by Abby Green
‘Why was it liberating?’ She felt him tense a little more.
He sighed. His chest moving beneath her cheek. ‘Because for the first time in my life I wasn’t a Chatsfield with all the accompanying acres of newsprint. The misconceptions, notoriety and expectations. I was … Marco Rossi.’
Orla lifted her head and rested her chin on her hand on his chest. But she couldn’t see his face in the gloom. ‘Rossi?’
‘My mother’s maiden name.’
Softly she said, ‘It must have been hard to walk away and leave your family behind. Your sister.’
Antonio took a minute to answer, almost long enough for Orla to think he wouldn’t. But then he said, ‘It was. But she told me to go. She knew I needed to get away before I became suffocated.’ His voice sounded bitter. ‘And as my father had helpfully pointed out, I wasn’t their father. He was.’
Orla’s heart clenched. ‘You and your sister shouldn’t have had to take over…. You were so young.’
‘We had no choice. We had a baby sister. We had to keep it together. Keep things running, stable. At least they were in schools most of the time and there was always money….’
Antonio couldn’t believe that he was talking about this to Orla. But there was something different about the way she asked the question that almost every woman inevitably asked. They wanted to hear about the glamour and danger. And Antonio knew instinctively that Orla didn’t. She asked to know about the real reality.
He felt the lightest of touches on one of the circular marks on his chest and he tensed, expecting her to ask about that … but she didn’t. She asked, ‘That tattoo on your arm … is it a coat of arms?’
Antonio relaxed again. ‘It’s the Legion’s coat of arms.’ He found himself smiling. ‘I got it in a tattoo parlour in Marseilles on my first period of leave…. Don’t ask me why. I was so drunk that night they could have tattooed a picture of Britney Spears on my arm and I wouldn’t have noticed.’
He felt Orla huff a little chuckle. ‘I think your street cred is still intact.’
Overcome with a sensation of losing his footing even though he was lying down, Antonio shifted them so that Orla was sprawled across his body, her breasts flattened against his chest.
He felt the hitch in her breathing; his hand became firmer on her back, sweeping up and down the silky skin, cupping her buttocks, squeezing gently and then harder. Telling her of his desire.
Needing no further encouragement, Orla’s head dipped and her mouth met his in a sweet kiss. So sweet that it set something aching inside Antonio, in his chest. In a second though, digging his fingers into her hair, clasping her head, he’d changed it to something much more carnal.
And as Orla groaned her approval and her body started to move against his, seeking for more, Antonio blanked his mind and body of anything but this urgency. Driving away the questions as to what the hell had just passed between them …
The following day, Orla still felt raw after what had happened the previous evening … and night. Between her legs was tender, burning slightly but in a wickedly delicious way. That sense of something having shifted was still strong, too strong for her to deny.
It was taking her mind off work. Making her want to stand and dream about him. About the things he’d revealed to her. She was losing sight of who he was and why he was there in the first place and that made Orla exceedingly nervous. Perhaps he was playing her? Distracting her. Seducing her. So that she’d be left so weak and—
Just then there was a flurry of activity at the doors of the hotel and Orla’s attention snapped back to the lobby. When she saw her mother appear from behind the reception desk to rush forward and greet what appeared to be an army of glamorous older ladies, Orla felt her chest sinking.
Oh, Mother, please, not today, she begged silently.
Antonio watched the interplay between Orla and her mother, who had apparently returned the day before ahead of her husband from where he was still wrapping up business in South-East Asia. It was clear where Orla got her looks from. The older woman was elegance personified, tall and slim with only the slightest hint of middle-aged spread. Her red hair fading slightly with age. But there the similarity ended. Orla’s mother had a look of distinct petulance about her. Unaware of the guests milling around them, when he could see Orla was constantly aware, keeping an eye on everything.
Her face was strained. From where he was seated in the lobby he could hear snippets of their conversation.
