Italian Attraction: The Italian Tycoon's Bride / An Italian Engagement / One Summer in Italy...

‘And that was too far for you to go and see her?’

‘Neither of us wanted that.’ His tone was becoming steely but considering he had laid it on the line for her she felt she had nothing to lose.

She nodded. ‘So you see the rest of your life in terms of being independent and self-sufficient and alone basically?’

He deliberately poured himself another cup of coffee from the pot on the table and drank some of it before he said, ‘Is there a point you are trying to make?’

Damn right. It was a terrible waste, for one thing. ‘Just that you are going to end up a very lonely old man when you don’t have to,’ she said bravely, ignoring his expression. ‘I can see your marriage must have been a nightmare for much of the time, but that doesn’t mean you couldn’t be happy with someone else.’ Like me, for instance. Fat chance.

‘I don’t see it that way.’

No, well she supposed he didn’t, and who was she to try and persuade him otherwise anyway? Maybe one of these gorgeous, bright, well-sorted career women he mixed with might have a chance, but her? You’d have to be pretty special to bag a man like Blaine in the first place and hanging on to him would be even harder, even without all his hang-ups.

Maisie finished the last of her now cold coffee. ‘I’m sorry it all went so wrong for you, Blaine,’ she said softly as she put the cup down. ‘I hope you’ll find happiness again one day.’ And she meant it, she did—as long as she wasn’t around to see him with someone else.

‘Thank you.’ His voice was equally low. ‘So we are still friends, sì?’

Maisie nodded.

‘And as friends maybe I could show you a little of my country over the next weeks once my mother is home? She will still need some help with the animals, of course, but there will be things she will prefer to do. I know this.’ His voice was wry. ‘She cannot, how do you say, sit around and twiddle her fingers all day.’

‘Her thumbs.’

‘Sì, her thumbs.’

It was rare that his excellent English let him down and Maisie felt a rush of something she would rather not put a name to flood her being. Dangerous, dangerous man—she had told herself this before and she ignored it at her peril. She nodded mentally to the warning.

‘So, we do some sightseeing, Maisie?’

‘If you’re sure you have the time.’ She was forewarned, wasn’t she? she told the little voice in her head which was screaming that she was mad. And forewarned is forearmed. That was what they said. She just hoped they—whoever they were—were right.

CHAPTER NINE

GUISEPPE came home a few days later and as soon as Maisie saw Blaine’s father she knew she was going to like him. He looked like an older version of Roberto, being plump, a little on the short side and with twinkly eyes. Blaine didn’t resemble him in the least.