by Trish Morey
She’d crashed, gone over an embankment, had never stood a chance in a car she hadn’t known how to handle. A car he’d given to her. He’d inflicted upon her the same fate that had met every other member of his family. He’d done that to her because he’d never once had the courage to accept what she’d said and faced up to what he really felt.
That he needed her. That she made him feel special and strong and protective. That he wanted to look after her.
That he loved her.
Anguish twisted him inside.
My God, but he did!
He loved her. And now it was too late.
He’d never wanted to love. Love only compounded pain, made it infinitely worse than it would otherwise be. But why had he thought he could deny love by simply ignoring its existence, by simply not thinking the thoughts or saying the words?
By not telling the woman he loved?
He was right not to want to love. Wouldn’t the pain he was feeling right now be so much easier to bear if he hadn’t loved her?
But he hadn’t told her, and right now that made his pain worse. He’d denied what she’d meant to him and he’d rejected her love. How must she have felt following him along those roads in those conditions? She must have been desperate to catch up with him.
The police car pulled up outside the hospital, its lights making crazy patterns on the slick roads. The storm had long gone and a strange calm had descended. That was outside at least. His storm had only just begun.
He looked up at the horizontal concrete façade, the windows lit with a dull glow and the occasional blip of colour from a machine.
He didn’t want to go inside. He wanted to deny it now, even though he knew it must be the truth. It was going to be one of the hardest things he’d ever done. But there was something even harder to follow.
How was he going to tell Daphne?
They led him along the long corridors, the atmosphere antiseptic, their bright fluorescent lighting garish and cold in this late hour. Then they made him wait outside a room in the morgue, giving him even more time to think about how he should have done things differently, how he should have told her what she meant to him, how wrong he’d been.
He hadn’t been fair to her. He’d bullied her at work, he’d bullied her at the Gold Coast, and he’d bullied her into this wedding. And now there was no chance to tell her he was sorry.
Now it was too late.
They called him inside, into a room where the clinical furniture and fittings faded into bland insignificance, where the cloaked trolley held centre stage. He walked slowly to one side, the policemen close behind, and stopped, wanting to know, not wanting to know, because until he knew for sure, there was always a chance they were wrong, however unlikely that seemed.
‘Mr DeLuca?’ The attendant’s brow was furrowed with concern.
‘She was pregnant, you know. Our first child.’
The man’s eyes blinked slowly, as if he hadn’t wanted to hear that. ‘Are you all right, Mr DeLuca?’
He gave a brief nod. ‘Ready,’ he muttered on a breath that tasted of death and cold ash.
The attendant peeled back the sheet. Damien’s heart stopped and he rocked on his heels as he scoured her face. Under the scratches and contusions her features still looked quite lovely considering she’d suffered such a sudden, savage end, her eyes closed, her lips slightly parted as if ready to draw her next soft breath. She looked at peace.
But she didn’t look familiar.
‘It’s not Philly.’ He sagged on a breath that brought relief, just as quickly replaced by a savage new fear. He turned to the officers behind him.
‘So where’s my wife?’
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
IT WAS so cold. Two minutes in the driving rain had been enough to soak her to the skin. Now she was out of the weather but there was no way she could warm up here. She’d found what had to be an old picnic rug that smelt as if it had seen more dogs’ breakfasts than picnic lunches, but it was at least something to drag over her shoulders and it helped to break up the otherwise wall-to-wall motor oil smell.
She was cramped, uncomfortable, and had no idea of the time, only that it must be still dark and she was so tired but way too cold to sleep. It hurt to move. It hurt not to move. But what hurt more was that she wouldn’t even be missed for hours. Damien was at the apartment, most likely, and at the house no one would question her absence before lunch time.
Every time she’d heard a car approach, she’d banged and yelled till she was hoarse. But no one had heard her and the cars had just kept on driving.
She was stuck here, shivering, until the sun rose. How long until sunrise? But how hot was it expected to be today? Right now the idea of warmth was attractive but how long would it take before she cooked inside here?
They had to find her first. Damien had to find her first. Before she died…
Before their baby died.
She hugged her abdomen gently, marginally relieved that right now the discomfort she was feeling down there had more to do with a pressing bladder than a sign that anything was wrong with her pregnancy, and she tried to rock in the cramped, airless space, crooning softly as if calming her tiny child.
How long could she hang on to both her bladder and her sanity? Hopefully long enough.
The police had said they’d contact him as soon as they found her, but if they thought there was any way he could sit and wait by a phone while his wife was missing they had him all wrong. Even if they had reason to wonder.
Tactfully they’d asked why it was that a man who’d just married had spent the night in his apartment in town, while his pregnant wife was left somewhere else.
It wasn’t easy to explain—a stupid argument—a misunderstanding. In the light of what had ensued, it all seemed so pointless.
By the time he’d started his own search dawn was lightening the sky, tingeing the few remaining clouds pink in an otherwise grey-blue sky. He set out, confident that if she’d been on the highway someone would have found her by now. She had to be somewhere between the house and the highway.
