Italian Invader

by Jessica Steele

  Even though her hopes had started to fade, she was all set to stay near the phone on the third day too. But as her stepfather ambled into the breakfast-room sifting through the morning's post he'd picked up from the hall en route, she was suddenly made startlingly aware that Zappelli Fine China were not going to telephone. Because suddenly her stepfather had halted stock-still and after studying the top envelope in his hands, he looked straight at her and demanded fiercely, 'What the hell are Zappelli's writing to you for?'

  Oh, dear, she thought, her stomach churning, and as her stepfather came and thrust the envelope at her she saw that the postage frank was emblazoned 'Zappelli Fine China'. This was something she hadn't thought of. 'I—er—hmm,' she coughed, 'I—um—applied for a job there.'

  'You did what?'

  'Well, I probably didn't get it,' she offered lamely.

  'Really, Elyn!' her mother exploded.

  'That's loyalty!' grunted Guy, and, with the exception of Loraine who wasn't down yet, the family en masse fell about her head.

  She had known there would be a row, to put it mildly, and for five minutes she put up with one after the other going for her. But then she started to get annoyed. 'It's all right for you to go on, Mother,' she cut her parent off in the middle of her what-an-ungrateful-creature-you-are monologue, 'and I'm sorry I've had to do what I've done, but we can't just sit here forever waiting for some­thing to turn up. Bills have to be paid somehow, and I just can't sit around adding to that debt without trying to do something about it. I know Zappelli is a dirty word, but their money's clean and they pay well. And,' she went on quickly when it looked as if her stepfather might erupt again, 'as I said, I probably didn't get the job anyway.'

  'Perhaps you'd like to read your letter and let us know, so we can all wave a flag,' Ann Pillinger sniffed sarcastically.

  Without enthusiasm, Elyn slit the envelope. Only then did she realise how very much she wanted the job. But as she unfolded the single sheet of paper and discovered that she had indeed got it, she felt none of the elation she might earlier have felt.

  'I start on the second of January,' she stated flatly.

  Her stepfather ignored her completely. 'Would you pass the toast, Ann?' he requested.

  Elyn loved her family—but damn the lot of them, she fumed when fifteen minutes later she took herself off for a walk. It was like a funeral parlour back at the house. Heavens, you'd have thought she'd committed some cardinal sin!

  She wouldn't have been at all surprised to have seen the curtains drawn, the house in mourning, when she returned an hour later. She supposed she'd better go in and make her peace.

  Her stepfather was just coming out as she went in, and to her horror it seemed as though he intended to walk by her without a word, ignore her! 'Still hate me?' she asked him in a rush.

  He stopped, paused, then looked her straight in the eye. She bore his look without flinching. 'Are you going to take that job?' he asked.

  Steadily, she looked back, 'Yes,' she replied quietly, 'I am.'

  She waited, fully expecting him to retort something pithy, but somehow she just couldn't back down. It might seem a crime in his eyes, but they needed the money. But then, to her relief, 'Who could hate you?' he grunted gruffly. 'Your motives are the best, I know that.'

  'Oh, Sam!' she cried, and hugged him, and felt so much better when he hugged her back before he went meandering on his way.

  Christmas passed quietly, with her mother thawing to her just a little, but with her stepbrother still very put out because she was joining a firm who he bitterly be­lieved had played a major part in the demise of a firm that one day would have been his.

  Elyn spent some of January the first, the national holiday, in pressing some of her good quality working suits, and in generally checking her wardrobe and making sure she had everything ready for the morrow.

  She had not expected anyone to wish her luck the next morning, nor did they, but as she got up from the breakfast table, to her pleasure and surprise, she heard her mother say, 'Elyn, I'll run you to the station if you like.'

  'Thanks,' she accepted readily, eager to put an end to the cold war. She felt better than ever when at the station before she got out of the car, her mother, never a very demonstrative person these days, leaned over and kissed her cheek. Elyn knew it was not a kiss in parting, but more a kiss of forgiveness.

