Chapter 40

'Dio!' he groaned in harsh satisfaction, shuddering in the possessive circle of her arms, burying his damp face in her hair. 'Te amo,' he muttered, almost crushing her beneath his weight. 'Te amo.'

She stilled. I love you. I love you, he had said.

'Scusi.' He rolled over and sprawled back in an indolent tangle of sun-darkened limbs against the white percale sheeting. 'Now I finally know what it's like to be a sex object,' he sighed without particular concern in the winging smile he angled at her. 'You made me lose control. That's my department.'

She smiled, a fat-cat-got-the-cream smile. He probably didn't even know he'd said it. That was fine. The last thing she wanted to do was to make an issue out of it. She had lived off 'I need you' for almost two years once. She could manage a good decade on 'I love you'. Moving over, she scattered a trail of kisses across a sweat-slicked broad shoulder. 'I love you…I love you…I love you,' she whispered feverishly.

He caught a hand into her tousled hair. 'I know, I know, I know,' he said playfully.

He hadn't bitten the bait. When did he? She was too impatient. If he had meant it, he would tell her in his own good time. If? It didn't help to be aware that such a confession at the height of sexual excitement was recorded the world over as a statutory and meaningless phrase. But didn't she have rather more to worry about right now? Daniel rose like Mount Everest in the back of her mind.

'Luc…how do you feel about children?'

He tugged her down on top of him, claimed a kiss, clearly not very focused on the concept of dialogue. 'I never thought of them until recently.'

'Do…do you like them?'

'Like them?' Ebony brows slashed together in a frown. 'What sort of a question is that? I expect I will like my own. I have no real interest in other people's.'

It wasn't very encouraging. She made no demur when his hands started to roam lazily over her again. Indeed, she needed that closeness, that hunger of his to control the fear that was steadily rising inside her. Luc would be furious. But what frightened her most was the unknown quantity of how he would react after the fury.

* * *

'You can sleep during the flight.' Luc smiled down into her heavy eyes, satisfaction and amusement mingling in his scrutiny.

They were about to leave the VIP lounge when a small grey-haired man, closely followed by a security guard, came in.

'Antonio?' Luc crossed the room to greet him with pleated brows.

The low-pitched exchange of Italian had an odd edge of urgency that made Catherine glance in their direction. The older man gave something to Luc, withdrew a handkerchief to mop his perspiring brow and, by his manner, was clearly apologising. He looked as though he was reporting a death. She stifled a yawn, and her attention slewed away again.

'Who was that?' she asked as they boarded the jet.

'One of my lawyers.' His intonation was curiously clipped.

She hated take-off; always had. She didn't open her eyes until they were airborne. Luc wasn't beside her. On the other side of the cabin, he was scanning a single sheet of paper. As she watched he scrunched it up between his fingers and snatched up the newspaper lying on the desk in front of him. He signalled to the steward with a snap of his fingers. A large whiskey arrived pronto. Draining it in one long, unappreciative gulp, he suddenly sprang up, issuing a terse instruction to the steward who left the cabin at speed.

'Catherine…come here.' He moved a hand in an oddly constrained arc.

Releasing her belt, she got up. His set profile was dark, brooding. He indicated the seat opposite. 'Sit down.'

When she collided with his eyes her heart stopped beating and her mouth ran dry. The suppressed violence that sprang out at her from that hawk-like stare of intimidation was terrifying.

'I will not lose my head with you,' he asserted in a controlled undertone. 'There must be an explanation. I still have faith, but it hangs by a thread.'

'You're scaring me.'

He continued to study her, a kind of flagellating stare that threatened to strip the skin from her facial bones. 'Last week, Rafaella told me something I refused to believe. After your disappearance five years ago, she stayed in the apartment we shared for some weeks. I didn't want it to be empty if you phoned or chose to return.'

Uncertainly she nodded.

'And last week she informed me that during her stay a call came from some doctor's surgery, asking why you hadn't been back for a check-up.'

She bent her head and studied the desk-top, gooseflesh prickling at the nape of her neck, an impending sense of doom sliding over her.

'From that call and certain trivia she subsequently uncovered in the apartment,' Luc continued in the same murderously calm tone, 'Rafaella deduced that you were pregnant at the time of your departure.'

She flinched, froze, watched the desk-top blur.