‘Many times for business. Much of my financial trading is with the Asian markets and I visit Japan and Hong Kong regularly. I usually manage to fit in some sightseeing during my trips.’
‘But Christos told me you rarely leave Chatsfield House.’
The moment she had spoken, Sophie wished she had kept quiet. Her worry that she had alienated Nicolo was confirmed when he frowned.
‘Giatrakos knows nothing about me. I’m not likely to confide in the enemy,’ he said drily.
Heeding the warning glint in Nicolo’s eyes, she dropped the thorny subject of the new CEO of the Chatsfield and turned her attention to fitting the dough into a tin.
‘So who taught you to cook?’ Nicolo said after a few minutes. ‘Your mother?’
‘Goodness, no.’ She laughed. ‘My mother can’t boil an egg. When I was growing up she was a top lawyer and far more interested in her career than anything as domesticated as cooking. Luckily for her she married a chef.’
‘So your interest in cooking comes from your father?’
‘Oh—no, my father is an architect.’ Sophie felt a familiar pang as she thought of her father. ‘My parents are divorced,’ she explained. ‘Mum married Giraud four years ago, and to everyone’s surprise she gave up her career and moved to Paris to help him run his restaurant.’
Nicolo glanced at her, wondering why her voice had sounded flat when she had mentioned her father. Maybe there were issues to do with her parents’ divorce. He reminded himself that he wasn’t interested in Sophie’s personal life.
‘You asked who taught me to cook?’ she said after a moment. ‘I learned a lot from a wonderful Italian au pair who stayed with us for a couple of years. Donatella trained to become a professional chef and she now teaches at a cookery school in Tuscany.’
She glanced at Nicolo. ‘Italy is a beautiful country. Did you spend much time in your mother’s homeland when you were a child?’
‘We visited a few times, but my mother made England her home with my father.’ His voice roughened. ‘I expect Christos told you that my mother left the family many years ago. Her whereabouts are unknown, but when I was a child she often spoke about Italy, and it is possible that she returned to her birth country.
‘Italy is certainly very beautiful,’ he continued. ‘My villa on the shores of Lake Como has spectacular views.’
‘I didn’t know you have a house in Italy.’ Sophie could not hide her surprise.
‘Why should you? Giatrakos knows nothing about my private life,’ Nicolo said drily.
From what Christos had told her, Sophie had assumed that Nicolo lived a reclusive life, but in fact he travelled regularly. She was curious about his personal life. Did he have a mistress? Perhaps he had several. He might have disappeared off the radar of the British press, but he was a virile man in the prime of his life and it was unlikely that he lived like a monk. Inexplicably, Sophie disliked the idea that he might still have numerous affairs.
She focused on what he had revealed about himself, and also the things he hadn’t said, like how he had felt when his mother had abandoned her children. Sophie had heard a note of raw emotion in his voice, and she recalled how the cleaning lady, Betty, had said she had often heard the teenage Nicolo crying after his mother had left.
‘Do you keep a house by Lake Como in case your mother is in Italy and you hope that perhaps one day she will look for you?’ she asked softly.
Sophie’s startling insight was too close to the truth for Nicolo’s comfort. He had never acknowledged even to himself that he clung to the hope he would see his mother again, or that he had bought the villa on the shores of Lake Como because he felt a link to her when he stayed there.
‘Don’t be absurd,’ he snapped. ‘I bought the villa because it was a good financial investment, and also because the secluded location ensures my privacy from the paparazzi.’
Did he want privacy so that he could invite women to his house in Italy without the press finding out? It was none of her business, Sophie reminded herself. She did not care if he had half a dozen mistresses.
‘I need to go and do some work,’ he said curtly.
His mood swings were as mercurial as the weather, she thought, glancing out of the window to see that the sun had disappeared behind thick clouds.
‘Take a slice of bread with you. It’s delicious when it’s still warm from the oven.’ She cut two thick slices from the freshly baked loaf and spread both liberally with butter before handing him once piece.
