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in view of what she’d found out since.
He muttered something under his breath in Italian and raked long fingers thought his glossy dark hair. ‘Tia, I have already admitted that my reaction was less than perfect—’
‘Understatement,’ Tia muttered. ‘Major understatement.’
A muscle worked in his jaw. ‘I think we both need to calm down and then start this conversation again.’
‘No.’ She shook her head vigorously, desperate to get rid of him. Being so close to him eroded her will-power. ‘There’s nothing more to be said. This isn’t about the baby, Luca, it’s about us. You and I. And the fact that our hormones got tangled with our common sense.’
Nausea washed over her and she lifted a hand to her mouth. Oh, help! She was going to be sick again. She was sure of it.
Luca frowned sharply and his long, strong fingers curled into her shoulders. ‘What’s the matter? Are you ill?’
‘No,’ she lied, steadying her stomach with a few deep breaths. ‘I’m just not enjoying this conversation. I want you to acknowledge that we both made a mistake so that we can move on.’
His hands dropped from her shoulders and his face might have been carved from stone. ‘We’re having a baby, Tia. It’s too late to talk about making mistakes. We need to plan for the future.’
‘Luca, we don’t have a future,’ she said firmly, genuinely amazed that he’d even suggest such a thing. But it was because of the baby, of course. Whatever his initial reaction had been, he’d clearly decided that responsibility should come before personal happiness. ‘If a relationship isn’t right without a baby then it certainly won’t be right with a baby. We’re totally wrong for each other. Discovering that I’m pregnant doesn’t change that. I understand that you’re upset because I left you at the altar, but—’
‘I don’t care about that,’ Luca said dismissively. ‘That is in the past, but the baby is in the future and our future is together.’
Tia stared at him. Sharon was obviously right. Luca Zattoni was a traditional Italian male to the core.
He might have been shocked originally, but the concept of family and children was so important to Italians that she should have guessed that, once he’d had time to think about it, there was no way that Luca would just dismiss the fact that she was pregnant.
‘I am not going back to Italy with you, Luca.’
‘You still haven’t told me why you left Italy in the first place,’ he said through gritted teeth. ‘I can’t believe that you changed your mind at the last minute. If you had doubts, why didn’t you discuss them with me? Dio, I went up to your room and found everything gone. How did you think I felt?’
Remembering just what had made her leave in such a hurry, she looked at him without sympathy. ‘I expect it damaged your ego.’
He muttered under his breath and gave her an impatient glance. ‘Tia, I left the need to protect my ego behind in childhood, but I would be less than human if the unexplained disappearance of my bride-to-be—my pregnant bride to be—didn’t disconcert me somewhat.’
‘I thought you’d be pleased that I’d gone,’ she mumbled, rubbing her toe on the kitchen floor and refusing to look at him. Having him so close was unsettling to say the least. She couldn’t look at the man without remembering how they’d been together…
‘I wasn’t pleased,’ he said softly, his Italian accent suddenly very pronounced as he accentuated every syllable.
She lifted her chin, her expression defiant. ‘If you missed me so badly, if you were really that worried, why didn’t you follow me straight away?’
He tensed and hesitated for only the briefest moment. ‘There were complications,’ he muttered finally. ‘Things I needed to sort out.’
Luisa.
Tia turned away, hiding her hurt, but knowing that she’d done the right thing not to marry him. She didn’t want to be anyone’s second choice.
‘You haven’t told me why you changed your mind.’
‘I—I had second thoughts,’ she said honestly, flicking her hair back and looking him straight in the eye. ‘I suddenly realised that there were so many things I didn’t know about you.’
Luca frowned. ‘Like what?’
Flustered, Tia avoided his question. ‘I don’t know, but it was all so fast and I don’t think you should get married without knowing everything there is to know about the person you’re marrying—’
‘Tia there are always things about another person that stays hidden,’ he said, and she shook her head.
‘Not when you’ve known each other for a long time. When people have known each other for a long time they’re as familiar as old socks.’
He lifted an eyebrow and looked at her incredulously. ‘Dio. That is your idea of a stimulating relationship? To live with someone who is like a sock?’
‘I’m just trying to say—’
‘It’s all right—I think know what you’re trying to say.’ He let out a long breath and shook his head slowly. ‘Tia, the length of a relationship is not always an indication of its depth.’
His voice was suddenly quiet and her heart suddenly missed a beat.
Was he going to tell her about Luisa?
Luca’s jaw clenched. ‘It’s true that our relationship moved quickly and was very intense—’
Intense?
That had to be the understatement of the year.
She’d been so totally overwhelmed by what had been happening between them that she hadn’t bothered to think about the future.
‘But we weren’t suited, Luca.’
‘No? If my memory serves me correctly, we were never able to look at each other without needing to rip each other’s clothes off,’ he drawled softly. ‘I wouldn’t exactly describe that as “not suited”, would you? You were in my bed the same night we met.’
His blunt reminder of just how quickly they’d become intimate brought a flood of colour to her cheeks and Tia closed her eyes. He was right, of course. The physical chemistry between them had been frighteningly powerful. It had completely swamped her common sense, what little she’d had, and it had clearly taken his mind off his troubles with Luisa.
‘There’s more to a relationship than good sex, Luca,’ she said quietly, dragging her eyes away from his penetrating gaze and trying to regain some semblance of control.
The mere brush of those long, strong fingers against her flesh made her tremble and she struggled to hide it from him.
Dear God, why couldn’t she just tell him the truth? That she knew he’d met her when his other relationship had been in trouble. That she knew he was in love with another woman.
He was watching her closely. ‘You think our relationship was just about sex?’
For her, no, but for him?
‘We’re different, Luca,’ she said finally. ‘I—I didn’t realise how different until we lived together in Milan. Perhaps if I’d had a job…’
The temperature in the room dropped below zero.
‘There was no reason for you to work.’ His jaw tightened and his expression was grim. ‘I gave you credit cards—you weren’t short of money.’
That was true enough. The Zattoni family were obviously extremely wealthy. She’d never had access to so much money in her life. But she didn’t really care about money.
‘It isn’t about money, Luca,’ Tia declared