Confessions of His Christmas Housekeeper by Sharon Kendrick
CHAPTER TEN
THISTIME LOUISEdidn’t shun the cashmere coat or the wide-brimmed hat which matched it so perfectly, because they were vital props for her latest reincarnation. As the private jet descended towards the festive lights of Milan, she thought about what she was doing—which by any stretch of the imagination was insane.
She had agreed to return to Italy as Giacomo’s wife!
‘Plan A,’ he had drawled when they’d been lying half naked in front of the roaring fire at Barton, his fingers on her flesh—distracting her and shoring up the feelings of confusion which had been building up inside her ever since she’d stepped over the threshold of his English mansion.
To describe it as Plan A was mildly insulting yet she had allowed him to persuade her to go through with a charade fraught with potential emotional danger. Was that because she had been feeling deliciously sated in his arms, or just unwilling to say goodbye to him yet? Wasn’t that closer to the truth? Probably. Louise smoothed her fingers over the fine wool of her designer dress. She needed to remember not to take her new role too seriously. Because she wasn’t a wife at all. She was a memory aide. And that was what he wanted her for.
To play a part.
To pretend to be something she wasn’t.
To facilitate something he wanted.
Because Giacomo’s reputation was as important to him as his memory and he wanted her as a distraction. He wanted her to draw attention away from the fact that the powerful billionaire might not be firing on all cylinders, by creating a fake marriage to confuse the world who was always watching him. That was what he had announced when he’d turned up at the offices of Posh Catering and nothing had changed since then.
The strange sexual intimacy which had evolved between them didn’t count for anything. It was simply the cherry on the cake. She was a means to an end, that was all. And if she allowed a few candid conversations and amazing orgasms to distract her from her primary purpose in his life, she had only herself to blame if that made her unhappy. He hadn’t promised her anything, or given her hope. He hadn’t started opening up to her, or showing any indication that he would. He certainly hadn’t implied that he wanted to commit properly to any relationship, least of all theirs—quite the opposite in fact. He was still a closed book in so many ways.
Yet there was still something unfinished between them.
He still didn’t know about the baby.
The sharp pain of recall momentarily took her breath away. Deep down she knew that if Giacomo’s memory hadn’t wholly returned by the end of her stay, she needed to ask him if it was time for her to fill in all the missing gaps. She would tell him about her miscarriage if he wanted her to, and surely that would give them both closure.
She closed her eyes.
It wasn’t something she was looking forward to.
‘We’re coming in to land,’ said a soft female voice. ‘Welcome to Milan, Signora Volterra. It is good to see you back.’
‘Grazie,’said Louise, her lashes fluttering open to see the stewardess whose sparkly diamond ring suggested a recent engagement. Better not disillusion her on the subject of marriage. She forced a big smile. ‘It’s good to be back.’
Once the stewardess had gone, Giacomo looked up from his laptop, dark eyebrows raised.
‘Did you mean that?’ he questioned drily.
‘I’m just playing my role with aplomb, as requested. Though if you’re asking whether I’m enjoying being whisked around in luxury—then the answer would have to be yes. I’d forgotten how easy it was to go anywhere if you had this amount of money at your disposal.’ She gave a rueful smile. ‘It certainly beats standing in line for hours at the airport.’
‘But my wealth didn’t tempt you into staying,’ he pointed out. ‘That might have been a big enough incentive for a lot of women to remain in a bad marriage, but not you.’
‘Ah, what price contentment?’ she said lightly. ‘All the money in the world doesn’t count for anything, if you don’t have that.’
His eyes narrowed thoughtfully but he made no comment as they descended the aircraft steps to where a limousine was waiting on the tarmac. Louise reminded herself that as far as Giacomo was concerned, it seemed to be business as usual. He had worked throughout the flight, hadn’t he? Then announced that they were expected at some party later on this evening and one tomorrow night, too. He was throwing her in at the deep end of Milanese society, without wondering if she might find it all a bit much. Hadn’t it occurred to him that her appearance might throw up more questions than it answered?
But she couldn’t deny feeling conflicted at being back in his beautiful apartment which overlooked the lush botanical gardens of the city’s university. The high-ceilinged rooms and polished wooden floors provided the perfect setting for the contemporary furniture which filled it, and vases of fragrant red roses had been dotted throughout the rooms—presumably to celebrate their arrival. It had always seemed so daunting to her before, but not any more. Although it remained an essentially masculine residence, she was able to appreciate its stylish beauty, rather than find fault with it. Perhaps now she had accepted she had no place here, she was able to view it with dispassionate eyes.
Which wasn’t quite so simple where Giacomo was concerned.
