by Helen Brooks
Cherry found she didn’t like being compared with his grandmother, although she couldn’t have said why.
‘You have the number of the hire company?’ he said practically.
She nodded. It was in her bag, with her passport and other papers. It took her a minute or two to dig it out. She found she was all fingers and thumbs with those grey eyes trained on her. Eventually she had it. The number was engaged.
‘No matter.’ It was impatient. ‘You can try again from the house. What do you need to bring with you?’
‘The house?’ She was doing the parrot thing again.
‘Si, my house. You cannot stay here.’
She wasn’t going anywhere with him. ‘Look, I’m sorry I’m blocking your road,’ she said quickly, ‘but once I get through to the hire company they can send someone to collect the car and give me a different one. Is—is there another way for you to get out?’ she finished hopefully.
He didn’t answer this. What he did say—and with an air of insulting patience—was, ‘It could be hours before you are in a position to leave, Cherry. They may not have another vehicle available or be in a position to collect this one. It might be tomorrow before this can be arranged. Do you intend to spend the night in the car?’
That was infinitely preferable to spending it in his house. ‘I wouldn’t dream of imposing on you,’ she said stiffly. ‘I’m sure I can find a small hotel or guest house somewhere close.’
The grey gaze took in her bulging suitcase and the equally bulging shoulder bag. ‘It could be a long hot walk,’ he said silkily, ‘with nothing at the end of it. I would not recommend putting yourself in such an unnecessarily vulnerable position when there is no need.’
No need was relative. The way he’d said her name, in that delicious accent, and the fact that he was easily the most attractive man she’d seen since she couldn’t remember when, as well as being the most arrogant, was acutely disturbing. It was ridiculous, but the sooner she was well clear of Vittorio Carella the better she’d feel.
On the other hand the suitcase weighed a ton, the sun was beating down, and once she was clear of the Carella estate she’d be at the mercy of any Tom, Dick or Harry she happened to meet. Or the Italian equivalent. ‘I’ll try the number again,’ she prevaricated. It was still engaged.
Vittorio was leaning against the car’s little bonnet, his arms folded and the sunglasses in place once more. She wondered how such an outwardly relaxed stance could express so much irritation. He clearly relished this situation as little as she did. Forcing herself to speak calmly, she said, ‘Perhaps if I could take advantage of your hospitality for an hour or two while I sort things out?’
‘Of course.’ Within moments he had transferred the luggage to the Ferrari, locking the Fiat and then opening the passenger door of his car for her to slide in.
Conscious that she was riding in a Ferrari for the first—and probably the last—time in her life, Cherry sank down in the cream leather seat. The car was sleek and magnificent—much like its owner, Cherry thought with a touch of hysteria. When he joined her in the car her senses went into overdrive. The muscled body was big, he was wearing an aftershave which was sex in a bottle, the gold Rolex on one tanned wrist shouted wealth and authority, and she had never felt so out of her depth in all her life. It was an acutely uncomfortable sensation.
‘OK?’ He glanced at her as the car’s engine purred into life like a big cat, and then they were travelling backwards far too fast—in Cherry’s opinion, at least—there being no room to turn round in the narrow, dusty road.
Her heart in her throat, she watched the drystone walls flash past and prayed she’d live to see another day. He was a madman. He had to be. Or a racing driver? No, a madman.
It was another few minutes before a passing place in the road enabled Vittorio to turn the car round in the most perfectly executed three-point turn Cherry had ever seen, and by then she had realised Vittorio wasn’t a madman—just the best driver she had ever come across. It was as though he was part of the powerful machine as he handled the Ferrari with a skill which was breathtaking. But then if anyone should be at home in a Ferrari it was an Italian.
‘You—you like driving?’ she croaked out once they were facing the right way and she’d managed to unclench her hands.
‘Si,’ he agreed easily as the car leapt forward. ‘It is one of the pleasures of life that carries no sting in the tail.’
