‘I’m not married.’
‘But you’re still with her father? ‘
Her cheeks pinking with embarrassment, she sighed. ‘No…I’m not.’
‘Obviously things didn’t work out between you?’ Dante’s racing heartbeat started to stabilise. So she was alone again? It must have been tough, raising her child on her own. He wondered if the father kept in touch and assumed the proper responsibility for his daughter’s welfare. Having had a father who had shamelessly deserted him and his mother when it didn’t suit him to be responsible, Dante deplored the mere idea that the man might have turned his back on Anna and the child.
‘Perhaps—perhaps you’d better come in after all.’ Saying no more, Anna turned back towards the room along the hallway, Tia’s hand gripped firmly in hers.
Barely knowing what to make of this, Dante followed. The living room was charming. The walls were painted in an off-white cream-coloured tone, helping to create a very attractive sense of spaciousness and light. It was the perfect solution in a basement apartment where the long rectangular windows were built too high up to let in much daylight.
‘Please,’ she said nervously, gesturing towards a plump gold-coloured couch with toys strewn at one end, ‘sit down. Can I get you something to drink?’
She’d gone from hostile to the perfect hostess in a couple of seconds flat. It immediately made Dante suspicious. He dropped down onto the couch.
‘No, thanks.’ Freeing his tie a little from his shirt collar, he gave Tia a smile then leant forward, his hands linked loosely across his thighs. ‘What’s going on, Anna? And don’t tell me nothing. I’m too good a reader of people to buy that.’
She was alternately twisting her hands together and fiddling with the ends of her bright auburn hair. The tension already building in Dante’s iron-hard stomach muscles increased an uncomfortable notch.
‘Tia? Would you go into your bedroom for a minute and look for that colouring book we were searching for earlier? You know the one—with the farm animals on the front? Have a really good look and bring some crayons too.’
‘Is Dante going to help me colour in my book, Mummy?’ The little girl’s voice was hopeful.
‘Sure.’ He grinned at her. ‘Why not?’
When Tia had left them to run along the hallway to her bedroom, Anna’s dark eyes immediately cleaved apprehensively to Dante’s. ‘That night—the night we were together.’ She cleared her throat a little and his avid gaze didn’t waver from hers for a second. ‘I got pregnant. I didn’t lie when I told you I was on the pill, but because I’d been working so hard I missed taking one… Anyway…Tia’s yours. What I’m saying—what I’m trying to tell you—is that you’re her father.’
He’d heard of white-outs, but not being enamoured of snow or freezing weather had never experienced one. He imagined the blinding sensation of disorientation that currently gripped him was a little like that condition. Time ticked on in its own relentless way, but for a long moment he couldn’t distinguish anything much. Feelings, thoughts—they just didn’t exist. He quite simply felt numb. Then, when emotions started to pour through him like a riptide, he pushed to his feet, staring hard at the slender redhead who stood stock-still, her brown eyes a myriad palette of shifting colours Dante couldn’t decipher right then.
‘What are you up to? ‘ he demanded. ‘Has someone put you up to this to try and swindle money from me? Answer me, damn it!’ He drove his shaking fingers through his hair in a bid to still them. ‘Tell me what you just said again, Anna—so I can be sure I didn’t misunderstand you.’
‘Nobody put me up to anything, and nor do I want your money. I’m telling you the truth, Dante. That night we spent together resulted in me becoming pregnant.’
‘And the baby you were carrying is Tia? ‘
‘Yes.’
‘Then if that’s the truth, why in God’s name didn’t you find me to let me know?’
‘We agreed.’ She swallowed hard. Her flawless smooth skin was alabaster-pale, Dante registered without sympathy. ‘We agreed that we wouldn’t hold each other to anything…that it was just for the one night and in the morning we’d both move on. You were—you were so troubled that night. I knew you were hurting. I didn’t know what had happened, because you didn’t tell me, but I guessed you might have just lost someone close. You weren’t looking for anything deep…like a relationship. I knew that. You didn’t even tell me your last name. You simply wanted—needed to be close to someone and for some reason—’ She momentarily dipped her head. ‘For some reason you chose me.’
Barely trusting himself to speak, because his chest felt so tight and he was afraid he might just explode, Dante grimly shook his head.
‘You could have easily found out my last name by checking in the reservations book. From there you could have found a contact address. Why didn’t you? ‘
She hesitated, as if she was about to say something, but changed her mind. ‘I—I told you. I didn’t because we’d made an agreement. I was respecting your wishes. that’s all.’
‘Respecting my wishes? Are you crazy? This wasn’t just some simple mistake you could brush aside, woman! Can’t you see what you’ve done? You’ve denied me my own child. For over four years my daughter has lived without her father. Did she never ask about me?’
‘Yes…she—she did.’
‘Then what did you tell her?’
Her expression anguished, Anna was clearly struggling to give him a reply.
‘When Tia asked me why her daddy wasn’t around I—I just told her that you’d been ill and had to go away to get better. What else could I tell her when I had no idea where you were or even if you’d care? ‘
Lifting a shaky hand to his forehead Dante grimaced painfully. ‘And whose fault is that, when you couldn’t even be bothered to find me?’
Her skin turned even paler. ‘I understand why you’d want to blame me, but at the time the decision not to see each other again was ostensibly yours, if you remember?’
‘And while I’ve been relegated to the back of your mind as some past inconvenient mistake…has there been anyone else on the scene?’ Dante demanded, his temper flashing like an electrical storm out of a previously calm summer sky. ‘Another man who’s played father to Tia?’
‘No, there hasn’t. I’ve been raising her on my own, and at the same time trying to build a career so that I can support us both. I don’t have time for relationships with other men!’
This last statement had clearly made her angry. The tightness in Dante’s chest eased a little, but not much. He was still furious with her. Frankly, the idea that his child might have witnessed a parade of different men filing through her mother’s life filled him with horror and distress. Children needed stability, support, love… The thought brought him up short. He had accepted without dispute the fact that Tia was his daughter—accepted the word of a woman he had only known for one too short and incredible night. Yet the moment he had gazed into Tia’s eyes—eyes that were the same unusual light shade as his—Dante had somehow known that she belonged to him.
‘Well, now you will make time for a relationship, Anna. Your comfortable little idyll of having things just the way you want them is about to change dramatically. You’ve dropped the bombshell that I am father to a daughter, and now you will have to accept the consequences.’
‘What consequences? ‘ The colour