The Italian's Secretary Bride (14 page)

‘Is that for me…?' he asked thickly as his fingers slid into her moistness. She shook her head mutely and pushed against his hand, moaning.

‘You're so tight…so hot…'

‘Oh, God…Luca…' she cried, her face twisted in anguish. ‘Please…'

Luca's eyes were fixed on her face as he slid between her thighs and entered her in one smooth upward motion into the slick heat.

‘You're so…so…I…' she cried brokenly, almost sobbing as she felt him fill her. When he began to stroke inside her she lost all sense of anything but the man who possessed her and the pleasure that stretched her senses to the utmost limit.

Her hands curved over the firm contours of his tight buttocks and her legs locked tight about his waist as he began to move faster and harder. Finally, when she thought she could bear no more, her body was convulsed by a shatteringly sweet climax at almost the exact moment she heard Luca cry out and felt his body shudder.

L
UCA
considered time his most important commodity; he didn't participate in endless meetings where pieces of paper were pushed around the table and no decisions made. He had no problem with people who disagreed with him; in fact he encouraged a lively exchange of views. One of his pet hates were people who sat on the fence.

This afternoon's meeting had by his own criteria been a total waste of time and the only person he could blame was himself! He had been totally unable to focus on the problem in hand…not only that but he didn't care!

His ability to ruthlessly compartmentalise his life had deserted him with a vengeance. Physically he had been in the meeting but in every other way he had been elsewhere…no prizes for guessing where!

Leaving a warm bed and the arms of an even warmer woman had required every ounce of his not-inconsiderable will-power. Alice had simply looked mildly surprised when he had suggested cancelling his meeting.

‘Don't be silly, Luca. You wouldn't expect me to cancel a meeting for you, would you?' she'd reproached, stroking his cheek.

Yes, I damned well would!

He'd stopped himself saying it, but only just. How could she treat what had passed between them as a casual coupling?

The supreme irony of his outraged thought suddenly struck him forcibly. He threw back his head and laughed out loud, a grim, harsh sound that made a nervous temp walking by stare at him.

Luca O'Hagan, the man who was a renowned commitment-phobic, was feeling badly done to because a woman had not acted as though her world would come to an end if he didn't call back. Actually from the way she'd acted it was difficult to imagine her losing an hour's sleep if he vanished off the face of the earth!

A taste of your own medicine, O'Hagan?

Alice had been his dream lover made flesh and blood in bed—warm, soft flesh, giving, warm and wild. Out of bed? Well, if she hadn't shown him the door, she hadn't seemed too damned bothered when he had gone through it! His jaw clenched as he recalled her response to his suggestion he ring her later.

‘That would be very nice, Luca, but don't worry if you can't,' she had told him with an absent smile that had suggested her thoughts had already been elsewhere.

Nice!

Luca had swallowed his anger and salvaged a little pride simulating the indifference Alice was displaying.

‘Well, actually I've got a full day.'

Had the flicker of hurt he'd seen in her eyes been wishful thinking? Certainly her practical shrug and cheerful smile had not suggested she would be hanging around waiting for him to call. Deciding he could wait until she realised she needed a flesh-and-blood man, not a dead hero, was fine in theory; in reality he frankly didn't think he could handle it.

 

One of the joys of being the boss was when you decided to take a walk in the park…
literally
…nobody was going to say a word. The fresh air might clear his head. It sure as hell needed clearing.

He reached the park and it began to rain, which made him think of home—Ireland. Luca, who considered himself cosmopolitan, a city boy through and through, experienced an unaccustomed pang of homesickness for the green isle of his youth.

By the time he sat down on a bench the sun had come back out. He brushed some of the excess moisture from his hair with a careless sweep of his hand as he stared into the distance, an abstracted expression on his handsome face. A couple walked by oblivious to the rain. Looking at their linked hands made his chest tighten. What the hell is happening to me? he thought.

