An Inheritance of Shame - By Kate Hewitt Page 0,45

time they drove back to Caltarione, and in the darkness of the car Lucia lapsed back into silence once more, staring out the window so Angelo couldn’t tell what she was thinking.

‘A penny for your thoughts,’ he said lightly, although he wasn’t sure he wanted to know. As they’d left the restaurant, Lucia’s expression had turned pensive, even drawn. Was she regretting this, him? Now she just shook her head, and he left it at that.

He climbed the rickety stairs with her to her second-floor apartment, hating the shabby smallness of it all. He wanted to take her to his villa, to give her all the things she’d never even dreamt for herself. Clothes and jewels, yes, but something more. Safety, comfort, the kind of life neither of them had had as children. The kind of life he wanted for her, even if she refused to want it for herself. Giving her those things would be a way to show her he cared, yet he knew she didn’t want them, would refuse his offers. She wanted something else—something he didn’t know if he had in him to give.

She turned to him in front of the door. ‘Do you want to—’

‘Come in?’ he finished. She looked delectable in her pale blue sundress, the colour a shade lighter than the startling sapphire of her eyes. Her teeth caught her lower lip and she gazed up at him, eyes wide before her lashes swept downwards. ‘More than you could possibly know,’ he told her gruffly, desire coursing through him in lightning streaks. ‘But I won’t.’

He was gratified to see disappointment turn down the corners of her mouth. ‘Why not?’

Gently he tucked a tendril of hair behind her ear. ‘Because I want to do this right, Lucia. I don’t want to rush things.’ It would be easy, he knew, to let it be about sex. Let their attraction for each other wipe out the need for talking or even thinking. Hell, that would be much easier. But he knew she wanted more, and, amazingly, so did he. If he could manage it.

She swallowed and nodded and he leaned forward to brush his lips against hers, allowing himself this much. Yet of course he couldn’t stop there. He never had been able to before. One taste of Lucia and he was a drowning man.

Her lips parted beneath his and he deepened the kiss, his hands coming around her shoulders as he pressed against her, losing himself in her warmth and softness so everything else fell away. He slid one knee between her legs, his mouth moving more firmly over hers as he pressed against her.

Behind her the wooden railing gave an almighty crack and, alarmed, Angelo pulled her forward into the shelter of his own body. ‘Dio, this place is falling down around your ears.’

Wrong thing to say. Perhaps even to think. She shook her head and stepped out of his embrace. ‘It’s my home, Angelo.’

He let out an irritated breath. ‘I wasn’t trying to insult you.’

‘I know that.’

They stared at each other in the darkness, the only sound the tinny music from the bar downstairs, the hitch of their own breathing.

‘Come with me,’ he said suddenly, ‘to the Corretti Cup next week.’

‘The Corretti Cup?’ she repeated blankly. ‘You mean, the horse race?’

He nodded. Gio Corretti, his cousin, ran the island’s premier racing track. The Corretti Cup was an important annual event, attended by the rich, the famous, the beautiful, as well as the entire Corretti clan. He’d never gone before, but he certainly intended on showing up this year, and letting the Corretti family tree know they now had to contend with his unfortunate offshoot. He wanted Lucia by his side.

She bit her lip, uncertainty swamping her wide-eyed gaze. ‘I don’t know, Angelo—’

‘You can’t hide forever, Lucia.’

‘I’m not hiding—’

‘Avoiding, then. My world is different from yours now, I know that. But I want you in it. Won’t you please come with me?’

She swallowed, and he knew she felt conflicted. Afraid, even, of this too. ‘I don’t have anything to wear,’ she finally said, and he almost laughed with relief.

‘That’s simple. I’ll take you shopping, buy you a dress.’

‘I don’t—’

‘Lucia, I want to buy you something. It would please me. Won’t you let me do that?’ He didn’t know what her difficulty in accepting gifts from him was, but he suspected it stemmed from the inequality she felt in their positions. He had more money than she did, but nothing else had changed. He was,