She would have asked him what he meant by that, but she’d just caught sight of the incredible house in the distance, nestled within an expanse of century-old olive groves. She had found since being in the region that this land of olive groves and vineyards, surrounded on all sides by a balmy if slightly craggy coastline, held whitewashed buildings on the whole, which glistened in the sunshine. The house they were approaching was built of a honey-colored stone, however, its pale walls glowing in the afternoon sun and its grey stone roof benign and tranquil. Balconies, bright with trailing bougainvillaea, surveyed the olive groves with sleepy ambience, and several large pine trees stood as sentinels either side of the sprawling building.
‘Casa Carella,’ Vittorio drawled lazily, noticing her rapt gaze. ‘One of my ancestors built the main house in the seventeenth century and subsequent Carellas have added to it.’
‘It’s beautiful,’ she breathed softly. As they came closer she could see just how beautiful. And how large and imposing.
Vittorio brought the Ferrari to a stop and smiled as he turned to face her. She wondered if he knew how that smile affected the opposite sex and then decided that of course he did.
‘Grazie.’ His eyes moved from her face to the languid villa. ‘I, too, think my home is beautiful and have never wished to live anywhere else.’
‘Do you still farm the olives?’ she asked weakly, reeling from the way his smile had softened the handsome but somewhat stern features.
‘But of course. The production of olive oil is one of the oldest industries in Puglia, and the Carella estate is second to none. Because of the methods required to harvest and produce the oil it is impossible to turn the industry into a high-tech affair, however. Modern machinery may be used, but the industry here is still by and large a private one, with the families of farmers tending to their own trees and producing their own oil as opposed to giant conglomerates. I like this.’
He turned to look at her again. ‘My great-grandfather was first and foremost a businessman, though, and invested much of the Carella wealth here and there, making sure we were not solely dependent on the olive trees. He was—how you say?—an entrepreneur. Is that correct?’
Cherry nodded. So he was one of the filthy rich.
‘He was, I understand, a formidable man, but his ruthlessness guaranteed a privileged lifestyle for future generations.’
She stared into the dark face. He sounded as though he approved of his great-grandfather’s hardness. ‘You think ruthlessness is a good thing?’ she murmured.
Slate-grey eyes met her blue ones. ‘On occasion, si.’ He opened his door before she could comment, walking round the low bonnet and helping her out of the car.
Cherry found she didn’t want him to touch her. It evoked something of a chain reaction which had her nerve-endings quivering. Not that he prolonged the contact. Once she was standing on the pebbled forecourt which led to wide circular steps fronting the house he stepped back a pace.
‘I am sure you would like to refresh yourself,’ he said formally, reminding her how bedraggled she must appear to him. ‘One of the maids will show you to a guest room and I will have coffee and cake waiting when you are ready.’
The door to the villa had opened as he’d spoken, and a neat little uniformed maid was standing in the aperture.
‘Ah, Rosa.’ He gestured for Cherry to precede him up the stone steps and she found she’d forgotten how to walk. ‘Would you take the signorina upstairs to one of the guest rooms and make sure she has everything she needs? And perhaps you would like me to try the hire c
ompany for you?’ he added to a bemused Cherry, who was trying not to gape at the palatial interior.
The light, cool hall, with a marble floor and white walls hung with exquisitely framed paintings, was huge, its air scented with bowls of fresh flowers and several chairs and tables dotted about the vast expanse. And the staircase stretching in front of them was a thing of beauty in itself, made of the same pale green marble as the floor and curving upwards to two levels, giving the impression that the hall itself was an inner courtyard.
Speechless, she followed the maid up the stairs and halfway along a landing, whereupon the young girl opened a door, allowing Cherry to precede her into a vast bedroom. ‘Please to call if you need anything, signorina,’ the maid said in broken English as she walked across and opened the door to an en-suite bathroom. She waved at open basketwork shelves holding neatly folded fluffy towels and toiletries and then left the room, shutting the door quietly behind her.
‘Wow!’ Cherry breathed out softly as she stood surveying her surroundings. The cream, stone and taupe colour palette of the room was offset by the blaze of colour coming from the open full-length windows leading on to a balcony thick with purple, red and white bougainvillaea and holding a small table and two chairs. It was obviously a guest bedroom—there were no personal belongings of any kind when she furtively opened one or two of the doors of the wall-to-wall wardrobes and drawers. Imagine what the rest of the house must be like, Cherry thought weakly. She’d been right. He must be absolutely loaded.
