“You want to be civil?” Angelo shot her a curling smile that sent shivers racing up and down her spine. “Let’s play that game, then. What have you been up to for the past few years? Still trawling cocktail bars in search of wealthy men?”
“I never did that.”
“So many things we disagree on.” Yet it hadn’t always been that way. Before everything had collapsed, he had considered her to be the best thing ever to have happened to him. Just thinking about it now made something deep inside him twist with pain.
“I...I haven’t done any waitressing for a while,” Rosie told him, determined to keep the conversation as remote and as polite as possible. She knew that what she should really be doing was leaving, walking away, but she couldn’t fight the small cowardly part of her that wanted just a little bit longer in his company because, like it or not, such a big part of her was still wrapped up in him.
“In fact, I finished at catering college a couple of years ago and I’ve been cooking at one of the top restaurants in London ever since. It’s hard work, but I enjoy it.”
“I can’t picture you behind the scenes. Nor can I picture you giving up a lucrative lifestyle of generous tips to take a pay cut.”
Rosie flushed. “I don’t care whether you can picture it or not. It’s the truth. You know I always wanted to go into the food business.”
“I stopped believing what I thought I knew about you a long time ago. But you’re right. Who wants to waste time bickering over a piece of history that has little relevance now? Let’s change the subject. Have you managed to net some poor guy? I can’t imagine you’d still be single after all this time.”
Angelo had no idea what possessed him to ask that question, but why fight the truth? It was something he had wondered about over the years. He didn’t like himself for his curiosity, not about a woman he had so thoroughly eliminated from his life. But, like some low-level virus, the question had circulated in his bloodstream, pernicious and resistant to the passage of time.
Rosie stilled. She could feel the sudden grip of clammy perspiration.
“I’m still single.” She tried to laugh but there was a nervous edge to her laughter.
Angelo looked at her narrowly, head tilted to one side. He hadn’t seen her for years, yet it seemed that he could still tune in to the nuances in her voice, the slight pauses and small hesitations that were always a clue as to what was going through her head. So there was a man in her life. His lips thinned as the silence hummed between them, broken only by the hushed voices of the people waiting to enter the crematorium.
“Now, why is it that I don’t quite believe that?” he asked softly. “Why lie, Rosie? Do you think I care one way or the other what’s going on in your life?”
“I know you don’t. And it’s none of your business whether I have someone in my life or not.” She was tempted to tell him about Ian, to pretend that there was someone significant in her life, but she couldn’t bring herself to lie. In fact, just the thought of Ian made her feel a little ill.
“I should go,” she said with a hint of desperation. She took a couple of steps back and nearly stumbled. She was no longer accustomed to wearing heels.
“Good idea,” Angelo said smoothly. “And then we can put an end to this charade of pretending that we’re actually interested in each other’s lives.” He turned away abruptly, but couldn’t walk away because the group who had attended the cremation, now standing outside, was splintering apart.
Rosie guessed that they would be making their separate ways to whatever pub they intended to go to. She saw Lizzy give her a little wave and wondered what the other woman must be thinking—that a friend had rolled up and after a three-year absence had shown surface interest before disappearing outside with the husband of the deceased.
She had barely paid attention to any of the other people there, but now she could recognise that a short, rotund man bearing down on them had also been there in the front row and she forced herself to stand her ground. As did Angelo, although once again she saw him glance at his watch.
She wondered what their marriage had been like. She had walked away and never looked back. Had they been happy? She couldn’t think so, but who knew?
“Foreman.”
Angelo greeted the man curtly before reluctantly turning around to make introductions.
It seemed that James Foreman was a lawyer.
“Nothing big and fancy.” James extended his hand out to Rosie. “Small practice near Twickenham. Brr, cold out here, isn’t it? Still, what can you expect in the middle of February?” He seemed to suddenly remember that he was at a funeral and altered his tone accordingly. “Terrible shame, all this. Terrible shame.”
“Miss Tom is in a bit of a rush, Foreman.”
Rosie nodded awkwardly. “I’m afraid I won’t be able to make it to the pub—one of Amanda’s friends mentioned that everyone would be gathering there to pay their respects. I’ve travelled all the way from East London and I really need to be getting along.”
“Of course, of course! But I need to corral the pair of you for a word.” James Foreman looked around him with a little frown, as though searching for somewhere convenient into which the corralling could take place. Rosie, by now, was thoroughly confused. More than anything else, she wanted to be gone. It had been a mistake seeing Angelo again. That part of her life was a chapter that should be firmly closed. Coming here had reopened it and now she knew that their brief, embittered encounter would prey on her mind for weeks ahead.
“What’s this about, Foreman?” Angelo asked in a clipped voice.
“Stroke of luck finding you both here. Of course, Mr Di Capua, I knew that you would be here but... Well, put it this way, Miss Tom, it’s saved me a bit of bother tracking you down...not that it would have been difficult. All part of the business.”
“Cut to the chase, Foreman.”
“It’s about a will.”
