Confessions of His Christmas Housekeeper by Sharon Kendrick

CHAPTER FIVE

GIACOMOCOULDN’TSLEEP.

Tossing and turning amid the rumpled sheets, he spent the long hours of the night unable to shake off the feeling of...

Turning onto his back, he stared up at the ceiling.

What?

He wasn’t sure. Last night he had wanted to ravish his wife where she stood in the kitchen but instead he had exercised a tight self-restraint. Yet despite the powerful sexual hunger which had pulsed between them, Louise had not acted on it either. She had primly moved herself away to the opposite side of the kitchen and regarded him with watchful eyes. Why was she so wary of him? Had he been cruel to her—unwittingly or otherwise?

But his preoccupation with memory soon gave way to the much more immediate demands of his body. An icy shower before turning in for the night had failed to quell the fierce ache which had been burning inside him, as did catching up on a couple of hours’ work which could easily have waited until after Christmas. He realised that this was the first time in his life he had ever experienced sexual frustration. In the darkness, he gave a wry smile. Perhaps the experience might prove useful.

He thought back to when he’d lain in that expensive Swiss clinic and a stream of ex-lovers had got in touch, and for a short while he had read their emails and listened to their voice messages. Women he had known before his marriage and his accident, whom he remembered with a curiously impartial clarity. Amazing blondes, with gym-honed legs which promised paradise. One in particular he hadn’t seen in years—now one of Hollywood’s most famous movie stars—who’d sent him a saccharine card belying the brazen offer inside to sneak into the clinic and give him a blow job.

He had been outraged by the suggestion and the others had left him cold. Every single one of them.

He had banned all such further contact unless he was the instigator and that was when he had discovered his brief, below-the-radar marriage and had informed his aide that he intended to seek out his estranged wife. But Paolo had seemed almost grudging when he had presented Giacomo with the information needed to find Louise. And he had said the strangest thing.

Don’t hurt her, boss.

Giacomo had been at first angry and then indignant. As if he would ever hurt a woman! In his opinion, women allowed themselves to be hurt, when they refused to accept the emotional limitations of a relationship, which he had always set out right from the beginning. But this woman he had married—she must have been much more than just a lover. He frowned. Did that mean that he had cared for her in a way which was special? This stubborn, dark-haired housekeeper who last night had set his blood on fire?

He remembered when he had touched her the night before and something dark and forgotten stirred inside him. But once again it eluded him.

In the end he gave up trying to sleep and waited until the wintry dawn was painting the sky with pale shades of monochrome. He gazed out of the window to see that the expected snow had not materialised and for that he was grateful, for he still had flashbacks about pristine white wastes covered in the crimson flowering of his own blood, which had followed his skiing accident.

He took a long shower and dressed—making himself a jug of strong coffee and taking a deep slug of it before sliding his laptop into his briefcase. The grandfather clock in the hall was chiming eight and he was just pulling on his heavy cashmere coat when he heard Louise moving around upstairs, and he automatically tensed as he heard her soft footfall on the stairs.

‘Oh,’ she said as she came into view halfway down the staircase, standing stock-still as if he had just put a spell on her and turned her to stone. She cast her gaze over his coat and his briefcase. ‘Are you going out?’

Giacomo tried to be objective but how could he possibly do that when her stillness made it all too easy to drink her in? Her dark hair looked rich and glossy and he itched to remove the constricting pins and let it fall in a silken tumble around his fingers. Her body looked firm and delicious and, even though she was wearing that unprepossessing uniform, all he could think about was undoing the buttons of her pink shirt and touching the delicious breasts which lay beneath.

‘Were you a detective in a former life?’ he questioned sardonically.

Reaching the bottom of the staircase, she pleated her brow together, as if she had decided to ignore his sarcasm. ‘It’s just...well, you said you wanted to talk and stuff and I’m only here until Boxing Day. That doesn’t give us a lot of time.’

‘Maybe you should have thought about that when you turned up so late yesterday. But it can’t be helped. I’m taking the train up to London and it’s something I can’t get out of,’ he informed her abruptly.

‘On Christmas Eve?’ She frowned and then the rather sniped words fired out, as if she couldn’t prevent herself from saying them. ‘Important lunch date?’

He gave a thin smile in response. ‘It was the one day when I could get an appointment with my doctor.’

She looked momentarily taken-aback. ‘I’m not surprised. Most people will be out doing last-minute bits of shopping or putting the tree up.’

‘Then I must give thanks that I am not most people,’ he observed drily.

Her blue eyes were suddenly watchful. ‘You look tired,’ she observed, before chewing on her bottom lip. ‘I’m sorry. That’s none of my business.’