Whatever it was he had to share what he was feeling…and that was definitely a first!

 

When he got back he cancelled his appointments for the rest of the day and caught a cab to the hotel. The manager saw him crossing the lobby.

‘I'm afraid your brother isn't here at the moment, Mr O'Hagan.'

‘Pity.'

‘I understand he won't be back until the morning.'

‘Has Miss Trevelyan gone with him?'

‘No, I believe the young lady is still here. Shall I have them ring her and say you're on your way up?'

‘Don't bother, I'll surprise her.'

There was a purposeful spring in his step as he approached the door. He went to knock when a maid carrying linen let herself out of the room. Luca nodded and stepped into the room past her. His lean body tensed as he heard the sound of Alice's voice; she was obviously on the phone.

He was in the act of revealing himself when he registered what she was saying. The blood drained from his face.

‘Yes, pregnancy test…that's right. Sure I'll hold…'

Luca could hear her humming softly under her breath as she waited. He raised a hand to his temple and massaged the spot where a vein visibly pulsed beneath the golden sheen of his skin.

‘And there's no doubt it's definitely positive…Right, thank you very much.' Alice, punching in her sister-in-law's number, didn't see the tall figure who slipped silently from the room.

The phone was picked up immediately. ‘It's positive—you're going to be a mum.' Alice couldn't stop grinning. ‘The nurse at the doctor's sent her congrats and said you should ring for an appointment to see her and the doctor. I explained you were going back to England tomorrow.'

‘I'm going to have a baby…' The sound of soft sobs echoed down the line.

The shock and wonder in the older woman's voice made Alice's own eyes fill up.
Relax
had been the doctor's advice to her brother and his wife when all the tests had given them both a clean bill of health. That had been ten years ago; no wonder her sister-in-law sounded gobsmacked.

‘You're
sure
they said it was positive?' Rachel hesitantly asked after a lot more sniffing.

‘Totally sure.' Alice wasn't surprised that Rachel sounded as though she couldn't believe it. After three false alarms her distrust was hardly surprising.

‘Oh, God, I don't know what I'd have done if you hadn't been over here,' admitted Rachel, who was on a visit to her parents in Long Island. ‘I couldn't tell Mom until I was sure—not after last time.'

Alice gave a sympathetic murmur. The ‘last time', by the time Rachel had realised the home pregnancy kit was not as foolproof as it claimed, she had given half her friends and family the glad tidings. She had then had the horrid task of telling them she wasn't pregnant after all.

‘I know you must have thought I was crazy when I asked you to phone the doctor's office, but after all the other times I was just
so
nervous. Oh, God, what will Ian say? Why isn't he here?' she added in the next breath. ‘That would make everything perfect.'

‘Well, he's due home next week, isn't he?' Alice comforted the wistful mother-to-be.

‘Tuesday morning.'

‘How long since you saw him?' Alice had boundless admiration for her sister-in-law, who coped stoically with her husband's long absences.

She wasn't sure she would have coped as well as Rachel if she had been married to a navy officer. His own wedding was about the only family occasion her brother had made it to in the last ten years!

‘Three months. What's the betting he won't be around for the birth?'

‘I'm sure he'll try to be.'

‘Well, if he's not…I hope you don't mind me asking this, Alice, but would you mind being there as my birthing partner? Well, actually, I'd like you to be there even if Ian is there. You know how bossy he gets—he'll probably put up the backs of everyone at the hospital.'

This unexpected request made Alice's eyes fill with emotional tears again. ‘Are you sure it's me you want?' she queried, incredibly touched to be asked.

‘There's absolutely nobody I'd prefer,' Rachel replied firmly.

‘If you want me I'll be there. I don't know that I'll be much use,' Alice warned. ‘But I'll be there with bells on if you want me,' she promised eagerly. She privately resolved to read up everything she could on the subject.

‘Always supposing that sexy boss of yours can spare you.'

