Never Too Late For Love

by Marie Ferrarella

  She grinned. "l have to admit, there’s something rather exciting, watching your nostrils flare."

  His attention was all hers again. "They did not flare."

  This time, she didn’t bother holding back her laugh. "Yes, they did."

  He loved that sound, he thought. Hearing it defused any rush of temper that threatened to overtake him. "They’re my nostrils, I should know whether or not they flared."

  "You didn’t have my view," she teased.

  "You know what Wakefield must think now," he pointed out. He didn’t want people thinking things like that about her. Not when it wasn’t true.

  She nodded. "l know." That they were lovers. Bruce had held back, very obviously reining himself in even then, just as obviously, he’d wanted to let go. He’d done it, she knew, not just because of the memory of his late wife, but out of an old-fashioned sense of consideration for her.

  His behavior only intensified the conflicting feelings battling within her. She’d always just wanted to enjoy herself and move on.

  But it wasn’t that simple. Not anymore.

  For now she ignored it. Margo raised herself up on her toes and pressed a soft kiss to his cheek.

  Bruce looked at her in surprise. It didn’t seem to bother her, he noted, that there was a ballroom full of people around.

  "My Sir Galahad."

  "You were right," Paul declared, coming up behind them. His eyes were all but glued to Margo when they both turned around to look at him. "She is a real knockout."

  Disregarding the fact that she was being referred to as if she were a trophy rather than a person, Margo looked at Bruce in surprise. "You called me a knockout?"

  Though he’d thought it more than once. Bruce didn’t remember actually using that term around Paul.

  Paul jumped in verbally. And took the opportunity to place himself between them. "Maybe not in so many words, but that was what he meant. I’ve been his friend for a long time and I can read between the lines. He’s ordinarily so quiet, I have to." He put out his hand to her. "Paul Giordano."

  She recognized his name. "You’re his best friend." She slipped her hand into his and made sure her handshake was firm, rather than the delicate one she knew he was expecting.

  "And you’re just the best," Paul pronounced with a sigh that was almost comical.

  Bruce tapped him on the shoulder. When Paul roused himself enough to glance at him, Bruce said. "l believe your lady friend is waiting for you to come back."

  "What lady friend?" Paul added. Bruce pointed to the woman who was looking in their direction. "Oh, yeah. Julie. Right." Chagrined, Paul laughed. "You’ll excuse me, I have a little damage control to tend to." He looked at Margo hopefully before leaving. "But you’ll save me a dance?"

  "Sure she will. At the next function," Bruce called after him as Paul hurried back to Julie.

  Margo made no attempt to conceal her amusement. "That wasn’t very nice."

  Bruce looked at her, feigning hurt at the criticism. "Just living up to my responsibility. Sir Galahad, remember? Paul’s my best friend, but he’s also a bit of a womanizer. l just saved you from having to endure dancing with a man who has more hands than an octopus."

  "Very thoughtful of you." Was that a trace of jealousy she detected? "Does this mean that every dance with you will be chaste?"

  "Only if you want it to be," he said quietly against her ear.

  The shiver it sent up her spine was in inverse proportion to the volume of his voice.

  "Reed, nice of you to show up." Weston clapped a hand on his shoulder, breaking the mood as he invaded their space. "And this is--"

  "Ms. Margo McCloud."

  The name was familiar to him. He’d been the one to okay hiring her. He would have asked for an interview had he known she looked like this.

  "The tutor, yes." He took her hand between his own. "I hear from Reed that you do wonderful work."

  So he’d been talking about her, had he? Pleasure slid through her like smoke curling from a chimney Christmas morning. "Teaching is very rewarding."

  "To be sure," he agreed. Still holding her hand, he slipped it through the crook of his arm. "Once we have the office in Florence up and running, I’m going to need a full staff to man it. And I don’t believe in going outside the company to fill positions if my own employees are up to the job. That means we’ll be in the market for a teacher on location." Like a magpie examining a shining rock, he cocked his head and looked at her. "Interested?"

  Ambivalent feelings fought for control of her, but Margo kept the struggle from registering on her face. "Mr. Weston, I am always interested."

  The dry laugh sounded very close to a crackle. "Something I never tire of hearing from a beautiful woman."

  Glancing around, he found who he was looking for. "Come with me, both of you. There’s someone here I’d like you to meet."

  Bruce knew who he was referring to. The guest of honor, Giovanni Marcello. They found the slender, dark-haired man in the center of the room, surrounded by several of the company’s CEOs.

  As they approached, the man’s husky, deeply accented voice was the only one heard. Even stumbling over English it sounded melodic. Bruce felt like a student about to take his final exam.

  Weston waited for the man to pause. It wasn’t long in coming. "Giovanni, I’d like to introduce Bruce Reed who’ll be heading our foreign office."

