beautiful,’ she said after a moment, her breath fast.
He looked towards the park, and pushed his sunglasses up onto his head. She transferred her attention from the park to Antonio, marvelling at how easy it was to forget just how intensely attractive he was.
‘Yes.’ He ran a hand over his stubbled chin. ‘When I was a boy,’ he said, turning to look at her and smiling an easy, companionable smile, ‘my father used to take me there, almost every weekend.’
‘Really? What for?’
‘Football,’ he said with a shrug so his shirt drew across his shoulders and she bit down on her lip to remind herself not to stare. ‘And puppets.’
‘Puppets?’
A waiter appeared with some sparkling water, placing it on the table before them.
‘Puppets,’ Antonio agreed, once they were alone again. ‘There are puppet shows on, all the time, and I used to love them.’
Her heart turned over in her chest at this unexpected detail from his childhood—so mundane, so regular, and completely perfect.
‘You’re surprised?’ he prompted, despite the fact she’d said nothing—and she knew it was because he could read her more easily with each day that passed.
‘I’m...yes,’ she said on a curt nod. ‘I am.’
‘Why?’
‘Because you don’t strike me as a man who was ever really a boy,’ she said, and then wrinkled her nose on a small laugh, which he echoed.
‘You think I was born like this?’
‘No.’ She rolled her eyes, her smile not fading. ‘I guess you must have physically been a boy at some point. But one that played and had fun?’
He wiggled his brows. ‘I assure you, I was both those things.’
‘You weren’t determined to take over the world, even at six?’
‘Perhaps a little,’ he said, lifting his hand, his forefinger and thumb pressed close together.
The waiter returned, brandishing menus, and Antonio took them without looking in the waiter’s direction.
‘Thank you,’ Amelia murmured, flying the flag of civility for both of them.
‘And you?’ Antonio pushed, after the waiter had left. ‘Was your childhood full of fun?’
Amelia bristled. ‘I’m sure you know the answer to that.’ She reached for her water, sipping it, turning back to the view. Inexplicably, her heart was racing.
‘I have an impression,’ he agreed with an air of relaxation. ‘But you have not told me specifics.’
‘With good reason.’ She tilted a small smile at him. ‘I don’t like to speak about it.’
Speculation glowed in the depths of his eyes, eyes that were—at times—dark black, and now showed specks of amber and caramel. ‘Then make an exception on this occasion. For me.’
HE WATCHED AS she considered those words, wondering at the sense of reserve she wore like a cloak. It hadn’t been there on the night in her cottage, when she’d brandished a meat cleaver and made him laugh, despite the seriousness of his business with the diSalvo family. Was it him that unsettled her?
The nature of their marriage?
Inwardly he cringed—how could it be anything else? Blackmailing someone into marriage was hardly a way to encourage closeness. Yet here they sat, husband and wife—as much an enigma to one another as the day they’d first met.
‘I think,’ she said, and he didn’t realise until then that he’d been holding his breath, waiting for her to speak and half believing she wouldn’t, ‘some people would characterise it as fun.’ She wrinkled her nose and his gut twisted, hard. He made an effort not to move, to appear natural, but it was as though he was hyper aware of every movement he made, every movement she made.
‘But not you?’ he asked, the words low and husky.
‘No.’ Her eyes met his and there was that thread of defiance, a whip of strength, that made his body arc up in immediate response. ‘Not me.’ She smiled, a tight smile, as she reached for her water glass, sipping from it slowly, her eyes landing on the view beyond them. ‘I think the novelty of freedom is exactly that—a novelty. As a child I was always afraid.’ She cleared her throat, and said no more.
So he prompted, ‘Afraid of what?’
‘What my mother would do.’
As though screws were being turned in every joint, his body tightened. ‘She hurt you?’
‘Oh, God, no.’ She spun back toward him, her eyes enormous, and he could see so much of the famed supermodel in his wife’s face that he wondered if they were alike in ways other than the physical. ‘My mother was the kindest person you could ever meet. Too kind.’
‘Is there such a thing?’
Amelia’s frown was instantaneous but it was as though a storm cloud was moving in front of the sun. ‘Modelling is a hard business. You can never be the prettiest, the skinniest, the best. She spent her life trying.’ Amelia shook her head. ‘She was a “good-time girl”—that was her reputation anyway, and it came to define her. She could never grow out of it, never shake it free. As I’ve got older, I’ve come to realise that she was living in fear, that she was afraid people wouldn’t like her any more if she wasn’t always the life and soul of the party.’
‘I’m sorry if she lived with that fear.’
‘I am too.’ Amelia swallowed. ‘But I spent a long time being angry with her.’
‘Why?’ he asked, though he had his own reasons for feeling anger towards her too.
‘She shouldn’t have kept me,’ she said with a wry twist of her lips. ‘I used to wish she’d put me up for adoption, you know.’
Sadness for the young Amelia flooded him—a surprising reaction, and not entirely welcome. ‘Why were you afraid of her, then?’ He reframed their conversation to her original statement.
‘Because she was erratic, and almost always drunk or high. She’d invite random people back to whatever hotel we were living in at the time. I can’t even tell you how often I woke up and found she’d left the hotplate on or taps running.’
Oh, Cristo.
Tears sparkled on Amelia’s lashes, making her eyes shine like the ocean on a sun-filled day but, instead of letting them roll down her cheeks, she ground her teeth together, her expression almost mutinous. ‘New boyfriends every few weeks—some of them creepy or not very nice, some of them fun but bad for her. I resented them all.’ She shook
