Italian Bachelors: Irresistible Sicilians. Michelle Smart

do. Portraits. I normally work with oil but as we’re outdoors I’ve brought my sketchbook with me.’

      ‘May I see it?’

      ‘Sure.’ She had knelt down for another rummage in her rucksack, giving him a perfect view of her pert bottom.

      He had blinked in shock as a stab of lust had run through him.

      Grubby urchins were usually well off his radar.

      This woman though...

      She had brought a large sketchbook over to him.

      Taking his time, he had flipped through it. Most of the drawings had been of her companion. They had been, without exception, exquisite.

      He had looked back up and met her eyes properly for the first time.

      The most enormous feeling of warmth had spread through his bones, a thickening in his chest that had made it hard to catch a breath.

      ‘Do you take commissions?’ he had asked after too long a pause during which they had simply stared at each other.

      Her wide hazel eyes had crinkled at the sides. ‘Not from people whose names I don’t know.’

      He had extended a hand. ‘I’m Luca Mastrangelo.’

      ‘Grace Holden.’ She had wiped her hand down the side of her shorts before reaching out to accept his.

      A shock of heat had zipped through his hand, permeating through him. ‘It is a pleasure to meet you, Grace Holden.’

      Her answering smile had stolen his remaining breath.

      Neither had made any attempt to relinquish the other’s hand.

      Later, over a romantic meal at his favourite restaurant, he’d asked why she hadn’t been scared when he had pulled out the gun.

      She’d smiled mischievously. ‘You weren’t aiming it at us. You looked peed off but not murderous.’

      Out of everything, that was the thing that cut in his craw the most. How could the woman who had judged him so accurately with one glance even dream he was capable of murder? Why the hell did she think they had let that man live? It had been at his insistence, that was why. That man had been caught cheating from them before, from their casino in Sardinia. Francesco’s men had been ready to tow him out to sea and throw him in with weights on his ankles.

      Did she think he enjoyed hurting people or having people hurt in his name?

      He took no more enjoyment from it than his father had.

      A lump formed in his throat. Pietro Mastrangelo had been a fine and honourable man who believed in the sanctity of life. Always he would favour the route that left the least physical and emotional damage, a lesson Luca had taken to heart.

      The way Grace had looked at him, the words she had said to him...she truly believed him to be a monster. She gave him no credit for saving that man’s life. Thanks to him, that man would still be able to live a long life and be a husband to his wife and a father to his children.

      She had been happy to leave him, Luca, unable to be a husband or a father.

      A wave of bitterness ran through him as he recalled her attempts to deflect her deplorable behaviour by turning it onto him.

      He made no apologies for restricting her movements and keeping her in the dark on certain matters. He had been doing his best to keep her safe. He would do anything—would have done anything, he corrected himself—to keep her safe. He hadn’t wanted her to worry about things she could never understand. That was what he’d told himself.

      The sound of Lily’s cries carried down the corridor and into his room.

      Grace’s accusation came back to him. Have you tried any form of interaction with her?

      Before he met Grace, he’d never imagined he would marry a woman and selfishly want to keep her all for himself, even if just for a while. With Grace, he’d wanted to enjoy every minute they had together before they got around to making lots of bouncing bambini. When those mythical babies eventually came along he’d known he would want to be involved in everything. Their children would be born of their parents’ love and would want for nothing, from either their mother or their father.

      Grace had stolen that from him.

      If she had her way she would steal it from him again.

      He rubbed his eyes, the sound of Lily’s cries ripping into his heart.

      ‘Don’t think it’s escaped my attention that you haven’t held her yet. Not once.’

      She was right.

      The way he was acting around his own flesh and blood, anyone would think he was scared of her.

      How could a baby be construed as even vaguely frightening? Especially when that baby was his child.

      He left his room and moved stealthily down the dark corridor to the nursery.

      Grace’s eyes widened when he walked through the door. ‘What’s the matter?’ she whispered, pacing the room, rocking Lily on her shoulder.

      The breath caught in his throat.

      His wife and daughter. Together. Illuminated by the moonlight seeping through a crack in the heavy curtains, Grace wearing her tatty dressing gown, Lily bundled up in blankets, her whimpers lessening.

      It was a sight he knew he would never tire of gazing at.

      He cleared his throat, taking in the dark rings circling his wife’s eyes. ‘When did you last have a proper night’s sleep?’

      Her brow furrowed, a flash of pain contorting her features. ‘About eleven months ago.’

      When she had left him.

      And just like that, he understood what terrible anguish she must have gone through.

      Whatever her reasoning had been, and whatever vitriol she might spout now, it hadn’t been any easier for Grace to break their union than it had been for him to accept that she had left of her own accord.

      She hadn’t left because she no longer loved him.

      She had left despite it.

      Dio, but he had no idea how that made him feel.

      ‘Can I hold her?’ He hadn’t meant to ask. He’d intended to simply take Lily from her. After all, he was the father. It was his right.

      She didn’t say anything, her tired eyes simply gazing at him with more than a hint of apprehension. Eventually she inclined her head.

      ‘Aren’t you going to give me any tips about keeping her head supported, or anything?’ he could not resist asking as he stood before her.

      A faint trace of a smile curved her lips, a smile that did something all squidgy to his chest, before it faded away and he detected sadness in its place. ‘You’d never hurt her.’

      She delivered it as a whimsical statement of fact. The squidgy feeling became a tight mass.

      Between them they transferred Lily into his arms, the tight mass solidifying into a heavy weight, spreading up his throat and down into his guts, enveloping his insides. The softness of Grace pressed against his arm, her clean fragrance filling his senses, all of this merged with the plump delicacy of his daughter and the new baby scent that was all her own.

      For a moment he couldn’t breathe, the feelings evoked so powerful they threatened to overwhelm him.

      Lily stopped grizzling. She stared up at him, her midnight eyes almost curious, as if she were trying to work out who this stranger was who now held her so protectively.

      Grace watched them, the ray of moonlight casting her in an ethereal light, emphasising both her beauty and her tiredness.

      ‘You need to sleep,’ he said, lowering himself