ALISSANDRU DROVE HOME from the fundraiser and the whole way he assured himself that he was giving Isla a night of unbroken sleep. But his foot hovered over the brake as he reached the palazzo and failed to connect, ensuring he drove on in the direction of his twin’s former home. Isla had had an upsetting day and it was natural that he would want to check on her to ensure that she was all right, he reasoned ruefully.
The house was in darkness, which he hadn’t expected because it wasn’t late. Anxious now, he banged on the door, wondering if she had fallen asleep, and, when even that failed to rouse her, he dug out the key he had always had but neglected to mention and stuck it in the door. He called out her name, switched on lights, frowned and took the stairs two at a time, striding into her bedroom to find it empty. Where was she? The dog was missing, as well.
Obviously she had gone out. Was she with his mother? Since his mother had got the puppy, she had been communicating regularly with Isla about dog training. As if Isla could tell anyone anything about dog training, Alissandru reflected wryly. He called his mother to ask if she had company and, while she was telling him that she had not, he finally noticed the letter lying on the bed with his name printed on it.
As he read the first paragraph, which mentioned her unexpected meeting with Marco, he froze and he cursed. When she referred to her having left, he wrenched open the wardrobe door so roughly it almost fell off its hinges. It was empty. Per l’amor di Dio... Isla had left him. Alissandru was stunned into momentary paralysis. He hovered in the centre of the room and tried to entertain the concept of Isla being gone. No, he wasn’t addicted to her, maybe a little obsessed...occasionally. Isla gone.
The shock of that knowledge made him sit down on the side of the bed because his legs turned weirdly weak. He returned to the letter with renewed interest and then reached the section about the baby on the way again and suddenly, in the midst of his turmoil, Alissandru was smiling. What was it about them? They got together and five minutes later...hey, no complaints, Alissandru reflected abstractedly, enthusiasm at the prospect leaping through him. Isla was going to have his baby. Obviously they were meant to be. It wouldn’t have happened again, he reasoned, if the fates hadn’t intended it so.
Alissandru smiled, temporarily in a world of his own, and then he unfroze. Isla had walked out on him when she needed him. He couldn’t live with that awareness. In fact, it filled him with panic. Where was she? How was he to track her down? Could she have flown out of Sicily already? Should he go to the airport first?
His mobile buzzed, and he snatched it up.
It was Grazia and he only answered it because, if he didn’t, Grazia would simply keep on ringing and ringing.
‘Alissandru...’ he breathed harshly.
‘Have you lost anything? Or should I say anyone?’
‘How do you know that?’ Alissandru demanded rawly.
‘Because I’ve found what you lost by the side of the road, complete with a yappy little dog.’
‘By the side of the road?’ Alissandru exclaimed, leaping upright in consternation.
‘The getaway car broke down,’ Grazia said succinctly. ‘I drove past them on the way home, had to practically force Isla into my car. What have you been doing, Alissandru?’
‘I screwed up,’ Alissandru bit out in a roughened undertone.
‘Well, they’re at my house and I’m off to my parents’ for the night. Keys in the usual place. Admit it... I’m the best friend you’ve ever had.’
‘You’re the best friend I’ve ever had,’ Alissandru recited breathlessly as he practically ran down the stairs, slammed through the door, flung himself into his car.
‘Now stop right there and think,’ Grazia urged as he fired the engine. ‘You don’t go in cold and without knowing what you’re going to say.’
‘I know. I know exactly,’ Alissandru told her boldly, and he did know, just the same way as his twin had once told him he knew, only it had taken an awful lot longer for the truth to hit Alissandru.
But the truth had hit him at remarkable speed when he’d walked through that empty house and the prospect of spending even one night without Isla had hung over him like a thunderclap of doom.
* * *
Emotionally speaking, Isla was all over the place. She had had the strength to walk away and then Tania’s car had broken down halfway between the estate and San Matteo. That was when the floods of tears had engulfed her. That was when everything going wrong had just combined into one giant heavy rock grinding her down, squeezing the life out of her. But above all had been the screaming sense of having left part of herself behind, as well.
She loved Alissandru Rossetti. She hated him for feeling sorry for her and neglecting to tell her about the will, but he was still the father of her baby and the man she loved. When Grazia had stopped and initially offered her a lift into town, Isla had had no choice but to accept the offer, and when she had asked if Grazia knew anywhere she could get a room for the night with a dog, Grazia had informed her that there was only one place. And she hadn’t explained until she’d pulled up outside a beautiful, newish-looking, modern detached house outside town that the only place that would take a dog for the night was her house.
Practically pushing Isla through the front door, Grazia had then shown her up to an en-suite bedroom, urging her to get into something comfortable while telling her that the kitchen was full of food and to make herself at home.
