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  like beg him to kiss her, to take her upstairs to his bed.

  Slowly, he took off his coat, thinking how pale she looked—all her old warmth and approachability gone. He stared at her. At the little pulse which was beating frantically at the base of her neck. He remembered kissing her there.

  ‘How are you, Tasha?

  How formal he sounded. ‘I’m fine. You? Good trip?’

  ‘Productive,’ he answered tersely, and turned away from the soft gleam of her lips.

  He made a couple of calls and then went downstairs to the basement kitchen, where the old-fashioned range radiated warmth and a pot of something that smelt like stew was bubbling on top. Natasha looked up with the startled expression of a young animal which had just heard a threatening noise in the undergrowth.

  ‘Would you like…coffee?’

  She never usually asked. He shook his head. ‘Actually, I need a drink.’

  A drink? He never drank before dinner as a rule. ‘You didn’t tell me you were coming home.’

  ‘You mean, warn you?’ His smile was mirthless as he opened a bottle of wine and held it up to her in question. She shook her head. ‘I thought I’d surprise you.’

  Oh, but this was awful. Horrible. Like walking on something hopelessly fragile that you were afraid was going to be shattered beyond recognition if you took a wrong turn. She needed to act before that happened. ‘Look, Raffaele, I need to talk to you.’

  ‘What is it, Tasha?’ he questioned, as he poured the wine and drank some, the rich vintage easing just a little of the tension which felt like a tight iron band clamped around his forehead.

  ‘I’ve got some news.’

  His fingers tightened around the glass and he put it down. ‘You’re not pregnant?’

  She heard the horror which had frozen his voice, and its icy tone confirmed all her worst fears—made her realise that the decision she had reached was the best one for all of them.

  ‘No, I’m not.’ She blushed, furious with him for bringing the subject up when that was the last thing she wanted to talk about. She was trying to forget it. She needed to forget it. ‘I’m on the pill.’

  ‘Oh, come on—no contraceptive is foolproof, cara. You, of all people, know that.’ He saw the stricken look on her face. ‘That was the wrong thing to say. I’m sorry.’

  ‘No—please. Don’t be. It’s true, after all.’ She had told herself that she wasn’t going to run away from the truth anymore. So she wouldn’t. She drew a deep breath. ‘Look, I had a chat with Sam’s headmaster the other day.’

  ‘Really?’ he queried politely, wondering if this was actually relevant. ‘He’s not in any kind of trouble, I hope?’

  Natasha bristled. ‘On the contrary. He’s doing exceptionally well. So well, in fact, that he’s been offered a scholarship at a bigger school.’ She paused. ‘In Sussex.’

  ‘Sussex?’ he said blankly, ignoring her expression of maternal pride. His eyes narrowed. ‘But that’s miles away.’

  ‘Yes, it is,’ she agreed, her voice so bright that she felt it might crack under the strain. ‘And it’s beautiful. You should see the school. Right out in the country—they’ve got huge playing fields.’

  ‘But you live here,’ he objected. ‘How the hell will he get to school? Or are you planning to board him?’

  Over her dead body! ‘No. He’ll…Well, we’ll…live in Sussex.’

  There was a pause. ‘We’ll?’ he echoed softly. ‘You’re planning to buy somewhere down there, are you? Or to rent?’

  Was he deliberately driving home her economic insecurity in order to make a point? To make her realise how dependent she was upon him? Well, she wasn’t! Natasha drew her shoulders back, her earlier reservations melting away beneath the determined look she directed at him.

  ‘Actually, neither. The school has offered me a job as Assistant Matron—and there’s a little cottage in the grounds which goes with the post. We can move in whenever we want before Christmas.’ She took a deep breath to give her words real conviction. ‘It’ll be a fantastic place to spend Christmas.’

  He was staring at her. ‘You? Assistant Matron?’ Raffaele’s eyes narrowed. ‘Madonna mia, Tasha—that’s a job for an old woman!’

  ‘Actually, it’s the perfect job for someone like me!’ she retorted.

