by Trish Morey
The prickling under her skin intensified and spread until even her breasts tingled and peaked. The cold, she told herself as she clutched her arms over her chest and pressed her fingernails tight into her flesh. Damn this cold and damn this man who was smiling as if he was welcome here.
As if he imagined he was going to get a slice of Purman Wine action.
Not on her watch.
‘Angus Purman?’ he said, extending a hand to her grandfather. ‘Franco Chatsfield. It’s good to meet you.’
‘Gus will do just fine,’ the older man said with a nod, and Franco felt his hand enveloped by a weatherbeaten paw that housed a grip of steel. ‘And this here’s my granddaughter, Holly. She’s the real boss of the show.’
Really? ‘Holly,’ he said, taking her hand in turn, and there could be no greater contrast between the two handshakes. For while the older man’s had been certain, his leathery skin calloused and hard, hers was cool and way too brief to decide if that buzz he’d felt on contact had been any more than his imagination. She made no attempt to acknowledge him or return his smile, but then, she didn’t look happy at all. Instead she looked—He searched for a word as he took in her khaki work pants, dusty boots and a faded long-sleeved polo jumper bearing the Purman Wines logo. Drab. In fact, if it wasn’t for blue eyes in a make-up-free face, she’d be completely colourless.
‘I apologise if my arrival has taken you unawares,’ he said, realising she must be angry because she hadn’t had time to get herself ready. He knew how women liked to preen.
‘No, of course, we were expecting you,’ the old man said genially.
‘We just weren’t expecting you—’ the woman added, gesturing towards the helicopter ‘—in that.’
So she was angry with him. But what the hell for? ‘I had to take it from Mount Gambier. Storms closed the Coonawarra airfield so my charter flight couldn’t land here.’
‘There were no hire cars?’ Gus asked as he wheeled himself inside and gestured Franco to follow.
‘No,’ he said as he followed, discounting the offer he’d had of a car so tiny his knees would have been around his ears. ‘At least, nothing that was suitable.’
‘They were all out of Maseratis?’ quipped the woman. ‘I just hate it when that happens.’
‘Holly!’ Gus growled over his shoulder, and Franco pulled his lips into a smile in spite of his building irritation. He was here with a fistful of dollars in his pocket and a deal that anyone would be mad to turn down and yet she was acting like he wasn’t welcome. What the hell was her problem?
Warmth enveloped him as he stepped into a spacious living area, a kitchen one end and a dining area dominated by a massive timber table the other, all warmed by a stone-walled fireplace pumping out the heat. Stone and timber featured largely in the interior, working in combination with the high ceilings and windows that afforded a view over the surrounding vines. And not that he’d given it much thought, but he hadn’t expected to be reminded of his own stone villa in the Piacenza hills outside Milan and to actually like what he found half a world away in the southeast corner of South Australia.
‘We were just about to have lunch,’ Gus said. ‘Why don’t you sit down and join us?’
Franco held up his hands. ‘I don’t want to put you out,’ he said, and Holly caught the gleam of a gold watch at his wrist. Ridiculously expensive gold watch, by the looks, just like the ridiculously expensive hand-stitched leather shoes on his feet. Big feet, she registered absently, and in the very next instant wished she hadn’t.
Tall.
Big feet.
What did they say about tall men with big feet?
And heat that had nothing to do with the fireplace suddenly blossomed hot and heavy in her cheeks. She turned her back towards the men, launching an attack on a loaf with the bread knife, furious with herself. She didn’t even like the man. Why the hell would she even think such a thing?
‘A man can’t be expected to do business on an empty stomach,’ Gus said. ‘It’s no trouble, is it, Holly?’
‘No trouble at all,’ she said with a brightness she didn’t feel. ‘I do hope you’re a fan of corned beef sandwiches?’
‘But of course,’ he said, and not for the first time, Holly wondered at his accent. She’d expected him to sound upper crust and privileged, and he did—for the most part. But every now and then there was an unexpected texture to his accent that curled the edges away from Sloane Square and headed for somewhere entirely more earthy.