‘I can’t think what on earth kept me awake,’ he answered softly. ‘When ordinarily I sleep like a baby.’

The colour had completely drained from her face and her eyes had clouded with what looked like acute distress. Was she really so super-sensitive about him making an oblique reference to the undeniable sexual chemistry which had fizzed between them?

‘Shall I make you some breakfast before you go?’ she questioned.

The voice was even more prim now and Giacomo glanced at his watch. Maybe it was a good thing he was going to be out all day, if she was going to be as prickly as this.

‘I’ll pass. My taxi will be here any minute. I’ll be back around five,’ he added as he opened the door, his attention caught by the sight of pale flakes floating past. ‘Dannazione,’ he swore softly. ‘It’s snowing.’

After he’d gone, Louise went into the kitchen, her head all over the place—unable to forget last night’s blissfully disturbing moment in the kitchen. And then Giacomo had added to her discomfiture by making that throwaway remark about sleeping like a baby. She shuddered out a sigh. Of course he wouldn’t have a clue that his unwitting words had stabbed like a knife to her chest and not just because he didn’t remember their own baby. Because fatherhood had never been high on his list of priorities, had it? He’d barely mentioned the tiny life growing inside her, even when she had been pregnant. He had never wanted to discuss names, or even decide where they were going to position the crib in his Milanese apartment.

But she wasn’t here to think about the way he’d behaved in the past. She was here to help him remember. So, rather than drifting around the place feeling useless pangs of sorrow and regret, how was she going to achieve that?

She poured some lukewarm coffee from the jug he must have made earlier and absently put a slice of bread in the toaster, because something he’d said in the Posh Catering office the other day had given her an idea.

I’m no fan of Christmas.

She knew that anyway and she knew why. Soon after they were married he’d explained that life at the orphanage had been especially grim during Christmas. It was the one time of year when gifts had flooded in for those deprived and lonely boys, but Giacomo hadn’t wanted people’s pity—or their charity.

His voice had been flat and definitive as he had given her this rare insight into his character and his past, but Louise had been on such a high with emotion that she had pleaded with him to have their own tree—because their first Christmas as a married couple needed a tree. And Giacomo must have been feeling indulgent at the time, because he had kissed her very softly and agreed.

It had been the only time during their short marriage when she had actually acted like a billionaire’s wife—waltzing into one of Knightsbridge’s fanciest department stores and letting her imagination run riot. She had been like a child in a sweet shop as she purchased festive baubles and ornaments and arranged to have them delivered to his country mansion. And while she had been busy shopping, so had Giacomo. He had bought her a necklace to place beneath that fragrant fir tree. A fine chain with a delicate star pendant—sparkling and studded with yellow diamonds which glittered like the Star of Bethlehem. She’d left it behind when she’d walked out of the marriage, along with all the other jewellery he’d bought her.

She wondered if he had kept the tree decorations. Would he have done that, or simply bundled up all evidence of her presence here and donated it to the local thrift store? The latter option, most probably. But what harm would it do to take a look? If she didn’t find anything, she could always drive down to the village and see if there was anything left on the shelves. Because Christmas was a big deal, for all kinds of reasons. It stuck like glue to the mind, even if you hated it. If she used the right props to recreate their Christmas past, mightn’t that prompt Giacomo’s memory?

She finished her toast and went upstairs, reminding herself that first she needed to think about the present, which meant making her employer’s bed, as any good housekeeper would. But that was easier said than done, to walk into the master bedroom which once she had shared with Giacomo and to stand beside his super-king bed. A lump rose in her throat. In this bed he had taught her to explore her sexuality and the wide gap in their levels of experience hadn’t seemed to matter a bit. He had given her orgasm after incredible orgasm, transforming the blank canvas of her innocence into a vibrantly sensual landscape. And with every day that had passed, she had loved him a little more.

Being here again could have triggered a whole raft of emotions—humiliation and embarrassment being the obvious ones—but as Louise tugged the fine linen under-sheet of the enormous bed until it was as smooth as glass, she was aware of nothing other than an aching sense of regret. Why was that? Because he had pushed her love away with a slickness born of practice? Maybe. But it was too late to do anything about it now. Everyone knew that regrets were pointless.

She polished and cleaned the bathroom until it gleamed, then began exploring the bedrooms in search of the Christmas decorations, not really believing she might find them.

But in that she was wrong.

She found herself standing stock-still in one of the guest rooms, staring in disbelief at several cardboard boxes lying in the back of the large wardrobe. The branding of the Knightsbridge store was instantly recognisable, but it wasn’t that which made Louise stop in her tracks. It was what she saw at the far end of the wardrobe and she narrowed her eyes in disbelief. A whole stack of clothes—her clothes—hanging in a neat line.