  He wanted to grab hold of her, to haul her into his arms and demand that she stay. But maybe that was her objective. He stilled. Was it? Was this just another attempt at manipulation in his lifetime of women trying to get him to do what they wanted him to?

  ‘Perhaps you are attempting to call my bluff,’ he observed softly.

  She stared at him and frowned. ‘I’m not sure I understand…’

  ‘Aren’t you?’ His mouth curved into a cruel smile as he observed how wonderful she looked—how glossy her carefully styled hair, how expensively creased the linen shirt she wore so easily with her skinny jeans. ‘I suspect that you enjoyed all the luxuries that our phoney relationship brought with it, didn’t you? Perhaps more than you could have ever anticipated? Maybe that’s one of the real reasons you agreed so readily to have sex with me—why you slipped so easily and so comfortably into the role of fiancée.’ His face darkened. ‘But perhaps the outcome of our little liaison wasn’t quite to your liking, mia bella—perhaps you wanted to go one stage further?’

  ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about!’

  ‘Don’t you?’ He gave a short laugh. ‘I’m talking about marriage! Wouldn’t it suit you better to give your role here some official status—as my wife? Hmm?’ Arrogantly, he raised his dark brows, seeing the stain of colour which washed over her cheekbones. Was that guilt?

  ‘And what better way of achieving that aim than by threatening to suddenly leave—with all the disruption that would bring.’

  For a moment, she thought she might have misheard him. But the dark look of some unknown emotion on his cold face told her otherwise. She shook her head, her heart beating so fast that she seriously thought she might faint.

  ‘How can you think that of me?’ she breathed. ‘How can you, Raffaele? To imagine me capable of such devious behaviour? I went to bed with you because I wanted to—because I couldn’t stop myself.’ Because I felt I would die if I didn’t. ‘There was no ulterior motive.’

  But he had been fighting himself and fighting the aspirations of women for too long to believe her. Had she imagined that he would beg her to stay? Would disclose that he needed her—he, who needed no one?

  ‘Well, then, go, Tasha. Go and sublimate your own life and bury yourself away in some godforsaken school somewhere.’

  ‘As opposed to burying myself away here?’ she questioned quietly.

  He heard the accusation and deflected it back. ‘That was your choice,’ he said, his voice equally quiet.

  Yes. He was right. Her life there had become what she had made it. She had settled herself into a predictable groove, perhaps hoping secretly that something would rocket her out of that comfortable existence. And something had.

  Perhaps Raffaele’s accusation was underpinned with more truth than she had at first cared to admit—for hadn’t there been a bit of her that had hoped for a storybook ending to the fairytale happiness she’d experienced in his arms?

  Was this what was known as getting above your station? Had her head been turned by a hedonistic series of outings with a royal sheikh and his retinue? By her surprise ability to charm strangers at charity dinners?

  She swallowed. ‘How much…how much notice do you want?’ she questioned.

  ‘Go as soon as you want,’ he snapped. ‘I can phone an agency and have you replaced in an instant.’

  Which showed her exactly how important she was to him. It was a sobering reminder, but perhaps a very necessary one. At least, she would be left with no illusions about Raffaele wanting her. ‘Very well. I’ll arrange it as quickly as possible.’ She crossed the room to the door and when she reached it she hesitated, turning round to find him watching her, hi
s face a mask of cold indifference. ‘There’s just one thing, Raffaele.’

  ‘Yes? You’ll need a reference, I imagine?’

  Natasha felt dizzy, wondering if he was aware of the hurt he could wield. Was this how it all ended—nearly four years of closeness—with him offering to commit a few words about her to the page? But it hadn’t been a real closeness they had shared, had it? More like her imagining of what closeness was. Because she didn’t have any experience of it. Because she had wanted to feel close to him. But things in life didn’t just happen because you wanted them to. Especially not love.

  She nodded. ‘Yes, obviously I’d like a reference—but I was actually thinking about Sam.’

