Jennifer sat down on one of the sofas and buried her head in her hands. In that moment she had never felt more lost or more alone. But it wasn’t as though she was going to waste time worrying about what she was going to do.

There was only one thing she could do.

She kept putting it off. And meanwhile time was ticking away. Her shape was changing and the appetite which had consumed her had now deserted her. Maybe that was a blessing in disguise—because she didn’t dare venture out to the local stores. Thank God for online shopping.

But she couldn’t put off telling Matt for ever—and one morning, when the bright blue of the early-autumn sky seemed unbearably poignant, she hunted down her phone and found Matteo’s programmed-in number. It rang for a while before he picked up, and his voice was wary in a way she had never heard it sound before. That in itself was a shock—the thought that Matteo was moving on, changing and growing and leaving her behind, while she remained stuck firmly in the groove of the past.

‘Jennifer?’ he said slowly. ‘This is very unexpected.’

Was it really? Didn’t it occur to him that she might want to discuss what had happened between them in France? Unless the caution in his voice was there for a more pragmatic reason—because she was disturbing him in the middle of…

Her words came out as if someone was strangling her. ‘Can you…?’ She swallowed. ‘Is it all right for you to talk?’

He frowned. ‘Sure.’

He wasn’t giving her any kind of help—but then, why should he? She was the one who had instigated this conversation, and soon all his ties with her would be severed completely. She bit her lip. Except that they wouldn’t. Not now.

‘Matteo, I have to see you.’

His voice hardened. ‘No, Jenny.’

The room swayed. ‘No?’

‘There isn’t any point.’

Jennifer felt the blood drain from her face as she realised that she had put herself in a position to be rejected. And that only increased her pain. ‘Matt, you don’t understand—’

‘Oh, but I do—believe me, I do. I’ve been thinking about it a lot.’ More than he’d wanted to. More than he could bear to. Matteo closed his eyes, wishing that he could blot out the memory of her legs laced tightly around his waist while he thrust deep inside her. Or—even more poignant—the memory of her blonde hair spread all over his pillow in Cannes. But their frantic coupling had been nothing but a mockery of a simple and tender intimacy which was gone for ever. Well, he would tolerate it—but he would not be used as some kind of stud to satisfy his ex-wife’s sexual needs!

He kept his voice terse. ‘What happened between us proved that we’re still sexually compatible. That’s all. Nothing more. That’s not enough basis for a relationship—and it would destroy even the memory of what we once had.’

In her outrage and her shame Jennifer nearly dropped the phone. He thought she was ringing him in order to get him back! He thought she was begging him to come back into her life! Trying to resurrect a relationship that was dead!

She wanted to hurl the phone hard against the wall—to finish this conversation and all future conversations with the arrogant and egotistical bastard in the most satisfyingly violent way possible.

But not yet.

‘Oh, don’t worry,’ she said coldly. ‘Such an agenda couldn’t be further from my mind.’

He felt a nerve flickering in his cheek. ‘I’m glad we understand each other.’

‘Perfectly.’

‘So. Why are you ringing?’

She couldn’t say it over the phone. She couldn’t. It was the coward’s way out and she wanted to see his face. Needed to see his face.

‘There’s some paperwork I need you to look at.’

And what? Look into those big sapphire eyes again and start seeing what he wanted to see instead of what was real? Letting himself confide in her and share his thoughts with her? Start wanting to tear her clothing off, with her letting him? Or would she? Maybe this time she would torment him by saying no, by flaunting her magnificent body and torturing him because it was hands-off.

‘Can’t you get someone else to deal with it?’ he questioned impatiently.

‘That’s your answer to everything, isn’t it, Matt? Why bother doing something when you can pay someone else to do it for you? No wonder you’re becoming increasingly remote from reality!’

There was a short, angry pause. ‘Do you really think I want to see you?’ he demanded hotly. ‘That I would voluntarily put myself in a position where I lay myself open to being insulted by you?’

‘Matt, you have to see me.’

‘Have to?’ he repeated dangerously. ‘Cara, nobody, but nobody, tells me that I have to do something.’

She realised then that there was no way out of telling him over the phone. And maybe this way was best. At least it would be short—if not sweet. She would provide the information in the starkest way possible and leave him with the options. Maybe the best one was for him to leave her completely alone.

‘I just thought you’d better know that I’m pregnant,’ she said, and then she hung up.

For a moment Matteo listened blankly to the burr of the dial tone, his eyes staring unseeingly at the wall in front of him. And then her words slammed into the forefront of his mind with the impact of a sledgehammer.

‘Jenny!’ As if saying that would suddenly put her back on the line! He dialled her number, but predictably she let it go through to voicemail.

He shook his head as a floodgate of feelings swamped him. Disbelief and anger and frustration made his heart-rate soar, but the tiniest flicker of hope and joy dazed him.

A baby?

He didn’t even know where she was!

Strega!

His mind worked around all the possibilities. She could be anywhere…but it was most likely that she was in their London flat. Her London flat, he reminded himself. He knew she wasn’t crazy about staying in hotels—not if she was on her own. And then he remembered the night in Cannes, and his heart contracted.

He frowned as he rang the service number of the exclusive apartment block and spoke to the concierge, using blatant influence, charm, and a hefty bribe to ensure that his enquiry was not passed on to Signora d’Arezzo. But, yes, she was there.

He allowed himself a brief, hard smile of satisfaction and then set about flying to England. Normally he might have cursed at a back-to-back flight from the States, but this wasn’t normal. He didn’t get told he was going to be a father every day of the week.

Beneath the knitted black brows his ebony eyes glittered with a hundred questions. But the one uppermost in his mind was the most important.

Was she telling him the truth?

CHAPTER SIX

THE KNOCKING ON THE DOOR wouldn’t stop, and Jennifer knew that she could not lie there for ever, pretending that the outside world did not exist.

Slowly she made her way to the hallway and began to unslide the great bolts which had made their flat into a fortress. When she finally opened the door she was not surprised to see Matteo standing there, but it was a Matteo she scarcely recognised.

Uncharacteristically, he had not shaved. His dark hair was unruly—and his black eyes wild and angry. He walked straight in and shut the door behind him, and when he turned to face her his breathing was unsteady—as if he had been running in a long, long race.

‘Now I see that your words are true,’ he breathed, because for the first time in his life he felt out of his depth as he raked his eyes over her body.

She was pregnant! Rosily and unashamedly pregnant! Oh, the curve of her belly was not huge, but on a woman of Jennifer’s slenderness it looked huge. Her breasts were swollen, and she had a look about her which made her appear quite different—but he couldn’t pinpoint what it was. An experience which had changed her? The most profound experience a woman could have? Or just a kind of luminous fragility which almost took his breath away?