Rosie had no idea what this had to do with her. She did know, however, that the longer she stood still the colder it felt. She glanced across to Angelo, her eyes drawn to the harsh, beautiful lines of his face like the unerring and dangerous tug of a moth towards an open flame.
The last conversation they had ever had was imprinted on her brain. The coldness in his eyes, the contempt in his voice when he had told her that he wanted nothing more to do with her. They had been dating for nearly a year, the most wonderful year of her entire life. She had not stopped marvelling at how this terrific, wealthy, sophisticated guy had pursued her. Later he had told her that the second he had laid eyes on her he had wanted her, and that he was a man who always got what he wanted. He had certainly got her and she had been on cloud nine.
Of course, on the home front, things had not been quite so rosy. Jack’s problems had been deteriorating steadily and Amanda... How could she not have guessed that, whilst she had been waxing lyrical about the love of her life, her best friend had been busily storing up jealousy and resentments that would one day spill over into the horror story from which none of them had emerged intact?
While the past threatened to overwhelm her, James Foreman was still talking in a low voice, ushering them away from the chapel and towards the car park which was shrouded in darkness.
“Hang on a minute.” Rosie stopped dead in her tracks and the other two men turned to look at her. “I don’t know what’s going on here and I don’t care. I need to get back home.”
“Have you been listening to a word Foreman’s been saying?”
Actually, no, she hadn’t. “So Amanda left a will. I don’t see what that has to do with me. I haven’t seen her for over three years.” She looked apologetically at the lawyer who probably hadn’t a clue what was going on. “We had a bit of a falling out, Mr Foreman. Amanda and I used to be friends, but something happened. I only came here because I felt sad about how things ha
d ended between us.”
“I know all about the falling out, my dear.”
“Do you? How?”
“Your friend—”
“Ex-friend.”
“Your ex-friend was a very vulnerable and confused young woman. She came to see me when...eh...she was having certain difficulties...”
“Difficulties? What difficulties?” Rosie laughed bitterly. Mandy had played her cards right and she had got exactly what she had wanted—Angelo Di Capua. “All’s fair in love and war,” she had once said to Rosie when they were fifteen. Rosie had come to see just how tightly her so-called friend had been prepared to cling to that outlook.
“Not for me to say at this juncture. Look, why don’t we nip to a little bistro I know not far from here? It should be relatively quiet at this hour and it would save you both the hassle of coming to my office in the morning. My car’s in the car park so we could go right now. Mr Di Capua, perhaps your driver could come and collect you in an hour or so?”
They were virtually at his car and Rosie heard Angelo click his tongue impatiently but he shrugged and made a brief phone call before sliding into the passenger seat, leaving her to clamber in the back. She felt as though she had no choice but to surrender to this turn of events. The short drive was completed in silence and twenty minutes later they were in a bistro which, as James Foreman had predicted, was fairly empty.
“I find it hard to believe that Amanda would leave a will,” Angelo said the second they were seated. “She had no one in her life. At least, no one of any significance.”
“You’d be surprised,” James Foreman murmured, his sharp eyes flicking between them.
“What were the difficulties you were talking about?” Rosie pressed. Next to her, Angelo’s hand, resting on the table, brought back sharp memories of how things had once been between them, cutting through the bitterness, leaving her dry-mouthed and panicked.
“Your friend was an emotional young woman carrying burdens she found difficult to cope with. She came to see me about a certain property she owned. I believe you know the property I’m talking about, Mr Di Capua—a certain cottage in Cornwall?” He turned to Rosie with a warmly sympathetic half-smile. “I understand the problems you both had. Over the years I built up a strong rapport with your friend. She was a needy soul and I became something of a father figure for her. My wife and I had her over many times for dinner. Indeed, we both did our best to counsel her on—”
“Are we ever destined to get to the point, Foreman?”
“The point is that the cottage was your wife’s prized possession, Mr Di Capua. She found refuge there.”
“Refuge from what?” Rosie interjected. She glanced across to Angelo’s hard, uncompromising profile and saw him flush darkly.
“We’re not here to discuss the state of my marriage,” Angelo bit out, meeting her puzzled stare with ice-cold eyes. “So she went a lot to the cottage.” He dragged his eyes away from her face. Hell, how was it that she could claw a reaction out of him? Was it possible that only this burning hatred could find a response in him?
“And the cottage belonged to her. In its entirety. Along with the acreage surrounding it. You recall, Mr Di Capua, she insisted shortly after you were married that you give it to her so that she could feel secure there and could be certain that it would never be taken away.”
“I recall,” Angelo said abruptly. “I agreed because I owned the estate alongside it. I could keep an eye on her.”
“Keep an eye on her? Why would you want to do that, Angelo?”
“Because.” Once again he looked at her. Once again he felt that surge of blistering, chaotic emotion which was a damn sight more than he had felt for the past few years. For as long as he could remember he had been completely dead inside. “Amanda had a problem with alcohol. She fancied the cottage because she wanted peace and quiet. On the other hand, with her fondness for the bottle, I couldn’t let her stay there without some form of supervision. She was unaware that I owned the estate abutting the cottage. I always made sure that one of my people was around to check on her now and again.”