Maybe because of his Italian mother? Not that it mattered. Not that she cared.
‘That’s the spirit,’ her grandfather said. ‘Holly not only makes the best wine in the district, it’s a little-known fact she also makes the best sandwiches. She makes the relish herself, you know.’
‘Then I am indeed fortunate. It appears I couldn’t have timed my arrival better.’
A charmer, she thought as she put together a platter of doorstop sandwiches, adding this latest discovery to his list of crimes, a list that was growing longer by the minute. A Chatsfield and a charmer with a posh accent, who wore handmade shoes and gold watches and who hired helicopters when mere mortals hired cars—and usually the budget model at that.
She didn’t care for charmers with fat pockets.
She didn’t trust them.
She glanced over her shoulder at their guest, her father and Franco engaged in conversation. Another squall had hit, the rain coming in fat drops that belted onto the tin roof and splattered over the windows when the wind blew it horizontally under the wide verandah, and over the din, she could barely hear what they were saying. It was just a shame the noise didn’t dull her vision. He’d shrugged off his jacket while her back had been turned, revealing a fine-knitted sweater that skimmed his powerful shoulders and chest like a second skin. Some tall people looked like weeds. Not Franco. He looked hard packed. Built. He seemed to own the space around him. Not an easy thing in this room when he was surrounded by so much of it.
All the more reason to resent him, she told herself as she set the plate of sandwiches on the table and retreated to the safety of the kitchen to snap on the kettle, watching him take a sandwich in his hands.
Long-fingered hands.
Long-fingered hands with big thumbs.
He’d taken her hand in his and she could still feel the tingle under her skin, the zap that had reminded her of science class where they’d scuffed shoes on the carpet and reached out a hand. It had been fun then.
It wasn’t fun now.
She lifted her eyes and caught him watching her and sensation skittered down her spine. She spun, looking out the window, looking anywhere but at him, wondering what was wrong with her.
‘You’re not eating,’ he said.
She shook her head, wondering what had happened to her appetite. She’d felt hungry when she’d first come in from outside, but she was too wound up now to eat, too busy thinking he should never have come. Wishing she’d taken the call and told him not to. Thinking there was no point to all of this …
‘You must take Franco out to the vineyard,’ Gus said, ‘when this latest shower has passed. You should show him our terra rossa soil, and why our grapes do so well.’
‘Pop, have you looked out the window? I’m not sure it’s a good day to take anyone outside.’ Especially if it meant being alone with him.
‘Nonsense!’ He looked at their guest. ‘Franco would never have come all this way without wanting to see everything there is to know about the vineyard and the winery.’
‘Of course,’ he conceded, his words and smile both tighter than a trellis wire. ‘Naturally, I would appreciate seeing as much as I can while I am here.’
‘Excellent,’ said Gus, slapping the palms of his hands on his legs, triumphant. Holly wasn’t so convinced. Their guest hadn’t exactly jumped at the chance. Maybe he was afraid of getting his pretty shoes wet. ‘Now, you’d better get going before the next squall hits. Holly will find you a coat.’
Franc
o rose to his feet.
‘Oh, and, Gus, after the tour, perhaps we could sit down together and go over the details of Chatsfield Hotel’s offer?’
Holly’s head snapped around. So here it was. ‘You sure don’t waste any time, do you, Mr Chatsfield?’
‘Please call me Franco. And no, I don’t like wasting time, neither yours nor mine. In fact, I have a contract with me all ready to be signed. I told your grandfather on the phone the terms were generous and I can guarantee we’ll better any other offer on the table. I’d appreciate the opportunity to discuss the proposal with you in more detail.’
‘I look forward to it,’ said a bright-eyed Gus, who was looking like a kid itching to unwrap the biggest present under the Christmas tree. ‘I’m sorry I can’t come out myself while I’m confined to this infernal thing. Holly, I’ll be in the study doing some paperwork. Let me know when you get back and we’ll all sit down together and see if we can’t do business.’
