Escape for Easter: The Brunelli Baby Bargain / The Italian Boss's Secret Child / The Midwife's Miracle Baby

She was briefly tempted to get in and drive away, and delegate the task of helping this ungrateful man to someone else. But not going back in would have been admitting she was afraid of feeling whatever it was this stranger had churned up.

The kitchen, with its inglenook fireplace and flagged floor, was as big as a barn, but despite this Sam felt as if the stone walls were closing in on her as she stepped back inside. The stranger had a way of making any space seem confined.

‘Would you like to sit down?’ she asked. It was an invitation that Sam wouldn’t have minded accepting herself—her knees had the consistency of cotton wool as she approached him.

His expression was surly as he held out his arm towards her, peeled off the towel and snapped, ‘Dio mio, woman, just get on with it if you must.’

‘Is this the Italian charm I’ve heard so much about?’ Her voice faded when she saw the edges of the gaping wound he had exposed on his palm. ‘You really need to see a doctor. It might need suturing…’

‘What I need is peace and quiet, so either put on a Band-Aid or go.’

Sam sighed reading the note of finality of his pronouncement. She didn’t have to be psychic to see he wasn’t a man who would recognise compromise if it hit him on his rather perfect nose.

She took his wrist and held his hand over the Belfast sink as she cleaned the area with antiseptic from the first-aid kit.

He accepted her ministrations in silence punctuated only by the rain that began to lash against the window.

The storm and the heaviness in the air probably accounted for ninety per cent of the weird tension that held her in its grip.

‘The storm is coming.’

Almost before the words were out of her mouth lightning flashed, filling the room with white. Sam tensed.

The storm was here.

‘What’s wrong?’

‘Nothing…lightning. I’m not keen on storms.’ In the distance Sam could hear the dull roll of thunder and he obviously did too.

‘It’s quite close.’

‘I’d worked that out for myself,’ she said crankily, keeping her head bent over his hand. ‘Sorry if this is hurting.’ She attached the final strip of tape to the bandage. ‘Done.’ She angled a questioning look at his face. She was pretty sure what his response would be, but she felt obliged to ask anyway. ‘Would you like me to call someone for you?’

‘I would like—’

At that moment there was a bang so loud that Sam shrieked and leapt as though shot. She saw the contents of the first-aid box hit the floor and a second later she couldn’t see anything at all—the lights went out and the room was plunged into inky darkness.

‘Calm down, woman, it’s only a bit of thunder.’

Despite the irritation in his voice she supposed the hand that fell on her shoulder was meant to offer comfort.

‘The lights have gone out,’ she said.

His face had separated itself out from the darkness, a more solid shadow, but she could not make out any details of his features as he responded in a voice wiped clean of all expression.

‘They went out for me five weeks ago.’

Only five weeks! Her eyes widened in shock and for a moment she was not conscious of the storm.

‘Was it gradual or…?’

The fingers on her arm tightened. ‘You mean did I have time to practise with my white cane and learn Braille? No, I didn’t. It was the side effect of surgery following an accident. But let’s look on the bright side—I’m the man you want around when the lights go out. And are you scared of the dark, my ministering angel?’

‘Are you?’ She reached out for his face, trailing her fingers down strong contours, trying to translate the tactile messages into an image…was this how he saw?

Did he live with a fear of the blackness he now faced every day? The thought of his dark world made something twist hard inside Sam. She reached up and grabbed his head, drawing his mouth to hers and pressing her lips against his. She kissed him with a ferocity born of, not just lust, but sharp, sweet tenderness.

He did not react. There was the space of several heartbeats, during which she wanted the floor to open up and swallow her, before he responded, kissing her back with the wild desperation of a starving man.

‘Sometimes,’ she heard herself admit when the kiss ended and she was standing there shaking, ‘I’m scared of just about everything.’ But nothing in her life so far made her as scared as the rush of primal need she felt in the arms of this total stranger.

‘You hide it well.’

She couldn’t hide her response when his hand slid under her top, his long fingers skating over the hot skin of her back. She didn’t actually try.

And when he bent his dark head and fitted his mouth to hers, parting her lips with his tongue, she met it with her own. As his mouth lifted a fractured moan escaped past the emotional thickening in Sam’s aching throat. Then she could feel his breath warm against her neck, stirring the downy hairs on her cheek as he took her face between his hands and ran his thumbs across the trembling outline of her lips, swollen from his hungry kisses.

‘Dio Mio, it’s been a long time,’ he slurred thickly.

Sam was shaking inside and out as she whispered, ‘You’ve not lost the knack, I promise you.’

He ran his tongue slowly along the curve of her upper lip, a slow sensual smile forming on his own mouth when his actions drew a second deep throaty moan from her. ‘I haven’t wanted a woman for a long time.’

His words sent a fresh rush of heat through her body. ‘But you want me?’

The electricity in the lengthening silence had nothing to do with the storm raging outside. When he finally spoke his voice was thick and heavily accented.

‘What do you think?’ His big hands slid to her hips and, cupping her bottom, he drew her hard against his body so that she could feel the strength of his arousal.

A whimpering sound left her throat as she felt the erotic imprint of his erection in the soft flesh of her belly.

‘Will you take all of me, cara?’ Without waiting for a response he took hold of the hem of her top, and peeling it over her head, flung it over his shoulder before reaching for the clip on her bra.

A tiny sliver of sense surfaced and Sam shook her head.

‘Not yet.’

Shivering as the cool air hit her overheated skin, Sam was glad of the dark as he suggested, ‘For you too, I think, it has been a long time?’ His voice shook, tremors raking his lean frame as he bent his head and claimed her lips again.

Sam was startled when, his hands still anchored to her hips, he fell to his knees. He placed a hand in the small of her back and drew her towards him.

‘What are you…?’ She broke off, gasping as she felt the flicker of his tongue across her hardened nipples through the silk of her bra. Her head went back and a low keening cry left her throat as the erotic caress sent a pulse of heat deep into her pelvis, then again and again as he drew the tight peak into his mouth.

‘Oh, God!’ she moaned, and didn’t recognise her voice. Her head was spinning and she couldn’t focus. Her body was on fire; every nerve ending was screaming for his attention. Her knees sagged and she thought how she couldn’t take any more of what he was doing, except maybe the words were not in her head, maybe she said them out loud, because he groaned.

‘Me neither, cara.’ Then he picked her up, his big hands cupped under her bottom supporting her weight as he rose to his feet in fluid motion.

Feet clear of the ground, Sam linked her arms behind his head and kissed him hard on his mouth. He tasted of whisky and she remembered the empty bottles.