Page 25 of Innocent's Wedding Day with the Italian

She should have been less inhibited and joined in with the body fluid swapping her party-loving university friends had indulged in. She might have struggled to remember the names of the faces she woke beside but at least she wouldn’t be holding on for dear life to stop hot tears from spilling at the monumental mistake she’d just made.

What she’d just experienced was more than in her wildest fantasies; not the things they’d done but the intensity of the feelings evoked in her. And, she suspected with a choked heart, evoked in Enzo.

But not the same ones. Whatever alchemy they’d just shared, for him it had been nothing but a chemical rush. When Rebecca left this villa, he would feel her absence only fleetingly. To miss someone, truly miss them, they had to have touched your soul. Enzo would not miss her. For him, this passion between them was nothing but a side effect of the game he’d been playing all these months.

The game had been played without Rebecca’s knowledge, but it had been everything to her. He’d been everything to her.

He still was, and she had to swallow hard to stem the tears as the impossibility of her love punched through her with the strength of a heavyweight’s blow.

Making love with him hadn’t purged her of anything. It had made everything worse, and now she had to double the strength needed to walk away as the emotions raging in her choked heart felt fit to burst. Because only now did it hit her, fully hit her, that it wasn’t just the tools to mend her shattered heart she needed to find but the tools to navigate her life without him.

The only positive she could find to cling to was that her insanity wouldn’t result in a pregnancy, but even that positive lasted only a flicker as it set off another pang of loss. Rebecca had gone on the pill a few months ago. They’d both agreed the first year of their marriage would be just for the two of them and then they’d start trying for a baby.

There would be no baby now. Not for them. Never for her. Not now.

Enzo slowly turned his face and kissed the top of her ear. ‘Say something,’ he murmured.

Unable to speak, she pressed her mouth even tighter into his neck and shook her head.

Carefully, he shifted his weight off her, rolling onto his back, taking her with him so she was cuddled onto him, her cheek on his upper chest, his chin resting on the top of her head.

One arm tight around her, he caught her hand and threaded their fingers together. ‘Did I hurt you?’

She couldn’t stop herself from squeezing his fingers. ‘No.’ Her voice was barely audible.

There had been no pain. Only bliss. Any pain in the aftermath was entirely her own fault.

He pressed his mouth into the top of her head and kept it there.

She wished he could keep it there for ever.

So many wishes. None of which could come true.

The silence stretched until he quietly said, ‘Tell me what you’re thinking.’

Her answer came without any thought. ‘That my parents’ marriage gave me completely unrealistic expectations.’

‘What makes you think that?’

Rebecca laughed morosely and finally made herself move, slipping her hand out of his hold and using his chest as a lever to sit herself up. Somehow they’d managed to end up on the other side of the bed to the pillows. She was certain there was a kind of symbolism in this but was too heartsick to think what it could be.

The silk bedsheets were all unravelled and she pulled at them to cover herself, holding them across her breasts and shuffling so her back was to the pillows.

Now facing him, she met Enzo’s stare and the longing that ripped through her to throw herself back on him and be held tightly to him, skin on skin, had her gripping the sheets with all her strength. ‘Their marriage was happy.’

He hooked an arm behind his head as a prop, his magnificent, naked body stretching with the motion. It had been barely a minute since she’d moved away from him but already she felt bereft without the comfort of his touch, and, as hard as she tried, she couldn’t stop herself from gazing at him.

‘Is happiness in a marriage unrealistic?’ he asked.

Less than a day ago she would have said no. What she’d felt in her heart and believed Enzo felt in his heart had convinced her a lifetime of happiness was theirs for the taking.

‘The level of happiness they shared is.’ She’d been a fool to think she could have it too. ‘They were just so wrapped up in each other. Sometimes I felt like a third wheel.’ Not sure where this admission had come from, she leaned forwards and gripped her calves. ‘Did my grandfather tell you he tried to pay my dad off?’

‘Yes.’

That made her eyebrows rise. Who would actually admit doing something like that? ‘Was he ashamed of that?’

‘No. He never stopped believing your father was bad for your mother.’

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