Italian Invader

by Jessica Steele

  From Back Cover…

  What Max wanted, Max got

  And Max wanted Elyn…in Italy…close to him. To keep an eye on her to determine if she was spying for her former company—at least that's what Elyn thought. After all, what other explanation could there be for her sudden transfer right after Max accused her of corporate espionage?

  Whatever the circumstances, Elyn was determined to make the best of the situation—she'd just stay out of Max's way. But that was impossible once the two were snowbound in a mountain cabin—especially when Max demanded Elyn's full attention!

  Excerpt…

  "Move in here."

  When Elyn didn't respond, Max tried again. "You can leave your hotel and move in here to look after me."

  "M-move in here?" she finally exclaimed, staring at him thunderstruck, her heartbeat racing at just that very thought. "I'm not doing anything of the kind!"

  "You don't think you owe me something?"

  "Not that much!" Elyn retorted.

  "Even though it's your fault that I can't look after myself?" Max's tone was challenging and Elyn found her resolve was weakening.

  Italian Invader

  by

  Jessica Steele

  CHAPTER ONE

  Elyn gripped the telephone and waited anxiously while the hotel telephonist rang her mother and stepfather's room.

  'I'm sorry,' the telephonist came back on the line to inform her, 'they're not answering. Would you like to leave a message? I can have it sent to their room for their return.'

  The woman's tone was pleasant, and somehow Elyn managed to hold down her rising sense of panic. 'My name is Elyn Talbot. Would you ask either of them to ring me, as a matter of some urgency, please,' she re­quested, finding an equally pleasant tone.

  She replaced the phone, owning that, although she had always thought herself level-headed and not given to panicking, she was on the verge of panicking now.

  She glanced at the pages of figures she had just re-checked for the umpteenth time, and suddenly felt the need to clear her head. She knew, as she slipped the pages of figure-work into her desk drawer and locked it, that things could not be worse. So it was with a vain hope that perhaps matters would not look so terrifyingly black when she returned that she shrugged into her coat, and decided to take herself off for a walk.

  First, though, the need to share the dreadfulness of her knowledge took her in the direction of the design department where her gifted stepbrother worked. Not that Guy would be able to help in any way, but it was such a frightening burden to carry alone.

  Had Samuel Pillinger, her stepfather and owner of Pillinger Ceramics, been anywhere around she would at once have gone to him to report that it did not look as if they'd be able to pay the staff wages at the end of the month, let alone their suppliers. But he wasn't around. Even after she had warned him, yet again, how bad things were, he had still carried out his promise to take her mother to London for a few days' break.

  Break! They were broke, Elyn thought humourlessly, and turned the handle of the design section door and went in. 'Guy not around?' she asked Hugh Burrell, a man she had no liking for, albeit that he was quite good at his job.

  Hugh Burrell didn't like her either, she knew that. He had taken a dislike to her ever since that day a couple of years ago when he'd asked her out and she'd de­clined. Stuck-up, he'd called her. But it wasn't that she was stuck-up, but that, apart from the fact that there was something about the sly-eyed look of him she couldn't take to, she made it a rule never to date anyone from work. She had done so once, only to discover af­terwards that the man thought that entitled him to special privileges at work.

  'He's at the dentist,' Hugh Burrell answered, his foxy eyes making a meal of her long honey-blonde hair and trim figure.

  'Thanks,' she murmured, and realising that she was so worried that she had forgotten Guy had said at breakfast that he'd a dental appointment this morning, Hugh Burrell's stare was making her flesh creep, and she walked out.

  Ten minutes later, having made it to the parkland side of Bovington, she slowed her pace and, despite its being a cold October day, she sank down on to one of the wooden benches scattered about—and felt not one whit better for her ten-minute walk.

  Worried she fretted again and again on how, from the beginning of the year, she had tried to warn Sam Pillinger about exactly how bad things were getting. But, like his son, more artist than academic, he'd either not believed things were as desperate as she said, or had de­cided, like Mr Micawber, that something would turn up.

