A Taste Of Italy: Midwife, Mother...Italian's Wife. Fiona McArthur
parents. Walls that prevented him being touched by feelings that could flay him alive.
He continued to murmur into her hair as her softness lay against his chest. His native tongue disguising the compromise and giving freedom to express the beginning of something he hadn’t admitted to himself as he held her warmth against his heart. Her healing warmth. The way she touched his soul. He told the truth.
How sorry he was to have brought this on her. How the lure of her physical attraction for him had begun to change to a more complete absorption. How she made him feel alive as he hadn’t felt for years, even if sometimes it was with impatience or frustration when she thwarted him.
How beautiful she was, how she’d captured his attention after their first dance at his brother’s wedding, how he’d never felt that connection before with another woman, even his wife, and that made him feel even worse.
How these past few days he couldn’t stay away, spent his mornings and afternoons dragging his thoughts away from her so he could concentrate on business—something he had never had trouble with before—when in fact he was waiting for the evening when he could call on her.
The lonely nights dreaming of her in her house a street away, staring out through the window all night so he could start the whole process again.
How he’d glimpsed the promise of what could have grown between them, but now that had changed. Had to change. Once the boys were returned he would sit on a plane and watch the ground fall away beneath him, knowing she was still in Australia. So she and Jack would be safe, apart from the danger that followed him.
Knowing the distance of miles would not be the only distance that grew between them every second. But he would. Because she would be safe. Her son would be safe. His life was too complicated for this, the ultimate complication, but he could never regret these past few days. And he would never forget her.
Tammy listened. Her head on his chest, the regular beat of his heart under her cheek as his liquid words flowed over her. Some words and phrases she didn’t catch but most she did, like the honesty in his voice and the gist of his avowal. The sad acceptance of his promise brought tears to her eyes.
When she lifted her face to his, he saw the tears and softness in her eyes and he could no more stop himself from kissing the dampness away than he could stop himself drawing breath. Her arms came up around his neck and her face tilted until she lay suspended below him, mute appeal his undoing.
He stood with her in his arms, cradled against him, and strode to her room, a dim and disconnected haven from the reality which they both sought to escape.
To hide in each other, buffer the pain of their fears with the physical, the warmth and heat of each other’s bodies. At the very least the release might let them sleep.
Tammy knew she would regret this. But there were so many huge regrets—this tiny one was nothing if it gave her some flight from the pain, and comfort to them both.
He lowered her feet to the floor until she stood next to him, beside the bed, eyes locked as slowly they peeled away each other’s clothes, layer by layer, like the emotions Leon had peeled away for her, until she was as bare as him.
She stepped forward until her breasts brushed his chest and with a muffled groan he crushed her to him. And she knew it was her turn to comfort him. She needed to comfort someone because she couldn’t comfort Jack. Her hands curved around his neck and she pulled him closer so she could wrap herself around him, and draw his pain into her. In some unexplained way it eased her own suffering as they stood locked together in a ball of consolation that slowly unravelled into something else.
It started with a kiss, a slow gathering of speed. Kissing Leon was like running beside the wolf she thought him, down an unexpectedly steep hill, barely able to keep her feet. The momentum grew and her heart shuddered and skipped as she was swept alongside the rush of Leon, the heat of his chest, his powerful hands, his eyes above her, burning fiercely down as he searched her face for consent.
She reached up and pulled his mouth to hers again and she could feel the need in her chest and belly and in the heart of her as he gathered her closer, stroked her, murmured soft endearments of wonder in Italian which deepened the mist of escape and made her want to melt into him even more.
His hands slid down her back, marvelling at the smoothness of her skin, curling around her bottom and lifting her until her weight was in his hands. When he lifted her higher she rose against his chest. She’d never felt so small and helpless, dominated yet so safe and protected. She ran her cheek against the bulge of his arms, savouring the tension of steel beneath her skin from this mountain of a man who made her feel like a feather, as effortlessly he carried her until she felt the wall behind her. Then the nudge of him against her belly.
In a moment of clarity that came from the coolness of the wall on her back, she told herself she shouldn’t do this, didn’t deserve to experience this man at this moment in this way, would not die if she didn’t. But she didn’t really believe it.
She did believe she’d always regret not taking the gift of solace they offered each other in their darkest hour. And soon he would be gone.
He stilled, as if sensing her thoughts, and when she looked again into the midnight of his eyes, she knew she could stop this. Her heart felt the tear of denial, the breath of resolution and the tiniest lift of her skin away from his but something inside her snapped. No. She needed this for her sanity because with that one millimetre of distance between them, the outside world pummelled her and the pain made her wrap her legs around his corded thighs, hook her ankles and implore him to save her.
Afterwards, they lay together on the bed, en-twined, her head on his chest as he stroked her hair and, against her will, against any conviction she’d be able to, she fell into a dreamless sleep and rested.
Leon listened to the slowing of her breathing and his arm tightened protectively around her. How would he forget this woman? What had happened between them was something he hadn’t expected and he certainly hadn’t foreseen the severity of the impact of their collision.
More barricades had tumbled under her hands, barriers he’d closely guarded and never planned to breach. He would regret this night and yet could not wish it undone. His eyes widened in the dark when he realised what else he’d done. Or not done.
His sins compounded. Not only had he not protected her son, he’d not protected her.
The flash of light on his silenced phone was muted by his shirt pocket on the floor but he saw it. He buried the enormity of that other problem for another time as he slipped his arm out from under her head. She snuggled back into him and he paused until her breathing resumed before he slid from the bed.
His brow creased as he read the message, then he gathered his clothes swiftly and left the room.
SHE was woken by ringing as he came back into the room. He leaned over and switched on the bed lamp before he reached for the phone beside the bed and gave it to her. ‘Yes,’ she listened, mouthed, ‘the police’ at him and then said, ‘I understand.’ She listened again and then nodded, her eyes closing with relief. He could read it in her face. She put the phone down. ‘They’re safe.’
He didn’t tell her he’d known already. Just turned her into his body and hugged her. It was her he needed to hug and not just because of the boys. Crushed her into his chest and closed his eyes as if blotting out all the terrifying pictures his mind had been filled with before his bodyguards had rung him.
Tammy pulled back and her tear-streaked face looked up into his. Searched his eyes, searched his face. ‘They wouldn’t have made a mistake. Would they?’
He shook his head. ‘They’re on their way home now.’ He didn’t tell her there had been a gunfight. Between two groups. Coming on them his men had scooped the boys from the confusion, had been fortunate one unidentified man had thrown himself