Their passion is blazing...

And leads to scandalous consequences!

While on a business trip, dutiful heiress Francesca Ristori is stunned to be swept away with her desire for Italian tycoon Nic Falcone! Nic is unlike any man she’s ever met before and his searing touch thrills and excites her beyond words. But Francesca believes it can only be temporary—she must return to her aristocratic life. Until she learns she’s pregnant with the billionaire’s baby!

Get swept away by this classic pregnancy story!

JULIA JAMES lives in England and adores the peaceful verdant countryside and the wild shores of Cornwall. She also loves the Mediterranean—so rich in myth and history, with its sunbaked landscapes and olive groves, ancient ruins and azure seas. ‘The perfect setting for romance!’ she says. ‘Rivalled only by the lush tropical heat of the Caribbean—palms swaying by a silver sand beach lapped by turquoise water…What more could lovers want?’

Also by Julia James

The Dark Side of Desire

Painted the Other Woman

Securing the Greek’s Legacy

The Forbidden Touch of Sanguardo

Captivated by the Greek

A Tycoon to Be Reckoned With

A Cinderella for the Greek

The Greek’s Secret Son

Tycoon’s Ring of Convenience

Mistress to Wife miniseries

Claiming His Scandalous Love-Child

Carrying His Scandalous Heir

Discover more at millsandboon.co.uk.

Heiress’s Pregnancy Scandal

Julia James

www.millsandboon.co.uk

ISBN: 978-1-474-08748-3

HEIRESS’S PREGNANCY SCANDAL

© 2019 Julia James

Published in Great Britain 2019

by Mills & Boon, an imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers 1 London Bridge Street, London, SE1 9GF

All rights reserved including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form. This edition is published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, locations and incidents are purely fictional and bear no relationship to any real life individuals, living or dead, or to any actual places, business establishments, locations, events or incidents. Any resemblance is entirely coincidental.

By payment of the required fees, you are granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right and licence to download and install this e-book on your personal computer, tablet computer, smart phone or other electronic reading device only (each a “Licensed Device”) and to access, display and read the text of this e-book on-screen on your Licensed Device. Except to the extent any of these acts shall be permitted pursuant to any mandatory provision of applicable law but no further, no part of this e-book or its text or images may be reproduced, transmitted, distributed, translated, converted or adapted for use on another file format, communicated to the public, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of publisher.

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www.millsandboon.co.uk

For WSW—my cosmology advisor!

Contents

Cover

Back Cover Text

About the Author

Booklist

Title Page

Copyright

Dedication

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

EPILOGUE

Extract

About the Publisher

CHAPTER ONE

NIC FALCONE STEPPED through the service door into the casino, glancing around with a deeply satisfied sweep. Yes, this had been a good idea, acquiring and restoring this fading hacienda-style hotel deep in the western desert, yet still within reach of both Las Vegas and the West Coast. Another prestigious money-spinner for the global Falcone chain of luxury hotels. More glittering proof of just how far he’d come in his thirty-odd years—from the backstreets of Rome to being one of the richest men in Italy.

The fatherless slum kid who’d started his first job at barely sixteen in the basement—literally—of the fabled Viscari Roma hotel had, by his own gruelling efforts, climbed as high as that dilettante playboy Vito Viscari, who’d had a legendary hotel chain handed to him on a plate by his family.

Nic’s expression shadowed as he remembered. Through dogged hard work he’d worked his way up through the ranks at the Viscari Roma, every promotion striven for, until he had finally been in line for the big move into management that he had known he was totally qualified for.

But Vito’s uncle, the chairman of the company, had instead preferred that his inexperienced nephew—fresh out of university, with none of the hard-earned, hands-on track record that Nic had under his belt—should get a taste of his future inheritance.

Nic had been passed over—and from that moment he’d known that from now on he would work only for himself. The seeds of the Falcone hotel chain had been sown. Falcone would be the rival that would outsoar Viscari once and for all.

And through a level of hard work that had absorbed his whole life Nic had succeeded—fantastically. So much so that last year he had been able to swoop, like his namesake the predatory falcon, to take ruthless advantage of an internal power struggle within the divided Viscari family and snap up an entire half of the Viscari portfolio of hotels in a blatantly hostile acquisition.

It had proved, though, to be a triumph that had turned to ashes. Yet again Nic had felt the pampering hand of nepotism thwarting him. This time it had been, of all things, Vito’s mother-in-law, persuading Nic’s own investors, who’d funded his acquisition, to sell the hotels back to her so she could hand them over to her son-in-law, Vito.

Yet again Vito had prospered without lifting a finger for himself—thanks to help from his family.

But the determination that had lifted Nic from the backstreets had kicked in again, and in the months since losing his grip on the Viscari portfolio he had reacted by lining up a string of potential new Falcone properties, including this, the newly opened Falcone Nevada, with its oh-so-lucrative on-site casino.

His keen eyes swept the crowded gaming floor as he strolled forward, noting that a good few of the gamblers had likely come over from the conference wing of the hotel, where a gathering of astrophysics academics were holding their annual shindig. Including the cluster of young hopefuls now quitting the bar area to head to the gaming floor. Leaving behind a woman who was now raising a hand to them in a casual goodnight.

A woman who halted him in his tracks. Tall, graceful and dazzlingly blonde.

Every sense went on high alert. In his time he’d seen—and sampled—many, many beautiful women. But none like this. He felt his stomach muscles clench, held his breath. His eyes fastened on her. And desire—hot, intense and instant—quickened...

* * *

Fran watched the post-grad students go off to buy their chips and hoped they wouldn’t lose their shirts at the tables. They were clearly in demob happy mood and making the most of this, the final night of the conference. As for herself, she should head off, for she still had a poster session to give the following morning, before the plenary session, and it wouldn’t hurt to run through her presentation again.

But as she turned back towards the barman to call for her bill a voice behind her spoke.

‘No temptation to try your luck at the tables?’

It was a deep voice, with an American accent that did not sound western, and it held a gravelled timbre that made her turn.

And as she did so her eyes widened.

Oh, wow...

The silent exclamation, as instinctive as it was unstoppable, resonated in her consciousness.

The man who stood there, his pose deceptively relaxed, was tall—easily topping her own willowy figure—with broad shoulders, lean hips and a muscled chest that looked as if it could take a punch without even noticing.

In fact, she registered, in her subliminal sweep of his features, it looked as if his nose, set in a face that was hard-planed and strong-jawed, had been on the receiving end of a slug at some stage.

The slight bump was a flaw that only added to his powerful appeal. The man might be in a tux, but everything about him said tough.

Part of the security team here? she wondered, a mind still reeling from the visceral impact he’d made on her. It had been like walking into a wall—a wall she’d never seen coming.

For a second—a sub-second—she was frozen, taking him in, reacting to him on a level at which she never, just never, reacted to men. Not even the formidably good-looking Cesare, the man she had so nearly married, had had the overpowering instantaneous impact the man standing here now was having on her.

He’s nothing like the men I usually find attractive!

