by Rachel Lyndhurst; Carmen Falcone; Ros Clarke; Annie Seaton; Christine Bell
Pontecorvo poured himself a glass of water and nodded. “As long as we do learn from them, of course.”
Lorenzo hadn’t missed the wry twitch of the Russian’s eyebrow. It was vital that any doubts about the genuineness of his engagement to Lora were quashed immediately. “You know how things work in Sicily, and you also know that I married in haste and for the wrong reasons with Ivanka. It’s different with Lora.”
“For life this time? You love this Lora from England?”
“Of course, and she feels the same. Everything will be perfect now. We will travel the world, set up a home somewhere beautiful. I can leave everything in Sicily happily now that I have Lora by my side.” He puffed out his chest and grinned. “She and my daughters are all I need.”
Pontecorvo appeared satisfied but continued to dig. “Her family must be delighted.”
“I hope so,” Lorenzo said with a smile. “But you know what it’s like with the Brits—so hard to tell if they truly hate you.”
The Russian chortled. “I know what you’re saying; more inscrutable than the goddamn Chinese.”
“Stiff upper lip.”
Pontecorvo guffawed. “And jam for tea.”
Both men smothered their laughter as a swathe of suited people became visible through the glass panel of the meeting room door.
“I can’t wait to leave all this behind me,” Lorenzo murmured and began to tap his pen on the desk.
Pontecorvo glanced at the pen, and Lorenzo put it firmly down. “I am eager to take it all from you now the circumstances are favorable. My vote here today will be sufficient to persuade the board to play their part in the deal.”
Pinerapid Aggregates, a pan-European conglomerate, was the corporate stepping stone between Russia and Sicily, the white gloves that would covertly steal the power from right under the Italian Mafia’s nose before they could do anything about it.
“Grigor, you will have everything once this deal is set up and signed. All my property in Sicily and the surrounding islands guarantees you will be untouchable asset-wise, and the power balance will be restored. Palermo and the dark forces that control it have had it all their own way for too long. To sell to anyone in Sicily would hand over too much control and influence, however lucrative it might be for me to do that. It’s time for change, and I think you are the man to do it.” He smiled and took a slow breath. “Besides, I’d like to leave Italy quietly, and selling to an Italian would most likely kick off a huge turf war.”
Pontecorvo nodded. “You are wise beyond your years. And Sorrento? Is this place included in our deal?”
“Yes…all of it, except the castle in Nebrodi. I’m leaving that in a safe pair of hands with somebody who shares my vision and passion for eradicating the poison that is choking Sicily.”
“I would never betray you on that, Lorenzo. You know how I loathe the mafia in both our countries, but I will have my lawyer insert a specific clause to exclude that community from our deal.”
“Excellente. So once the board agrees to the specific terms of transfer in principle today and the legal documents are drawn up, all my real estate and business interests will transfer to Pinerapid once the contract is signed. We should be able to pull that together in the next four to six weeks. Then, as the ultimate owner of Pinerapid, everything will be yours. My father and half-brother might try to make life difficult when they find out, but I’m sure you can deal with that.”
Pontecorvo winked as the board members filtered in to take their places. “That will no longer be your concern. I can deal with them.”
Lorenzo flinched as one of his security team approached from behind and whispered urgently in his ear that Lora had gone missing. He felt his jaw turn to granite. He was too close to clinching this deal now for anything to go wrong. “Trovare, find her,” he said harshly. “Se tenete alla vostra vita, if you value your life.”
…
“Where the hell have you been?”
Lora dropped a dusty rucksack inside the door to the penthouse and ran the back of a hand across her forehead. “Yes, I did have a nice day, thank you, Lorenzo. And I’m back a good hour before your deadline, so why the angry face?” She even had the temerity to glare at him before pulling off a pair of disgusting-looking walking boots.
“It’s not an angry face,” he blurted and felt even angrier because he actually was angry with her and this meant he was losing control. He never lost control. “I’ve had people out looking for you all over Sorrento, and I was concerned.”
