The Italian in Need of an Heir

by Lynne Graham

  But she didn’t and the polite lie roused colour in her cheeks. How could she trust a man who wasn’t in love with her? How could she trust a man whose right to freedom after she became pregnant had been written into their pre-nup? And there Aurora was, exactly the kind of glossy, self-assured woman whom Raffaele had specialised in before he married Maya. Maya watched Aurora toss her long, unnaturally pale blonde hair while treating Raffaele to flirtatious, covetous looks from her sultry brown eyes and she wanted to slap her and lock Raffaele in a cupboard where no other woman could get near him. Her mood swan-dived while her temper bubbled.

  Maya’s parents and grandparents decided to move their reconciliation to the Campbells’ house. Lucia and Rory had to be home in time for Matt returning from school and the older couple were eager to meet their youngest grandchild. Izzy and Rafiq accompanied them and then planned to return to the hotel they had organised, Izzy explaining apologetically that she wanted to lie down and nap for a while. After a great deal more hair-tossing and giggling, Aurora departed as well, still as much a stranger to Maya and her immediate family as she had been on her arrival.

  ‘It went well,’ Raffaele remarked with satisfaction when their last visitor had departed. ‘Fences all mended...and you and Izzy enjoyed yourself.’

  ‘We did.’ The silence smouldered. ‘Would you have preferred to have married someone like Aurora?’ That question just bounced off Maya’s tongue before she even knew it was there.

  Raffaele dealt her a surprised appraisal and strolled back into the lounge. ‘Why are you asking me that?’

  Maya compressed her lips and gave a jerky shrug. ‘She’s definitely more your style than I ever was.’

  ‘Realistically, I don’t think it could ever have been a legal option because a niece isn’t as close a relative as a granddaughter,’ Raffaele fielded. ‘When she made that remark, she was only trying to get a rise out of you. I think she’s jealous that she missed out on what she would have seen as an opportunity to enrich herself.’

  ‘No, she was jealous because I’m with you.’

  ‘Then, she doesn’t know what I put you through,’ Raffaele parried. ‘Your twin was watching me like a hawk while I was with Aurora. It’s pretty obvious that she thinks I’m not to be trusted around other women. I hope that doesn’t last.’

  ‘It won’t matter if it does, will it?’ Maya cut in curtly. ‘We’ll be separated and you won’t be my business any more and I doubt if there’ll be any reason for you to meet my sister again.’

  Frowning, Raffaele studied her. ‘What are you talking about?’

  ‘I get pregnant and then we split up,’ Maya reminded him doggedly, choosing to voice her biggest, deepest fear as if throwing it into the open would magically dispel it. She shifted restively as her phone vibrated in her pocket. ‘We agreed.’

  Raffaele breathed in deep and slow, dark eyes flaring like fireworks. ‘I’m not ready to let you go.’

  ‘I thought you played by the rules. That was our business deal.’

  ‘That deal ended in Sicily and we renegotiated,’ Raffaele informed her.

  ‘I don’t remember renegotiating anything!’ Maya slung back at him tartly.

  ‘You came to my club and told me that I was yours,’ he reminded her.

  Maya coloured hotly at having that reminder tossed at her. Her phone vibrated afresh against her hip and with a muttered apology she dug it out and listened to the voicemail, waving her hand at him in a frustrated silencing motion as she tried to listen to the lengthy harassed message left for her. The breeder who had sold her the puppies had been taken into hospital for emergency surgery. The caller was the breeder’s daughter and she was ringing to tell Maya that she would be dropping off the pups early because she was unable to look after them while her mother was in hospital. Dismay and disappointment filled Maya and she wondered how much earlier the puppies would arrive because she really had wanted them kept until the day of Raffaele’s birthday.

  ‘Why did you tell me that I was yours?’ Raffaele asked with icy precision.

  ‘I should think that would be obvious to a man of your intelligence.’

  ‘Oddly enough, it’s not,’ Raffaele contradicted.

  In a storm of turbulent emotions and growing mortification, Maya turned back to him. ‘I’m not having this conversation with you right now... I can’t think straight!’