With the exception of Cesare, with his hawkish, aristocratic demeanour, she’d always only gone for men with studious looks—not the muscled type that she’d always regarded as...well, brutish.

But there was nothing brutish about this man. Not with eyes like that. Glinting with sharp intelligence.

And blue—piercing blue—which is really weird, because the tan of his skin tone and the sable of his hair indicates Hispanic, probably...

Yet even as she made that reasonable assumption she realised she needed to do something other than just gaze dumbstruck at him. Should she acknowledge his remark? Without vanity, she knew from experience that her blonde looks drew male eyes—and more—and if she was chatted up she normally kept her reaction vague to the point of evasive until she could get away or the man gave up. If absolutely necessary she froze them out.

For the moment, though, she went for option one, and gave a brief, impersonal flicker of a smile and a demurring shake of her head.

‘Not my thing...gambling,’ she replied, glad to accept the leather-bound drinks bill, and jot her room number on it.

‘You’re part of the conference?’

Again, the deep, slightly gravelled voice made her glance up as she pushed the folder back to the barman.

‘Yes,’ she acknowledged.

She moved to slip off the high stool, and immediately the man’s hand was there, guiding her. She glanced at him, murmuring her thanks, but wished that she could retain the air of impersonal indifference that she knew she should be displaying at this time.

Only it was impossible to do so. Impossible to do anything but feel the extraordinary visceral impact on her that he was having.

An impact that suddenly increased exponentially.

He was smiling—and the smile was like the smile of a desert wolf.

Fran felt her lungs squeeze, her breath catch. The smile was swift—a sudden indentation of the firm mouth, a brief flash of teeth, a lightening of his tough features as if the sun had just come out and then disappeared again.

‘Forgive me for sounding clichéd, but you don’t look the least like an astrophysicist!’

Amusement played around his firm mouth, as if he knew perfectly well that it was, indeed, a clichéd observation, but didn’t give a damn. Because the light in those blue, blue eyes of his was telling her just why he’d said what he had.

He wanted to do anything to keep the conversation going.

Fran lifted an eyebrow. Whatever was going on here, it was unlikely to be anything to do with the man’s role as a member of the hotel’s security team, if that was who he was, given the air of toughness radiating from him. And if he wasn’t—if he was just another guest—then that made it no better. He was still chatting her up. So maybe she should just call time and walk.

Except that she didn’t want to. The sudden fizzing in her veins, the catch in her heart rate, was telling her that she was reacting to this man as she had never reacted to any man before—that something was happening to her that had never happened to her before.

So, instead of whatever she might have been planning to reply to him with, she could hear her own voice, with a clear hint of answering amusement in it, saying, ‘And you’ve encountered many astrophysicists in your time, have you?’

She was conscious that her eyebrow had lifted, just as her mouth had twitched in amusement, conscious too of how that flashing smile had come again. Her sense was that here was a man totally at ease with himself. Even if he was a security guy, chatting up one of the guests in the hotel he worked in, he didn’t care—and he was inviting her not to care either. He was a man who knew he was blatantly accosting a woman who had caught his eye...

She was conscious that long, dark lashes had swept down over those brilliant blue eyes as he answered her in turn.

‘Enough,’ he said laconically.

Fran’s eyes narrowed deliberately. ‘Name three,’ she challenged.

He laughed—a low, attractive sound that went with the flashing smile, and the brilliant blue eyes and the tough face and the tougher body. All of which were doing incredible things to her.

She felt herself reel inwardly.

What is happening to me? I get chatted up by some guy strolling up to me in a bar at a casino hotel and suddenly I feel like I’m eighteen again. Not a sober-minded post-doc on the far side of twenty-five, who writes abstruse scientific papers on cosmology at a prestigious West Coast university.

Hard-working research academics didn’t go doolally because some muscled hunk smiled at them. And nor, came the even more sobering thought, did the woman who was her identity as well as Dr Fran Ristori.

Donna Francesca di Ristori. Offspring of two noble houses—one Italian, one English—both centuries old, with bloodlines that could be traced back to the Middle Ages, and estates and lands, castles and palazzos. She was the daughter of Il Marchese d’Arromento, and granddaughter of one of the peers of the British realm, the Duke of Revinscourt.

Not that anyone here in the USA knew that—or cared. In academia only the quality of your research counted, nothing else. It was something that her mother—born Lady Emma, now Marchesa d’Arromento—had never really understood. But then her mother had never really understood why Fran had turned away from the life she’d been born to in order to follow her deep love of learning to the halls of academia.

It had caused, Fran knew, something of a rift between them, and it was only because Fran had agreed to marry into the Italian aristocracy that her mother had been reconciled to her research career.

But last year Fran had broken up with Cesare, Il Conte di Mantegna, whom she had long been expected to marry, and now her mother was barely speaking to her.

‘But he was perfect for you!’ her mother had cried protestingly. ‘You’ve known each other all your lives and he would have let you continue with all this star-gazing you insist on as well as being his Contessa!’

‘I got a better offer,’ was all Fran had been able to say.

It had been an offer her mother could never have appreciated—the exciting invitation to join the research team of a Nobel Laureate out in California.

Fran had been relieved to take the offer, and not just for herself. Cesare was a friend—a good friend—and he would always be a friend, but it had turned out that he was actually in love with someone else and had since married her.

Fran was glad for Cesare, and for Carla, his new bride, and the baby that had been born to them, and wished them every happiness.

She had moved out to the West Coast, rented an apartment, and was revelling in the heady atmosphere of one of the world’s most advanced cosmology research centres. Although it was strange not to have Cesare in her life any longer—even long-distance, across the Atlantic—she had joyfully immersed herself in her work, thrilled to be assisting the famous Nobel Laureate.

Except that this last semester her revered professor had suffered a heart attack and retired prematurely, and his successor wasn’t a patch on him. Already Fran had resolved to seek another post, another university. She would see out this conference and then start actively looking.

‘OK—I fold.’ The man blatantly chatting her up held up a large, square-palmed hand to indicate defeat. ‘You called my bluff.’

The flashing smile came again, and yet again Fran felt her heart give a kick. Tomorrow’s plenary session, the poster session she was giving—both vanished.

She gave a laugh. She couldn’t help it. The guy was so sure of himself. Usually that put her right off, but somehow, in this man, it was simply one more part of his appeal. As to why he had that appeal to her—she just could not analyse that. It was beyond rational thought.

‘Well, we had the conference dinner tonight, so we’re all togged up in our best bib and tucker,’ she answered him. ‘None of us are looking like nerdy scientists right now!’

Blue, blue eyes swept over her. Open in their admiration for her.

‘Sicuramente no.’ Definitely not.

The murmured syllables were audible, and Fran’s expression changed automatically. He wasn’t Hispanic after all...

‘Sei Italiano?’

The question came from her before she could stop himself. The man’s expression changed as she asked it. Slight surprise and then clear satisfaction.

Fran realised she’d just given him a whole new avenue to chat her up with. And she found she didn’t mind at all.

