LITMIR.BIZ

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I’ll take you straight to him. Did you ask the taxi driver to bring in your luggage?’

      ‘I don’t have any luggage. I’m not planning on staying. I’m here to collect Nico and take him home.’

      Sergio’s eyes narrowed on her determined face and he seemed about to argue, but thought better of it. ‘We will discuss what is best for him later. You certainly won’t be taking him anywhere while he’s throwing up.’

      Kristen hurried after Sergio up the sweeping staircase. On the first-floor landing they walked past the master bedroom. The door was open and she could not resist peeping in. The wallpaper and soft furnishings had been updated and were a soft blue rather than gold as she remembered, but the huge four-poster bed still dominated the room and the sight of it evoked memories she wished she could forget. Now was not a good time to recall in vivid detail Sergio’s naked, muscular body, or to remember the firestorm passion they had once shared and his unexpected tenderness when he made love to her.

      There was no hint of tenderness about him now, she noted as she caught up with him. He was waiting outside the door next to his room. His unreadable expression became speculative when his glance travelled from her flushed face to his bedroom but he made no comment other than to say, ‘Nico has been asking for you.’

      ‘I’m not surprised. He was probably frightened when you whisked him away from everything that is familiar to him and brought him to a place he has never seen before. What were you thinking of?’ Kristen asked him curtly. ‘You told me that when you were a young child your mother snatched you and took you to another country. How could you do the same thing to Nico?’

      His jaw tightened. ‘I had my reasons.’

      ‘Or maybe you were trying to score a point over me and prove how powerful you are?’ she said cynically. ‘This isn’t one of your boardroom battles.’ Kristen broke off at the sound of Nico crying. Her fight with Sergio could wait until later.

      Pushing open the door, she entered an elegant bedroom which had a pale carpet and silk covers on the bed that were hardly suitable for a pre-school child, especially one with a stomach upset. Nico looked feverish; his cheeks were flushed and his curls clustered damply on his brow. A woman was leaning over him, trying to persuade him to take a sip of water, but he pushed her away and his sobs grew louder until he looked across the room and saw Kristen.

      ‘Mummy...’ His lip quivered, and his distress tore Kristen’s heart. She dashed over to the bed and gathered him in her arms.

      ‘It’s all right, sweetheart. I’m here.’ She frowned at Sergio. ‘He feels very hot. Have you given him anything to bring his temperature down?’

      ‘He brought up the medicine the doctor left for him,’ Sergio started to explain, but at that moment Nico was sick again—all over Kristen. ‘Santa Madre! I can’t believe he’s got anything left in his stomach,’ Sergio muttered as he sprang forward to lift the little boy off her lap. But Nico clung to her and wouldn’t let go.

      ‘Leave him,’ Kristen said quietly. ‘I’ll get cleaned up later.’

      ‘But you’re covered...’

      ‘It doesn’t matter. Pass me a towel so that I can mop him up.’ She gave Sergio a fierce look. ‘This is what parenting is. It’s not about buying expensive toys—it’s about being there for your child when he needs you.’ She glanced towards the woman who she guessed was the nanny Sergio had mentioned. ‘Please leave me alone with him. He’s confused and upset, and having people around him that he doesn’t know isn’t helping.’

      * * *

      It was the early hours of the following morning before Nico showed signs that the worst of the vomiting virus was over. His temperature dropped back to normal and he fell into a comfortable sleep.

      ‘He’ll probably be absolutely fine and full of energy when he wakes up,’ Kristen told Sergio, who had remained to help nurse the little boy, although he had sent the nanny away. She tucked the sheet around Nico and moved away from the bed so that her voice did not disturb him. ‘You’ll be amazed at how resilient children are.’ As she spoke she was hit by a wave of exhaustion and collapsed onto the sofa.

      ‘He already looks a whole lot better than you do,’ Sergio murmured drily, comparing Nico’s healthy colour with Kristen’s white face. He quickly looked away from her, unable to meet her gaze. During the past few hours she had proved beyond doubt her devotion to her son. Her patience as she had attended to Nico when he had been sick and comforted him with loving care had shown Sergio how wrong he had been about her, and he felt guilty that he had misjudged her so badly. She was nothing like his mother, thank God. He knew he owed her an explanation of why he had snatched Nico, but he did not find it easy to talk about his childhood experiences.

      He sat down next to her on the sofa and felt her instantly become tense. Was she afraid of him? He couldn’t blame her after the way he had behaved, he thought grimly. The worry he had put her through when he had disappeared with Nico was evident in her drawn features. She looked infinitely fragile, and when he brushed a stray tendril of hair back from her cheek she jerked away from him as if he had struck her.

      But it was not fear he saw in her eyes, although her expression was wary and mistrustful. He deserved that, Sergio accepted. He had done nothing to earn her trust. What he found more intriguing was the fact that her pupils had dilated and her chest was rising and falling unevenly. Sexual awareness could not be denied or disguised, however hard she might try to hide her feelings. His analytical brain acknowledged that her attraction to him was the ace up his sleeve. The first rule of business was to discover your opponent’s weakness, and it was useful to know that Kristen was vulnerable where he was concerned.

      ‘Why do you and Nico have the surname Lloyd?’ he asked her. ‘When I knew you four years ago your name was Russell, so why did you change it?’ His jaw tightened as an unwelcome thought occurred to him. ‘Did you marry some guy who then became a stepfather to Nico?’

      ‘No, of course not. There hasn’t been anyone...’ She broke off abruptly, making Sergio wonder if she had been about to say that she had not dated anyone since him. He hoped that was the case, but only because he hated the idea that she might have introduced a boyfriend to Nico, not because the thought of her having sex with another guy made his insides burn as if he had swallowed acid, he assured himself.

      ‘Russell was my stepfather’s name,’ Kristen explained. ‘My real father, David Lloyd, died when I was a baby. When I was eight my mother married my gymnastics coach, Alan Russell, and I took his name.’

      ‘I remember your stepfather. He made it clear that he did not approve of me.’ Sergio frowned. ‘I only met him once when I came to see you at your rented villa, and he warned me to stay away from you.’

      ‘He didn’t approve of anything that distracted me from my training. And you were a major distraction.’ Kristen sighed. ‘Four years ago I came to Sicily with my mum and Alan, but they were called home and while they were in England I met you. When Alan came back to Sicily he was furious when he discovered I was having an affair with you instead of focusing on my gymnastics training.

      ‘While I was growing up I was very close to Alan. He was a top coach and he spotted my potential early on. It was his dream as much as mine that I should become a champion gymnast. Sometimes...’ she hesitated ‘...I’ve wondered if he married Mum so that he could have control over me and my career. He was a very domineering man, but the attention he gave me made me feel special and I wanted to do well and please him. But as I grew older I started to resent the fact that I had no other life outside of gymnastics. Alan insisted I followed a rigorous training schedule and I never had time for anything else, including boyfriends.’

      ‘I discovered just how innocent you were,’ Sergio said drily. ‘Why didn’t you tell me you were a virgin?’

      Kristen blushed. ‘I was scared you wouldn’t make love to me if you knew it was my first time...and I desperately wanted you to,’ she admitted.

      He gave a harsh laugh.

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