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Alessandro and the Cheery Nanny
Amy Andrews
Alessandro and the Cheery Nanny
Amy Andrews
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
Table of Contents
Cover Page (#ufaa6ccaf-5df0-5cd4-92c8-f8c55044bf8d)
Title Page (#ub2ee52aa-49e3-5509-af67-6f7a5c12512c)
Excerpt (#ue852786e-20d4-55ac-8cf0-9b56d073ae7a)
Chapter One (#uae56266b-6fab-5201-b9b8-f4beed1e2868)
Chapter Two (#u85c9d9c2-a42c-5f04-bd65-b9bd6eb330e5)
Chapter Three (#ud83613ad-9aeb-5dcb-ae46-a661a3a894fe)
Chapter Four (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Five (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Six (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Seven (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eight (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Nine (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Ten (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eleven (#litres_trial_promo)
Copyright (#litres_trial_promo)
Extract from ALESSANDRO AND THE CHEERY NANNY:
Alessandro pulled up short in the doorway as the sound of his son’s laughter drifted towards him. It had been months since he’d heard the noise. He’d almost forgotten what it sounded like. And after an arduous day it was a surprising pick-me-up.
His midnight gaze followed the sound, widening to take in the picture before him: his son, cuddled up next to a woman with blonde hair and blue eyes.
His welcoming smile froze before it had even made an indent into the uncompromising planes of his face.
Chapter One
NAT DAVIES was instantly attracted to the downcast head and the dark curly hair. There was something about the slump to the little boy’s shoulders and the less than enthusiastic way he was colouring in. He seemed separate from the other children laughing and playing around him, and it roused the mother lion in her.
He was the only stationary object in a room full of movement. And he seemed so…forlorn.
‘Who’s that?’ she asked, bumping Trudy’s hip with hers to get her boss’s attention.
Trudy stopped chopping fruit and followed Nat’s gaze. ‘Julian. It’s his second day. Four years old. Father is ooh-la-la handsome. Italian. Perfect English. Just moved from London. Widower. Recent, I think. Doesn’t smile much.’
Nat nodded, well used to Trudy’s staccato style of speech. ‘Poor darling.’ No wonder he looked so bereft. ‘How awful to lose your mother at such a young age.’ Not that it mattered at any age really. She’d been eight when her father had left and it still hurt.
Trudy nodded. ‘He’s very quiet. Very withdrawn.’
Nat’s heart strings gave another tug. She’d always had a soft spot for loners. She knew how it felt to have your perfect world turned upside down while life continued around you. How alienating it could be. How it separated you from the bustle of life.
‘Well, let’s see if I can fix that,’ she murmured.
Nat made a beeline for the lonely little boy, stopping only to grab a copy of Possum Magic off the bookshelf. In her experience she found there was very little a book couldn’t fix, if only for a short while.
‘Juliano.’ Nat called his name softly as she approached, smiling gently.
The little boy looked up from his lacklustre attempt at colouring in a giant frog. His mouth dropped open and he stared at Nat with eyes that grew visibly rounder. She suppressed the frown that was itching to crease her forehead at the unexpected response. Surely he was used to hearing his name spoken in Italian?
He was looking at her with a mix of confusion and wonder, like he was trying to figure out if he should run into her arms or burst into tears.
She kept her smile in place. ‘Ciao, Juliano. Come sta?’
Nat had learnt Italian at school and spent a year in Milan on a student exchange after completing grade twelve. Given that she was now thirty-three, it had been a while since she’d spoken it but she had been reasonably fluent at one stage.
Julian’s grave little face eked out a tentative smile and Nat relaxed. ‘Posso sedermi?’ she asked. Julian nodded and moved over so Nat could share the bench seat with him.
‘Hi, Juliano. My name’s Nat,’ she said.
The boy’s smile slipped a little. ‘Papa likes me to be called Julian,’ he said quietly.
The formality in his voice was heart-breaking and Nat wanted to reach out and give him a fierce hug. Four-year-olds shouldn’t be so buttoned up. If this hadn’t been St Auburn’s Hospital crèche for the children of hospital staff, she might have wondered if Julian’s father had a military background.
Maybe Captain Von Trapp. Before Maria had come on the scene.
‘Julian it is,’ she said, and held out her hand for a shake. He shook it like a good little soldier and the urge to tickle him until his giggles filled the room ate at her.
She battled very uncharitable thoughts towards the boy’s father. Could he not see his son was miserable and so tightly wound he’d probably be the first four-year-old in history to develop an ulcer?