She didn’t notice the slight flicker in his expression as he answered her, nor the very slight air of evasion in his voice.

‘Many Americans are,’ he said, speaking English now. ‘E sei?’ And you?

‘Italian on my father’s side. English on my mother’s,’ answered Fran.

With every passing exchange she could feel herself simply giving in to this—whatever it was—and still not really knowing why it was happening. Why she should be giving the time of day—make that the time of nearly midnight!—to a muscled hunk who was blazingly sure of himself, blatantly chatting her up, when she really ought to be heading back to her room to go through her presentation for tomorrow.

She only knew a sense of heady breathlessness that had come from nowhere the moment he’d spoken to her. Knew that he was suddenly making her feel so, so different from the sober-minded research academic she knew herself to be—so, so different from the stately Donna Francesca she had been born to be.

He was speaking again. ‘English, huh? I thought you were from the East Coast.’

‘I lived there for a while,’ she allowed. ‘Studying for my doctorate.’

A sudden whoop coming from the direction of the post-grads gathered at one of the blackjack tables distracted her and she glanced towards them.

She frowned suddenly. ‘I hope they’re not trying to beat the dealer by counting in cahoots!’ she exclaimed. ‘They’re all maths hotshots, so they probably could if they tried, but I know casinos don’t like that...’

‘Don’t worry—the croupiers know not to let that happen.’

The words were reassuring, the tone laconic, but Fran glanced at him all the same.

‘You sound like you know that,’ she said.

He nodded, the blue eyes on her. ‘I do,’ he answered.

She looked at him. So that sounded as if he was definitely part of hotel security, didn’t it? But she still wasn’t sure.

Then she realised she didn’t care either way. He was speaking again, in that deep, laconic and oh-so-attractive voice of his.

‘So, has it been a good conference for you?’ he was asking.

She nodded. He was keeping her in conversation. She knew he was, he knew she knew he was, and she was OK with it. She didn’t know why she was OK with it, but she was. And right now she would give him an answer to his question.

‘Yes—it’s been mentally stimulating. Full-on, but good. And this hotel...’ she gestured with her hand ‘...is fantastic. I don’t really know the Falcone chain, but they’ve pulled out the stops here. My only regret is that I haven’t made enough use of the facilities—I haven’t even had a chance to try out the pool. I definitely will tomorrow, though, before we leave. It’s just a shame I won’t have time to take any of the tours on offer—not even the one to the Grand Canyon!’

The minute she’d said that she regretted it. Oh, Lord, did he think she was angling for an invitation? She hoped not.

To her relief he let it pass and simply said, ‘I’m glad you like the hotel—a lot of work went into it.’

There was professional pride in his voice—she could hear it. It confirmed to her that he must, indeed, be part of the security team that any hotel—let alone one that included a casino—would surely need.

‘I’d prefer it without the casino, but there you go. When in Nevada...’ she finished insouciantly.

‘Casinos make a lot of money,’ came the laconic reply, and there was another sweep of those long dark lashes over those blue, blue eyes.

Another whoop of triumph came from the post-grads at the blackjack table.

Fran laughed. ‘Maybe a little less tonight,’ she observed dryly.

‘Maybe,’ he allowed, with a glint of amusement in his face, his eyes, around his mouth.

The amusement didn’t leave his face, but suddenly there was something else there in his expression—a question. A question that told her, with a quiver of reassurance, that maybe he was not so absolutely sure of himself as he was giving out. And she liked him the more for it.

‘And maybe...’ he went on, and there was a speculative look in his eyes now that went with the question, that went with the sense that he was in no way taking her answer for granted. ‘Maybe,’ he continued, the change in his tone of voice matching the change in his expression, ‘if I asked if I might buy you a drink to celebrate your fellow astrophysicists’ obvious win over there, you might say yes?’

Fran looked at him, glanced back over towards the blackjack table, then looked back at the man who had been chatting her up and was now clearly intent on getting to second base.

Should she co-operate? Did she want to? Or should she say no politely and head to her room to mug up on her presentation?

Even as she cogitated, in the milliseconds it took for her brain’s synapses to flash their signals to each other, she felt another emotion stab through her. A sense of restlessness, of wanting something more than to give a fluent presentation the next day. Something more than the hard year of non-stop slog she’d put in since breaking up with Cesare, taking up her research post with the world-famous Nobel Laureate, producing a clutch of published papers with him and his team.

Whoever this blue-eyed, tough-faced, muscled hunk was, and why it was that, for reasons she could not yet figure out, he was capable of drawing her into conversation the way he so effortlessly had, only one thought was dominating her consciousness right now.

No, she didn’t want to retire meekly to her room. She wanted, instead, to keep this conversation going, keep this encounter going—keep the rush of fizzing blood in her veins from falling flat.

A smile parted her lips and she climbed back on to the high bar stool. He let her this time, without trying to help. She looked straight at him. Liking what she saw. Going for broke.

‘Why not?’ she said.

* * *

Nic’s gaze swept over her with distinct appreciation as she resettled herself on the bar stool. And with gratification too. He hadn’t been entirely sure she would accept his move on her. But that, he knew, was part of her appeal. He was bored with women being over-keen on him, and maybe that was why he was being evasive about who he was—Nicolo Falcone, billionaire founder and owner of the Falcone hotel chain.

For that very reason he threw a warning glance at the barman as he glided up to them, and received an infinitesimal nod of acknowledgement in return.

They gave their orders—a Campari and soda for her, a bourbon for him—and Nic lowered himself to sit beside her on the next bar stool.

‘So,’ he opened, ‘are you giving any papers yourself at the conference?’

‘Yes, a post—that’s a small presentation—about where I’ve got to in my current research. It’s for tomorrow, before the final plenary session.’

‘What’s it about—and would I even understand the title?’ he added with good-humoured self-deprecation.

For all that her incandescent beauty lit up the room for him, she lived in a world that was far, far distant from the cut and thrust of his.

He watched her take a sip from her drink, admiring her delicate fingers, the elegant air she had about her. She was wearing a mid-price-range cocktail dress, with a square neckline and cap sleeves, which, although it was fitting for the purpose of a formal conference dinner, had little pizzazz about it. Her hair was dressed in a neat pleat, and her make-up was subdued. She looked what she was—an academic dressed up for the evening.

Desire curled in him, focussed and demanding.

She was answering him now, and he paid attention, subduing his primitive response to her.

Her voice, light and crisp in the English style, had warmed with an enthusiasm that came, he knew instinctively, from the intellectual passion in her that lit up in her eyes, animating her fine-boned face.

‘My research field is cosmology—understanding the origins and eventual fate of the universe. This poster is just one small aspect of that. I’m running observational data through a computer model, testing various options for the geometry and density of space which might indicate whether, to put it at its simplest, the universe is open or closed.’

Nic frowned in concentration. ‘What does that mean?’

