LITMIR.BIZ

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      ‘They can wait for me,’ Santo said with all the arrogance of someone who knew that the world would. He handed her back her sunglasses as they stepped outside and he was the nicest company, pointed out villages as they walked down the hillside.

      ‘My mum’s from there,’ Ella said, wondering if it was being here that had upset her and perhaps brought it all to a head. ‘I’ve got aunts there.’

      ‘Are you going to visit?’

      ‘Maybe after we finish shooting.’

      ‘Don’t tell them you work for me then,’ he nudged. ‘They will warn you.’

      ‘I already know your reputation.’

      ‘Not me,’ Santo said, ‘my family.’ He pointed yonder. ‘My nonna lives over there. There is a lot of history, a lot of enemies have been made. Ours is not always a good name.’ He gave her another nudge. ‘Issues.’ But this time it didn’t make her smile and for the first time Santo knew he couldn’t just joke his way out of things, that her silence was perhaps a demand for something more, something he had never given. Except he looked at her swollen lips and thought of her eyes puffy behind the glasses. If he wanted more, then Santo realised he had first to give.

      ‘My father and his brother were killed in a warehouse fire.’ He wasn’t telling her any great secret. It had been the talk of Sicily then and still was at times. ‘That is when my grandfather divided everything up.’

      ‘When the warring started?’

      ‘Oh, it started long before that,’ Santo admitted. ‘My father and Benito were always rivals, Salvatore saw to that.’

      ‘You call him Salvatore?’

      ‘I call him both,’ Santo said. ‘You don’t really sit through business meetings saying Papà and Nonno.’

      ‘I guess.’

      ‘It’s got worse since he divided things up. Once a year we put on an act and are civil.’ He saw her frown, explained just a little bit more. ‘The family gets together at my nonna’s each year for her birthday—the only thing we all agree on is that we adore her, and we call a truce for one day, but after that, it’s gloves off again. These next few weeks…’

      Santo shook his head. He simply never went there, not even with himself, and really, there wasn’t time to now. There was a movie to be made after all. Except Santo found himself standing on a hillside and looking out to the docklands and the sea beyond, thinking how black it had all seemed on Sunday, the hell he had felt in a hotel room, except Ella had been there for him, had turned that day around. He wished last night she had let him do the same, wanted her to open up to him, so for her he broke his unspoken rule.

      ‘My grandfather played his sons off against the other. He taught them from the start that to get on you had to be ruthless.’ He looked at Ella. ‘So they were. When his health got worse he divided things up. Benito he put in charge of the hotel empire, and my father, Carlo, media. Now though, if we want the proposal to redevelop the docklands to go through, we need to pull together.’ He gave a wry grin. ‘I can’t see it happening. Angelo is—’

      ‘Angelo?’

      ‘My half-brother.’

      ‘You never said.’

      ‘I never do.’ He looked down the hill. ‘He has bought some of the houses here. This is supposed to be our development, but now Battaglia is throwing his weight behind Angelo.’

      ‘Because the marriage didn’t go ahead?’

      ‘Because of so many things.’

      ‘Does it matter?’ Ella ventured. ‘I mean, it’s just one project.’

      ‘It matters,’ Santo said, and in that he wasn’t going to go into detail, wasn’t about to tell her that the Corretti empire was crumbling around them. It wasn’t so much that he didn’t trust her—he could not bear to admit it to himself.

      ‘Right now, I need to concentrate on this movie, but first…’ He pulled her into his arms and took her glasses off again, and kissed her very nicely, strangely tenderly. It made her want to cry, because she understood perfectly now her predecessors’ tears and rantings. It wasn’t just the sex—Santo Corretti was the whole package. How cold and lonely would the world be after him.

      And then, when his phone started begging for the producer to please arrive on set, there was no choice but to get moving.

      They arrived at the docklands. It was rough and worn down, but Santo told her that with some money thrown at it, it would one day again be so beautiful. ‘The town is dying,’ Santo said, ‘but if the tourists found it, if the people came back…’ There were locals all gathered to watch the activity. ‘See…’ Santo said. ‘That café has not been open for years, but now, today, it is. That is the sort of thing this film could do, and maybe it would have the people associate the Corretti name with what it can do in the future, not ways of old… .’ Then he stopped talking about family. ‘Will you do one thing for me?’ Santo asked before he got to work. ‘Will you check out Luigi before you accept the job?’

      ‘I’ve already accepted it.’

      To his credit, Santo said nothing, not that he had much chance to. He was in a lot of demand and Ella took a seat and started working. Or trying to work, more often than not she found herself peering over her computer, frowning at a couple of Rafaele’s suggestions, because they weren’t interpretations Ella would have considered.

      Still, Rafaele was the expert, Ella told herself, determined to put pride aside and to learn from him.

      ‘Are you okay?’ Ella blinked in surprise a little while later to the sight of Santo handing her a coffee.

      ‘Better,’ Ella said.

      ‘Because if you being here is a bit much, I don’t need you.’ He winced. ‘That came out so wrong—what I meant…’

      ‘I know what you meant.’ Ella smiled, touched that he seemed to realise that last night had been about so much more than their exchange of words. ‘How’s it going?’

      Santo grimaced. ‘Vince just lost his temper. I don’t know. It’s early days, I guess.’

      She sipped on her coffee, but after a moment or so she decided to take him up on his offer. ‘If you’re sure you don’t need me I might go and get some work done in the hotel.’

      ‘Sure,’ Santo said. ‘I’ll call if I need anything.’

      It was safer to be alone right now—she simply daren’t get closer to him. He’d been open, far more open about his family than Ella had expected him to be and, as nice as it had been to talk, on reflection it disarmed her. Sex she could handle—it was the rest that terrified her so. Holding that thought once back in her room Ella contacted the agency that had first sent her to Santo. She spent most of the day going through résumés as well as confirming the docking times for the ship which was going to be a huge part of the film set. Ella did a few phone and online interviews, until she had narrowed it down to two. Then she checked her own emails, frowning a little at the response from Luigi, who was, he said, delighted to give her this opportunity and that he was looking forward to seeing her when she came to Rome, that they must have dinner as soon as she got there.

      Of course Luigi would want to take her out to dinner and go over things before filming started. It was dinner, Ella told herself as she headed down to the restaurant to have dinner herself with Santo.

      ‘Better?’ Santo checked, standing briefly as she walked over.

      ‘Much.’

      And then there was no more personal talk, because there was actually an awful lot of work to discuss, especially now that they had started shooting. They worked their way through most of it, even the rather more delicate stuff.

      ‘Her name is Marianna

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