His Final Bargain(4)

'I have seen lives and reputations destroyed by idle speculation in the  press,' he said. 'I will not tolerate any scurrilous rumour mongering.  If you don't think you can abide by the rules set out in that document,  then I will leave now and let you get on with your life. There will be  no need for any further contact between us.'

Eliza couldn't help wondering why he wanted contact with her now. Why  her? He could afford to employ the most highly qualified nanny in the  world.                       
       
           



       

They hadn't parted on the best of terms. Every time she thought of that  final scene between them she felt sick to her stomach. He had been livid  to find out she was already engaged to another man. His anger had been  palpable. She had felt bruised by it even though he had only touched her  with his gaze. Oh, those hard, bitter eyes! How they had stabbed and  burned her with their hatred and loathing. He hadn't even given her time  to explain. He had stormed out of the restaurant and out of her life.  He had cut all contact with her.

She could so easily have defended herself back then and in the weeks and  months and years since. At any one point she could have called him and  told him. She could have explained it all, but guilt had kept her  silent.

It still kept her silent.

Dare she go with him? For a million pounds how could she not? Strictly  speaking, the money wasn't for her. That made it more palatable, or at  least slightly. She would be doing it for the children and their poor  disadvantaged mothers. It was only for a month. That wasn't a long time  by anyone's standards. It would be over in a flash. Besides, England's  summer was turning out to be a non-event. A month's break looking after a  little girl in sun-drenched Positano would be a piece of cake.

How hard could it be?

Eliza straightened her spine and looked him in the eye as she held out her hand. 'Do you have a pen?'





CHAPTER TWO


LEO WATCHED AS Eliza scratched her signature across the paper. She had a  neat hand, loopy and very feminine. He had loved those soft little  hands on his body. His flesh had sung with delight every time she had  touched him …

He jerked his thoughts back like a rider tugging the reins on a bolting  horse. He would not allow himself to think of her that way. He needed a  nanny. This was strictly a business arrangement. There was nothing else  he wanted from her.

Four years on he was still furious with her for what she had done. He  was even more furious with himself for falling for her when she had only  been using him. How had he been so beguiled by her? She had reeled him  in like a dumb fish on a line. She had dangled the bait and he had  gobbled it up without thinking of what he was doing. He had acted like a  lovesick swain by proposing to her so quickly. He had offered her the  world-his world, the one he had worked such backbreaking hours to make  up from scratch.

She had captivated him from the moment she had taken the seat beside him  in the bar where he had been sitting brooding into his drink on the  night of his father's funeral. There was a restless sort of energy about  her that he had recognised and responded to instantly. He had felt his  body start to sizzle as soon as her arm brushed against his. She had  been upfront and brazen with him, but in an edgy, exhilarating way.  Their first night together had been monumentally explosive. He had never  felt such a maelstrom of lust. He had been totally consumed by it. He  had taken what he could with her, how he could, relishing that she  seemed to want to do the same. He had loved that about her, that her  need for him was as lusty and racy as his for her.

Their one-night stand had morphed into a passionate three-week affair  that had him issuing a romantic proposal because he couldn't bear the  thought of never seeing her again. But all that time she had been  harbouring a secret-she was already engaged to a man back home in  England.

Leo looked at her left hand. Her engagement ring glinted at him, taunting him like an evil eye.

Anger was like a red mist in front of him. He had been nothing more to  her than a holiday fling, a diversion-a shallow little hook-up to laugh  about with her friends once she got home.

He hated her for it.

He hated her for how his life had turned out since.

The life he'd planned for himself had been derailed by her betrayal. It  had had a domino effect on every part of his life since. If it hadn't  been for her perfidy he would not have met poor, sad, lonely Giulia. The  guilt he felt about Giulia's death was like a clamp around his heart.  He had been the wrong person for her. She had been the wrong person for  him. But in their mutual despair over being let down by the ones they  had loved, they had formed a wretched sort of alliance that was always  going to end in tragedy. From the first moment Giulia had set eyes on  their dark-haired baby girl she had rejected her. She had seemed  repulsed by her own child. The doctors talked about post-natal  depression and other failure to bond issues, given that the baby had  been premature and had special needs, but deep inside Leo already knew  what the problem had been.

Giulia hadn't wanted his child; she had wanted her ex's.

He had been a very poor substitute husband for her, but he was  determined to be the best possible father he could be to his little  daughter.                       
       
           



       

Bringing Eliza back into his life to help with Alessandra would be a way  of putting things in order once and for all. Revenge was an ugly word.  He didn't want to think along those lines. This was more of a way of  drawing a line under that part of his life.

This time he would be in the driving seat. Once the month was up she  could pack her bags and leave. It was a business arrangement, just like  any other.

No feelings were involved.

Eliza handed him back his pen. 'I can't start until school finishes at the end of the week.'

Leo pocketed the pen, trying to ignore the warmth it had taken from her  fingers. Trying to ignore the hot wave of lust that rumbled beneath his  skin like a wild beast waking up after a long hibernation.

He had to ignore it.

He would ignore it.

'I understand that,' he said. 'I will send a car to take you to the airport on Friday. The flight has already been booked.'

Her blue-green eyes widened in surprise or affront, he couldn't be quite  sure which. 'You're very certain of yourself, aren't you?'

'I'm used to getting what I want. I don't allow minor obstacles to get in my way.'

Her chin came up a notch and her eyes took on a glittering, challenging  sheen. 'I don't think I've ever been described as a "minor obstacle"  before. What if I turn out to be a much bigger challenge than you  bargained for?'

Leo had already factored in the danger element. It was dangerous to have  her back in his life. He knew that. But in a perverse sort of way he  wanted that. He was sick of his pallid life. She represented all that he  had lost-the colour, the vibrancy and the passion.

The energy.

He could feel it now, zinging along his veins like an electric pulse.  She did that to him. She made him feel alive again. She had done that to  him four years ago. He was aware of her in a way he had never felt with  any other woman. She spoke to him on a visceral level. He felt the  communication in his flesh, in every pore of his skin. He could feel it  now, how his body stood to attention when she was near: the blood  pulsing through his veins, the urgent need already thickening beneath  his clothes.

Did she feel the same need too?

She was acting all cool and composed on the surface, but now and again  he caught her tugging at her lower lip with her teeth and her gaze would  fall away from his. Was she remembering how wanton she had been in his  arms? How he had made her scream and thrash about as she came time and  time again? His flesh tingled at the memory of her hot little body  clutching at him so tightly. He had felt every rippling contraction of  her orgasms. Was that how she responded to her fiancé? His gut roiled at  the thought of her with that nameless, faceless man she had chosen over  him. 'I think it's pretty safe to say I can handle whatever you dish  up,' he said. 'I'm used to women like you. I know the games you like to  play.'

The defiant gleam in her eyes made them seem more green than blue. 'If  you find my company so distasteful then why are you employing me to look  after your daughter?'

'You have a good reputation with handling small children,' Leo said. 'I  was sitting in an airport gate lounge about a year ago when I happened  to read an article in one of the papers about the work you do with  unprivileged children. You were given an award for teaching excellence. I  recognised your name. I thought there couldn't be two Eliza Lincolns  working as primary school teachers in London. I assumed-quite rightly as  it turns out-that it was you.'