Her voice warmed yet more as she explained. ‘Well, if it’s open, the expansion that started with the Big Bang will cause all the matter in the universe to be dissipated, so there will be no stars, no planets, no galaxies and no energy. It’s called heat death and it would be really boring,’ she said with a moue of dislike. ‘So I’m rooting for a closed universe, which could cause everything to eventually collapse back in a Big Crunch and trigger another Big Bang—and the universe will be reborn. Far more fun!’

Nic took a mouthful of bourbon, feeling the strong liquid ease pleasantly down his throat.

‘So, which is it?’ he asked in his laconic fashion.

She gave another moue. ‘No one knows for sure—though it’s tending towards open at the moment, alas. Whichever it is we have to accept it—even if I don’t like it.’

Nic felt himself shake his head. ‘No. I don’t buy that.’

She was looking at him questioningly, her eyes beautiful and wide.

He elaborated, his voice decisive. ‘We should never accept what we don’t like. It’s defeatist.’ His jaw set. ‘OK, maybe it applies to the universe—but it doesn’t apply to humanity. We can change things, and it’s up to us. We don’t have to accept the status quo.’

She was still looking at him, but her expression was one of curiosity now. ‘That sounds like it runs very deep in you,’ she said. Her eyes rested on him a moment, as if reading him.

He gave a half-shrug of one shoulder, as if impatient. ‘We can’t just accept things as they are.’

She frowned slightly. ‘Some things we have to, though. Some things we can’t change. Who we are, for example. Who we were born as—’

Like I was born Donna Francesca—that’s in me whether I want it to be or not. It’s part of my heritage—an indelible part. For all the changes I’ve made to my life, I can’t change my birth.

‘That’s exactly what we can change!’ There was vehemence in his reply, and he took another slug of bourbon. Memories were pressing in on him suddenly—bad memories. His hapless mother, abandoned by the man who’d fathered her son, abandoned by all of the other men who’d taken up with her—or worse. His memory darkened. Like the brute who had inflicted beatings on her until the day had come when Nic had reached his teenage years and had been strong enough to protect her from thugs like that....

I had to change my life! I had to do it for myself—by myself. There was no one to help me. And I did change it.

She was looking at him, a slightly curious look in her eyes at the vehemence of his expression, her beautiful grey eyes clear in her fine-boned face.

She gave a slow nod. ‘Then perhaps,’ she said, in an equally slow voice, ‘we have to bear in mind that old prayer, don’t we? The one that asks that we be granted the courage to change what we can, but the patience to accept what we can’t, and the wisdom to know the difference.’

Nic thought about it. Then, ‘Nope,’ he said decisively. ‘I want to change everything I don’t like.’

She gave a laugh—a deliberately light one. ‘Well, you wouldn’t make a scientist, that’s for sure,’ she said.

He gave an echoing laugh, realising with a sense of shock that he had spoken more about his deepest feelings to this woman than he had ever done to anyone. It struck him that to have touched on matters that ran so very deep within him with a woman he hadn’t known existed twenty minutes earlier was....

Significant?

I don’t have conversations like this with women—never. So why this one?

It had to be because of her being a scientist—that had to be it. It was just that, nothing more.

She’s a fantastically beautiful woman—and I want to know her more. But there have been a lot of beautiful women in my life, when I’ve had time for them. She’s just one more.

She was different, yes, because of her being an incredibly talented astrophysicist when the women he was usually interested in were party girls, prioritising good times and carefree enjoyment, which allowed him time out from his obsession with building his personal empire. Females who didn’t ask for commitment. For more than he could give them.

But thinking about the assorted women who’d been and gone in his life was not what he was here to do. He was here to make the most of this one.

He flexed his shoulders, feeling himself relax again, his eyes focussed on drinking in her extraordinary entrancing beauty.

She had finished her drink, and so had he. With every instinct in his body, long honed by experience, he knew it was time to call time on the evening. He’d set the wheels in motion, but tonight was not going to get them further to the destination he wanted for them both. She was not, he knew, the kind of woman who could be rushed. He’d followed through on the impulse that had brought him across the casino floor to her, and for now that was enough.

He signalled the barman, signed the chit as presented, making sure his scrawling ‘Falcone’ was visible only to his employee, and got to his feet with a smile.

Fran did likewise. Her emotions were strange—new to her—but she smiled politely. ‘Thank you for the drink,’ she said.

The long dark lashes swept over the blue, blue eyes. ‘My pleasure,’ came the laconic reply. ‘And thank you for the science tutorial,’ he added, the smile warm in his gaze.

‘You’re welcome,’ Fran replied, her smile just as warm, but briefer, more circumspect.

She headed towards the bank of elevators across the lobby, conscious of his gaze upon her. Was she regretting the fact that he was calling time on their encounter? Surely not? Surely anything more was out of the question?

And yet even as with her head she knew it must be, with quite a different part of her body she knew—from the heady buzz in her bloodstream and the quickened heart rate—that she was regretful that she must retire to her solitary bedroom.

That sense of restlessness she’d felt earlier filled her again. Cesare had been a long time ago—over a year ago now—and anyway, theirs had never been a physical relationship. That, she knew, would have waited until well into their engagement, or even their actual wedding night, for Cesare was a traditionally-minded Italian male.

Not many would have understood their relationship—understood that, having known each other all their lives, it had made perfect sense for them to marry one day. In the meantime, they had both been single agents, and she was well aware that Cesare—an extremely attractive male, blessed with a high social position and great wealth to boot—had indulged in many a romantic liaison.

He had accepted that such tolerance was two-way, and until they had become formally engaged she had been as free as he to indulge in affairs. She’d had only two what might be called ‘full affairs’ in her life—one with another undergrad at Cambridge, a very boy-girl romance, and one brief liaison with a visiting academic while on her PhD course on the East Coast—and that had amply sufficed.

Her dating had nearly always been with fellow academics, and usually based around concerts, films or theatre outings. Searing passion had not played a role, and its absence had not troubled her. One day, after all, she would be marrying Cesare...

Except that now she wouldn’t, after all.

She was footloose and fancy-free. If she chose to be. Free to move on from Cesare, to seek romance—free to take a break, if she wanted, from the demands of academia.

Free to be chatted up by a muscled hunk with the bluest eyes she’d ever seen in a man, let alone one of Italian origin. A man whose smile was lazy, his speech laconic, and whose expression and long-lashed deep blue eyes were telling her just how very much he appreciated her.

She jabbed at the elevator button, her feeling of restlessness increasing as she stepped inside, feeling it swoop her the couple of floors upwards in this low-rise hotel that blended so gracefully into the desert landscape.

Inside her room, she glanced at the folder with her notes, but did not open it. Instead she stripped off for bed, taking off her make-up, brushing out her hair. Wondering why her heart rate still was not back to normal.

Her dreams, when they came, were full—and unsettling.

CHAPTER TWO

THE CONFERENCE WAS wrapping up, with the panel of plenary speakers paying courteous tribute to each other.

Fran flexed her tired fingers, having taken copious notes throughout. Her thoughts were uncertain. She was scheduled to fly back to the West Coast with her colleagues that afternoon, but was conscious that she was reluctant to do so. She’d meant what she’d said about wanting to take advantage of the hotel’s amenities, and why shouldn’t she? She hadn’t taken any holiday time for a year—she was overdue for a break. So why not here and now?