“I can’t believe she started drinking. She was always so sure she wouldn’t go down that road.”
“Is that your convoluted way of asking me whether I drove her to drink?”
“Of course not!”
“Because you’re not sitting here at my request. Nor are you entitled to any explanations or niceties from me. You burned your bridges three years ago and lost the right to have a voice, as far as I am concerned.”
Rosie flushed bright red. She forgot that they both had an audience. The only person she was aware of was Angelo, looking at her with deep, dark hostility.
“You forget that I don’t even want to be here. Why should I? Why would I want to spend more time than absolutely necessary in your company?”
James Foreman cleared his throat and Angelo was the first to break the stranglehold of their stares.
“The cottage,” he said curtly. “Cut to the chase, man, and get on with it.”
“She left the cottage to you, Miss Tom.”
“Don’t be ridiculous!” Angelo cut in before Rosie had had time to assimilate what had been said to her. He placed both hands squarely on the table and leant forward, his body language bristling with intimidation, and the lawyer looked back at him with an apologetic smile.
“It’s all above board, Mr Di Capua. Amanda left the cottage to her friend.”
“Why on earth would she do that?” Rosie asked in bewilderment.
“Before you start getting any ideas,” Angelo gritted, looking at her, “over my dead body will you so much as put a foot over the threshold of that place.” He sat back and turned to stare at the lawyer who, for someone round-faced and sheepishly polite, was doing a good job of not being in the slightest bit cowed by a toweringly angry Angelo. A lesser man would have run for the hills at this point.
“I’m very much afraid that there’s very little you can do to prevent Miss Tom from accepting what has been willed to her,” James Foreman said, in the same apologetic voice. He looked at her with kindly eyes. “Whatever happened between you, my dear, there were regrets.”
“I wouldn’t dream of accepting anything Amanda may have left to me, Mr Foreman.”
“Well, hallelujah!” Angelo flung his hands up in a gesture of pure satisfaction, success rightfully accepted as his due. “So for once, we’re singing from the same song sheet. Now that this little charade is over, perhaps you two can get together and work out the paperwork to ensure that Miss Tom relinquishes whatever dodgy hold she may think she has on my property—which, in point of fact, will be a matter of necessity because I intend to develop it within the year. Now, if that’s all?”
“You always wanted to go into the catering business—am I right, Miss Tom?”
Rosie nodded dumbly. She felt as though she had been taken on a rollercoaster ride. Her thoughts were all over the place. Every part of her body was in a state of shock. All over again, and to her dismay, she was realising how powerfully Angelo Di Capua still affected her, despite her deep loathing of him.
“How did you know?”
“Amanda kept tabs on you without you realising it, I expect.” He shrugged. “With the Internet and social networks, it’s virtually impossible to remain anonymous these days. At any rate, you might want to think about what was behind this legacy to you. Of course, you must do what your heart tells you to do, but Amanda began cultivating the land around the cottage. There’s quite a bit of it, if I’m not mistaken.”
“This conversation is going nowhere!” Angelo insisted, making a slashing motion with his hand.
“It is my duty to explain the circumstances of this will,” the lawyer murmured, still looking at Rosie. “Amanda made plans of how the land was to be laid out, and what would grow where.�
�
“But she didn’t know that she would... She couldn’t possibly predict...”
“I think she knew, deep down, that she was not destined for a long life. I also think that she was working up the courage to contact you to give you the land. Fate got in the way.”
“This is so much to take in,” Rosie said, dazed. “Perhaps...perhaps I might just have a look at the cottage.” If nothing else, to see whether she might get full closure at least by visiting the place her one-time friend had obviously come to regard as a haven. Perhaps, more than attending a service in a chapel, visiting that cottage would be a better way to pay her final respects.
“Yes.” She made her mind up, although she didn’t dare look across to where Angelo was sitting in a silence far more threatening than any words. “Yes. I think, Mr Foreman, I would very much like to see that cottage.”
CHAPTER TWO
“YOU’RE WASTING YOUR time.” Angelo rounded on her the second the lawyer had disappeared back to his car, into the night. “You surface here from out of nowhere and suddenly you think you’re a cottage richer?”
Rosie looked up at him. He was one of the few men who towered above her when she was in heels. Once upon a time, that had made her feel very feminine and very protected. Now it made her feel intimidated.
“I don’t think anything of the sort.”
“No. Well, you moved very swiftly from wanting nothing to do with a dubious inheritance to informing us that you would be paying it a visit.” His chauffeur-driven luxury car pulled up alongside them and, as she tried to turn in the direction of the station, Angelo stepped out in front of her, blocking her path.
“Not so fast,” he said grimly.
“I need to get back.”
“Really? To whom?”
“There’s nothing to discuss, Angelo.”
“There’s a hell of a lot to discuss and we’ve only just begun. Get in the car.” He pulled open the car door and moved around so that he was now somehow cornering her into stepping into the long, powerful car. It remained gently purring while George, the guy with whom she had laughed on many an occasion in the past, stared straight ahead with a blank expression.
A Deal with Di Capua Page 2