A Forbidden Seduction. SARA WOOD

in amazement. When Gio had tried similar flattery before they’d married, her mother had brushed him off impatiently and said he was too smooth by half. Luciano was a better flattierer; he actually sounded as if he believed what he said.

      And she, in her late teens! She tried to keep back the giggle. He’d get a shock if he knew she was twenty-five!

      ‘We’ve got a lot of washing-up to do. Greasy pans. Sausages to make,’ she said prosaically. ‘Me and the youngster here,’ she added straight-faced, indicating her mother, who put her arm around Debbie’s waist and gave her a hug.

      ‘Thanks for bringing her home,’ Stella said to Luciano. She smiled affectionately at Debbie, whose eyes instantly glowed with the warmth of love. ‘She means the world to me.’

      There was some emotion tugging at Luciano’s mouth and it seemed to Debbie that he didn’t know whether to smile or be sad. Puzzled, she gave her mother a quick hug back and watched him carefully.

      ‘There are people who would give the world to have what you have,’ he said gravely to them both.

      ‘Yes, we’re very lucky,’ Debbie acknowledged quietly.

      He hesitated as if he wanted to tell her something and then frowned and lowered his thick fringe of black lashes. Debbie felt a little pang eating into her heart because he would go now and they’d never meet again. Perhaps it was just as well—he seemed a very dangerous man to know.

      ‘I hope your fortunes improve,’ he said with deep sincerity and then he turned, got back into the car and was driven away, his eyes rigidly fixed on the chauffeur’s head.

      Debbie stood mutely on the pavement and then followed her mother in, knowing that she’d have to explain what had happened, and that she’d leave most of the important stuff out; otherwise her mother would read all the right things into the extraordinary attraction she’d felt for the worryingly magnetic Luciano.

      She delayed answering her mother’s barrage of questions by protesting that she had to change out of the outfit first. In the privacy of the little back room she stared at herself, amazed to see that she didn’t look any different.

      She felt different. Despite all her endeavours to remain indifferent to Luciano, she had secretly coveted him—a virtual stranger—and felt a stir of sexual energy so strong that she was fully aware that it had the potential to be more powerful than anything she’d ever known. It was frightening.

      Today she’d met someone who’d shaken her world.

      

      The next day, Gio didn’t come home at the expected time. When she found herself fretting at the fact that she couldn’t finish her farce of a marriage-yet feeling a sense of utter relief at her freedom from her husband’s oppressive demands—she knew that seeking a divorce was the right decision. There was no marriage any more. There hadn’t been anything between them for a long while and they both knew it. It was time to tell her mother the truth.