“You’ve no need to be. I’m a big girl, and I can look after myself.”
She clearly didn’t understand that he was the one in charge. “I need to know where you are at all times, is that clear?”
“No, it isn’t actually. Why do you need to know? I thought you had great big important business dealings to occupy you today, and you didn’t want me around as a distraction.”
“The meeting is over now.”
She made a wide-eyed face. “Successful?”
“Of course.”
She took a plastic clip out of her hair and shook her head like a wet dog. Dust and grit fell onto the black marble floor by the doorway. “Good, then you have no excuse for being grumpy at all. Do I have time for a quick shower?”
“Yes, of course you do,” he said, irritated by the way she was brushing him off as effectively as the detritus that was now cascading all over his penthouse floor. “But I’d still like to know where you’ve been all day.”
“If you must know, I went off and did something I’ve always dreamed of doing. One of the things on my bucket list.”
Their eyes locked, and he saw a steely determination in her expression. It ignited a spark of admiration in him in spite of her being so infuriating. “And that was?”
“I stared down into the crater of a live volcano.”
A small laugh escaped him. “You went up Vesuvius?”
“Yep, and I had a quick stop off at Herculaneum, too. No time for Pompeii, unfortunately, but one day…”
“So how did you do all that without a car? Please don’t tell me you hired a moped. You could have been killed on these roads!”
She grinned mischievously. “No, nothing like that. Turn right, walk a hundred yards, and you’ll find a little corner shop selling postcards and rolls. It’s right next to a bus stop where the tour buses leave. I bought a ticket for a day trip and got right on board. Easy.”
“A guided tour?”
“Yes, why not? It was cheap, too, much less than what your hotel reception is charging. I wouldn’t have known if it wasn’t for the nice Polish couple in the foyer that tipped me off about it.”
“Really?” He wasn’t going to admit to her that he had no idea about the cost of tourist trips in Sorrento because he’d never had to be herded along with the crowd, and he had no intention of ever doing so. Before he could demand more explanation, Lora disappeared into her suite and left him standing alone in the silence of his penthouse with just her dusty heap of clothes for company. He walked over to the pile she’d left and poked it with the toe of his shoe. It looked like she’d bought half of Herculaneum’s deadly mudslide with her. He stooped to have a closer inspection of her garments, and his suspicions were quickly confirmed; these were Lora’s own rags. She’d not worn one scrap of the glamorous clothes that she’d been provided by Madam Farage at considerable expense to himself. Maybe now would be the ideal opportunity for him to show Miss Lorelei Pryce-Howard who was in charge here.
Lorenzo grabbed a phone from a console table by the door. “Franco? Thank you for dealing with our luggage. I have one more job for you, and it’s fairly urgent. Please come up immediately?” He smiled to himself as he got the reply he had been accustomed to receiving from all in his employ.
A yes.
Chapter Eight
“I wish you’d stop sulking, Lora,” Lorenzo said once the jet steward had left them with drinks and some light snacks. “It doesn’t suit your features.”
&n
bsp; “Makes me look even more unattractive, does it?” She pursed her lips petulantly for effect.
“What?”
“I still can’t believe you threw my stuff away.”
Lorenzo affected a laugh. “Those beaten-up boots, you mean? And those rank socks? Believe me, if I could have got my hands on your filthy shorts and T-shirt without you noticing, they’d be in the incinerator, too.”
“But it was my property! You had no right to do that.”
“And you have no rights as such until about four to six weeks’ time when your usefulness ends. In the interim, you will wear attire suitable for a wealthy Sicilian’s fiancée and not be seen in public looking like a tramp or an itinerant hippy.”
Lora picked idly at the blue linen trousers she’d chosen for the journey. “I didn’t see many women hobbling up to the top of Vesuvius wearing Louboutin heels, actually.”
“Sarcasm doesn’t become you, either, and I certainly hope you’re not going to behave like this once we get to Sicily. Insubordination is bad enough in adult company, but I’ll be very annoyed if your disrespect rubs off on my daughters.”