And whether that hunky security guy chatting her up last night had anything to do with her decision, she would not consider. He’d been a catalyst for it, that was all.

The sense of restlessness that had started to well up in her again subsided, her decision made. She said as much to her colleagues, telling them that she would be staying on for a few days at the hotel.

Grinning, they informed her they were off to hit Vegas and see if their luck at the tables was holding out. Fran wished them well and waved them off. Las Vegas was one place she did not want to go to.

No, if she went anywhere it would be to see something of the western desert—maybe even, she pondered, as she headed for the reception desk to keep her room on, take one of the hotel’s tours to the Grand Canyon.

She made enquiries, took away the tour brochure, and headed into the poolside bistro to have a light lunch and go through her notes. Her mind felt wiped out from all the heavy-duty presentations, and she realised she was looking forward to a few days off.

As she tucked into her salad she found herself wondering if she would see that hunky security guy again. But if he’d been on duty the night before maybe he wasn’t around in the daytime? Or if he was maybe he wouldn’t show any further interest in her anyway? Or maybe—

‘Hi—so, conference all finished?’

The deep, gravelled voice sounded behind her, and Fran turned her head. Felt something quiver inside her as she set her eyes on his powerful body again. This time he was not in a tux, but in a dark burgundy polo shirt bearing the hotel’s logo—the words Falcone, Nevada, with a golden falcon, wings outstretched, above—that stretched across his broad, muscled chest in a way that made her want to study the contours minutely.

That internal quiver came again, and a quickening of her heart rate. She felt something lift inside her...a sense of lightness.

‘All done,’ she acknowledged. ‘Just the notes to go through.’ She gestured at the pile of papers in the folder.

He glanced at them, and then at her. ‘May I?’ He indicated the free seat at her table.

He was asking her—courteously—if he could continue their slight acquaintance. Fran saw it and registered the courtesy, the request.

She knew she was entirely free to say something like, Oh, I’m sorry, but I really do need to go through my notes straight away while they’re fresh in my head, and he would simply accept it, give her a regretful smile and stroll away. Accept her rejection.

But those words of polite rejection never came. Instead she heard her voice say, just as courteously, ‘Of course,’ and she smiled.

She felt that lift again inside her—in her body, in her spirits. Seeing him again was reinforcing the extraordinary reaction she’d had to him last night—confirming it for her. Whatever was going on, something different was happening to her.

And she would let it happen. Mentally, the decision had been made. And as he lowered his powerful frame on to the chair, with a grace and ease that she found pleasing to the eye, she knew she would let him continue with his move on her.

For a move it was—that was obvious. Inexperienced she might be, compared with many of her contemporaries, but she knew when a man was making a play for her. And this one was. Quite decidedly.

So his next words came as no surprise.

‘You’ve decided not to check out yet—I’m glad.’

She threw him an old-fashioned look. Clearly he’d had a word with the staff at the reception desk, discovered she’d extended her booking.

Nic returned her look with a bland expression. He was deliberately wearing the staff polo shirt today, to confirm the impression he guessed she had that he was one of his own employees. That suited him fine.

‘Glad?’ she queried. Challenged.

The bland expression did not falter. ‘Glad you’ll have a chance to enjoy the hotel’s leisure amenities—and maybe take one of the tours as well?’

His glance now went to the hotel tour brochure. It was extensive—part of the offering the resort made to visitors. It included personalised tours to anywhere in the US West they might want to visit. Far or near.

‘Maybe,’ he went on, his expression still bland, but belied by a glint in those incredibly blue dark-lashed eyes that was telling Fran something not bland in the slightest, ‘you might like to start with the Sunset Drive this evening?’

Fran’s heart gave a little unconscious skip but she frowned slightly—her first glance at the brochure hadn’t listed such a tour.

‘It’s one of the personalised ones.’ On cue came the answer to her unspoken question. His voice was as bland as his expression. ‘It sets off from here late afternoon, going to a viewing spot for the sunset. It’s only a couple of hours. You’ll be back in time for dinner.’

He smiled. Not the desert wolf smile, but a bland smile, his long dark lashes dipping over his blue, blue eyes.

Fran considered it. Carefully analysed it for all the pros and cons for all of five seconds. Then gave her answer.

‘Sounds good,’ she said, and smiled a bland smile in return.

‘Great,’ he said.

Satisfaction was in his voice. Mission accomplished. Fran heard it, and it amused her. Nothing about this man was putting her off. He was being open about his intentions—conspiratorial, even. And yet she realised she still didn’t actually know whether this Sunset Drive was really part of the hotel’s offering to guests or was a particularly personalised tour, customised for herself alone.

That he would turn out to be the driver for this Sunset Drive, and she the sole passenger, she had little doubt at all.

And no reservations either.

He got to his feet—again, remarkably smoothly and easily for a man with his powerful frame—and smiled down at her again. His expression was just a touch less bland. A touch more openly appreciative.

‘I’ll fix it,’ he said, and lifted a hand in casual farewell and strolled away.

As he went Fran’s eyes went after him, saw how he paused to say something to one of the waitresses—a young woman whose expression as he talked to her told Fran that she was not the only female susceptible to that unforced, laid-back charm, those powerful good looks. Whatever the man had to draw women to him he had it in spades.

She gave a little sigh that turned into a good-humoured wry smile. She’d felt restless, mentally wiped from the conference—as if she were surfacing after a long, intensely focussed cerebral engagement that had lasted a whole year since she’d realised that making her life with Cesare was not what she wanted to do after all.

And now suddenly, out of nowhere, the future was beckoning to her. A future that was her own—that held more than her career. That held adventure—

And if that adventure, for now, happened to include a man who was making it very clear that she was pleasing to his eye—a man who was pleasing her eye in a way that was as totally unexpected as it was unpredicted—well, she would go for that.

She felt that lift inside her come again, that heady quickening of her pulse.

And welcomed it.

* * *

‘Hi, let me help you up.’

Nic handed Fran up into the SUV he’d commandeered and parked on the hotel forecourt, before vaulting into the driver’s seat. He’d changed into a western shirt, jeans and boots, and saw that for her part she’d sensibly put on firmer footwear, a loose shirt and long cotton trousers.

‘One Sunset Drive coming up,’ he said, casting his wolf-like smile at her, making Fran glad she was wearing sunglasses. Making her glad she was taking a chance for a change.

He fired the engine, easing the SUV down the hotel drive on to the main highway, then turning to her as he settled into a cruising speed. ‘So, did you enjoy your leisurely afternoon, Dr Ristori?’

It was an amiable, courteous enquiry, and she answered in kind, accepting that he must know her name from the hotel register. ‘Yes, I wrote up my notes then got in a swim and flopped on a lounger poolside. Totally lazy.’

‘Well, why not?’ he answered easily. ‘Your vacation—your choice.’

