‘Yes…he’s a class act, is my father.’
‘So he’s still alive?’
‘Not to me.’
The implacable way in which he said the words and the black look on his face made a shiver pass over the back of my neck. ‘You really hate him,’ I said, rather unnecessarily.
His coal-black eyes pulsated with it. ‘Six months after the divorce my mother had a fatal car accident. After the funeral Bianca and I went to live with our father and his new wife.’
‘How old were you?’
‘Ten. Bianca was seven.’
I pictured him as a ten-year-old boy. Devastated by the divorce of his parents, shattered by the loss of his mother, traumatised by being forced to live with a parent he no longer respected and a new stepmother who might well have resented having to care for two children who weren’t her own.
I could see why he hadn’t wanted to tell me about his background. It was probably too painful even to think about, much less talk about. And now he had the worry of his sister’s health and the responsibility of caring for his little niece.
‘I’m really sorry,’ I said. ‘It must’ve been a terrible time for you and your sister.’
He moved to the door. ‘Come on. I’ll show you the kitchen.’
I tried a couple more times to draw him out about his past as we went through each of the rooms, but it seemed the subject was now well and truly closed. He showed me the rest of the house in much the same way as I’d shown him around the school. In a bored tour-guide manner that made me feel I was being a nuisance to him.
Under any other circumstances I would have been angry with him, but after finding out about his bleak childhood it made my emotions towards him somewhat confusing, to say the least. For so long I’d blistered and bubbled with bitterness towards him. My anger had become such an entrenched part of my personality I wasn’t sure how to live without it. It was my armour. Stepping out of it would be like being naked in public.
But wasn’t his reluctance to dredge over the past more than a little like mine? I was the high priestess of avoidance. How could I blame him for not telling me about his childhood when I hadn’t told him what had happened in mine?
Once the tour was over Alessandro accompanied me out to my car. He held the door open for me.
‘Thanks for showing me around,’ I said. ‘It’s a really nice house. It has loads of potential. I can see why you want to get it back in the family.’
‘It’s what my mother would’ve wanted. To see her grandchild enjoy the place as much as she did.’
I put my hand on the top of the car door and then half turned to look at him. In the heat of the moment I’d forgotten my whole purpose for being there. ‘How long has Claudia had her stutter?’
‘I’m not sure.’
I raised my brows. ‘You haven’t asked her mother?’
His expression tightened. ‘My sister isn’t well enough to handle much conversation right now.’
‘She must be very ill.’
‘She is.’
I rolled my lips together for a moment. ‘Look, I think I can help with Claudia’s speech. I’ve done a special course on language and learning problems.’
I wondered if I should tell him about my own experience. But just as swiftly decided against it. I wasn’t going to be fooled into being too open with him. I would treat him like any other parent or guardian at my school. Which meant I would have to erase that kiss out of my memory as soon as possible.
I was about to slip in behind the wheel when his hand came down on mine, where it was resting on the top of the car door.
‘Thank you for what you’re doing for my niece,’ he said.
I glanced at his tanned hand, covering my paler one. A traitorous pulse of longing passed like a current through my body. It was as if he had direct access to my core by that simple touch. It had always been that way between us. I’d felt it the first time he’d touched me outside that café in Paris. I had no immunity from him. For all these years I’d kidded myself I was over him. But every time he touched me I felt that same jolt of awareness. No one else had the same effect on me. I was beginning to suspect no one else ever would.
I brought my gaze up to his. ‘I’m not doing anything I wouldn’t do for any other child under my care.’
‘I called the boarding house before you came,’ he said. ‘The house mistress told me you’d dropped in after school to see how Claudia was getting on.’
I dismissed his comment with a shrug. ‘I often call in on the boarders—especially the young ones.’
His lips lifted in a little sideways smile. ‘I would have done it, you know.’
I frowned in puzzlement. ‘Done what?’
‘Paid you five million.’
I swallowed thickly. ‘I’m sure you’re not lacking in available and willing partners.’
