Tycoon's Temptation

by Trish Morey

  Her hands were in her hair, her nails pressing into her scalp. She could not be hearing this. ‘What are you saying?’

  ‘I did it for the money, Holly. I only ever did it for the money. I came here wanting your signature so that I could keep my share of the Chatsfield empire’s income.’

  It made no sense to Holly. She’d thought that her declaration of the impending contract would put a full stop on their relationship, but not now, just in a day or two, when the contract was signed. And until then, she’d still have those days and nights.

  But now? He was telling her he’d never been interested in their wines, just the signature on a contract …

  And the gears and cogs of her mind turned back a few short weeks and she remembered a man who had come here in one God-awful hurry, and not been interested in the vineyard or the winery or the cellar door or anything more than getting their signature on the dotted line.

  ‘You never did care about any of it,’ she said, thinking back as all the pieces fell into place. ‘You didn’t even want to taste our wine. And that’s why. Because it didn’t matter to you.’ She looked up at him then and asked him how much. He named an annual figure and she closed her eyes again.

  She should be flattered, she guessed. That was one almighty signing fee.

  And not the only fee he’d extracted from this deal.

  Oh, God, she was all kinds of stupid. She’d offered herself to him on a silver platter.

  How old did you have to be before you learned when you were being played? How many times did you have to fall for the worst kind of man—the one who said pretty words and sounded like he meant them when all the time he was just stringing you along?

  ‘So what was I?’ she demanded, her voice becoming shrill and there was no way she could prevent it. ‘The bonus?’

  ‘Holly, that had nothing to do with it.’

  ‘Really? Because that’s how it looks to me, Franco. That’s very much how it looks to me. You get a gold-plated deal and a lovely commission and take whatever you can get on the side.’

  ‘You offered! You practically begged me to make love to you! To help you out with your little problem. Don’t you remember?’

  She shrugged his words away. Nothing he could say could make up for what he had done. ‘What kind of low-life are you? We trusted you, Gus and me, and you reward that trust by treating us like some kind of keys to your fortune?’

  ‘Then don’t sign!’ he said. ‘I don’t want you to sign. Forget I was ever here.’

  ‘I’ll forget you ever lived, Franco Chatsfield!’ she cried as the best day of her life rapidly turned into the worst. ‘Just go!’

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  WINTER MOVED INTO spring. The days grew slowly warmer and sunnier. There was always something to do, always work in the vineyard or the cellar door or even about the house, and yet for Holly, day dragged wearily after day. Even bud burst, usually her favourite time of year as the vines burst back into life, failed to lift her spirits.

  Gus did his best to cheer her up, she knew, and she loved him for it. But she didn’t have the heart to laugh at his stories any more. She tried to, she really did, but she just didn’t have the heart for anything. Somebody else had ripped her heart away.

  Franco.

  ‘You’ll be all right,’ Gus encouraged her one evening as she picked at her food. ‘You’ll get over him. He wasn’t good enough for you, just like that other bloke.’

  And she smiled at her grandfather and nodded, because she loved him, but Franco hadn’t been like that other bloke at all. She’d never loved Mark Turner, she’d known that for years now. She’d been young and flattered and in love with the idea of being in love, and then she’d been devastated when he’d turned around and walked away and done all he could to trash their brand into the deal. So hurt that she’d turned her hurt into anger and blamed it all on the grandfather who had done her such a big favour by getting rid of him.

  There was no comparison between the two.

  Loving Franco had shown her what love was. And loving Franco had shown her what it really felt like to experience deep, gut-wrenching hurt.

  So she smiled for her grandfather and did what she had to do in the vineyard, while inside she grieved for what she had lost.

  Then one night she needed to look something up and was searching for a book on winemaking in the study when she came across the wrappedup package that Franco had left behind when he’d thrown his clothes into a bag in a Sydney hotel room, and disappeared from her life. She’d put it in her luggage and brought it home, meaning to send it on.

