starfish hands splayed either side of her head as she slept. Sooty-black eyelashes fanned her little cheeks, her rosebud mouth slightly open as her breath came in and then out. She looked small for her age, petite, almost fragile. Eliza reached over the side of the cot and gently brushed a dark curl back off the tiny forehead, a tight fist of maternal longing clutching at her insides.
This could have been our child.
The thought of never having a child of her own was something that grieved and haunted her. All of her life she had craved a family of her own. Becoming engaged to Ewan when she was only nineteen had been part of her plan to create a solid family base. She hadn’t wanted to wait until she was older. She had planned to get married and have children while she was young, to build the secure base she had missed out on.
But life had a habit of messing with one’s carefully laid out plans.
There was a part cry, part murmur from the cot. ‘Mamma?’
Eliza felt a hand grasp at her heart at that plaintive sound. ‘It’s all right, Alessandra,’ she said as she stroked the little girl’s silky head again. ‘Shh, now, go back to sleep.’
The child’s little hand found hers and she curled her fingers around two of hers although she didn’t appear to be fully awake. Her eyes were still closed, those thick lashes resting against her pale cheeks like miniature fans. After a while her breathing evened out and her little body relaxed on a sigh that tugged again at Eliza’s heartstrings.
She looked at the tiny fingers that were clinging to hers. How tragic that one so young had lost her mother. Who would she turn to as she grew through her childhood into her teens and then as a young woman—nannies and carers and a host of lovers that came and went in Leo’s life? What sort of upbringing would that be? Eliza knew what it was like to be handed back and forth like a parcel nobody wanted. All her life she had tried to heal the wound the death of her mother had left. Of feeling that it was her fault her mother had died. Would it be the same for little Alessandra? Feeling guilty that she was somehow the cause of her mother giving up on life? Of constantly seeking to fill the aching void in her soul?
There was a sound from the door and Eliza turned and saw Leo standing there watching her with an unreadable expression on his face. ‘Where’s Laura, the agency girl?’ he asked.
‘I think she’s having a shower. I was just going past and I—’
‘You’re not on duty until the morning.’
Eliza didn’t care for being reprimanded for doing something that came as naturally to her as breathing. Sleeping children needed checking on. Distressed children needed comforting. She raised her chin at him. ‘Your daughter seemed restless. She called out to her mother. I comforted her back to sleep.’
Something moved through his eyes, a rapid flash of pain that was painful to witness. ‘Marella is waiting to dish up dinner.’ He held open the door for her in a pointed fashion. ‘I’ll see you downstairs.’
‘She looks like you.’ The words were out before Eliza could stop them.
It was a moment or two before he spoke. ‘Yes…’ His expression remained inscrutable but she sensed an inner tension that he seemed at great pains to keep hidden.
She swallowed against the tide of regret that rose in her throat. If things had been different they would both be leaning over that cot as the proud, devoted parents of that gorgeous little girl. They might have even had another baby on the way by now. The family she had longed for, the family she had dreamed about for most of her life could have been hers but for that one fateful night that had changed the entire course of her life.
‘Mamma?’
Eliza swung her gaze to the cot where Alessandra had now pulled herself upright, her little dimpled hands clinging to the rail. She rubbed at one of her eyes with a little fisted hand. ‘I want Mamma,’ she whimpered as her chin started to wobble.
Eliza went over to the cot and picked up the little toddler and cuddled her close. ‘I’m not your mummy but I’ve come to take care of you for a little while,’ she said as she stroked the child’s back in a soothing and rhythmic manner.
Alessandra tried to wriggle away. ‘I want Kathleen.’
‘Kathleen had to go and see her family,’ Eliza said, rocking her gently from side to side. ‘She’ll be back before you know it.’
‘Where’s Papà?’ Alessandra asked.
‘I’m here, mia piccolo.’ Leo’s voice was gentle as he placed his hand on his daughter’s raven-black head.
The base of Eliza’s spine quivered at his closeness. She could smell his citrus-based aftershave; she could even smell the fabric softener that clung to the fibres of his shirt. Her senses were instantly on high alert. Her left shoulder was within touching distance of his chest. She could feel the solid wall of him just behind her. She was so tempted to lean against the shelter of his body. It had been so long since she had felt someone put their arms around her and hold her close.
‘I wetted the bed,’ Alessandra said sheepishly.
Eliza could feel the dampness against her arm where the little tot’s bottom was resting. She glanced up at Leo, who gave her a don’t-blame-me look. ‘She refuses to wear a nappy to bed,’ he said.
‘I’m too big for nappies,’ Alessandra announced with a cute little pout of her rosebud mouth, although her deep-set eyes were still half closed. ‘I’m a big girl now.’
‘I’m sure you are,’ Eliza said. ‘But even big girls need a bit of help now and again, especially at night. Maybe you could wear pull-ups for a while. They’re much more grown-up. I’ve seen some really cool ones with little pink kittens on them. I can get some for you if you like.’
Alessandra plugged a thumb in her mouth by way of answer. It seemed this was one little Munchkin who was rather practised in getting her own way.
‘Let’s get you changed, shall we?’ Eliza said as she carried the little girl to the changing table in the corner of the nursery. ‘Do you want the pink pyjamas or the blue ones?’
‘I don’t know my colours,’ Alessandra said from around her thumb.
‘Well, maybe I can teach you while I’m here,’ Eliza said.
‘You’d be wasting your time,’ Leo said.
Eliza glanced at him with a reproving frown. Little children should not be exposed to negative messages about their capacity to learn. It could set up a lifelong pattern of failure. ‘Pardon?’ she said.
‘My daughter will never learn her colours.’
‘That’s ridiculous,’ she said. ‘Why ever not?’
He gave her a grim look. ‘Because she is blind.’
ELIZA BLINKED AT him in shock.
Blind?
Her