He glanced at her—a throwaway glance that was hidden by his aviator sunglasses, accompanied by a smile indenting around his mouth. It was a friendly, open smile, yet one that acknowledged that behind the word ‘choice’ there was more than whether or not she had had a lazy afternoon.

A lot more might be hers to choose.

She answered with a flickering smile and looked away, down the dusty road stretching through the desert landscape like something out of a Western movie.

He didn’t talk any more as he drove, and after some miles he turned off up an unmade track, along the edge of a bluff that terminated in a rocky col overlooking a valley beyond, where he parked.

As they got out the heat and the silence enveloped them. Nic jammed a wide-brimmed hat on his head, offering her one for herself, which she dutifully donned against the glare of the lowering sun. He then helped himself to a backpack holding twin water bottles and the mandatory emergency kit.

‘It’s about a ten-minute hike now,’ Nic said, and set off up a trail that led higher among the rugged outcrops.

Fran followed nimbly, and as they gained height saw the valley beyond fill with deep golden light, the azure sky arching above. It seemed very far from anywhere, with only the wind keening in her ears. Eventually they reached a flat outcrop affording a ringside view of the sight they had come to see and they settled down, backs against the warm rock behind them.

‘Now we wait,’ Nic said.

He passed her a water bottle and Fran drank thirstily. So did he. Before their eyes the sun was starting to lower into the horizon, turning deep bronze as it did so. Fran gazed, mesmerised, glad of her sunglasses as the sun seemed to fuse with the earth, flushing the azure sky with a halo of deep crimson until finally it slipped beyond the rim of the ever-turning globe and the sky began to darken.

She slid the dark glasses from her face, and saw him do likewise. Then he turned to her.

‘Worth it?’ he asked laconically.

She nodded. ‘Oh, yes,’ she breathed.

Her eyes met his, held, and for a moment—just a moment—something was exchanged between them. Something that seemed to go with this slow, unhurried landscape, desolate but with a beauty of its own, lonely but intensely special.

A thought occurred to her, and she heard herself give voice to it.

‘I don’t know your name,’ she said. She said it with a little frown, as if it were strange to have shared this moment with him not knowing it.

He gave her his slow smile, holding out his strong, large hand.

‘Nic,’ he said. ‘Nic Rossi.’

He gave his birth name quite deliberately. He didn’t want complications—he wanted things to be very, very simple.

She took his hand, felt its strength and warmth. Felt more than its strength and warmth.

‘Fran,’ she said. Her smile met his. Her eyes met his. Acknowledging something that needed to be acknowledged between them. The fact that, whatever was going on, from this moment she was no longer a hotel guest and he was not part of the security team, or whatever his role was.

That this was something between them—only between them.

‘Doc Fran,’ Nic murmured contemplatively, his eyes working over her. He nodded. ‘It suits you.’

He didn’t release her hand, only drew her upright as he climbed to his feet as well.

‘We need to head down before the light goes,’ he told her, and carefully they made their way back to the SUV. ‘Hungry?’ Nic asked. He kept his question studiedly casual. ‘Because if you don’t want to head back to the hotel yet I know a diner nearby...’

He let the suggestion hang, let her choose to answer it as she wanted.

She gave her flickering smile—the one that told him she was hovering between holding back and not holding back.

‘That sounds good,’ she answered. ‘A change from the hotel.’

He gunned the engine and they headed off, headlights cutting through the desert dusk that had turned to night by the time they drew up in the car park of a roadside diner.

It was a typical western diner, with a friendly, laid-back atmosphere and staff in the customary western outfits that went with the setting.

They ate at a table overlooking the desert, making themselves comfortable on the padded banquettes. Fran stuck to iced tea, but Nic had a beer, and they both ordered steak.

Hers was so massive she cut off a third, placing it on Nic’s plate. ‘You need to feed your muscles,’ she told him with a smile, refusing to let herself think that it was a strangely intimate gesture.

He laughed. ‘I’ll trade you my salad,’ he said, and pushed the bowl towards her.

‘Salad’s good for you!’ she protested, and pushed it back.

His hand was still on the bowl. Did her fingers brush against his hand? She didn’t know. Knew only that she pulled her hand away and that as she did so she felt it tingle, as though, maybe, she had made contact. Electrical contact...

She started to eat her steak. Made some remark about its tenderness. Any remark.

What am I doing?

The question framed itself. Rhetorical. Unnecessary. She knew what she was doing—knew perfectly well.

I’m on a date. Not official. Not announced. Not planned. But a date, all the same. We’ve watched the sun go down together, and now we’re eating together.

And what would they do next together?

She didn’t answer that one. Didn’t want to. Not yet. Not now.

Instead she asked a question—something about the desert. After all, he worked in this region—he must know more about it than she did. And, whatever Italian-American locality he came from originally, right now he was way more a native here than she was.

He answered the question readily, and all her other questions, but sometimes he shrugged and said he didn’t know. So they asked the diners at another table, obviously locals, who assumed they were tourists.

Fran did not enlighten them.

They also assumed they were a couple.

Fran did not enlighten them on that either.

Supposing we were.

The thought was in her head. Tantalising. Making her wonder. Speculate. Was that why she was sharing dinner with him now? Because she was accepting that she was willing to take things further between them?

But just how far?

She felt her mind thinking ahead. An affair? No, maybe not even that. A—a fling. That was more like it. Something out of the ordinary in her life...something that wouldn’t happen twice—because he was from a world different from her, as she was from him.

But that doesn’t matter.

Her eyes went to his face again, slid down over his strong, muscled body. The flicker of electricity came again—a kind of current flowing between them, strengthening, or so it seemed to her, with every circuit that it made. She didn’t know why...knew only that it was powerful and enticing.

Why not? Why not take this opportunity if it comes? I need to move on from Cesare. I need something...different. It would be good for me—mark a new chapter in my life.

Would Nic Rossi—so entirely different from any man she’d known before, so rawly, powerfully attractive to her—be it?

The question circled in her head. They’d finished eating—steaks demolished, side orders too—and now Nic was leaning back in his chair, letting his weight tilt it back, easing his broad shoulders. Relaxed, leonine, powerful.

Sexy as hell.

The phrase forced its way into her head. It was not one she’d ever used about a man. Not a phrase that had fitted any man she’d ever known. Not even Cesare. Her lips twisted. Cesare would have loathed any woman calling him that. Nic, she suspected, with another twist of her lips, but this time with humour in it, would simply take it as his due.

He knows he can pull. It’s in him, in every cell of his body. It’s part of him. It isn’t arrogance or conceit—it’s just... Well, it just is, that’s all. And he’d be glad I’m thinking it.

She didn’t need to spell it out. Didn’t need to think about it. Didn’t need to analyse it or wonder about it or speculate about it. All she needed to do right now was answer the question he was asking her as he picked up the menu, flicked it over to the dessert list.

‘Ice cream?’ he asked.

Fran smiled. That was one decision that was easy to make.

‘Oh, yes,’ she said. ‘Definitely.’