“Insubordination? Disrespect?” Lora knew her face was contorting with disgust, but she didn’t care. “So I’m to be a doormat of a fake fiancée, am I? What sort of an impression is that going to make on your daughters?
The muscles in his jaw clenched, but he stared straight ahead. The tone of his voice was flat and emotionless. “I don’t think being polite to me in public is too much to ask for considering how much your brother has made out of this arrangement.”
Lora frowned and looked out of the jet window. He was right; she was being difficult, and it had nothing to do with her beaten-up old hiking boots. There had been no reference to their penthouse liaison since she’d come back from her day trip, or even the mildest flirtation. She should take the hint and forget she had ever ridden herself to orgasm on the rock-hard businessman, possibly mafia gangster.
“I’m sorry, you’re right. Those boots were crap anyway. I’ve got blisters all over the place.”
“For the record, you’re still very attractive even when you are scowling like a gargoyle.”
Lora laughed. “Thanks!” She then did her best to forget the compliment immediately. Any thoughts of further dalliance with Lorenzo Ferrante were best laid to rest because she didn’t have the nerve to ask him where they stood regarding bedrooms. She was at a high risk of being humiliated and embarrassing both of them if the subject was broached. He was trying to let her down gently, and it was up to her to get on with the job at hand, which was to pretend to the world she was his doting fiancée. A change of subject was in order. “So I’ll finally meet your girls when we get to Sicily?”
Lorenzo glanced at his watch and pursed his lips in thought. “Possibly not. We’ll be home past their bedtime, and the nanny gets agitated if their routine is messed up.”
“Even if they’ve not seen their daddy for a few days?”
He shot her a quizzical look. “It’s been a few weeks as it happens, but they’re used to it. I’ve never been the kind of father who comes home for dinner at six p.m. every day.”
A chill descended. “They must miss their mother in that case.”
“I very much doubt that, either,” he said and fiddled with a cufflink. “Ivanka found it hard to exist without at least two nannies on the payroll. Breastfeeding and interrupted sleep were not her idea of motherhood. The only person they will ever genuinely miss is their grandmother, my mother, and the only person who’s been a constant in their lives so far.”
“How very sad.”
“Depends on how you look at it. You can’t miss what you’ve never had, and the big wide world is a hard and lonely place, especially for women.” He snapped on his seatbelt as the landing warning came on. “They may never love me as their father, but I will have given them the gift of independence and inner strength to cope on their own. Isn’t that a parent’s real job? To help them fly the nest and survive?”
Lora wanted to remind him that his children were only five years old and still needed the warmth and protection of a loving adult. However, instinct told her it wouldn’t be taken well, and at the end of the day it was none of her business. She dearly hoped the micro Ferrantes were spoiled, tedious little brats so it would be harder to fall in love with them…
…
The drive from Catania airport to the coastal town of Taormina took about forty minutes. Forty minutes of Lorenzo barking in Italian into his cell phone and forty minutes of Lora staring out of the car window. The scenery in the setting sun was fantastic, but for some reason she had a sense of foreboding about finally reaching their destination. It was madness, but when she tried to pin the feeling down, there was no denying the fact that she was nervous about meeting the Ferrante twins. Come to think about it, she was nervous about meeting the nanny. And then there was Grandma, Lorenzo’s mother…would she be there? She had a lot of urgent questions to ask.
“Lorenzo, will your mother be at your house?”
“No, she has a place in town, about five minutes’ drive away. Why?”
“I was wondering if she knows you’ve suddenly got engaged?”
Lorenzo cracked a smile. “I’m not sure she’s even speaking to me right now.”
“No?”
“I had a text earlier. She’s seen the front page of Stelios magazine. I’m in big trouble.”
Lora vaguely recalled having seen the cheap weekly glossy magazine at the supermarket checkout in the past; usually it had celebrities in bikinis on the cover. “Oh, what have you been up to?”
