Page 12 of The Italian's Marriage Bargain

‘Oh, come on, Luca. From the performance you put on this morning, even with my limited experience I’m quite sure that you haven’t been saving yourself for marriage.’

‘We’re talking about you, Felice.’

‘So it’s different for men?’ She gave a disbelieving laugh. ‘I was right when I said you were a sexist. Don’t worry, Luca, I don’t expect you to follow up the morning’s events with a proposal. My father’s not going to ride up with a shotgun and shoot you at dawn.’

‘Don’t you see that this is something you should have shared? You should have told me,’ he shouted, but his anger only riled her further.

‘You make it sound as if I had some terrible disease,’ Felicity responded hotly. How dared he treat her like this? How dared he turn something so beautiful into something so sordid. ‘You make it sound as if I’ve tricked you into you sleeping with me. For God’s sake, Luca, you’re overreacting!’

‘No.’ He shook his head firmly, proudly, even, as if she were the mad one! As if it was Felicity who had jumped off the bed in a furious rage for no apparent reason. ‘I should have been told that you were…’ His voice trailed off, as if he couldn’t even bear to say the word, but Felicity had been quiet long enough, and she jumped out of the bed, facing his fury head-on.

‘A virgin! You are allowed to say it, Luca.’

‘Then why the hell didn’t you? Why did you let me make love to you and not even think to tell me?’ His lips sneered around each and every word as he practically spat them out. ‘Did it not for one minute enter your head that I might want to know? When I lay you down on that bed, when I undressed you, kissed you, held you, did you not even think to tell me that this was your first time, that I was taking your, your…?’ Angry fingers were clicking now, only abating when his word of choice finally made itself known. ‘Your womanhood?’

Denial surged forth, but the truth beat her to it, and a nervous swallow drowned her lie as Felicity’s solemn eyes met his. ‘It did enter my head,’ she admitted slowly.

‘Then why didn’t you say something?’ he demanded ‘Why didn’t you tell me?’

‘Because I didn’t want you to stop.’ The raw sincerity in her voice reached him, the painful honesty quelling some of his fury, and he stood there in defeated silence as she slowly continued. ‘Luca, I wasn’t tricking you. Yes, perhaps I should have told you that I’d never slept with anyone before, but the simple truth is that I didn’t want you to stop, and maybe deep down I knew that if I told you you would have.’

For an age he stared at her, for an age he didn’t answer, but when finally he spoke his words were gentler, the anger gone. The Luca she almost knew was back now—a touch sulkier, perhaps, definitely moodier, but infinitely more desirable.

‘I wouldn’t have stopped,’ he said slowly, ‘because I don’t think I could have.’ Sitting down on the edge of the bed, he ran a hand through his jet hair, then over his dark unshaven chin, and let out a long ravaged sigh.

‘I wasn’t trying to trap you,’ Felicity said, tentatively joining him.

‘I know,’ Luca conceded.

‘And I know I’ve got nothing to compare it with, but I’d say as far as first times go it was pretty amazing.’

‘Even for a self-confessed unromantic?’ Luca checked, a small smile softening his taut lips.

‘Luca, I haven’t been saving myself for marriage—well, not deliberately anyway. The line I spun Matthew was just that—a line. The truth is, between my studies and Joseph’s ill health there really hasn’t been much time for relationships. I can’t believe I’m discussing this!’ She swallowed hard as he turned to face her. Her anger had gone now, and all she felt was embarrassed and shy and utterly unable to look at him. Burying her scorching face in her hands, she kept them clamped there despite his efforts to prise them away. ‘I’m so embarrassed.’

‘But why?’ he asked, perplexed. ‘It is me who should be feeling shame.’

‘I don’t feel shame.’ Behind her hands, she couldn’t see him, and somehow away from his penetrating gaze it made things easier—easier to be honest, easier to say what she was really feeling. ‘Embarrassment and shame are two different things, Luca. I’m embarrassed because…’ Suddenly she felt like clicking her own fingers, attempting to summon a word, but instead she cringed as she forced herself to continue. ‘I’m a twenty-six-year-old virgin.’ She let out a wry laugh. ‘Or at least until this morning I was.’

‘And my overreaction to the news helped, I’m sure.’

A smile he couldn’t see ghosted across her lips, and he saw her shoulders relax slightly, a tumble of blonde curls fall over her forehead, and chose that moment to gently prise her fingers away.

‘Surely the very fact that you waited meant that you wanted to be sure, that you wanted it to be right…?’

‘And it was.’ Her eyes found his then, only this time she didn’t jerk them away. What she had to say was too important to hide away from. ‘Luca this morning was everything I could have dreamed of and more. Look at this—’ she gestured at the room, the vast bed, the elegant surroundings, then her hand came back to his face, tracing his cheekbone with one long slender finger ‘—and look at you. You made me feel beautiful. You made me feel more like a woman than I’ve ever felt in my life. Our lovemaking was something I’m never going to forget and it’s certainly not something I’m going to regret.’

An impish smile spread across her face. ‘There is a down side to that, though. You’ve probably ruined my love-life for ever; I doubt anyone will ever match up to you, Luca. I’m probably destined to spend the next fifty years or so comparing everything to this one delicious morning and wondering why it doesn’t measure up!’

He knew she was joking, knew she was just trying to lighten the mood, but his mind was working overtime. The knowledge that this gorgeous parcel of femininity, this warm, sweet body, was uncharted territory he alone had explored was almost more than he could comprehend. But hearing her speak of the future, imagining another man touching her, loving her, going where only he had been, fired something inside him, something black and churning. To a man who had everything it was so painfully unfamiliar it took a moment or two to register that the emotion assailing him now was jealousy.

‘I cannot just walk away, Felice.’

‘Then don’t.’ She was back in businesswoman mode now—back in control, back where she belonged. Pulling on the robe, she shot him a smile as she fastened the belt, flicking her hair from the collar till it tumbled in a golden curtain around her shoulders. ‘If you really want to make this morning count all I ask is that you don’t forget all about my father when you go back to Rome.’

‘I will not let you down, Felice. I am a man of my word.’

‘I hope so,’ she said softly, heading for the phone again. ‘This time I really am going, Luca—and if my dress isn’t ready I’ll go down and fetch it myself.’

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