  She forgot about the book as she looked at the wrapping. It was just a photograph—it wouldn’t hurt to have a look, she reasoned. They’d been there together that day after all. She slipped a nail under the tape and eased it off, unwrapping the paper from the frame.

  The mother koala looked into the lens, inquisitive but not bothered, a twig of gum leaves clutched in one paw, while the joey nestled against her chest. But it was the words engraved on the gold plate underneath that drew her eye, words written in both Italian and English.

  For Nikki’s Ward,

  dedicated to the memory of Nikki.

  And then a date.

  Curious, she went to her computer and searched and found and read a webpage about a hospital in Italy with a ward for children with kidney disease, Nikki’s Ward, that was funded entirely by one Franco Chatsfield.

  There was a picture of a little girl with large, grey eyes and wavy long sandy hair, and a vice clamped hard around her heart because she didn’t have to read any more to know whose child she was.

  Franco’s child.

  He hadn’t given up his kidney for his friend. It had been to save his own daughter’s life. Except it hadn’t.

  And she thought about the scar at his side and how much it must cost to run a ward for children with kidney disease, and her heart ached for a man with secrets.

  A man she would never see again.

  He was helping with the harvest when he heard the news. He’d returned to Italy and thrown himself into work, but he couldn’t sit still in his office for five minutes, he couldn’t focus. So he helped out with the harvest instead. He picked the grapes that had rescued him once before, when he was just a teenager running away from a family he thought didn’t want him and where he could never see himself belonging.

  And one day, after a day’s picking, he’d returned to his office and found an email from Christos Giatrakos waiting for him, an email he’d almost deleted, until he’d registered the subject line.

  From: Christos.Giatrakos@TheChatsfield.com

  To: Franco.Chatsfield@TheChatsfield.com

  Subject: CONGRATULATIONS

  Purman Wines has signed and returned their contract with the Chatsfields. As per our agreement, your entitlements under the Chatsfield Family Trust will continue.

  I would also like to extend an invitation to the shareholders’ meeting in August. More info to follow.

  C.G.

  Franco could barely believe the words. He’d sat and stared a long time at that email.

  And he’d wondered about a woman who was full of surprises.

  And who’d just given him the biggest surprise of them all.

  The cellar door had been busy with a couple of last-minute bus tours and Holly had sent Josh home before finishing the dishes and hanging up the last few glasses in the racks herself. Josh had a date with Rachel from the bakery again and she was happy for him, even though he’d looked guilty about going out to have fun and leaving her finishing up.

  She didn’t mind. Sooner or later she’d get over Franco, and until then, she might as well stay busy. That was the good thing about working in a vineyard and winery—there was always something to do, even if it couldn’t stop her thinking.

  Did Franco ever stop to think about her? Probably not. He was probably relieved to have escaped at last, back to his own vines in Italy where the women no doubt looked like women. Did he hav
e a woman now?

  She shook her head as she racked the last glass and gave the bench top a final wipe down. Sometimes it didn’t pay to think.

  She heard the crunch of gravel and the growl of an engine outside and cursed herself for worrying about the dishes before bringing in the open sign. She glanced out the window, seeing the bonnet of a flashy red car pulled up outside. Typical, she thought, someone down from the big smoke trying to cram in as many wineries as they could for the day. She was glad she’d sent Josh home because he would have stayed for the duration, whereas she wasn’t in the mood to be hospitable.

  ‘I’m sorry, we’re actually closed,’ she said, busy wiping down the sink as the door swung open behind her. There was no time to waste on pleasantries.

  ‘I’m not here to taste.’

  Her hands stilled on the sink’s edge and she used them to hold herself up.

  She spun around and found Franco standing in the doorway, larger than life, his chiselled Chatsfield good looks even more beautiful than she remembered.

  ‘I called by the house. Gus said you were here. He’s walking. He looks good.’

