The Valtieri Marriage Deal by Caroline Anderson Read Free Book Online Page A

then because she had no choice. And she couldn’t do that if she allowed him to creep under her guard.
    He sighed. ‘Isabella, we do need to talk about this,’ he said quietly. ‘Maybe not now, but soon. At the very least, you owe me the chance to—’
    ‘I owe you nothing,’ she said bluntly.
    He leant over the desk so his face was mere inches from hers. ‘Then at least do me the decency of hearing me out.’
    Isabelle swallowed. He was so close that she could smell him, smell the combination of spice and citrus and man that had trashed her defences so thoroughly in Florence, so that even now the evocative scent brought it all back and left her weak and wanting.
    She shut her eyes and stifled the whimper. ‘Luca, I don’t want to. You’ve come and found me, I didn’t want to see you, that’s the end of it.’
    ‘Not for me.’
    ‘Well, tough. It is for me, and it takes two. Go and talk to Richard if you want someone to talk to. I’m not opening myself up to hurt all over again just to give you closure.’
    ‘All over again? Is that what this is about, some man who hurt you? Who was it, Isabelle? Who hurt you so much you’re afraid to try again?’
    She met his eyes in desperation. ‘Luca! Go away!’
    He sighed softly under his breath. ‘OK—for now. But I’m not finished, and we need to do this somewhere a little more private.’
    She contemplated saying no, but he wasn’t going to give up, so she agreed, grudgingly. ‘Oh, for God’s sake, all right. I’ll have coffee with you later, when I’ve finished this, but not now. Now, please move your hand,’ she said calmly, although her heart was pounding, but as he opened his mouth to say something his pager bleeped.
    He gave a low growl of frustration, muttered, ‘Later—and don’t forget,’ and stalked off down the ward, muttering something in Italian.
    ‘Oh, that man is so-o-o sexy!’ one of the midwives murmured as she walked past, and Isabelle closed her eyes.
    He might be sexy—she could testify to that—but she wasn’t going to be influenced by it. She’d been stupid enough already and she wasn’t letting him any further into her life. She completed the labour report she was writing up for Julie Marchant, slapped the file onto the heap and reached for the next one.
    She’d hear him out, over coffee, as she’d agreed, but that was all. She wasn’t going to let him get to her. No way.

CHAPTER THREE

    ‘W HAT ARE YOU doing?’
    ‘Taking you home.’
    She turned up her coat collar against the February chill and sighed shortly. ‘I thought we were going for coffee? I don’t need to be taken home.’
    ‘I disagree. It’s dark, it’s late and you’ve worked fifteen hours without a proper break. You can’t go home alone and unaccompanied, especially not by the time we’ve had coffee, it’s not safe.’
    She glared at him in exasperation. ‘Luca, I’m twenty-eight! I’ve lived in London all my life, and I’ve been doing this journey for weeks now. It’s perfectly safe!’
    ‘But it’s a long way to Herne Hill—that is where you said you live, isn’t it? Unless you’ve moved house, as well, during the refurb?’
    She contemplated lying, but it went against the grain, and, anyway, he only had to check the HR files. Probably had already. ‘No—no, I haven’t moved house,’ she told him, amazed that he’d remembered where she lived from her fleeting mention of it weeks ago, ‘but the journey’s perfectly straightforward.’
    ‘Straightforward?’
    She rolled her eyes. ‘I walk to the Tube, get the train to Victoria, get the bus to the end of the road next to mine and walk home.’
    ‘In the dark? That’s not safe.’
    ‘It’s perfectly safe. There are lots of streetlights.’ Although it wasn’t great. There were too many trees shading the lights, and there were several dark spots where she often felt a little nervous, but there was no way on God’s green earth she was telling Luca that.
    ‘And how long