The sky outside offered a rare patch of blue and Holly reckoned they had ten minutes before the next bank of dark cloud rumbled overhead and dropped its load.
‘This is going to ruin your snazzy shoes,’ Holly warned as she climbed into her creaky-with-age Driza-Bone oilskin. No way would his feet fit into Gus’s boots.
‘It’s no problem, really,’ he said. ‘They’re only shoes.’
She smiled at that as she pulled on her knee-high gumboots.
Only someone used to buying hand-crafted shoes would think they were only shoes. Clearly the Chatsfields had more money than sense.
Another crime added to the list.
She strode before him across the sodden lawn in her work boots, hands wedged deeply in the pockets of her coat. She didn’t need to look over her shoulder to know Franco was right behind her. She could feel him in the prickling heat of her skin. She could sense him in the swirling air of her wake—thick, smug air—just one more dark cloud on a stormy day. At least this cloud would soon blow away. Back to his privileged world and his scandal-ridden existence.
‘Be nice to him,’ Pop had told her, and she reined in on the resentment that bubbled up under her skin at him being here, at his film-star good looks and his entitled accent and his damned big feet and thumbs, but nowhere near enough to quell it completely. No. She could not find it in herself to be nice. But she supposed she could at least try for civil. He wasn’t going to be here long. She could do civil.
At least until he put his offer on the table.
‘We have around fifty hectares of prime Coonawarra land under vines,’ she started, and Franco tuned out, toying with a new and unexpected discovery. Because he’d seen her smile back in the mud room, maybe only because she’d been laughing at his shoes, but still she’d smiled. And it had been a revelation, because she was almost pretty when she smiled, when she let her frosty guard down and let the light play about her blue eyes and tweak her lips. They’d become startling blue eyes when she smiled, a burst of colour when she was otherwise clad in so much drabness. Who would have thought it?
She led him towards an old stone building nestled into a stand of enormous gum trees that served as their cellar door, smoke rising from its chimney, and all the while Holly talked and Franco only half listened, letting the details of the varieties and acreage and yields wash over him, details he didn’t need to know because soon he’d be gone and would never need to give Purman Wines or its cantankerous Miss Drab another thought.
Until then, he guessed, he would just have to endure it.
They stopped at a cutting in the soil, where the ground had been scooped away in a wedge shape to reveal the rich red soil lying atop its white limestone base, and she began to explain terra rossa soil, and Franco’s patience snapped.
‘Save me the lecture. I know what terra rossa means.’ Dio, if it wasn’t enough that his mother was Italian, he’d lived in Italy for the past decade.
‘Oh, I’m sorry. I assumed you’d grown up in England.’
‘I did,’ he said tersely, glancing over the massive shed beyond that housed the winery proper, suspecting that she was headed there next and already impatient for it to be over. He’d only agreed to come along because he’d worried they might have thought it looked odd if he hadn’t shown an interest.
But now he looked back across the vineyards, in the direction of the homestead, thinking he’d played Mr Cooperative long enough. It was time to get down to business if he wanted this thing wrapped up today.
‘Thank you for the tour, Ms Purman. I think we should be heading back now.’
Holly blinked those blue eyes. ‘The tour isn’t actually finished yet.’
‘Gus is waiting for us.’
‘He knows we’ll be a while.’
‘I’d rather not keep him waiting.’
She drew in a short sharp breath, laced with frustration.
‘But you haven’t even tasted the wines or seen the winery yet.’
‘The wine is good. Otherwise I wouldn’t be here with a contract in my pocket. Don’t you understand? Chatsfield Hotels wants to buy your entire vintage, down to every lock, stock and French oak barrel. We’re not about to change our minds whatever you show me. We’d be better off using our time getting agreement over the contract.’
