Hold On to Me

by Victoria Purman

  ‘You were about to say something before? Something about … you think I might do better …?’ Stella waved her hands, trying to conjure the words from him. He was grateful for the reminder because he’d lost his train of thought.

  Then he remembered. He’d been about to tell her he couldn’t do the job. For all the right reasons, it didn’t seem like a good fit. His own reno, the size, the travel, her stubbornness. But the words wouldn’t come. He tore his eyes from hers and looked around the space again, trying to imagine what they could do with it. There was so much potential there. They could do so much more than return it to its former life. It could be transformed into a landmark. He walked over to the southern wall, picked at the damaged plasterwork and it flaked off in his fingers. The stone underneath was sturdy and the render looked to be intact. Luca felt something swelling inside him, something he never felt when he was building a pergola or a deck or a pool house. They were good jobs and kept him in business, and he was grateful for every customer. But there was something different here.

  He turned to Stella and wondered if she noticed his idiotic smile. There was history and magic here, and a future. He could feel it tingling his fingertips and thumping in his chest.

  ‘I was about to say …’

  And it wasn’t just the bricks and mortar that had captured his imagination. There was something intriguing about Stella. She was so sure of what she wanted and exactly how she was going to get it. He could work with a woman like her. He could learn a lot from a woman like her, with her experience and her ideas.

  ‘Will you get me that quote?’ Her voice had softened. It wasn’t a demand any more, a suspicious question thrown at him because she was wary. It sounded—and felt—more like an invitation.

  ‘I’ll get you everything you need. Give me an hour here to look around, take some measurements and some photos, and then I need to get some quotes, source some supplies. Talk to a sparky, a plumber, some other trades.’

  ‘Great.’

  She stared up at him. He could see her brain ticking over, deciding if she could work with him. He’d get her all the paperwork she needed to prove his bona fides, but their working relationship had to be built on trust. He could see she was figuring out whether she could trust him. Being Anna’s brother scored him some bonus points, he knew that. On the flip side, he was young, just starting out. She didn’t know anything else about him other than he was a Morelli.

  ‘I’ll do all that work, prep you a quote, the whole box and dice. I’ll project manage it for you.’ And then, just for fun, he added, ‘You can get on with worrying about your dresses and your shoes and your jewellery and I’ll handle all this.’

  Was that steam coming out of her ears?

  ‘Hold on one minute. If you think—’

  He lifted his hands in surrender. ‘Joking.’

  ‘You’d better be.’

  ‘I know exactly who’s boss around here.’

  ‘And don’t forget it.’

  ‘But there is one thing. I have one condition.’ Luca crossed his arms again, needing to keep them occupied.

  ‘What’s that? Smoko at a regular hour? Double time on a Sunday?’

  ‘I won’t put up with armchair fucking experts. Excuse my Italian.’

  ‘I know what I’m doing,’ she fumed again.

  ‘Not you, Boss. The Suit.’

  She took a minute. ‘You mean Duncan?’

  ‘Is he going to be around a lot while we get this work done?’

  ‘Shit, I hope not.’

  ‘Good.’

  ‘Well.’ Stella looked down to the floor. ‘I don’t have a minute to lose. I’d better get back to work.’

  ‘I’ll get to work, too.’ Luca pulled his notebook out of his breast pocket and she glanced at his chest. Checking him out again. Something swelled in his male ego.

  ‘Stella, even before we agree on anything, you really have to get the window glazed and the door fixed. You want to secure the site so you don’t get kids wandering in and causing trouble.’

  She stepped back, pursed her lips. ‘I know. I’ve called a glazier already.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘And I’m waiting for his quote so I can send it to the insurance company.’

  Luca shook his head. ‘Leave it to me.’ He pulled his phone out of his pocket.

  ‘No, I won’t leave it to you.’

  There was a fierceness in her voice that unsettled him. ‘Hang on—’

  ‘I’ve got that organised,’ she added through gritted teeth.

  ‘Clearly you don’t ‘cos he’s not here and he hasn’t got back to you. I can do this with one call.’

