Having made the decision to try and speak to Sergio, she had arranged for her neighbour to babysit Nico before she had caught the Tube to Bayswater. She half-expected the concierge to ask the reason for her visit but the reception area was busy and she walked past the front desk without anyone seeming to notice her. There was a good chance that Sergio would refuse to see her and so it seemed better to surprise him. The newspaper article had mentioned that he was staying in his private penthouse suite. As the lift whisked Kristen smoothly towards the top floor she could feel her heart beating painfully fast beneath her ribs.
It was a crazy idea to have come here, whispered a voice inside her head. Even if she managed to find Sergio, the prospect of telling him he had a son was daunting. She felt sick with nerves and when the lift doors opened she was tempted to remain inside and press the button for the ground floor. Only the memory of Nico’s excitement when she had promised to take him on holiday hardened her resolve to ask for financial help from Sergio.
She walked along numerous grey-carpeted corridors with a growing sense of despair that she did not have a clue where his private suite might be. Turning down another corridor, she was confronted with a set of double doors and a sign on the wall announced that she was outside the Princess Elizabeth Function Room.
A waiter emerged from a side door and, catching sight of Kristen, he thrust a tray filled with glasses into her hands. ‘Don’t just stand there,’ he said, sounding harassed. ‘They’re about to make a toast and some of the guests are still waiting for champagne.’
‘Oh, I’m not...’ she began to explain, but the waiter wasn’t listening as he opened the doors and practically pushed her into the room.
‘Hurry up. Mr Castellano is not happy that the party is running late.’
‘But...’ Kristen’s voice trailed off as the waiter hurried away. Glancing around the enormous function room, she realised that her outfit was almost identical to the waitresses’ uniform and it was easy to understand how she had been mistaken for a member of staff.
But at least she had found Sergio.
Her heart lurched as her eyes were drawn to the man at the far end of the room. His almost-black hair gleamed like raw silk beneath the blazing lights of the chandeliers. Taller than everyone circled around him and a hundred times more devastatingly handsome than the photo in the newspaper, it was not just his physical attributes that made him stand out from the crowd. Even from a distance, Kristen was conscious of his aura of power and charisma that made all other men seem diminished.
With his stunning looks, huge fortune and blatant virility, Sergio Castellano captured the attention of every woman in the room. But, although he smiled and exuded effortless charm, Kristen sensed a restless air about him. His dark eyes flicked around the room as if he was searching for someone. She caught her breath. He could not possibly know she was here, she reminded herself. And yet in Sicily their awareness of each other had been so acute that they had sensed each other’s presence across a crowded room, she remembered.
She watched a woman walk up to him and recognised her as the woman from the paper, Lady Felicity something-or-other. The woman he was planning to marry. The sensation of a knife-blade being thrust between her ribs made Kristen catch her breath. Four years ago Sergio had broken her heart but after all this time she had not anticipated that seeing him again would be so agonising.
He stepped onto a raised platform where a microphone had been set up. Kristen guessed he was about to announce his engagement to Felicity and she was unprepared for the violent feeling of possessiveness that swept through her. For years she had tried to forget Sergio because she had believed he was married to his Sicilian bride. But here he was, about to reveal his plans to marry another woman, while she was struggling to bring up his son on her own.