‘A change is as good as a rest, as you said. Is that what you did? Never deviate? Were you never tempted by any other career choice?’
‘I…’ Erin blinked. She seemed to think for a second. ‘No. Financial security is important to me,’ she said firmly. ‘I also didn’t think that we were talking about me.’
‘Now that we’re getting to know one another a little better, I think that conversations between us should be fluid, don’t you? Airport up ahead. We made excellent time.’
The conversation was lost in a whirlwind of valet parking and checking in and then, within half an hour, they were in the first-class lounge, ushered through the opulent, semi-empty space like royalty to a group of comfy chairs and brought coffee and breakfast by one of the uniformed staff who was clearly in awe of Raffaele.
And then they carried on chatting about work.
Her comfort zone, Raffaele mused. He looked at her from under his lashes as she busied herself on her laptop, swivelling it occasionally to corroborate whatever point she was making. He intended to dig much deeper into his guarded secretary than she might anticipate.
Why the sudden fascination? Had it always been there, lurking under the surface, waiting for the right key to unlock it?
Or maybe he was bored of his standard-issue women. Bored with ridiculously good-looking women who were always too eager to please. Maybe he needed the safe distraction of someone like Erin, someone clever and restrained and, even more important, someone who wasn’t in awe of him, who would never want any sort of romantic involvement with him. Why shouldn’t he give in to curiosity about his disciplined, guarded secretary with all those enticing layers?
One day he would settle down, although right now the thought alone was enough to bring him out in a cold sweat. Too many associations with his parents and their dysfunctional marriage, two people wandering around their mansions, barely connecting on any meaningful level. Too many memories of his youthful hopes shot down in flames because the girl he’d thought he’d loved just couldn’t put up with a guy who had no heart to give. He thought of all the many ways love could fail and his mind went blank.
Why was the past resurfacing right now and with such vigour? Raffaele didn’t know, but it made no difference. He was firmly rooted in the way he was. He would never change.
He was here, Erin was here and she had challenged him by revealing just a little bit more about herself than she ever had before. He’d never been one to resist a challenge so right now, Erin was irresistible.
‘Are you listening to what I’m saying, Raffaele?’
Raffaele smiled slowly at her. ‘I’m always listening to what you say.’
Erin reddened. For a couple of seconds, she appeared to be lost for words. She stared down at her computer; Raffaele watched, lazy and amused and interested.
‘Good,’ she told him huskily when she finally dragged her gaze back to him, ‘because I’ve done a lot of work on these hotels…and a lot of background research into the hospitality trade.’
‘I’m getting the picture. Definitely beyond the call of duty. No need for you to have stayed up working into the early hours of the morning to collate all this material. I may be a hard taskmaster but even I have limits. You told me you were curious about my sudden interest in branching out from the well-trodden path.’
Someone came around to tell them that they could board and Raffaele stood up and waited for her to follow suit.
‘I’ll tell you why…’ He picked up where he had left off and fell into step alongside her, looking down at the smooth, silky, chestnut-brown hair that swung in a shiny curtain on either side of her face. The little clips restraining it were somehow prissy and sexy at the same time. ‘I came into a sizeable trust fund when I was twenty-one, enough for me to play around and take my time discovering what I was really good at. It was a privilege. I had the luxury of only needing brains and drive to get where I wanted to go. A very gifted guy I met a few months ago, Alessandro Barbieri, had equal amounts of brains and drive but he also had obstacles to deal with that I never had. My trust fund was brilliant but there’s no such thing as a free gift, at least not in my corner of the world with my wealthy parents.’
‘How so?’ Erin looked sideways at him with wide, curious eyes and shivered as his deep blue gaze lingered on her face.
‘Part of the condition of my trust fund was to continue working for the family company as a form of long-term repayment of the money being granted to me at such a young age. Had I chosen to take my trust fund later, when I was in my early thirties, it would have come with no strings attached. My parents could have waived that condition but they chose not to.’
‘So there was no rush for you. You could have gone to work for your family company, knowing that you would come into a lump sum when it was time for you to settle down and get married.’ She smiled. ‘You’re an only child. Maybe they couldn’t bear the thought of an empty nest.’
Raffaele’s lips thinned. She couldn’t have been further from the truth. His father had always enjoyed power over other people and that had included him. For Franco Rossi, love was control and control could be cruel.
Somehow he had got lost in his explanation but now he found that he was enjoying the rare experience of opening up to someone else. This wasn’t weakness. He had casually mentioned something that could be found anywhere on the internet if you could be bothered to sift through all the bumph about him that had been posted over the years.
The details of his background were all there for anyone to see. Erin knew that he was an only child and he couldn’t remember ever having mentioned that to her. It was just general knowledge.
If he had elaborated on the bare bones, then it just came under the heading of chit-chat with a woman he actually spent the majority of his life with.
‘Empty nest? No. You haven’t quite got that right.’ His voice was bitter and as their eyes briefly met he noted her startled look. He forced a tight smile. ‘I actually paid back every penny of the trust fund as soon as I was financially able to so that I could sever any hold my parents might have felt they had on me. Then I worked furiously to replenish my resources. But now that I have more than I could ever possibly need, I fancy doing something I was never geared to do but was always interested in pursuing.’
Walking at pace and not looking at him, Erin felt a slow flush of heat within her. This sharing of confidences felt incredibly intimate.
She wondered whether Raffaele was aware of the change in his tone of voice, the disillusionment that had seeped through at that passing mention of his parents.
‘That’s brilliant,’ she said warmly but she didn’t glance across at him because she realised that she didn’t want this moment to be over quite yet. It was like having a taste of forbidden fruit—exciting, irresistible…dangerous.
She’d always had a lot of insight into his work ethic, into his many and varied relationships with the opposite sex…into his utter lack of commitment on that front, but she had never had any inkling of his buried dreams or unfulfilled desires, had never once heard him mention his family.
