The Sicilian's Passion by Sharon Kendrick Page B

mutual. A man and a woman sent spinning out of orbit by the power of their mutual attraction.
    But if that was the case, where was he now?
    She licked at her dry lips distractedly. He had been on his way back to Sicily, she reasoned. Perhaps his business had been of a particularly urgent nature, and he had not wanted to disturb her. Because some unshakable instinct told her that Giovanni Calverri was far too fastidious a man to ever indulge in the transient pleasures of a one-night stand. Why, she had certainly never done anything like it herself!
    Which meant that he would almost certainly have left a note.
    Her heart was beating very fast as she went from room to room, switching on every light as she did so, so that no surface would go unsearched.
    Until she was forced to admit to herself the ghastly, horrible truth.
    That Giovanni had left without a trace.
    And that was when pain began to metamorphosise into anger…
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    Giovanni lifted his eyes to the dark-haired stewardess, and frowned, barely noticing the overt look of admiration she was slanting at him. ‘What?’ Automatically, he had lapsed into Sicilian.
    Her eyes flashed excitedly as she heard the distinctive dialect, but she was only able to answer him in Italian. ‘I asked whether you would like a cup of coffee before take-off?’ she said in a smooth, practised voice.
    What he wanted was for the damned plane to be touching down on the soil of his homeland—and certainly not a flight which involved a changeover in Rome while he waited for a connection.
    For half a moment he had considered chartering a private jet to take him on from Rome, but another sharp jab of his conscience had stopped him. Was he really about to startrewarding his outrageous indiscretion with a flamboyant gesture of extravagance?
    â€˜Please,’ he said shortly.
    She prettily offered him a tray of pastries but he waved them away with an impatient hand, and spent the rest of the flight forcing himself to go through a batch of papers which could easily have waited.
    But he needed something to occupy his mind. Something to try to stop him remembering the red blur of her hair and the emerald gleam of bewitching eyes.
    You’re going home, he told himself. With all that that entails.
    In Rome, he forced himself to eat a little something, reminding himself that he had had nothing since yesterday’s lunch. But the food tasted bland, and he pushed the half-touched plate away as his flight was announced.
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    The minutes ticked by like hours as Kate prowled around the flat, her initial sense of desolation gradually being replaced by a feeling of outright fury.
    How dared he?
    How dared he?
    By such a cold and uncaring rejection he had reduced a wonderful night to the bitter realisation that she had indulged in a classic one-night stand.
    And then been dumped!
    She felt her cheeks stain with shame. They were both mature and consenting adults. OK, he might have decided that he didn’t want to see her again, but at least he could have done her the courtesy of going through the motions of civilised behaviour. It wouldn’t have killed him to have breakfast with her, surely? Or to have made love to her when she woke up? prompted the hungry voice of her senses. He could have taken her telephone number and said that he would ring her, even if he hadn’t meant it.
    Bastard!
    She couldn’t sleep, eat, or concentrate on anything. She ran a bath and afterwards threw on a pair of jeans and a T-shirt—and the more she thought about Giovanni’s behaviour towards her, the more her fury grew and grew. But fury seemed to hurt less than shame—and far less than the pang of realising that she would probably never see him again.
    She couldn’t understand it. Had she misread everything?
    He had been the best lover she had ever had, and she was certain that the experience had been as wonderful for him as it had been for her. She had seen that almost dazed