She padded across to the balcony. It overlooked an enormous garden stretching away from the back of the villa for what seemed like miles to her stunned gaze. It was bursting with tropical trees and shrubs and manicured flowerbeds, and the ancient walls which enclosed the garden from the olive groves were brilliant in places with cascade upon cascade of more bougainvillaea. An Olympic-size swimming pool glittered blue under the clear cerulean Italian sky, and orange, apricot, almond and fig trees lived in harmony in a small orchard at the very rear of the grounds. She had never seen anything like it.
Double wow! She breathed out slowly. Triple. What an oasis. How the other half lived!
As she continued to gaze out she noticed what must be Vittorio Carella’s gardener, tending a flowerbed next to a lush flower-covered bower, but otherwise the sun-soaked grounds were still, slumbering in the heat of the afternoon.
One thing was for sure, Cherry thought with wry humour as she stepped back into the bedroom. Vittorio Carella was no ordinary olive farmer. And she supposed if she had to be stranded anywhere for a few hours she could have picked somewhere a darn sight worse than Casa Carella.
Becoming aware she had been lost in contemplation when she should have been freshening up, Cherry hastily walked into the gorgeous en-suite bathroom of cream marble. The mirror which took up all of one wall showed her just how grubby and bedraggled she looked. She groaned softly. No wonder he’d thought she was a young kid playing at being grown-up. Urgent repair work was needed.
The bathroom held everything from hairbrushes and cosmetics—still in their wrapping—to male and female perfume and other such niceties. Clearly the guests of Vittorio Carella had their every need met. But she wasn’t a guest. Not in the traditional sense anyway.
Cherry stood in front of the mirror, decorum warring with vanity. Vanity won. After washing her face, and brushing her hair until it shone like silk with one of the brushes she’d unwrapped, she opened a tube of mascara and a pot of eyeshadow. Not for the first time she blessed the fact she was a female and had make-up at her disposal. She might have entered the house as a little lost waif and stray. She certainly didn’t intend to leave as anything less than a full-grown woman!
CHAPTER TWO
WHEN she opened the door of the bedroom to go downstairs the little maid was hovering at the end of the landing, fiddling with the huge bowl of sweet-smelling roses on a small table under the magnificent arched window which flooded the space with light. Cherry smiled at her.
‘Ah, signorina. If you will come this way? The signore, he is waiting,’ the young girl said politely.
Cherry nodded and followed the immaculately dressed maid as she led the way down the stairs and across the hall. After knocking on a door the girl opened it and then stood aside for Cherry to enter. The drawing room was even more beautiful than she’d prepared herself for: the ceiling high, the light wood floor scattered with thick rugs, the gracious furniture and drapes clearly wildly expensive and the white walls covered with exquisite paintings. The huge French windows were open to the scents of the garden beyond, and on the patio immediately beyond the windows a fountain tinkled in the afternoon heat.
But all this was on the perimeter of her consciousness. Her senses were caught up with the man who had risen from an armchair at her entrance and was now saying, ‘Come and sit down and take some refreshment. Would you prefer coffee or perhaps a cold drink? Orange juice? Pineapple? Mango?’
‘Coffee will be fine, thank you.’ He remained standing as he waved his hand at a chair opposite his. A coffee table was groaning with an array of cakes and pastries, and the aroma from espresso coffee was rich. His loose-fitting trousers and silver-grey cotton shirt were clearly expensive, and the way they sat on the lean male body was guaranteed to make any female heart beat a little faster.
He didn’t sit down again until she was seated, and then he poured her a coffee before gesturing at the cream, milk and sugar. ‘Help yourself.’
‘Thank you. I take mine black.’
‘It is the only way.’ He smiled in agreement.
Her heartbeat—which had just returned to normal—quickened again. He really was the man with everything, she thought weakly. It was a shame that included an ego to match.
