The Consequences of That Night

drab, not particularly pretty, with the big hips of someone who loved extra cookies at teatime, wearing a beige raincoat, knit dress and sensible shoes. Her long black hair, when it wasn’t pulled back in a plaited chignon, hadn’t seen the inside of a hairdresser’s in years.
    Humiliation made her ears burn. How could she have dreamed, even for an instant, that Cesare might want to marry someone like her and raise a baby in a snug little cottage?
    He must have slept with her that night out of pity —nothing more!
    “Well?”
    “No.” Emma shook her head, hiding her tears. “No message.”
    “Ta, then,” she said rudely. But as she started to close the door, there was a loud bang as Cesare came out of the bathroom.
    Emma’s heart stopped in her chest as she saw him for the first time since he’d left her in his bed.
    Cesare was nearly naked, wearing only a low-slung white towel around his hips, gripping another towel wrapped carelessly over his broad shoulders. His tanned, muscular chest was bare, his black hair still damp from the shower. He stopped, scowling at Olga.
    “What are you—”
    Then he saw Emma in the doorway, and his spine snapped straight. His darkly handsome face turned blank. “Miss Hayes.”
    Miss Hayes? He was back to calling her that—when for the past five years they’d been on a first-name basis? Miss Hayes?
    After so long of hiding her every emotion from him, purely out of self-preservation, something cracked in her heart. She looked from him, to Olga, to the mussed bed.
    “Is this your way of showing me my place?” She shook her head tearfully. “What is wrong with you, Cesare?”
    His dark eyes widened in shock.
    Staggering back, horrified at what she’d said, and brokenhearted at what she’d not been able to say, she turned and fled.
    “Miss Hayes,” she heard him call behind her, and then, “Emma!”
    She kept going. Her throat throbbed with pain. She ran with all her heart, desperate to reach the safety of the elevator, where she could burst into tears in privacy. And start planning an immediate departure for Paris, where she’d never have to face him again—or remember her own foolish dreams.
    A father for her baby. A snug home. A happy family. A man who’d love her back, who would protect her, who’d be faithful. A tear fell for each crushed dream. She wiped her eyes furiously. How could she have ever let herself get in this position—with Cesare, of all people? Why hadn’t she been more careful? Why?
    Emma heard his low, rough curse behind her, and the hard thud of his bare feet. Before she reached the elevator, he grabbed her arm, whirling her around in the hall.
    “What do you want, Miss Hayes?” he demanded.
    “Miss Hayes?” she bit out, struggling to get free. “Are you kidding me with that? We’ve seen each other naked!”
    He released her, clearly surprised by her sharp tone.
    “That doesn’t explain what you’re doing here,” he said stiffly. “You’ve never sought me out like this before.”
    No, and she never would again! “Sorry I interrupted your date.”
    “It’s not a— I have no idea what Olga is doing in my room. She must have gotten a key and snuck in.”
    Hot tears burned behind her eyes. “Right.”
    “We broke up months ago.”
    “Looks like you’re back together.”
    “Not so far as I’m concerned.”
    “Now, that I believe,” she choked out. “Because once you have sex, any relationship is pretty much over where you’re concerned, isn’t it?”
    “We didn’t just have sex.” He set his jaw. “Have you ever known me to lie?”
    That stopped her.
    “No,” she whispered. Cesare never lied. He always made his position brutally clear. No commitment, no promises, no future.
    Yet, somehow many women still managed to convince themselves otherwise. To believe they were special. Until they woke alone the morning after, to find Emma serving them breakfast with their going-away present, and ended up weeping in her arms.
    “I really don’t care.” Emma ran an unsteady hand over her forehead. “It’s none of my business.”
    “No. It’s not.”
    She took a deep breath. “I just came to...to tell you something.”
    The dim lighting of the elegant hotel hallway left hard shadows against Cesare’s cheekbones, the dark scruff of his jaw, and his muscular, tanned chest. His black eyes turned grim. “Don’t.”
    Her lips parted on an intake of breath. “What?”
    “Just don’t.”
    “You don’t even know