His Suitable Bride(85)

Rowan steeled herself to withstand it. ‘I’m a woman. I’ve au paired. And apart from anything else he’s my son. I—’

She stopped. She’d been about to say I love him, but knew that would bring down a whole torrent of abuse on her head.

‘He’s my son, Isandro,’ she said simply instead. ‘And you’re going to have to get used to it. I’m not going anywhere. I’m going to be around for the rest of his life.’

Isandro raked his blistering blue gaze up and down. ‘Until you’ve got your hands on what you came back for, you mean. Then he’ll be dropped like a hot potato again, and this time it’ll be worse because he’ll have got to know you.’ He swung away from her with a violent movement. ‘I can’t believe I’m allowing this—’ He stopped, his voice full of self-recrimination, and came back close again, eyes blazing.

Rowan couldn’t back away any more as a chair was behind her. He’d come so close that she could see the flecks of lighter blue in his eyes. Smell him. Dear God. If he knew for a second—

‘I know what you’re doing. But know this. With me as his protector you can be damn sure that if you so much as cause one tear of distress to fall from his eyes you’re gone.’

Rowan’s throat closed over as she felt a well of sadness rise up. She could feel Isandro’s pain. His uncertainty. She could feel it because she’d been through it, a million times over. It was one of the reasons she’d walked away. She wanted to reach out and reassure him, and her hand even stretched out impulsively.

Immediately he jerked back. He looked at her hand suspended in the air as if it were toxic. Couldn’t believe that he’d almost, for one second, responded to her gesture. ‘Don’t come near me. You disgust me.’

With a chilling look he turned and walked from the room.

Rowan couldn’t move. She was locked in stasis. Paralysed by the venom in his expression just now. The very real evidence of his absolute hatred and unforgiveness. Hot tears filled her eyes, splashing down her cheeks. She pulled her hand in and cradled it against her chest as if he had struck it. Because, worse than anything else that had just happened, there was another emotion that she had to acknowledge. And it shamed her beyond belief. It had been jealousy. Jealousy of her own son. Because Isandro loved him so completely, so utterly, that she knew he had the capacity to do what she had done. Lay down his life for his child. And the fact that she represented that level of a threat to him hurt her more than she could bear.

For the last couple of days of Isandro’s week off he had watched Rowan even more closely. Instead of leaving her alone with Zac and María in the afternoons, as he had done before, he joined them. His reluctance to leave Rowan unsupervised with Zac was palpable. It had made something harden inside her. She would not let him scare her. She was stronger than that. He didn’t know how strong she’d had to become. So she endured his company, his looks, his obvious distrust.

Even so, her nerves were stretched to breaking point by the time Sunday night came. They were in the dining room drinking coffee, having finished dinner. Rowan took another sip and closed her eyes to savour the aroma and taste as much as to block Isandro out.

When Julia came in to bid them goodnight, Rowan got up quickly, wanting to leave, to avoid being subjected to more of Isandro’s scathing looks, ascerbic comments. But a hand snaked out of nowhere and caught her wrist, enveloping it in shocking heat. The physical contact threw her so much that she stumbled backwards. If not for Isandro standing to catch her shoulders she would have fallen.

She looked up with startled eyes. His hands were like a brand, burning through the threadbare material of her thin sweater. He seemed to be caught too. His eyes flared. Rowan stopped breathing as the air around them seemed suddenly charged with electricity. It couldn’t be. He despised her. And yet … this was what she’d felt that night. The night of their wedding. And countless nights over the months of her pregnancy. Nights of passion … white-hot consummation. The memories of which had become her fantasies.

In an instant he’d moved even closer, and one hand came off her shoulder to tip her chin upwards. To better see her face. Her neck seemed to be made of elastic as her head fell back.

‘I wonder …’

‘You wonder what …’ Rowan croaked out.

‘What tricks you’ve learnt in the past two years. For no doubt you’ve been busy becoming more experienced.’





CHAPTER FIVE


ISANDRO’S words didn’t make sense at first, and it was only when his mouth was dropping towards hers, his eyes closing, that she realised what he was doing. She felt her body sway towards him, helpless. The sensation of wanting this, wanting him to kiss her, was so overwhelming, so intense that she couldn’t help it.