  But nothing had turned up. Though, when Elyn had insisted on going through last month's figures with him, she had thought she was finally beginning to get through. 'As bad as that, eh!' he had commented, chewing thoughtfully on his pipe. But, when Elyn had been hoping he might add something constructive about how they were going to survive should the rumours be true that one of their chief outlets was going bust, all she got was his opinion that the rumours were just scaremongering. To which he had added a few bitter comments on how he blamed any failing of his own business on the newcomer, Maximilian Zappelli.

  In point of fact, Elyn recalled, Maximilian Zappelli had taken over the ailing firm of Gradburns in the next town of Pinwich about two years ago—and promptly started to make it profitable! Signor Zappelli already had an extremely prosperous business in marble and mosaics in Italy, so Elyn realised he must have deemed that to have a ceramics connection in England would be a sound business move. In the process of making Gradburns a going concern, however, he had taken quite a chunk of Pillingers' trade and, with Pinwich not ten miles away from Bovington, quite a few of their highly specialised staff too.

  That in itself, Elyn felt, was reason enough not to like him. After all, Pillingers had trained them—and he had poached them.

  A strand of fairness gave her a nudge to suggest that, since Maximilian Zappelli spent more time in Italy than he did in England, it was probable his manager was the one who had poached some of their key workers.

  Seated on her bench, she sank her hands into her pockets in an irritated gesture, her beautiful green eyes staring unseeingly in front of her. That still didn't mean that she liked Maximilian Zappelli any better! Not that she'd ever met him—or wanted to! But she knew his type. He'd been in the papers again only the other day. For an Italian, said to be living for the most part in Italy, he certainly had his share of publicity in the British Press, she thought sourly.

  He hadn't been alone, she recalled without effort. But then he never was! As if the picture was still in front of her she again saw the tall, dark-haired, evening-suited mid-thirties male with an elegant and beautiful female on his arm. Naturally he'd be squiring some woman around, and naturally she'd be beautiful—and nat­urally, she'd be a different female from the one he'd hit the headlines with the last time.

  Men like him—philanderer, Elyn had dubbed him— made her cross. The worst of it was that women fell for that sort of man in droves. She had no need to look further than her stepsister Loraine to know that.

  Not that Loraine had ever met Maximilian Zappelli either, but Loraine seemed to have an inbuilt penchant for the Casanova type and lurched from one disastrous relationship to another.

  Strangely though, Elyn mused, considering her mother had been through the same ghastly experience at the hands of a womaniser, she seemed to have little sym­pathy for her stepdaughter. Nor did Sam Pillinger seem to be able to cope with having his much indulged daughter weeping about the place. So it was left to Elyn to cope when Loraine wailed, 'But I thought he loved me,' and Elyn it was who soothed and sympathised— until Loraine was ready to pitch headlong into her next disaster. There was nothing Elyn could do but watch. But she knew the philandering type! And hated them!
Never would she have any truck with a man of that sort. Her own father had been the same—all charm and no substance.

  Elyn remembered her childhood as being a most be­wildering time. She had been a quiet and sensitive child who loved both her parents, but who shrank into herself at the violence of their arguments. For either her parents were all in all to each other, or there would be raised voices with crockery flying. She remembered frequent other times seeing her mother distressed and alone when Jack Talbot would go off for weeks at a time—and re­called yet more rows, more tears and recriminations when, as always, he came back. Loving her father as she did, it had been painful to learn at an early age that life was much more peaceful when he was not at home.

  She had been twelve years old when her father had again done a disappearing trick. It was the last time. Ann Talbot had divorced him, and Elyn, keeping her hurt to herself, had not seen him since.

  Only much later had she learned of the many affairs her mother had forgiven him, of the many times she had believed in his protestations of love and how it would never happen again—until, after one affair too many, she had finally thrown in the towel.