She reminded herself that the man had not long lost his wife and was no doubt grieving heavily. But his son had also lost his mother. Just because he was only four, it didn’t mean that Julian wasn’t capable of profound grief also.
‘Would you like me to read you a story?’ Nat pointed to the book. ‘It’s about a possum and has lots of wonderful Australian animals in it.’
Julian nodded. ‘I like animals.’
‘Have you got a pet?’
He shook his head forlornly. ‘I had a cat. Pinocchio. But we had to leave him behind. Papa promised me another one but…he’s been too busy…’
Nat ground her teeth. ‘I have a cat. Her name’s Flo. After Florence Nightingale. She loves fish and makes a noise like this.’
Nat mimicked the low rumbling of her five-year-old tortoiseshell, embellishing slightly. Julian giggled and it was such a beautiful sound she did it again. ‘She’s a purring machine.’ Nat laughed and repeated the noise, delighted to once again hear Julian’s giggle.
As children careened around them, immersed in their own worlds, she opened the book and began to read aloud, her heart warmed by Julian’s instant immersion into its world. Page after page of exquisite illustrations of Australian bush animals swept them both away and by the end of the tale Julian was begging her to read it again, his little hand tucked into hers.
‘I see you’ve made a friend there,’ Trudy said a few minutes later, plonking a tray of cut-up fruit on the table in front of them and calling for the children to go and wash up for afternoon tea.
Julian followed the rest of the kids into the bathroom, looking behind him frequently to check Nat was still there. ‘I hope so, Trude,’ Nat replied.
If anyone needed a friend, it was Julian.
An hour later the chatter and chaos that was usually the kindy room was filled only with the beautiful sounds of silence as the busy bunch of three- to five-year-olds slumbered through the afternoon rest period. Nat wandered down the lines of little canvas beds, checking on her charges, pulling up kicked-off sheets and picking up the odd teddy bear that had been displaced.
She stopped at Julian’s bed and looked down at his dear little face. His soft curls framed his cheeks and forehead. His olive complexion was flawless in the way of children the world over. His mouth had an enticing bow shape and his lips were fat little cherubic pillows.
Unlike every other child in the room, he slept alone, no cuddle toy clutched to his side. With the serious lines of his face smoothed in slumber he looked like any other carefree four-year-old. Except he wasn’t. He was a motherless little boy who seemed to carry the weight of the world on his shoulders.
More like forty than four.
He whimpered slightly and his brow puckered. Her heart twisted and she reached out to smooth it but he turned on his side and as she watched, his thumb found its way into his mouth. He sucked subconsciously and her heart ached for him. He seemed so alone, even in sleep. It was wrong that a boy who had just lost his mother should have nothing other than a thumb to comfort him.
She made a mental note to talk to his father at pick-up. Ask him if Julian would like to bring along a toy, something familiar from home. Maybe she could even broach the subject of counselling for Julian. Something had to be done for the sad little darling. Someone had to try.
It may as well be her.
It was early evening when Nat found herself curled up in a bean bag with Julian in Book Corner, reading Possum Magic for the third time. The room was once again quiet, most of the children having gone home, their parents’ shifts long since finished. The few remaining kids had eaten their night-time meals and were occupied in quiet play.
Despite her best efforts to engage him with other children, Julian had steadfastly refused to join in, shadowing her instead. Nat knew she should be firmer but in a short space of time she’d developed a real soft spot for Julian.
His despondent little face clawed at her insides and she didn’t have the heart to turn him away. He looked like he was crying out to be loved and Nat knew how that felt. How could she deny a grieving child some affection?
She didn’t notice as she turned the pages that Julian’s thumb had found its way into his mouth or that one little hand had worked its way into her hair, rhythmically stroking the blonde strands.
All she was really aware of was Julian’s warm body pressed into her side and his belly laugh as she mimicked Grandma Poss and Hush on their quest to find the magic food. As ways to end the day went, it wasn’t too bad at all.
Dr Alessandro Lombardi strode into the crèche. He was tired. Dog tired. Emotional upheaval, months of no sleep, moving to the other side of the planet and starting a new job had really taken their toll. He wanted to go home, get into bed and sleep for a year.
If only.
He pulled up short in the doorway as his son’s laughter drifted towards him. It had been months since he’d heard the sound and he’d almost forgotten what it sounded like. And after an arduous day it was a surprising pick-me-up.
His midnight-dark gaze followed the sound, his eyes widening to take in the picture before him. His son cuddled up next to a woman with blonde hair and blue eyes exactly like Camilla’s. His fingers absently stroked her hair while he sucked his thumb, just as he used to do with Camilla.