He lifted a hand to brush back one of my escaping curls and carefully tucked it back behind my ear. ‘No. But none quite like you.’
I couldn’t drag my eyes away from his lustrous brown gaze. I moistened my lips with a quick dart of my tongue, my pulse doing one of its mad sprints that made me feel light-headed and a little off-balance.
‘This is all types of crazy. You. Me. It’s not going to happen.’
He traced a spine-tingling pathway along my jawbone from below my ear to my chin. There was no reason why I couldn’t have pulled back from his touch but somehow I didn’t. I couldn’t. There was something in his caress that was almost wistful. Nostalgic.
‘Have you been back to Paris since?’ he asked.
‘No.’
His mouth took on a rueful twist. ‘Have I ruined it for you?’
I made a scoffing noise. ‘Of course not.’
His eyes searched mine. ‘Sure?’
‘Absolutely,’ I said. ‘I was over you as soon as I boarded the plane back home.’
It’s a pretty handy skill to be good at lying. My sister and I are masters at it. We’ve had to be. Years of trying to pretend we had normal parents gave us an edge in the lying stakes. All those schools we had to fit in to made us experts.
We learned early on how to lie through our teeth and how to control our giveaway body language. No nose-rubbing or face-touching. Always maintaining eye contact. No fidgeting. No looking to the right. I’ve told some porkies in my time, and no one’s caught me out.
But for all that I didn’t think Alessandro was buying it. His fingertip skated over the vermilion border of my lower lip, triggering sensations I felt all the way to my core.
‘So why no steady relationship since me?’ he asked.
‘I’m a career girl—that’s why.’
‘Can’t women have it all these days?’
I decided against maintaining eye contact. I’m good at lying, but not that good. I looked at his tanned neck instead.
‘Why do you keep touching me?’
‘I like touching you.’
‘It’s not appropriate, given our…circumstances.’ I was going to say relationship but thought better of it.
He put his finger underneath my chin until our gazes met. ‘You like it too. I can feel it. It’s always been like that between us, hasn’t it?’
I wanted to deny it. It was just a matter of saying the words. But my voice refused to work. I could feel myself being drawn into that coal-black gaze until I was all but mesmerised. His thumb brushed over my lower lip, sending a riot of sensations through me.
‘How much do I have to pay you to have dinner with me?’ he said.
‘You don’t have to pay me,’ I said, suddenly embarrassed at the way I’d handled things.
What did money have to do with what I felt about him? If I wanted to spend the evening with him I would. It didn’t have to mean we were resuming our fling. Besides, I wanted to dig a little deeper into his background, find out a little more about his sister. A dinner on neutral ground would be just the ticket.
‘That’s crazy. Dinner’s just dinner. We can split
the bill.’
His half smile made something in my stomach slip sideways. ‘I’ll pick you up at eight tomorrow night.’
Why not tonight? I thought with a little pang of disappointment.
As if he could read my mind, he added, ‘I have to go to London to check on a transplant patient.’
‘How are you managing your work with all this?’ I nodded towards the house.
He gave me a weary-looking smile. ‘It’s a balancing act—probably no different from what your average working woman does every day.’
‘True, but surely you’ve got help? A nanny organised for the holidays and a housekeeper and so on?’
‘Can you recommend anyone?’
‘As a nanny?’
He nodded. ‘I’ve interviewed four or five, but I can’t seem to find what I’m looking for.’
I gave him a cynical look. ‘Yes, well, I expect all the blonde busty bombshells are signed on at modelling agencies instead.’
His dark eyes glinted. ‘Or teaching.’
I pursed my lips. ‘Flattery doesn’t work with me, Alessandro. You should know that by now.’
His knuckles lightly grazed my cheek again, his eyes still holding mine in a lock that tethered much more than my gaze. It was like he was pulling on my most intimate muscles every time he looked at me. The memory of him inside me—stretching me, pleasuring me, filling me and completing me—consumed my senses. I couldn’t escape the feelings he stirred in me. I couldn’t run away from them and pretend they didn’t exist. They did, and they clamoured for attention like baying hungry hounds.
