The From Paris With Love And Regency Season Of Secrets Ultimate Collection. Кэрол Мортимер

But he hadn’t asked anything. He’d offered her comfort instead, as though he understood. As though everything could somehow be put right.

      And it had been too much for Charlotte. Her defences had collapsed completely and she’d sobbed out the tears that had been bottled up for years and years. And then she must have been overcome by sheer exhaustion and fallen asleep.

      And he’d just continued to hold her?

      ‘How long?’ Charlotte put a hand to her hair, which felt like a rat’s nest. She closed her eyes in disbelief and found that her eyelashes felt all clumpy when she blinked. She probably had mascara all over her face. She opened them again. The short winter’s day was ending already and it was dark outside but their cabin was glowing in the soft light from a lamp on the table. ‘How long have I been asleep?’

      Nico was tilting his head to one side and then the other, stretching his neck. ‘I wasn’t watching the clock.’ He smiled. ‘I may have dozed off myself, in fact.’

      Charlotte could feel a smile stirring. A joke about them sleeping together forming.

      ‘Only until the steward woke me to tell me about Jendi.’

      The smile and joke evaporated. ‘What? Oh, my God…and you didn’t wake me? What was wrong? Why—?’

      Nico put a finger against her lips and the gentle pressure stopped her anxious flow of words.

      ‘He merely came to ask if I could accompany her to the bar for the afternoon tea she had arranged to have with Mrs Black. As soon as he saw that I was…ah…otherwise occupied, he said it was no problem, he would accompany her himself and ensure that she didn’t lose her balance.’

      Charlotte couldn’t believe she could have slept through the whole exchange. ‘I’m sorry,’ she muttered. ‘I must have been more tired than I realised. I…um…didn’t sleep much last night.’

      ‘Of course not. You’re worried about your nonna.’

      ‘Mmm. That, too…’

      She saw the flash of understanding in his eyes as he considered what else might have been keeping her awake. Like that kiss…

      Distraction was needed. Charlotte looked around. The bottle of champagne was still sitting in the bucket. There were a few small cubes of ice floating on the water inside. Nico must have followed her glance.

      ‘It may still be cold enough,’ he said. ‘Shall we have a toast?’

      ‘To what?’

      ‘To making this evening as enjoyable as possible? For everyone involved. It will be time to get ready for dinner before long, I expect.’ Nico was dealing with the foil on the champagne bottle. ‘We need to prepare ourselves to put on a good show.’ The cork came out with a satisfying ‘pop’. He smiled that slow, easy, irresistible grin as he filled the glasses and held one out to Charlotte. ‘Dutch courage?’

      ‘Will I need it?’ And then Charlotte remembered what her hair and face must look like and she smiled ruefully. ‘Don’t answer that. I know I look a complete mess.’ She took a sip of her drink. ‘It’s just as well I won’t see you again after tomorrow. I would be mortified. I can’t think of anyone who’s ever seen me look this terrible.’

      Apart from Siegfried, of course. Charlotte took a longer sip of the wine.

      Nico touched his glass to hers. ‘You are beautiful, Carlotta.’

      He looked as though he believed the words. He was giving her that look again. Like the one he’d given her last night. And again, in the gift shop. But why? There was no one around to see. He didn’t have to pretend here.

      And hadn’t he told her that she was safe because she was so completely not his type?

      She wanted to be his type. Heaven help her but she wanted Nico to kiss her again.

      Dammit. Where were her safety barriers when she needed them? At the very least she needed to break their eye contact but it seemed impossible.

      Charlotte searched for a barrier she could put up to protect herself but couldn’t find a trace of one. All she could find was a memory of how it had felt to know that Nico had shared his shameful secret with her and how cathartic it had been to finally share her own with another living person. How it had felt to wake up in Nico’s arms.

      How was it possible to feel so vulnerable and yet so safe at exactly the same time?

      She still couldn’t break the eye contact either. And Nico wasn’t looking away. Charlotte could feel the distance between them closing. The kiss that she wanted so badly was only a heartbeat away.

      Until a knock sounded on the cabin door.

      ‘Dr Moretti? Dr Highton?’ The steward sounded as if the matter was urgent. ‘I’m sorry to disturb you, but you are both needed.’

      It was just as well the moment had been broken by the interruption.

      Perhaps it had been a mistake to let Charlotte sleep in his arms for so long but what else could he have done?

      The depth of pain he’d heard in those words ‘not compatible’. They couldn’t have had anything other than a sexual reference and for it to be so hard for Charlotte to have uttered them meant they were the key to the puzzle of what had changed her so much.

      A horrible suspicion had formed in Nico’s mind. Something unthinkable. So dark it couldn’t be given a name. So horrific all he’d been able to do was hold onto this damaged woman as he’d tried to fit in the other pieces of the puzzle and control the rush of pure fury on her behalf.

      He had to control it. Nico hadn’t known if his assumption was correct. Maybe Charlotte would never tell him and even if she did, what on earth could he do about it?

      Nothing, that’s what. It was none of his business. Not his problem. But it would provide an explanation to the mystery and that was what he’d wanted, wasn’t it?

      So Nico had done nothing. Said nothing. As the minutes had ticked by he’d continued to do nothing and that was when he’d felt Charlotte’s heartbroken sobbing subside. When the exhaustion in her body had taken over. When she’d slipped into a peaceful, bone-deep slumber.

      He could have eased himself away at that point, found a pillow and blanket to make her comfortable on the seat. Or carried her to a bunk, maybe, and left her to sleep for an hour or two. What was it about this bizarre situation he’d been caught up in since early yesterday morning that made it impossible to walk away?

      He could have ignored Charlotte when he’d first seen her crying on the terrace below his window. He certainly hadn’t needed to come up with the dangerous notion of posing as her lover, let alone shoving a ring on her finger. And he could have found an excuse not to accompany the women on this train journey.

      But he hadn’t. Every step of the way he had hesitated and then been drawn in deeper by something he couldn’t explain. And if the steward hadn’t rapped on the door at that particular moment, he would have kissed Charlotte again.

      More than kissed her, actually. He could have asked gentle questions with his mouth and his hands that would have confirmed what he suspected was the answer to the puzzle that had intrigued him ever since he’d recognised Charlotte on that cobbled Venetian street.

      He would have got answers to those questions, he was sure of that. Just as sure as he was of the fact that Charlotte had wanted him to kiss her. He had seen that desire darken her eyes and soften her lips and he’d felt that knowledge kindle his own flame because it was part of what intrigued him so much. The contradictions. The ice queen on the surface and the woman capable of such deep emotion within. Was the single, ultimately professional doctor desperately in need of physical release, possibly without being consciously aware of it?

      Whatever. The desire had been wiped from her eyes the moment that sharp rap had sounded on the door and the tone of the steward’s