LITMIR.BIZ

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he’s not here. In fact he won’t be coming at all. Not ever.’

      ‘Not even when the baby…?’

      ‘No.’

      She shook her head again, her expression that of a forlorn child.

      ‘He won’t come for me, or for the baby. He doesn’t want either of us. He never did. Not really. He was just having a bit of fun—playing around. As a matter of fact…’

      She drew in another of those deep breaths that he had come to realise always preceded another of the announcements that were so shockingly disturbing to his emotional equilibrium.

      ‘He’s married.’

      ‘Married? Oh, Meggie, Meggie, you little fool!’

      ‘I didn’t know!’

      Indignation rang sharp in her voice.

      ‘Do you think I’d even have gone out with—for one night alone if I’d known! If I’d so much as suspected? I’m not that much of an idiot!’

      ‘No?’ Once more those black eyebrows rose, cynically questioning her assertion. ‘It seems to me…’

      ‘Oh, I know how it seems to you—to the great, the all-knowing—the supremely infallible Cesare Santorino!’

      Bitterness darkened Megan’s tone as she swung away to stare moodily into the empty fireplace.

      ‘We all know that you would never, ever make a mistake like that!’

      ‘Oh, wouldn’t I?’ Cesare muttered bleakly, half to himself.

      He made a mistake all right, coming here tonight, like this! Made a complete and total fool of himself! He’d thought of nothing else but this moment. Of the time when, freed from his promise to Megan’s father, he could declare the way he felt about her, the torch he’d been carrying for her for years as he’d watched her develop from a child into an adolescent and then into a beautiful young woman.

      But he’d deceived himself totally into thinking that she felt something of the same. That she would wait for him, as he had determined to wait for her. She hadn’t waited! Hadn’t even thought about him! Instead she’d jumped straight into bed with someone else—a married man at that!

      And how was he to know that this Gary had been the first?

      The blazing rage that had been burning inside him stilled suddenly, the red-hot flames turning blue and icy. And cold fury was even harder to deal with than heated anger. Bitterness was cold—and jealousy—and hatred. And he hated even to think of Megan—his lovely, sweet innocent Megan in bed with someone else—giving herself to someone else!

      He had never felt such an icy burn in his heart before. It stung like acid, seeming to eat away at his soul, leaving it broken and ruined, with great dark holes where his emotions should be.

      ‘And when was that?’ Megan’s voice broke into the blackness of his thoughts, jarring him out of the brooding darkness and into the present again, making him unwillingly aware of the way that she had turned back from the fire and was now staring at him in puzzled confusion.

      ‘What?’ he responded, struggling to get himself back under control. ‘What did you say?’

      ‘I wanted to know just when you made this great mistake you’re talking about,’ Megan told him. ‘What was this terrible thing you did and when?’

      Idiota! Cesare cursed himself inwardly. You fool! You damn, damn fool! Now he’d alerted her attention, piquing her curiosity and centring it on him. And just when he was least capable of handling her questions. When he had only just realised how badly he’d misjudged everything and was incapable of explaining anything to her—if in fact he’d wanted to do any explaining!

      On the contrary, he was determined that she should never find out how he had felt. He had come here tonight with the determination to tell Megan just that. To declare the instant attraction to her that had never faded over the years. To say that deep inside he actually believed he loved her and that he wanted her to spend the rest of her life with him.

      But her rash words, her blunt declaration, had damaged those dreams beyond repair. He doubted if he would ever admit to them. He would never tell her how he felt—how he had felt, because he didn’t feel that way any more.

      If the truth was told, he had no idea how he felt at all.

      ‘Cesare…’ Megan persisted, soft, but insistent.

      ‘Oh, it was nothing!’ he bluffed, veiling his eyes behind long black lashes in order to hide the truth from her. ‘Like you, I fell in love with the wrong person.’

      ‘And when was that?’

      ‘Years ago. I was little more than a child. Same age as you if you must know.’

      It was like a slap in the face, Megan reflected miserably. A cool-voiced reminder that he thought of her as little more than an awkward, troublesome adolescent. Nothing had changed then since his brutal dismissal of her just over six months before.

      ‘Except that, unlike me, you didn’t end up with—unfortunate consequences!’ she tossed back, hiding pain behind sarcasm.

      Don’t you believe it! Hastily Cesare bit the words back. Unfortunate consequences! He had given his heart into the keeping of a child. Put his life on hold until she was old enough to be his—and now she had turned out to be someone else entirely.

      ‘I got over it,’ he returned, lacing the words with acid. ‘You do. What is it you say—time heals all wounds.’

      ‘Except that in my case, time can only make things worse.’ Unthinkingly Megan touched a hand to her lower body, bringing Cesare’s dark-eyed gaze to the spot.

      ‘Are you sure?’

      ‘As sure as I can be.’

      ‘Have you seen a doctor?’

      ‘Cesare, I don’t need to see a doctor. I know what’s happening to me! I haven’t had a period for the past two months and I was always regular as clockwork—same time same day. I’ve been feeling sick in the mornings—and I did one of those horrible tests from the chemists. It came up positive.’

      ‘I understand that those things aren’t always accurate.’

      ‘Stop clutching at straws, Cesare! I’m pregnant. There’s no two ways about it!’

      ‘So what are you going to do about it?’

      ‘I don’t know,’ Megan admitted honestly.

      ‘You’re not thinking of an abortion?’

      If he hadn’t been such a great businessman, then Cesare could have had a great career as an interrogator, Megan found herself thinking. He fired the questions at her, cold and hard and fierce, like rounds of bullets from a machinegun, hardly giving her time to think. She had had enough of his stony-faced disapproval, that cold-eyed, critical glare.

      ‘No, I’m not thinking of an abortion! I couldn’t and I wouldn’t! Not that it’s any business of yours!’

      ‘I was only trying to help!’

      ‘By suggesting that I got rid of my baby? I can do without that sort of help!’

      ‘Megan, that isn’t what I meant!’

      ‘Isn’t it? Sounded like it to me! Well, can I remind you, Signor Santorino, that this is my baby! And as such it has nothing whatsoever to do with you!’

      ‘Which, Signorina Ellis,’ Cesare returned viciously. ‘Is exactly the way I want it.’

      ‘Fine!’ Megan tossed her head as she spoke, her russet hair flying, her chin coming up in defiance. ‘I’m glad we understand each other!’

      ‘Oh, we do!’ Cesare returned darkly. ‘Believe

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