‘You don’t see yourself as others see you,’ he said. ‘You find fault where others find perfection.’
I gave a little snort and pulled out of his hold. ‘I have to go. I’ve got lessons to prepare.’
I slipped behind the wheel and reached for my seat belt and snapped it into place. Alessandro closed the door and stepped back from the car. I put my keys in the ignition and prayed. Yes, you read that correctly. I might not believe in the supernatural, but when it comes to my car my feeling is a little prayer never goes astray.
The engine kicked over without a cough or a splutter. Maybe I’d have to rethink my atheist stance, I thought. But as I drove away my car gave a cacophonous backfire that was as loud as a thunderclap.
I glanced in my rear-view mirror to see Alessandro smiling crookedly. Damn.
CHAPTER FIVE
I WAS ON my way to my classroom the next morning when my mother phoned. I’ve told her hundreds of times never to call me during school hours, but she has no concept of the nine-to-five working day. I normally switch my phone off or to silent the moment I get to school, but my mother has this uncanny ability to call me just as I reach for the ‘off’ button. It’s as if she knows I’m about to go incommunicado so she gets in first.
‘Poppet, you won’t believe the vision I had last night.’ That was her opening gambit.
Why my mother continues to call me poppet when I’ve got a perfectly fine name—if you use Jem, not Jemima, that is—is a mystery to me.
‘Mum, I’m at school. I can’t talk right now.’
‘But it’s only seven-thirty in the morning!’
‘Yes, well…I have to get the classroom ready and—’
‘You have no balance,’ she said. ‘I was only saying to your father the other day, you’re going to work yourself into an early grave. People can have heart attacks and strokes in their twenties, you know and you’re nearly thirty.’
Thanks for reminding me, I thought. ‘I’m fine, Mum, really. Now, I really must go as I—’
‘But I have to tell you about my vision,’ my mother said. ‘You were having wild kinky sex with a man.’
I always try to be logical and rational when my mother shares one of her visions with me—especially any that involve sex. She has a very overactive imagination, and the stuff she imagines wouldn’t even be allowed in the Kama Sutra.
‘That’s not a vision,’ I said. ‘It’s a dream. It’s just your subconscious making a narrative out of what you’ve been thinking about during the day. That’s basically what dreams are.’
‘I wasn’t dreaming,’ my mother insisted. ‘I was having a vision. There’s a big difference. I know when I’m receiving a sign from the cosmos. It always happens like that. I get this fizzy feeling that won’t go away. Last night I closed my eyes and focused on the images coming to me. I could see him clear as day. He was tall and dark and handsome, with really dark brown eyes.’
I felt a little shiver go over my skin in spite of my sandbags of logic. ‘That certainly narrows it down a bit,’ I said.
‘Not only that,’ my mother said, ‘he looked like that famous doctor. You know—the one who saved Richard Ravensdale the stage actor? It could have been his twin.’
My sandbags were in a sorry shape, but for all that I persisted. ‘There’s a perfectly logical explanation for your dream…erm…vision. You’ve probably read something in a gossip magazine about him at the hairdresser’s and the image has stuck in your mind. Plus Bertie’s Matt is a doctor, so you’ve—’
‘I haven’t been to a hairdresser in years,’ my mother said. Which is true.
She has dreadlocks—long ones, with beads woven in. At least she washes them now. There was a time when my parents were anti-shampoo, because they believed toxic chemicals would give us all cancer. Thankfully Bertie and I got head lice, so we were allowed a few toxic chemicals to sort them out.
I glanced at my watch. ‘Mum, I really have to dash. Say hi to Dad and I’ll call you soon. ’Bye.’
