PROLOGUE

      ORLA O’REILLY BLEW her nose and swallowed back a breath, trying her hardest to stop fresh tears falling down her sodden cheeks. She didn’t want people to see her like this.

      She’d flown to Sicily ten days ago on a mission to meet the man her mother had always unkindly referred to as ‘Orla’s sperm donor’. Only now did she understand her mother had actually been diplomatic.

      Her father, who’d returned from his travels that morning, had refused to see her. He had no curiosity about his twenty-three-year-old daughter. No curiosity at all.

      She hadn’t expected a grand reunion or anything but his outright rejection…

      It hurt. Really, really hurt. Now all she wanted was Tonino’s strong arms holding her tightly and his breath whispering into her hair that everything would be okay.

      At least something good had come from her time in Sicily. She’d met the man of her dreams.

      Ten days ago she’d taken one look at her room in the budget hotel she’d checked into and gone back to the reception. Orla was not one for complaining but the state of it would have driven a saint to boiling point. The bed sheets were stained and crumpled, the carpet sticky under her feet and the bathroom…well, the less said about that, the better.

      She’d stood at that reception desk for exactly six minutes before a tall, imposing figure had appeared from a door marked Privato and Orla had found herself