Page 2 of The Italian's Pregnant Enemy (A Diamond in the Rough)

But then, her father had always treated Dario like a god. Or perhaps just the son he’d always wanted and never had.

But seriously, he was. Her mom died before her parents could have more kids, and had left this space that contained so many possibilities and no answers. Her dad had been lost in grief, unable to parent, unable to handle Lyssia’s emotions and by the time he emerged...

Dario had appeared. Tall and bronze and eminently golden from the inside out.

Lyssia had been keenly away of Dario as competition from the time she was twelve years old. He’d been a grown man and she’d been...jealous of him. Not even mentioning that his dark gaze had always made her feel like something had gone haywire inside of her.

That was how she’d thought of it then. It was how she thought of it now.

The problem was, Lyssia tried. It was only that she wasn’t Dario, so what could she do?

Dario might be like a son to her father, but he wasn’t like a brother to her. Granted, she did delight in irritating, infuriating and otherwise refusing to be impressed by him. Dario seemed to pride himself on his people management skills. Consequentially, Lyssia refused to be manageable when in his presence.

She’d watched Dario work a room—many times. He was excellent at reading people and figuring out exactly how to behave with them. Lyssia refused to be known. When he looked at her with his cool, dark eyes, she responded with fire. When he treated her to dry, scathing commentary, she responded with spiky words and a placid expression. She knew Dario couldn’t tell if she was toying with him, if she was incompetent or an airhead.

When she’d interned at Anderson after she graduated high school she’d been installed as Dario’s assistant when he was present at the office and she had absolutely delighted in acting the most unserious person imaginable, much to his irritation.

Of course, in hindsight she could see that hadn’t done her many favors.

Act unserious long enough and people believed it.

She wasn’t unserious.

She sniffed against the wind—her nose was running—and looked out at the snow, trying to see if there was a vehicle coming for her yet. It was clear and pristine out there. The sky was blue, but there was a band of dark gray clouds looming over the mountains that looked portentous.

Finally, a sleek, black Land Rover pulled up to the curb and Lyssia got inside, her stomach tightening. Carter would be at the chalet she was staying in.

The driver loaded her bags into the back and Lyssia thanked him, even though she could barely hear her voice over the sound of her heart pounding in her head.

She wondered if Carter was expecting this? For her to say it was time for them to take things to the next level. They’d kissed. Like, twice but still. But she wasn’t achild. And no, she didn’t have a lot of physical experience with men, but she was sophisticated enough to know no one wasmaking outthese days and ending it there.

People were sex positive and liberated. And she was also those things, she had just never been positive she wanted to have sex with anyone, so she hadn’t done it. Which was liberation in and of itself, wasn’t it?

She wanted to have sex with Carter, though. He made her feel warm and happy, and seen, and wasn’t that the thing that was worth waiting for? She thought it might be.

The truth was, he made her feel happy. He made her feel good about herself. That was what she wanted. Someone who made her feel good.

There were just so many hard things. Carter felt easy.

She had been so tempted to text him the whole day but then she’d kept reminding herself to try and be cool. To try and just let it happen. It was very hard to be cool.

As the chalet came into view, her palms got sweaty. Great. No one wanted to be seduced by a woman with sweaty palms. Only then did she think perhaps she should take her mittens off.

But then they stopped and she knew she’d be headed outside again, so the mittens stayed on.

She got out of the car, and the driver handled her bags, bringing them up to the front of the chalet.

Pure adrenaline spiked in her veins. She was going to do it. She wouldn’t even wait for it to get dark. That’s how sex positive she was.

She went through the door of the chalet, expecting to see Carter there with his laptop. But he wasn’t in the grand living area. Nor did he have anything set up in the kitchen. No milk frother. No French press. He kept both on his desk back in Manhattan.

Well, then she could go and take her clothes off. Strip down to her underwear...greet him that way when he arrived.

She laughed out loud in the empty house. No. That was her hard limit.

Still the thought made her feel edgy and a bit...aroused. She didn’t hate that.

She went back to the front of the chalet and dragged her bags inside, then began to try and ferret them up the stairs.

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