Jemima focused on the man she loved and her heart jumped behind her breastbone. All hers at last, officially, finally, permanently hers. As if a wedding ring were the equivalent of a padlock, she scolded herself. It was the love she saw in his beautiful dark eyes that would hold him and she rejoiced in the thought of the future that awaited them and their son.
‘IL CAPO!’ AGNESE SIGNALLED Jemima from the door of the castle with a beatific smile that said that all was now right with the housekeeper’s world because Luciano was finally home again after a week away on business.
Jemima thought back four years to the days when the elderly Agnese, Luciano’s fiercest admirer, had still been unsure of her former charge’s second wife. She and Agnese had started out being excruciatingly polite to each other while Jemima had become friendlier with the housekeeper’s daughter, Carlotta, whose English had come on as quickly as Jemima’s Italian during the first year of her marriage. And then Concetta, their first child, had been born and Agnese had crumbled like a meringue at first sight of Il Capo’s daughter to reveal the kindly, loving woman she hid behind her tough little image.
After Concetta, the nursery had got even busier and had had to expand because two children had been born to swell the family. Jemima’s second pregnancy had produced twin boys, Marco and Matteo, and she had decided to take a break from the production line for a year or two at least. Three little boys ranging from Nicky, who was almost five, and the twins, who were two years old, had proved quite a handful. Concetta was three, clever and well behaved, certainly easier to control than three rumbustious little boys. Jemima’s daughter was very fond of raising her brows in the boys’ direction and mimicking her father with an air of female superiority.
Jemima’s life had changed so rapidly from the moment she had become a mother for the first time after Nicky that she sometimes could hardly recall the period before she had met Luciano. Real life and fulfilling happiness had begun for her in Sicily at the castello. Occasionally she had thought sadly about the job she had left behind, but caring for Nicky had kept her very busy and Concetta’s arrival had persuaded Jemima that she was perfectly happy shaping her routine round her husband and children. Such an existence might not be perfect for everyone, but it was perfect for her.
She adored Luciano and she adored her kids and her home and the staff who looked after them so well. She never ever forgot either to be grateful for her good fortune. Luciano had bought a comfortable house for her parents back in the UK, but they remained regular visitors to the island, most often staying in the cottage by the beach. Her husband had become almost as fond of his in-laws as his wife. He appreciated the retired couple’s loving interest in their grandchildren and rarely went to the UK without taking them out to dinner. Jemima’s friend, Ellie, was a regular visitor as well, but there had been no further contact from Steven, who had married a couple of years back.
Now awaiting Luciano’s arrival, Jemima smoothed her hands down over the elegant blue dress she wore with the most ridiculously high heels in her wardrobe. He bought her shoes everywhere he went without her because he knew that, even though she preferred to spend most of her time at home rather than shopping or partying as she could have done, she got a kick out of wearing that kind of footwear. It was the type of thoughtfulness and all the little caring touches that accompanied it that made Jemima such an adoring wife.
The shouts of three little boys backed by the far more muted tones of her little daughter warned Jemima that Luciano was in the hall. She grinned as he raised his voice to be heard above the hubbub and then there was silence, the sound of quick steps across the tiles as he made his escape and the door opened.
And there he stood, her beautiful Luciano, who still thrilled her as much at first glance as he had five years earlier. ‘You look very beautiful, Signora Vitale,’ he told her teasingly.
She encountered his stunning dark golden eyes and her heart sang as she surged across the room to throw herself into his arms. ‘I missed you.’
Luciano gazed down at her with smouldering appreciation. ‘The kids are waiting in the hall.’
‘They want to see you too.’
‘Can’t be in two places at once, amata mia,’ he husked, claiming a passionate kiss with raw, hungry enthusiasm.
‘Carlotta will distract them,’ Jemima mumbled.
‘We’re being selfish,’ he groaned, lean brown hands worshipping her generous curves. ‘But I can’t... Bedtime’s hours away,’ he muttered defensively.
‘So it is... I love you,’ Jemima confided, enchanted by the level of passionate appreciation in his smouldering scrutiny, for it was wonderful to feel that desirable to the man she loved.
‘Not one half as much as I love and need you,’ Luciano countered. ‘It isn’t possible, amata mia.’
‘What have I told you about that negative outlook of yours?’ Jemima censured, backing down on the sofa in what was a decidedly inviting way with happiness and amusement and passion all bubbling up together inside her and making her feel distinctly intoxicated on love.
* * * * *
Lynne Graham
‘OH, YES, I should mention that last week I ran into your future father-in-law, Rodas,’ Anatole Zikos said towards the end of the congratulatory phone call he had made to his son. ‘He seemed a little twitchy about when you might...finally...be setting a date for the wedding. It has been three years, Leo. When are you planning to marry Marina?’
‘She’s meeting me for lunch today,’ Leo divulged with some amusement, unperturbed by the hint of censure in his father’s deep voice. ‘Neither of us has any desire to sprint to the altar.’
‘After three years, believe me, nobody will accuse you of sprinting,’ Anatole said drily. ‘Are you sure you want to marry the girl?’
Leo Zikos frowned, level black brows lifting in surprise. ‘Of course I do—’
‘I mean, it’s not as if you need Kouros Electronics these days.’
Leo stiffened. ‘It’s not a matter of need. It’s a matter of common sense. Marina will make me the perfect wife.’
‘There is no such thing as a perfect wife, Leo.’
Thinking of his late and much-lamented mother, Leo clamped his wide sensual mouth firmly closed lest he say something he would regret, something that would shatter the closer relationship he had since attained with the older man. A wise man did not continually look back to a better-forgotten past, he reminded himself grimly, and Leo’s childhood in a deeply troubled and unhappy family home definitely fell into that category.
At the other end of the silent line, Anatole made a soft sound of frustration. ‘I want you to be happy in your marriage,’ he admitted heavily.
‘I will be,’ Leo told his father with supreme assurance and he came off the phone smiling.
Life was good, in fact life was very good, Leo acknowledged with the slow-burning smile on his lean, darkly handsome face that many women found irresistible. He had just that morning closed a deal that had enriched him by millions, hence his father’s phone call. His father was quite correct in assuming that Leo did not need to marry Marina simply to inherit her father’s electronics company as a dowry. But then Leo had never wanted to marry Marina for her money.