She wondered if she was on a road to nowhere, with ideas which now seemed flaky rather than the brainwave she’d originally thought. Her insistence on stopping short of full sex was supposed to provide her with a degree of immunity. So why did her emotions keep getting involved, no matter how hard she tried to fight it? Was it because over Christmas Giacomo had demonstrated a patience and understanding towards her which she hadn’t been expecting? Which had dazzled her and charmed her, despite her determination not to be either of those things.
His permanent staff were waiting to greet them—a married couple who lived in an apartment on the floor below and who seemed genuinely overjoyed to see her again. Rosa enveloped her in a huge hug and Louise suddenly felt her eyes filling up.
‘What’s the matter?’ asked Giacomo, once they were alone.
‘Nothing.’
‘You had tears in your eyes.’
She threw him a mocking glance. ‘Not your area of expertise, I wouldn’t have thought, Giacomo. You once told me you despised the way women turned their tears on and off, and it was easier to ignore them.’
He appeared momentarily chastened by her response and for a while he paced up and down the room, as if he were measuring its dimensions with his long stride. Without warning he came to a sudden halt and began to speak, with the deliberation of someone reading from an autocue.
‘I can picture you in a blue dress, by candlelight, and you’re supposed to be eating but you’re not. You get up and you walk away from the table and you’re...you’re crying,’ he said, his voice growing thick. ‘Did I make you cry, Louise?’
She was totally unprepared for the question. Maybe that was why she was able to answer it with total honesty.
‘Of course you did,’ she said in a low voice. ‘Show me a woman who says she never cried when her marriage was breaking down and I’ll show you a liar.’
Silently, he evaluated this. ‘What did I do that was so awful?’
She thought what a gift this question would have been had he asked it when they’d been living together—a long list of resentments compiled during his many absences would have been presented to him with a flourish. But now that their marriage was over, it merited a different kind of answer. This wasn’t about anger or blame or retribution, she reminded herself. It was about healing. For both of them.
‘When we arrived back here after that first Christmas, you seemed to want to push me away. We’d been happy in England, or so I thought. And then suddenly, everything changed.’ She stared out of the window at the distant spire of a church, just visible above the treetops, and it reminded her of all the times she’d sat there, alone. ‘For a start, you were never here.’
His jaw tightened. ‘What do you mean, I was never here?’
He was on the defensive, she thought. And for a man who never liked being wrong and rarely admitted to it, this wasn’t surprising.
‘You travelled so much when we got back to Milan,’ she said slowly. ‘You were away for so much of the time, I hardly ever saw you. And when I did, there was never time for much more than the basics. We never really talked. We never really got to know one another. With each day that passed, we were growing apart—and we hadn’t really known each other that well in the first place.’
He nodded and in the clever contemporary lighting of the high-ceilinged room, his facial scar was barely noticeable. All Louise could see was the gleam of his black eyes and the dramatic darkness of his raven hair and she felt the twist of something she didn’t want, or need. He looked like the man she had married and her body was reacting to him in exactly the same way as it had done back then. Not just her body, but her heart, too. She felt a surge of indignation. Was she fated to always want him like this? Not just physically but in every which way. To accept on some level that, for the rest of her life, every other man she met would be a pale imitation of him. If only her memory had been wiped clean, wouldn’t that have been kinder to them both?
‘But you must have known what my life was like when you married me, Louise,’ he said, his rich voice breaking into the muddle of her thoughts. ‘I am the head of an international company with outlets all over the world. I have never made any secret of my ambition and as long as my business continues to grow, I have commitments.’
‘Of course I realised that, but—’
‘You thought you could change me, is that it?’ He elevated his eyebrows. ‘Isn’t that the mistake people have been making since the beginning of time, with inevitable consequences?’
She wished he had expressed himself a little differently—or maybe he intended to remind her that she was just one in a long line of women. Women who had come before her—and possibly since—who had tried and failed to make him into the man of their dreams. ‘I thought you might want to change. Surely everyone has to adapt when they move from single life to being part of a couple?’
‘And did you? Were you as adaptable as you wanted me to be?’
She met the challenge in his eyes and tried to answer as honestly as she could. ‘I upped sticks and came to Milan, where I didn’t know a soul. I started learning the language. I tried my best to fit into your life.’
‘But your tone suggests you may have been unsuccessful,’ he observed shrewdly. ‘Why was that?’
His astute questions were tumbling her defences and Louise felt exposed beneath the cashmere dress, which clung to her body like chocolate sauce poured over an ice-cream cone. Almost instinctively, her fingers crept up to touch the yellow diamond star which dangled above her breasts, and as his gaze followed the movement she could feel her nipples pebbling in response, as if he were able to control her response to him by just the narrowed flash of his dark eyes.
How did he do that? she wondered as she forced herself to admit what she had never been able to face up to at the time. Because in some ways it had been easier to walk away from the marriage than to admit her own part in its decline. ‘Maybe my insecurity came about because I was so different from all the other women you’d dated before.’ She sucked in a deep breath and, as she waited for the remark that didn’t come, she gave a wry smile. ‘I notice that’s something you don’t deny.’