Puggle had required no such encouragement. He had curled up in a basket in the kitchen with Grazia’s elegant little grey whippet, Primo, and gone straight to sleep, the trauma of being pushed into his transport carrier gratefully left behind him.
Isla had showered and put on her pyjamas. She wasn’t hungry and she wasn’t sleepy either and the prospect of watching Italian television when she couldn’t speak the language had little appeal. When she heard the front door opening, she assumed it was Grazia returning from wherever she had rushed off to, and she stood up. The sight of Alissandru walking through the door was a total shock and her eyes flew wide.
‘How did you know I was here?’ she gasped.
‘Grazia. She knew I’d want to know. I owe her a massive thank you,’ Alissandru bit out harshly. ‘How could you just run off like that? What on earth possessed you?’
‘What else could I do in the circumstances?’ Isla hurled back. ‘How did you think I’d feel when I found out about the second will? Where was it anyway?’
‘Paulu’s assistant found it in the contents of his desk... Look, sit down. You shouldn’t be getting all riled up,’ Alissandru framed jerkily, shaken to look at her and appreciate that she was carrying his child again, even more shaken by how that made him feel. It made him feel better; it made him feel that he had a future again.
‘Why shouldn’t I be getting all riled up?’ Isla asked combatively. ‘You withheld vital information from me. Information that I had a right to know.’
Alissandru yanked loose his bow tie and undid his collar while expelling his breath slowly. He didn’t look as knife-sharp elegant and self-contained as he usually did. His black hair was untidy and lines of strain bracketed his mouth. He stared at her with glittering golden eyes. ‘Where were you going when the car broke down?’
‘I was hoping to find a hotel that would take Puggle but Grazia said there wasn’t one that she knew of and brought me here. Then she just disappeared.’
‘She’s gone to her parents’ for the night,’ Alissandru explained and he stalked round the room, stopped to shrug and then looked at her again. ‘How was I supposed to tell you about the second will? I knew it would wreck all your plans. I knew it would make you leave Sicily and that you wouldn’t accept my financial help. I didn’t want you to leave.’
‘I’m leaving,’ Isla told him, dry-mouthed. ‘I have to deal with this situation and get on with my life. I may be pregnant but I’m not living off you unless I’m forced to.’
‘Expect to be forced,’ Alissandru muttered half under his breath while scooping up Puggle and ruffling his curly head with a wry apology for not having a treat for him. ‘You see, if you’re Puggle, life is simple. He trusts and likes the people who feed him.’
‘I don’t need you to feed me, Alissandru,’ Isla said drily, while watching in surprise as he stroked her dog. ‘When did you start liking him?’
He set the dog down. ‘I wouldn’t go as far as saying I like him yet, but he’s yours and that makes a difference. He accepts me, I accept him.’ He glanced at her through the tangle of his long black lashes, golden eyes bright as sunlight. ‘I want this baby... I really, really want this baby. By the time I warmed up to the idea of the first baby, it was gone.’
‘I didn’t know you’d warmed up,’ Isla whispered shakily, thoroughly disconcerted by what he had declared.
‘You didn’t give me the chance to tell you,’ he reminded her. ‘You just shut me out after the...miscarriage. I didn’t think you’d believe me if I told you how I felt or that I was grieving, too. It was a loss to me, as well. I’d started looking forward to becoming a father, seeing the whole situation in a very positive light. But what restricted me back then doesn’t restrict me now.’
Her brow furrowed as she tried to accept that he had felt much more than she had given him credit for when she’d miscarried. But she could not doubt the sincerity in his eyes or the husky emotion lacing his words. ‘What restricted you?’
‘I still had you all tangled up with Tania inside my head back then. I didn’t trust you, didn’t really know you. That’s all changed,’ he pointed out.
‘Yes. But after the miscarriage, you said that it wasn’t meant to be, and that really upset me,’ she admitted unevenly. ‘I assumed you meant that people like you and me, from such different backgrounds, don’t have children together.’
His ebony brows pleated. ‘Of course, I didn’t mean that. I’m not a snob. I don’t rate people by how much money they have.’
‘You did me,’ she reminded him helplessly.
‘Tania cast a long shadow,’ he said ruefully in his own defence. ‘And I received a bad first impression of you. I didn’t want to make the same mistake Paulu had and get involved with the wrong woman. That’s why I left the croft so fast that morning. I wanted to stay longer. I wanted to spend time with you and that shocked me. I thought I’d soon get over it but after you, I didn’t want other women. You spoiled me for them. I’ve only been with you since that first night.’
Genuine joy unfurled inside Isla at that unexpected assurance. She had wondered, of course she’d wondered whether he had been with anyone else before she came to Sicily. The discovery that he had only been with her made her feel much more secure. That he wanted their baby as well and was willing to openly acknowledge the fact warmed her down deep inside.
