‘You’re kind of famous.’
His laugh resonated around the cove. ‘Is that so?’
‘Well...well-known.’ She grinned, her head bobbing in agreement.
Art had mentioned Rio several times. She’d listened. She’d learned. Though she had never imagined herself coming face to face with the man.
‘What’s the building?’
He frowned.
‘In New York?’ she supplied.
‘It’s a turn-of-the-century masterpiece,’ he said with a grin. ‘Art Deco, with original fittings on almost all the floors. It’s on the edge of Harlem, and for a long time it was ignored, but now the area has begun to gentrify.’
‘And you want to be in on that?’
His eyes were dark in his face. ‘I want to stop it being knocked down to make way for yet another steel monolith.’
She nodded thoughtfully. ‘You have a habit of doing that. Of buying old buildings.’
Again, she thought of the pub in London he’d saved.
‘It’s good business,’ he said with a shrug. ‘To see value in what other people disdain. It’s served me well.’
She tilted her head to one side. ‘I think it’s more than that.’
His laugh was a rumble. Desire skittered along her spine. ‘Do you? Why?’
Because she looked at him and saw something she didn’t understand. Because she’d known him a day and felt as if she’d seen into his soul. Because he was a confusing mix of machismo and compassion. Because she just did.
‘You bought a pub in London.’
His eyes honed in on her, waiting for her to continue.
‘It’s really beautiful. Old. Dilapidated. And you saved it. I think you buy these old buildings because you want to save them.’
‘That’s a by-product of what I do,’ he agreed.
‘Why don’t you admit it?’
He laughed. ‘There is nothing to admit.’ He flicked his fingers along the water’s surface. ‘The first building I bought was something no one wanted. It was very cheap. I couldn’t save it.’
‘What did you do with it?’
He grinned. ‘I thought you knew everything about me?’
‘What did you do with it?’ she repeated, too curious to exchange teasing jokes with him.
He sobered, leaning back in the water a little and staring at the canopy of trees overhead. ‘I arranged to demolish it but I salvaged everything. My first business was a brokerage of historic building parts. Tiles, bricks, marble, mirrors, light fittings—even carpets.’
‘How did you know that would even work? That people would be interested in buying the parts alone? I would have ended up with only a run-down old building to my name.’
‘There is value in beauty,’ he said finally. ‘Always.’
She bit down on her lower lip, focussing her attention on the cliff face. His words had set her pulse racing, but it wasn’t just him and his words. It was the island. The whispering trees. The warmth of the sun and the saltiness of the water.
‘What’s there now?’
‘A steel monolith,’ he responded with wry humour.
‘Ah.’ She flicked her eyes to his face to find him staring at her. Her heart skipped.
‘The building in Harlem isn’t just a collection of bricks. It marks a time in the city’s history when man was mastering the skills of constructing homes in the sky. It is a snapshot of time, a testament to what was. To the strength and resilience and the wonderment of what could be. It speaks of history and hope. If we demolish all of these old buildings there will be nothing left to show what used to be.’
Her pulse fired. His words sparked passion in her blood; their cadence was a call to arms she was quick to hear.
‘I agree.’ She smiled at him, her enthusiasm radiating from every pore. ‘London is an ever-changing city. So many of the buildings in my area have been knocked down to make way for new developments and every time I go past them I feel sad at what we’re losing. Homes that survived wars don’t have value any more.’
He lifted his fingers from the water. She watched, mesmerised. They were beautiful fingers. Lovely hands. Strong. Confident. Tanned. She blinked and looked away, before she did something stupid like reach out and wrap her fingers around his.
‘Where did the previous owner of the island want to build the hotel?’ she asked, bringing the conversation neatly back to business, desperately looking to stifle the desire that was wrapping around her.
‘Not far from the cabin.’ His words were spiced with an unknown emotion. ‘It is an ideal spot.’
‘I think you’d be hard-pressed to find anywhere here that isn’t ideal.’