  Her mother had been working part-time then at Pillingers, the ceramic art manufacturers, and they had gone through an alarming period when her suspicion that maintenance due from her ex-husband would never ma­terialise became fact. For an age they had gone through an absolutely dreadful and frightening time of scraping along to try and keep ahead of the bills, and never quite making it. They were still owing money when Ann Talbot managed to switch to a full-time vacancy at Pillingers, and she had continued to struggle to pay off their debts.

  Things had started to look up, however, when some while later her mother introduced her to her employ­er, the widowed Samuel Pillinger, and shortly after that asked her how she'd feel about having him for a stepfather.

  'You're going to marry him?' Elyn had asked, wide-eyed, going on fifteen and romantic. 'You're in love with him?'

  'I've had love—you can keep it,' her mother had re­plied coldly. 'Sam Pillinger's about the best bargain going, and it's time I looked after number one.'

  Elyn supposed she couldn't blame her mother that she had toughened up a little since, dewy-eyed, she had gone into her first marriage, so she suppressed her shock and told her mother, 'I want you to be happy.'

  'I will be,' her mother had declared firmly.

  A month later Ann had married her employer, and she and Elyn had moved out of their rented accom­modation and into the large and rambling lovely old house where Samuel Pillinger lived with his fifteen-year-old son and seventeen-year-old daughter and Mrs Munslow, their housekeeper.

  Although the new Mrs Pillinger gave up her job, she saw no reason whatsoever to dispense with Madge Munslow's services, and in no time life at the Grange had settled down very pleasantly.

  Elyn liked both her stepsister Loraine and her step­brother Guy, and swiftly took to Mrs Munslow. Though it was Guy, a quiet and shy boy, with whom she spent most time. Loraine was finding the company of the op­posite sex of much more interest than a pair of fifteen-year-olds.

  In the next year Elyn grew fond of her new family, discovering her stepfather to be a kind man who, to her great relief, was true to his wife. A man who said little and believed in the work ethic.

  That belief, however, did not extend to cover his daughter. Loraine was clearly his favourite, and was able to twist him around her little finger—she got away with murder! Loraine decided at sixteen that she'd had enough of school, and left. She decided, too, that she didn't want a job or career—and, with her father happy to give her a generous allowance, did not seek one.

  It was different for Elyn and Guy, though. When they were sixteen and thinking about careers, it was Samuel Pillinger's view that they should forget about any further education nonsense and start building a career in the ceramic art world.

  'You want us to start work at the studios?' Guy had asked.

  'Why not?' his father had responded. 'It'll be yours one day, yours and Loraine's. Elyn will have a stake in it too.' He smiled in her direction. 'Now, what I suggest is that you go through each department in turn, and…'

  That conversation had taken place six years ago, Elyn reflected as she glanced at her watch and realised, just in case Sam and her mother had returned to their hotel and had been trying to contact her, that she'd better go back to her office.

  They had, for the most part, been six happy years, she recalled as she headed back the way she had come. She and Guy had spent six months in each of the de­partments, from slip-room through moulding and mod­elling, firing and decorating, not forgetting the administration side of the business. Elyn had an out­standing ability where figures were concerned, and it was in that section that she shone.

  'Why, you're brilliant!' her stepfather had exclaimed when in no time she had caught up on his backlog of confidential paperwork. And from that day he had left her to take care of anything confidential and to learn all she could of office procedures, and gone back to spend a large slice of his time in his beloved design section where, this being an area where his son shone, he had set about teaching him all he knew.

  As year by year someone either retired or left to work elsewhere, so gradually, and by dint of dedicated effort, Elyn worked her way to the top. She had owned to feeling a little startled at waking up one morning the previous year to realise that, at twenty-one, she was the one ul­timately in charge of everything relating to administration.

  She re-entered the gates of Pillingers and realised that, if her calculations were correct, there would be nothing for her to be in charge of! Sorely did she wish she had made a miscalculation somewhere—but she knew she hadn't.