* * *

They drove back to the hotel, the moon rising to the east, the night ablaze with stars. Nic had seen Fran glance upwards as they got back into the SUV and an idea had struck him. As they drove he gave voice to it.

‘Would you have any interest,’ he opened, glancing at her briefly, then back to the ink-dark road, ‘in maybe taking off to see the South-West Array tomorrow?’

She turned her head. ‘Could we do it in a day?’ she asked. Unconsciously, she had used the word ‘we’, and it registered a moment later. But she didn’t mind that she had. It seemed right that she had.

‘If we make an early start,’ Nic said. He paused. ‘So, how about it?’

‘Oh, yes!’ Fran answered, enthusiasm in her voice. ‘You know,’ she mused, ‘as a theoretical physicist I simply use the data that the observational physicists provide for me, to test my theories—but to actually see where they get that data is always a privilege. The South-West Array is only just coming on-stream—’

She fished in her bag for her phone, looked it up. Her face brightened.

‘Nic, could we? I can message them tonight, see if I can get in touch with one of the onsite guys tomorrow...’ She paused. ‘It might be boring for you, though,’ she warned.

Then she wondered whether she should have said that. Maybe this was just another tour laid on by the hotel, with her own personal chauffeur? But she didn’t think that—not now. Not any longer. Not after sharing steak and ice-cream at a roadside diner.

This isn’t about his job, or even mine. This is about us.

She felt the now familiar skip of her heart rate, telling her she was glad—glad that that was what it was about. Then she realised Nic was speaking again.

‘You can give me another physics tutorial on the way there,’ he said. ‘The elementary version, that is.’

There was a smile in his voice, and in hers as she answered. ‘Physics is usually simple—it’s just the maths that’s hard!’

He laughed, that low, gravelly sound that she was getting used to sending a little frisson through her—a frisson that she felt again as, gaining the hotel’s rear car park, he helped her step down, retaining her hand just a fraction longer than was necessary. Then he was opening a side door and they were heading down a deserted corridor towards the lobby.

As they did, a service door opened and someone emerged. He glanced at Nic as they headed past.

‘Evening, boss.’

Nic acknowledged him with a brief nod, and as the staff member passed by, Fran murmured, ‘Boss?’

‘He’s on my team,’ Nic answered smoothly.

They arrived at the elevators. Nic was glad that no other members of his staff were around, and without waiting to be invited he stepped inside the lift with her.

‘I’ll see you to your room,’ he said.

Fran made no demur, but suddenly, out of nowhere, she was supremely conscious of the confined space of the elevator, of Nic’s closeness to her, of her own heightened sense of the moment. Would he try and kiss her? She tensed, not knowing whether she wanted him to or not.

He made no move on her, however, just waited until she had opened her room door and was turning to bid him goodnight, finding it hard to take her eyes from him when she was this close to him.

His hand splayed against the doorjamb, enclosing her. ‘Thank you for tonight,’ he said. ‘It’s been good.’

There was a low note in his voice, a huskiness, and a smile—she could hear it, see the slight curve of his mouth, the dip of his long, long lashes over those blue, blue eyes. And then, while she was still gazing up at him, his mouth was lowering to hers.

It was a kiss like none she’d known. Slow, deliberate, and for one purpose only. To tell her what she could have if she chose to.

She gave herself to it, her eyelids fluttering closed, feeling her shoulders sag against the door, her hands slacken as her whole being became focussed on the sensation he was drawing from her.

It was like a kind of silken velvet, moving over her leisurely, tasting, exploring, taking his time. And then, without her even realising, he was deepening the kiss, easing her lips apart. Letting her taste, enjoy his tasting, enjoy what there was between them. What more there could be.

She felt arousal flare within her, more powerful than she had ever felt, more intense, more sensuous, and she yielded her willing mouth to his, feeling the pleasure of it until, it seemed like an age later, he was drawing back from her, gliding his mouth over her, skimming leisurely over her parted lips, a velvet withdrawal.

He lifted his head and her eyes fluttered open, looked into his gaze. So close...so very close to hers. She felt dazed, dizzy. He smiled, seeing her reaction to his kiss, liking it.

He stepped away, giving her a little space. ‘Goodnight, Doc Fran,’ he said, but there was intimacy in the way he said it. ‘Sleep well.’

She gave a reply, and then he was turning away, heading back down the corridor. She watched him reach the elevators. Felt dizziness inside her still.

Knew that whatever this man wanted of her she wanted it too.

* * *

Nic did not sleep well that night in the suite he’d reserved for himself at this, his latest multi-million-dollar acquisition. He lay sleepless, gazing at the shadowed ceiling, one arm crooked behind his head, feeling a mix of restlessness, satisfaction and anticipation.

Dio, but how he’d wanted to stay with her! That kiss had been like dipping his finger into a pot of honey to taste the sweetness, and it had told him she had found it just as pleasurable as he had. But it had also told him, just as every instinct since he’d first set eyes on her had told him, that she was not a woman to be hurried. She was no hedonistic party girl. She was a mature, highly intelligent woman, who would make her decision in her own time, in her own way, about indulging in a romance with him.

And if she did, as he burningly hoped she would, it would not be conducted here at the hotel. He liked it that to her he was not Nicolo Falcone, and if they stayed here it was bound to come out at some point. That encounter in the corridor had been a warning of that inevitability. No, better that they took off to somewhere he was not known, so that he was still simply Nic Rossi to her.

Nic Rossi—his birth name, abandoned so long ago, when he’d first set out to forge his glittering empire, echoed in his mind. It had been strange to use it again. As strange as remembering the way he’d revealed so much of his own deep feelings and his passionate beliefs to her in that very first conversation he’d had with her the previous night. His belief never to accept what life had dumped you with—to make someone new of yourself by effort and dedication and determination.

His thoughts moved on. Back to the familiar territory of his empire-building. He ran through his latest ambitions to launch a flagship hotel in Manhattan. It wouldn’t be easy, let alone cheap to achieve, but he’d do it in the end. He always did. Always. The determination to succeed in business never left him.

And to succeed on more pleasurable fronts too.

His thoughts went back to the breathtakingly beautiful, entrancing blonde, the oh-so-lovely Doc Fran, alone in her lonely bed—alone for one last night.

He smiled, anticipation filling him again.

* * *

‘Oh, wow!’ Fran breathed, her eyes widening at the sight appearing before them as the SUV gained the low brow of a hill, revealing what was beyond.

It was like something out of a sci-fi film—other-worldly—with a vast matrix of huge dish antennae, angled upwards to catch the faintest radio whisper of distant stars, each one set on rails for moving into precise position.

The whole place was perimeter-fenced, but they drove up to the visitor centre, where Fran identified herself as from her university and promptly got the attention of one of the technical staff to show them around.

Nic was as impressed as anyone would be by the engineering feats achieved, but understood scarcely a word of their erudite exchanges. He was content just to see how the animation in her face, the interest in her keen, intelligent eyes, only enhanced her beauty, her appeal to him.