He shrugged. ‘Perhaps.’
He rubbed his fingers over his shoulder, scratching at something she couldn’t see.
She swallowed and looked away.
But the trees whispered above her.
Inevitable.
Don’t fight it.
It’s going to happen.
She sent them an angry look and swam closer to the rocks.
What did trees know, anyway?
He was right behind her, but at the same time he kept his distance. A distance that allowed her to breathe.
‘I’d be interested to pick your brain on that. You’ve spent more time on the island than I have. Even in a week, I’m sure I won’t have really got to grips with the place.’
‘There are plans you can look at—plans the previous owner commissioned many years ago for a potential hotel,’ he suggested, without realising what he was saying.
He caught at the offer a moment too late; there was no way to pull the words back. Rio was not a man who made mistakes. Ever. Yet offering up his mother’s drawings was like giving her the key to his longest held secrets.
‘That would be great.’ She was nodding, her mind skipping several steps ahead. ‘I want to put together as much information as possible for Ar—Daddy.’
That was a little bonus she’d decided on for Cressida. Thirty thousand pounds had bought Cressida a week off the radar, celebrating a wedding with her friends. But Tilly was going to throw in the kind of report that would make Art think Cressida had turned over a new leaf.
‘Fine.’
Was he angry? Tilly studied him from beneath her lashes. His dark face was tilted away from her, his cheekbones slashed with colour. She wanted to reach over and trace his jawline, dip her finger into the cleft of his chin and the dimple in his cheek. She wanted to feel his stubble tickle her cheek as she ran her face close to his.
She wanted so much.
‘Ready to go back?’ His words were thick.
She turned to him and nodded. ‘I’m ready.’
And, come what may, she really, really was.
* * *
She dreamed of Jack that night. Jack, pale and shaking. Jack, crying, his eyes dark and his cheeks stained by tears. Jack, afraid. Jack, in danger.
She saw him vividly—not through a veil of sleep and memory, but as he’d really been. As he’d been only six weeks earlier, when he’d turned up on her doorstep and told her everything.
‘I made a bad bet, Tilly. A really bad bet. I didn’t realise it at the time but...but the guy...the bookie...’
She’d waited, impatient and also annoyed that he’d had the nerve to rock up on her doorstep at three in the morning when she had a big meeting to attend at work the following day.
‘His name’s Anton Meravic. I didn’t know he was hooked up, Tilly. I swear.’
‘“Hooked up”?’ she’d asked, not exactly sure what that meant. It had been late, after all. Her mind had been fogged by sleep.
‘To the mob! The Russian mob. He’s in with Walter Karkov and I owe him twenty-five thousand pounds! They’re going to kill me.’
She dreamed of Jack, pale and shaking.
She dreamed of Jack, her twin.
Her brother.
Her other half.
And she woke with a start.
Her heart
was racing, blood was pounding through her body, and her mind, her brain, were slamming with fear and adrenalin. The crashing of the waves echoed through her as bit by bit she remembered where she was.
Jack was safe. She’d done what she needed to pay off his debts. Thanks to Cressida, and the payment for this week’s ‘job’, she’d been able to fix it for him.
Nothing mattered more than keeping Jack safe. Nothing.
Not even the strange feeling that Rio was beginning to wrap his hands around her heart and squeeze it tight.
CHAPTER FIVE
IN THE MORNING she woke early, and was still tired.
Her eyes were scratchy, her mind exhausted.
Jack.
Her sigh perforated the silence, slitting her stomach with worry and doubt.
Some people were easy to worry about. They had problems that could be understood and therefore reliably navigated. With Jack it was like a dark cloud of uncertainty all the time. Wrong turns abounded. Since they were children he’d been that way. Not a naughty child, and certainly not unkind. Just worrisome and vulnerable. He’d made poor decisions, bad friends, worse choices.
And now, at twenty-four, he was still making those bad choices.
