A Secret Disgrace Read online

  An aching, an almost unbearable, sharply sweet sense of humility and love filled him.

  He waited until he had reached her and crouched down beside her before reaching out to place his hand on her tense body and say her name softly.

  The lightning was so close to the thunder now. She could hear them even here, in this protected windowless room. It could only be seconds before the storm was right overhead. The temptation to take one of Caesar’s jackets from his closet and wrap it around her had been one she couldn’t resist. The comfort of the scent of his cologne and of Caesar himself was a wretched treachery that somehow brought her a warped kind of pleasure.

  For it to somehow produce Caesar’s voice, though, was impossible and must surely mean that she was going mad. Caesar couldn’t possibly be here. But she wanted him to be here, didn’t she? She wanted that more than anything else in the world. Weak tears burned her eyes.

  The sudden explosion of flashes of lightning she could see illuminating the bedroom from the door that Caesar had left open, followed by thunder right overhead drove every other thought out of her head. Her sharp cry of terror and her rigid body caused Caesar to reach for her, sitting on the sofa next to her as he drew her trembling body into his arms.

  She felt incredibly fragile, her whole body trembling from head to foot. Such strong emotion swept him that he had to bend his head to blink away the feelings dampening his eyes. How could he have ever allowed himself to think that she didn’t matter? How could he ever have allowed himself to turn his back on her and publicly condemn her? His own hands trembled as he held her beneath the force of his own remorse and regret.

  Another crack of thunder overhead had her burrowing closer to him with a small sound of terror.

  ‘It’s all right, Lou. It’s all right. Everything’s going to be all right.’

  Caesar. He was here. And he had seen her hysteria and her weakness. He had witnessed what she had promised herself no one else would ever witness.

  A soft moan of despair tore at her throat as she tried to pull away from him, but Caesar was refusing to let her go, ignoring her attempts to break free of him and instead binding her even closer to him—so close that her face was pressed against his throat, her lips to his bare flesh. It would be the easiest thing in the world to kiss that column of warm, bare, beloved Caesar flesh.

  Now when she trembled violently in his arms it wasn’t because of the thunderstorm that was already receding and beginning to die away. Instead it was caused by an even greater threat to her emotional security.

  Caesar. Here. Holding her. Keeping her close to him, whispering words that unbelievably suggested that he cared about her. But that was impossible. She only mattered to him because of Oliver.

  Her son. Guilt and fear immediately tensed her body.

  ‘Why did you come back? Where’s Oliver?’ she delivered, in a maternal voice that was openly fearful and anxious as terrifying mental images of the danger the storm might have caused to her son filled her imagination.

  ‘Probably in Rome by now,’ Caesar told her. ‘And as for why I came back …’

  He slid one hand beneath her chin and along her neck, tilting her face up to his own. The touch of his fingertips was so tender and gentle that it locked the breath in her throat.

  ‘I came back because Oliver was very worried about you when he saw that a storm was gathering over the mountains.’

  When Louise sucked in her breath he continued.

  ‘You mustn’t be cross with him, Louise, I made him tell me how thunderstorms affect you—and why.’

  He could feel the jolt of emotion that ran through her as she tried to pull away from him.

  ‘No, don’t hide yourself away from me. I am the one who should feel shame, not you. Your father did a very cruel thing, but in my way I have been equally cruel and I have let you down just as badly. Instead of listening to my deepest and truest emotions all those years ago, when we first met, I allowed pride and arrogance, the way I believed I should feel and behave as Duca to direct my behaviour rather than what I really felt. Because of that I lost you—a punishment I deserved—and you were hurt, and for that I can never forgive myself.’

  ‘I don’t want to discuss this,’ Louise told him wildly.

  He was probing too deeply, touching places that were too raw, revealing emotions that she knew could so easily betray her. His very gentleness towards her was undermining what was left of her defences.

  ‘We must if we are to have any hope of laying down new foundations for a loving and happy future together.’

  Loving?

  Even as her eyes widened Caesar was saying softly, ‘And that is what we both want, isn’t it, Louise? A future based on love?’

  She was trapped. Her love for him was obvious and now he pitied her for it—just as he pitied her for her weakness during thunderstorms. There could be no other explanation. She had to defend herself. She had to make him understand that despite her love for him she still had her pride—still wanted Oliver to grow up believing that her sex could be strong and empowered by their emotions, not imprisoned and weakened by them.

  ‘Just because I love you …’ she began shakily, but before she could get any further, Caesar interrupted her.

  ‘Just because I love you …’ she began shakily, but before she could get any further, Caesar interrupted her.

  His voice cracked with such raw male emotion that it caught at her own breath, as he said, ‘You love me? I had hardly dared … I have no right … I had dreamed and begun to hope. Oh, my love. My sweet, precious love …’

  What was happening? Her thoughts were in turmoil, her heart pounding with a mix of exhilaration, hope and disbelief, and then Caesar was kissing her gently, sweetly, with the tender kisses her young self might have yearned for, as he cupped her face and brushed his lips over hers.