How the woman had stolen the car, he was too scared to think. The only thing he could hang on to was that she was alive somewhere, alive and waiting to be found. She had to be.
He almost missed the car, only the perfect circles of its tail-lights looking too regular amongst the shrubs along the side of the road. Someone had tried to hide it—why else park it like that?
His heart raced as he pulled up nearby, watching for any indication that anyone was about, but all he could hear was the morning cries of magpies and crows high up in the trees. Until something thumped and thumped again, dull and repetitive and totally at odds with the sounds of a bush morning and hope sprang wild and unfettered in his chest. He heard a cry, muffled and weak, but he heard it all the same and he rushed to the car.
It had to be.
‘Philly,’ he yelled, his face up close to the metal. ‘Is that you? Can you hear me?’
He wasn’t sure if it was a squeal of relief or of delight that he heard in response, but it sure was the best sound he’d ever heard.
She was alive.
He checked the boot but there was no external release mechanism. Without a key he’d need to break it open. Unless… The car was old but there was a chance. He pulled open the driver’s side door and sent up a silent prayer of thanks when he saw the boot release lever. He flicked it up and heard the satisfying click as the catch was released.
A fraction of a second later he pulled open the boot lid and scooped her out of the small space, holding her in his arms and hugging her tightly to him.
Her gown was torn and grease-stained, an old rag hung off her shoulders; she smelled more of car and oil than her familiar apricot scent and tears had left tracks down her grimy face but she’d never looked more beautiful to him than right now.
‘Philly.’ He held her close, his lips brushing her brow as she sobbed gently against him.
‘You found me
,’ she said, her voice shuddering on a sob.
‘I was afraid I’d lost you for ever. Are you all right? Did they hurt you?’
‘I’m stiff and sore and cold. But I think I’m okay. A woman took the car; she had a gun. She made me get in the boot and then drove it into the bushes.’
She’d had a gun.
Breath hissed through his teeth. What might have happened? What was he thinking, to lead her into danger like this?
He carried her to his car and sat inside with her cradled on his lap to pass on his warmth. He pulled the smelly rag from her shoulders and replaced it with the mohair rug from his car. She snuggled closer, enjoying the warmth both his body and the rug lent as he pulled out his mobile phone and made a quick call to the police.
‘How did you find me?’ she asked when he’d finished the call.
‘The police found your car. You weren’t in it.’ He didn’t tell her about the driver; there were some things that could wait. And some things that were more important and couldn’t.
‘I’m so sorry,’ she said, her voice quivering. ‘I didn’t mean to cause you so much fuss.’
‘Shh,’ he said. ‘It’s not your fault. I shouldn’t have left like that. You were following me, weren’t you?’
‘I had to talk to you. You wouldn’t believe me. I couldn’t let you go, thinking what you did.’
He smoothed her tangled hair with his fingers. ‘I was wrong to think all those things. I was wrong.’
‘But Damien—’ she sniffed, rubbing her nose with her hand ‘—in a way you were right.’
‘No,’ he said, interrupting her. ‘You don’t have to do this now.’
‘Please, I have to. I was crazy with wanting a baby; that much was right. I’d asked about IVF but they wouldn’t take me on because I wasn’t married. I’d even thought about picking someone up, a one-night stand.’
He stiffened, not sure he wanted to hear this.
She looked up at him, her eyes earnest. ‘I thought about it but I couldn’t do it. I’d all but given up hope of having a baby by the time the masquerade ball happened and it didn’t even occur to me that night. Because of you. You made me feel so good, you felt so wonderful, that nothing else mattered. It was only afterwards that I realised what we’d done. I panicked.’
‘You really thought I would have sacked you?’
‘I didn’t know and I was too scared to find out. But as soon as I discovered I was pregnant, I knew you had to be told. I couldn’t keep it a secret any longer. I’m sorry now I even waited that long. It made it harder for you to believe me.’
He sighed and squeezed her tight against him. ‘I made it hard to believe you. I didn’t want to be close to anyone. But I couldn’t stop wanting you. Not believing you became my way of pushing you away. If I couldn’t trust you, I couldn’t feel anything for you.
‘But I was mad,’ he said, cocking his ear to the wail of an approaching siren. ‘Mad to think I could shut you out. It was only when I thought I’d lost you that I realised just how much you meant to me.’
She looked up at him, her expression hopeful. ‘I do?’
He raised her in his lap and brushed his lips against hers. ‘Oh, you do.’ His lips moved over hers and he felt the tremor that passed through her and the depth it added to her kiss. ‘Did I tell you lately,’ he said, raising his lips just a fraction, ‘that I love you?’
This time she pulled her mouth away completely, her tired eyes blinking, bright and beautiful. ‘You’ve never told me that.’
‘Then it’s time I did. I love you, Philly. It took almost losing you to realise that, but I do. I love you and I’m proud, even honoured, that you are now part of my family and you will be part of my family for ever, if you still want me after all I’ve done to you.’
