‘I...’ She glared at him. He made her life sound bare and empty, standing there leaning against the door, watching her with lazy interest. She was only twenty-two, yet she knew that she had few friends, definitely no significant other and that there had never been any significant other until Jefferson, not even an adolescent first love. She’d launched herself into a relationship with Jefferson, high on a sense of freedom, in love with the idea of being in love—and here she was, still a virgin, because nothing had worked out. She wondered, somewhere deep down, whether anything ever would. Who knew? What shedidknow was that Jefferson had put doubts in her head that had not been there before. ‘My taxi’s here,’ she said coolly.
‘It’ll wait.’
‘Really?’
‘Really. No one would dare pull up to this house and leave without my permission. I’m guessing that your flexibility on the lifestyle front answers my question.’ He pushed himself away from the door and looked down at her for a few seconds. ‘You want me to have the face-to-face conversation I had intended to have with your friend?’
Izzy shot him a hopeful glance and immediately felt a little unsteady on her feet. His lazy, veiled stare pinned her to the spot and sucked the breath out of her.
‘You know I do.’ She was aiming for cool, composed and a little sarcastic. Instead, she sounded breathless and flustered.
‘Tomorrow. I’ll come across to the cottage.’
‘You know how to get there?’
‘I have a lot of land, but I think I can work out the route to the gingerbread house without a trail of breadcrumbs guiding me.’
‘There’s no need to be sarcastic,’ Izzy muttered. She tore her eyes away and looked down at her feet. When she next looked up, it was to find him staring at her in a way which made her feel giddy. ‘What time can Evelyn expect you to come?’
‘Both of you,’ Gabriel told her smoothly. ‘I want you there as well—not that I’m sure I have to say that, considering you’ve volunteered for guardian angel duty.’ He opened the door for her, letting in a waft of warm, evening breeze. ‘I’ll be over at six.’
Izzy backed out of the door and nodded. Tomorrow. Six. It was good news. He wouldn’t be acquiescing if he wascompletelyagainst the idea of letting Evelyn stay put.
And once they had sorted it out, whatever the conclusion, she would hang around for another week maybe—make sure Evelyn was fine—and then return to Hawaii.
And the weird, unsettled feeling afflicting her would, thankfully, be gone.
CHAPTER THREE
ITWASVERYdifferent here, Gabriel thought as he paused to look at the cottage tucked away amidst the trees. Where his mansion looked out to a sea of vines undulating towards a distant horizon, here, tucked away from the vineyards, the trees had been allowed to grow unchecked. It was the difference between order and a certain pleasing wildness. Flowers bloomed and the fading sun glinted through the trees, casting shadows in the undergrowth.
Gabriel had not ventured out here at all. He’d had no interest in it. His focus had been exclusively on the vineyards. He’d known about the cottage, and of course on the few occasions when he’d made the trip to the house he had glanced towards the sprawling, endless wooded area at the back and admired the contrast in scenery. That had been roughly the extent of it, though.
Had he not decided to extend his acreage, he would not have been overly concerned about the cottage. It was a gap in his holdings, but he could afford gaps. Who cared whether an elderly lady owned a tiny bit of neighbouring land? Doubtless, the previous owners had never anticipated extending their holdings, so the cottage in its little plot, situated in the furthest reaches and well out of sight, would never have proved bothersome.
It certainly wouldn’t have been to Gabriel had he not been more ambitious in wanting to expand the winery. Not only would it provide jobs in the community—which was something that had clearly not occurred to Izzy in her heated rush to overturn his plans—but it would also be another step in that onward march away from the blistering poverty of his childhood.
So, alas, needs must.
Still, he could see what Izzy had been talking about. The cottage was very sweet. White picket fence, winding path to front door, faded red roof. It was fairy-tale stuff and, holding his hand, Rosa was clearly of the same opinion.
In fact, she had been enchanted by the woods ever since they had set off in search of the cottage. She had talked non-stop. She wanted to do some tree-climbing, she told him. Could she explore the woods on her own? She was bored staying in all the time. Could he come swim in the pool with her? Go to the shops with her? Play her computer game with her?
Right now she was hopping from one foot to the other, bristling with excitement. She ran towards the cottage, a slight, tanned kid in a scrappy T-shirt and a pair of denim shorts and some trainers, because she hated dresses or anything girly.
Gabriel followed.
His work load was intense. Things were happening with a couple of massive deals on the other side of the pond. His instinct was simply to get an agency to find someone who could temporarily cover Bella’s absence, but his ex-wife’s nasty jibes about his preoccupation with work had struck a chord. He was gearing up to an almighty battle with Bianca in trying to prevent her from absconding to Italy with Rosa.
Gabriel hadn’t been born yesterday. For all his staggering wealth, he knew that in a court of law a mother would take precedence, especially if it could be proved that the father was consumed with work to the exclusion of everything else. Never mind the fact that Rosa, his number-one priority, the only female in his life to hold his heart, was theveryreason he put in the hours. He had thrown money at Bianca following their divorce. She wanted for nothing, yet she remained embittered enough to paint him in the darkest of lights.
There was nothing more dangerous than a woman scorned. Gabriel had long concluded that Bianca’s pride had taken a beating. She had been the high-born Italian beauty of impeccable lineage. Her mother was a dowager with far-reaching influence, even though the woman was now nearly seventy.
He, on the other hand, had been the poor kid made good. His parents had been in service and had lived in near penury. Bianca had been born and raised to be worshipped, yet he had failed to pander to her demands, had ignored her, had failed to be jealous of her increasing need to flirt with other men. He had committed the gravest of sins by not treating her as number one and the fact that he was ‘just an upstart’, as she had screamed at one point, had been the final humiliation for her.
The truth was that he had married in haste because she had become pregnant, a mistake he blamed himself for, even though he later discovered that she had deliberately stopped taking the pill. He had not loved her, not been in love with her. He had, in the end, been indifferent and she had increasingly recognised that and hated him for it.
Gabriel had no intention of allowing his vindictive ex-wife to remove his daughter from his orbit, not least because it would be easy for her to make Rosa pay forhissins. That unplanned pregnancy had endowed him with the most precious gift of his life and he had no intention of allowing Rosa to be taken to Tuscany and out of his jurisdiction. Not if he could help it.
