Escape for Easter: The Brunelli Baby Bargain / The Italian Boss's Secret Child / The Midwife's Miracle Baby. Trish Morey

he couldn’t.

      Again things hurt inside as she felt an unwelcome wave of empathic pain for his loss. She had already worked out that sympathy would only make him more pigheadedly uncooperative so she kept her tone flat as she admitted, ‘But I’m going to clean and dress that wound whether you like it or not.’

      ‘Bearded…?’

      She almost wanted to smile as he lifted a hand to his face and looked surprised as his fingers slid across the stubble on his hard jawline. It was ironic really—there were numerous men out there who carefully nurtured their designer stubble in an effort to achieve exactly the look of dark, dangerous dissipation this man had without trying.

      ‘Call me selfish, but it would be bad for business if you went home feet first, and the estate is just about the only employer around here.’

      ‘So you wish to tend my wounds because it would affect the local economy, not because you are a ministering angel.’

      His amused sneer made her see red. ‘If bloody-minded aggression and nastiness is a defence mechanism meant to keep the world at a distance, I have to tell you it works.’

      A look of complete astonishment replaced the sneer. Then he threw her totally. The grin that revealed his even white teeth and some gorgeous crinkly lines around his eyes also ironed out the engrained lines of cynicism around his mouth.

      The breath snagged in her throat as she stared at the transformation. Mercy, he’s gorgeous!

      Then he completed the transformation by throwing back his head and laughing. The uninhibited sound was deep, warm and attractive.

      ‘You have quite a tongue on you.’

      There was no mistaking the reluctant admiration in his voice. Sam found it more disturbing than his hostility. Brows knitted in consternation, she backed out of the door, unaware until she was in the open air that she had been holding her breath.

      CHAPTER FIVE

      THE first spatters of rain were falling from the already darkening sky as Sam ran towards the Land Rover to get the first-aid kit. She hoped the storm would hold off until she got back to Home Farm. A childhood incident had left her with an irrational fear of thunder, and heavy rain made the road back with its hairpin bends and dramatic drops a nightmare.

      She was briefly tempted to get in and drive away, and delegate the task of helping this ungrateful man to someone else. But not going back in would have been admitting she was afraid of feeling whatever it was this stranger had churned up.

      The kitchen, with its inglenook fireplace and flagged floor, was as big as a barn, but despite this Sam felt as if the stone walls were closing in on her as she stepped back inside. The stranger had a way of making any space seem confined.

      ‘Would you like to sit down?’ she asked. It was an invitation that Sam wouldn’t have minded accepting herself—her knees had the consistency of cotton wool as she approached him.

      His expression was surly as he held out his arm towards her, peeled off the towel and snapped, ‘Dio mio, woman, just get on with it if you must.’

      ‘Is this the Italian charm I’ve heard so much about?’ Her voice faded when she saw the edges of the gaping wound he had exposed on his palm. ‘You really need to see a doctor. It might need suturing…’

      ‘What I need is peace and quiet, so either put on a Band-Aid or go.’

      Sam sighed reading the note of finality of his pronouncement. She didn’t have to be psychic to see he wasn’t a man who would recognise compromise if it hit him on his rather perfect nose.

      She took his wrist and held his hand over the Belfast sink as she cleaned the area with antiseptic from the first-aid kit.

      He accepted her ministrations in silence punctuated only by the rain that began to lash against the window.

      The storm and the heaviness in the air probably accounted for ninety per cent of the weird tension that held her in its grip.

      ‘The storm is coming.’

      Almost before the words were out of her mouth lightning flashed, filling the room with white. Sam tensed.

      The storm was here.

      ‘What’s wrong?’

      ‘Nothing…lightning. I’m not keen on storms.’ In the distance Sam could hear the dull roll of thunder and he obviously did too.

      ‘It’s quite close.’

      ‘I’d worked that out for myself,’ she said crankily, keeping her head bent over his hand. ‘Sorry if this is hurting.’ She attached the final strip of tape to the bandage. ‘Done.’ She angled a questioning look at his face. She was pretty sure what his response would be, but she felt obliged to ask anyway. ‘Would you like me to call someone for you?’

      ‘I would like—’

      At that moment there was a bang so loud that Sam shrieked and leapt as though shot. She saw the contents of the first-aid box hit the floor and a second later she couldn’t see anything at all—the lights went out and the room was plunged into inky darkness.

      ‘Calm down, woman, it’s only a bit of thunder.’

      Despite the irritation in his voice she supposed the hand that fell on her shoulder was meant to offer comfort.

      ‘The lights have gone out,’ she said.

      His face had separated itself out from the darkness, a more solid shadow, but she could not make out any details of his features as he responded in a voice wiped clean of all expression.

      ‘They went out for me five weeks ago.’

      Only five weeks! Her eyes widened in shock and for a moment she was not conscious of the storm.

      ‘Was it gradual or…?’

      The fingers on her arm tightened. ‘You mean did I have time to practise with my white cane and learn Braille? No, I didn’t. It was the side effect of surgery following an accident. But let’s look on the bright side—I’m the man you want around when the lights go out. And are you scared of the dark, my ministering angel?’

      ‘Are you?’ She reached out for his face, trailing her fingers down strong contours, trying to translate the tactile messages into an image…was this how he saw?

      Did he live with a fear of the blackness he now faced every day? The thought of his dark world made something twist hard inside Sam. She reached up and grabbed his head, drawing his mouth to hers and pressing her lips against his. She kissed him with a ferocity born of, not just lust, but sharp, sweet tenderness.

      He did not react. There was the space of several heartbeats, during which she wanted the floor to open up and swallow her, before he responded, kissing her back with the wild desperation of a starving man.

      ‘Sometimes,’ she heard herself admit when the kiss ended and she was standing there shaking, ‘I’m scared of just about everything.’ But nothing in her life so far made her as scared as the rush of primal need she felt in the arms of this total stranger.

      ‘You hide it well.’

      She couldn’t hide her response when his hand slid under her top, his long fingers skating over the hot skin of her back. She didn’t actually try.

      And when he bent his dark head and fitted his mouth to hers, parting her lips with his tongue, she met it with her own. As his mouth lifted a fractured moan escaped past the emotional thickening in Sam’s aching throat. Then she could feel his breath warm against her neck, stirring the downy hairs on her cheek as he took her face between his hands and ran his thumbs across the trembling outline of her lips, swollen from his hungry kisses.

      ‘Dio Mio, it’s been a long time,’ he slurred thickly.

      Sam was shaking