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CHAPTER ONE ‘LORENZO, I sent a message requesting your presence in Luca’s office for a meeting ten minutes ago. Did you not receive it?’ The words were calm. Professional. They stated the facts and requested an explanation of the man’s absence, nothing more or less. Yes, Scarlett Gibson wanted to tug in frustration on the hot-pink ribbon adorning her ponytail of shoulder-length black hair and, yes, that reaction annoyed her. She hadn’t seen Lorenzo for five years. For the next two months she would be working with him. Scarlett had hoped she would be able to do that without caring much about anything to do with him. After all, that was the state she had been forced to reach after he broke her heart five years ago. Well, Scarlett hadn’t become a top financial advisor in Australia by losing her control the first time something annoyed her. But she also hadn’t come back to Italy to help out at her uncle Luca’s Rosa restaurant, only to have her authority thwarted by the head chef on her fir
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO ‘YOU know there’ll be fallout for you once Lisa learns that you’ve moved yourself out of her villa.’ Isabella put the middle-sized suitcase of Scarlett’s set of three down in the centre of the small bedsit, and turned with raised brows to face her cousin. ‘And I’d have loved to have—’ ‘I know. And…thanks. But I would have felt I was intruding.’ It was the next morning, early. Max had driven them here, helped them to unload Scarlett’s luggage, and had then disappeared with a promise to meet Isabella in the village later. Or should Scarlett say the prince had driven the princess into town? The romance between his cousin and the reclusive prince was a little like a fairy tale. Scarlett stifled a small grin and wondered how she could be so cheerful when a part of her very much did not want to face another day at the restaurant with Lorenzo working under her nose, and making her feel uncomfortable and overly conscious of him by turns. Not that he’d been trying to do that, to be
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE ‘THANK you all for staying back for this meeting.’ Scarlett uttered the words and let her gaze travel over each of the employees present. It was the end of her second day at Rosa’s restaurant. The dinner hour was over, tables and chairs stacked, the kitchen clean and tidy. For the next few minutes it would be the site of their meeting. Scarlett’s office was not tidy. It was covered with bookwork, sheaves of account invoices and receipts. Amongst it were Lorenzo’s records of kitchen expenditure. He was very thorough, and in fact so far his bookkeeping was the easiest to understand of all of this. When Lorenzo had delivered his bookkeeping records to the office, he’d apologised for his words about her that morning. He’d clearly figured out she’d been standing there, had heard it all. He’d explained he’d wanted to scare the boy into behaving better but not make him feel as if he didn’t have a friend in Lorenzo if he needed one. Scarlett had…admired him for that and realised
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR ‘GOODNIGHT. I—thank you for seeing me home.’ Scarlett uttered the words through lips that wanted to deny what had just happened. Wanted to deny a kiss that had lasted less than a second, a mere brush of lips against lips before she and Lorenzo had both…broken away. They’d each stepped back as though they’d been burnt. ‘I have to—’ She couldn’t make calm words come out, couldn’t do anything to downplay something that shouldn’t even need to be downplayed and yet, to Scarlett, the entire world had stopped and then started up again and now it was spinning strangely and nothing felt quite right because of Lorenzo’s kiss… Barely even a kiss, Scarlett. Somehow she got her key straight into the lock, twisted it and got the door open. Her feet carried her through and she closed the door. She didn’t look back, and then through the closed door she heard his footsteps taking him away in a rapid stride that went, and then half missed a step, and then kept going. He’d hesitated. And as
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE ‘THERE has to be an answer somewhere. I just know it’s there, but I can’t zero in on it.’ Scarlett murmured the words beneath her breath, mostly in the hopes of getting them out of her head. Her swim earlier this afternoon felt aeons away. Night had fallen outside the restaurant while she slaved away in Luca’s office inputting financial information onto a computer system to bring Rosa’s paperwork side of things—kicking and screaming if necessary—into the twenty-first century. Well, it had been a big day. Scarlett had come out onto the terrace that adjoined with Sorella’s terrace for a breath of air, even if that air was still quite warm and balmy. There was nobody out here at this time of night, and in fact, though the terraces joined, there was an air of disuse about both of them. She had to stop this nonsense when it came to Rosa’s head chef. She had to stop it right now, if not sooner. It just wasn’t right that she still could react to him that way when he’d broken her
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX ‘OH, NO!’ Scarlett stared at the e-mail she’d just dug out of the spam folder in her Internet mail program. ‘How could this have ended up in the mail trash? What date was it sent? Why didn’t they contact me when I didn’t respond? What if I’ve missed out on the opportunity?’ As these questions popped out another question followed. She opened the e-mail and started to scan its contents. ‘What date have they said they want to do this?’ It was Friday evening. She’d been just about to pack up in Luca’s office and to be honest she had felt a true sense of achievement. She still didn’t have all the answers for making the restaurant completely self-supporting and guaranteed to always run in the black, but the changes she’d made were starting to pay off and she wasn’t at the end of her stream of ideas by any means. This was only the beginning of what Scarlett could do. One of the things she’d tried was to canvas the local promotional body for Monta Correnti to see if she could inter
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN SCARLETT stood to the side of the courtyard dining area of Rosa the following Friday and asked herself where the time had gone between her decision to grill Isabella about Lorenzo’s past, and now. The cook-off was about to start. Lorenzo had worked so hard all week, preparing for it, thinking about dishes, working things out. Scarlett had worked equally hard to get him the extra workers he’d need, to get as much advertising out as she could to augment what was already out there and yet without costing Rosa too much in doing that. The focus was to bring diners in for the event, because diners meant money, and money helped Rosa’s bottom line. They couldn’t really afford for this weekend to run at a loss. ‘Visitors, diners and friends, what you are seeing here tonight is the beginning of a very exciting Monta Correnti event.’ The head of the local entertainment body spoke into her microphone with just the right edge of dramatic effect to ensure she had the attention of every