‘Mother, it’s just not practical to bring twenty of your friends in for afternoon tea. You’ll swamp the front reception area and you know how they get after a few drinks.’
Her mother pooh-poohed her. ‘Nonsense, darling. It’s Tilly’s birthday and if your father was here he’d never say no to me. Anyway, it’s too late because they’re here now.’
Antonio’s eyes narrowed on Orla. In an instant he read the dynamics of the Kennedy family. There was a veritable flock of expensively perfumed women thronging the lobby as they greeted one another and exclaimed loudly. It was the Ladies Who Lunch brigade and Orla’s mother was the Queen Bee.
He could see Orla’s frustration as they did exactly what she’d feared, taking over the serene peace of the main reception area off the lobby. She called one of the managers over and had a quiet word but his attempts to corral the ladies into a corner were unsuccessful once Mrs Kennedy had realised his instructions.
Antonio could see some of the other guests already getting up to leave, casting looks at the group. He knew that if he hadn’t been staying here and hadn’t seen Orla’s work ethic, and he’d just witnessed this, he would have judged her passion for her brand as being shallow. It was anything but, especially if the pinched expression on her face was anything to go by.
She saw him then and her face went even paler. Two spots of colour blooming in her cheeks. He hadn’t seen her since they’d woken at dawn that morning and made love again. While she’d been taking a shower, he’d left. His head in a tangled mess after baring his soul in a way he hadn’t done with another person apart from his therapist.
He lifted his hand and gestured for her to come to him and a predictably mutinous look came over her face, making his body tighten with awareness. Damn her and this ability she had to reduce him to the status of a horny teenager.
She walked towards him, her slim body graceful today in a cream silk shirt and slightly darker pencil skirt. Her hair immaculate, just begging for him to undo it and muss it up.
An image of a place popped into Antonio’s mind’s eye. And a desire to see Orla out of this milieu. Out of those too-structured clothes. A desire to see her naked and on her back, in his bed, for long hours at a time. Days, even. His heart sped up as an idea formed in his head and she sat down on the chair near him.
Immediately a staff member rushed over and asked if he could get them anything. Orla smiled and asked for tea. Antonio asked for coffee. He could hear the shrieks of laughter coming from Orla’s mother’s party now and saw her wince.
She caught his look and said, a little embarrassed, ‘It wouldn’t be so bad if I could persuade Mother to go to a private room but she won’t hear of it. She likes to show off the hotel to her friends.’
Antonio tried not to let the fact that he could see how much this pained her affect him. He cursed himself; he shouldn’t have slept with her. A voice in his head laughed uproariously at that. As if he’d had a choice.
And then he made a split-second decision. He told Orla that he’d be back in a few minutes and stood up, taking out his phone to make a call. Then he went straight over to where Orla’s mother sat.
Orla watched Antonio and her breathing stopped when she saw him bend down to talk to her mother. Marianne Kennedy knew who he was because she’d met him before with Orla’s father when the takeover was being discussed initially. So Orla could see her mother’s less than friendly expression.
But then it was changing and becoming distinctly friendlier. To Orla’s chagrin, she felt
something dark settle into the pit of her belly. And then she almost gasped out loud—was she actually feeling jealous of her own mother?
She stood up as much in agitation at that revelation as for any other reason, just as Antonio also stood and headed back to Orla with an enigmatic expression on his face. But he walked right by her and went to the hotel entrance where Orla could see that a luxury coach was pulling up.
Then her mother came past her in a haze of expensive scent and she stopped momentarily to say, ‘Orla, darling, that Mr Chatsfield has just offered us a champagne reception in his hotel for Tilly’s birthday.’
Orla looked at her and her jaw dropped. Her mother sniffed. ‘I mean, it’s the least he can do, really, I think, in the circumstances.’
Orla was too stunned to say anything and could only watch as her mother led her merry band of acolytes out of the Kennedy hotel and onto a bus. As soon as they were gone, serene calm descended again.