He picked up the cakestand and offered it to her, and as she gazed at the sweet delicacies she found she was hungry. She selected one of the small iced sponge cakes filled with cream and jam which she knew were called sospiri—sighs in English—and sighed herself inwardly. What must it be like to enjoy such a privileged life, free from the cares and trials which afflicted most people? He only had to crook his little finger and his every need was catered for. Heady stuff to the uninitiated.
‘I spoke with the hire company while you were upstairs, but they will not be able to send another car for twenty-four hours.’
Cherry almost choked on the cake. ‘Twenty-four hours?’
‘This is not a great problem, surely? You had no pressing engagement?’ he asked with silky smoothness.
He knew she didn’t. ‘No, but—’ She paused, wondering how to say she had no intention of staying in this house for twenty-four hours—if that was what he was suggesting. ‘But I can’t impose on your hospitality—’
‘Please do not speak of it. You are more than welcome to stay for as long as you like. I am desolate you have had such a bad experience whilst visiting my beautiful country. Let me make amends by offering you the safety of my home until the new car arrives.’
Oh, hell. What could she say to that?
In the event she wasn’t called upon to say anything, because the drawing-room door opening with a flourish caused both their heads to turn to the voluptuous young woman standing in the aperture, her hands on her hips and her eyes flashing fire. Cherry didn’t need to speak the language to understand the thrust of the outburst in Italian which followed. For some reason the girl was furious with Vittorio, and not afraid to tell him so in spite of his darkening face. Cherry found she was beginning to enjoy herself.
He rapped out something in Italian which stopped the flow but still left the girl glowering at him. Then he turned to Cherry. ‘I apologise,’ he said with steely flatness. She could see he was hanging on to his temper by a thread. ‘My sister is not usually so bereft of manners. Let me introduce you. Cherry, this is my sister, Sophia. Sophia, meet Cherry, a guest from England who deserves more courtesy than you have shown.’
Cherry could see Vittorio’s sister was fighting for control but no
w she stepped forward, forcing a smile as she held out her hand and said, ‘I am sorry. I did not know Vittorio had anyone with him or that we were expecting a guest.’
A little embarrassed now, Cherry smiled back. ‘You weren’t expecting me,’ she said awkwardly as she shook hands. ‘I’m afraid I strayed on to your property by mistake and my car broke down, so it’s me who should be apologising for intruding.’
Vivid green eyes set in a face which was quite outstandingly lovely surveyed her for a long moment. And then Sophia smiled—a real smile this time. ‘No, it is me,’ she said ruefully. ‘But you are most welcome, Cherry from England. Where is your car?’ she added. ‘I did not see it.’
Cherry waved her hand vaguely in the direction of the road. ‘Out there somewhere. I’m afraid it’s blocking the way to the house. Apparently my petrol was sy phoned off in the last town.’
‘The south road?’ Sophia enquired of her brother, who nodded, his face still grim. ‘It is of no matter, Cherry. We have more than one entrance to the property. You are staying for dinner?’ she added.
‘Cherry is staying overnight until the hire company can deliver a new vehicle.’ Vittorio’s voice was cold.
‘Then I will see you later. I am going to my room to rest.’ Sophia swung round, her hair—which hung in a glossy black curtain to her waist—rippling as she left the room.
Cherry sat down again, reaching for her coffee cup and not knowing what to say. Clearly brother and sister were at loggerheads over something or other. Aiming to relieve the crackling atmosphere, she murmured, ‘Your sister is very beautiful.’
‘And very wilful.’ It was almost a bark. And then he raked a hand through his hair. ‘Scusi. Now it is I who has the bad manners, si? But Sophia—she tries my patience.’
Cherry had the feeling that patience was not one of Vittorio’s attributes at the best of times. He had the air of a man who was used to having people dance to his tune without question—a man who controlled his world absolutely. She found all her sympathies were with his sister, whatever the disagreement was about. Quietly, she said, ‘I don’t think it’s necessarily a bad thing for a woman to be strong and wilful. We are living in the twenty-first century after all.’
