She knew he was watching her. She felt the weight of his gaze. She had always been aware of him watching her in the past. She had developed a sixth sense where he was concerned. She poured herself another wine and began sipping it, slower this time, aware that she was probably still a little low on fluids given how warm it was. The last thing she wanted to do was lose her head while in the presence of Alessandro Vallini.
God, she was so hot. Why hadn’t she packed a bikini in her handbag? It would have taken no space. Why hadn’t she thought? Luggage went missing all the time. It was one of the drags of travelling. She should have been more prepared. She pushed some sticky strands of hair off her face and took another cautious sip of her wine.
‘Have you got sunscreen on?’ Alessandro said.
‘Have you?’ she threw back.
‘I always use protection.’
Rachel felt that disturbing quiver again deep and low in her belly and to distract herself, jumped up and snatched a cold lager off the tray and took it to him. ‘Do you want a glass with that?’
‘No, this is fine. Thank you.’
She watched as he tipped his head back and drank from the bottle, the column of his long strong throat making her wonder what his skin would taste like if she were to trail her tongue along the dark stubble along his jaw …
She shied away from her traitorous thoughts like a cat springing away from a snapping dog. She went back to the chair in the shade and picked up her wine, holding it with both of her hands to control their sudden trembling. She had definitely been too long in the sun or something. She was acting so out of character. She wasn’t the type to be affected by a hot body and a slow sensual curve of a smile. Not any more. She was sensible and sorted out now. Life had taught her to get her priorities in order. No more infatuations, no more silly little dreams of being loved unconditionally. Everyone was out for what they could get and she was no different. She wished she could make him change his mind about backing her, however. If only she had more time with him to convince him of the potential of her label. If she could just get him to sit down with her and look at her spring and summer collection surely he would see how serious she was about this? How could she get him to change his mind?
Alessandro finished his beer and set the bottle well back from the edge of the pool. ‘Are you sure you won’t join me?’ he asked.
‘No, thank you.’
‘You could swim in your bra and knickers,’ he said. He waited a beat and added with another glint in his eyes, ‘You are wearing a bra and knickers, aren’t you?’
Rachel’s face felt like a furnace. How she hated him for taunting her like this. He was reminding her of the times when he had been at her father’s estate in the early years when she had deliberately paraded her scantily clad body before him. She had thought it amusing back then. It had made her feel so powerful. But now he was the one with all the power.
‘Of course I am wearing underwear,’ she said primly.
‘I am sure it is far more modest than some of the bikinis I have seen in this pool,’ he said.
Rachel could just imagine the minuscule scraps of fabric his lovers would prance around in. Not that she could talk. She had worn plenty of racy little numbers herself in the past. And he had seen her in them too. She had made sure of it. These days she went for a more classic look. ‘I might come down later after you’ve gone,’ she said.
‘I’m not planning on leaving any time soon,’ he said. ‘I swim for an hour each day, sometimes twice a day.’
Hence the strong pecs, Rachel thought. ‘That seems rather excessive,’ she said. ‘Are you training for something? The next Olympics maybe?’ She didn’t care that she sounded sarcastic. She didn’t see why she should pull any punches with him. He had insulted her from the moment she had stepped into his presence. It wasn’t helping her cause, she knew, but it sure felt good to give as good as she got from him.
His expression became shuttered, closed off, shadowed. ‘I like the exercise,’ he said. ‘It’s good for the mind as well as the body.’
He resumed swimming, length after length, the same rhythmic action having an almost hypnotic effect on her as she watched from the shade.
She sat for a bit longer finishing her wine, and in spite of the overhanging branches of the tree beside the table and chairs the heat became a torment. Perhaps it was the wine, perhaps it was the heat, or perhaps it was the streak of wilfulness in her personality that refused to let Alessandro think he could win any tussles with her.
She stood up and slipped out of her sandals and linen trousers and top, leaving them folded over the back of the chair she had just vacated. The bra and knickers ensemble she was wearing was thankfully a decent set Caitlyn had bought her for her last birthday. It was white with tiny pink rosebuds sewn in between the cups of the bra and on the front of the knickers. It covered her far more than some of the bikinis she had worn in the past, but even so as she walked towards the pool she felt as naked as the day she had been born.
Alessandro was at the other end of the pool when she slipped into the water but he turned to look at her as if some internal radar had signalled to him she had joined him. ‘Changed your mind?’ he said.
‘I was practically melting out there,’ she said, disguising a sigh of pure bliss as the cool water embraced her.
‘You should be used to the heat coming from Melbourne.’
‘It’s winter there now and it’s been a cold one,’ she said.
He leaned against the end of the pool in an indolent pose. ‘Come over here,’ he said. ‘It’s deeper.’
‘I’m fine here,’ Rachel said. ‘I like to be able to touch the bottom.’
‘You can still swim, can’t you?’
‘Of course, but I’m clearly not in quite the same league as you,’ she said.
‘I’ve been putting in a little extra practice just lately,’ he said in a tone touched with wryness as he effortlessly hauled himself out of the pool to sit on the edge, his legs still dangling in the water.
Rachel’s eyes went to his flat abdomen seemingly of their own volition. There was not a spare gram of flesh on him. Every abdominal muscle was clearly defined as if drawn by an anatomy artist. Her fingers itched to explore those hard ridges, to feel the texture of his skin, to tiptoe through the hair that marked him as a healthy potent male. Her heart began to beat heavily and she hadn’t even swum a stroke. Her breathing too was uneven, stopping and starting in her chest as if her lungs were being squeezed on and off by a large hand.
‘Are you going to do a length or two?’ Alessandro asked.
‘Are you going to criticise me if I don’t do it like a professional athlete?’ she tossed back archly.
He gave a slow, lopsided smile. ‘You need to learn to take constructive criticism, Rachel,’ he said. ‘How else can one learn to improve oneself if one is not open to feedback?’
Rather than answer him she slipped into the water and began swimming. She had never been more conscious of her body, and yet she had strutted on catwalks in several major cities before her career had been blown apart by her ex-fiancé’s double life in dealing drugs being exposed.
She got to the other end of the pool and had to draw breath. Obviously her fitness was something she needed to work on.
‘You need to stop fighting the water,’ Alessandro said from where he was sitting on the poolside. ‘You’re making it harder for yourself. You’re expending twice as much energy as you need to.’
She pushed the hair back off her face. ‘Yes, well, it’s not easy when I can’t see where the heck I am going.’
‘You need