Anger surged within Rafaele at her pronouncement. He uncrossed his arms, unable to disguise his frustration. Sam was standing before him, and despite the charged atmosphere and the words between them he was acutely aware that all he wanted to do was rip that flimsy T-shirt over her head and position her on the counter behind her so that he could thrust deep into her and obliterate all the questions and turmoil in his head.
When she’d walked into the room all he’d seen had been the tantalising shape of her firm breasts, their pointed tips visible through the thin fabric. Her sleep-mussed hair had reminded him of when she’d been on top of him, riding him, her head falling back...
Desire was like a wild thing inside him, clawing for fulfilment. It wasn’t helped by the fact that in a bid to prove that Sam didn’t have this unique effect on him, he’d found himself hitting on his friend’s mistress at the function earlier. Flirting with her, handing her his card—desperate to provoke some response in his flatlining libido. He’d acted completely out of character, managed to insult his friend Andreas Xenakis, and he’d proved nothing.
Except that he wanted this woman more than ever.
He hated her. But he wanted her. And he wanted his son.
‘Let it go?’ he asked now with deceptive softness, and something in him exulted when he saw how Sam paled slightly. ‘I think I’ve more than proved myself to be accommodating where my son and your deception are concerned.’
Rafaele knew he was reacting to Sam’s almost patronising tone and to his anger at this inconvenient desire.
His lip curled. ‘Do you really think I would be here in the suburbs with you if it wasn’t in my son’s best interests? Do you really think I want you working at the factory for any reason other than because I want to keep you where I can see your every treacherous move?’
She paled even more at that, and Rafaele felt something lance him deep inside, but he couldn’t stop.
‘You’ve put us all in this position by choosing the path that you did. By believing that you knew best. Well, now I know best and you’re just going to have to live with it. You’re going to have to let it go, Samantha.’
The hurt Sam felt at Rafaele’s words shamed her. He looked as hard and obdurate as a granite block just feet away. And as unyielding. The thought of them ever reaching some sort of amicable agreement felt like the biggest and most ludicrous fantasy on earth. And yet between her legs her panties chafed uncomfortably against swollen slick folds of flesh. She wanted to scream out her frustration at her wayward body.
Just before he’d fallen asleep earlier Milo had asked, in a small, hesitant voice, ‘Will the man...I mean Rafelli...will he remember to take me in the car tomorrow?’
Anger at Rafaele’s assertion that he was doing his utmost to think of Milo when all he seemed to be concerned about was needling her made her lash out. ‘You might feel like you’re sacrificing your glamorous life for your son, Rafaele, but when will you get bored and want out? Milo has been talking about you all day. He’s terrified you won’t remember to take him out in the car tomorrow. He’s fast heading for hero-worship territory and he’ll be devastated if you keep leading him on this path only to disappear from his life.’
Sam was breathing heavily. ‘This is what I wanted to avoid all along. Milo’s vulnerable. He doesn’t understand what’s going on between us. You can punish me all you want, Rafaele, but it’s Milo who matters now. And I can’t say sorry again.’
Rafaele was completely unreadable, but Sam sensed his tension spike.
‘What makes you think that I am going to disappear from Milo’s life?’
The words were softly delivered, but Sam could sense the volcanic anger behind them.
‘You know what I mean. You’re not going to stay here for ever. You’ll leave sooner or later. Milo will be confused. Upset.’
Sam was aware that she could have been talking about herself, about what had happened to her.
Panic at the way Rafaele took a step closer made Sam’s breath choppy. Instinctively she moved back. ‘I think this was a very bad idea. I think you should move out before he gets too attached. You can visit us. That way he won’t be so upset when you leave...we’ll have proper boundaries.’
‘Boundaries, you say?’ His accent sounded thicker. ‘Like the kind of boundaries you put around yourself and my son when you decided that it would be a good idea not to inform me of his existence?’
‘You’re just...not about commitment, Rafaele. You said it yourself to me over and over again. And a child is all about commitment—a lifetime of it.’
Rafaele was so close now that she could see veritable sparks shooting from those green depths.
His voice was low and blistering. ‘How dare you patronise me? You have had the experience of giving birth to a baby and all the natural bonding that goes with it—a bonding experience you decided to deny me. I now have the task of bonding with my son when his personality is practically formed. He has missed out on the natural bonding between a father and son. You have deprived us both of that.’
He stopped in front of her and Sam found it hard to concentrate when she could smell his musky heat. The anger within her was vying with something far hotter and more dangerous.
‘I can give my son a lifetime of commitment. That is not a problem. If and when I do leave this place he will know I am his father. He will be as much a part of me and my life as the very air I breathe.’
His eyes pinned her to the spot.
‘Know this, Sam. I am in Milo’s life now, and yours, and I’m not going away. I am his father and I am not shirking that responsibility. You and I are going to have to learn to co-exist.’
Sam’s arms were so tight now that she felt she might be constricting the bloodflow to her brain. ‘I’m willing to try to co-exist, Rafaele. But sooner or later you’ll have to forgive me, or we’ll never move on.’
* * *
Rafaele stood for a long moment after Sam had left, his heart still racing. She had no idea how close he’d come to reaching for her, pulling her into him so that he could taste her again.
Sooner or later you’ll have to forgive me.
For the first time Rafaele didn’t feel the intense anger surge. Instead he thought of Sam’s stricken pale features that day in the clinic. He remembered his own sense of panic, and the awful shameful relief when he could run away, far and fast, and put Sam and the emotions she’d evoked within him behind him.
For the first time he had to ask the question: if he’d been in her position would he have done the same thing? If he’d believed that his baby was unwanted by one parent? It wasn’t so black and white any more. Rafaele had to admit to the role he’d played.
Completely unbidden a memory came to him of something Sam had told him one night while they’d been lying in bed. It was something he avoided like the plague—the post-coital intimacy that women seemed engineered to pursue—but this hadn’t been like that. Sam had started telling him something and then stopped. He’d urged her on.
It was her mention of
