‘No interest in hearing what the house is like?’ He tried to keep the annoyance out of his voice.
‘It’s not going to make any difference, is it?’ she pointed out politely. ‘Considering it’s already been bought.’ She sighed and ran her fingers through her hair, untangling small knots. ‘I know I should be grateful. You’ve been very good over all this. There are a lot of guys who would have been running for the hills a long time ago.’
‘And there are some who might have tried to force your hand when it came to the marriage situation,’ Sergio countered.
‘I suppose... Not that you can force someone to do something they don’t want to do.’
‘You’d be surprised how many men might dislike the thought of their child being born out of wedlock.’ His voice was grim.
‘That’s such an old-fashioned expression.’
But she didn’t like the thought of any child starting life on a conveyor belt, being shuffled between parents. Would she be blamed in the years to come? Would she end up being the villain in the piece? Her conscience stirred uneasily.
‘And it’s better than a child being torn apart between two warring, unhappy parents. Where are we?’
Busy streets had given way to more open spaces. The houses were spaced further apart. Up ahead she saw open fields and she sat forward, peering ahead.
‘Richmond Park stretches for miles around,’ he said, grimly and silently contemplating the reality that she saw any union between them as a potential battleground.
Susie was enchanted. You could almost forget that London was still accessible. She had been to a couple of parks, but generally the ones she had been to had been small and crowded. This stretched as far as the eye could see—a wilderness and yet still attached to the most vibrant city on the planet.
The car had slowed, was now manoeuvring through a series of roads that became smaller and smaller, until eventually they pulled up in front of a house that sat squarely in the middle of a well-tended garden.
‘We’re here,’ Sergio said, swinging out of the car as it pulled to a stop.
‘It’s...amazing...’
‘You sound shocked. What were you expecting? A smaller version of my apartment? No, don’t bother answering that. I can tell from the expression on your face that you were.’
He had the front door key, but first he wanted to show her the garden. They walked to the side and he led her to the back of the house, which was even more picture-perfect than the front. Overlooking the extensive open land of the park, the house gave an illusion of isolation that was seductive.
Fruit trees bordered a small, containable garden, in which a bench had been cleverly positioned so that the occupant would have unparalleled views of the parkland.
On cue, Susie strolled over and sat down.
‘It’s a little chilly out here,’ Sergio said after a few minutes. ‘Let’s go inside. You can see the rest of the house.’
She followed him and everything inside seduced her—from the cosy kitchen with its bottle-green Aga, to the quaint arrangement of rooms downstairs, each with its own personality but all of them warm and inviting.
‘Does this furniture belong to the owners?’ She ran her hands along the back of a sofa which was upholstered in colours of faded rose and cream.
‘No. I had it fully kitted out when the sale went through.’
Susie yanked her hand back as though it had been stung by a wasp. ‘So you chose the house and you chose the furniture as well?’
‘Do you like it?’
‘That’s not the point.’
‘Then what, exactly, is the point?’
He moved towards her and she stumbled a couple of paces back.
‘How long do you intend to maintain silent warfare between us, Susie? If that’s your way of trying to get rid of me through the back door, then rest assured that it’s not going to work.’
Susie licked her lips. In a desperate attempt not to find herself staring at him she turned her head. He firmly redirected it by dint of one finger on her chin.
‘I’m not... I... There’s no warfare between us...’
But that was how he would interpret her attempts to detach herself from him, even though they still gelled, still talked to one another...even though, when her guard was down, she always seemed to fall right back into him, enjoying his wit, his humour and his sharp, invigorating intelligence.