Happy Mother's Day! - By Sharon Kendrick Page 0,82

‘You mean I should take whatever crumbs you throw in my direction and not ask too many awkward questions.’

‘I mean that my word should have been enough for you.’

‘I should have been enough for you,’ she countered, dismayed because his simple statement increased her growing sense of irrational guilt.

But was it irrational? What if it was merited? A chill swept over her at the unbidden thought and without wanting to she remembered how none of the many who had witnessed the embrace on the night of the ball had looked at her with anything that approached discomfort when Francesco had ruefully disentangled himself from the tipsy blonde.

I’m not the one who had cause to feel guilty, she reminded herself deliberately. The image of the curvaceous blonde plastered all over him brought the taste of bile to Erin’s mouth.

They had been married almost a month and had still been enjoying their extended honeymoon. The charity ball in Venice, a glittering society affair, had been the first—and as it turned out the last—public event they had attended together.

It was his intention, Francesco had explained, to use the occasion to show off his beautiful new wife to the world.

It had clearly not occurred to him that the idea of being paraded in public scared her stiff.

When he had commented with some concern on her quietness the day leading up to the ball, Erin had finally confessed that she was nervous.

‘What if I let you down by using the wrong fork or saying the wrong thing? What if your friends don’t like me?’

Francesco seemed astonished by her anxieties, but she had already worked out that concern for what people thought of him did not register with the man she had married.

He laughed at her fears. ‘Of course they’ll like you. Just be yourself.’

‘I will,’ she promised, wishing that herself was more interesting.

So dressed in unaccustomed designer finery, her confidence buoyed by the sensual glow in Francesco’s eyes as she had paraded before him in the slim black silk sheath dress that swished deliciously against her bare legs as she moved, Erin walked in beside her handsome husband. Her head held high, her stomach tied in nervous knots.

The scene inside the spectacular room took her breath away. She was dazzled as much by the people as the chandeliers glittering overhead.

The first people Francesco introduced her to were a colleague of his, and his wife.

The sophisticated-looking brunette was so charming to her that Erin actually began to relax and think that this might not be so bad after all. This made her even less prepared for the sudden change in the older woman’s manner when the men briefly excused themselves to speak to a mutual acquaintance.

Her charming smile stayed fixed, but there was a hostility in the other woman’s eyes that bordered on malice as she looked Erin up and down in a way that brought Erin’s insecurities rushing back.

‘Married? Well, you’ve succeeded where many before you have failed, so I suppose there must be something more to you than meets the eye. I can’t say I envy you … Francesco is the sort of man who makes a perfect lover, and I’m not the only woman in the room tonight who is in a position to vouch for that. But as a husband?’ She arched an artfully shaped brow. ‘He would, I think, be difficult to manage.’

The men returned before Erin could respond and the woman switched to being sweetness and light again, going as far as to suggest that Erin join her for lunch the following week.

Erin smiled and thought, Over my dead body.

Francesco, one hand lightly in the small of her back, bent his head to speak in her ear as they left the other couple. ‘See—I told you everyone would love you.’

Shivering in response to the warmth of his breath on her neck, she lifted her head and smiled serenely. ‘So you did, but you’re prejudiced … at least,’ she amended, ‘I hope you are?’

Deep down she had never been able to believe that a man like her lethally handsome husband could really be satisfied with someone as ordinary as her and the evil seeds of distrust the other woman had planted in Erin’s mind fed on this self doubt.

Of course, she accepted that there must have been other women in Francesco’s life—her husband was a very sensual, passionate man. But after the brunette’s malicious comments Erin found it hard not to wonder when she saw a beautiful woman look at Francesco—was