‘Well, that’s good, isn’t it?’ His dark eyes narrowed as she blew her nose again. ‘Not the most reliable job in the world in terms of future employment, but if he’s talented…’
‘Yes, he’s talented!’ Frustratedly, she shook her head. ‘And no, it isn’t good.’
‘Why not?’
She stared at him. Was he really so dense that he couldn’t see—so that she’d be forced to spell it out for him, syllable by humiliating syllable? Maybe it was vulgar to mention the precarious state of her finances—especially to a man who had clearly never known such a predicament himself. But she knew it was too late for restraint, that she’d gone too far to stop and she needed to tell someone. ‘Because it costs money to go and study in London. Money we haven’t got.’
‘You haven’t got any tucked away somewhere? No stocks? Shares? That kind of thing?’
‘Do you think I wouldn’t already have redeemed them if I had any? When I said that my stepmother had inherited everything, I meant it.’
There was a moment of silence during which Ciro despaired at his lack of insight. Why the hell hadn’t her words sunk in properly? Maybe he’d been too distracted by the sight of her heaving breasts, or the tantalising strand of hair which had flopped down around her tear-stained cheek. Or maybe he just never bothered to look at the detail of other people’s lives. He knew that if she hadn’t sold the Grange to him, then her stepmother would have found another buyer. But he could also see that in her emotional state, Lily might see him as partially responsible for her brother’s thwarted dreams.
So what was he going to do about it? Given the vast resources at his disposal, couldn’t he reach out to help her, even though so far she had stubbornly resisted any attempt to do so? She’d even refused his offer to provide a removal lorry and he’d heard through the grapevine that she had driven a large van rather dangerously around the village green.
She was certainly stubborn—and proud. It seemed she would rather struggle on independently than accept the assistance which he could provide. He found himself comparing her to the women he’d known in the past. He thought about Eugenia in particular—and her never-ending hunger for all things material. Yet as he looked into a pair of shimmering, bloodshot eyes he realised that Lily Scott couldn’t have been more different.
Her flowery dress revealed her bare knees and her shoulders were slumped dejectedly—and in that moment she looked so damned young and vulnerable that he felt an aching sense of destiny deep inside him. Walking over to the sofa, he sat down beside her, seeing the startled question in her blue eyes. Slipping his arm around her, he brought her up close. ‘Come here,’ he said.
‘Don’t,’ she whispered, but it was a word which lacked conviction because the truth was that it felt wonderful to be close to him again—to feel the heat of his powerful body next to hers. Only this time it wasn’t sex which had brought her here—but something nearly as potent. It was safety. And solace. It was the feeling that nothing could harm her as long as Ciro was near. She felt protected by him—as if he could throw a charmed and protective circle around her—and that was a dangerously heady feeling. She wanted to burrow her head up against his chest, like a little animal who had found itself a safe haven. But somehow she resisted and stayed right where she was.
‘Why didn’t you come to me for help, Lily?’ he demanded. ‘When I told you that you only had to call me.’
She shook her head. ‘You know why.’
He pulled her against him, so that her face was close to his neck and he realised that he was holding his breath—unsure whether she’d shy away. He felt the delicious warmth of her breath against his skin as a bitter truth washed over him. Yes, he knew why she hadn’t asked him for help. Because she thought he would ask for something in return. For sex. Briefly, he closed his eyes. Was that true? Had he made his benevolent offer out of the goodness of his heart, or because he wanted something much more fundamental from her?
Suddenly, he was angry with himself. After years of meeting women who just wanted to get into his trousers or his bank account, he had finally met one who didn’t. Who worked hard for a minimum wage and put the needs of her younger brother above her own. She hadn’t fallen into bed with him, even though her hunger had easily matched his. She hadn’t phoned him, or stalked him. She hadn’t engineered an ‘accidental’ meeting in order to save face.
She had behaved like a lady from the start, while he had responded by coming onto her with the finesse of a randy soldier who hadn’t been near a woman for months. He could feel the whisper of her breath on his skin, soft and rhythmical, like a warm balm. He remembered that first moment of seeing her, all warm and flushed from her baking—when the thunderbolt had hit him. He found he could imagine a child at her breast. His child. He could imagine Lily making an exemplary mother. She represented an innocent yet seductive world he had never known and suddenly he saw that it could be his. She could be his.
For a moment he stilled as a powerful wave of certainty washed over him and he tilted her chin upwards so that her bright eyes were looking straight at him. ‘I think I’m going to have to marry you,’ he said.
Blinking away the last of her tears, Lily looked at him in disbelief. For a moment she thought she must have misheard him, but the expression on his face was deadly serious. ‘Have you taken leave of your senses?’ she breathed.
‘Maybe I have.’ He shrugged. ‘I don’t seem to have been thinking very straight lately—but maybe that’s the way it’s supposed to feel when you meet a woman who is like no other woman you’ve known.’
‘What are you talking about, Ciro?’
‘I’m talking about a solution to your problems. I think you’re going to have to marry me, Lily,’ he said, the tip of his finger tracing a path over her suddenly trembling lips. ‘Let me take care of you—and your brother. There’s no need for him to turn down his place at art school—as my brother-in-law, he won’t have to worry about a thing.’
Lily tried to tell herself this couldn’t be real. She tried to fight against it, more as a defence mechanism than anything. But his words were unbearably tempting—and not just because she recognised that he could change Jonny’s future by taking away all the doubts and uncertainty. It went deeper than that. Her thoughts were now taking her to a place which was dangerous as she acknowledged the impact this man could have on her emotions as well as her finances.
‘Tell me you don’t mean it,’ she said, trying to inject a note of humour into her voice. ‘Either you’ve had a knock on the head—or you’ve been drinking.’
He gave a low laugh. ‘Neither. I do mean it and do you know why? Because you thrill me, Lily. You thrill me in a way I’ve never been thrilled by a woman before. I admire your prudence and your pride. And in a crazy kind of way, I like the fact that you refused to go to bed with me the other night.’
‘Is that something which is unheard of, then?’
‘Yes,’ he answered simply. ‘No woman has ever turned down the opportunity to have sex with me. Only you. And your old-fashioned values appeal to something fundamental in me—something which I’ve discovered is important. You see, I’ve never come across such qualities in a woman before and I may never do so again. And that’s why I want you to marry me, Lily. Be my wife—and I will give you everything you need.’
Distractedly, she shook her head. ‘You don’t know what I need.’
‘Ah, but I do, dolcezza. You need a man who will take care of you. Who will provide for you and let your brother fulfil his potential. While you…’ He framed her face with his hands, seeing the wariness which had darkened her blue eyes. ‘You can give me exactly what I want.’
She met the heated gleam of his gaze as a shiver of awareness whispered over her skin. ‘And what might that be?’
He shrugged, as if he was silently acknowledging that his ideas were outmoded—that few men would have admitted to what he was about to say. ‘I want a conventional wife in a conventional role. Someone who will create a home for me. Who is waiting for me at the end of the day—not a woman fighting her way into some damned job every morning, who’s too tired for dinner when she gets home. I want someone who respects her body enough to cherish it, in the way that you do. I want you, Lily,’ he said simply. ‘I’ve wanted you since I saw you standing in the kitchen, making pastry. I remember walking towards you and thinking that any moment I would wake up and find that I’d been dreaming. But each step which took me towards you made me realise that I was wide awake. I saw some flour on your nose and wanted to reach out and brush it away. And then you looked into my eyes and I felt the thunderbolt. I’d heard other men speak of it before, but up until that moment I didn’t believe it existed. At least, not for me.’