  And a shiver ran down her spine. She knew he hadn’t come to see how Gus was. ‘Is there a problem with the wine?’ They’d recently sent a batch of the sparkling Rubida to London for Gene Chatsfield’s upcoming wedding. ‘If anything’s happened …’

  He shook his head. ‘It’s good. All good.’ But then he frowned. ‘What happened to the khaki uniform?’

  Holly glanced down at her fitted floral dress—the result of a spontaneous shopping trip to Adelaide the day she’d gone to disgorge and dosage the order for Gene’s wedding. Because after working there alone, in that space, after the day she’d spent working there with Franco, she’d needed cheering up. She’d spent a lot of money in her effort to cheer up and it had worked too, for all of five minutes.

  But the dress had become one of her spring favourites with its square neck and cap sleeves and it made her feel good wearing it.

  ‘I save that for when I’m working in the vineyard.’

  He nodded, approval in his eyes. ‘You look good.’

  So do you. ‘Thank you.’

  He just continued to stare at her with those grey eyes and she let him because it gave her an excuse to stare right back at him. How many nights had she lain awake thinking of Franco? Remembering Franco? Picturing him in her mind’s eye? And yet her memories had done the man an injustice. He was taller somehow, his shoulders broader, his features more chiselled, his olive skin darker, like he’d spent time working outside under a Piacenzan sun.

  He was so beautiful it ached to look at him, knowing she’d been in his orbit for a time—such a short time—until their paths had spun them apart in different directions and she’d lost him.

  It hurt even more to feel the tiny flicker of hope that curled from her heart, knowing how likely and how easily it would be extinguished. She forced herself not to let it catch.

  ‘So … why are you here?’

  He blinked like he’d lost his way and had to find his way back.

  ‘Why did you sign?’

  A nerve twitched in her cheek. She squared her shoulders, strangely disappointed. ‘It’s a good deal. Too good to turn down. Already Chatsfield’s is apparently working on a new marketing campaign featuring the new menus and wine choices. It’s all good.’

  ‘You didn’t have to sign.’

  ‘I know. I didn’t do it for you.’ She hadn’t done it for Nikki’s Ward either—in spite of what had happened, Gus and Holly had signed the week after she’d won the award and she hadn’t known about Nikki’s Ward then.

  He turned and raked a hand through his hair and it was killing her to see him looking so tortured but she had her own pain to deal with. She couldn’t take his on too. Not if all he was bringing was more pain. Not if this tiny flicker of hope so valiantly persisting in her chest was only going to be quashed. She crossed her arms to protect the feeble flame.

  ‘So if that’s all? Because we’re closed.’

  He took a wavering step closer. ‘Holly, when I left, I left something behind.’

  The picture. Nikki’s picture.

  And she had to close her eyes as that flicker of hope fizzled into nothingness.

  ‘I’m sorry, Franco. You didn’t have to come all this way. I was going to post the photo. I just hadn’t—’ been able to bring myself to do it ‘—got around to it.’

  ‘Thank you,’ he said. ‘But I’m not here for the photograph. But first, I have to explain something.’

  Her heart skipped a beat. But she had something to tell him too. ‘I know about Nikki’s Ward.’

  ‘You do? But—’

  ‘The photo. I opened it. I saw the plaque. I looked up Nikki’s Ward on the computer—it wasn’t hard. You founded that ward, Franco, and you fund it. I don’t know how much it would cost to run, but I’m guessing you rely on those distributions from the Chatsfield Family Trust. And that’s why you needed that contract signed. That’s why you were so determined to stay until you had secured it. Am I warm?’

  His grey eyes surveyed her, and he gave the merest dip of his head in acknowledgement.

  ‘Nikki was your daughter. She was the one you donated your kidney to.’

  He shook his head and looked at the floor, and when he raised his head again he smiled softly. ‘I never even knew I had a daughter until she was five. I probably would never have known—except she was sick and her mother came looking for me. The only hope was to find a match for a kidney transplant. I was her best chance and I was that match.’