Her blue eyes flashed like sun on ice, as cold and sharp as the wind that needled around his ears. She swept one arm around in an arc over the vineyard. ‘I knew you weren’t interested in a tour. But then, you’re not actually interested in any of this, are you?’ She was staring right at him, right into him, shaking her head while those ice-blue eyes continued to try to slice him to pieces with laser precision.
‘Don’t take it personally. I’m here to do business, not play tourist.’
‘Have you ever tasted our wines?’
‘Is that relevant?’
‘You’re unbelievable! I bet you don’t even know the first thing about wine!’
The hackles on the back of his neck rose. If she only knew. But he wasn’t about to tell her. ‘I know a bit about wine, yes.’
She smiled then, if you could call it a smile, because there was no light dancing in those blue eyes. They were cold and glassy and filled with bad intentions. ‘You know “a bit” about wine then?’ she repeated, nodding. ‘An expert indeed. So I guess you know there are two kinds of wine, right? Red and white?’
He felt the skin pull taut over the bones of his cheeks, felt his lips draw back into a snarl, but his voice, when it came, was tight and purposeful and betrayed nothing of how close he was to losing his control. ‘I wouldn’t quite put it that way.’
‘Oh, of course not,’ she said, any pretence at civility abandoned and left smoking in the heat of her delivery. ‘I was forgetting. Because there are actually three kinds of wine. You are a Chatsfield after all. You weren’t just born with a silver spoon in your mouth, you were born clutching a champagne flute in your hand.’
His hands formed fists, and if there’d been a champagne flute in either of them, it would have shattered, like his control, into tiny pieces.
Nobody judged him.
Not since his father had made it clear he didn’t need a son and Franco had subsequently dropped out of Eton and stormed off to Italy in rebellion had he been judged and found guilty by anyone other than himself.
And he was his own harshest critic.
So he was hardly likely to sit back and be found guilty by the likes of this woman.
She knew nothing of him.
Nothing!
The scar in his side ached as a familiar guilt assailed him—guilt for when he’d discovered what he’d unwittingly left behind in England—guilt for the years he’d lost and the pain he’d caused. Guilt that he’d been unable to save his child’s life just twelve short months later.
Nikki.
And pain lanced him as sharp and deep as it had that day, ten years before, when he’d learned that everything he’d done—everything he’d given—had come to nothing.
Curse the woman!
She knew nothing. But nothing in his agreement with Christos Giatrakos said he had to educate her, to explain. Nothing in his agreement said he had to apologise. He didn’t want her understanding or her forgiveness. All he needed was her damned signature on the dotted line.
‘Chatsfield Hotels want to buy your wines and we’re prepared to pay top dollar for the privilege.’ His voice was as calm and reasonable as he could manage under the circumstances, a thin veneer of civility over a mountain of reason and he’d make her appreciate just how much reason if it killed him. ‘We’ll not only purchase the entire vintage, but your precious wines will be showcased exclusively in the executive lounges of our hotels all over the world. You will never get a better deal. So why the hell won’t you even attempt to listen to what I have to say?’
Her chin kicked up. ‘Maybe because I’m not interested in what you have to say. If Chatsfield Hotels were actually serious about buying Purman Wines, they should have sent someone who knows something about wine and winemaking—not some messenger boy!’
If she’d slapped his cold cheek with the palm of her hand it couldn’t have stung as much as her ice-cold words, and far from the first time he cursed Christos Giatrakos for putting him in this position.
If he didn’t need to seal this deal—didn’t need this woman’s cooperation—Franco could have climbed back in the helicopter and left then and there.
But he couldn’t leave. He wouldn’t give frosty Ms Purman and her ice-blue eyes the satisfaction. She might be standing in his way now, frustrating his efforts to get a quick closure, but he’d get what he’d come for.
He had to. He could not risk losing his distribution from the Chatsfield Family Trust. He would do a deal with the devil himself to save it.
So he swallowed down cold air smelling of damp earth and wet grass. He could not afford to antagonise this woman any more than he clearly already had, so he would not rise to her bait, but that didn’t mean he must take her barbs and insults lying down. He might at least call her on it.