The Italian's Passionate Return by Elizabeth Lennox

not only possible, it was incredible.
    A long time later, when her breathing was back to normal once more, she looked around, astonished to find that her bedroom was a disaster. The sheets were completely torn off of the bed, the pillows were nowhere to be found and clothes were strewn everywhere. Then her eyes caught the clock on her bedside table and she jackknifed up. “Oh no!” she gasped, pushing her hair out of her eyes.
    Damien wasn’t ready to expend that much energy yet, but he knew that something wasn’t right. “What’s wrong, love?” he asked, his fingers sliding down her spine.
    “Dylan! He’s going to be home in less than a half hour!” She sprang out of bed, grabbing her clothes as she hurried into the shower. “You have to be gone!” she called out to him.
    Damien caught his shirt just as she tossed it to him and smiled at her comment. Leave? Not a chance!
    He heard the shower start up and he dropped his shirt back down onto the bed. Heading into the shower, he ignored her look of outrage as she quickly washed the scent of their afternoon away with a floral soap. When she finished, he took it himself and lathered up, chuckling when her mouth fell open as she watched him.
    But she regrouped quickly, blinking and turning away as she grabbed a towel and stepped out of the shower at the same time. By the time he’d finished his own shower, she was already dried and pulling on her jeans again. She blushed when he caught her in her plain cotton underwear, but he didn’t mind. He liked it. But he was also going to like her in sexy bits of nothing very, very soon.
    “You have to go,” she told him again.
    He pulled on his boxers, then his slacks, buttoning up his shirt and stuffing his tie into his suit jacket. “I’m not going anywhere, Jemma.”
    She shook her head. “No. I know you want to meet him, but it’s too soon. I’ll figure out a good time to introduce you. But not today.” She was frantic, not wanting Dylan to be upset by the discovery of his father. “I’ll have to explain what happened and he won’t understand. He’s just a little boy…”
    “Jemma. I’ve already missed five years of his life. There’s no chance I’m going to miss another moment.” He moved closer, taking her hands before she could pull her hair into a ponytail again. “We’ll talk to him together. From what I’ve seen of Adriana, children are very resilient if they are treated with kindness.” He paused to let his words sink in. “I’m sure Dylan will be fine as soon as we explain who I am and why I’m here.”
    “But he might not like the fact that you’ve been gone for the first five years of his life.”
    He pulled her into his arms and kissed the top of her head. “We’ll just explain the circumstances. Not going into the crazy details of how he was conceived, but…”
    Jemma thought about that for all of five seconds before she shook her head. “No. It would be better if you came back later.”
    He sighed and looked down at her. “Better for whom?” he asked, knowing that what she was asking would only be better for her. Not for him and probably not for their son although he admitted that he wasn’t an expert at children.
    Jemma just looked at him for a long moment, her mind going over his comment. He was right. It wasn’t better for him to wait to meet his son. In fact, she was probably being very self-centered to even ask him to wait.
    And Dylan was a good kid. He would probably be thrilled to meet his father. Not that he had started to ask about him, but he’d just started school. He was bound to start understanding that other kids had two parents while he only had one.
    Well, two now.
    But there were so many questions still unanswered. How in the world could the two of them make this work? She didn’t want to share Dylan. He’d been hers alone for so long, it was painful to accept change.
    She sighed and looked down at her worn out sneakers, wishing she had something more