LITMIR.BIZ

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of feeling even more under his control, because she knew when he touched her she’d lose her sense of reason completely. And yet she couldn’t get the images, the memories, out of her mind.

      As if sensing her looking at him, Alessandro glanced up, his frown deepening as their gazes met. ‘Is everything all right? Do you need something?’

      She shook her head. She’d just fed Ella, and her daughter was asleep in her car seat. ‘No, I’m all right.’

      ‘Why don’t we have champagne?’ Alessandro suggested. ‘To toast our future.’

      ‘The next three months, you mean,’ Mia couldn’t help but correct. She needed to remind herself of that safeguard as much as him. ‘I don’t know. I shouldn’t drink too much whilst I’m breastfeeding…’

      ‘Surely a sip won’t hurt.’ Alessandro motioned to an aide, and then barked out a command in Italian. Mia watched him silently; he wasn’t even aware of how once again he’d exerted his will. It was a small matter, seemingly insignificant, and yet she felt it.

      She also felt how, after just one day, she was too weary and defeated to challenge him. What would she be like after a month, a year, a decade? Would she become as worn out and ghost-like as her mother had been, drifting through life, half-heartedly defending her choices, or lack of them?

      The staff member came back with a bottle of champagne and two crystal flutes. Alessandro dismissed the man and then expertly opened the champagne, the cork giving a stifled pop before he poured them both glasses.

      ‘To Ella,’ he said as he handed her a glass. ‘And to us.’

      Dutifully Mia clinked her glass against his before taking a tiny sip. The bubbles fizzed through her, pleasantly surprising; it had been over a year since she’d had any alcohol. In fact…

      ‘Do you remember the last time we had champagne?’ Alessandro murmured, and Mia stiffened.

      ‘I’m sure you’ve had champagne last week, if not sooner.’

      ‘I haven’t, but I meant when we had it together.’

      Together. The word held memory as well as promise. Intent. Mia took another sip of champagne, just to steady her nerves. ‘I didn’t expect you to talk about that,’ she said after a moment.

      ‘Why not?’

      ‘The last time we were together, you wanted to forget it, just like I did.’ Her voice was unsteady, as was her hand as she put her flute of champagne on the table in front of her.

      ‘Things have changed,’ Alessandro answered with a nod towards a still sleeping Ella. ‘Obviously.’

      ‘They haven’t changed that much,’ Mia protested. ‘You said I had three months to get to know you…to decide.’ Something flickered in his face and she leaned forward. ‘Did you mean that?’

      ‘Of course.’

      She scanned his taut expression, dark brows drawn together, gaze slightly averted. ‘Alessandro,’ she said slowly, ‘what will happen after three months?’

      ‘My hope is we’ll get married.’

      ‘Married…’ Was she a fool to think he might have relinquished that notion? ‘And if I refuse?’

      His eyes gleamed as he leaned forward. ‘I will make it my life’s mission for the next three months to make sure you don’t want to refuse.’

      His voice was a sensuous caress, yet to Mia the words felt like a threat…and one she suspected he could carry out all too well.

      ‘And how will you do that?’ she asked, her voice wobbling. She hadn’t meant to direct a challenge, but she realised she had as Alessandro smiled knowingly, his lingering gaze as tangible as if he’d touched her.

      ‘I think you know how.’

      ‘By seducing me?’

      ‘Do I need to remind you how explosive our chemistry was?’

      ‘No, but perhaps I need to remind you there is more to a relationship—to a marriage—than what happens between the sheets.’

      ‘Or on a desk,’ Alessandro murmured, his eyes glinting.

      Mia’s cheeks heated and she looked away. ‘Indeed.’

      Alessandro settled back in his seat. ‘Like I said, we have chemistry, Mia. Let’s build on that.’

      ‘That’s hardly the foundation for a good marriage.’ In fact she feared it could be a disastrous one. What about shared values, aspirations, ideals? And besides, she had never wanted to get married, anyway. She’d never wanted to be so in thrall to another person, so under their control…and yet here she was. It filled her with a feeling of fearful hopelessness.

      ‘Chemistry and a shared love of a child is plenty,’ Alessandro returned. ‘More than many, or even most, have, and something we can build on.’

      ‘Did your parents love each other?’ she asked bluntly, and he stilled, clearly surprised by the question, before he gave a terse shake of his head.

      ‘My mother loved my father, but he did not love her in return.’

      ‘So would our marriage be one of love, eventually? Is that what you would hope for?’

      Alessandro stilled, a guarded look coming over his face. ‘Our love of Ella…’

      ‘You know that’s not what I mean.’

      ‘What do you mean, Mia? Yesterday you told me you had never intended on marrying. Are you now telling me you want something different out of your marriage?’

      She deflated, wondering why she’d pursued the point. ‘No, I’m not saying that. I’ve never wanted to fall in love.’

      ‘And neither have I, so I think we’re a good match.’

      Yet why did that make her feel so despairing, so hopeless? She’d never wanted to marry, yet now that she might, she didn’t think she wanted a marriage devoid of affection. She felt trapped, choiceless, and she hated that. At least it was only for three months. It felt like the only silver lining to an otherwise towering, dark cloud.

      ‘My parents’ relationship was stormy and difficult,’ Alessandro said after a moment. She had the sense he was telling her something he didn’t relate often. ‘They never married, and, as I told you once before, my father walked out before I was born. My mother spent the next fifteen years beaten down by life, working dead-end jobs, moving from grotty flat to grotty flat, all in pursuit of some man or other…toxic relationships with wastrels or drunks or men who only wanted one thing.’ He sighed heavily, his gaze turning distant, as if he was lost or even trapped in a memory. ‘And she gave her heart every time, or so it seemed to me. It was no way to live.’ Mia heard a raw note of sadness in his voice that she’d never heard before, and it touched her, made her see him in a new and surprising light.

      ‘That must have been difficult for you,’ she said quietly, the aggression gone from her voice.

      ‘It wasn’t easy,’ Alessandro agreed, a dark note in his voice that made Mia’s heart ache. She had an image in her head of a little black-haired boy watching with wide, grey eyes as his mother invited another man into their lives, as they were forced to move, as life upended for him again and again. His childhood had been as challenging as hers, if not more so, just in a different way.

      ‘And so this is the alternative?’ she asked after a moment.

      ‘It’s an alternative.’ Alessandro met her gaze directly, his expression now one of firm purpose. ‘Give us a chance, Mia. I’m willing to. We can have a marriage of companionship and compatibility. It doesn’t have to be some terrible truce, or a sorry stalemate.’

      ‘A loveless marriage?’

      ‘Love is overrated.

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