put his shoulder to the door and forced it open. A second later, he was inside a tiny foyer.
Aimee was pressed against the wall, looking up at him with fear in her eyes.
He felt a tightening in his gut.
She hadn’t been afraid of him that night…But this wasn’t that night. It was good that she was afraid. Hell, it was what he wanted. When he was done with her…
“No,” she said again, her voice high and thin.
Her eyes rolled up. She collapsed as if she were a marionette and someone had cut her strings.
Nicolo caught her before she crumpled to the floor. It was an automatic move but he knew damned well the faint was simply another outstanding performance…
Merda. His heart skipped a beat. It was not an act. She was limp in his arms.
He looked around frantically, saw a small sofa and carried her to it. “Ms. Black. Aimee. Can you hear me?”
Stupido! Of course she couldn’t hear him. She was unconscious. What did you do for an unconscious woman?
Cold compresses. And spirits of—of what? Ammonia? Who in hell had spirits of ammonia lying around in this day and age?
A doorway opened onto a kitchen. Nicolo hurried inside, grabbed a towel from the sink, stuffed it with ice cubes from the fridge’s freezer tray and ran back into the living room.
Aimee lay as he’d left her, small and unmoving, her pulse beat visible in her slender throat.
“Aimee,” he said softly.
She didn’t respond. Nicolo knelt beside her. Slipped his arm around her shoulders and lifted her to him.
“Aimee,” he said again, and gently placed the ice pack against her forehead.
After a moment, she groaned.
“That’s it, cara. Come on. Look at me. Open your eyes and look at me.”
Her lashes fluttered but her lids stayed down. Nicolo drew her closer. Held her against him, eased her silky curls from the back of her neck and ran the ice pack lightly over the nape.
She moaned softly, her breath warm against his throat.
He closed his eyes.
He had forgotten what it was like to hold her. The delicacy of her bones. The floral scent of her hair. The unblemished softness of her skin.
His arms tightened around her. “Aimee,” he whispered.
Suddenly he held a wildcat in his arms. She pulled back, curled her hands into fists and pounded them against his shoulders.
“Get away from me!”
“Aimee! Stop it!”
“What are you doing here?” Her voice shook. “Get out. Do you hear me? Get out!”
Nicolo grabbed her wrists in one hand. “Damn it, you fainted! Would you rather I’d left you lying on the floor?”
“I’d rather never see your face again!”
His mouth thinned. He let go of her and rose to his feet.
“My sentiments, exactly, Ms. Black. Where is your telephone?”
“What do you want with the telephone?”
“I’m going to phone for an ambulance. Then it will be my pleasure to walk out that door and not look back.”
“No!” Aimee sat up quickly. Too quickly; the room seemed to give a sickening lurch and the all-too-familiar nausea sent a rush of bile up her throat. “I don’t—I don’t need an—”
“Dio, look at you! You’re white as a ghost.”
“I am fine,” she said carefully, as she rose to her feet. The room tilted again. She took a deep breath, then slowly let it out. “Thank you for your help, Prince Barbieri. Now, get the hell out of my apartment.”
“Not until I know you’re all right.”
“Why would you give a damn?”
“Why? Well, let’s see. I rang the bell. You opened the door, saw me and did an excellent imitation of a Victorian swoon.” His smile was lupine and all teeth. “I’m sure you’ll forgive me if I tell you I can envision a scenario in which you end up accusing me of somehow causing that swoon.”
He meant it as an insult, she knew, but Aimee could only think how close to the truth he’d come.
“I just thanked you for your help, didn’t I?”
“You’re a superb liar,” Nicolo said coldly. “Or did you think I’d forget that?”
“We’ve been all through this.”
“Yes. We have. And you lied.” His eyes narrowed as they met hers. “You told your grandfather I seduced you when we both know that what happened in that club, and in my hotel room, was by mutual consent.”
Aimee stared up at him. His face might have been the stone face of a Roman emperor, his eyes unseeing and unfeeling. It was impossible to imagine she’d slept with this man.
He was, indeed, a stranger.
“Is that why you came here? To hear me admit that I—that I let you seduce me?”
“That you let me seduce you?” Nicolo folded his arms and gave a hollow laugh. “Such clever phrasing.”
Aimee’s legs were like rubber. She’d never fainted before but she thought she might damned well do it again if she had to keep up a conversation with this arrogant ass who was in a snit because he believed she’d come on to him deliberately.
She could only imagine how he’d react if he knew she carried a baby.
His baby.
A choked laugh caught in her throat. Prince Nicolo Barbieri’s child. He wouldn’t believe it. Well, who could blame him? She could hardly believe it, either.
She couldn’t be pregnant. She took the pill. She’d been taking it for a couple of years now, not to prevent getting pregnant. Why would she, considering that the last time she’d been intimate with a man before she’d slept with Nicolo Barbieri was her senior year at college?
She took it to regulate her period, but what had happened to its primary function as a contraceptive?
Accidents happen. She could almost hear the tut-tutting voice of her boarding school’s sex-ed teacher. Remember, ladies, accidents happen.
Her legs buckled.
“Dio!” Nicolo grabbed her shoulders as she collapsed on the sofa. “That’s it. You need a doctor.”
“I need you to go away.” Aimee struggled up against the pillows as he took his cell phone from his pocket. “What are you doing?”
“Calling for an ambulance.”
“No! I don’t want an ambulance. Damn you, will you just—”
“Then tell me your physician’s number.”
Her physician’s number. The man who’d made her pregnant wanted to call the doctor who’d just told her about that pregnancy. Wild laughter rose in her throat.
“You find this amusing?”
“No. Not amusing. Just—just…”
Aimee shook her head. The only thing she wanted was to bury her face in her hands and weep. That meant getting Nicolo Barbieri out of her apartment and out of her life.
Time to ditch her stupid pride.
“You came here to hear me admit that—that what happened between us was as much my idea as yours.” She paused, touched