Page 17 of Back to Claim His Italian Heir
Her bag was just outside the door, and Emma reached in it for her phone, heading to the privacy of the bedroom to make the dreaded call.
‘Emma?’ Will answered after the first ring. ‘Are you okay? I’ve been worried—’
‘Oh, Will. I’m so sorry.’
‘So that man is your husband?’
‘I thought he was dead. But...he wasn’t.’
‘He didn’t seem that thrilled to see you,’ Will remarked, and Emma let out a trembling laugh.
‘No, but...we’ll work it out.’ At least she would try. She hoped Nico would, too.
‘Well, you know I’m here for you,’ Will said after a moment, and Emma’s eyes stung. Even though she’d only known him a short while, Will was a good friend, and she was grateful for him.
‘Thank you,’ she whispered.
‘You will keep in touch?’
‘I’ll try.’ Right now it felt like the most she could offer.
The call finished, Emma knew there was nothing to keep her from seeking out Nico. The marble floor was cold and slick beneath her bare feet as she walked into the massive living area, a vast open space, looking for him. It took her a few minutes to find him, standing on the wraparound balcony, gazing out at the city lights.
Emma took a deep breath and then slid open the sliding glass and stepped out onto the balcony, the balmy evening air rushing over her skin, heated from the bath.
‘Hello, Nico,’ she said quietly.
Nico turned around, jolted by the soft sound of Emma’s voice. He’d been so lost in his thoughts he hadn’t heard the door slide back, or realised she’d come out here to join him. He glanced at her now, her face flushed from the bath, her hair curling about her shoulders in damp tendrils. The dressing gown enveloped her and yet still offered a tantalising peek of the shadowy vee between her breasts, a hidden valley whose delights he remembered all too well.
The dressing gown stopped just above her knees, and he could see the shapely curve of her golden legs. Everything about her made him ache to touch her, his palms itching with the need. A simple tug and the sash of her dressing gown would fall away; she’d shrug out of it and step towards him, naked and perfect. He’d take her in his arms as he had before...
With an enormous amount of effort, Nico forced the tempting vision away. He could not complicate matters with sex right now. ‘Did you have a nice bath?’ he asked in his most solicitous tone.
‘Yes, it was amazing.’ She offered him a small, wry smile that felt like a truce. ‘I forgot how easy it was to get used to this kind of living.’
Presumably she hadn’t had it, then, in the three and a half months since his alleged death, which had to have been part of the reason she’d gone for this Will. ‘What did you do, after the plane crash?’ he asked. He realised he was curious. He’d already determined he needed to know more about her, to figure out if he could trust her. Now seemed to be as good a time as any to start finding the answers he needed, assuming she would tell him the truth. He didn’t yet know if that was a reasonable assumption to make.
‘After your memorial service, you mean?’ She let out a sigh as she turned back to the suite. ‘Do you mind if we sit down? My feet are absolutely aching.’
‘Are they?’ He couldn’t keep from sounding concerned, and she let out a little laugh as she walked back inside.
‘Three-inch heels and pregnancy do not go together, as it turns out.’ She sat on one of the sofas, tucking her legs up underneath her. ‘What did I do?’ she resumed, her expression turning thoughtful, guarded. ‘First let me ask you what you did.’
It was clearly a prevarication, but one he decided he was willing to run with. For now. ‘I told you, I was in hospital.’
‘Yes, but...’ She shook her head slowly, her eyes wide and golden. ‘I can’t get my head around the fact that you survived a plane crash. That must have been...’ she blew out a breath ‘...terrifying.’
‘I don’t remember it, actually.’ He glanced down, finding it weirdly vulnerable to admit even that much. It felt like a deficiency, a weakness, that his brain had these blanks.
Emma drew her brows together as she studied him. ‘You don’t?’
‘No,’ he admitted, settling back into the sofa, his hands splayed on his thighs. ‘The crash itself is a complete blank. I don’t even remember being on the plane, or any of it. The last thing I can remember comprehensively is—’kissing you goodbye‘—a bit before,’ he finished after a second’s pause. ‘Apparently, it’s common for the brain to block out that kind of trauma. Sometimes the memories come back, sometimes they don’t.’ He smiled a bit crookedly. ‘Or so the doctors told me.’
‘Oh, Nico.’ Her face softened with sympathy and caused a rush of—something—to course through him. A longing, deeper than desire, stirred in him. This woman had touched him in ways he never had been before. At least, he’d convinced himself of that, when he’d been lying in a hospital bed, with the memory of Emma the only thing he could hold onto. Whether it was a mirage or not hadn’t mattered, not then.
But it mattered now. Love was most certainly not going to feature in their future at all, not in any shape or form. He’d learned better now. Wised up, thankfully.
‘All I remember is waking up in a hospital bed,’ he stated matter-of-factly. ‘Staring around and having no idea where I was, or even who I was. Everything was a complete blank—just this whiteness. In my head.’ He shook his head slowly as the memory of it filtered through him. ‘It was terrifying,’ he admitted, ‘as well as completely disorientating.’