As they finally left the array she was fulsome in her thanks. He gave her his slashing smile. ‘This morning was your treat—this afternoon is mine. But you’ll enjoy it, I promise you.’

She did, too—though she gasped breathlessly as Nic showed her just why it was his treat.

They drove on another forty miles or so to a reservoir lake with a water resort, where they lunched at a waterfront café. Then Nic led her out along the jetty and hired the leanest, meanest motorboat available.

And hit the accelerator.

Fran’s breath and speech were blown far behind her, her hair streaming, her hands clutching at the rails as the boat flew across the lake, the bow hitting the water’s surface as if it was concrete. Italian words broke from her—and she heard Nic laugh, realised he could understand her expletives, and her description of him as a certifiable maniac who would kill them both.

‘No way! You’re safe as a baby!’ he yelled at her, in the same language, his face alight with laughter.

He bombed across the width of the lake, slewing around in a huge arcing curve of water that caught the sun’s rays in a million rainbows before racing back towards the jetty again.

Within reach of it he slowed and turned to Fran. Her hair was a wild tangle, her eyes alight with laughter. Nic let his arm slide around her shoulder and pulled her against him.

‘Fun?’ he asked.

He didn’t really have to ask. It was visible in her face.

She let her head rest on his shoulder, feeling it strong beneath her cheek. ‘Most fun ever,’ she said.

‘Happy to please you,’ he said, and dropped a kiss on her forehead.

Such a slight gesture, such a slight tightening of his arm around her... They sat beside each other, his other hand on the wheel, guiding the boat lightly on the water as if he were Cesare on one of his thoroughbreds.

Fran’s eyes flickered slightly, and she wondered why, of all things, she was thinking of Cesare now.

Nic saw it, saw her expression change. ‘What is it?’ he asked quietly.

She looked at him, easing away a little, but not freeing herself. ‘I’m thinking of the man I nearly married,’ she said.

Nic stilled. It was impossible to think of her married, or even engaged—taken by another man. Not when he wanted her himself so much.

‘What happened?’ he heard his voice asking. He heard the tension in it, but didn’t know why it was there.

‘I broke it off,’ she said. ‘I’d just been offered a research post out on the West Coast, working with a Nobel Laureate, and I couldn’t resist it. And I was pretty sure,’ she added slowly, ‘that Cesare was involved with someone else anyway.’

‘Then he was nuts,’ said Nic bluntly. ‘Nuts to prefer someone else to you.’

She gave a little laugh. ‘Thank you,’ she said. ‘But he and I...we never—well, you know. It wasn’t an affair that we had. It was a—Well, I guess a kind of expectation. We’d known each other all our lives. It would have worked, him and me.’

‘Cesare?’ mused Nic, registering the Italian name, which she’d pronounced in the Italian way. ‘So—back in the old country?’

‘Very much so,’ she said dryly, thinking of just how sizeable a chunk of ‘the old country’ Cesare’s estates covered.

Nic eased the throttle again. He didn’t want to know any more about the guy that she’d nearly married and hadn’t. Right now he wanted to be the only male in her vision, her thoughts.

Her desires.

At a much slower pace he nosed the boat forward again, keeping his arm around Fran, where he wanted it to be.

‘Let’s see what’s at the far end of the lake,’ he said.

* * *

The sun was lowering by the time they handed the boat in. Nic turned to her. Her hair was still windblown, her skin sun-kissed even with sun-block. She looked effortlessly lovely.

‘What next?’ he asked.

His eyes were light on her, the question in his voice putting the decision in her hands. The choice of what was to happen—or not—between them now.

Fran’s expression flickered. ‘It’s a long way back to the Falcone,’ she observed. ‘Maybe too far?’ Her glance went to the resort motel that was set back on a low bluff.

‘Not in the Falcone league,’ Nic said, ‘but it looks passable.’

He kept his voice neutral, not wanting to show his satisfaction that she was indicating they should stay there together. As he so wanted.

Fran gave a wry smile. ‘There speaks a loyal employee of the famous Falcone chain!’ she answered lightly.

Then she nodded, as if making a silent decision for herself. Maybe thinking about Cesare, talking about him, had confirmed her feelings. Told her that whatever it was that was happening between her and Nic, she wanted it to happen.

‘OK...’ She took a breath. ‘Let’s go for it.’

Even so, she booked separate rooms at Reception—and not just because anything else might have seemed too...obvious. She definitely needed a bathroom and a bedroom entirely to herself—her wind-tangled hair and water-splashed day-worn clothes were a disaster.

Gratefully spotting a small retail outlet, inset into the lobby, she plunged in.

It was a good hour before she was ready to meet Nic in the motel’s bar. As he rose to greet her, she laughed.

‘Snap!’

They had both, it seemed, availed themselves of the retail outlet’s offerings—and not just shampoo and toiletries for her, and a razor for him. They were both now wearing tee shirts bearing the name of the lake, Fran’s in pink and Nic’s in blue.

But where Nic was making do with the chinos he’d been wearing all day, Fran had found a wraparound cotton skirt in white seersucker that floated gracefully to mid-calf to replace her water-stained Bermuda shorts. Her newly washed hair tumbled over her shoulders, and her only make-up was a touch of mascara and lip gloss.

She knew Nic’s eyes were warm upon her.

But then, hers were warm on him, too. He was cleanly shaven, damp hair feathering at the nape of his neck, and the deep blue tee shirt matched his eyes and lovingly moulded his torso. But he was no muscle-bound Adonis. That innate air of Italian style he possessed was overwhelming—the kind of automatic male display that she was used to seeing in her countrymen. It was not vanity, or showing off, but it came instinctively to them.

‘You look so Italian,’ she heard herself say as they took their happy hour cocktails over to a table looking out across the darkening lake. She studied his face consideringly. ‘I wonder where the blue eyes come from? Some Norman ancestor way back...rampaging through the peninsula to make a kingdom for themselves?’

Nic thought about it and liked the idea. He’d made his own kingdom—the Falcone kingdom—deliberately choosing that new name for himself because it made him want to fly high, swoop down on his prey, fly ever higher.

‘What about your grey eyes and blonde hair?’ he asked in return. ‘Are they from your English mother?’

She nodded, not wishing to elaborate about her parentage, aware that she did not want to bring that side of her into what was happening now. Here, with Nic, she was ‘Doc Fran’—she smiled inwardly at his amusedly bestowed moniker—and that was all she wanted to be.

The fact that her mother, Lady Emma, would consider it incomprehensible that her daughter might want to take off as she had with someone who worked in hotel security was irrelevant to her. Her whole other identity, as Donna Francesca, was also irrelevant, as it always was when she was here in the USA, whether it was in her university department, or now, here, with Nic.

And Nic was—well, just Nic. And she didn’t want him any other way. He had a strength to him, a quality to his character that was as evident as his physical strength. It lay beneath the casual, laid-back attitude—a sure knowledge of his own worth, but without any need to display it. She liked him all the more for it.

He was asking her, now, how she had become an astrophysicist, and she answered readily.