  As she stalked off towards the bedroom, Raffaele followed her. ‘We’re having this conversation now.’

  ‘This is not the right moment to be dominant,’ Maya told him shakily.

  ‘I need an honest answer.’

  ‘All right, I would have told you anything that night to keep you away from other women and get you home,’ she admitted between clenched teeth. ‘Happy now?’

  ‘You mean...you were lying when you said that all you wanted from me was another baby?’ Raffaele pressed hoarsely.

  ‘Yes, I was lying. I was desperate. I was jealous and scared that you were going to go off and do something really stupid that there would be no coming back from,’ she muttered in a bitter surge.

  ‘If the “doing something really stupid” involves me going off with other women, that was never a risk. I don’t cheat and I haven’t wanted anyone but you since I first laid eyes on you at that hen party and you pretty much told me to go to hell,’ Raffaele advanced rawly. ‘I’m disappointed that you felt the need to lie to me about anything though. But why were you feeling desperate that night?’

  The bell buzzed and she heard Sal’s voice mingling with their housekeeper’s, a strange low whining sound, the noise of something heavy being shifted over the tiled floor and a lot of exclamation from at least two male voices. And then the animal whines penetrated and she realised that the puppies must have been delivered and she shut her eyes tight, wondering what else could possibly go wrong in the space of one short day.

  ‘I was desperate because I love you,’ she told Raffaele flatly, assuming that that would end the humiliating dialogue. ‘Having another baby was only an excuse to hang onto you. It was the only excuse I could come up with in the time I had. And you went for it. You went for the sex, which is OK...you are a man and you do like things simple. Excuse me...could you stay in here for a while? I have something to sort out.’

  What on earth was she going to do with the puppies? This, the very day their marriage disintegrated, was not the moment to gift Raffaele a pair of dogs. But she couldn’t ask the breeder’s daughter or whoever was delivering them to take them away again because they were now Maya’s responsibility.

  * * *

  She loved him.

  She had lied to him only because she loved him, Raffaele reflected, thunderstruck by that admission. Even after all he had done, she had somehow contrived to fall in love with him? Rafiq had compared the conception of Izzy’s twins to the eighth wonder of the world but Maya had pulled off an even bigger wonder in Raffaele’s opinion. She loved him. He couldn’t believe it, he just couldn’t believe it and, intent on seeking further explanation, he followed her back out of the bedroom and down the corridor to where Sal and two of his security team were standing over a giant pet carrier, Sal’s face pale and rigid.

  ‘What’s going on?’ Raffaele prompted.

  The strange woman beside the carrier broke into a flood of explanation that ranged from her mother’s broken hip to her mother’s current incarceration in hospital. ‘I couldn’t possibly keep them for you the way my mother promised,’ she said apologetically to Maya. ‘There’s no room in my home for two lively puppies.’

  ‘I understand. It’s fine, thank you for bringing them,’ Maya broke in gently.

  ‘I’m afraid I’ll have to take the carrier with me but I’ve brought a bag of immediate supplies, their vaccination records and current feeding schedule and their other documentation,’ the woman told Maya, indicating the large sack one of the men car
ried as she bent down to release the catch on the carrier. ‘Any problems you have, my phone number is in the bag.’

  Maya caught a glimpse of Sal’s anxious face as she bent down and guessed instantly that he knew the same tragic tale of Raffaele’s brief pet ownership as she did and was concerned about Raffaele’s possible reaction to the animals. A little black nose poked curiously out of the carrier, swiftly followed by a little squirming golden puppy body, and then a second explorer appeared.

  ‘They were a gift for your birthday,’ Maya whispered weakly to Raffaele as the carrier was withdrawn. Somehow, she got through the departure of the breeder’s daughter and said all that was polite before she even dared to glance in Raffaele’s direction again.

  Raffaele was down on the floor engulfed in puppies. At least he wasn’t backing away or fighting them off, she told herself in consolation. He lifted glinting dark golden eyes to hers and smiled. ‘Thank you,’ he said in a husky undertone.

