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weekend?’
    Riccardo felt a surge of irritation at her diversion tactic, but he swallowed it back and he hid his natural anger at finding his movements dictated by someone else.
    â€˜Perhaps Saturday,’ he said, ‘I can take you both out to lunch somewhere. Where would she like to go?’
    â€˜Oh, any place where the meal comes in a box with a toy,’ Julia told him with a smile and he grimaced.
    â€˜In other words, French food is out of the question.’
    â€˜Out of the question,’ Julia agreed. She looked at him curiously. ‘This must be, yes, I know, very hard for you, but also…very different. Do you have nephews? Nieces?’ She stood by the kitchen sink, arms folded.
    â€˜Four nephews, all much older. They live in Italy with my two sisters and their husbands. As for nieces, no. But she has a ready-made family, complete with grandmother.’ He grimaced wryly and caught Julia’s eye. ‘My mother isa very assertive woman,’ he said, almost adding a bit like you . ‘But very fair. She has been longing for a bambina in the family. Nicola will find herself swamped by her affection.’
    â€˜And you’ve told them about…the situation?’
    â€˜Not yet, no. You have your own timescale as to when you think Nicola should be made aware of who I am, and I have mine when it comes to my family.’ He stood up and raked his long fingers through his impossibly dark hair while Julia watched him cautiously from a safe distance.
    â€˜And what are your…intentions once Nicola knows that you’re her father?’ Julia asked, taking the bull by the horns. ‘The reason I ask is that if you intend to return to Italy to live and take her with you then I shall do my utmost to prevent it.’
    â€˜Is that a threat?’ he asked mildly, shrugging on his jacket and preceding her to the front door.
    â€˜Of course it’s not.’ Julia wrapped her arms around her body, hugging herself. ‘But this is the only life that Nicola knows. To be removed from it…’
    â€˜Would require a little adjustment but would not by any means be an impossibility.’ He paused by the door and stared down at her. ‘However, for the time being at least, that is not on the agenda. My work takes me all over the world but I am primarily based in London.’
    Julia breathed a sigh of relief. For all the changes that Nicola’s presence in her life entailed, she would be lost without her. They had always been close, more so now. She uneasily wondered whether Nicola didn’t serve the even greater purpose of filling the void in her life, the same void she denied having to her mother whenever the question was raised.
    â€˜So I shall see you on Saturday?’ she said shakily and he nodded.
    â€˜About ten-thirty?’ He pulled open the door but instead of walking to his car leaned indolently against the door frame and stared down at her. ‘And don’t forget.’
    â€˜Forget what?’
    â€˜Why, Julia, that we’re lovers, of course.’ His dark eyes roamed over her flustered face, a sensation he enjoyed thoroughly, then he succumbed to the wicked urge that had been plaguing him all night and he lowered his head, covering her startled mouth with his. It was a fleeting kiss, a shadow of a caress, and it tasted as sweet as honey.
    And as paralysing as an electric shock, Julia thought numbly as he straightened and turned away as though nothing had happened.
    And she had worried about the dangers of him trying to remove Nicola, to take her to Italy to live!
    What about the danger lying far closer on her doorstep? She brushed her mouth with the back of her hand but she was still trembling by the time she made it to bed.

CHAPTER FOUR
    â€˜I AM beginning to have a whole new outlook on the word exhaustion ,’ Riccardo said to her on the Saturday afternoon as the three of them made their way back to the house.
    Julia