‘How can I when it’s true?’ His ebony gaze clashed with hers. ‘But I didn’t marry any of the others, did I?’
‘No.’
His voice was rough. ‘And you know why not? You know what was different about you?’
She froze and felt the trickle of ice snaking its way down her spine. Had he remembered the pitifully short life of their unborn child, which had brought the curtain down on their ill-starred union?
‘Tell me, Giacomo,’ she whispered. ‘Tell me why you married me.’
‘Because of this,’ he husked savagely as he walked across the room and pulled her into his arms. ‘This.’
His touch was electric but his answer was brutal. It shouldn’t have shocked her but it did—yet deep down it was exactly as she had suspected. It had just been an incredible physical chemistry between two very different people, which had resulted in repercussions neither of them had been expecting. And despite the temptation of his seeking kiss and the answering heat of her own body, for once Louise didn’t capitulate.
‘No,’ she said fervently, pulling away from him and hoping he wouldn’t notice that she was trembling. She walked over to the window and stared down at the Christmas lights sparkling over Milan, before turning back to him again. ‘I don’t need any reward therapy, Giacomo.’
He regarded her blankly. ‘Reward therapy?’
‘Isn’t sex a variation on buying a woman jewels, or taking her on a fancy holiday? Just something to keep her quiet.’
Surprisingly, he had started laughing. ‘If keeping a woman quiet is what sex is all about, then it seems to have failed spectacularly in your case.’
She wanted to tell him not to laugh like that because she couldn’t cope with his own seductive brand of humour. She wanted him to display all his flaws so she could concentrate on those and remind herself why she was better off without him. She kept her voice low. ‘We can’t go on like this, Giacomo,’ she said. ‘Couples who are on the brink of divorce don’t behave like this. We’re not teenagers and it’s messing with my head. So why don’t we do what we should have done in the first place?’
‘Which is, what?’ he drawled.
‘We keep a sensible physical distance between us for the next few days and hope your memory returns in the meantime.’
There was silence for a long moment. ‘And if it doesn’t?’ he said, at last.
She hesitated, uncomfortable beneath that flinty gaze but determined to brazen it out, despite her body’s screaming objection. Because this was for the best. Not just for her, but for both of them. ‘Then I’ll answer any questions you might have and tell you anything you want to know. Anything at all.’ She smoothed her dress down, more for something to do with her hands than for any other reason. ‘How does that sound?’
‘Honestly?’ His mouth grew hard. ‘It sounds like hell.’
Giacomo watched Louise from the other side of the room. She meant it. She had meant every damned word of the fervent little declaration she’d made last night and which she had then demonstrated by taking herself off to sleep separately, with not even a goodnight kiss to remember her by. The sexual perks of this strange reunion were over. From now on he could look but he most definitely could not touch.
He looked.
And, Madonna mia, she was worth looking at. A ragged sigh left his lungs. The most beautiful woman he had ever seen. Had he ever told her that, he wondered, or had his tight-lipped arrogance simply left her to assume that he found her immensely pleasing to the eye?
Like many of the other women at the party, she wore a black dress—but Louise’s take on a simple garment elevated it to an entirely different level. Her abundant curves ensured that she projected a warmth and sexuality which nobody else in the room possessed and which seemed to draw every other man’s eyes to her, as if she were a magnet. She stood by a window which overlooked Milan’s famous cathedral, beside which a giant fir tree sparkled. Behind her, giant flakes of snow were swirling in a golden swarm against the flamboyance of the seasonal lights. His car had dropped them off a short while ago and they had walked among the festive throng, making their way along the crowded streets to the sound of festive music echoing through the Piazza del Duomo. Once again, he had been filled with an unfamiliar lightness of spirit, which had made him feel curiously relaxed.
And now they were here at Alessio Cavalcante’s famous post-Christmas party—an invitation to which was highly sought after in the rarefied circles of the city in which Giacomo mixed. Usually, he had a lot of time for Alessio—the two men had grown up in similar, deprived circumstances and had much in common. So why was he currently feeling as if he’d like to pick up one of his oldest friends by the scruff of his neck and hurl him out onto the snow? Would it have anything to do with the fact that Alessio had been monopolising his wife since they’d arrived and all he could feel was the slow, black burn of jealousy?
She was his wife.
Except that she wasn’t.
He shook his head as a waitress offered him an arancino, unable to escape the torture of his thoughts. He must have been a bad person for her to have walked away, because he sensed that a woman like Louise wouldn’t give up on a marriage unless she really had to. Hadn’t he seen concern, even tenderness on her face sometimes, when she’d thought he wasn’t looking? When she had slowly touched the scars on his back, she had projected a fierce protectiveness which had taken his breath away. Wasn’t that one of the reasons why he’d never mentioned the other stuff? The bitter stuff he couldn’t bear to remember. The hungry days and long, cold nights. The way people looked at boys like him who had nothing, or no one. Wasn’t he afraid that her innate softness might swamp him and leave him feeling raw and vulnerable, if he confided in her? He had worn his heavy emotional armour for so long that he couldn’t imagine ever removing it.