  On that cheerful note she made her way to Zappelli Fine China. Her work team were a couple of people round about her own age. Diana Kerr was a plain but pleasant young woman, and Neil Jennings was a thin young man, with a love, it soon transpired, of potholing.

  Elyn was used to having loads of responsibility and fell into the role of head of department quite naturally, and in no time at all the three were working together harmoniously.

  When at around eleven that morning the phone on her desk rang, Elyn stretched out her hand automati­cally without taking her eyes off her work. Given that it was new surroundings, it was as if she had never been away.

  'Elyn, it's Chris, Chris Nickson,' he announced. 'How are you settling in?'

  'Settled already is the answer to that, I think,' she smiled down the phone.

  'Good. I should be free in about ten minutes. I thought it might be an idea if I took you on a tour of the place. How does that sound?'

  'I'll look forward to it,' she told him, and replaced her phone feeling that it would make for more efficient management if she knew just where in the vast building each department lay.

  True to his word, Chris Nickson arrived ten minutes later, and they left the office she shared with the two others, and he took her around to introduce her to the heads of the other departments.

  In view of his remark at her interview about one or two of the Pillinger people starting there, Elyn fully ex­pected to bump into at least a few of the people she knew. That she did not, however, was soon explained when Chris informed her, 'We haven't got a full work­force in today. A good few of them applied for an extra day's holiday. In view of the hours they put in when we have a rush order, Mr Orford, the manager,' he ex­plained, 'was pleased to meet them halfway.'

  'I see,' Elyn smiled, unable to remember the last time Pillingers had had a rush order. But, as they entered the design office, all such thoughts abruptly left her. Because it was in that office that she saw someone that she did know from Pillingers!

  'Good morning,' Chris Nickson said generally to the two men and a woman at work there, as they went through to the chief designer's office.

  There was a general response from two of them and Elyn offered her own 'good morning', but Hugh Burrell, still bearing a grudge, she noted from the cynical, un­smiling, sly-eyed way he looked at her, said not a word.

  Elyn made a mental note to give the design section a wide berth, and subsequently finished her first month at Zappelli Fine China with that small incident the only thing that was in any way unpleasant.

  Chris Nickson had asked her out a couple of times, and she liked him, but, since any date with him meant him calling for her, she wasn't too happy about intro­ducing him to her family, when any one of them was bound to say something derogatory about the firm he worked for.

  She went to work on the first of February, outwardly looking as smart as paint, but feeling inwardly more than a little bit frazzled. Loraine had fallen for yet another of the Don Juan types that drew her like a magnet, and had again come out of the relationship licking her wounds.

  'It's just not fair!' she had sobbed, and Elyn had been up with her half the night trying to get her to calm down.

  Which, while Elyn was as keen as ever to get her teeth into some really absorbing work, made her not at all keen to meet any of that philandering type.

  Not that she 'met' the owner of Zappelli Fine China exactly. It was more that she bumped into him. He was coming out of one door as she was going in and, bang, she came up against something solid. She rocked, but before she could lose her balance, in an instant a pair of strong firm hands were there
on her arms to secure her.

  Feeling slightly shaken, Elyn stepped back and, although fairly tall herself, looked up, and found herself looking straight into the cool, all-assessing dark-eyed gaze of a man she would know anywhere!

  His photograph didn't do him justice, she observed at once as she took in Maximilian Zappelli's olive skin with a hint of bronze, his strong dark-as-night hair and aristocratic features. She made to go round him, and he let go of her—but not before he'd done a quick ap­praisal of her own fine features.

  My stars! she fumed as his glance swept over her long honey-blonde hair, flawless complexion, and on to her suit with its expensive label. The man was a woman-eater!

  'Excuse me, signorina,' he murmured, his apology for nearly knocking her off her feet sounding deliberately seductive, she thought, and as her insides, for the first time ever, did a quite idiotic somersault, she counter­acted that she was in any way affected by the womaniser, and politely, if a touch arrogantly, she tilted her head a fraction and stepped past him.