  Stella propped her balled fists on her hips. Okay. He looked at her curves, checked out her arse. She was a woman. A hot one. And he was a man.

  ‘I have this under control,’ she insisted.

  ‘You’ve got plenty of other things to do. I’ve got this.’

  She was silent.

  ‘Stella.’

  She looked at him. She was steaming.

  ‘Listen. It’s no big deal. I have a good guy. I trust him. I’ll pay for it now and you can pay me when your insurance comes through, okay?’

  Stella glared at him. It seemed to take her a very long time to agree. ‘Okay. But I want those references.’ She picked up her shovel and got back to work.

  CHAPTER

  6

  Stella was trying very hard not to be distracted by the stubborn and now silent Morelli Constructions. He was snapping photos on his phone, taking measurements and making notes; so totally focussed on his task that he didn’t even glance in her direction. She continued to scoop up the muck and mess all around her, loading bucket after bucket into the skip out on the street.

  If they were going to work together, Stella knew she had to define the rules early. She was the boss and he was the builder. The cautious, serious businesswoman Stella, who’d been burnt before, had asked for references. He’d seemed a little taken aback, but she needed to do things by the book.

  However, there was another Stella: the one who was all woman. The one who hadn’t had sex in too long to think about. That Stella was staring at him like he was a rock star and she was a teenage girl.

  How could she not notice how gorgeous he was?

  She watched him out of the corner of her eye, waiting until he was distracted or deep in thought so he wouldn’t notice her admiration. She fought the unprecedented urge to reach out and stroke his Mediterranean, olive-skinned smoothness and watched how his muscled arms moved in interesting ways as he worked. And it wasn’t just his arms. She lowered her gaze to his legs and noticed a curve to his calf muscles that was really quite hot. And the regulation young-guy three-day growth on his chin looked stylish and rough all at the same time. Dark eyes were shadowed by dark eyebrows, and a straight nose drew attention to his perfect, full lips. And as to what was under the work clothes? Taller than her, by at least a head, and lean. Strong. Flat-stomached, judging by the way his polo shirt was tucked into his shorts.

  Oh, he was a picture, there was no doubt about that: young, fresh and unrumpled. Stella figured he was perhaps in his late twenties but, whatever the number was, it was clearly the age at which men reached peak physical perfection. In fact, he appeared to have summited that very morning.

  Stella propped her shovel up against the wall and reached for her bottle of water. Shovelling was thirsty work. That had to be the reason her mouth was dry. She unscrewed the bottle slowly, watching Luca as he peered up into the hole in the ceiling. He lifted a hand to shield the sun from his eyes and the move did something nice to the width of his shoulders. She let herself enjoy the flitter of attraction she was feeling for Luca Morelli. A flitter? Who was she kidding? It was more like a flock of seagulls had landed in her chest and were thumping inside her rib cage, trying to break free.

  There was absolutely nothing wrong with appreciating beauty. Her business was based on it. She loved knowing that her customers walked out fee
ling much more beautiful than when they’d walked in. It didn’t have to be much. Perhaps it was the way a pair of earrings caught someone’s attention or how the colour of a silk scarf could bring out a customer’s eyes. Sometimes a drapey top with a boat neck could make even the most self-conscious person feel sexy. While beauty was in the eye of the beholder—fashion had taught her that—most people appreciated things that gave them pleasure.

  And she found handsome men quite pleasurable.

  Stella tilted her head back and drank from her water bottle. She swallowed over and over, savouring the way the chilled water slid down her gullet and cooled her from the inside. A drizzle of water had escaped her lips and slipped down her chin onto her décolletage. She wiped it away with outstretched fingers and looked up: she was being watched.

  Luca didn’t seem to care about being caught out. He raised his eyebrows and smiled. Stella wiped her mouth with the back of her hand and smiled right back.

  ‘Sorry, that was rude of me. I didn’t offer you anything,’ she said, and there was a tease in her slightly breathless voice that she hadn’t intended.

  Will you listen to yourself ? she chided. But oh, it was fun. ‘Water? Coffee?’

  ‘I’m good,’ he said, his voice low and husky.