Her eyes shone up at him, her teeth gripping her bottom lip. Tears welled in her bright eyes, as if she was afraid to believe what he was saying.
‘Oh, Damien,’ she managed to say when the bubble of happiness had cleared from her throat enough to speak. ‘I love you so much. I can’t imagine being anywhere else. You saved my life.’
‘Fair payback,’ he said. ‘You’ve given me back mine.’
She opened her mouth as if to argue the point and he shushed her with a finger to her lips as the sirens screamed closer.
‘Don’t argue with me; any minute now we’re going to be surrounded by emergency services and I have much more important things right now to be doing with my time.’ And she smiled under his finger, her eyes sparkling as he slanted his mouth over hers, his lips warm and gentle, his breath and his final words moving her soul.
‘Much more important…’
EPILOGUE
WHAT a day! Damien turned off the highway, loosening his tie as the hot air blew through the open top. He could have kept on the roof and the air conditioner—the temperature sure warranted it—but now that he was out of the city he wanted to feel the air around him, he wanted to smell the scents of the baking, crisp countryside, he wanted to feel a part of it.
It was a great day—two o’clock in the afternoon and he’d decided that being home was more important than being in the office.
He’d been making a habit of that lately, Enid had been quick to point out. Not that she minded; she’d scolded him half-heartedly as she’d set about rejigging his timetable. He’d spent much of the last two years taking the time to feel things and the novelty was yet to wear off. He’d never have believed he could have found satisfaction in a life outside the office, but then it was only just over two years ago that he’d met Philly and she’d changed everything.
He looked at the clock on the dashboard as he pulled into the driveway. Great, it was still early enough to see little Anna before she went down for her afternoon nap.
He found the women sitting out on the veranda, shaded from the sun and where the breeze cooled naturally as it filtered through the hanging wisteria covering the pergola alongside. A small paddling pool sat between them, a dark-haired toddler sitting within an inflatable safety seat inside, splashing at the shallow water with obvious delight.
She squealed as soon as she saw him round the corner of the home, raising her chubby arms high and calling ‘da-da, da-da’ in her sweet baby voice. She bounced up and down in the seat, her toothy smile stretching wide across her chubby cheeks.
He swept her up, naked and wet, and she shrieked with delight as he blew raspberries over her skin.
‘You’re home early,’ said Philly, laughing as he reached down to kiss her, the giggling infant still in his arms and replying with raspberries of her own.
‘How could I stay away, knowing how much fun the three most important women in my life are having?’
He ruffled the curly black locks of his daughter’s hair as she yawned widely, her eyelids suddenly droopy. ‘Is it sleep time for you, little lady?’
‘I’ll take her,’ said Daphne, looking slim but healthy in a cool sundress. ‘I could do with an afternoon siesta myself.’
She wrapped the infant in a fluffy towel and let her kiss both her parents and wave goodbye wearily before she turned into the house. Damien watched her go before he pulled Philly to her feet and walked with her to the veranda railing.
‘It’s remarkable, the change in your mother. She could never have been strong enough to lift a child before.’
‘I know,’ said Philly. ‘The doctors are amazed. I know she’s far from being out of the woods, but they say it’s because she’s had a change of attitude; she’s allowing the drugs to work.’
Something in her tone twigged in his mind. ‘And what do you say?’
She turned from the view to face him. ‘I say it’s a miracle and that miracle has a lot to do with you and what you’ve done for my family.’
‘You’re my family now,’ he said, gently lifting her chin. ‘Always and for ever. And I thank the stars for the day you walked into my life. I love you, Philly.’
His lips brushed over hers even as she said th
e words, ‘I love you, too.’ She caught his intake of air before his kiss deepened, as if powered by the words she’d spoken. When at last he pulled his mouth away, he smiled and reached a hand down to the firm swell of her abdomen.
‘And what of our other miracle? How does my son progress?’
She laughed. ‘You’re so sure he’s a boy. Well, maybe you’re right, the way this baby is kicking. I think he’s practising for when he’s the boss. He’s going to be just like his dad.’
He wrapped his arms more tightly around her, pulling her close. ‘I hope you’re not mocking me,’ he warned. ‘To think I once thought of you as a shy little mouse. You know I’ll make you pay for any insubordination.’
‘And just what did you have in mind for my punishment?’
His eyes twinkled down at her, the love within them aflame with desire.
‘Slow, delicious torture,’ he said, tugging her towards the house, his lips curled into a wicked smile. ‘I’ll have you screaming for release.’
And he did.
ISBN: 978-1-4268-5920-5
THE ITALIAN BOSS’S SECRET CHILD
First North American Publication 2005.
Copyright © 2005 by Trish Morey.
All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including xerography, photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, is forbidden without the written permission of the publisher, Harlequin Enterprises Limited, 225 Duncan Mill Road, Don Mills, Ontario, Canada M3B 3K9.
All characters in this book have no existence outside the imagination of the author and have no relation whatsoever to anyone bearing the same name or names. They are not even distantly inspired by any individual known or unknown to the author, and all incidents are pure invention.