  She was first in at her department, and she was glad about that, because—and it was so ridiculous she could hardly believe it—she was shaking from the encounter. Without any trouble she recalled those dark liquid se­ductive eyes, recalled his barely accented English in those two words 'excuse me', and suddenly she was glad of her mother's experience. Glad of the experiences of her stepsister. Because, had she not known that there were such men around, she would have felt quite vulnerable. And she wasn't vulnerable, she knew she wasn't.

  She got some work out of her desk drawer, but felt strangely on edge—so much so that she found she was hoping that this was just a fleeting visit by Signor Zappelli to his Pinwich factory. She wasn't afraid of him, of course, she scoffed. But somehow she felt she would rather not see him again.

  CHAPTER TWO

  By that afternoon, while having not forgotten the in­cident, Elyn was back on an even keel and was busily employed sifting through some averages when she realised she was some figures short. She glanced up to see that both Diana and Neil were absorbed in what they were doing, and left her chair.

  'Design section,' she stated pleasantly, by way of letting them know where she would be if needed. She passed the tea dispenser on the way, however, and, noting Vivian and Ian, two members of the design staff, standing in a small queue, she almost did an about-turn. Hugh Burrell would probably be in the design section's outer office alone!

  But—don't be ridiculous, her head took over from her feeling of wanting to return to her own office and avoiding anything unpleasant. She was more pro­fessional than that, wasn't she? In any case, it wasn't Hugh Burrell she wanted to see, but Brian Cole, his head of department.

  She reached the design section door to recall how she had been more emotionally motivated than professional first thing that morning. Vowing to be more coolly pro­fessional when next she saw Maximilian Zappelli—and with luck this would be only a brief visit he was making to his English subsidiary—Elyn opened the door and went in.

  Hugh Burrell was there. She gave him a courteous half-smile, which was received with a peevish look of ill-will. But since there was nothing she could do, or wanted to do, for that matter, to ease his personality problems, she carried on through to the chief designer's office.

  That Brian Cole was not there was niggling on two counts: one that she would be held up for her figures, the other that Hugh Burrell could have told her his boss was out. Spotting a load of paperwork on Brian's desk, however, Elyn grew hopeful that he had left the figures she needed out for her.

  Putting Hugh Burrell's rancorous attitude out of her mind, she sifted through the various pieces of paper at the side of his desk for anything that looked like what she was seeking. But some minutes later, she was still looking.

  Realising that since her figure-work was not what Brian was most interested in and that there was every possibility that he hadn't found time yet to work out the breakdown she wanted, Elyn decided to find a scrap of paper and jot down a gentle reminder. Seeing how there was little free space on his huge desk, though, she de­cided against it.

  Fortunately, Hugh Burrell had gone—probably to the tea machine—so she was spared another of his ill-natured looks, though she didn't see him as she returned to her own office. She was unable to complete her averages without that paperwork, though, so she found another small job to do for ten minutes.

  That particular job completed, however, she was in the act of reaching for the internal phone in the hope that Brian was back, when suddenly the phone rang. 'Hello?' she said—and promptly got the shock of her life!

  'Miss Talbot?' enquired a voice she would know anywhere.

  So much for her hoping that this visit to his Pinwich subsidiary would be only fleeting—he was still here! 'Yes,' she answered, and heard what must be a natural trace of seduction in his voice, for it was there even when, authoritatively, he was issuing his orders.

  And it was an order, there was no mistaking that, when 'Please to present yourself to Mr Cole's office immedi­ately!' he commanded.

  Left staring at the phone in her hand as his went down, Elyn felt her insides turn over again. This time, though, she'd had advance warning and wasn't bumping into him accidentally. This time, although she was mystified as to why, when she knew Maximilian Zappelli had an office in the building, she was being summoned to the design section—or summoned anywhere at all—she was going to be exceedingly professional.

