While Lorenti’s assistant knocked on the library door and waited for a reply, Tali brushed off her clothing, tied her long hair into a knot at the back of her head and swallowed the lump of panic.
She was young for her position at twenty-two and not looking her best at the minute. But there was nothing she didn’t know about the estate. She’d lived here almost as long as she could remember, ever since her mum had taken the job of housekeeper after her dad had deserted them both—the winter before Lorenti’s accident.
She just hoped she didn’t have any horse manure on her face.
‘Entrare.’
The lump pushed into her throat at the harsh demand delivered from behind the door.
The assistant opened the door and introduced her in Italian.
Tali plastered what she hoped was a professional smile on her face as she stepped into the room.
She inhaled the smell of old leather and lemon polish, comforting and familiar, as the assistant excused himself and closed the door behind him on his way out.
She’d always loved the library—the rows and rows of books, many of them first editions, displayed on shelves that rose two storeys and included a mezzanine level accessed by a wrought iron spiral staircase. At the far end of the room was the old Lord’s mahogany desk. Behind it stood Lorenti, with his back to her, as he gazed out of the large, mullioned window, which looked out over Westwick’s circular driveway and the fishing lake beyond.
Lorenti’s silhouette in the light cast by the mid-morning sunshine made him seem incredibly tall, his muscular shoulders and lean waist displayed to perfection in a steel grey designer suit. His stance was tense, making the usually soothing atmosphere in the library bristle with energy…
The lump of panic expanded. Should she alert him to her presence?
He raked his fingers through his hair, the waves cropped close to his head. His hair was much shorter than she remembered it being that summer, when it had grown long enough to hit his collar.
She shook her head to dispel the distant memory. And gave herself a mental kick.
He’s not that wounded, angry teenager anymore. He isn’t going to remember you, and you don’t want him to. Because you’re already at enough of a disadvantage…first-impressions-wise.
In fact, he seemed to have forgotten she was there, transfixed by who-knew-what in the driveway… She hoped it wasn’t the potholes they’d been unable to afford to fill in this spring.
The moments ticked past, the grandfather clock by the door keeping time with the hammer thuds of her pulse—and increasing the tension which hovered around him like an aura.
She cleared her throat. ‘Mr Lorenti, you wished to speak to me…urgently.’
He stiffened as if he’d been woken from a trance, then turned. Even in the half-light she could sense his gaze on her. The energy emanating from him seemed to stroke her skin, then sank into her abdomen. The heat in her cheeks blasted to her hairline.
‘Vieni qui… Come into the light,’ he demanded. The brittle tone made her shiver.
She stepped forward with as much courage as she could muster under that penetrating stare—which seemed to look through her without seeing her.
‘Che cosa?’ he murmured.
‘I’m sorry, I don’t speak Italian,’ she managed, wondering if he even realised he’d spoken in his native tongue. She’d been trying to learn Italian on an app over the last two years, in case anyone from Lorenti Corp came to Westwick, but she wasn’t confident enough to converse in it yet.
He frowned. ‘Who are you?’
‘I’m Westwick Hall’s estate manager. Your assistant said you wanted to speak with me?’
Now that he was no longer in shadow, she could see his face, and it wasn’t helping the swooping sensation in her stomach. His features were sharper and more dramatic now, having lost the softness of youth—but his eyes, that rich dark brown flecked with molten gold which held so many secrets, were exactly the same… The scar on the left side of his face was also still there, slashing across his cheek all the way to his hairline. But where the scar had been disfiguring that summer, the livid bruising and stitching fresh, now it only made him look more striking.
Something else about him, though, was very different. Or maybe she simply hadn’t noticed it when she was eight—and a child, instead of a woman. The combination of those harsh features, his magnetic eyes and his tall, muscular build made him look incredibly…hot…
She dragged in a breath. No, hot was too basic—more like breath-taking. Her stomach fluttered, annoyingly.
She’d never been the type to swoon over good-looking guys, because they usually turned out to be egotistical arseholes. Not that she’d ever met any who were as good-looking as this man.
She mentally kicked herself. Again. Hard.
So what if Dario Lorenti’s rugged male beauty—accentuated by that designer suit and the dark scowl on his face—was making her light-headed. He was still technically her boss.