  Oh, you most definitely are, she thought with a slow glance up and down his tall frame. What was it about this young man that had her acting this way, flirting with him? God, she was flirting. Something she hadn’t done in a long, long time.

  ‘Okay. I’m done.’ Luca slipped his phone into his hip pocket.

  ‘Great.’ Stella wiped her wet hand on her singlet top, on the section pulled tight under her breasts and above her waist. ‘I look forward to seeing what you can do for me.’

  He grinned. ‘I’ll email everything to you. Where can I send it?’

  ‘Google me. You’ll find my email address on my website.’

  ‘Style by Stella, right?’

  She smiled. ‘The one and only.’

  ‘Well.’ Luca smiled back at her and the sun shining through the roof lit up his perfect white teeth like in a toothpaste commercial. Oh, she could definitely stand to have him around for a little while. Then she caught herself: only if his price was right, of course.

  ‘Thank you, Mr Morelli. I really appreciate you coming all the way from Adelaide. I hope we can work something out.’

  ‘I’m sure you’ll like what I have to offer. And it’s Luca.’ He took a step towards her and held out his hand. This time, Stella didn’t refuse the contact. She whipped off a rubber glove, wiped her hand down the front of her jeans, and reached for his fingers. His tanned skin against her pale fingers looked like a block of Top Deck chocolate. The heat she felt sizzled up her arm and right into the space behind her ribs. When she lifted her gaze from their entwined hands to his face, she realised that his charming smile had disappeared and something entirely different was in its place.

  Slowly, they let go. He smiled at her again and walked away.

  Stella propped her hands on her hips and watched his bum move in those shorts and his shoulders sway. When he reached the doorway, he looked back over his shoulder and gave her a slight nod. ‘I’ll be in touch.’

  ‘Ciao,’ she said.

  His smile was like an arrow to her heart.

  ‘Oh, that’s amazing.’ Stella sighed into the sheet covering Summer’s massage table, enjoying the excruciating sensation of her friend’s strong fingers kneading her back and shoulders. She’d gone there straight from her shop, slipped into Summer’s shower, and was now enjoying the ministrations of the best massage therapist on the south coast. The room in Summer’s practice was peaceful and quiet. Painted a pale shade of green, its windows captured the setting sun and the aroma of jasmine-scented candles teased Stella’s nostrils. New-age music was playing softly in the background and, although it was a little different from the jazz that Stella preferred, she found it the perfect tonic to help her relax while being manipulated and pounded by her friend.

  It had been a long day. Stella’s every limb ached and there were spasms in muscles she hadn’t known she had. She was fit and healthy—she regularly walked along the cliff tops west of Horseshoe Bay—but that day’s work had been back-breaking.

  ‘You’re very tense,’ Summer said, pushing her fingers into Stella’s left shoulder.

  ‘Yes,’ Stella mumbled into the sheet covering the massage table.

  ‘I wish you’d taken up my offer to come and help you clean up, you crazy independent woman. I can handle a mop and bucket like a champion.’

  ‘I know, I know,’ Stella turned her head to the side so she could chat. She’d had lots of offers but she was so afraid of falling to pieces in front of her friends that she’d refused their help. She was scraping up the ruins of her beloved business—and her life—and she wanted to do that in private.

  ‘Believe me, Summer, this is the best thing you can do for me right now. Oh,’ she murmured, ‘that’s good.’

  ‘Happy to oblige. Did you get much work done today?’ Summer positioned her palms on Stella’s shoulders and pressed down. Stella exhaled a big breath and felt half her tension flow out of her mouth.

  ‘Tons. I filled the skip. There’s still water on the floor but it’s concrete, after all, and given how warm it’s been, that should dry out by itself over the next couple of days. I organised a quote for the building work.’

  ‘Wow. You don’t just sit around, do you? Is it someone local?’

  ‘No. Yes. Kind of. It’s Anna Morelli’s brother.’

  ‘Ooh, you just tensed up, hon. You need to relax. Whatever you’re thinking about, let it go.’