He saw her laugh at something Alessio had said, her hair swinging around her shoulders like a glossy curtain. He watched her chink glasses and nod rather intently before taking a sip of champagne and, again, he felt that dark coil of fury deep inside him.
‘Giacomo?’
He turned to see a woman who had suddenly appeared by his side and was slanting her long-lashed eyes at him. She was stick-thin, her skirt was outrageously short and her waist-length hair the colour of ripe corn. She was a very famous model he’d met on a handful of occasions in the past and he knew that she had tried to contact him when he’d lain in that Swiss clinic, because his aide had told him. Many men considered her beautiful, but Giacomo had ignored all her overtures and ordered that the exquisite arrangement of white flowers she had sent to his bedside should be dispatched home immediately with his favourite nurse.
‘Ciao, Daniela,’ he replied.
‘You’re looking good. Very good.’ The look in her eyes was unashamedly appreciative. ‘You’ve recovered, I see?’
‘I have.’
‘Nice to see you back.’ She followed the direction of his gaze, which had inevitably returned to drink in the delicious sight of Louise’s abundant flesh. ‘Though I’m guessing her presence here means you’re off the market?’
‘Her name is Louise,’ he answered coolly. ‘And I hate to disappoint you, but I was never on the market. I am not a piece of fish.’ He crinkled her a smile to soften the blow. ‘And now, if you will excuse me.’
He saw the disappointment which crumpled her red lips and, compelled by an instinct he had no desire to control, he walked across the room towards Louise, who was still deep in conversation with his friend.
‘Ah, Giacomo.’ Alessio’s voice was smooth as they both looked up. ‘Such a delight to see Louise again. Though I notice she’s refusing to be pinned down about an invitation extended to you both to come to my Umbrian house for Easter. In fact, I’m getting the distinct feeling she isn’t planning to stay that long. Isn’t there anything you can do to persuade her otherwise?’
Giacomo felt a mixture of outrage and indignation. Wasn’t she supposed to be playing the part of his wife? How dared she hint at her plans with someone else, especially when she had not discussed the exact date of her departure with him?
‘We will be sure to keep you posted,’ he said blandly, snaking an arm around his wife’s waist in an overtly possessive gesture. ‘Thanks for a wonderful evening, Alessio. Louise, are you ready to leave?’
He saw the look of surprise in her eyes and the faint flicker of resentment which followed it but she did well not to challenge him, because the way he was feeling right then, he might very well have thrown her over his shoulder and carried her out of the glittering party.
And just imagine what that would have done to his super-cool reputation, he thought grimly.
She didn’t say a word as someone fetched her coat, was tight-lipped as they recrossed the Piazza del Duomo, and it wasn’t until they were in the car and it was purring back towards his apartment that she turned on him with anger spitting from her eyes.
‘Just what is your problem?’ she demanded.
‘My problem? You think I enjoy the sight of my wife flirting with another man?’
‘Oh, for goodness’ sake—I was talking to him. That’s what people are supposed to do at parties. They laugh. They joke. They raise their glasses and wish each other Happy Christmas—’
‘Buon Natale,’he corrected automatically.
‘They don’t stand in one corner of the room with a face like thunder, acting like a reborn Neanderthal,’ she raged on, as if he hadn’t spoken. ‘I don’t understand, Giacomo. You never used to be jealous. The very opposite, in fact. We hardly ever used to go out and when we did, you used to be so tightly controlled.’
And with those words she unleashed something inside him. It was a moment of unwanted epiphany. Like the untethering of a helium balloon which then floated up into the sky. Giacomo’s mouth was dry as he stared out of the car window, his pulse pounding as the bright blur of the city lights passed them by.
His memory hadn’t magically been returned to him wholesale—other than the sporadic episodes he’d been experiencing for a while now. But suddenly he recognised that his determination to keep all the other stuff buried away—the bitter, unsavoury stuff—might be acting as some kind of barrier.
But it was more than just wanting his memories back.
He wanted Louise.
He wanted her very badly. Not just in his bed but in his life. Not just now, but for ever.
How had it taken so long for him to realise that?
Had it only just occurred to him that the Christmas they’d just spent in England had been happy—as it had been once before, soon after they were married? And then they had come back to Milan and it had all gone wrong.
Why was that?
He turned to look at her but she was staring fixedly at the fingers which were clasped in her lap as if she couldn’t bear to meet his eyes. And he wondered then if he could bear to reveal his soul to her. His dark and empty soul.
As far as he could see, he had no choice.