Antonio returned and Orla found that she was sitting back down into the chair because her legs felt weak. Antonio sat down and proceeded to drink his coffee as if nothing had just happened. She stared at him as if he’d grown two heads. He raised a brow. ‘What? Your mother was causing you stress so I removed it.’
Orla’s mouth opened and closed. The overriding thing she was feeling was something very ambiguous. No one had ever, ever, done something like that for her before. She didn’t quite know how to react and she was fairly sure she should be angry but quite for what reason she wasn’t sure.
Antonio gestured. ‘Drink your tea. It’ll be getting cold.’
Orla shook her head slowly, some of the shock wearing off. ‘I can’t believe you just did that.’
‘When is your father due back?’
Orla took a sip of tea to restore some sense of reality and frowned. ‘Not till next week. Selling up in Bangkok has proved to be more complicated than he’d expected but he won’t hear of me going out to help him.’
Antonio looked at her. ‘Because you advised him against it, didn’t you?’
Orla blanched before guilty colour seeped up from her neck. She saw Antonio’s expression turn grim.
‘What was it?’ he asked now. ‘Your mother fancied hotels in the Far East to impress her friends?’
Orla avoided his eye, feeling prickly after his very unexpected show of support. ‘It’s none of your business why we took those decisions.’
‘But we didn’t, did we? Your father was influenced by your mother. I spoke to her just now, Orla. She has nothing more on her mind than—’
She cut him off fiercely, all of her defensive hackles raised. ‘My mother is not shallow.’ She coloured hotly. ‘Well, that is … not like you think. When we started out we had nothing. She helped my father build everything up but she came from a well-off background, so she was never entirely comfortable with having nothing. But she loves my father. And he adores her.’
Orla stopped, breathing harshly. She couldn’t leave it there. She’d said too much now. She wasn’t even aware of the hubbub of the lobby going on around them, only wanting to wipe that judgemental look off Antonio’s face.
‘My father knew that he’d taken her from a life of relative luxury, so as soon as we started making money, he insisted that she not work any more.’
Orla suddenly realised something and spoke aloud almost as much to herself as to Antonio. ‘He was as much an architect of the woman she is today as she was. She got seduced by the wealth, the things she could buy. Her influence over him. But I know she’s scared to death of what’s going to happen, even though she’d never admit it. That’s why she’s behaving as if nothing is wrong.’
Antonio said softly, ‘And you stepped into the breach to take her place. You want to save the hotels, don’t you? Somehow?’
Orla glared at him for a long moment for unsettling her and making her reveal what she had, and then blurted out, ‘Of course I do. This is our family legacy. My father worked so hard for this. It’s killing me to think that it’ll be lost. The fact that our name will live on is small comfort when we know they won’t really be our hotels.’
Orla’s mouth tightened at her outburst. She blamed Antonio for making love to her so thoroughly that she felt raw and exposed, unable to protect herself. And for making her realise something about her mother that she’d never even really articulated to herself before.
‘And yet, that’s enough for your father,’ Antonio surmised grimly. ‘Have you talked to him about ways to save the business apart from just saving the brand name?’
Orla fought to control her wayward emotions, took another sip of lukewarm tea and put the cup down, as if this conversation wasn’t costing her as much as it was.
She nodded slowly and admitted reluctantly, ‘He doesn’t want to know. He thinks that if we can save the name across as many hotels as possible, then he won’t have failed completely. But I know we have a chance if he’ll just agree to sell everything, name and all, apart from this flagship hotel and the ones in Dublin and New York.’
Antonio whistled softly. ‘That’s ambitious.’
Orla lifted her chin. ‘We could do it though, if my father would just agree to talk about a much smaller investment with a partner, and to let all our other interests go, name and all. But he’s stubborn. He either wants to retain as many of our hotels as he can, or none….’
