Ginny bit her lip at the swift, accusing glance Steve flung at her. Herr Frederick Metz, the Swiss banker she had been involved with when she first reached London, had sent men to snatch the children from the country house while Steve was away. The hired thugs had not counted on Steve’s early return, nor anticipated that Laura would recognize her father and wave to him as their carriage passed him on the road. The result was inevitable, but for them to watch their father battle—Oh, she remembered too well how Steve fought, viciously and with no restraint. It would have been even more frightening to two small children, and it was all her fault.

Her gaze shifted from Laura to Franco’s bed across the room. He was sitting up, sleepy-eyed but observant. What must he think, as well? In the past weeks she had tried so hard to penetrate the shell he kept around him, but the boy resisted her every effort.

“I told you Papa would come,” he said now to Laura, “and he did. He always keeps us safe. Go back to sleep.”

Was there an unvoiced rebuke in that comment for his mother, perhaps? Ginny couldn’t blame him. She had not been there for them when they needed her, had not kept them safe as Steve had done.

When Laura was finally settled, Steve accompanied Ginny to her bedroom, reaching around her to open the door. A low fire eased the chill, the coals a flickering glow in the grate. Ginny draped her silk shawl over the graceful lines of a Sheraton chair and turned to watch as Steve shrugged out of his evening jacket to toss it carelessly onto the coatrack in one corner.

Lately, he left her at her door, going down the hall to his own chamber, courteous and remote, as if they were complete strangers again. No—even when they were strangers, he had never viewed her with the same dispassionate gaze of the past month.

Her resolve to draw him into an honest discussion intensified, and she was slightly surprised to find that she was nervous and on edge. Clumsily, she began to fumble with the buttons of her gown, more to gain time than anything else.

“Dismiss your maid,” he said, eyeing her, “and I’ll help you with the rest of your dress.”

“No, thank you, this dress is far too expensive to allow you to rip it,” she retorted with a faint smile, “and I recall very well your methods of removing my garments for me.”

A flash of humor glinted in his eyes, his mocking smile reminding her of the many times he had stripped away her clothes without regard for their expense, or her protests.