‘When I stood in that empty house tonight, I was devastated that you were gone and I knew then that I loved you and that nothing but marriage would satisfy me this time around.’
It was quite a speech and it shook Isla where she stood. She blinked and swallowed hard and when she looked again he was still studying her as if she was the only woman in the world for him. ‘You love me? You want to marry me?’
‘You once said you wouldn’t marry me if I was the last man alive. I hope I’ve risen a little higher in your estimation since then,’ he confided with entirely surprising humility as, to her shock, he got down on one knee.
‘Marry me, Isla,’ he urged. ‘I do love you, more than I ever thought I could love any woman. Unfortunately you came into my life when I wasn’t expecting you but having you in my life means everything to me and I don’t want to lose you.’
Absolutely gobsmacked, Isla stared down at him without words, in such shock that she was reeling. ‘You really love me?’
‘I started falling for you the first night but I didn’t realise why I couldn’t forget you. So, will you marry me? I’m starting to feel like a bit of an idiot down here!’ he told her drily.
‘Of course, I’m going to marry you,’ Isla informed him with newly learned confidence as she hauled him up to her with greedy hands. ‘You love me, you want me, you want our baby...that’s the biggest surprise of all!’
‘A piece of you, a piece of me, maybe even a dash of my brother or even Tania,’ Alissandru pointed out with only the faintest flinch at that final possibility. ‘How could I not want my child? It took me a long time to get here, Isla, but now you’ve got me, you’re not going to get rid of me again.’
Isla stood in the strong circle of his arms, trying to compute how life could travel from being totally horrendous to totally wonderful in the space of minutes, and not doing very well. ‘I don’t want rid of you,’ she mumbled shakily, and then the tears were coming, cascading from her eyes as though she had taps behind them.
And Alissandru grabbed her up in a panic and sank down on the sofa holding her. ‘What’s wrong?’
‘I’m j-just s-so h-happy!’ Isla stammered apologetically through her tears.
‘But you’re crying,’ Alissandru said gently as though she might not have noticed.
Isla gave an inelegant sniff. ‘I think it’s my hormones. I think it’s being pregnant.’
Alissandru was bewildered. ‘So...you’re happy? You’re definitely going to marry me?’
‘Obviously.’ She gulped. ‘You’re not usually this stupid.’
‘I’ve never been in love before. Never been with a woman who would dare to call me stupid, either,’ Alissandru admitted with a spontaneous laugh.
‘Well, of course, you’re going to be stupid sometimes,’ Isla told him briskly, having finally mastered the tears dripping down her face. ‘But, you know, you’re not the only one who fell in love this spring. I love you too, but this time I thought we were only having an affair because you kept on hinting that we weren’t going to last for ever.’
‘That was the last dying strands of the single guy trying to stay free,’ Alissandru told her with wry amusement in his gaze. ‘Paulu told me once I didn’t know what love was and he was right. I would forgive you just about anything...but now don’t take that as an invitation,’ he added with his usual caution.
‘Are you really happy about the baby? How do you think it happened?’
‘I haven’t got a clue and don’t care. I’m just delighted that it has,’ Alissandru confided with warmth glowing in his level dark golden eyes.
‘I’m scared that something will go wrong again,’ Isla confided in a rush.
‘We both are, but at least we’re together now and together we can handle anything,’ Alissandru said with confidence. ‘I’ve got you and a whole future with you waiting for me...and I’ve never been happier in my whole life than I feel at this moment.’
That was quite a declaration from the once cynical love of her life and Isla rested her head back against his shoulder, struggling to accept that such wondrous happiness could finally be hers. ‘I love you,’ she whispered, stroking a fingertip along his shapely upper lip. ‘And we’re going to be incredibly good together.’
Alissandru smiled down at her with such tenderness in his beautiful eyes that her heart squeezed tight as the hold she had on him. This man with all his emotion would love strong and true, she sensed, thinking of his care for his own family. They had travelled a rocky road to their happy ending but they had both learned a lot on the journey. Her whole life was now opening up into a new dimension and the knowledge that she was no longer alone was a great source of joy to her. Alissandru and a baby too, she thought blissfully...
* * *
Almost four years later, Isla presided over a Christmas spent in London in their town house, which was filled to capacity with dogs and children. Indeed, Alissandru was talking about looking for a larger house as a London base.
‘I just don’t know how you’ve managed to acquire four of them so fast,’ Grazia pronounced, eying the four children surrounding Constantia with astonishment. ‘Thank heaven, I’m only having one,’ she added, patting the swell of her stomach beneath her highly trendy mint-green dress.