Orla looked away from Antonio’s narrowed gaze. To admit to this defeat, in front of him … was galling. Especially after last night, when she still felt wobbly and oversensitised and all over the place emotionally. Between her legs stung with the after-effects of his powerful body surging into hers over and over again.
She glanced back at him, suddenly acutely aware of how much she’d revealed. ‘What are you doing, Antonio? You’re hardly our ally. You don’t care what happens to us as long as you get your precious deal to keep your sister happy.’
His face got darker at that and then he said gruffly, ‘I’ve never pretended anything else is the case. But you can’t deny that things have changed … between us.’
Orla’s breath got choppy. ‘No, I can’t. But we should never have got involved—it’s not a good idea.’
Antonio looked even darker. ‘It was inevitable. If it hadn’t happened that night, Orla, it would have happened after we’d met. That’s just maths.’
Orla’s chest felt tight. He leant forward then and she had to stop herself from moving back, afraid of the way her body responded so violently.
‘I have a proposition for you.’
Orla’s heart stopped and started again. Surely … he wasn’t going to offer—
‘Come away with me.’
CHAPTER SEVEN
ORLA BLINKED AT HIM. For a crazy bizarre moment she’d thought that he might be about to offer to be the investor that they would need if she was to push her plan with her father. Wishful thinking. Of course he wasn’t. He was as bound by blood as she was to get the outcome he wanted. She was nothing to him. And then his words sank in, belatedly.
She frowned. ‘Come away with you … where?’
His eyes captivated her, making the hubbub of the lobby of the hotel fade away.
‘I have a place in the south of France, near Saint-Raphaël. I bought it while I was in the Legion for my periods of leave.’
Orla’s heart sped up; her belly grew tight. ‘But … why?’
‘Because I want you and you want me, and maybe if we have a few days together, on our own, this desire will burn out.’
Something about his coolly delivered reasoning and the fact that he wanted this desire to burn out made her recoil and want to protect herself. She stood up and said frostily, ‘Thanks but no thanks. I have a job to do. In case it’s escaped your notice we’re in the middle of a takeover bid. Last night was a mistake and shouldn’t be repeated.’
She was about to stalk away when Antonio caught her hand in a powerful grip and she looked down at him reluctantly, mindful of being under the scrutiny of staff and gues
ts. His eyes compelled her though.
His voice was low but she heard the steel in it. ‘The fact is that we can’t be within ten feet of each other and not want each other. And to deny that is to deny a fact of life.’
Orla stared at him for a long moment, caught. She was losing her footing, feeling increasingly out of her depth.
With effort, she pulled her hand free and it tingled. Along with other parts of her body. She finally walked away from Antonio and that black gaze before he could see how turbulent her emotions were.
As she passed the reception area though, a waiter crossed her path with a tray full of the detritus of the empty glasses from Orla’s mother’s table. They’d already managed to open a few bottles of champagne before they’d been offered a better deal via Antonio. She stopped in her tracks.
Orla felt very vulnerable to recall that feeling of how Antonio had taken charge of a situation. For her. Your mother was causing you stress so I removed it. She hated to admit it, but a part of her thrilled to know that he had done that, even if it had been heavy-handed. She’d been proving herself for so long that she’d never had support herself.
Something sharp gripped her. Along the way Orla had sacrificed almost any personal desires. Relationships had been relegated to the periphery. She’d worked her fingers to the bone. Any holiday had been taken in one of their hotels with work as the main focus. She’d even missed out on girlfriends, as one by one they’d stopped calling because she was simply too busy.
Something rose up within her, anger and a sense of futility. She turned around and saw Antonio standing just feet away, watching her with that heavy-lidded gaze. Her insides clenched, hard.
The fact is that we can’t be within ten feet of each other and not want each other. And to deny that is to deny a fact of life.
Just looking at him right now made her want him. He was right. He was also an assault on her senses and, more disturbingly, on her emotions and the walls she’d built around herself to concentrate on work for all these years. He made her forget that. He made her want more … like the home she’d always dreamed of.