  Maya recognised the tears in his eyes, and she was stunned. Grinning, Sal was already hustling the rest of his team out of the penthouse and their housekeeper was lifting the sack of supplies.

  ‘Puppies,’ she said in barely hidden consternation. ‘Here.’

  ‘But not for long, Mrs Abram. We’re moving out to the country as soon as possible,’ Raffaele informed her, a puppy gathered under each arm as he walked back to their bedroom, clumsily hit the button that opened the patio doors onto the balcony and set both little animals down outside. Puddles quickly appeared and he laughed. ‘Yes, these two are going to keep us busy.’

  ‘You’re not upset?’ Maya whispered worriedly. ‘It seemed such a great idea but after I thought about what I had done, I started getting second thoughts, but it was too late because I’d already booked and picked and paid for them.’

  ‘It was a great idea...and now I believe that you love me,’ Raffaele admitted almost buoyantly. ‘Because you understand me too. You knew I was afraid to love anything or anyone again.’

  ‘Yes,’ she muttered limply. ‘You don’t mind me loving you?’

  ‘Why would I mind such an honour?’ Raffaele demanded. ‘If it means you’ll consider staying with me for ever? I presume it does mean that? I’ve got you for good?’

  Her smooth brow furrowed because she was confused by his attitude. ‘For good?’

  ‘We’re not a business deal any longer, we’re a couple in a normal marriage. That’s all I want and I can promise you now that I will not do anything to make you regret staying with me,’ Raffaele swore feverishly. ‘I’ll probably annoy you and frustrate you at times, but I will never deliberately hurt you.’

  Maya nodded slowly as if she was afraid to break the spell. ‘For good,’ she agreed. ‘But what’s changed?’

  ‘I had the stupid idea that all you did want from me was a baby, that you didn’t actually want me for me...which was perfectly understandable after the way I’d behaved. But it wasn’t something I felt that I could live with long-term,’ he explained ruefully. ‘You could have had a baby with any man, even had a baby without a man and gone for artificial insemination, so you wanting a baby fathered by me didn’t really mean much, just that you knew it was achievable with me because you already knew that I was fertile.’

  Maya had paled. ‘I never thought of it from that angle.’

  ‘Nobody has ever wanted me for me but you,’ Raffaele breathed grimly. ‘I’ve been wanted a hundred times over for my wealth, my looks, my body, for the publicity I attract. I’ve never been wanted just for me.’

  ‘Oh, I’m sure you have, you probably didn’t notice,’ Maya opined, dismayed to register once again that she had wounded him by telling him that she only wanted him because he could give her another baby. ‘And maybe you haven’t always been the most lovable person around other women, but you’ve been honest and wonderful with me since quite early on, always surprising me with how kind and thoughtful you could be, and tender.’

  Raffaele winced. ‘I’m really not the tender type.’

  She wanted to tell him how amazingly affectionate and demonstrative he could be, but thought that possibly it was wiser for him to slowly recognise that about himself. He needed to accept that his ready affection did not in any way detract from his masculinity, that indeed it only enhanced it.

  He had picked her a dream of a wedding gown, had guided her around Egyptian antiquities purely to surprise and please her, had in every way pandered unerringly to her likes and dislikes rather than his own. He had reunited her family, had introduced her to her long-lost grandparents and had searched out and designed a beautiful ring for her pleasure. He had even lied and declared that their marriage was rocky to his brother-in-law to cover up any damage she might have inflicted by avoiding her sister for so long.

  And after they had been engulfed by their first crisis when she suffered a miscarriage, he had ignored her attempts to push him away even though that would have offered him an easier path. He had not been detached and even when she had lashed out at him, he had stayed supportive and caring. The more she thought about everything Raffaele had done for her since their first intimidating meeting, the less she marvelled at the love she had for him because he had changed just as much as she had changed and within that change they had grown very close.

