its way inside Allegra like a river of chocolate, pure sensual indulgence. ‘Are you?’

Was she what? She was gaping, that much was certain. Allegra snapped her mouth closed and forced her expression into something suitably composed. She hoped.

‘As a matter of fact, I am. Hiding, that is. I don’t know anyone here.’ She took a sip of wine, needing the fortification as well as the second’s respite.

‘Do you make a habit of crashing funerals?’ he asked lightly, and she tensed, not wanting to admit who she was…the rejected daughter, the cast-off child, coming back for scraps.

“Not unless there’s an open bar,” she joked, hefting her glass, and the man eyed her thoughtfully. Did he believe her? She couldn’t tell. ‘Did you know him?’ she asked. ‘Alberto Mancini?’ The name stuck in her throat, and she saw a flash in the stranger’s eyes, a single blaze of feeling that she couldn’t identify but which still jolted her like lightning.

‘Not directly. My father did business with him, a long time ago. I wanted to…pay my respects.’

‘I see.’ She tried to gather her scattered wits. The look of sleepy speculation in the man’s eyes made her skin prickle. His gaze was like a caress, invisible fingertips trailing on her heated skin. She’d never reacted to someone so viscerally before, so immediately. Maybe it was simply because her emotions were raw, everything too near the surface. She certainly couldn’t ever recall feeling this way before. ‘That’s very kind of you.’ He smiled and said nothing. ‘What did you say your name was?’

‘I didn’t.’ His gaze swooped over her again, like a hawk looking for its prey. ‘But it’s Rafael.’

Rafael Vitali didn’t know who this beguiling woman was, but he was captivated by her cloud of Titian curls, the wide, grey eyes that were as clear as mirrors, reflecting her emotions so he could read them from across the room. Weariness. Sorrow. Grief.

Who was she? And what was her relationship to Mancini? It didn’t really matter, not now his business was done, justice finally satisfied, but he was still curious. A family friend—or something less innocuous? A lover? A mistress? She hadn’t come just for the bar, of that he was certain. So what was she hiding?

Rafael took a sip of his drink, watching the emotions play across her face like ripples in water. Confusion, hope, sadness. A lover, he decided, although she was surely young enough to be his daughter. Mancini’s wife and daughter were across the room, looking sulky and even bored. Rafael would have spared a second of sympathy for the man’s widow if he hadn’t known how she’d raced through his money. And tomorrow she would discover how little there was left…perfect justice, considering how Mancini had done the same to his mother, leaving her with nothing.

And as for his father…

He braced himself for the flash of pain, the memories he closed off as a matter of self-protection, of sanity. He never let himself think about his father, couldn’t go to that dark, closed-off place, and yet for some reason Mancini’s death had pried open that long-locked door, and now he was feeling flickers of the old pain, as raw as ever, like flashes of lightning inside him, a storm of emotion he needed to control.

‘Take care of them for me, Rafael. You’re the man of the house now. You must protect your mother and sister. No matter what…’

But, no. He needed to slam that door shut once more, and right now he knew the perfect way to do it…with this beguiling woman by his side.

‘I hope the bar is worth enduring a wake for,’ he said lightly, and she grimaced.

‘I’m not really here for the bar.’

‘I thought not.’ He braced a shoulder against the wall so he was closer to her, inhaling her light, floral scent. A flyaway strand of coppery hair brushed his shoulder. She was utterly lovely, from her silver-grey eyes to her pert nose and lush mouth, her skin pale and creamy with a scattering of red-gold freckles. ‘So how did you know him?’ he asked.

She shrugged, her gaze sliding away. ‘I knew him a long time ago. I’m not even sure he’d have remembered me, to be honest.’ She let out a wavering laugh that sounded a little too sad, and Rafael resisted the tug of sympathy he felt for her. He didn’t want to feel sorry for her, not now. Not when he’d already decided to sleep with her. Besides, she was no doubt been one of Mancini’s cast-off mistresses, a gold-digger in it for the money and baubles. Why feel sorry for such a woman?

And yet he couldn’t help but notice how fragile she looked, as if a breath might blow her away. There were violent smudges like bruises under her eyes, and her face was pale underneath the gold dust scattering of freckles. The figure underneath the rather shapeless black dress looked slender and willowy, with a hint of intriguing curves. ‘I can’t believe anyone would forget you,’ he said, and was amused to see her cheeks turn pink, her pupils flare, as if she were an innocent unused to compliments.