‘Mmm, heavenly,’ she murmured as she took a bite of her slice of bread.
Nicolo watched her with amused eyes. ‘It’s refreshing to meet a woman who enjoys food. Most women seem to survive on lettuce leaves, and still worry about putting on weight. Not that you need to be concerned about that,’ he added, eyeing Sophie’s slender figure. ‘You’re perfectly proportioned.’
He visualised her when he had pulled her out of the pool. Her sodden silk dress had clung to her body, moulding the firm mounds of her breasts and her pebble-hard nipples. The jeans and T-shirt she was wearing now were not as revealing, but Nicolo felt a slow burn of desire in his gut.
‘I love good food,’ Sophie admitted. ‘I guess I appreciate it more because for a long time I couldn’t eat properly—’ She broke off abruptly when she noticed the curious look Nicolo gave her and silently cursed her runaway tongue.
‘Why couldn’t you eat?’
‘Oh … I just had a few health problems when I was a teenager,’ she said dismissively. She did not want to mention her battle with cancer to a virtual stranger.
The timing of when to explain to a new acquaintance that she had once developed a life-threatening illness which had had life-changing consequences was a perennial problem, Sophie thought ruefully. Richard had accused her of deliberately withholding the fact that cancer had left her infertile. He’d said that if she had told him soon after they had met, he would not have allowed their relationship to develop because he wanted children in the future.
It was three years since she and Richard had broken up, and the last Sophie had heard was that he had married someone else and he and his wife were expecting their first child. Since then she had dated other men occasionally, but nothing serious. She had accepted that she would probably never have her own family. Cancer, or more specifically chemotherapy, had destroyed her chance of having children. But her illness had made Sophie a realist. Life didn’t come with guarantees. Rather than grieve for what she didn’t have, she was grateful to be alive and determined to live her life to the fullest.
She realised that Nicolo was waiting for her to finish what she had been saying. There was no likelihood of her ever having a relationship with him—she smiled wryly at such a crazy thought—and therefore no reason to tell him about her past. ‘My health is absolutely fine now,’ she said cheerfully. ‘What do you think of my bread?’
‘It’s very good.’ Nicolo took a bite of warm wholemeal bread and was reminded of a field of wheat rippling in the breeze on a hot summer’s day.
He sensed that Sophie had not told him the complete story about her health problems when she had been younger. He wondered if she had suffered from an eating disorder as a teenager. She had mentioned that her parents were divorced. Perhaps the breakup had been another pressure she’d had to cope with at a vulnerable age. He remembered how angry and confused he had felt as a teenager when his parents’ marriage had fallen apart.
It had been his father’s fault, Nicolo thought bitterly. His father had betrayed his mother and that was why she had left. Now Gene had betrayed his children by putting an outsider in place as CEO of the Chatsfield. But if his father and the Greek usurper Giatrakos expected him to cooperate they were going to be disappointed, just as Sophie was going to be when she failed to persuade him to attend the shareholders’ meeting.
CHAPTER FIVE
SOPHIE GAVE THE casserole a final stir and checked that the roast potatoes were crisping up nicely on the top shelf of the ov
en. If the meal she had spent all afternoon preparing did not put Nicolo in a more receptive frame of mind she did not know what would. She had decided to appeal to his conscience and try and convince him that it would be in everyone’s best interest, especially his sister Lucilla’s, if he agreed to be present at the shareholders’ meeting. She was through with prevaricating, Sophie thought firmly. She needed to use all her persuasive powers, and the dinner was part of her strategy.
The dining table looked lovely covered in a white damask cloth with a vase of roses she had picked from the garden as a centrepiece. She had even unearthed some candles from one of the kitchen cupboards and placed them in the silver candelabra that she had found.
Before serving dinner she walked into the hall to check her appearance in the mirror. Her black silk-jersey dress was elegant and businesslike and she felt confident that she deserved Christos’s faith in her. Hopefully she would be able to return to London tomorrow with the news that Nicolo had agreed to play ball.
