Innocent's Secret Baby(13)

‘Raul...’ Her voice was breathless, but she should say it now—she was trying to.

‘You talk too much.’

She had said two words and both had been his name. She went to point that out but lost her thought processes as his head went down between her legs and she lay holding her breath and nervously awaiting his intimate touch.

He kissed her exactly as he had the first time.

Raul’s mouth lightly pressed there, and then there was the tease of his tongue. Slowly at first, as Lydia had been slow, for he thought she had been teasing him at the time.

‘Please...’ Lydia said, not sure if she was asking to speak, asking him to slow down or asking for more.

His jaw was rough, his mouth soft and his tongue probing. It was sublime.

His mouth worked on and she started to moan.

His tongue urged her on.

Lydia’s thighs were shaking and she fought to stay silent. And then she gave in, and he moaned in pleasure as she orgasmed. He kissed her and swallowed as she pulsed against his lips.

And then he left them.

She was heated and twitching, breathless and giddy and perfectly done as he moved over her and crushed her tense lips with his moist ones. His thigh moved between her legs and splayed her, and even coming down from a high, with the feel of him nudging and the energy of him, Lydia knew this would hurt.

‘Slowly,’ she said, but her words were muffled, so she turned her head. ‘I’ve never—’

He was about to aim for hard, fast and deep, when he heard those two words that were so unexpected.

‘Slowly,’ she said again.

He could do that.

An unseen smile stretched his lips at the thought of taking her first, practically beneath Bastiano’s nose. And then the thought of taking her first made his ardour grow.

But then, just when bliss appeared on the menu, the stars seemed to collect and become one that shone too bright. And, like a headmaster grabbing an errant student by the shoulder, he suddenly hauled himself back from the edge.

Everything went still.

All the delicious sensations, gathering tight, slowly loosened as his weight came down on her rather than within her.

And then he rolled off and onto his back and lay breathless, unsated, both turned on and angry.

He told her why. ‘I don’t do virgins.’

There was so much she could protest at about that statement.

Do?

And her response was tart, to cover up her disappointment and, yes, her embarrassment that he had brought things to a very shuddering halt.

‘What, only experienced applicants need apply?’

‘Don’t you get it?’ He ripped off the condom and tossed it aside, and ached to finish the job. ‘There’s nothing to apply for, Lydia. I like one-night stands. I like to get up in the morning and have coffee and then go about my day. It’s sex. That’s it. There are no vacant positions waiting to be filled in my life.’

‘I wasn’t expecting anything more.’

‘You say that now.’

And now Raul sulked.

He had heard it so many times before.

Raul didn’t do virgins, and with good reason—because even the most seasoned of his lovers tended to ask for more than he was prepared to give.

‘I mean it,’ Lydia insisted.

‘Do you know what, Lydia? If you’ve waited till you’re twenty-four I’m guessing there’s a reason.’

There was—she’d hardly had men beating down the door.

But a small voice was telling her that Raul, as arrogant as his words were, was actually right—making love would change things for her.

Then again, since she had met Raul everything had already changed.

‘Go to sleep,’ he said.

‘I can’t.’

‘Yes, Lydia, you can.’

His voice was sulky, and she didn’t know what he meant, but as she lay there Lydia started to understand.

She felt a little as if she was floating.

All the events of the night were dancing before her eyes, and she could watch them unfold without feeling—except for one.

‘What happened to your back?’

Her voice came from that place just before she fell asleep. Raul knew that.

Yet he wished she had not asked.

Lydia had not asked about one scar but about his whole back.

He did not want to think about that.

But now he was starting to.




CHAPTER SIX

‘IT’S YOUR MOTHER’S FUNERAL,’ the priest admonished, but only once Raul had been safely cuffed and led away.

Raul and Bastiano, the police decided, should not be in the same building, so Raul was taken to the jailhouse to cool down and Bastiano was cuffed to a stretcher and taken to the valley’s small hospital.

A towel covered Raul’s injury, and he sat in a cell until a doctor came to check on him.