Plus, while she’d never been interested in celebrity gossip, Joss and Becca—the Hall’s cleaners—had told her all about Lorenti’s playboy reputation, because they were celebrity news junkies. So, even if he looked like every woman’s fantasy, he really wasn’t.
It also became clear he was nowhere near as impressed with her appearance when his eyes narrowed, and his gaze swept over her grubby clothes.
‘How old are you?’ he demanded, his tone as searing as the inspection.
‘I’m twenty-two,’ she replied firmly, trying not to sound defensive.
One dark brow lifted. ‘How can you have the experience to run a large estate at this age?’
She winced at the judgemental tone and the note of criticism.
The truth was, although she’d worked for two years as the previous estate manager’s assistant and taken courses at the local agricultural college in project management, she didn’t have the experience. But that was hardly her fault.
‘When Mr Chambers quit two years ago, no one else would take the job at the reduced salary we could offer,’ she said. ‘And Lorenti Corp didn’t respond to any of my emails outlining the problem.’
She shoved her hands into the back pockets of her jeans, to stop them trembling.
This meeting was not going how she’d hoped. Why was he being so hostile? And why did she get the feeling his harsh expression wasn’t just about her lack of qualifications?
‘So, I stepped up to the role as an interim arrangement,’ she finished.
And maybe if you’d replied to a single one of my emails you would know all this already.
The muscle in his jaw tensed, making the scar on his cheek flex. But then the flecks of gold in his irises shimmered, his gaze intensifying as if he was seeing her properly for the first time. ‘What is your name?’
‘Tallulah Whittaker,’ she blurted out, not sure why she’d given him her full name.
Everyone called her Tali, because she had never felt like a Tallulah. The florid, old-fashioned name had belonged to her father’s grandmother, and she’d always considered it just another burden her dad had saddled her with—along with his disinterest, and the crippling bouts of sadness which had dogged her mother for years after he’d walked out on them.
But the formality of her proper name felt like a trusty shield against Lorenti’s disapproval.
His eyes narrowed even more as he studied her.
Suddenly, heady recollections of the brooding, unhappy teenager whose enforced solitude she had insisted on disturbing that summer swirled through her consciousness.
Should she tell him they had met before?
Perhaps he hadn’t completely forgotten the little girl who had worked so hard to entertain him that summer. But as he continued to stare at her, his inscrutable gaze made her palms start to sweat, still buried in her back pockets. And it occurred to her this meeting was already awkward enough, without bringing up ancient history. Plus, if she had ever known that boy, she certainly did not know the man he had become.
At last, he nodded. ‘I suppose your qualifications are of no significance now,’ he remarked.
What was that supposed to mean?
The swooping sensation in her stomach went into overdrive when he walked to the desk and lowered himself into the chair. The pronounced limp had sympathy tangling with the knot of anxiety in her stomach.
Was he still in pain? His movements were stiff, unwieldy, but his face no longer had the strained, stoic pallor she remembered from the early weeks after his accident, whenever the painkillers had worn off.
He opened a laptop on the desk, jolting her out of her thoughts.
Stop staring at him and thinking about that boy and start making a better impression on your boss.
Gathering a breath, she launched into the spiel she’d rehearsed a million times in the last two years, during all those sleepless nights, preparing for this exact moment.
‘Actually, I’m so glad you’re finally here, Mr Lorenti,’ she began, determined not to falter when his gaze rose to hers, the blank disdain even more intimidating than the sceptical frown. ‘There’s so much to discuss about Westwick. I’ve worked up a detailed investment plan to turn the Estate around. It’s got so much potential, and our hiring freeze is only the tip of the iceberg when it comes to problems with staff…’
‘Fermare.’ He held up his hand.
She stopped talking, intimidated despite herself by the command in his voice. The lump of panic became a boulder. Something was seriously wrong.
‘Your plans are not important now, Tallulah Whittaker,’ he said, the hollow tone of voice somehow much worse than the earlier hostility. ‘As I am here only to end your employment. The land will be parcelled up and sold as soon as possible.’ He glanced around the room, his features devoid of emotion, while Tali’s stomach went into free fall—and the boulder threatened to crush her ribs.
At last, that searing gaze landed back on her face. ‘And the Hall demolished.’
