His Suitable Bride(125)

Rowan still felt slightly shell shocked at what she’d just said. The urge to self-protect was still strong. Her back was still tense. ‘Sandro.’

He lifted his head and he was smiling, grinning inanely. She’d never seen him look so happy. ‘Rowan … querida … I fell in love with you too along the way. Somewhere you crept into my heart. When you gave birth to Zac—in that moment … I knew it then.’

A shadow crossed his face. He sobered. Rowan was holding her breath. Surely he wouldn’t go this far just to get her to comply?

‘When I came back and found you gone … found that note …’

He looked so bleak for a moment that Rowan had to believe. Tentative wings of joy started to take off in her heart.

‘You were right. I was so angry, so incensed, that I damned you to hell and told myself I’d been the biggest fool. But the hurt didn’t go. It festered. I told myself I’d been stupid to trust you when all along you’d turned out to be the same as every other money-hungry social climbing.’ He stopped. ‘That day when you walked away you didn’t just walk out on Zac … you walked out on me, and I didn’t think I could ever forgive you for it.’

Rowan’s whole body and head were going into meltdown. ‘I had no idea I meant anything to you at all. It was that that gave me the courage to go. I didn’t want to burden you with a terminally ill wife you felt nothing for. I wanted you to be free to remarry … someone you loved and desired. And I couldn’t bear for Zac to know the pain of separation …’

His hand came and cupped her jaw, his thumb catching a tear that she hadn’t even been aware of. ‘You’re the only one, Rowan. I love and desire you, no one else. The other night … I know you read me wrong in the morning. I never meant that I didn’t want to make love to you. I felt like a crass schoolboy when I should have been offering you nothing but comfort … yet I couldn’t help myself. I haven’t even been with another woman since you left. I couldn’t. I told myself it was anger hampering me. I couldn’t even go looking for you … the hurt was too intense.’

‘Oh, my love.’ Rowan’s heart overflowed. If she was dreaming then she never wanted to wake up. She pressed a kiss to his palm and, unable to hold back any more, Isandro pulled her forward and crushed her against his chest.

‘I love you, Rowan. You’re my life.’ He smiled ruefully for a second. ‘I called you my mistress … that thought lasted about two minutes. I just couldn’t see you like that, no matter how much I tried to distance myself.’ He was serious again. ‘When you and Zac were taken … when I saw you in that awful room …’

A shudder ran through his big frame, and Rowan welcomed him when his head bent and his mouth met hers in a searing kiss.

When they broke apart Rowan was crying in earnest. ‘I’m so sorry I didn’t tell you straight away … I just … couldn’t …’

‘Shh.’ He kissed her again, pulling her close. ‘It doesn’t matter now. You’re here, you’re well, you’re going to be well. Zac is well. We’re together, and that’s all that matters.’

Rowan nodded tearily.

Isandro gestured with a shoulder and sent a quick glance around the room. ‘I brought you here because I want this to be a new start. We never had a honeymoon.’

Rowan shook her head in acknowledgment.

Isandro kissed her hand again. ‘Well, now we will. Starting tonight. With dinner overlooking the Eiffel Tower.’ He smiled a little ruefully, almost shyly, and it made Rowan’s heart soar even higher. ‘I know it’s a bit of a cliché, the table overlooking the Eiffel Tower … the room … the champagne … I have so much catching up to do with you, Rowan. This is just the start of it … I promise.’

She shook her head vaguely, too entranced by his eyes and his words to be able to begin to tell him that it was all okay. Fine. Perfect. His words were washing over her like a healing balm.

And then he reached into a pocket and took something out. She looked down. In his palm he held her wedding and engagement rings. She watched wordlessly as he took her hand and slipped them onto her ring finger one by one. He’d had them resized and now they fitted perfectly.

Rowan reached up to touch his mouth with a finger, her eyes dropping in an innocently provocative gesture before looking back up. Her hand shook with the emotions running through her. ‘You were so sure?’

He shook his head then, that vulnerable light still in his eyes, and caught her finger and kissed it. ‘No, I wasn’t sure at all … but I prayed to every god I know that you felt something for me … that you would at least agree to stay married.’