I ended the call and then spent the next hour or two feeling guilty. I always feel like that over my parents. They frustrate me. I know I should accept people for who they are, but there’s a part of me that can’t accept my parents’ lifestyle. They drive me nuts because they have zero ambition. They just want to sit around and navel-gaze, or meditate, or have sex in weird positions while chanting ridiculous chants. Bertie is much more accepting of them, but then I did a lot to protect her from the worst of it.
The rest of the day passed without drama, but I noticed Claudia was still not speaking. I didn’t pressure her, for I knew the stress would make her stutter worse.
I spoke to Jennifer at the boarding house and she told me Claudia had slept well and was not showing any signs of homesickness other than seeming reluctant to speak. We talked about my plan to help Claudia with some drama therapy and I told her I would suggest that Alessandro engage a speech therapist as well. Of course I didn’t tell Jennifer I was having dinner with him that night.
The prospect of our ‘date’ had had me in a state of restlessness all day. Whenever there was a moment when I wasn’t fully engaged in teaching the girls—when they were working on their own or something—my mind would drift…I would start thinking of how he would look. Would he wear a suit or dress casually? How would he smell? Of lemons or lime or sandalwood or soap? How would his hand feel in the small of my back as he led me to his car?
I was like a lovesick teenager. Talk about nauseating. I kept telling myself we were just having dinner to discuss Claudia’s management. It was perfectly legitimate and aboveboard. It didn’t mean I had to take it any further. It wasn’t as if I was going to jump into an affair with him after what had happened last time.
But no amount of self-talk could take away my attraction to him. It was as feverish as ever—maybe even worse than five years ago. I only had to think of him and my flesh would tingle all over.
I got home late after a staff meeting ran overtime. Normally I enjoy staff meetings. It’s a good chance to chat through any issues that have come up with the pupils or concerns about the curriculum. But this time I was fidgeting like I had a bad case of intestinal worms. Miss Fletcher had glanced at me once or twice from over the top of her bifocals and asked if I was all right. I assured her everything was just fine and concentrated harder on taking down the minutes of the meeting.
Once inside the door
of my flat I had just enough time to have a shower and do something with my hair. I rummaged through my wardrobe for something to wear, pointedly ignoring the wedding dress bagged in a silk bag, hanging at the back behind my hiking jacket. I selected the classic little black dress I’d bought in a sale when shopping with Bertie.
I’m not a slave to fashion. Unlike Bertie, who adores bright colours and quirky clothes, I have very little colour in my wardrobe. I stick to the basics: black, white, navy and grey. Boring as hell, but I’m not out to impress anyone.
I had only just finished with the hair straightener when the doorbell rang. My heart lurched as I glanced at my watch. It was only seven-thirty. Alessandro had said eight o’clock. I hadn’t even done my make-up. Not that I use a lot at the best of times, but I’d figured a bit of facial armour wouldn’t go astray—especially since I’d blushed more in the last twenty-four hours than I had in the last five years.
I put down the straighteners and smoothed my hands down my dress, slipped my feet into a pair of heels. He’d seen me without make-up so what did it matter? He’d seen me without anything.
I opened the door and found my parents standing there, with big cheesy grins on their faces.
‘Surprise!’ they said in unison.
I mentally rolled my eyes. I think I did it in reality as well. My parents love surprises. I hate them. Not my parents. Just surprises. I don’t like anything spontaneous. I’m a planner. Surprises do not fit into neat plans.
‘What are you doing here?’ I said. ‘I thought you were on a yoga retreat in Salisbury?’
‘We cancelled,’ my father said. ‘Your mother was worried about you. We thought we’d come and stay for a few days.’
Stay? My brain was like a neon sign, flashing PANIC in big red letters. I was about to say it was totally inconvenient and inappropriate of them to turn up announced when I suddenly realised how tired Dad looked. He would have been driving for hours, because my mother had lost her licence a few months ago for speeding. I know… Talk about irresponsible. She maintains she was driving well under the limit, but because she got into a ‘discussion’, as she called it, with the traffic cop things got a little testy.
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