  "Foreign to you, not to me," Giovanni said grandly with an indulgent smile.

  Weston, mindful of the agreement yet to be cemented was quick to agree. "Yes, of course."

  "A pleasure to finally meet you." Bruce shook Giovanni’s hand. He was spared one shrewd look before the man’s dark eyes roamed to Margo, obviously very taken with what he saw. Introductions were in order. Bruce stepped aside to usher Margo forward. "And this is--"

  "The most exquisite woman I have ever set my eyes on." The flattering words descended like flower petals floating on the spring breeze as Giovanni eased Bruce out of the way. He took Margo’s hand and pressed his lips lightly to her knuckles. "Tell me, what is your name, lovely lady?"

  Unimpressed, she gave her answer in Italian.

  At the sound of his native tongue, Giovanni’s eyes lit up. "Ah, but you speak Italian'?" His pleasure was unmistakable as he repeated the question again in Italian.

  "A little."

  Giovanni immediately launched into a profusion of words that swiftly left Bruce behind, like a man who had just missed boarding the train. Obviously he hadn’t learned as much as he’d originally believed, Bruce thought grudgingly.

  Margo, he observed, held her own during the conversation, There was no indication that she was the least bit confused as the words continued to flow swiftly in her direction. She answered Giovanni’s initial questions, made appropriate comments on several things he said, and then, ever so politely, pointed out that with the exception of Bruce, the others didn’t have a clue what they were talking about.

  "Oh, but of course, you are right. Where are my manners?" he apologized, though it was to her rather than the others that he directed the apology. "It is just that it is not often I discover angels speaking my native tongue." Hope alighted within the almost black orbs. "You will be part of the office that we are discussing, yes?"

  Pausing, Giovanni looked to Weston for confirmation.

  "l offered her a position." And if this was what it took to cement negotiations between the two companies, Weston at as willing to put pressure wherever it would do the most good.

  Giovanni looked as if he believed it was a done deal. "And you will accept, yes?"

  Margo had never liked being backed into a corner, even a lucrative one. She thought of the offer in her purse at home. Options.

  "l will think about it," she agreed.

  That didn't sound as if she was going to give him the answer he wanted. Giovanni, accustomed to getting his way both professionally and privately, moved a little closer.

  "Is there anything I can do to perhaps per
suade you? You have but to name it."

  "Thank you." Her soft, sultry laughter drifted between them. "You are too kind."

  "Eh, 'kind,' yes," he acknowledged. He beat his fisted hand once against his chest. "It is, as you Americans say, my middle name."

  Behind them, the musicians began playing Stardust. She doubted either man standing beside her recognized it.

  But Giovanni did recognize an opportunity when he saw one. He took her hand again. "You will do me the honor, yes?"

  She found herself glancing toward Bruce, who reluctantly nodded, before she agreed. That had never happened before, she realized with an inward start. She’d never looked for approval before doing anything. She didn’t need any man’s stamp of approval before she acted.

  Yet there was no denying that his feelings had become important to her. That made her uncomfortable.

  Giovanni swept her into his arms. As if to deny what she was feeling. to deny an even stronger emotion that was trying to break free, Margo smiled up into his face. They let the music take them away.

  "Great idea, bringing her along," Weston congratulated Bruce. "Did you see the way he looked at her?"

  "Yes," Bruce said evenly. "l did." And he didn’t like it.

  Damn, what was happening to him? Jealousy wasn’t in his nature. Neither was possessiveness. Yet he was feeling both.

  He was going to have to get all that under control and fast before he completely scared her away. Margo wasn’t the type to be charmed by either of those traits.

  "This should cinch it for us," Weston was saying. "She seems to have really hooked him." He cackled. building on the comparison that had just occurred to him. "He looks like a fish that’s positively eager to leap into her lap, even if it means dying."

  "I don’t think it’s dying that he has on his mind," Bruce muttered in reply.

  Weston merely laughed, missing the fact that Bruce didn’t join in.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Bruce stood it for as long as he could, which was a lot longer than he thought he would. All the while, he counselled the way he would a friend. That what he was feeling was a childish emotion. That he and Margo and Giovanni were all mature adults and could act accordingly.

  That was just the problem.

  Right now, he wasn’t feeling very mature. What he was feeling was adolescently possessive. He didn’t want Margo in Giovanni’s arms, either for dancing or for any other reason. Bruce wanted her in his arms. Exclusively.

  And for that matter, he had no idea what acting according to their maturity might mean to Giovanni.

  But he had a damn good hunch.

  Giovanni Marcello was darkly handsome, suave and from what Bruce had heard around the office and from Paul, the man was born to money. It made for one hell of a combination. A background like that lent itself to a certain laid-back, carefree enjoyment of the liner things in life.