  Sam. For the first time the mask slipped—and Raffaele felt the harsh grit of regret stinging at his heart, because he had grown fond of the boy. ‘What about him?’ he questioned gruffly.

  She opened her mouth to tell him that Sam was going to miss him, but changed her mind at the last minute. If she made too big a deal out of it wouldn’t that be another accusation he might fling at her? That she was looking for a rich stepfather for her son? ‘He’s been very happy here,’ she said. ‘Thank you.’

  The quiet dignity on her face made something twist inside him. ‘Prego,’ he said harshly, and then turned his back on her and poured himself another drink.

  Chapter 14

  The house seemed empty.

  The house was empty.

  Raffaele slammed the front door behind him and listened to the silence which seemed to settle down on him like a heavy blanket. Suddenly the silence was broken by the sound of carol singers outside. He flung the door open to see a variopinto bunch of boys standing on his doorstep, giving it everything they had—even though their voices were lusty rather than melodic. What was it, he wondered, that made Christmas songs so unbearably poignant when sung like this rather than in the perfect massed chorus of a formal choir?

  Was it because they made him think of Sam?

  And Tasha?

  Tasha.

  He narrowed his eyes as one of the boys held up a tin and rattled it. What on earth were they doing out at this time of night?

  ‘Do your mothers know you’re here?’ he demanded.

  ‘Yes, they do!’ called a voice from the end of the path, and a young girl, scarcely out of her teens, came forward. ‘I asked permission for them all, and it’s fine. I’m the au pair,’ she added helpfully.

  She looked little more than a teenager herself, he thought, and he found himself staring at her.

  Natasha wouldn’t have been very much older than this when she’d turned up that night. But that had been a long time ago now. She had been a big part of his life in that time—more than he’d realised—was it any wonder he missed her?

  ‘What are you collecting money for?’ he demanded.

  ‘For orphans everywhere, sir!’

  He withdrew a note from his pocket and stuffed it into the tin.

  ‘Oh, thank you, sir!’

  ‘Sing “Silent Night” will you?’ he said quietly, and shut the door, wondering what kind of masochistic urge had made him ask for that—because it was so unbearably heartrending that he found he couldn’t listen to it all the way through.

  That evening he played opera while he was getting ready to go out—the most passionate and angry he could find—and found it as satisfying as it was possible to be satisfied by anything in his current state. He was due to attend a fund-raising dinner that he simply didn’t feel he could get out of, though he had told the organiser to give his second ticket to someone else.

  ‘You won’t be bringing a guest, Signor de Feretti?’ she had asked in surprise.

  ‘No, I won’t.’

  He would leave as soon as it was reasonable to do so. Going was the last thing he wanted, or needed, but his company was making a sizeable donation and he knew that his presence was important to the charity.

  There was the usual rag-bag of press hanging around the red carpet, and a couple of questions were flung his way about what had happened to his fiancée—but he gave a dismissive shake of his head and continued up the carpet.

  Inside, he saw a few people he knew and many he’d done business with—including John Huntingdon, who had been there the night he’d taken Tasha to a dinner. He had a stunning and much younger woman on his arm, as usual.

  Raffaele narrowed his eyes. Was it the same one as last time? It was hard to tell. They all looked the same. ‘I think we’ve met before?’

  She shook her spun-sugar blonde hair and not a strand of it moved. ‘Oh, no—I don’t think so!

  I’d certainly have remembered you!’ she trilled. ‘Johnny and I have only been dating for two and a half weeks—haven’t we, darling? Will you excuse me—I must just toddle off to the little girls’ room and powder my nose!’

  The two men watched her go.

  ‘Your women get younger every day,’ observed Raffaele.

  ‘Oh, they’re all interchangeable!’ said John cheerfully. ‘When you’ve been married as many times as I have it’s as well not to foster dependence—far too expensive!’ He frowned. ‘But I liked that woman you brought with you last time, though. She was different.’

