LITMIR.BIZ

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rip them off and refuse to leave the plane until she had her own clothes back, Julie decided defiantly, lifting her chin. She certainly wasn’t going to thank him for them, was she? But somehow she heard herself saying huskily, ‘Thank you for … for providing everything for Josh and me. You shouldn’t have gone to so much trouble.’

      Her voice made it plain that she was more resentful of his generosity than grateful, Rocco acknowledged grimly, and he told her, ‘One phone call to a concierge service is hardly going to any trouble.’

      He’d put his suit jacket back on, and over it he was wearing a raincoat with the collar turned up—with that special kind of aplomb and style that Italian men were so very good at.

      A flashing light warned that their descent was about to begin, and broke the tension. Julie let Russell help her into her seat and fasten Josh into his, glad of the fact that their descent allowed her to escape from further conversation.

       CHAPTER FOUR

      IT WAS raining—hard. The rain bounced noisily off the umbrella that the steward was struggling to keep open over her against the fierce force of the wind as he escorted her to a waiting car, making sure she was safely inside it and settled comfortably in the rear with Josh in the baby seat before returning to the plane for Rocco.

      The bright lights of the landing strip and the airfield illuminated a landscape that could have been anywhere: scrubby vegetation just visible beyond the perimeter fence under the flare of the lights, vanishing into an ink-black darkness that could have been land, sky or sea.

      The cream leather upholstery of the car was so luxurious Julie was almost afraid of touching it. She looked at Josh, mentally praying that he would not be sick.

      They were soon leaving the airfield and its lights behind them, to be sucked into the rain-lashed darkness. Despite the warmth of the interior of the car, Julie shivered. The darkness was so intense it almost felt as though it was pressing in on the car, driven by the same wind that was forcing the rain against the car windows with a buffeting roar.

      She didn’t really know very much about Sicily, but she had never imagined it would be subject to this kind of violent weather.

      Like a tightly wound spring, abruptly released to unravel too quickly, thoughts as wild as the night spun frantically through Julie’s head. What if Rocco Leopardi’s intentions towards Josh were not benign? What if Josh was an obstacle to him in some way? Why hadn’t she thought of this before? Who would know—or care—if tonight she and Josh were driven away into the darkness never to return?

      Reaction not just to the extraordinary events of the last few hours but also to everything else that had happened over the last few months and which she had refused to allow herself to react to—first for James’s sake and then later for Josh’s sake—hit her, smashing her self-control and thrusting her headlong into the grip of an attack of panic and self-blame so strong that it seized her breath and made her heart thump so heavily and with such speed that she thought it was going to burst out of her chest.

      Rocco knew every centimetre of the single-track road that led from his private airstrip to Villa Rosa, one of the Leopardi country houses, but as always, as he drove round the final sharp curve in the road to reveal the villa up ahead, he felt the familiar surge of pride and pleasure at the sight of it, rising from the fertile plain to dominate the landscape with its elegance.

      The sight of the villa materialising virtually out of the darkness, its honey-coloured walls illuminated by the large wrought-iron flambeaux that threw a soft flickering light not just over the building but also over the setting that housed it, brought Julie a merciful release from her anxiety.

      Who could not look at something so stunningly architecturally beautiful and not be entranced by the sight of it?

      ‘It’s almost too perfect to be real.’ Julie couldn’t keep the awe from her voice as she stared up at the high portal, where what she assumed must be the Leopardi coat of arms was illuminated by the light of the flambeaux.

      ‘It is real, I assure you,’ Rocco drawled. ‘It was built in the eighteenth century, originally as a summer retreat from the heat of the city. Caspar Leopardi designed it himself, and brought the very best craftsmen of the day here to work on it. He wanted to combine in the architecture all those things that were Leopardi—thus the front of the villa you see here is built on the classical lines of the eighteenth century, with reference to Greek and Roman architecture and thus the Greek and Roman influence on Sicily, whilst the enclosed courtyard around which the villa is built echoes the Arab influence on the island and on the Leopardi family.

      ‘The flambeaux you can see here on the walls were especially commissioned on the island. Each one embraces a different part of our history via an heraldic design, and the gardens are of the Italianate style that was so popular amongst the English who travelled to Italy in the eighteenth century.’

      As he spoke Rocco was driving them through the portal to a formal courtyard dominated by an imposing marble stairway.

      ‘The marble was quarried in Carrera,’ Rocco told Julie, ‘and the stairs lead up to the piano nobile—that is to say the main floor into the formal reception rooms of the villa.’

      Julie’s face burned with angry pride.

      ‘I do know what piano nobile means,’ she informed him sharply, but even if he realised he had offended her he certainly wasn’t going to apologise, she recognised.

      The emotional switchback she had been riding since he had stopped her in the street outside her flat, culminating as it just had with a surge of terror followed by an equally powerful release of that tension, was beginning to take effect on her body, Julie recognised muzzily. She had gone through too much, climbed too far too fast and fallen back too quickly, to maintain any equilibrium. She felt distinctly odd—weak, breathless, trembling inside, whilst her heart raced and thudded.

      Rocco had brought the car to a halt in front of the double flight of stone stairs. His arrogant, ‘I will take the child,’ as he got out of the driver’s seat, had Julie rushing feverishly to remove Josh from the baby seat, determined not to let him do so. She held her nephew tightly.

      Instead of calming her, the sensation of the night air on her face made her feel slightly sick and dizzy. Holding on to Josh, she looked towards the flight of steps. So many of them, and she felt so very odd and weak—not like herself at all. Way above the porticoed entrance up at the top of the villa the carved stone heads of gargoyles and mystical animals stared down at her. All her growing doubts rushed in on her.

      Why had she allowed him to persuade her to come here? Just as soon as she could she was going to demand some proper reassurances and explanations—and a lawyer to hear them, she told herself fiercely as she started to climb the stone steps.

      She was halfway up them when it happened—her foot somehow slipping on the wet stone so that she half stumbled forward, with Josh in her arms.

      Before she had time to cry out strong arms were gripping them, holding them both safe. She could smell male flesh—alien, and yet at the same time recognised by senses already attuned to him. She could feel male warmth, and had to fight to stop herself from simply wanting to relax into it, to give in to the weakness that had invaded her. She wanted to lie here against him, protected by him, never to have to leave that protection. She wanted his arms to close round her and stay closed round her. She ached almost desperately for a man like this one—a totally male, totally strong man—to lift the burdens she was carrying from her heart and heal the hurt inside her.

      What was she thinking? The only man she had ever wanted—the only man she would ever want—was dead.

      How long had passed? How many minutes had she been lying against him, her heart thumping sickly, too weak to move, whilst shocked tears of reaction and remorse blurred her vision? Too long.

      If he hadn’t been close enough and quick enough—if she had dropped Josh on the steps—if he had been hurt because of her.

      ‘Give me

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