  Oh, Franco. And her heart went out to him, because she knew how this story ended, and she knew what it was costing him to even talk about it, but she didn’t move an inch. Didn’t budge. Because this was his story and he had to tell it.

  ‘There was a window of hope, where we thought that she would be okay, but eventually her little body rejected it, and she caught infection after infection and withered slowly away before our eyes. I watched her die, and as she died, I promised myself I would never expose myself to hurt like that again.’

  She ached to hold him, to comfort him, but she dared not move. How could she move, when there was an ocean of pain to navigate between them?

  ‘Michele—her mother—and I broke up after that. There was too much pressure. Too much need. She was desperate for another child.’ He looked away. ‘But it wasn’t the same. We’d got back together for Nikki’s sake, but without Nikki …’ His voice cracked. ‘I just couldn’t go there.’

  ‘She was the one,’ she said, understanding. ‘The one you judged me against.’

  ‘Unfairly,’ he said, his grey eyes on her. ‘I know it was unfair. You were never anything like her. It took losing you to make me realize that.’

  Her heart skipped a beat.

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because when she left, I felt relief, like there was a chance for me to believe I might one day live again, however long it took. But when I left you …’

  She didn’t dare breathe. ‘What?’

  ‘It felt like my heart had been ripped from my chest—a heart I didn’t realise I had. I was numb all over again. Except this time, I’d brought it on myself.’

  She felt herself sway on the spot, her own heart thudding so hard and fast in her chest that she had to put a hand over it to stop it jumping right out. This was the moment she’d dreamed of so many times since he’d left, so surely she must be dreaming. But when she blinked and opened her eyes, he was still standing there across the room from her, and the hand over her chest felt hope dance inside.

  ‘I can’t imagine what it must be like,’ she said, ‘to lose a child.’

  He smiled a sad smile. ‘When Nikki died, it killed something inside me. I’d known her such a short time. An intense time. And after she died, there was simply nothing left of a heart that had been shattered into a million pieces, that I was sure could never be repaired. I knew I could never love again.’

>   He paused, baring his teeth, his lips pulled back tight as he breathed, as if it hurt. ‘I was wrong.’

  Part of her wanted to hope and dream he had come back for her and to throw herself into his arms, but she’d been in those arms before, only to have them push her away and that had been such a terrible thing. And she was still so very, very raw and she wasn’t sure she could endure it if it happened a second time. So instead she mustered every remaining shred of strength she could find, and asked, ‘What changed your mind?’

  He looked at her with those storm-tossed grey eyes and said, ‘You did.’

  Sensation zippered down her spine as the air was sucked from her lungs.

  ‘How?’ she whispered.

  ‘I’m not sure. But when I went back to Italy, I couldn’t settle at my desk. So I worked with the pickers on the harvest. We sat together for lunch in the shade of the vines. We talked and laughed and ate together, and that was better and I told myself I was happier, but still there was this heaviness in my chest that would not go away.

  ‘I thought it was emptiness, because my kidney scar aches and my kidney is gone. I convinced myself it was emptiness because I didn’t want to find another explanation.

  ‘Except that didn’t explain why it hurt more when I thought of you. If there was no heart, if I was just empty, I should feel nothing. And so I tried to put you out of my mind. I tried to forget, but there was no putting you out of my mind, just as there was no forgetting, and every time I thought of you, it hurt more and more.

  ‘Then I realised it hurt because my heart was there. Because, slowly and inexorably, you had put the pieces of my heart back together.’

  He looked at her and shrugged. ‘And I don’t even know how it happened. I told myself you weren’t my type and still I wanted you. I warned you not to be needy but if anyone is needy here it’s me. I needed you so much I had to come back, to find out if you could ever forgive me for what I did. To find out if you might feel a fraction of what I do.’

  Could a heart possibly thud any louder?

  ‘What do you feel?’

  ‘Empty without you. Because I need you by my side. I need you in my bed. I want you for my wife. And all because I love you, Holly. I want to be whole again and I cannot see how I can be whole without you, without a lifetime of you by my side.’