Riccardo's Secret Child by Cathy Williams Read Free Book Online Page B

visitor.’
    Nicola looked up from what she was doing and Riccardo felt a wave of unsteadiness wash over him as he looked at the little girl at the table, her dark hair braided away from her face, her dark brown eyes staring back at him with mild curiosity.
    â€˜Hello…’ This was such new terrain for him, a man normally in command of any situation life had ever been able to throw at him, that he instinctively looked towards Julia, who read the awkwardness in his eyes and felt her heart soften towards the powerful, aggressive man now hovering uncertainly in front of his daughter.
    â€˜Nicola,’ she said quietly, ‘why don’t you show Riccardo what you’re drawing? He loves art and he’s never seen what a talented five-year-old girl can do.’ Loves art indeed, she thought wryly. Although, he did, didn’t he? The memory struggled out from the dim recesses of her brain, the memory of Caroline telling her that that was one of the first things that attracted her to him. They had met at an art show and he had been deeply and genuinely interested in the pieces, had been able to talk at length and knowledgeably about paintings. She had misread his interest for aninsight into a sensitive nature. Time, she had said more than once, had put paid to that illusion.
    But he was certainly doing his level best to maintain it as he walked hesitantly towards Nicola and looked at what she was drawing.
    â€˜It’s an elephant,’ she said. ‘There’s the trunk.’
    â€˜Ah, yes. I see.’ He moved a bit closer and bent down, nodding. ‘Yes. But it is a very fine elephant. Will it have any legs, do you think?’
    â€˜Oh, yes.’ She drew four sticks. ‘There. Legs.’
    â€˜Excellent legs.’
    Nicola looked pleased with the flattery and smiled, her curiosity a bit more alive now that the man had passed the crucial test of admiring her work.
    â€˜Want to keep it?’ she asked and he nodded again.
    â€˜Perhaps you could write your name under it.’ He could feel his skin prickling with nerves and felt another rush of dislike towards the people who had put him in this situation. Behind him, he knew that Julia was looking at him. Mentally ticking off various boxes in her head, he wondered acidly, labelled Pass and Fail ?
    â€˜I…I’ve brought you something. Well, two things actually. Presents.’
    Nicola paused with her pencil raised in mid-air and her eyes slid away from Riccardo towards Julia, who smiled weakly. Riccardo gruffly shoved the wrapped parcels towards his daughter and then stood back with his hands stuffed into his pockets.
    â€˜You can open them,’ Julia said lightly, and Riccardo gritted his teeth together in frustration. To be viewed with suspicion by his own flesh and blood! To have to seek approval from a woman whose brother had crept into his marital bed and seduced his wife!
    The woman in question had approached them, movingto stand next to her niece so that the three of them formed an uneven triangle around the table. Riccardo refused to look at her, refused to give her the satisfaction of seeing his own uncertainty.
    Nicola, oblivious to the tension crackling around her and blithely unaware that she was the focus of his intense concentration, began opening the parcels, her face softening into pleasure as she held up the stuffed Winnie the Pooh bear for them all to see, then the little stack of books, which she looked at one by one, turning each over in her hand until Riccardo muttered uncomfortably, ‘I wasn’t too sure what you liked and what you did not.’
    â€˜Thank you very much.’ The almond-shaped eyes were now very curious indeed. ‘I love them. Aunty Jules can read one to me tonight,’ she added politely, her eyes flicking for support from Julia as she became attuned to the undercurrents zinging through the room.
    When Jeannette spoke the strange scenario was broken, thankfully,