“What have we been up to?”
Her blood ran cold. “What do you mean?”
“It means, my beautiful fiancée, that we were papped kissing on the balcony in Sorrento. They even have a close up of the ring.”
“You’re joking?”
“At least it wasn’t a few minutes later.”
Lora gulped and felt herself blushing furiously. “Oh, no…”
“So I’ve told her that it was a whirlwind romance in the UK. An office affair that I’d tried to keep quiet but had to go public with because you told one of your friends, and they sold the story to the press, and the whole thing was about to go nuclear. I told her that I needed to keep you quiet until I’d sealed a very important deal and that proposing was the easiest way to do that in a hurry. And, of course, a powerful Russian is desperate to see me married off again.”
“Great. Thanks. Your mother is going to love me.”
“My mother understands the way things have to work sometimes because she’s Sicilian. Personal feelings have to be put aside when it’s business. I explained it was a situation that would benefit us long term, that I would call the engagement off in about six weeks.”
“Bloody hell.”
“We’ll just need to have a blazing row in public at some point, and you can chuck the ring back at me.” He shrugged. “Something along those lines.”
The whole family was ruthless, cold-blooded sharks by the sound of it. “So, to be clear: it’s the same story for the nanny? She may have seen the magazine, too.”
“The nanny is staff; she knows not to ask questions about anyone who visits and needs to know nothing. It will be easier overall if you don’t talk to her much anyway. That goes for everyone else you may come across.” He scratched his nose thoughtfully. “Women have such loose tongues. I’ve never met one who could resist gossip.”
“Charming.”
“Apart from my mother, of course. If she ever opened her mouth about some of the things my father got up to, she’d be six feet under a long time ago.”
“I don’t think I want to know much more about your family and business interests.”
“I’m only telling you what you need to know to pull this deal off. Follow my instructions, and everything will be fine. And you will be fine.”
“I think I’m getting the message.”
“And one more thing. My
mother isn’t to know that you know that she knows.”
Lora let out a tiny incredulous laugh. “I am your fiancée. I adore you. I will do anything you say, and I’m a brainless doormat.”
He paused for a second before replying. “That will probably cover it. And my daughters are not to know I have a fiancée; it wouldn’t be fair. They’d get excited about being bridesmaids and be upset when you go.”
She frowned at him, annoyed at how ridiculously complicated all this was getting. “This isn’t going to be easy.”
“Life rarely is. As far as my children are concerned, you are an employee and…a friend of the family. They’re only five years old, much more interested in puppies and ice cream than adult business. It’s important they don’t get attached to you. The nanny will be instructed to keep her mouth shut on the matter, too.”
The car turned off the main highway and along a private road, narrow with no markings. A steady climb took them through a tunnel of mature trees, an arch of dark green with the setting sun glowing behind and through the branches. The car rocked as the road surface became pitted, and Lora felt nervous again. The chauffeur clicked a key fob to open an imposing pair of wooden gates, and the Mercedes slipped through into a cobbled courtyard that overlooked a golden horseshoe-shaped bay below.
Lora stepped out and couldn’t stop a smile spreading across her face. “Now this is just as amazing as Sorrento!”
“I suppose it’s similar.” Lorenzo swung his suit jacket nonchalantly over his shoulder as he took in the vista. “But smaller and less ostentatious.”
“And a lot more private,” she said and shot him a knowing look.
“You noticed.”
She peered over the low wall that surrounded the property. “Big gates, sheer drops from a craggy rockface in to the sea. No lift, no pontoons, no postcard shops.”
“No escape,” he said, and his eyes sparkled like the ocean below. “Especially as I had your best climbing boots destroyed.”
Then a horrible thought struck her. “Doesn’t it worry you that your daughters might fall down there?”
To her dismay, he just shrugged. “It’s not ideal, but this place was never intended as a family home. They lived at their mother’s place mostly when they found their feet. It’s too small and too dangerous for children. That’s why it’s going up for sale when we’ve finished here.”