  This was surely a dream. It had to be. But she knew she could not possibly have dreamed the firm reality of Caesar’s broad strong shoulders beneath her hands as she clung to him any more than she could have dreamed the emotion in his voice when he had called her his ‘sweet, precious love,’ but how could this be? How could it be happening?

  ‘Caesar?’ She spoke his name uncertainly beneath his kiss.

  Immediately Caesar heard and felt her confusion and her doubt, and equally immediately reacted to it as he forced himself to stop kissing her. He couldn’t make himself let her go, though, holding her close, keeping his arms wrapped around her so that her head nestled naturally against his shoulder.

  ‘There is so much I want to say to you,’ he told her. ‘So much I need to say. So many apologies I need to make, so many pleas for your forgiveness, and it is my hope that we shall have a lifetime together in which I can make those apologies and prove to you how much I love you. How much I have loved you right from the start.’

  Louise’s sound of denial was accompanied by an attempt to move away from him, but Caesar wouldn’t let her. His arms were constraining her with the greatest tenderness and care. He never again wanted her to feel that she wasn’t valued or respected or loved in all the ways there were.

  ‘Yes, I know what you must be thinking. All those years ago I behaved towards you with unforgivable cruelty. That cruelty was born of conceit and arrogance. It was the behaviour of a coward too—a man who could not and would not face the truth within himself that he already knew because that truth did not fit the pattern he had drawn for himself. Of all the offences against you of which I am guilty, refusing to acknowledge that I was falling in love with you—even to myself—was the worst. And I was falling in love with you, Louise. Something about you burned away everything I thought I knew about myself and the life I had planned for myself. You were not …’

  ‘The kind of girl you wanted to want?’ Louise supplied for him.

  Caesar exhaled. ‘Yes. And because of that I allowed myself to believe the judgements others had made on you instead of making my own. Again I was a coward, because I chose the easier p
ath. Their judgement made it easier for me to deny what I knew I really felt. You gave your sweet self and your love to me and I let you, and then I publicly and cruelly rejected you—because that was what other people expected of me. I can never forgive myself for that.’

  Louise could hear the honesty in his voice.

  ‘I don’t blame you for what you did, Caesar,’ she told him, surprised herself to discover that it was true. ‘After all I wasn’t honest with you myself. Initially I planned to use you to gain my father’s love. It was only later that I—’

  When she broke off Caesar prompted her. ‘It was only later that you fell in love with me?’

  Louise looked away from him. Even now, even knowing that he knew the truth, it was still hard for her to say the words that would leave her vulnerable and afraid. Rejection did that to you over time. It stole away all the belief you might once have had in yourself.

  ‘Louise, look at me—please.’

  Caesar was turning her head towards his own, and automatically she lifted her gaze to his, gasping out loud when she saw the pain and the longing so clearly revealed in his eyes. Did it matter to him so much? Did she matter to him so much?

  Before she could lose her courage she answered quickly, ‘Yes, it was later when I fell in love with you.’

  ‘And I destroyed that love—the most precious gift that can ever be given. Don’t think that I didn’t suffer because of that. In my dreams and in my most private thoughts you were always there, your memory tormenting me, and today I knew I had to be here with you.’

  ‘You came back because of me? You put me first?’ Everything that knowledge made her feel was revealed in her voice.

  ‘Yes. And that’s something I should have done a long, long time ago.’

  ‘It hurt me so much when you rejected me.’

  ‘I know. It was unforgivable. And all the more so when what I really wanted to reject and deny was the way you made me feel.’

  She looked at him.

  ‘I wanted you so badly, Louise. So very badly. I resented that wanting and I resented you for being the cause of it. It went against everything I believed being a Falconari meant. I was young—and arrogant. More than anything else I hope you will give me a second chance to prove how strong my love for you really is—a second chance to be worthy of your love.’

  ‘Oh, Caesar.’

  All that she felt for him was contained in those two words—a simple acknowledgement of her love for him.

  ‘The storm is over,’ he told her, looking towards the bedroom. ‘Come and look.’ Taking hold of her hand, he led the way from the dressing room to the bedroom.

  Outside it was now growing dark, but it was still possible to see that the sky was clear, and the moon was coming up to illuminate the now storm-free mountains.

  ‘Caesar?’

  As she said his name Caesar turned to her, bending his head to kiss her and then picking her up and carrying her towards the bed.

  ‘One storm is over, but there is another, I think, that is possessing us both with an equal ferocity of need—if you trust me with that need, with our love?’

  Could she? Did she trust him? Did she trust herself to take such a risk after everything that had happened? Did she have the courage to trust him and herself?

  There was only one way in which she could find out.

  Louise looked at him and nodded her head.

  ‘Yes,’ she whispered. Her voice grew more fervent as she told him, ‘Yes. Caesar. Yes, I do.’

  Louise knew what Caesar was asking. She knew too that he understood her answer. When he turned her in his arms and started to kiss her, slowly at first and then with growing passion, she responded to him with a passion of her own—a passion that had been locked away inside her for far too long.

  then with growing passion, she responded to him with a passion of her own—a passion that had been locked away inside her for far too long.

