Happy Mother's Day! - By Sharon Kendrick Page 0,85

find English stoicism irritating.’

Erin took a deep breath and, hands pressed to his chest, pushed hard. His hands remained curved around her upper arms preventing her stepping back.

‘Not just English stoicism,’ she muttered.

One corner of his mobile mouth twitched into a half-smile as their eyes met. ‘No, you I find infuriating.’

On the brink of smiling back, Erin stopped herself and frowned. ‘I’m not ill, Francesco.’ Pregnancy was not an illness, though this was hard to remember some mornings!

He angled a sardonic brow and let her go. ‘You make a habit of fainting?’

‘I did not faint.’ Though the past few weeks there had been a few close calls, but the doctor had soothed her concerns and told her that this was normal, especially as her blood pressure was unusually low. ‘I just … lost my balance for a moment. And you have no rights, Francesco, not where I’m concerned anyhow.’

But he had rights where his child was concerned. She pressed a hand to her stomach and wondered how many of those rights he would avail himself of.

God, I have to tell him.

She looked at him and thought, I can’t do it! I need to psych myself up … I need to find the right words. In the back of her mind Erin knew that there were no magical right words. She knew she was only delaying the inevitable.

‘Don’t you think it might be an idea to sit down just in case you lose your balance again?’

‘What? Yes, fine.’ She tore her eyes from the muscle that was clenching in his shadowed jaw and sat down in the nearest armchair.

‘I’m still waiting to hear why you’ve come here, Francesco.’

‘I came here hoping that you might have stopped avoiding issues.’

If only you knew the half of it!

She opened her mouth, but the words wouldn’t come. Her shaking fingers massaging the skin of her throbbing temples, she shook her head in a negative gesture.

A hiss of frustration escaped Francesco’s lips. ‘Marriage is not something you throw away casually.’

‘I’m not doing anything casually.’

‘Walking out the way you did was hardly something you put a lot of thought into, was it?’ he retorted.

‘Well, the situation seems to have suited you.’

‘You base that statement on what exactly?’ The furrow in his brow deepened as he mused. ‘Or was it an accusation?’ he speculated.

‘Well, until you got my letter you seemed happy with the situation.’ Erin’s stomach lurched sickly as her eyes fell from his. It would be too much to hope he hadn’t heard the quivering note of bitterness in her voice.

‘You expected me to run after you?’

She started to shake her head in denial while he was still speaking.

A slow smile crossed his lean features. ‘You wanted me to chase after you.’ He sounded smug about the discovery.

‘That’s the last thing I wanted,’ she denied, her cheeks burning with mortification at the suggestion. ‘I was relieved that when you thought about it, you realised I was right.’

‘Now whatever gave you that idea, cara?’

Her head lifted. ‘Because you’re not a passive person. If you’d wanted me …’ She stopped, hot, mortified colour flooding her face. ‘You’re not the sort of man who would meekly stand to one side and let something happen if it’s not what you actually want.’

‘So what you’re saying is I don’t want you, cara.’

‘Don’t call me that!’ she spat, covering her ears with her hands.

‘Cue a ranting irrational outburst. Now that,’ he mused, sounding bored, ‘was predictable.’

‘What was? What are you looking at me like that for?’

‘Whenever you get close to acknowledging a problem you start an argument to deflect the discussion … either that or,’ he observed with a hard laugh, ‘you pack your bags.’

Her denial was automatic. ‘That’s ridiculous.’

Francesco’s brows lifted. ‘Is it?’ he asked, dragging a hand through his dark hair. ‘I think if you let your mind drift back …’

Did he have a point? Her expression troubled, Erin shook her head in rejection of his theory. ‘How is this suddenly my problem, my fault? You spent the night with another woman.’

Still scanning her flushed face, he shook his head. ‘I don’t think that deep down even you are insecure enough to believe that. No, infidelity wasn’t the problem in our marriage.’

She folded her arms across her chest and tried to disguise the fact his assessment of the situation had shaken her deeply, and raised some uncomfortable questions in her mind.

‘So you’re saying I was the problem? Even if I was wrong,’ she said, grudgingly conceding to herself for the