  Bruce was afraid that for Giovanni, Margo just might come under that broad heading. And worse, she might even like coming under that heading.

  He didn’t want to chance that.

  So as Weston stood by, watching him with more than a measure of incredulous disbelief, Bruce crossed the floor and cut in on Giovanni.

  Reluctantly surrendering his oblivion to everything else around him, Giovanni looked over his shoulder at Bruce.

  "Oh, but we have not finished our dance yet," he protested when Bruce moved to take his place with Margo. He gave no indication that he had any intention of releasing her from his arms, a place he obviously felt she fit in very nicely.

  "That’s the whole point of cutting in," Bruce informed him.

  "There are rules for such things?" Still dancing, Giovanni looked to Margo for an explanation.

  But it was Bruce who answered him. "There are no rules for cutting in, other than the couple has to be dancing. And that the person being cut in on gives way to the person doing the cutting." He looked at Giovanni expectantly.

  Appearing to roll this information over in his head, the younger man finally gave in. "This language of yours, I must say it is confusing." Giovanni smiled as he looked up at Bruce. The smile the latter wore was strictly perfunctory. Giovanni saw what he needed to see. "But the feelings, they are not. I bow to your claim, Mr. Reed." lnclining his head, he withdrew.

  Margo slipped easily into Bruce’s arms. With a contented sigh, she rested her head against his chest. Was it her imagination, or was his heart beating just a little harder? Because of her?

  A small thrill shimmied along her skin.

  "Well, that went well," she murmured.

  Bruce folded his hand around hers. He could swear he felt her smiling against his chest. At least one of them was amused.

  It took him a moment to collect himself. "Frankly, I don’t care if it did or not. He looked as if he was enjoying himself way too much."

  Margo raised her head to look at him. And saw exactly what Giovanni had detected. Bruce was jealous. Really jealous. She couldn’t help being flattered.

  "Isn’t that the whole point of this party?" she asked mildly. "To get him to relax, to enjoy himself and then sign on the dotted line?"

  "Yeah, but--" Bruce stopped, some of his anger dissipating like taffy after it’d been chewed for a moment. He looked at the matter from her perspective. The grin that slowly spread along his lips was self-deprecating. "I am behaving like the rear end of a horse, aren’t I?"

  "Not a horse..." Her eyes shone with amusement and sympathy. He didn’t like feeling this way, it confused him, she could tell. "A pony, maybe." And then she smiled up at him. "Actually, I find it very sweet."

  "l find it annoying." He was keenly disappointed in himself. He didn’t want to even think about what she probably thought of him. "I’m not like this, normally."

  "I wouldn’t know."

  He looked into her eyes, searching for a sign, for something he could build on. "I’d like to show you."

  Her response was guarded. "How?"

  If he noticed the change in her voice, the infinitesimal change in her body as it stiffened ever so slightly against his, he pretended not to.

  "Why don’t you take Weston up on his offer?"

  If they had more time together, if she got to know him, then perhaps she’d see that this was just an insane, temporary aberration for him. Until she had entered his life, he would have said that he hadn’t a jealous bone in his body. He couldn’t make that claim any longer. But it was something that he intended to get under control.

  "And which offer would that be?" Her face lit up with humor again, the guarded manner gone as if it had never existed. "His eyes were saying things l don’t think the rest of him could make delivery on."

  Bruce had no doubt that Weston was entertaining thoughts of his own about Margo. Probably half the men in the room were. That, too, was something he was going to have to get used to. He only hoped she’d give him the chance. "The offer to come to Florence, Margo. To work for the company."

  Come to Florence with me, he added silently. He had an uneasy feeling that if he phrased it that way, she’d say no. The odd thing was, he wasn’t certain if she would say no because she didn’t want to, or because there was something else in the way. Something he couldn’t quite put his finger on yet.

  Margo knew she wasn’t about to say yes, even though part of her was tempted. She couldn't say yes. It would ruin everything.

  But for the moment she played devil’s advocate. "That would put me in contact with Giovanni on a regular basis, wouldn’t it?"

  "And me." he emphasized significantly. Bruce held her hand tighter, curving his other hand around the one that rested against his chest. "And don’t worry, I’ll take care of Giovanni."

  She tried not to laugh. He looked so endearingly serious. "Does that mean if he comes on to me, he’ll find himself sleeping with the fishes?"

  "Not sleeping," Bruce denied, "but he might be taking long nap."

  She could just see Bruce, bare-chested, fists poised to pummel the much
slighter man into the ground. It was all so hopelessly Neanderthal and she had no idea why it gave her such a thrill.

  But she couldn’t help grinning at him. "l love it when you get physical."

  lt took all he could do not to caress her face, not to press a kiss to each lid and lose himself in the fragrance that lightly swirled around her. Was there a dab behind each ear and another along the column of her throat? Would he