Only the stakes were much, much higher.
She shook her head, tilting her head towards the window and staring out at the sea. The day was breaking, the sun’s yolk spreading across the sky in a fog of orange and peach.
He’d be okay. She’d make sure of it.
Having paid off his debts to whoever the hell this mobster was, she wanted to believe Jack was out of trouble for good. But that wasn’t guaranteed.
She stood slowly, planting her feet against the tiled floor, her eyes not leaving the view.
What time was it?
She crept closer and then pushed the window open slowly, carefully, not wanting to wake Rio. A hint of the night’s cool brushed her cheeks, kissing them pink. She breathed in deeply, catching the tang of salt and smiling despite her nightmares.
It was early and the house was silent.
She lifted her shoes off the floor and padded barefoot from her bedroom, then tiptoed down the hallway. The front door to the cabin was unlocked. She pushed it outwards and her smile widened as she emerged onto the deck. The steps were covered in sand; it felt ice-cold beneath her bare feet. She paused to slip her shoes on and then thought better of it, tossing them to the ground and walking away from the house.
The wind was decidedly brisk. She wrapped her arms around her waist as she walked, her eyes focussed on the dawning day.
The island was stunning. It almost beggared belief to find such a piece of untouched paradise in this day and age.
It wouldn’t be untouched for long, though. Her lips shifted, a small frown dragging down her mouth at one side. Would the island still resonate with magic and mystery when buildings crowded it? When a cable ran across the volcano, allowing tourists to spy into the cavernous top and see its secrets?
Her frown deepened. And how could Rio care so little about what happened to this place? Why had he bought it? And why was he selling it so quickly? He was a businessman, and he’d made a career out of preserving beautiful buildings that were in jeopardy. Surely he felt the same about nature.
Was it possible that he really didn’t care what happened to Prim’amore?
She stopped walking and stared out to sea as the breeze pushed past her, lifting her dark red hair and whipping it into the air behind her. She wanted answers. Not because it would change a damned thing. Art would still buy the island and do what he wanted; and Rio would sell. She didn’t think she had a chance to change their minds. But that didn’t mean she couldn’t ask questions. Curiosity was alive inside her, begging for release.
* * *
Her hair was a flame. It shifted with the wind, creating contrast with her pale skin. He stared out at her, transfixed. The morning sun was bathing her with its buttery light and she looked soft and sweet.
Sweet.
Hardly a word he’d thought would ever apply to Cressida Wyndham.
He watched as she swooped down and lifted some sand into her fingers, then spread them wide to let it sprinkle on the ground like billions of pieces of confetti. Even at this distance he could see her smile and the way it shone across her face.
Her eyes shifted, moving towards the cottage, and despite the fact he was looking through a window, he moved away. The impulse to hide made him laugh.
Rio Mastrangelo didn’t run from anyone.
With a guttural sound of impatience he stalked out of his bedroom and into the kitchen, pressing a pod into the coffee machine and watching the thick, dark liquid pool into a mug. He paused it mid-flow, needing just a hit of caffeine and the taste of something other than desire to warm his gut.
So she was beautiful. Stunning. Sexy. That he had expected. But, knowing what he did about her lifestyle, he’d thought her charms would hold little appeal.
That belief had been scuppered by a hard-on he’d been grappling with since they’d swum together yesterday. Since she’d turned her back and waited for him to clip her bikini in place. Her skin had been so smooth beneath his hands. How he’d wanted to reach around and cup her breasts, to stroke her nipples and ease her backwards against him so that he could trace kisses along her neck.
It had been too long since he’d been laid. That was all. For a man used to indulging his virile libido whenever he wanted—a man who had any number of women lining up to join him in his bed—a month of abstinence had been a spectacular feat. Being in close proximity to a woman like Cressida, with her body men would go to war for, was like pouring gasoline into a room and leaving a packet of matches by the door.
He just had to move the matches.