  ‘Tasha?’ Raffaele nodded, looking at the sea of glamour, the waves of silk and taffeta, hearing the trills of high, rather forced laughter. ‘Yes,’ he said slowly. ‘She was certainly different.’

  He thought about her all evening—and all night, too.

  She had sent him her new address and telephone number, accompanied by a rather sweet little note from Sam, telling him that he was enjoying the country. And playing football. And somehow that had hurt as much as anything else.

  Raffaele stared down at the winter-bare trees in the garden. Shouldn’t he drive down there—

  take the boy a present for the holiday period? See what Tasha was up to? Would he ever be able to rid himself of this nagging disquiet if he didn’t at least try?

  The winter day was crisp and clear, with frost icing the hedgerows and fields and bright red berries daubing the holly trees and hawthorn bushes so that the landscape looked like a Christmas card. He drove past thatched cottages where trees twinkled in latticed bay windows and wreaths made out of ivy leaves lay hanging on glossy front doors.

  The school had obviously been a stately home in a former life, because the approach to it was along a wide and winding gravel drive, through formal parkland. There was even a small lake around which padded a clutch of cold-looking ducks.

  He hadn’t told her he was coming. Maybe she wouldn’t even be there. Why, there might even be some new man on the scene. Raffaele’s mouth twisted and his leather-gloved fingers bit into the steering wheel of the powerful car. But why shouldn’t she have a new man? She was in no way committed to him. Hadn’t he made it starkly clear that he didn’t want her?

  An offshoot of the main drive curved away to the left, on it a sign saying Spring Cottage. As he approached he could see a figure in the garden, bending over and digging furiously and, even though the figure wore a woollen hat and unisex clothes, he knew immediately that it was Tasha.

  She must have heard the sound of his car, for he saw her stop digging and straighten up, then stab the fork into the ground and lean on it as if for support.

  Natasha stared. She didn’t recognise the car—was it a new one?—but she didn’t need to. Nor did she need to see the shadowed face of the man who drove it. She would have recognised Raffaele anywhere—sensed him at a hundred paces on a dark night, so attuned did she always seem to be to his presence. But that’s because you’re a well-trained worker, she told herself forcefully. Because that’s what you spent all those years doing.

  She watched as he climbed out of the car and began to walk towards her. His black hair gleamed in the crisp, clear light of the winter sun and his dark cashmere coat was softly familiar. But she didn’t move forward to meet him. She couldn’t. Her legs felt as if they had been planted into the hard and unforgiving soil which she had
been trying to break up all morning.

  As he approached she could feel the increased thundering of her heart. She tried to read the expression on his dark and autocratic features, but she couldn’t. She wanted to drink in his beloved face, and yet she wanted to turn away from it—as if that might protect herself from the way he was making her feel.

  She tried to smile, but the icy air seemed to freeze it onto her face and, inside, she felt the cold plunge in her heart as she realised how much she had missed him.

  ‘Hello, Raffaele.’

  ‘Hello, Tasha.’

  They stood looking at one another.

  ‘This is a…surprise.’

  He nodded. ‘Yes.’

  ‘Would you…would you like to come inside?’

  As opposed to standing here freezing? he wondered. He glanced at the ground, which was lying in great, dark chunks of earth—like giant pieces of the gingerbread she sometimes used to make.

  ‘You’re making plans for your garden?’ he observed. And didn’t that tell him something about her life here? She was settled. You didn’t plant things unless you were planning to stick around long enough to watch them grow.

  She wasn’t going to tell him that gardening had become a kind of acceptable exercise and distraction therapy. That it helped break the constant thoughts of regret and the reflections which sometimes circled round and round in her head like killer-sharks who had scented fresh blood.

  ‘I’m a bit of a novice,’ she admitted. But then she remembered that last terrible conversation they’d had—which had started out with similar polite niceties and ended up with him accusing her of wanting to marry him because she had grown used to the luxury he could provide! You don’t work for him anymore, she reminded herself. You don’t have to be in thrall to him any longer. You’re free. Even if you don’t want to be. ‘Raffaele, why are you here?’