  ‘In fact... I may not be tender or sensitive or any of that stuff that’s important to women,’ Raffaele admitted gruffly, ‘but I do really love you. I couldn’t face the idea of life without you. When we viewed Grey Gables, I said, “when we’re no longer together” to try and get a reaction out of you...something, anything that would give me hope, but instead you succumbed to the pregnancy sickness and afterwards, well, you were a bit quiet but you certainly didn’t seem upset to me.’

  ‘You said that deliberately?’ Maya gasped. ‘I was upset and hiding it. Where were your eyes?’

  ‘Well, you’re pretty good at hiding being upset. You burbled about the house all the way back here.’

  Belatedly she blinked. ‘You said that you loved me?’

  ‘You’re the only person I’ve ever loved. I like my father, my little sisters, but I don’t think I love them. I don’t think I’ve let myself love them, but I didn’t get a choice with you. From the start I was flooded by these feelings about you and I was always burying them and then we lost our baby and...’ Raffaele turned in an almost clumsy half-circle. ‘Suddenly it was all there in front of me, how much I cared about you, how much it hurt to see you hurting and not be able to fix it for you. I felt helpless. I hated it at first. I was flailing around trying to work out what would be best for you, what would make you happy even if it made me unhappy and that’s why I took you to see your family.’

  ‘And that’s why you stayed out of bed with me too,’ Maya guessed. ‘Because you thought letting me go was the kindest thing you could do for me...you idiot!’

  ‘So, you stormed into the club that night and that was so incredibly sexy, such a turn-on.’

  ‘You’re easily impressed, Mr Manzini,’ Maya teased, looking up at him with her heart in her eyes. ‘And such a sweetie behind the nasty front. What did you really think of cousin Aurora?’

  ‘Pushy, fake, not my type but she made you jealous and I liked that, which is why I stayed talking to her. I could see your annoyance,’ Raffaele confessed ruefully.

  ‘You can be so sneaky sometimes,’ Maya sighed, wrapping both arms round him and resting her cheek against his shirtfront, loving the familiar warmth and scent of him.

  He tilted back her head and kissed her passionately. ‘I want you so much at this moment.’

  ‘You can’t have me. We have puppies to take care of,’ Maya reminded him ruefully, watching the puppies gambol about the floor.

  ‘All right, we feed them, we play with them, we come up with some names for them and then, we go to bed and they get an early night as well,’ Raffaele proposed.

 
‘We’ll see. You’re happy with them? They weren’t a stupid gift?’ she checked.

  ‘This is my fresh start in life alongside you. There’s nothing stupid about that,’ Raffaele assured her fondly, running a fingertip along her cheekbone and leaning down to claim another, longer kiss. ‘I love you, I’ll love our child and I’ll love our dogs.’

  It was late when the puppies got fed and several shoes got chewed up in the intervening time, but Raffaele and Maya got to make love and celebrate their newfound happiness and both pets and owners remained delighted with each other.

  EPILOGUE

  FIVE YEARS LATER, Maya lay back on her sun lounger in the shade with Izzy beside her.

  It was gloriously peaceful on the little island of Aoussa. The children and the dogs were down on the beach with their nannies. Izzy was a queen but she didn’t act like one in private because Maya was always teasing her about the fact.

  Maya had given birth to a little girl called Greta, and she was blonde and dark-eyed and crazy about mechanical things. Maya had had an easy pregnancy and a straightforward delivery but she had been well into the second trimester before she’d stopped fretting about something going wrong again. A year later she had conceived twins and, like her sister, had given birth a few weeks early. She had had two little boys, Pietro and Daniele. Black-haired and green-eyed and identical, they were noisy little boys full of endless energy, she thought with a rueful smile, but wonderfully affectionate and loving. Izzy’s family was complete with her two girls, Lucia and Leila, and her son, Nazir, and Maya rather thought her family was complete as well unless Raffaele took another notion and persuaded her otherwise.

  Raffaele adored children, his own children in particular. He got out of bed at night when they were babies and got under the feet of their nanny. He changed nappies, built brightly coloured plastic towers of bricks and dressed dolls and combed their hair. He showed their children all the love he himself had lacked but he didn’t over-indulge them.