And it had been fun. Unexpectedly fun.
Working with people all day, all part of a team, all trying to attain the same goal, was a buzz. Why did people say the nine-to-five was dull? It was absolutely stimulating. Of course, she conceded, she wasn’t having the full experience, moving from department to department as she was, but she had never felt so full of ideas, of creativity. Even at night she lay there with ideas buzzing round her brain, unable to sleep with it all.
Okay, it wasn’t just the work stopping her sleeping. Sharing a house with Luca was a serious mistake. Just knowing she could slip out of her bed, pad along the corridor to his room and slip in beside him was torture.
But what if he said no? He had refused her before. He wanted a woman to have his babies, all four of them. He didn’t want a ditzy debutante who fluttered from project to project, fiancé to fiancé, like a pollen-drunk butterfly. He wanted a sensible woman in sensible shoes with a sensible attitude.
And thank goodness he did, she told herself sternly. It was too risky. This one would hurt—had hurt. She might not bounce back this time.
If she was staying, she should seriously consider finding her own place well away from temptation. Maybe the local convent had a room. ‘So?’
‘So?’ he echoed.
‘Have I passed? Do I get to stay?’
‘If you want to.’ He sounded indifferent, as if her arrangements, her presence here, meant nothing to him. Perhaps it didn’t. Why should it? Occasionally she thought he felt it too, that he might be attracted to her. But attraction meant nothing without respect. Good genes had given her a healthy metabolism, body and bone structure. Money and an abundance of leisure time had allowed her to enhance those genetic gifts. Minty was under no illusions: a toned body, good skin and thick hair were nice to have. But she hoped she was worth more than their sum.
She hoped she’d have the chance to find out how much more one day. Being here, working with people who didn’t seem to care that her father was an earl, her mother an actress, or didn’t care that she had been tabloid fodder since her wild-child teens, people who only expected hard work, was liberating. It gave her hope.
‘Of course I want to stay.’
‘Of course,’ he murmured. ‘Of course, why would you want the financial freedom selling your shares to me would give you? Of course you would prefer to get up early every day and work for nine hours, five days a week.’
‘That’s how most people live.’
‘Yes, but you are not most people.’ Minty flinched at the sardonic gleam in his eyes, another reason not to get too close. He’d always had a disconcerting habit of seeing more than she revealed, seeing past her armour. ‘However, if you wish to stay I will, of course, honour our agreement. Unless...’ He paused reflectively. The amber eyes blazed; he looked at his most devilish. ‘Can you handle a new deal?’
He sounded so calm, so superior. Minty was tempted to say no, to flounce out, head held high. They’d made a deal and she had won. He couldn’t take that away from her.
But she was intrigued. Damn those gaming ancestors of hers.
‘Okay,’ she said. ‘I’ll consider what you have to say.’
‘You can stay. I can see you would be useful in the marketing department working on the English-language campaigns. You have worked hard the past two weeks. Everyone is full of praise—and it’s what Rose would have wanted—so, we’ll sort out a job description, salary; everything will be done properly. And, of course, I expect you to take up your seat on the board. But when you get bored...’ He looked her straight in the eyes. ‘And you will get bored, Minty, we both know that— probably sooner rather than later. Then you sell your shares and you don’t come near my company again. Capisce?’
Oh, he was good, too good; too damn perceptive.
She slid off the desk, pulling her dress down as she did so. ‘What if I have a genuine reason?’ she asked sweetly. ‘A new job, a baby, a fiancé who sticks around, a broken leg, an emergency back home? What if I work for you for ten years and get a new opportunity? Does that still count?’
He laughed, a genuine burst of humour that surprised her, made her smile with the infectiousness of it. ‘If you are here in ten years I’ll...’ He cast about for an appropriate expression.
‘In English, we say “eat my hat”,’ Minty informed him helpfully and smiled back over at him. The smile wavered on her lips. Luca was looking at her intently, the humour disappearing as suddenly as it had arrived, an unreadable expression in his amber eyes. The contrast with his olive skin and those long, dark lashes was startling; it made him seem wild, almost wolflike. They were eyes a girl could get lost in, eyes that could make you forget where you were, what you were doing.
She swayed, taking a tiny step closer, and then another, hypnotised by those eyes, by the heat she could see burning in them, when the shrill sound of her phone’s ringtone blared out. She looked about for her phone, desperate to shut the intrusive noise off, to get back to the intimacy that had suddenly flared up. The noise was coming from her bag which was slumped on the desk behind her, next to the rapidly melting ice cream.
The ice cream wasn’t the only thing melting in the suddenly stuffy room.
Her legs like jelly, Minty wobbled to the desk, reaching out to grasp it for support. This wasn’t right. Luca hadn’t even touched her! How could a look, one look, affect her this way? She fumbled for her phone, but by the time she had pulled it out it was too late; the call had diverted to voicemail.
She took a deep breath. She was going to say something. She just wasn’t sure what. ‘Don’t look at me that way.’ Or maybe, ‘Kiss me.’
Possibly both.
She turned round, the words trembling on her lips. But Luca was gone.
‘GOOD MORNING.’
Cheerful, well-modulated tones rang clearly across the room. The tones of someone who embraced each morning, someone raised on kippers, kidneys and anaemic toast. Someone raised on hearty pre-breakfast tramps across fields and woodland trails, a well-trained spaniel at their heel.
‘I hope you slept well?’ the cheerful inquisition continued.
‘Buongiorno.’ Forcing a polite smile on his face, Luca turned to face her. He might prefer silence, a brisk walk, black coffee and a newspaper to help him wake up properly but Minty was a member of that despised breed: breakfast chatterer.
And, annoyingly, using his newspaper as a barrier wasn’t working. She just chatted on regardless. He lowered it reluctantly. He should have gone in earlier, had his coffee and read his paper in the peaceful privacy of his office.
She was dressed and ready to go, a file by her side and the ubiquitous iPad in her hand. Sure, the effect looked industrious but Luca would bet good money that she was checking her social media accounts, not actually working. His mouth twisted wryly as he observed her. At least Minty was taking her new job seriously, sartorially at least, he noted. She definitely looked the part of a young marketing executive in a pretty grey dress that fell to just above the knee, teamed with a lemon cardigan and yet another flimsy pair of flip-flops, these the same colour as her cardigan. She had twisted her hair up into a knot with just a few tendrils hanging down. She looked as fresh as a lemon sorbet.
And just as desirable.
No, he reminded himself. Don’t go there. But he felt that increasingly familiar pull towards her, the heating of his blood as it flowed through his veins. Minty by comparison looked as cool as the sorbet she resembled, sitting on the tiled counter as she swiped the tablet’s screen, swinging those long, bare legs; slim, muscular, formed on the hockey fields of