The two of them carried on in this vein, with Maria smiling on, Ana trying not to laugh and even Rebecca smiling.
Felipe rolled his eyes. ‘Don’t you two have schoolwork to finish?’
‘No,’ said Katerina. ‘Watching you squirm is much more interesting.’
‘Who says I’m squirming?’ he teased. ‘I’m looking forward to a break from you two monkeys.’
‘You don’t mean that,’ said Katerina, dramatically clutching her neck. ‘You love us even though you give us the worst jobs to do.’
‘Yes, because I’m a cruel villain. I think it would be easier to employ people who do what I tell them.’ He wasn’t going to remind them that the weekly allowance he gave them was far more than the hourly rate for the work they did. They each worked one shift a week, which wasn’t much to ask. When he was Katerina’s age, he’d worked most evenings in the restaurant and still went to school the next day. His father had always impressed upon him that the family all pull together, and it was something he felt he should continue as part of his father and uncle’s legacy. But sometimes it was a relief to get away from the chaos and the constant buzz of the female hormonal soup that he lived with.
‘You should take Rebecca with you,’ said Maria suddenly.
He could almost hear the synapses clicking in synchronisation as one by one each female head bobbed up.
‘That’s a very good idea,’ said Ana.
‘Yes,’ said Maria. ‘Rebecca, you should go. You have Friday and Saturday off and no classes on Sunday. You should visit Lisbon. It’s a beautiful city. You can stay at Felipe’s apartment. It has two bedrooms, doesn’t it, Felipe?’
Chapter Ten
The wind whipped through Rebecca’s ponytail as they drove along in Felipe’s sleek BMW cabriolet towards Lisbon. She threw back her head, imagining she had the starring role in some Hollywood epic, enjoying every minute of it. There was also the small matter of anticipation, a nub of which had been building and building from the minute Felipe had properly invited her to Lisbon, away from the prying eyes and ears of Maria and Ana. Since then, her imagination had been in overdrive, and at inconvenient times she’d look at Felipe and imagine his mouth on hers without any distractions and quite simply lose the power of speech.
‘How was your class this morning?’
‘It was good,’ she said, wondering if he was feeling any of the pent-up tension that was surely humming from her. ‘I had a couple of guests.’
‘That’s good.’
‘Mmm,’ said Rebecca, trying to keep her frustration out of her voice.
‘Mmm?’ asked Felipe. He was no fool.
‘It’s great when people turn up and I love it when they really enjoy the class but there’s no consistency. Some days I only have a couple of people. I’d love to have more regulars so I can work with people to build up their strength and improve their core over time. Or work with people intensively for a whole week, like a Pilates retreat.
‘My dream would be to run different weekly classes for beginners, intermediates and advanced pupils. If I could do it here, that would be amazing. I’d like to think there might a demand among local people.’
‘That sounds like a great idea. You should suggest it to Inês.’
‘Ha! I don’t think so. Inês doesn’t seem that keen on the classes at the best of times. I can’t see her going for a full-on Pilates retreat.’
‘Why don’t you ask her? She might surprise you. It takes her a while to come round to anything new, especially if it’s not her idea. If it’s any consolation, she’s like that with everyone. Grumpy is her middle name. Whereas my other sister, whom you’ve yet to meet, Sara, is the sunshine queen. She’s always happy.’
Grateful for the change in direction of the conversation, Rebecca ran with it. She always felt a bit uncomfortable complaining about Inês to Felipe. She was his sister after all.
‘Where does Sara live?’
‘She and her husband live up in the foothills about twenty kilometres away. They run our sister farm, which my uncle originally ran. They supply all our vegetables and some of our meat, as well as our lavender honey and more of our fruit. We have a production facility up there where we make jam, piri piri sauce, vinegar and flavour our own olive oil. Sara and Diogo have three children, all girls.’
‘More girls?’
‘I know,’ he said with a mournful smile that had her laughing and nudging his arm.
‘Oh, you’re so hard done by. Do you even have to pick up your own socks?’ she asked with a teasing tilt of her head.
‘Certainly not,’ he said with one of his blasé, charming grins.
‘Life must be tough.’