‘Roman? If I added up all the overtime I've put in for that man he owes me a
year's
holiday.' Alice frowned when there was no response. ‘Rachel…Rachel…?'

‘Sorry,' came the breathless reply seconds later. ‘I was just dancing around the table.' Her voice dropped to an awed whisper. ‘God, Alice, I'm going to have a baby! Isn't it incredible?'

‘Absolutely,' Alice agreed fondly.

‘What were you saying?'

‘Nothing, I just said leave the boss to me,' she recapped quickly. ‘When is the great day? Have you worked out when you're due?' Rachel told her and her eyes widened as she made a quick mental calculation. ‘That makes you almost four months gone!' she exclaimed.

‘I know. Ironic, isn't it? I spend years getting excited if I'm half an hour late and when I actually fall pregnant…' she gave a burble of euphoric laughter ‘…I don't even realise it until I'm almost four months! And if Mom hadn't remarked on how much weight I'd put on I'd probably still think I had indigestion.'

‘What are you going to call indigestion? Do you want a boy or a girl? Gosh, what if it's twins?'

The two women spent a happy half-hour talking baby names and somehow, Alice wasn't sure how, but as often happened when two women chatted, they got onto the subject of men.

Alice thought she was being incredibly discreet until Rachel said, ‘Does he have a name, this man we're talking about?'

‘I was talking hypothetically.' She was glad that her sister-in-law couldn't see that she had gone the same colour as her freshly painted toenails—scarlet had seemed appropriate under the circumstances. ‘You didn't think I was talking about me?' Sometimes she forgot that Rachel actually
listened
and in doing so often heard the things you
weren't
saying.

‘Sure you weren't.'

‘I wasn't!'

‘It sounds to me like you're pretty smitten.'

‘Good God, no, it was just casual.'
For him at least
, and she had tried, she had really tried, to follow his lead even though she had wanted to lock the door and tell him he couldn't possibly leave.

It was irrational, she knew, to feel bitter. It wasn't as if he had offered her anything but sex. She ought to be grateful that he hadn't lied to her the way some men did. At least this way they both knew where they stood.

At least she hadn't done anything terminally stupid such as tell him of her undying love! When she recalled how close she'd come her blood ran cold.

‘Then we are talking about you.' Rachel sounded smug. ‘I thought so. About time too,' she approved. ‘Now tell me all—who is the lucky guy? Is he incredibly gorgeous?'

‘I don't even like him,' she lied.

‘So it's pure animal lust. Well, that can be fun too.'

Alice had no intention of discussing animal lust with her embarrassingly outspoken sister-in-law. ‘Great fun,' Alice agreed unhappily.

‘Is there a problem?'

‘No problem, we just…we don't actually have much in common.'

‘So this isn't a meeting of minds. Does that matter if the sex is great? It's not like you're planning to marry the guy, is it? Like I keep saying to Ian, Alice got married so young, she never really let down her hair and did the crazy, irresponsible, single-girl bit.'

Alice's lips quivered as she imagined how her protective big brother would have reacted to the opinion his little sister should be crazy and irresponsible.

‘You need to test-drive a few men, compare and contrast. You know what I mean?'

‘I get your drift, Rachel.' The sparkle of humour died from her eyes as an image of Luca came into her head. Luca with his incredible eyes sparkling with sexual challenge, his sensual lips curved into an insolent smile. Compare and contrast? Luca was quite simply incomparable!

The only way to go after Luca was definitely down. Though down might be less exhausting, both emotionally and physically, than Luca.

‘The sex
is
great, I take it?'

Alice blinked. Eyes half closed, she recalled the way her treacherous body had responded to Luca's touch, his raw masculinity. Even thinking about his voice made her tummy muscles clench.

‘
I
thought it was.'

The sound of Rachel's exasperated sigh echoed down the line. ‘Sometimes British self-deprecation is kind of sweet, other times it's just plain irritating! Who is this guy, anyway? Have you known him long?'