In the Italian's Bed: Bedded for Pleasure, Purchased for Pregnancy / The Italian's Ruthless Baby Bargain / The Italian Count's Defiant Bride

Humiliatingly, he paid the bill and then led her downstairs to a very exclusive jeweller, which looked, to Emma’s untrained eyes, to be closed.

Zarios pushed on the intercom and growled out his name. It was clearly the abracadabra word, because the thick black glass doors parted.

‘Mr D’Amilo…’ A suited gentleman greeted them politely, ushering them to waiting chairs. An assistant entered with two glasses of champagne and an arrangement of chocolates, before the serious business of choosing a ring began. Emma hesitantly tried a couple on with the encouragement of the jeweller, as Zarios sat drumming his fingers on his thigh as he did when he was bored.

‘They’re all beautiful…’ Emma gulped. ‘What do you think?’ Her eyes turned to his, silently pleading with him for some help, but his uninterest was embarrassingly apparent, causing Emma to flush in front of the jeweller.

‘Does that one fit?’ Zarios pointed to the one she was wearing.

‘Don’t worry about size—’ the jeweller began, but Zarios’s mind was already made up.

‘I think my fiancée has chosen.’

He didn’t even have to hand over his credit card! Zarios, Emma was fast realising, lived in the world of the seriously rich, where no money or signature was either exchanged or required. No doubt an invoice would be sent somewhere and dealt with by somebody.

As they stepped out Emma could feel tears stinging her eyes. Rather than letting them fall, she sniffed loudly.

‘What’s wrong?’ Zarios said irritably.

‘Could you have made it any more obvious in there?’ Emma sniffed again, then checked herself.

‘Made what obvious?’

‘That we’re not a couple—that we don’t…It doesn’t matter.’

‘Clearly it does,’ Zarios observed, then stopped walking, turning to face her. But they were blocking an aisle, and Zarios moved her out of the current to the entrance of a shop. ‘How do you want me to be?’

‘I’m just saying that in public…’

‘Am I not affectionate enough for you?’ There was a dangerous glint to his eyes.

‘It’s not that.’ His face was so close she could barely breathe, her thought processes dizzied by his proximity.

‘Would you rather I was more demonstrative?’

‘No!’ Emma shrilled. ‘But if we are going to pretend, then at least you could look as if you care…’

‘You confuse me, Emma.’ His face was coming nearer so she backed away, leaning against the shop window. She was confused herself as to what it was she was saying, what it was that she wanted, but Zarios was rapidly enlightening her! ‘You tell me to leave you alone, you dress like a gypsy for bed—and you certainly didn’t want my attentions this morning—but now, suddenly, when I am observing your wishes, you accuse me of not being demonstrative enough.’

‘We’re supposed to be engaged…’ Emma swallowed. ‘We’re supposed to look as if we’re in love. Yet you snapped your fingers at me in the hairdressers, you couldn’t have been less interested in the choice of ring, and you didn’t even hold my hand!’ Oh, what was the point? Shaking her head, she went to stalk off—but now he caught her hand and held it.

‘Is that better?’

‘No!’ She stared down at their entwined fingers, at the obnoxiously large ring that had been placed there in the name of business only, unable to hold the tears back. ‘I’m ashamed enough by what we’re doing, even though I have my reasons for doing it…’ There was a stoicism about her, despite the tears. ‘But I’m not that good an actress, Zarios. If my real fiancé ever treated me or spoke to me in that way, I’d walk!’

‘Fair enough!’ For once it wasn’t a flip comment. ‘You’re right—it does not look good—and for what it’s worth, if you were my real fiancée, I’d expect you to walk…Hey…’ he added as her tears fell further. ‘My fiancée crying in the street is not a good look either.’ But there was almost a smudge of kindness hidden in his pompous voice.

‘They’re tears of joy!’ The irony of her words actually eked a smile from his haughty face. ‘Just don’t treat me like a lapdog…’ Emma sniffed ‘…don’t embarrass me further than I already am.’

He loosened his grip from her hand and with the pads of his thumbs wiped away the tears on her cheeks so tenderly it almost felt as if he meant it.

‘Is that better?’

‘Yes.’

‘You’re sure?’ Zarios checked.

‘Quite sure.’

‘And if I did embarrass you in there…’ his mouth lowered to hers, kissing her clamped unmoving mouth slowly and very, very surely as she stood there rigid ‘…then I was wrong.’ He moved his face away just a fraction. ‘I will remember to behave better in public next time.’

He was still just as appalling in private, though.

He ignored her request to stop at her flat and grab some things. ‘You don’t need them—you have nice things now!’ Zarios said, pinging open the car boot once they had slid into the forecourt of a luxury five-star hotel.

‘Where are we?’

‘Home.’

She felt like a beggar girl as boxes and bags were hauled out of the boot by the bellboys, and King Cophetua led her by the hand briskly though the lobby, where they were whizzed to the Presidential Suite.

‘You live here?’

‘Sometimes,’ Zarios said, dropping his jacket as he did so, and kicking off his shoes as he walked. He stretched out on the settee in the lounge, flicking a remote control. Instead of the television coming on, the drapes lifted to reveal the most stunning view out over the city and beyond to the bay. ‘I divide my time between many cities. It makes sense to stay in hotels rather than maintaining several homes.’

Of all the surprises Zarios had thrown at her this was the one, however unwitting, that shocked her the most. Oh, it was luxurious—Emma had never stayed at such an exclusive hotel before, let alone in the Presidential Suite. At every turn it screamed luxury, and as she wandered through, Emma tried to take the details in: the deep sofa, the six-seater oak dining table with a lavish Australian native flower arrangement. The master bedroom was vast, opening into a sparkling marble bathroom, with racks lined with fluffy white towels, two robes hanging on the door just begging for someone to step into them—even soft white slippers patiently waited outside the luxurious two-person shower. Back she wandered, frowning as she realised there was even a small butler’s kitchen, and the gnawing disquiet she felt multiplied as Zarios flicked through the room-service menu.

Staring out of the window, she saw Port Phillip Bay stretched like a horseshoe, and her eyes scanned the familiar landmarks that lined it: Brighton Pier, then along to Mentone, and ever on till they came to rest, as they always did, on the gorgeous tip at the end that seemed to be reaching out to embrace Queenscliff. The jagged edge that contained within it her family home.

This wasn’t, as first she had thought, Zarios’s home within a hotel.

This—despite its luxurious furnishings, despite the impressive artwork that lined the walls—was just a hotel room. A room that when Zarios left would be painstakingly prepared for the next well-heeled guest to stay.

Emma’s eyes were so thick with tears that she could hardly make out her home now—but even if it was being sold in two weeks, even if her parents had gone way too soon, even if she was indebted to Zarios, still she was richer than he had ever been.

Even if she’d mourn them for ever, at least she’d had a family, and at least she’d had a home.

Which were two luxuries that Zarios had never been afforded.

CHAPTER NINE (#ulink_6e881142-739e-56ea-8869-b2a73e7b07dc)

‘IT’S just a dream, Emma.’

By unspoken consent it was the only time he held her. When nightmares crept in, so, too, did his hand, bringing her back to reality and then holding her for the rest of the scary night. It had never been discussed, and for that Emma was grateful. She was just surprised each and every night by just how nice he could be when he wanted—by the remarkable tenderness he offered at these times, and the infinite patience he was capable of.

But only at night.

Their first week together had passed in a blur of endless social functions as Melbourne’s elite toasted the happy couple. Her days, though, had been long and lonely, while Zarios attacked his formidable workload, leaving Emma to rattle around the Presidential Suite like a marble in a tin.