His welcoming smile froze before it had even made a dent into the uncompromising planes of his face. He crossed the room in three strides. ‘Julian!’
Nat felt the word crack like a whip across the room and looked up startled as Julian’s thumb fell from his mouth and he dropped his hand from her hair as if it had suddenly caught fire.
She didn’t need Trudy to tell her Julian’s father had arrived. They were carbon copies of each other. Same frowns, same serious gazes and brooding intensity, same cherubic mouths.
But where Julian’s appeal was all round-eyed childhood innocence, his father’s appeal was much more adult. There was nothing childish about his effect on her pulse. He looked like some tragic prince from a Shakespearean plot to whom the slings and arrows had not been kind.
Put quite simply, at one glance Julian’s father was most categorically heart-throb material. A tumble of dark hair, with occasional streaks of silver, brushed his forehead and collar, a dark shadow drew the eye to his magnificent jaw line and that mouth…
She knew without a doubt she was going to dream about that mouth.
She suddenly felt warm all over despite the chill that blanketed her as cold dark eyes, like black ice, raked over her. Nat was used to men staring. She was blonde and, as had been pointed out to her on numerous occasions, had a decent rack. She was no supermodel but she knew she’d been blessed with clear skin, healthy hair and a perfect size twelve figure.
Until today she’d thought living in Italy had immunised her against being openly ogled. As an eighteen-year-old blonde with pale skin in a country where dark hair and olive complexions were the norm, she’d certainly attracted a lot of interest from Italian boys.
But there was nothing sexual about this Italian’s interest. Rather he was looking at her like she was the wicked witch of the west.
And he was definitely no boy.
‘Julian,’ he said quietly, not taking his eyes off the strange woman who was eerily familiar. From the way she folded her long pale legs under her to the blonde ponytail that brushed her shoulders and the fringe that flicked back from her face, she was just like Camilla.
His gaze strayed to the way the top two buttons of her V-necked T-shirt gaped slightly across her ample chest. They lingered there for a moment, unconsciously appreciating the ripe swell of female flesh. It had been a long time since he’d appreciated a woman’s cleavage and he quickly glanced away.
His gaze moved upwards instead, finding the similarities to Camilla slapped him in the face again. Same wide-set eyes, same high cheekbones, same full mouth and pointed chin complete with sexy little cleft that no doubt dimpled when she smiled.
Hell, he must be tired, he was hallucinating.
He held his hand out to his son. ‘Come here.’
Julian obeyed his father immediately and Nat felt the beads of the bean bag beneath her shift and realign, deflating her position somewhat. She looked up, way up, at a distinct disadvantage in her semi-reclined state on the floor.
From this angle Julian’s father looked even more intimidating. More male. His legs looked longer. His chest broader. He loomed above her and she was torn between professionalism and just lolling her head back and looking her fill.
She couldn’t remember ever having such an immediate response to a man.
His pinstriped trousers fell softly against his legs, hinting at the powerful contours of his quadriceps. The thick fabric of his business shirt did the same, outlining broad shoulders and a lean torso tapering to even leaner hips.
Unfortunately he was still staring down at her like she was one of those insects who ate their young and reluctantly professionalism won out. She floundered in the bean bag for a few seconds, totally annihilating any chance of presenting herself as a highly skilled child care worker before struggling to her feet.
Snatching a moment to collect herself, she smiled encouragingly at Julian. She noticed immediately how, even standing next to his father, Julian still looked alone. They didn’t touch. There had been no great-to-see-you hug, he didn’t take his father’s hand, neither did his father reach for him. There was no affectionate shoulder squeeze or special father-son eye contact.
It was obvious Julian wasn’t frightened of him but also obvious the poor child didn’t expect much.
Nat returned her gaze upwards. Good Lord—the man was tall. And seriously sexy. She smiled, mainly for Julian’s benefit. ‘Hi. I’m Nat Davies.’ She extended her hand.
Alessandro blinked. He’d braced himself when she’d opened her mouth to speak, half expecting a cut-glass English accent. But when the words came out in that slow, laid-back Australian way, still unfamiliar to his ear, he relaxed slightly.
The similarities between this woman and his dead wife were startling on the surface. Same height, same build, same eye colour, same blonde hair worn in exactly the same style, same facial structure and generous mouth. Same cute chin dimple.
No wonder Julian had taken a shine to her.
But looking at the fresh-faced woman before him, he knew that’s where the similarities ended. This woman exuded openness, friendliness, an innocence, almost, that his wife had never had.
