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He hadn’t.
That much was obvious by the noise levels as they neared the sitting room, which was at the end of long corridor and attached to a huge conservatory, where Leonard was fond of napping in his chair with a view of the garden.
Looking through the open door, Sophie paused to take in the scene in front of her. Sarah and her new assistant, with whom she seemed very familiar, were circulating with nibbles and drinks. On the polished sideboard there was a selection of yet more canapés and buckets filled with bottles of wine and any number of non-alcoholic drinks. Towards the back of the room, perched on a padded chair, Leonard was holding court.
There must have been at least twenty people in the room, and most of them she recognised.
Friends from the village...chums he had worked alongside for years...their other halves...the lady who ran the flower shop...
She paled, and yanked Alessio back before Leonard could spot them, tugging him away from the sitting room and into the snug, which was small and private and set to one side of what Leonard referred to as ‘the piano room’, even though the piano had long vanished from its pride of place. Sold, she reckoned, to help pay bills.
‘This is a nightmare!’ she whispered. ‘All those people!’
Alessio looked at her...at the patches of colour staining her cheeks and the hectic brightness in her eyes and the look of utter horror on her face.
His body was still coming down from the high of having her touch him.
They hadn’t been able keep their hands off one another! That being the case, he couldn’t see why she was suddenly shrieking in the face of this charade they had concocted.
So what if a few people thought that this was more serious than it actually was? They could bide their time, couldn’t they? Why the rush to find a way out? Why begin formulating all the reasons why the situation didn’t stand a chance in hell of going anywhere? Why not enjoy what they had?
He sighed with a mixture of impatience and frustration and raked his fingers through his hair. He leant against the wall and shoved his hand in his trouser pocket and frowned.
‘I admit it’s not ideal that he’s invited people over to...to celebrate, but they’re here, and there’s nothing we can do about it.’
‘No, I know we can’t turf them out. But, Alessio...this is a disaster!’
‘Disaster seems a bit overblown, don’t you think?’
‘No! No, I don’t!’
He didn’t understand. He just didn’t get it. Sophie was sapped by the feeling of utter defeat.
‘Sophie, this isn’t the end of the world.’
‘You looked pretty ashen when you breezed into my bedroom to tell me,’ she shot back with asperity.
‘I was taken aback.’
But then we fell into each other’s arms,Sophie thought,and you realised that, hey, continuing the charade might be okay, irrespective of other people knowing...
In a heartbeat, Sophie knew what she had to do.
She knew how the land lay. She’d always known how the land was going to lie, because Alessio was honest when it came to telling it like it was.
No commitment.
No emotional entanglements.
No risk of love.
Just great sex for as long as they both felt the same.
Sophie knew that she had entered into their arrangement with her eyes wide open, and then she had allowed herself to sink further and deeper into something that had now ended up meshing around her like a net, until thrashing her way out felt like a struggle.
But she would have to thrash her way out. And the only way she could do that was by being honest.
As long as Alessio was aware of the power he had over her physically...as long as he knew that she wanted him as much as he wanted her, and that she found him downrightirresistible...what would be the impetus for anything to change for him?