He walked out of his study, and Sophie’s heart did an annoying little skitter as her eyes drank in his appearance—black tailored trousers that hugged his hips, and a white silk collarless shirt with long sleeves. Despite his formal clothes he still reminded her of a highwayman with his dark hair falling to his shoulders and the shadow of black stubble on his jaw. It was such a resolute jaw, and Sophie suddenly felt less confident of her persuasive abilities.
She hid her reservations behind a bright smile. ‘I’m just about to serve dinner. Is chicken-and-white-wine casserole okay?’
‘It certainly smells good, but to be honest, anything will make a welcome change from steak.’
‘Is steak really all you ever cook for yourself?’
‘It’s the only thing I know how to cook. Anyway, having the same thing for dinner every day is easier than wasting time trying to decide what to eat when I could be working.’
Sophie shook her head. ‘Is making money so important to you that you don’t ever take time to … I don’t know—’ she shrugged ‘—smell the roses, watch the sunset, listen to a blackbird’s song? Surely life is to be enjoyed? That’s especially true for people like us.’
Nicolo stared at her. ‘What do you mean—people like us?’
She almost said, People like us who have been given a second chance at life. They had both looked death in the face and survived. But she did not want to think of the darkest days of her illness. She had felt so scared and alone when she had been in hospital for months, but she had learned to put on a brave front so that she did not upset her mother. Hiding her true feelings behind a veneer of cheerfulness had become part of her nature and she rarely shared her emotions even with her closest friends.
‘What I mean is that we’re lucky we don’t live in a war zone or have to cope with terrible hardship. We are healthy, and able to live our lives however we choose.’
Sophie’s brand of relentless optimism was beginning to grate on Nicolo’s nerves. ‘Do you think I was lucky to have been severely burned in a fire?’
‘No, but I think you are lucky to have recovered from your injuries and can lead a normal life. Don’t you agree?’
He felt a stab of guilt as he remembered Michael, who hadn’t recovered from terrible burns. Through his charity that supported burns victims Nicolo had met many people whose lives had been changed for ever by their injuries. Compared to them, of course he was lucky, he acknowledged. But he did not need a young woman who would no doubt consider breaking one of her perfectly manicured fingernails a major trauma to tell him how he should feel.
Sophie walked into the dining room. Nicolo glanced through the doorway and tensed when he noticed the candelabra standing in the centre of the table. A box of matches was on the table and as Sophie struck a match and lit a candle Nicolo jerked forward and pinched out the flame with his fingers.
‘What the hell are you doing?’ he growled, snatching the box of matches out of her hand. ‘Where did you find the candles? I don’t allow them in the house.’
Sophie stared at him in surprise, her anger at his overbearing behaviour changing to confusion when she saw his clenched jaw. She was sure she had glimpsed fear in his eyes for a few seconds.
‘Th-they were at the back of one of the kitchen cupboards,’ she stammered. ‘Why shouldn’t I light them? What’s the harm in having candles on the dining table, for heaven’s sake?’
‘Do you know how many house fires are caused by lit candles left unattended?’ he said grimly.
‘I wasn’t going to leave them unattended. Well—only for a few minutes while I went to the kitchen to serve dinner …’ Sophie’s voice trailed away as Nicolo’s eyes flashed with fury. ‘Okay, I’m sorry. I didn’t know you had banned candles from the house. But really, a couple of candles are hardly a major fire risk.’
‘What if a lit candle had fallen out of the holder while you were out of the room and set the tablecloth alight? You have no idea how fast flames can travel and how fierce a fire can become in a short space of time.’
In his mind Nicolo was back in his father’s penthouse suite at the Chatsfield London hotel, trapped on the balcony as an inferno blazed inside, cutting off his path across the room to the door. His only chance of escape was to try and climb down from the balcony, but the ground was dizzyingly far below. He had been thirteen years old, faced with burning to death or risk falling to his death. The human instinct for survival had kicked in and he had started to climb over the balcony railing when he had heard screams from inside the penthouse.
