I’m never going to be that woman, Justina vowed fiercely as another sharp band of pain tightened across her abdomen. I’m never going to have hopeless expectations of a man who can never meet them, because that’s a sure-fire recipe for unhappiness. Much better to be independent and free of emotional pain.

But then another very physical pain caught her by surprise. It was so strong that she had to stand perfectly still and cling to the back of the sofa. It wasn’t until they started coming regularly that she realised she was in labour.

She tried to stay calm and remember what to do. Stay at home for as long as possible. Time the contractions and call the hospital. Another wave clamped like a burning iron around her middle, and she was gasping a little as she picked up the phone and spoke to a midwife.

‘Come in now,’ said the midwife. ‘Have you got someone with you?’

‘I’m on my way,’ said Justina, neatly avoiding the question.

But they asked her again when she’d been checked in to the birthing suite as she lay on the bed, having her blood pressure monitored.

‘Is the father on his way, Miss Perry?’

‘No.’ Justina shook her head. ‘He’s in New York.’

‘Does he know that you’re in labour?’

She thought about Dante seeing her like this. She thought about how nothing but a capricious fate had brought them together. Hadn’t she told him that she was independent and that she didn’t actually need him? Well, that hadn’t just been bluster—she’d meant it.

She shook her head. ‘No, he doesn’t know.’

‘Someone here could easily—’

‘I don’t want him here,’ declared Justina.

Did she imagine the look of disapproval which passed between the midwife and her student? But then another pain came, and it was so powerful that it obliterated everything, and she stopped wondering if she was being judged for her morals or her cold-heartedness.

Time slowed and she felt disorientated—only the relentless contractions brought reality into sharp and clear focus. Hours passed by in a blur of pain as Justina tried to remember all the things she’d learned at her antenatal classes and put them into practice. She paced the floor. She crouched down on her hands and knees as sweat poured from her brow. She tried not to gasp, but not gasping became impossible when the midwife examined her and announced that she’d gone into ‘second stage’.

‘I don’t care what stage I’m in! I just want this bloody baby out!’ shouted Justina recklessly.

She heard the sound of some commotion at the door, where the student midwife stood talking to someone. She heard an unmistakable Italian accent speaking low words edged with fierce intent.

‘Just ask her. Please.’

The student came over to the bed, her cheeks looking flushed. ‘There’s a man outside who says he’s the father of your baby and he wants to come in. He says his name is Dante D’Arezzo and please could I ask you.’

In a brief respite between contractions it occurred to Justina that this was possibly the first time in Dante’s life that he’d had to ask for anything without being guaranteed the desired response. But her reasons for wanting to exclude him seemed petty in the light of what was happening. Justina looked towards the door and there he stood—six feet plus of dark and brooding determination. And strength, she realized as she registered the tension in his powerful shoulders. Couldn’t she use a little of that strength right now?

‘Let him in,’ she croaked, and he must have heard her because in an instant he was at her bedside, his expression impenetrable as he looked down at her. But the words of recrimination she’d expected were absent as he brushed aside a lock of matted hair with a hand which was remarkably gentle.

‘I’m here now,’ he said simply.

‘Is that supposed to make me feel better?’

‘I’m rather hoping it might.’

For some reason his words made her feel bad. ‘Dante, I didn’t want to—’

‘Shh. I doesn’t matter. I’m here,’ he repeated. ‘And that’s all that matters.’

She swallowed. ‘It...hurts.’

‘Then hold on to me. Go on, hold on—as tight as you like. Hurt me instead, if it makes you feel better.’

She told herself that it was stupid to want to cling to him. To hold him so tightly so that he would never let her go. But all her inhibitions seemed to be melting away as the demands of her body took over and she clutched him like a drowning woman snatching at a floating branch.

‘I’m hot,’ she added.

‘Then lose the gown.’ The corners of his lips curved. ‘It’s not the best thing I’ve ever seen you in.’

She almost smiled back as he helped her tug the sweat-soaked hospital issue garment from her body and the coolness of the air washed over her naked skin. But then came another of those contractions, and when she had breath enough to speak she shuddered out the fear which was threatening to overwhelm her.

‘I’m so scared that something’s going to go wrong.’

His black gaze caught hold of her and enveloped her. He lifted up the hand which wasn’t digging into his and briefly touched it to his lips. ‘The chances of that happening are infinitesimally small. You’re in the best possible hands. You know that, Jus. You’ve told me often enough. How did you put it? A perfectly natural procedure that women have been going through since the beginning of time.’

Had she really said that? Had she really sounded so stupidly confident when now she felt as nervous as a child on the first day of school?

Her fingernails dug even farther into his hand. ‘I want to push!’

Dante flicked a glance at the midwife, who nodded. ‘Then push, tesoro,’ he urged softly. ‘Go ahead and push all you like.’

‘Arrgh!’

Her anguished cry made him feel helpless—Dante felt more powerless than he’d ever felt in his life. Frustration washed over him as he watched her writhe, but he did what little he could to help her. He smoothed away her hair when she thrashed her head wildly against the pillow, and dabbed cool water at her temples which briefly made her moan with gratitude. But only briefly.

All too soon the tension in the room increased, along with the rising sound of her cries. Dante watched as the movements of the midwives became brisker, though one of them paused long enough to raise her head and ask, ‘Do you want to come and see your baby being born, Signor D’Arezzo?’

Dante met Justina’s eyes and wordlessly she nodded. For one minute he thought she might be about to make some smart comment, and perhaps if she hadn’t been in the middle of giving birth she might have done, but she closed her eyes again and screwed up her face with a fierce concentration.

And then it all became very urgent. The air pulsed with taut words and fractured cries as Justina gave an almighty push. His breath caught in his throat as he saw a dark slick of hair appear, followed by the seemingly impossible appearance of a bruised and bloodied baby as she pushed again. And his heart clenched as the infant opened its mouth and howled and somebody said, “It’s a boy!”

They put the slippery infant into the cradle of his hands as they cut the cord, and Dante’s throat was so tight he could barely breathe. His baby. His son. So tiny and so helpless. He could feel the tears pricking at his eyes as the midwife took the baby from him. She cleaned him, before placing him onto Justina’s breast, where he began to suckle, his eyes fixed on his mother’s as if they’d known each other for a very long time. Silently, Dante watched as Justina touched a finger to the newborn’s smooth cheek and gave a secretive kind of smile.

And in that moment he had never wanted her quite so much.

CHAPTER EIGHT

JUSTINA WATCHED AS Dante’s fingers moved with remarkable dexterity over the tiny baby, his dark head bent as he focussed intently on the task at hand. He was so careful, she thought, as if Nico was made of porcelain rather than of flesh and blood. But every so often the intense concentration on his features would soften a little, and he would smile and murmur something in Italian. With an unwanted rush of emotion she acknowledged how tender he could be—and how gentle—and something dangerously close to nostalgia flickered over her.