LITMIR.BIZ

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don’t know, then.’

      ‘So why are you here?’ Luca asked. ‘Working yourself into the ground, that cruel boss never giving you a night off?’

      ‘Because I love my work!’ she duly answered.

      ‘Rubbish!’ came the voice over the intercom, and Emma smiled. ‘Why are you here Em?’

      She paused for the longest time—almost expecting the door to open and Luca to walk in. This conversation, despite taking place over an intercom, was surprisingly intimate. And lying in dark, she was almost tempted to tell him, about the bills and the house, about her dream of going to art school. About how this job was her lifeline, about how, one day, she hoped it might set her up to pursue her goals…

      Which was hardly the conversation to have with your boss.

      ‘’Night, Luca!’

      She could never have guessed but save for those two words her office door would have opened.

      He liked her.

      Luca stared up at the familiar ceiling, at the dimmed lights that never actually went off—and it was a measure of how much he liked her that he didn’t go to her.

      It had nothing to do with Evelyn’s stern warnings— well, maybe a bit, as Evelyn was too good to lose, and her husband was getting less and less impressed with the hours his wife put in.

      But it was more than that.

      He didn’t want to lose Emma.

      He liked her.

      Not just liked her, but actually liked her.

      Liked having her in his day.

      She was nothing like anyone he’d met before. She brightened up the office with her chatter and her fizz and she answered him back and made him smile.

      And she liked him too. In that way.

      He’d actually been beginning to wonder—he’d been a bit taken aback when she’d so coolly turned him down at their first meeting. Working with him, she was so on guard, so scathing of his ways, that he’d wondered if the reason he liked her was that she was the one woman who didn’t fancy him.

      Then tonight he’d seen her expression in the mirror, and in that second before she’d realised he’d caught her, he had seen the want in her eyes.

      He lay racked with rare indecision.

      His instinct was to let nature take its course.

      With women, Luca always followed instinct—and instinct told him to go out there to where she lay, in those ugly pyjamas she wore. Luca became instantly hard at the thought of those curls on the pillow, and her soft skin.

      So why the reticence?

      Because it would last a couple of weeks, a couple of months perhaps—and then she’d want more from him, like they all did, like Martha had…

      He closed his eyes on that sudden thought, but circles of light still danced before his eyes.

      Martha had been the only one it had really hurt to let go.

      It was a thought that till now had comforted him—that he had said goodbye to the one, that the hardest part of the deal he had made all those years ago was over.

      So why, when he hadn’t so much as kissed Emma, was he comparing her to Martha?

      He hadn’t seen anyone since Emma had joined the staff, had finally dumped Ruby, whom he’d kept dangling for weeks.

      He thought about going out there to Emma—how he thought about going out there—but something stopped him: she really needed this job and for now, at least, he wanted her around.

      He couldn’t have both.

      CHAPTER FOUR

      ‘YOUR sister is insisting that she speak with you. She’s tried your mobile, she’s been calling all morning,’ Emma said to the silence of the intercom. ‘And now she is insisting.’

      ‘I’m still in a meeting.’

      Luca did everything the other way around from anyone else she had met: he didn’t drop a thing for family! He had several mobile phone numbers—yet his family all went directly to message bank, no exception, no deviation. Emma knew he checked them—had seen him listen, scowl and hit ‘delete’, yet unless he was in the right frame of mind, Luca refused to pick up.

      Which left Emma to deal with the fallout.

      ‘I’m sorry, Daniela,’ she said for the umpteenth time. ‘He really can’t be disturbed—is there anything that I can help you with?’

      ‘You can ask why he no come, why all he can give me on my special day is two hours of his precious time, familia is everything, my own brother…’ It really was rather draining to listen to, yet she was being paid fabulously to do so. And dealing with Daniela’s histrionics was actually easier than dealing with Luca right now— as the wedding approached his mood blackened. Oh, nothing had been said, he was still his fastidious, energetic self, barking orders, making her laugh every now and then, but there was this tension to him that was palpable—this grey, gathering cloud that seemed to be following him wherever he went.

      ‘I’m going over to Hemming’s.’ Evelyn came to her desk. ‘Luca needs some files and I have to speak with the accountant.’

      ‘Sure.’

      ‘Whatever you do, Emma—’ Evelyn’s voice was serious ‘—don’t put Daniela through—with Luca in this mood, he’ll surely say something he regrets and guess who will have to deal with it?’

      ‘What is going on?’ Emma asked for the fiftieth time. ‘Why can’t he just go for the weekend? He does it for his clients all the time.’

      ‘I’ve no idea.’ Suddenly Emma realised Evelyn wasn’t putting her off with vague answers. ‘I’ve worked for Luca for years now and have had little to do with his family, but since this wedding was announced, they’re on the phone every five minutes, and it’s doing nothing to improve his mood.’

      ‘I had worked that one out.’

      ‘Get me Dr Calista on the phone.’ Luca’s voice through the intercom was a brusque order and Evelyn rolled her eyes as Emma picked up the phone.

      ‘Good luck.’

      It was rather like knowing there was a wild bear in the building with the door unlocked.

      Luca wandered out every now and then, snarling and sniping, giving his orders and then retreating. The phones were ringing red hot and with Evelyn out, Emma rang the deli and had some sandwiches sent up for her own lunch. Luca had snapped, when she’d asked him, that he didn’t want anything.

      ‘What’s in them?’ He peered at her lunch and selected the smoked salmon and cream cheese without a word, but Emma was used to him now, and the second he slammed the door of his office she opened her drawer and pulled out her own smoked salmon and cream cheese sandwiches, smiling at her own foresight as she picked up the phone.

      She wasn’t smiling now—the sandwich like sawdust in her mouth as she faced a new challenge, wondering if she should ring Evelyn and check, completely unsure what to do.

      ‘Luca…’ she swallowed the mouthful of water she had quickly taken ‘…it’s your mother on the phone.’

      ‘I’ll call her later,’ came the curt reply.

      Which she relayed, to no avail.

      ‘Luca…’ She felt as if she were pressing the demolition button as she pressed the intercom again.

      ‘What?’

      ‘She’s crying. I don’t know if something’s happened…’

      When

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