LITMIR.BIZ

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as a woman worth his interest.

      * * *

      Feeling something prickling at the back of his neck, Raphael looked up amidst Alyssa’s slobbering kiss on his cheek.

      Pia stood at the center of the room, her eyes wide behind a pair of black-framed spectacles. Sunlight drew an outline of her lithe body in a simple T-shirt and shorts that bared her long, tanned legs. She’d braided her hair but was losing the fight against it. It fell in unruly curls around her face.

      Among the women dressed in casual couture with designer handbags and diamonds dripping at their ears and wrists, she stood out like a wildflower amidst pricey, carefully cultivated crossbred prize orchids.

      No makeup, no artifice.

      Emotions chased across her face, the naked vulnerability in it rousing desire and a fierce protectiveness within him.

      Pretending a liaison with her, however harmless she thought it, wouldn’t be without consequences. His conversation with her at his office, Gio’s Machiavellian maneuvering of them both toward what he deemed inevitable, every instinct Raphael possessed told him that it was a bad idea, screamed at him to keep his distance from her.

      And yet, how could he leave her to the jackals Giovanni had unleashed on her? To Gio’s ridiculous schemes? The thought of any man, even Enzo, touching her, the thought of her bestowing her friendship, her loyalty, her affection on any other man—it was becoming unbearable.

      Was she going to fare any better with him? The question had been haunting him since he’d agreed to her scheme.

      “Pia?” he whispered softly.

      She lifted those luminous eyes to his. A jolt of sensation hit his muscles at the artless want in her eyes. Her open desire for him made every male instinct in him rise to the surface.

      Color washed up her cheeks and she blinked. “I was looking for you,” she finally said, pushing the glasses up on the bridge of her nose. “I don’t think we should—”

      He could see Giovanni and his mother and a couple of other people walking into the huge room. “Come and meet my daughter, Alyssa.” He cut her off abruptly.

      “Your daughter?” She looked like a deer caught in headlights, ready to flee any moment. “You have a daughter?”

      His daughter slid off his legs, sauntered over to Pia, wrapped herself around Pia’s bare leg like a vine and looked up. The thought of Pia’s dislike for him translating itself to Alyssa made him cover the distance between them.

      All her distress forgotten, Pia picked up Alyssa with a soft laugh. Raphael watched transfixed as she buried her face in Alyssa’s tummy with a sigh.

      He could hear Gio in the background saying what a pretty picture the three of them made, the manipulative bastard! Could imagine his mother’s shock; could practically hear the wheels turning in her head; could hear the soft whispers spreading from mouth to mouth.

      Raphael had never believed in fate or higher power. None of them had ever come to his aid. Always it had been his own decisions and actions that had made his path. Even after Giovanni had taken him under his wing, it was Raphael who’d pushed himself to set new goals, to reach new heights in his business.

      And yet, as Alyssa twisted one of Pia’s curls around her chubby finger and tugged hard, sending a gush of pained tears to Pia’s eyes and laughter spilling from her mouth, it felt as if he was taking a step that couldn’t be undone.

      He laughed at the way Pia cooed at the three-year-old in fractured Italian, begging her to let go of her hair; at the way she instantly dropped to her knees when Alyssa demanded to be set down and tugged Pia in that boisterous way of hers.

      Amused, he watched as his daughter and Pia charmed each other for the next hour. He watched his daughter, who barely tolerated strangers, instinctively trust Pia, and he watched as Pia, who’d been so uncomfortable with the sophisticated crowd, fell for his girl.

      Slowly, Alyssa began to sway where she stood. Pia gathered Alyssa—who didn’t let anyone except him or his mother put her to sleep—and she neatly cuddled into Pia’s chest, sucked her thumb into her mouth and promptly fell asleep.

      “Don’t wake her up,” Pia hissed at him when he tried to untangle her hair from his daughter’s fist.

      Only this woman could make him laugh just as much as she could turn him on with one look. “Unless you want her to rip out your—” his gaze fell to the thick honey-brown strands that were like rough silk between his fingers “—lovely hair, which would be a shame, I have to do this.” Firmly, he uncurled Alyssa’s fingers until Pia’s hair was free. “Believe me, she has ripped out my hair from the roots far too many times.”

      “You don’t look like you’ve lost any,” she threw back, and then blushed when he grinned. He took Alyssa from her, gave her to his sister, who left with a wide-eyed glance at the both of them.

      Having lost their buffer, Pia stepped back from him hurriedly. She frowned as she noted Gio and his mother in deep discussion outside the French windows. “You didn’t tell me you have a daughter.”

      “Alyssa is no one’s business but mine,” he said before he could modulate his tone.

      Hurt flashed in her eyes before she lifted her chin in defiance. “Is your ex-wife here too? I’m not really comfortable stepping in between—”

      “Allegra is not a part of our lives anymore. She lost all her rights to Alyssa.”

      “I wouldn’t have suggested this ridiculous charade if I’d known you had a daughter. I won’t be a part of anything that could harm that little girl. Maybe she’s too young to understand which woman her father is...has...”

      He raised a brow.

      She was the first woman who hadn’t immediately thought to use Alyssa like a ladder toward him. The first woman in his sphere who had considered his child’s interests before her own.

      She was the first woman he’d ever met who always put someone else before her own needs—first her Nonni, Gio and now a little girl. Even his mother, who adored her grandchildren, sometimes used Alyssa to try to manipulate him.

      But Pia... Could Pia be truly different in this too?

      “Do you always stammer when you talk about what men and women do?” he goaded.

      “It can’t be good for her to know you and I...you and me...”

      “My mother and my sister Teresa are the only ones who’re allowed to look after Alyssa,” he offered. He’d never explained his actions to anyone and yet the words fell from his mouth. “I need a woman for only one thing and I do that when I’m out of town.”

      “You need a woman for only...” Her words trailed off, a flush dusting her cheeks. “That’s horrible and so...clinical. Are you saying you’ll never need a woman, even in the future, for anything else?”

      “I’m saying exactly that. I don’t intend to marry ever again.”

      “What about affection, companionship, y’know...”

      “I’ve never met a woman who made me feel or want those things. Alyssa has me, and my mother and sisters for a woman’s influence.” He took a step toward her, more turned on by this ridiculous conversation than made sense. The infuriating woman took another step back. “My mother will understand that our relationship is not something I want discussed in front of Alyssa. She wasn’t even supposed to bring Alyssa today. But I bet she couldn’t pass up the chance to meet you.”

      “When I met her...she...” Pia hesitated. When he just stared back at her, she finally said, “I could be wrong, but I think she...doesn’t like me.”

      “She doesn’t.”

      “Why? She doesn’t even know me.”

      “You’re the prime contender for Gio’s

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