  Let it go? There was no chance of that. After Luca had walked out of her shop with a grin that could melt an ice-cream at twenty feet, Stella had plonked herself on the wet floor and thought over their encounter. So he was handsome—any woman with a pulse could tell you that—but there was more. He was ambitious, already had a builder’s licence and his own company. She knew what it was like to start up your own business. Sure, she wasn’t building things, but the principles were the same. When it was your name on the letterhead, you worked like mad to make it a success. It was your baby and you wanted to make sure it survived and thrived. Luca was only two years in, and Stella figured he was probably working all the hours under the sun, trying to establish himself and his reputation. And yet he’d dropped everything that day to drive down to the beach and help her out. She had to make sure to thank Anna. She understood how persuasive that woman could be. She’d managed to convince Stella to stock stiletto heels in a beachside boutique, after all, despite her gut instinct that women on holidays wanted comfortable summer flats. Of course Anna had been right. Since the day Stella had put the first pair on display in the window, they’d been among her best sellers.

  And it seemed like Anna was going to be right about her brother, too.

  Stella blew out a breath and rolled her eyes. As she reflected on her behaviour that afternoon, she came to the conclusion she’d probably not been as grateful to Morelli Constructions as she should have been.

  ‘So is he going to do the work for you? Anna’s brother?’

  Stella thought about the young man with the skin and the smile and the charm. ‘Luca. His name is Luca. Luca Morelli.’

  Summer stopped. ‘You just said his name three times. What’s going on? You’re tensing up again. Did it go badly? Is it going to be more expensive than you thought?’

  ‘No, no. Nothing like that. It’s …’

  ‘Relax a little. You’ve been through a major shock. No wonder your back and shoulders feel like fishing rope.’ Summer ran her knuckles down Stella’s spine.

  ‘It’s not the shop. I know I can fix that. I know I can get back to business.’

  ‘Then what else has got you all tied up in knots, hon?’

  ‘Luca Morelli.’

  Stella didn’t like gossip and usually kept things very close to her chest, even when it was bare a
nd only her most private bits were covered with a warm towel. But she’d grown to know and love Summer and felt safe sharing at least some of her secrets.

  ‘Really?’

  ‘Oh, yeah. He is absolutely gorgeous.’

  ‘Don’t tease me. There is a serious lack of men in this town. Hang on, let me qualify. Available men. Where are all the available men, Stella?’

  ‘You’re asking me?’ Stella chuckled.

  ‘I know, why am I asking you, the born-again virgin of Port Elliot?’

  ‘Oh, if only I was.’ Stella laughed.

  ‘So you don’t mind if I accidentally swing by and check him out for myself?’

  ‘Please, go ahead. I know I’m a sensible woman, a sensible older woman, but he is hot. Young. Buff. In his prime, if you know what I mean. I don’t know what it is. It’s not like I don’t see hot young men all the time, wandering up from the beach in their boardshorts. They’re everywhere down here. But this one …’

  ‘Score out of ten?’

  ‘Fifteen.’

  Summer sighed. ‘I’m coming tomorrow.’

  Stella felt loose and began to talk. ‘It hit me today when I was walking here. I’m thirty-five years old, Summer. I’m too young to not be having sex.’

  ‘Join the club, hon.’ Summer moved to the other side of the massage table and began working on Stella’s calves with her magic thumbs. ‘But I don’t know what you’re complaining about. My dry spell is way longer than yours. You did have Duncan.’

  ‘Please don’t remind me.’

  ‘You’ve been so tough on him. I think he’s … nice. In a suit-and-tie kind of unruffled way.’

  One drunken and very ill-advised night a year back, Stella had slept with Duncan McNamee after an impromptu early-summer street party. All the neighbours had dragged deckchairs and bottles of wine out onto the street and toasted the approaching holidays. The sex had been perfectly fine—if you liked perfectly fine sex—but she shouldn’t have scratched that particular itch with a man who’d turned out to have serious feelings for her. She had no intention of getting serious about anyone ever again. She’d thought she and Duncan understood each other, that their no-strings-attached sex was mutually convenient and definitely not to be repeated. But, in hindsight, neither of them had been entirely honest about what they were looking for. She had been looking for sex. He’d been looking for love—and he wasn’t going to find that with Stella.