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT ‘WHERE is Rocco? Shouldn’t he be here for his shift by now?’ As Lorenzo asked the question Scarlett stepped into the busy kitchen. A frown formed between her brows and she walked swiftly towards him. She looked neat as a pin today, fresh and lovely in a simple white sleeveless blouse over a tan skirt. On her feet she wore closed-in shoes with good supportive soles, and Lorenzo had the passing thought that only his Scarlett would be able to don shoes like that and look sexy in them. But of course Scarlett was not ‘his’ anything, other than his boss here at Rosa. He’d been trying to remember that. Trying not to still want her, desire her, be attracted to her. It’s not only those things. There are emotions involved in this for you, at least to some degree. You should admit it, be honest about it to yourself, anyway. As he’d been honest with her five years ago? Hiding, at first, the fact that he was married? He’d fallen hard for Scarlett. There’d never been anyone in his life
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE ‘SCARLETT—’ Isabella drew a breath and her hand came to rest on Scarlett’s arm. ‘I’ve been talking to Jackie and, well, I think… I think we need to talk. Will you come into Luca’s office for a minute?’ It was Sunday. The restaurant was crowded with diners inside and out. Lorenzo and the Sorella chef were back at their outside cooking stations. Less than an hour from now the overall winner for the weekend would be decided, one way or another. The challenge was five authentic Italian main meals. Scarlett was convinced that Lorenzo would win this. There hadn’t been time today for even a moment alone with him, and Scarlett admitted that she had wanted, had hoped for that. Last night…they could have ended up making love. Oh, the way she felt when she was with him! The way everything within her longed— After five years of not seeing him, of telling herself she was over him, that the hurt he had done to her could never be forgiven and would never be forgotten. After all that, for
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN ‘WHAT was that?’ As the sound of splintering glass echoed through the front part of the restaurant Scarlett caught her breath and started forward. Lorenzo touched her arm and swore. ‘That sounded like a brick or something coming through one of the windows. Wait here while I go look.’ He flung the kitchen door open and started to stride forward without waiting for a reply. Scarlett didn’t give him one. She simply started forward at his side. Upset or not, she wasn’t about to let him go out there on his own. They were both just outside the kitchen swing doors. There was a shout outside. A second missile flew through the broken window. A bottle, a burning wick. The smell of petrol. The sound of footsteps running away. ‘Oh, my God!’ ‘Get back, Scarlett!’ As Lorenzo spoke he grasped her arms and shoved them both through the kitchen doors. The bottle exploded and there was a whooshing sound. Shards of glass hit against the doors behind them. Lorenzo’s arms were hard about her, hi
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN ‘SCARLETT, I’m sorry to wake you. It’s still before dawn but I thought we’d better talk.’ Lorenzo’s soft words woke Scarlett. ‘I brought coffee for you.’ The bed dipped as he sat on its edge. She opened her eyes to the sight of him, fully dressed in a fine white linen shirt and black trousers. His hair was still damp. He must have taken a shower while she slept. Scarlett remembered their shared shower last night and all that it had led to. He turned his head and their gazes met and, through eyes still blurred with sleep, she looked into familiar features. Though she knew that she was vulnerable and her instincts were starting to warn her that she needed to do something about that, that she had made herself vulnerable last night, and where had that got her because he was still, when it came down to it, a married man? Despite these thoughts, her heart swelled. While Scarlett lay in Lorenzo’s bed and he looked down at her with gentle eyes that only as he had loved her last
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CHAPTER TWELVE ‘I WONDER if Scarlett realises what she’s achieved by getting Lisa even to the point of being prepared to consider this idea,’ Romano said to Lorenzo as they stood outside Lorenzo’s home. It was Wednesday morning. Lorenzo had been leaving Lisa’s when Romano had dropped Jackie and Scarlett there, before taking Lorenzo home. The last two days had been busy with police reports. The restaurant, despite or perhaps in part also because of the arson attempt, was doing great business, and working in co-operation with Sorella’s to ensure they could seat everyone and get on with things. Scarlett was forging ahead with family and work. Romano had boasted just now about his beautiful daughter, Kate, and said that Scarlett had spent hours poring over Kate’s photos with her sister Jackie. Scarlett seemed to be finding forgiveness for herself for her part in Jackie losing her child for so long. Soon Scarlett would have resolved all her issues with family, and, with her work done at Ros
CHAPTER TWELVE
CHAPTER THIRTEEN ‘THIS is lovely.’ Scarlett uttered the words around a stampede of butterflies that were doing hob-nailed cartwheels in her tummy. They seemed to be fluttering around in her throat, too. It was the following day, late lunch time. She and Lorenzo were sitting on a blanket at the same quiet mountain knoll they’d visited in the middle of the night. Isabella was covering for Lorenzo back at Rosa. The Sorella chef was helping. Scarlett wasn’t sure if she should be pleased about that co-operative effort, or embarrassed, because apparently the chef seemed to think he was helping the course of love for Lorenzo and Scarlett. The man apparently had a soft romantic streak. ‘This has been a long time coming and I wanted to do it right,’ Lorenzo said as he uncorked a bottle of wine and poured some into two glasses. He placed one glass in her hand. His fingers shook slightly, and somehow that small sign of uncertainty helped Scarlett to relax a little. He took the lid from a wicker p
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
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