  She decided against going to seek Guy out again. It was seldom that she went to the design section, and if anyone had heard a whisper about Huttons, their main outlet, going broke, then, knowing how rumours spread from department to department like wildfire, she didn't want any speculative rumour starting up that she had urgently been trying to get in touch with the owner's son.

  Back in her office, her first action was to pick up the phone. 'Any calls for me, Rachel? I had to pop out for a while.'

  'No, none,' Rachel answered.

  'Thanks. Oh, can you give me an outside line?' Elyn asked, as though she'd only then remembered that she wanted to make a call.

  A minute later and Elyn was asking the hotel tele­phonist if either Mr or Mrs Samuel Pillinger was available.

  'Just one moment, please,' the telephonist replied politely—and Elyn waited.

  She waited quite some while, but only realised just how anxious and upset she was when she heard her step­father answer, 'Hello?' and felt she could have easily burst into tears.

  'Sam, it's me, Elyn.'

  'Hello, love. Just been reading a message from you. You're, lucky you've caught us. We only came back be­cause your mother wanted to change her shoes. She…'

  'Sam, listen to me—it's urgent,' Elyn cut him off—if her mother's feet were suffering from doing too much sightseeing then she couldn't feel a hundred per cent sympathetic right now.

  'I'm listening,' he invited.

  Elyn took a deep breath, and while knowing that no one could possibly overhear, she stated quietly, 'Keith Ipsley rang me this morning…' She paused as she took another steadying breath. 'Huttons have folded.'

  'Folded! Gone bust, you mean?'

  'That's what I mean,' she replied as evenly as she could.

  'But—but, we were expecting a cheque from them—My stars, they owe us thousands!'

  'I know. Which is why I rang them as soon as I got the tip-off. I'm sorry, Sam,' she had to tell him reluc­tantly, 'they've got the receivers in. We'll be lucky if we get ten pence in the pound, and lord knows how long we'll have to wait for that.'

  It took him but seconds to digest what she had said, then he said what she'd been hoping he would say. 'I'd better come home,' he stated flatly, and as Elyn guessed her mother hadn't
liked the sound of that and had made some sound to remind him of her presence. 'Er—do you want a word with Ann?'

  'Not right now,' Elyn said gently, and said goodbye, to put down the phone knowing that, love her parent though she might, things were so grave at the Bovington end, she hadn't the heart for idle chit-chat.

  Elyn tried to immerse herself in some work in the fol­lowing hours, but her thoughts kept returning again and again to the knock on effect of Huttons' calling in the official receiver. Part of the amount outstanding from Huttons had been promised without fail for this week, and was needed. She supposed she should be grateful that Keith Ipsley, Huttons' chief clerk, had felt so per­sonally responsible that he couldn't keep his word about that cheque that he'd had the decency to tip her off.

  Not that she could blame him about his broken promise over the cheque. It wasn't his fault that his firm had gone under. Poor man, things weren't very rosy for him either. From yesterday being chief clerk at the repu­table firm of Huttons, he was, from that morning, like the rest of the Huttons payroll, without a job.

  When the stark reality hit her that she too, not to mention the rest of the Pillinger workforce, would be without a job unless by some miracle Sam could see a way out that she couldn't, Elyn loaded her briefcase and went home. Knowing what she knew, she would have a hard time looking the tea girl in the eye, let alone anyone else.

  She guessed that Sam would drop her mother off first, but there was no sign of his car on the drive. Elyn went to the kitchen where the big motherly-looking woman she had gown so fond of stood with her hands up to her elbows in flour.

  'What are you doing home?' Madge Munslow looked up in surprise, a special smile of warmth on her mouth for the mistress's daughter.

  'Playing truant,' Elyn returned her smile, while a sick feeling hit her stomach as it dawned on her that there was every possibility that they wouldn't be able to afford Madge for much longer. Oh, dear lord, Madge was past sixty, and now had extra help in the house, but who would take her on if they had to let her go? 'In case neither my mother nor Mr Pillinger have phoned, they're coming back some time today, not tomorrow, as planned,' Elyn told her in a rush.