His memories of the fire were so vivid that Nicolo could remember the acrid smell of smoke as if he were back in the penthouse now. He could feel his heart pounding as he walked over to the French doors and flung them open so that he could breathe the fresh evening air. The sweet scent of the honeysuckle growing up the wall of the house was a reminder of the sweetness of life, but he would never forget the charred smell of the burning penthouse—a smell he would forever associate with pain and death.
He remembered how the flames had scorched his skin as if it had happened yesterday, the smell of his flesh burning and the petrified expression on the face of the hotel chambermaid whom he had discovered cowering in the bathroom. Sophie could not comprehend the sheer terror of being trapped in a fire, he thought darkly.
‘Well, I still think you’re overreacting,’ she muttered.
Nicolo was infuriated by Sophie’s dismissive comment. ‘What if a fire had started and quickly raged out of control throughout the entire house? What if one of us had been upstairs? How do you think it feels to be trapped on the upper floor with no way out, forced to watch the flames coming nearer and feeling your skin blister from the heat?’
Sophie stared at him, too shocked by the raw emotion in his voice to speak.
‘I’ll tell you how I felt when I was caught in a fire,’ Nicolo said harshly. ‘I felt sick with a fear greater than anything I could ever have imagined. I thought I was going to die—’ his voice roughened ‘—and for a long time afterwards, when I was in agony from my burns and repelled by the sight of my scarred body, I almost wished that I had.’
He gripped the front of his shirt and ripped it open, buttons flying into the air as he wrenched the material apart to expose the red, mottled skin that covered half of his chest. ‘This is the harm a fire can inflict,’ he told Sophie. ‘My scars look ugly nearly two decades after I was burned. Be thankful you did not see them when they were raw and weeping.’
Last night, when she had gone to his room to wake him from his nightmare, Sophie had seen his scars in the soft light of the bedside lamp. Now, in the bright glare of the evening sunlight gleaming through the windows, the extent of his scarring was apparent. The skin on one side of his torso was mottled and discoloured, and although dark hairs covered the rest of his chest, they did not grow on the scarred area.
Nicolo’s jaw clenched as she watched various expressions cross Sophie’s face, the look of horror she could not disguise. He felt asham
ed of his ugliness and wounded by the disgust he was sure he could see in her eyes. What had he expected? he asked himself bitterly. Of course she was repelled by his scars. He told himself he did not care. After all, she was on the enemy’s side, sent here by the Greek usurper, Christos Giatrakos. Yet inexplicably, he found himself wishing that she could see beyond his scars to the man beneath.
‘Now do you understand the destructive force of fire, and the horrific injuries it can inflict?’ he demanded.
Sophie heard pain in his voice and felt an unexpected ache in her heart for this proud man. Nicolo had told her that he had come to terms with his injuries but she sensed he was watching her closely to gauge her reaction to his scars.
She recalled the day in her hospital room ten years ago when she had stared at her bald head in the mirror and wept because she had believed she looked ugly. All her friends were starting to go on dates with boys. What boy would want to date a girl with no hair? Sophie had thought. Eventually her hair had grown back and she had been left with no visible signs of her illness. But Nicolo would bear his scars for the rest of his life. Beneath his tough exterior she wondered if he felt vulnerable about the way he looked, as she had once done.
She wanted to reassure him that he was not a monster as he had described himself, but she knew instinctively that he would despise any hint of pity. Not knowing what to say, but wanting to somehow let him know that she understood and sympathised with his internal conflict, she walked over to him, and after a moment’s hesitation she lifted her hand and placed it on the scarred side of his chest.
He flinched, but she sensed it was from surprise and not because the scar tissue was painful.
‘I am truly sorry that I put the candles on the table,’ she said quietly. ‘I should have realised that you have terrible memories of being trapped in the fire.’ She moved her fingers lightly over the ridges of scar tissue. ‘Your scars must remind you of that night. But you are not defined by these marks on your body.’
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