The Italian's Baby of Passion: The Italian's Secret Baby / One-Night Baby / The Italian's Secret Child. Catherine Spencer

to tell you, Mr O’Hagan,’ Angie gushed, ‘those photos in Scarlet’s magazine didn’t do you justice.’ She turned to her friend for support. ‘Did they, Scarlet?’

      ‘Angie, I think it might be an idea if you got back to the story.’ Scarlet gave a significant nod towards the children. They were growing restive.

       God bless restive children.

      To her immense relief the distraction worked.

      ‘Timothy Jones, don’t pull Bethany’s hair!’ Angie exclaimed, wading in to calmly separate two small figures.

      ‘She pulled mine.’

      ‘Angie, if I could just see Sam for a minute.’

      ‘Sure thing, you go with your mum, Sam. Now, children, say goodbye to Mr O’Hagan and thank him for this lovely present. My, isn’t he just gorgeous?’ she exclaimed.

      Scarlet was pretty certain she wasn’t talking about the stuffed toy; she certainly wasn’t looking at it.

      Roman had a choice; he could tell the eager faces that the toy wasn’t for them or he could hand it over. He handed it over.

      Scarlet hid a smile as she tucked Sam’s hand in her own.

      ‘Don’t worry, Sam knows about sharing, don’t you, sweetheart?’

      Sam, who was looking with saucer-like eyes up at the tall man standing beside his mother, didn’t reply.

      ‘However, he doesn’t always like it,’ she admitted drily. ‘Say hello to Mr O’Hagan, Sam. He’s not normally so tongue-tied,’ she added, bending down to speak in her son’s ear. ‘Say hello to Mr O’Hagan, darling.’

      ‘Hello,’ Sam grunted, looking at his toes.

      Scarlet gave an affectionate sigh and ruffled his dark hair before standing up.

      ‘Hello there, Sam.’

      Scarlet happened to be looking at Roman O’Hagan at the moment Sam lifted his head—so nothing unusual there—but what she saw was unusual. Unusual and inexplicable. At least as far as she could see there was no immediately obvious reason why the colour would seep out of Roman’s face until his vibrant golden skin looked like marble. He stilled, the nerve that throbbed in the hollow of his lean cheek about the only movement in his body. There was no evidence that he was breathing until a deep, soundless sigh shuddered through his body, lifting his ribcage.

      As she watched he dropped casually down on his haunches. ‘Hello, Sam. I’m Roman.’

      He sounded so normal and his whole body language was so relaxed that Scarlet wondered if she had imagined what had gone before.

      ‘Do you like teddy bears, Sam?’ Roman ran his hand over the little boy’s dark head.

      ‘They’re all right, but I’m a big boy—I prefer footballs.’

      ‘I’ll remember that,’ Roman promised.

       ‘I’m going to be a footballer when I grow up.’

      Roman made the appropriate impressed noises.

      ‘Are you Mummy’s friend?’ she was deeply embarrassed to hear Sam ask.

      Roman lifted his head; his eyes, which considering his manner with the child had been so relaxed and friendly, were bewilderingly cold. The hostility emanating from his lean body was equally pointed.

      He turned back to the boy.

      ‘I’m going to be, Sam, so we’ll be seeing each other a lot,’ he promised with a smile before he straightened up.

      Scarlet held in her indignation until they got out to the corridor.

      ‘Why on earth did you say that to Sam?’ she demanded, turning on him angrily. ‘He may only be three, but he remembers things.’

      ‘Good. He won’t be surprised the next time he sees me.’

      ‘He won’t be seeing you and neither will I. To be blunt, Mr O’Hagan, I don’t actually like you very much.’

      ‘Actually, Miss Smith, I’m not wild about you either…but I think you’ll find you’ll be seeing a lot more of me.’

      Scarlet stared after him with a baffled expression as he retreated. To say his behaviour was bizarre would have been an understatement.

      Still, one thing was certain: if she had anything to do with it neither she nor Sam would be seeing him again, despite his odd claim to the contrary!

      CHAPTER SEVEN

      SAM was spending Friday night at his best friend Thomas’s house. This was the second time he had had a sleep-over. The first time Scarlet had spent the entire night worrying and hanging around the phone just in case an emergency had arisen that necessitated her rushing out of the house.

      She had even mentally worked out the quickest routes to the two local hospitals, working on the assumption you couldn’t be too prepared and it was always better to assume the worst.

      The telephone hadn’t rung and, far from crying for her, Sam had had a great time. The reciprocal sleep-over had gone equally well.

      This time Scarlet was determined not to go weird again; she was not going to let the over-anxious mum thing turn her into a basket case. Instead she was going to look on this as an opportunity to enjoy a few self-indulgent hours alone. She would relax if it killed her! she determined grimly.

      Her plans included a long, luxurious soak in a hot bath of decadent bubbles and using the moisturising face mask that guaranteed to bring the youthful bloom back to tired skin. After that there were a box of chocolates and a feelgood video with her name on them.

      The opening credits of It’s a Wonderful Life had just finished when the doorbell rang. She had forgotten that plans were an invitation for things to go wrong, especially when that plan was an evening of unadulterated indulgence.

      ‘Damn!’ she swore as she paused the film, hitched up the legs of her slightly too long pyjama bottoms and slid her feet into her slippers. ‘Hold your horses,’ she muttered crossly under her breath as she trudged to the door.

      If Sam had been home she would have been a lot crankier; the chance of him sleeping through the racket their caller was making was just about nil. The doorbell was so insistent that she almost missed the sound of the phone ringing as she passed by.

      Scarlet dived for it.

      Her heart thudding with trepidation, she lifted it to her ear. I knew the sleep-over was a daft idea. Three is much too young to be encouraging independence in a child…a child of three should be home with his mother.

      By the time she had politely heard out the person on the line selling double glazing, her heart rate had almost returned to normal and the person ringing the doorbell had begun to hammer on the door with their fist.

      It was a very angry sound.

      Though not always as security conscious as she might be Scarlet had no problem remembering in this instance to leave the safety chain on as she opened the door a crack. Of all the people she had imagined to discover standing there, Roman O’Hagan had not even featured on the list.

      Her exclamation of, ‘Gracious!’ hardly covered her feelings as she peered up at the tall, commanding figure standing in the hallway.

      She swallowed convulsively as her pulse rate shot off the scale. The fluttering sensation low in her belly combined with the difficulty she had breathing made it hard for her to do anything but gape. He was worth gaping at. Gosh, but he looked good, and my, she thought, attempting to nudge her appreciation towards the safer direction of scorn, didn’t he know it?

      He removed the designer shades he wore and tucked them into the breast pocket of his jacket. The dark, wintry eyes that surveyed her coldly were even less reassuring