  Louise could feel its power and its danger. She could feel herself being swept away by it. For a few seconds her old fear of rejection returned. But, as though he knew what she was thinking and feeling, Caesar held her tight, whispering against her ear.

  ‘It’s all right. It’s all right. I love you and I’ll never let you down again. Just hold on to me, Louise, and I’ll keep you safe.’

  Safe? When he was making her feel the way she was feeling? When he was making her want to abandon herself completely to him?

  ‘I want you so much.’ She couldn’t say anything more but she didn’t need to. Caesar was sliding her clothes from her body and then covering it with kisses, making her shudder from head to foot when he caressed her eager, melting naked flesh.

  From somewhere she found the courage to match her own desire and started to undress him, trembling-fingered, tugging on buttons and male clothing with giddy pleasure as she explored his body with her hands and her mouth. The sensation of the hair-roughened texture of his skin beneath her hands made her quiver with increased need and increased boldness as she explored the taut muscles of his thighs. She had thought him already impressively hard and aroused, but beneath her caress his erection pulsed so fiercely and commandingly that her heartbeat increased to match its demand.

  ‘I want you so much too …’

  He had said that to her before—all those years ago.

  ‘Too much?’ she asked him, repeating the other words he had said to her then.

  Caesar shook his head as he drew her up beside him so that their naked bodies lay together. ‘Where my love for you is concerned there could never be anything such as too much.’

  Such healing words, such loving words—the words of a man a woman must know she could trust with her own love.

  Now was the time for her to cross the final chasm that separated her from the darkness of her past to the present, and the future she knew she wanted.

  ‘I love you, Caesar,’ she told him, and then gasped as he kissed her with such an intensity of passion that she knew beyond any shadow of doubt just how much her words meant to him.

  Now, in his fervency, he was letting her see his own vulnerability, his own need for her. Beneath his passionate touch, the full, proud flood of her love for him filled her. His expression as he looked down at her body made her shudder with need, made her breasts swell with longing into, soft, rounded spheres of sensuality.

  A million aroused nerve-endings were cloaked in honey-warm skin, every single one of them urgently responding to his hands and then his lips as he gave her what his ardent look had promised.

  But then it was his turn to shudder with mute pleasure as he drew her nipple into his mouth, and she arched against him, wild and wanton, her response feeding his own desire and burning away the last of his self-control.

  How often in his dreams and his private, secret imaginings had he longed for her and for this? A lifetime of times, or so it had sometimes felt, but now she was here, and she was his, willingly and with love.

  When he parted her thighs she looked up at him, her eyes luminous with her feelings. Her sex was swollen and wet, the slow, erotic caress of his fingertips causing her to draw in her breath and then release it on a wild shudder of pleasure.

  ‘Caesar …’

  Louise couldn’t bear to wait any longer. She reached up to him, pulling him down against her, quivering with expectation, wrapping her legs around him, gasping out loud. He couldn’t wait any longer. He knew her already, and moving into her felt like coming home to a sweetness and a welcome ceaselessly longed for.

  They moved together, silently at first and then with growing cries of pleasure, as they abandoned themselves to one another on their journey to that place where for a few seconds out of time they were one perfect whole.

  Later, wrapped protectively in Caesar’s arms, Louise freely told him of her love for him.

  ‘I don’t deserve you,’ Caesar whispered back emotionally, ‘but I shall strive to do so. I promise you that. My biggest regret, aside from the hurt I have caused you,
is the fact that I cannot give you any more children.’ His voice became muffled as he buried his face in her hair.

  ‘You have given me Oliver, and you have given me your love—I could not want for anything else,’ Louise assured him truthfully.

  She could hear and feel his deep unsteady breath, and for the first time she sensed something of what it must mean to him to have to judge himself as less than the man he had believed himself to be, the man he had been brought up to think of himself as being. Tenderly she wrapped her arms around him, holding him as gently as if he were their son.

  When he had himself back under control, he said gruffly, ‘I wonder if perhaps there isn’t something that directs our lives? Fate—call it what you will—and that something made sure that Oliver would be conceived, so that we would have our second chance to find one another. You are my love and you always will be.’

  ‘Just as you are mine and always will be,’ Louise told him back.

  A tender kiss, gently exchanged, the sudden silver beam of moonlight on a sensual male torso, and then the curve of an inviting female breast, an upwelling of mutual shared desire, and they were reaching for one another again, whispering precious words of love to one another, knowing that the past had finally been laid to rest.

  EPILOGUE

  Eighteen months later.

  ‘JUST look at Caesar and Ollie showing off Francesca to everyone. I don’t think I have ever seen a prouder pair of males.’ Anna Maria laughed as she spoke to Louise and the two of them watched father and son introducing Ollie’s four-month-old baby sister to the guests invited to her christening.

  Their special miracle, as Caesar had described her emotionally when they had looked at the scan together and received the news that, against all the odds, Louise was pregnant. Although a recent check-up had revealed that Caesar’s chances of conceiving were extremely low, rather than impossible, neither of them had expected it.

  ‘Sometimes it does happen, when all the probabilities are against it,’ the consultant had told them both. ‘There is no scientific evidence to explain exactly why, or