THEY had been married ten days. Maria had informed her again that Rocco had left the villa early to attend a site meeting. Every night Rocco came to her bed and made love to her, and every morning she woke up alone. Painful though it was for her to admit it, Julie acknowledged that she couldn’t avoid knowing that the physical intimacy they now shared had, instead of bringing them closer together, actually destroyed the bond she had felt they were beginning to build. Rocco no longer sought her out to talk with her. He no longer smiled at her, or seemed to want to be with her, and even in bed there was a repressed tension about him that was almost tinged with anger—because he regretted his generosity in marrying her?
It was Julie’s nature to give generously to those she loved, without counting the cost to herself, and never more so than when it came to Rocco. She hated the thought that she could be blighting his life and shadowing his enjoyment of it. She wanted him to be happy, to see him smile, hear him laugh. But even if that meant it was someone else, another woman, whose presence gave him those things?
She loved him, and that meant putting his happiness first, Julie insisted to herself as she reached out to unclamp Josh’s too exploratory fingers from the edge of the rug on which he was lying, which he was now trying desperately to tug from beneath himself.
The patio where Julie was sitting was warm from the morning sun; her body still had that lethargic ache that came from intense sexual pleasure. Julie looked up lazily when Maria suddenly appeared, her laziness disappearing when Maria told her importantly, ‘Il Principe is here to see you.’
The Prince? Rocco’s father? She had understood from Rocco that his father was suffering from a terminal heart condition and was virtually bedridden. Why on earth would he want to see her?
‘Are you sure it is me he wishes to see and not Rocco?’ she asked Maria uncertainly.
‘It is you he wishes to see,’ Maria confirmed, adding, ‘Quick—you must hurry and not keep him waiting.’
Against her better judgement Julie found that she was allowing herself to be coaxed and bullied into hurrying back into the house, Josh clasped tightly in her arms.
Maria had shown Rocco’s father into the grandest of all the formal salons, twenty metres long and fifteen metres wide, with heavy rococo décor and gilded furniture. Its rich blue embroidered silk drapes threw shadows that reached out to create dim pools of darkness, making it almost impossible to see anything clearly.
It was a shock to see Rocco’s good looks stamped so clearly on the face of the man seated in a wheelchair behind which was standing a harassed-looking middle-aged man, whom Julie assumed must be his attendant. The Prince’s mouth was etched with pride, and his eyes were colder than polished black marble.
He was, Julie recognised, everything that Rocco had warned her he would be, and her heart ached for the three small boys left to this man’s pitiless care by the death of the mother who had loved them.
‘So!’ His angry gaze raked Julie from top to toe. ‘There is no need for me to ask why you married my son. There can only be one reason.’
Rocco, alerted to his father’s arrival at the villa by a phone call from Maria, arrived just as his father and Julie were confronting one another. Both of them were oblivious to his presence, the hostility between them so powerful it was almost like a force field.
‘Actually, there are two reasons,’ Julie corrected the Prince determinedly. ‘One is my love for my nephew, and the other is my love for Rocco himself.’
Pride and truth rang in the clear enunciation of her words, causing Rocco to remain where he was instead of alerting them to his presence.
‘You love my son?’ Rocco’s father gave a contemptuous shrug. ‘Of course you do. After all, he is a rich man.’
‘I love Rocco for what he is himself, not for his wealth. I would love him just as much if he was poor. In fact I wish he was,’ Julie told the Prince passionately.
Rocco’s father gave her another cold look.
‘Such words are the words of the ignorant and the foolish. How naïve you are. I suppose you believe that Rocco returns your feelings, do you? Your kind always do.’
Rocco had heard enough. He wasn’t about to let his father verbally abuse and hurt Julie. He started to move forward, but once again the sound of Julie’s emotionally charged voice stopped him.
‘No. I don’t,’ Julie answered her inquisitor. ‘I know that Rocco married me for reasons of duty and of…of chivalry. Because he wants to protect Josh from being stolen from me to suffer as he himself did as a child.’
She could be accused of being cruel, Julie knew, but hadn’t this man been cruel to his three eldest sons? Hadn’t he denied them the love they had had every right to expect from him? Shouldn’t she, out of her love for Rocco, redress the balance if only a little, and show him what an honourable and wonderful man his third son was—even if his father didn’t have the wisdom to see it for himself?
‘I don’t love Rocco because he is your son, or because he has wealth and position. I love him because despite everything he has had to endure the love his mother bore him has touched his heart and made him something that money can never buy.’
‘And what might that be?’
‘Rocco may have his pride—the pride of his ancestors—but he also has magnanimity of spirit. He has compassion and wisdom; he understands the true meaning of love. He is a man who as a child never knew the true love of a father, and yet he has grown beyond that, instead of allowing it to cripple him emotionally, to take into his protection a child who has no claim whatsoever on him.
‘You may be a Prince, but Rocco bears a higher and far more worthy title—and that is the title of a good and honest man, the best of men. The kind of man other men will always look up to because of what he is, not who he is, the kind of man who deserves to have a loving father who values him as he should be valued. I will never burden Rocco with my love. He already has enough to bear. But neither will I allow you to think that he needs anything to win a woman’s love other than himself. I would be proud to follow him in rags to the end of the earth if he asked that of me.’
She almost threw her last words at Rocco’s father, turning on her heel as she did so, unable to endure another second in his company. She was not going to allow Rocco’s father to deni¬ grate the man she loved, no matter how afraid he made her feel, Julie told herself fiercely—and then gasped with shock when she saw Rocco standing in front of her.
‘Julie.’
He was angry with her. He had to be. Shaking her head, Julie evaded him, holding Josh tightly as she fled.
Rocco let her go. What he needed to say to her was best said in private—and besides, there were things he had to say to his father, issues that must now be dealt with.