* * *
‘Oh! You’re up.’
She smiled as she breezed into the kitchen, smelling like sand and sunshine, and looking like a water nymph who’d risen from the depths of the sea, her long hair tangling down her back as he’d imagined it the first time they’d met.
He reached for his coffee and sipped it without dropping his eyes from her face. ‘It’s almost nine,’ he pointed out.
‘Right.’ Her cheeks were pink, as though she’d been running. ‘I’ve been exploring.’
It was such a conspiratorial confession that he almost laughed. The urge to chastise her for going on her own, without him to save her from plummeting off cliff faces, died in the face of her obvious joy.
‘Have you? And what have you found?’
‘Just the most beautiful island,’ she said, with a smile that was lit from inside.
The gasoline dripped closer to the matches.
‘I can’t believe how lovely it is here.’ She eyed his coffee thoughtfully and then walked, barefoot, into the kitchen. She left little drifts of sand in her wake. ‘Mind if I make a coffee?’
He shook his head. ‘Of course not.’
‘Would you like another one?’
Surprise at the simple courtesy flared. ‘No. Thank you.’
The machine made its tell-tale groaning noise as she brought it to life and waited for coffee to fill the cup she’d selected.
‘Do you have those plans? I’d love to take a look at what the architect came up with.’
His expression gave little away. ‘They are somewhere here.’
Mischief danced in her eyes. ‘Is that like a clue? Am I to hunt them out, à la The Secret Seven or The Famous Five?’
He stared at her blankly and she rolled her eyes.
‘Please tell me you’ve read them?’
‘Read what?’ He was lost.
‘The books! Enid Blyton mysteries.’
He shook his head, dragging a hand through his hair. ‘No.’
‘How deprived your childhood must have been!’ She laughed, and then sobered as she recalled his claim that he’d had nothing growing up. ‘I didn’t mean... I meant... Oh, crap.’
She clamped a hand over her mouth and speared him with a
look of such bewilderment that he burst out laughing.
‘You think you have hurt my feelings? That I am crying inside?’
She dropped her hand and looked away, back to the coffee. How ridiculous she was being! Talking to him as though they were old friends, teasing him about not having read Enid Blyton books and reacting as though she, Tilly Morgan, had the power to hurt him! Rio Mastrangelo! The man who was renowned for his ruthless cold temperament.
With effort, she shoved her enthusiasm and delight deep inside her and assumed her best mask of casual arrogance—just as she’d seen Cressida do a thousand times.
‘I’m serious about those plans.’ She cradled the warm mug in her hands.
He stared at her for long enough that the air began to crackle around them. Time stood still, but her emotions did not. They were a fever in her blood. Uncertainty, lust, confusion, danger.
She bit down on her lip, and then stopped when his gaze lowered, his eyes knitting together as he traced the outline of her pout with heavy eyes.
Uh-oh.
Her heart was pounding hard and fast.
‘I am going to Capri later today. Would you like to come and see it?’
The question came to her from a long way away. Her mind was jelly. She swallowed, but her pulse was throbbing so loudly that she wasn’t even sure she’d heard him properly.
‘Capri?’ she murmured, shaking her head slightly from side to side.
Rio stood and prowled towards her. There was no other word for it. He was like a powerful animal stalking its prey, his eyes hooded as he gained ground, closing in on her. He hooked his mug beneath the coffee machine, his body only inches from hers. So close she could feel his warmth. A shiver danced along her spine.
‘I’m sure it’s not like your usual haunts. Only a few nightclubs. No couture boutiques that I know of...’
Her cheeks flushed and her eyes met his beseechingly. He was determined to think the worst of Cressida. It shouldn’t have bothered her. So why did she find herself wanting to plead the other woman’s case to him?
‘No, thanks.’
His eyes narrowed speculatively, as though he’d been expecting her to jump at the chance to get off the island. She gathered it hadn’t entered his head that she might prefer to stay where she was.
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