Raul loathed anyone seeing his back, due to the scars his father had put there, but thankfully the doctor didn’t comment on them. He took one look at the gaping wound and shook his head.

‘This is too big to repair under a local,’ the doctor informed him. ‘I’ll tell the guards to arrange your transfer to the hospital.’

‘Is Bastiano still there?’ Raul asked, and the doctor nodded. ‘Then you’ll do it here.’

The thought of being in the same building as Bastiano tonight was not one he relished, and a hospital was no place for his current mood.

‘It’s going to hurt,’ the doctor warned.

But Raul already did.

The closure of the wound took ages.

He felt the fizz and sear of the peroxide as it bubbled its way through raw flesh, and then came the jab of the doctor’s fingers as he explored it.

‘I really think...’ the doctor started, but Raul did not change his stance.

‘Just close it.’

Deep catgut sutures closed the muscles and then thick silk finally drew together the skin.

He was written up for some painkillers to be taken throughout the night when required, but he did not bother to ask the guards for them.

Nothing could dim the pain.

It was not the wounds of the flesh that caused agony, more the memories and regret.

He should have known what was going on.

His mother’s more cheerful disposition on his last visit was because she’d had a lover. Raul knew that now.

And there was guilt too—tangible guilt—because she had called him on the morning she had died and Raul had not picked up.

Instead he had been deep in oblivion with some no-name woman and had chosen not to take the call.

Raul lay on the hard, narrow bed and stared at the ceiling through the longest night of his life.

There would be many more to come.

Light came in through the barred windows and he heard a drunk who had sung the night through being processed and released.

And then another.

Raul was in no rush for his turn.

‘Hey.’

The heavy door opened and a police officer brought him coffee. He was familiar.

Marco.

They had been at school together.

‘For what it’s worth, I’m on your side,’ Marco told Raul as he handed him a coffee. ‘Bastiano’s a snake. I wish they had let you finish the job.’

Raul said nothing—just accepted the coffee.

God, but he hated the valley. There was corruption at every turn. If memory served him correctly, and it usually did, Bastiano had slept with the young woman who was now Marco’s fiancée.

Just after nine Raul signed the papers for his release and Marco handed him his tie and belt, which Raul pocketed.

‘Smarten up,’ Marco warned him. ‘You are to be at the courthouse by ten.’

Raul put on his belt and tucked in his shirt somewhat but gave up by the time he got to his tie. One look in the small washroom mirror and he knew it was pointless. His eyes were bruised purple, his lips swollen, his hair matted with blood and he needed to shave.

Groggy, his head pounding, Raul stepped out onto the street into a cruelly bright day and walked the short distance to the courthouse. Raul assumed he was there to be formally charged, but instead he found out it was for the reading of Maria Di Savo’s last will and testament.

His father, Gino, was there for that, of course. And he sat gloating, because he knew that apart from the very few trinkets he had given her in earlier years everything Maria had had was his.

Raul just wanted it over and done with, and then he would get the hell out.

He was done with Casta for good.

But then, for the second time in less than twenty-four hours, the man he hated most in the world appeared—again at the most inappropriate time.

‘What the hell is he doing here?’

It was Gino who rose in angry response as an equally battered Bastiano took a seat on a bench. His face had been sutured and a jagged scar ran the length of his now purple cheek. Clearly he had just come from the hospital, for he was still wearing yesterday’s suit.

And then the judge commenced the reading of the will.

This was a mere formality, and Raul simply hoped he might get the crucifix Maria had always worn.

That wish came true, for he was handed a slim envelope and the simple cross and chain fell onto his palm.

But then out slid a ring.

It was exquisite—far more elaborate than anything his mother had owned—rose gold with an emerald stone, it was dotted with tiny seed pearls and it felt heavy in his palm. Raul picked it up between finger and thumb and tried to place it, yet he could not remember his mother wearing it.

He was distracted from examining the ring when the judge spoke again.

‘Testamona Segreto.’

Even the rather bored court personnel stood to attention, as suddenly there was an unexpected turn in the formalities.