Her fingers were trembling as she touched the velvet and silk gowns, the cashmere sweaters and tailored pants. Beautiful clothes in luxurious fabrics. The sort of clothes you might wear to the theatre, or a party, but only if you were very, very rich. She’d left them here because she’d been planning to come back—during that brief window of time when anything had seemed possible. But she had never come back. Until now.

There were shoes, too—neatly stored in cardboard boxes—their toes stuffed with wads of tissue paper to keep them looking perfect. And drawers of gossamer-fine lingerie which had always made her feel decadent when she’d been wearing it—and even more decadent when Giacomo had slowly been removing it with that slow smile on his lips. That sense of disbelief lingered as she ran her hand over the shimmer of silk and delicate froth of lace.

Why had he kept them?Why had he clung to these remnants of a past he claimed not to remember?

She had walked out of their brief marriage with very little. Her Milanese designer clothes had felt hopelessly out of place after her return to England, so she’d sold them and lived off the proceeds until a vacancy had come up at Posh Catering. She had quickly recognised that the trinkets and accessories of a billionaire’s wife would be hopelessly unsuitable for her normal life.

Thislife. Her life as it was now. The life she would return to once her job here was over, when she would be serving and clearing up after her wealthy clients rather than wasting time by being tugged towards a past which was gone for ever.

But at least the decorations she’d bought were intact—the only one she couldn’t bear to open was the carved nativity scene with the miniature crib, because she honestly thought she might dissolve if she even glanced at the tiny baby, lying in a manger.

She straightened up and started thinking that maybe she could capitalise on all this. Was it too much to hope that if she drove down to the village there might still be a tree for sale? Wasn’t Christmas supposed to be about hope?

Grabbing her anorak, she found her purse and car keys, and ten minutes later her little car was bumping its way over the cobbled stones of Westover high street, before grinding to a noisy halt outside the little greengrocery store.

It was still early. Too early for the last-minute Christmas shoppers who would soon descend on this upmarket little village in the Chilterns, with its tasteful festive traditions which went back years. She remembered that other Christmas Eve when Giacomo had brought her here late in the afternoon and they’d joined the small throng gathered around the giant tree in the square, as the daylight had faded and mothers had been trying to calm their over-excited children.

She had been a mother once.

Her eyes filled as she got out of the car.

Because didn’t some cruel people think that mothers without children weren’t really mothers at all?

Brushing an impatient fist over her eyes, she went towards the old-fashioned shop, which presented a Christmassy scene glowing enough to have made Charles Dickens drool. Outside, there were all manner of seasonal goodies. Bright orange pyramids of clementines. Boxes of walnuts and shiny dates. Bunches of mistletoe as big as bouquets, and spiky green holly studded with crimson berries.

And a single tree propped against the wall. It was a massive thing with rather sad and drooping branches at the bottom and the matronly assistant cast a doubtful eye over Louise when she asked how much it was.

‘It’s the last one,’ she said, presumably to justify the astronomical price she quoted.

‘I’ll take it.’

‘I’ve had trouble shifting it because it won’t fit in the average house. You do realise it’s nearly fourteen feet tall?’ the woman added, before casting a doubtful eye over Louise’s small car. ‘And you’ll never be able to get it in there.’

It was a masterclass in how not to sell something and Louise found herself smiling. ‘It’s for Barton.’

‘Barton?’The eye-popping response was predictable. ‘Ooh! Well, you won’t have any trouble fitting it in there. Lucky girl to be working in that lovely house—and for that gorgeous man.’ She smiled. ‘Don’t worry, dear, I can have it delivered soon after lunch.’

Louise reached in her bag and paid for the tree, some scarlet candles and a big bag of clementines, thinking she would get Giacomo to reimburse her for it later, as she would if he were any other client. She also told herself it was stupid to bristle at having been mistaken for a member of his staff. Because what else was she, if not that? Maybe she needed to get it into her thick skull that she fitted the role of Volterra housekeeper far better than she ever had the role of Volterra wife. She felt more at ease cleaning his sink than she’d ever done flying in his private jet.

She put the candles and clementines on the passenger seat and started up the engine, but now that some of her initial euphoria had worn off, a feeling of dread had started gathering like a small pile of pebbles at the pit of her stomach. The next couple of days had the potential to be painful, she recognised—for both of them. Especially if Giacomo got around to remembering that he’d only ever married her because she’d been carrying his child. She had wanted his baby so much, and had been left with nothing but an empty womb and a terrible aching deep inside her as she had done the only thing she could do—walked away from a man who had never really wanted to marry.

No, the next couple of days weren’t going to be easy.

But surely far better to accept that and face it full on, no matter how much it hurt.

Because wasn’t pain necessary for a wound to heal properly?