‘If we were ever to have a relationship—’ She stopped herself then, her nose tightening as she fought to suppress the tears building in her eyes, because a relationship, a real one, a close one, was the very thing he didn’t want. ‘You could have at least told me as a friend.’
‘I wanted to,’ he admitted. ‘But it was not my place. They were not my secrets to tell. I tried to get you to speak to your father, that day of the interview—’
‘You didn’t try hard enough then.’ Her anger, however misplaced, she aimed directly at him. ‘For two years I felt pushed away by Papà. Now I find out that he just wanted to live out his days in peace with Roberto. My God! I was led to blame Mia. I was goaded and encouraged to hate her by my mother, just because she didn’t want the truth getting out.’
‘Ariana...’ He tried to calm her down. ‘Your mother came from a time—’
‘I don’t care!’ She swore viciously in Italian and told him what rubbish he spoke. ‘I’m his daughter. I deserved to know...’ He crossed over as she swallowed down a scream that felt as if it had been building since her father died. ‘If I’d known the truth, I could have spent quality time with him. Hadyoutold me...’
She was almost hysterical and for once he was not trying to keep a lid on the drama or stop a commotion. It was not for that reason that he pulled her into his arms, but to comfort her. But she thumped at his chest and then scrunched his perfect shirt in her fist, knowing it wasn’t his fault, knowing that the truth could only have come from her father.
‘It was all just a farce...’ She was starting to cry now in a way she never had before. Angry, bitter tears, and Gian held her as she drowned in his arms. ‘I was so proud of their marriage, but it was just a sham. Even Stefano and I were conceived by IVF to keep up the charade...’ All she had just learned poured out in an unchecked torrent he allowed to flow. ‘They didn’t really want us...’ It was then Gian intervened.
‘No.’
‘Yes!’ she insisted. ‘It was all just a sham.’
‘You were wanted,’ he insisted, but Ariana would not be mollified.
‘You don’t know that...’
‘But I do.’ He was holding her arms and almost shaking her in an effort to loosen her dark thoughts before they took hold. ‘I know for a fact you were wanted and loved.’
‘Oh, what would you know?’ Ariana responded. ‘What would a man like you know about love?’
‘Nothing!’
She stilled in his arms at the harsh anguish in his voice.
‘I know nothing about love!’ He hated to tell her, for Gian was loath to share, but he would expose his soul if it saved her from the dark hole she was sinking into. ‘I wasn’t wanted, Ariana. I was a regretful mistake and they never let me forget that fact. When Eduardo caved to their lifestyle, I brought myself up. I could see my mother’s loathing on the rare occasions she actually looked me in the eye. You know how your mother called me a beggar? Well, I was one. I walked the streets at night, just for conversation, for contact...’
Her stomach clenched in fear at the thought of a child out there alone.
‘They didn’t even notice or care that I was gone. You want the truth, Ariana? I wanted to disappear...’
She couldn’t breathe. So passionate was his revelation that there was not even the space to take in the air her lungs craved.
‘No!’ she refuted. It wasn’t that she thought he lied, more that she could not bear his truth.
‘Yes,’ he said, ‘so while I have never known love, I know what it looks like, and I know how much you were wanted and loved...’
They were the words she was desperate to hear, but she wanted to hear them from him. She was so desperate that she managed to twist her mind to pretend that Gian was sayinghewanted her, thatheloved her.
‘Gian...’ His name was a sob, a plea that she could hold onto the dream that those words were for her. Ariana honestly did not know who initiated their kiss but it was as if he read her cry in his name. For a man who knew nothing of love, he knew a lot about numbing pain. The room went dark then as their mouths melded, hot angry kisses to douse the pain. As his mouth bruised hers, as their teeth clashed, Ariana reacted with an urgency she had never known.
She kissed him as if it were vital.
And Gian kissed her to a place where only they remained. His hands were deft, shedding her jacket and lifting her top, pushing his hands up and caressing her breasts through her flimsy bra, his palms making her skin burn, then leaving her smouldering as he tackled her skirt.
He scalded her with desire, his hands hitching up her skirt so impatiently that she heard the lining rip. And Ariana, who had thought desire moved more slowly, could not begin to comprehend that she might simply seize what she craved.
He offered oblivion in the salty taste of his skin as she undid his shirt and buried her face in him. He offered escape as she unbuckled his belt and trousers.
‘Ariana,’ he warned, for he had not come for this. He had come to offer more, yet it was a poor attempt at a protest for he was lifting her onto the bench and tearing at her knickers as their mouths found each other again.
She had not known that the world could feel empty and soulless one moment and then find herself wrapped in his arms and drowning in the succour he gave.
He spread her thighs and she let out a shout as he pushed inside her. It was not a cry of pain but of relief, for here she could simply escape and be.