  Coolly professional, she reiterated, as she walked along the corridors. Coolly professional and pleasant, she de­cided, and entered the design office, to find it empty, but with the door to Brian Cole's office standing ajar.

  She went over to it and, as before that day, was met in a doorway by Maximilian Zappelli. This time, though, they did not collide, because he stood back. 'Elyn Talbot?' he enquired, not by so much of a flicker of an eyelid revealing if he recalled their earlier meeting. 'Max Zappelli,' he introduced himself, stretching out a hand.

  'How do you do,' she murmured, shaking his hand, but was more mystified than ever over what this was all about when, following him into Brian Cole's office, she saw that not only was Brian there, but his staff of three as well.

  'I wonder if you can throw some light on a very serious matter that has come to our attention,' the head of Zappelli Fine China lost no time in coming to the point; as perfectly at home in her language as his own, Elyn noted.

  'I will if I can,' she answered pleasantly. 'What…'

  'Brian here has been working for some weeks now on a particularly fine sculpture involving a mix of bronze and ceramic. It is a design of the most intricate and beautiful. A design which, while still on paper, he is certain will work, but, because it breaks new ground, is of such uniqueness that any one of our competitors would give a lot to be first with.'

  'How super!' she smiled, but was still mystified as to where she came into it. Quite clearly any mathematical calculations required on the design had been done without her help, or Brian Cole would not have been so certain that it would work. She was still feeling happy inside for Brian, though. 'But there's a problem?' she took a calculated guess.

  'A very serious problem, Miss Talbot,' Maximilian Zappelli replied, giving her a level-eyed look. 'Some time today, between the hours of three and four, someone came into this office…' his eyes did not merely look into hers but seemed to pierce hers as if he could see into her very soul'… and removed the design from this desk.'

  'No!' she gasped in astonishment, as 'removed' trans­lated in her head to 'stole'. 'But I was in here myself at…' Her voice trailed off, and she looked wildly from him to the four others in the room, who she realised for the first time were looking at her—could it be—ac­cusingly? Horrified, she swung her gaze back to the owner of the factory.

  His stern gaze met hers full on, and she felt unable to look away. 'You were in here at a quarter to four,' he documented.

  'Yes—yes, I was,' she answered in a rush—Hugh Burrell would have
given him that information. 'I was short of some figures I wanted from Brian, so I came and…'

  'But I did those figures! I took them to your office myself at lunchtime,' Vivian interrupted.

  'So there was no need for you to be in here at all,' Hugh Burrell had to put in. 'You'd gone when I came back from Stationery, but there was no need for you…'

  'Who did you give those figures to, Vivian?' Maximilian Zappelli chopped him off to ask.

  'I didn't. They were all at lunch in the statistics de­partment, so I left them by a computer, and…' Vivian's voice tailed off, and she looked apologetically at Elyn. Clearly, Elyn realised, in this computer age, Vivian thought everyone in the statistics section stayed glued to the computers all day long, and would return to the machines after lunch.

  'You didn't see them?' the Italian asked Elyn coolly.

  'No. I'd have had no need to have come looking for them if I had,' she defended, not meaning to be rude, but not at all liking the situation she was in.

  'But you did come in here?'

  'Yes. I saw Vivian and Ian at the tea dispenser…' She hesitated, and broke off, realising that she was feeling so unnerved that she seemed to be being accused that she was rattling on, and had been about to blurt out that she'd guessed Hugh Burrell would be there—and had almost turned back. Oh, how she wished she had! 'Anyhow…'

  'You knew Brian was working on an outstanding design, and thought these offices would be empty?' the man she had dubbed philanderer swiftly misread her hesitation.

  'No, I didn't!' she denied, a shade hotly, she had to own, with no sign of the cool professional she had de­termined to be as she faced her employer.

  'According to this man here,' he ignored her show of spirit as he referred to Hugh Burrell, 'you were in this office alone for quite some time before he left.'