He had been trying to ring her on her mobile phone for the past two hours, but Sally was in the habit of switching it off while driving so had never received his call.
Apparently her mother had suffered a massive heart attack and slipped into a coma. The staff had made her as comfortable as possible under the circumstances, and her husband had been informed but had not arrived as yet.
He finally did arrive—an hour after his wife had died…
The six days before the funeral were the worst of Sally’s life—though for once her father rose to the occasion and looked after the arrangements. Devastated by her mum’s death, even though it had been expected, Sally cried herself to sleep every night. Tossing and turning in bed, she remembered how Zac had once offered to cuddle her, and, oh, how she longed for the comfort and the strength of his strong arms now.
The funeral was held on a bright July day at the church in Bournemouth where her mum had been baptised, a short forty-three years earlier. The service was brief and the congregation was no more than fifty people. Her doctor and the nurse who had been her primary carer at the home came; the rest were friends and people her mum had known all her life, plus Al and his parents, and Sally was glad of their support. But in her heart of hearts she wished Zac was by her side, supporting her. A futile wish as there had been no word from him…no call…
Her father played the grieving widower, but she was too distraught with grief to care what he did.
Her mother was buried in the cemetery in a plot next to her parents, and the funeral tea was held in the hotel where Sally and her father were staying for the night.
The whole affair took barely four hours, from start to finish.
She could not face dinner with her father, but the next morning he handed Sally her mother’s jewellery box with the statement, ‘She left you this. You can check with the solicitor, if you like, but what money she had she left to me. As for the studio apartment, you can keep it until probate is settled and there is no danger of it being included in your mother’s estate, and then I want it back.’ He said this without a trace of shame, and then got into a new BMW car and drove off.
Sally had no desire to return to her apartment, but it was legally hers and she was damned sure she was not giving it back to her father. That he could suggest such a thing at her mum’s funeral beggared belief. He must think she really was the silly girl he was fond of calling her, as easily manipulated as her mother had been. He was so self-centred, so blind, he didn’t realise she had only ever obeyed him for her mum’s sake…
Well, not any more…She was desolate with grief, and had never felt so alone in her life, but she was not a fool…
At Al’s insistence she spent a few days at his parents’ home. In comfort, with old friends around her, she began to come to terms with her mum’s death. And with Al’s encouragement she decided she was going to take a sabbatical from her job and see the world, as she had once promised herself.
She walked into her apartment a week later, full of good intentions. The first one was to have a strong cup of coffee after the long car journey. She saw the message light flashing on the telephone as she filled the kettle at the sink.
Zac, she thought, and her heart missed a beat. It was over four long, devastatingly sad weeks since she had seen him, but she was wrong. There were two messages: in the first no one spoke—probably a wrong number—and the second message was from the estate agent who was handling the sale of her apartment, asking her to get in touch immediately. He had a cash buyer for the property at the full asking price, on condition she left the furniture and could complete and vacate within two weeks…
August in Peru, and spring was on the horizon. Sally breathed in the warm air and felt her excitement mounting as she boarded the bus outside Lima airport with the other members of her tour group, embarking on a month-long tour of the country.
She still thought of her mum every day, and the sadness would be with her always, Sally knew, but it would no longer rule her life. She thought of Zac most days as well, but she was gradually coming to terms with their one-week affair, having accepted that that was all it had ever been or could have been with a womaniser like Zac.
Today was her birthday: she was twenty-six and free to do exactly what she wanted, with no one to worry about except herself for the first time in years.
Actually, it had been surprisingly easy to leave London. The sale of her apartment had gone through without a hitch, she had sold her car, and with her clothes and the few belongings she wanted to keep she had stayed with Jemma for a week until her holiday started. Jemma was storing her things for her, and Sally now had more money than she had ever dreamt of. She would buy somewhere to live eventually—but not yet.
Her boss had agreed to her taking a year-long sabbatical, and the world was her oyster. If some nights she woke from sleep with dreams of Zac Delucca still haunting her she dismissed them from her mind—usually by making a cup of hot chocolate. It was now seven weeks since they had parted—not that she was counting!
Sally’s blue eyes widened in awe as she stood high in the Andes, the ruins of Machu Picchu spread out before her. She had made it, her dream come true, and with the other members of the party she followed where the guide led.
It was everything and more that she
had ever imagined, and she would have liked to spend some time to explore on her own, but when they stopped for morning coffee to her embarrassment she fainted…The youngest and probably the fittest member of the party, and yet she was the only one affected by the thin air—or so she thought…
Zac Delucca ran his hands through his hair. He could not concentrate on the papers before him, and, spinning around in his chair, he stared out of the window of his office, looking out over Rome and seeing nothing but the image of Sally. He had lost count of the times he had reached for his phone to call her and put it down again. Once he had actually let it ring and had got her answering service; he hadn’t left a message. And Lisa in Milan was a lost cause, because he had no desire to bed the woman—or any woman except Sally, which was a first for him.
Salmacis, the nymph of the fountain, he thought with a wry smile. If she had been anything like her namesake Sally then poor Hermaphroditos hadn’t stood a chance but to become one with her…
Finally Zac had to accept that he felt as if he had become one with Sally in a way he had never considered possible before. She had totally bewitched him. From the night she drew blood from his arm with the roses, and then lay naked in his arms, he had fallen under her spell, and now he felt as if she was drawing the life blood from his body. He couldn’t concentrate on work; he couldn’t think straight for any length of time. His waking and sleeping hours were filled with images of his Salmacis.
The door opened and Zac swung back. ‘I ordered that I was not to be disturbed,’ he growled as Raffe walked into the room and sat down in a chair facing the desk. ‘I hired you to take care of things. What’s gone wrong now?’
‘Nothing—except you. According to Anna, your secretary, you are impossible to work with and someone has to tell you. I have been given the task. For the past four months you have travelled constantly and driven all your staff crazy—both here and in America. Not to mention the Far East, where apparently your abrupt attitude so insulted the head of the Japanese company we were in the process of buying that he has just informed me he is pulling out of the deal. What is going on with you, Zac? Woman trouble…?’
‘I don’t have women trouble,’ Zac said adamantly, and knew he lied. He also knew he could not go on like this.
He had never been close to anyone in his life except maybe Raffe and Marco, his old fight manager, who now, with his wife, took care of his home in Calabria. They were as near to family as he had. He was a loner, and he had never needed anyone before, but now he needed Sally Paxton every which way there was…
He had been a coward too long. He loved Sally, and he wanted her bound to him by every law known to man—including marriage, he decided, and he was going to make it happen.