Page 45 of Italian Baby Shock

The feeling that had wound itself around her heart and made itself part of her.

He’d made good on every single promise he’d given her and since that night where they’d talked outside Maya’s room, he’d never given her a single moment’s doubt either.

He made her so happy.

He was beautiful inside and out.

Lark’s vision swam and her throat tightened as she felt that feeling grow bigger, taking up every part of her, making it hard to breathe.

It was love. She knew it with every cell of her being.

Somehow, at some point in the past few months, she’d committed a cardinal sin and fallen in love with her husband.

She turned away, her heart beating far too hard, furiously blinking away her tears.

Love had never been what she wanted—had never been what either of them wanted—and yet it had happened all the same.

He accepted all the passionate feelings that lived inside her that she’d had to keep under control for her mother’s sake, and had never turned away from them, not once. He even liked her anger as he’d told her on more than one occasion.

And all through these difficult months of starting a new life in a new country, he’d been there supporting her. Caring for her and her daughter, damn him.

Now she understood why she’d trusted him the night she had no memory of. Why she’d told him everything, why she’d givenherself to him. Perhaps she’d even fallen in love with him that night and now, here she was doing it all over again.

Now, it was all so clear.

He’d made himself so much a part of her life, she couldn’t imagine being without him.

He’d told her that all of this would be his new legacy, a new start for the Donati family, and that was what was important to him. Not Maya and not her. He kept insisting that he was selfish, that he wasn’t a good man, and yet everything he did proved the opposite.

She wanted to show him that. Show him what an incredible man he was and what a fantastic father he’d been, and make him believe it.

She wanted to make him as happy as he’d made her.

She wanted to love him. Yet that was the one thing he didn’t want.

So? What difference does it make? You have a life with him that’s already perfect, so why not keep things as they are?

Lark pushed herself away from the doorframe and stepped into the cool of the salon, trying to get a breath.

She desperately wanted to keep things as they were, but there had been rare occasions where he’d shut himself away in his study or left on a business trip and not asked her to join him. Moments where there were shadows in his blue eyes and a tension in his powerful shoulders. And it was in those moments that she wanted to ask him what was wrong, to help him the way he’d helped her. Soothe him. Love him. But whenever she asked about it, he’d brush it aside, change the subject or simply kiss her and distract her with pleasure.

He wouldn’t let her in and he never would. Because he’d told her right at the start of this marriage, and nothing had changed, not for him.

Yet everything had changed for her. Everything.

Your love wasn’t enough to make your mother happy. Why would it be enough for him?

Tears slid down her cheeks.

It would never be enough. His past was too dark, his wounds too deep. Some hurts couldn’t be healed with a smile and a good mood, and she knew that all too well.

She didn’t know what to do. Leaving him wasn’t an option. Cesare loved his daughter so much, and Maya loved him too, she saw it every day in her daughter’s eyes. Lark would never tear them apart by taking Maya from him, never.

Leaving without Maya also wasn’t an option. She couldn’t bear to leave her child. Her falling in love wasn’t Maya’s fault after all.

But she had to do something, protect herself somehow. Loving someone who didn’t want it was a terrible thing and she didn’t want the relationship she had with Cesare to break down because of her own hurt feelings.

Which left her with only one option. She had to tell Cesare that she couldn’t sleep with him any more, that she couldn’t be his wife, not in that way. Friendship was all she could do, and at the moment she wasn’t even sure she could do that.

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