Husband by Contract by Helen Brooks

Author:Helen Brooks [Brooks, Helen]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fiction, Romance, Contemporary
ISBN: 9781459261914
Google: lJaqtu-JZ_MC
Publisher: Harlequin
Published: 2011-07-15T04:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER SIX

THE drive back to Alessandro and Anna's villa was an exercise in agony, the dinner that followed more so as Grace struggled to match Donato's polite, cool charm that revealed nothing of what had transpired between them.

Nevertheless, she thought she saw Alessandro glance at his friend more than once with a keenness that told her he suspected something was badly amiss, although their Italian host was far too gracious to refer to it.

They left Amalfi just as it grew dark, the crescent moon shedding a thin, hollow light over the dark world below and the air warm and soft with the scents of summer in its languid stillness. Lorenzo curled up on the back seat and was asleep almost immediately, tired out after a day spent playing with his friend, which left Grace and Donato in a tense electric silence that crackled and buzzed with a tautness that was physically painful.

Don't cry, don't cry, don't cry ... She spoke the warning to herself all the way back to Casa Pontina, staring out of the window with dry, burning eyes, vitally aware of the big lithe figure at her side. He must think she was crazy, mad, that she had lost it utterly, she thought with a stab of misery that closed her throat and made it hard to swallow. Either that or that she was the very worst sort of tease, delighting in taking him to the very edge of fulfillment before drawing away and saying no.

Not that she had actually said no, she thought miserably. No, she'd just pushed him straight off the rock into the sea like some outraged virgin defending an attack on her purity. It would be funny if it weren't so tragic.

Oh ... She screwed her eyes tightly shut in despair. What a mess she'd made of the day. She'd wanted to be clothed with cool dignity in all her dealings with him before she left Italy for good, and the time at the beach had resembled some sort of ridiculous farce.

'Do you wish to add cramp to your list of misfortunes?'

'What?' The dark, cool voice at her side made her nearly leap out of her seat as they drew into the slumbering grounds of Casa Pontina; so deeply had she been wrapped in her cloak of misery, and she checked herself angrily. She was like a cat on a hot tin roof round him, she thought painfully.

'I said you will get cramp.' He gestured at her hands, so tightly clasped together that the knuckles were shining White through the flesh. 'Do you really consider me such a monster that you need be so afraid?" be asked softly, cutting the car engine as he spoke and turning to face her in his seat.

‘I would not hurt you, Grace. It is clear you do not believe this, but it is true.'

But you have, you've hurt me so much there have been times I thought I’d die from it, she screamed silently. 'I'm not afraid of you, Donato.

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