‘Two sets of twins adds to the count,’ Isla pointed out with amusement sparkling in her eyes, for Grazia, who had become a dear friend, had only married the year before and motherhood was entirely new to her. Entering an environment cluttered with the paraphernalia of four young children was more than a little daunting for her.
Gerlanda and Cettina had been born first—identical twins, dark haired and blue-eyed, two very lively little girls now three years old. Luciu and Grazzianu were non-identical boys and still babies, one noisy and demanding like his father but with red hair, the other quieter and more contented and dark. They had truly planned their third pregnancy although they hadn’t planned on a second set of twins.
Isla’s favourite photograph of their wedding sat near the fire, ring-fenced by a guard to protect the children. It showed her gorgeous traditional wedding dress, which had been nowhere near as trendy as poor Grazia had wanted to make it but had been everything that Isla had dreamt of, which was exactly as it should be, Grazia had said of a bride’s gown. Her uncle had given her away at their beautiful Sicilian summer wedding and it had been a wonderful family day, her relatives as welcome as the Rossetti clan could make them.
It was hard for Isla to credit that she had been married to Alissandru for almost four years. While she was pregnant with the girls she had done the London course she had wanted to do to complete her education to her own satisfaction. That achieved, she had discovered that she was happy to be a stay-at-home mother with a bunch of kids and dogs because she liked to be available when Alissandru was at home. He didn’t travel as much as he once had and he was always home at weekends and holidays, she thought fondly, watching Alissandru lift his youngest son in his arms and talk with apparent confidence about his feeding schedule. As if he had anything to do with it, Isla ruminated with amusement. They had a nanny to help and Alissandru got more involved with the fun side of parenting like bathtime and bedtime and buying toys. My goodness, could that man buy toys!
That had possibly been the biggest surprise of their marriage, Isla conceded with a tender smile. Alissandru adored kids, adored her being pregnant and wanted more. And she had told him no, four was enough and he would just have to content himself with four.
They spent most of their time now in Sicily and Isla could speak the language, although she made a fair number of mistakes, which she could depend on Alissandru to always correct. Sometimes, she thought ruefully, he was the most annoying man and yet if anything, after four years, he owned even more of her heart than he had at the outset of their marriage. He treated her as if she were as fragile as glass and tried to protect her from anything that he deemed prejudicial to her state of mind.
He strode over to her, clutching Grazzianu to his chest like a well-wrapped parcel. ‘He’s ready for his nap.’
As he bent his dark head down to her she saw the devilment in his gaze and knew that the only person ready for a nap was Alissandru and it wasn’t a nap he meant. She collected Luciu from his adoring grandmother and they took the babies upstairs to the nursery to settle them into their cots.
‘I... I just wanted to give you this,’ Alissandru confessed, surprising her as he loved to do, wrapping a diamond necklace round her throat like a choker and fixing the clasp before she could object. ‘You thought I meant sex,’ he said piously, as if such an idea would never have occurred to him.
‘It’s not even Christmas Day yet!’ Isla exclaimed, ignoring that crack.
‘I love buying you stuff. I love that you can’t say no now, mia bella,’ Alissandru confided, tugging her close to his lean, powerful frame.
‘I have more diamonds than I know what to do with,’ she muttered repressively, thinking of the king’s ransom in jewellery he had given her and the shelves and shelves of glorious handmade silk and lace lingerie, which she was willing to admit that she enjoyed wearing. ‘But thank you very, very much,’ she whispered, because she knew it was his way of showing how much he loved her and that she couldn’t change him and wouldn’t have changed him even if she could have done.
‘But you’re the most precious diamond of all,’ Alissandru intoned huskily. ‘I just adore you.’
And Isla smiled with the tremendous warmth that had attracted him from the very first time he saw that smile, he acknowledged thankfully. She was the centre of his world and all the sunshine in it, and the idea that he might have walked on by and missed out on what he had found with her still terrified him in retrospect.
‘And you know you’re loved...or you ought to,’ Isla informed him, kissing that smoothly shaven jaw line, which was as far up as she could reach, thinking how different he felt unshaven as he had been at dawn and as hot and rampant as only Alissandru could be and making her equally so.
‘I like to be told occasionally,’ Alissandru countered, taking a stand.
‘Why don’t I show you instead?’ Isla whispered, watching those stunning eyes of his light up with alacrity and smiling even more.
* * * * *
If you enjoyed The Italian’s Inherited Mistress you’re sure to enjoy these other stories by Lynne Graham!
The Secret Valtinos Baby
Castiglione’s Pregnant Princess
Da Rocha’s Convenient Heir
The Billionaire’s Blackmailed Mistress
Available now!
Keep reading for an excerpt from Married for His One-Night Heir by Jennifer Hayward.
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