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Relieved to have the focus off her and onto work, Lesley allowed some of the tension to ooze out of her body.
‘I have found one or two things you might be interested in,’ she said with staccato jerkiness. ‘And I’ll come right down to the office.’
‘Better still, meet me outside. I’ll get Violet to bring us out some tea.’ He smiled, encouraging her to relax further. It was all he could do not to let his eyes wander over her, drink her in. He lowered his eyes and reluctantly spun round, walking towards the door and knowing that she wouldn’t move a muscle until he was well and truly out of the suite of rooms and heading down the staircase.
Once outside, he couldn’t wait for her to join him. He was oblivious to his surroundings as he stared off into the distance, thinking of how she had looked in that outfit. She had incredible legs, an incredible body and it was all the more enhanced by the fact that she was so unaware of her charms.
Five brothers; no mother; karate lessons when the rest of her friends were practising the feminine skills that would serve them well in later life. Was that why she was so skittish around him? Was she skittish around all men, or was it just him? Was that why she chose to dress the way she did, why she projected such a capable image, why she deliberately seemed to spurn feminine clothes?
He found himself idly trying to work out what made her tick and he was enjoying the game when he saw her walking towards him with a sheaf of papers in her hand, all business as usual.
‘Thank you.’ Lesley sat down, taking the glass that was offered to her. She had been so hot and bothered after he had left that she had taken time out to wash her face in cold water and gather herself. ‘First of all—and I’m almost one-hundred-per-cent sure about this—our emailing friend has no idea about your wife or the sort of person she was.’
Alessio leant closer, forearms resting on his thighs. ‘And you’ve reached that conclusion because...?’
‘Because I’ve been through each and every email very carefully, looking for clues. I’ve also found a couple of earlier emails which arrived in your junk box and for some reason weren’t deleted. They weren’t significant. Perhaps our friend was just having a bit of fun.’
‘So you think this isn’t about a blackmail plot to do with revelations about Bianca?’
‘Yes, partly from reading through the emails and partly common sense. I think if they involved your ex-wife there would have been some sort of guarded reference made that would have warned you of what was to come. And, whilst he or she knew what they were doing and were careful to leave as few tracks behind them as they could, some of those emails are definitely more rushed than others.’
‘Woman’s intuition?’ There was genuine curiosity in his voice and Lesley nodded slowly.
‘I think so. What’s really significant, though, is that the Internet cafés used were all in roughly the same area, within a radius of a dozen miles or so, and they are all in the general vicinity of where Rachel goes to school. Which leads me to think that she is at the centre of this in some way, shape or form because the person responsible probably knows her or knows of her.’
Alessio sat back and rubbed his eyes wearily. Lesley could see the strain visible beneath the cool, collected exterior when he next looked at her. He might have approached this problem with pragmatism and detachment, as a job to be done—but his daughter was involved and that showed on his face now, in the worry and the stress.
‘Any idea of what could be going on? It could still be that our friend, as you call him, has information on Bianca and wants me to pay him for not sharing that information with Rachel.’
‘Does Rachel know anything about what her mother was like as...err...a young girl? I mean, when she was still married to you? I know your daughter would have been a toddler with no memories of that time, but you know how it is: overheard conversations between adults, bits and pieces of gossip from friends or family or whatever.’
Alessio leaned back in the chair and closed his eyes.
‘As far as I am aware, Rachel is completely in the dark about Bianca, but who knows? We haven’t talked about it. We’ve barely got past the stage of polite pleasantries.’
Lesley stared at his averted profile. Seeing them in repose, as now, she felt the full impact of his devastating good looks. His sensual mouth lost its stern contours; she could appreciate the length and thickness of his eyelashes, the strong angle of his jaw, the tousled blackness of his slightly too-long hair. His fingers were linked loosely on his stomach; she took in the dark hair on his forearms and then burned when she wondered where that dark hair was replicated.
She wondered whether she should tell him about those random scribbles she had found and decided against it. They formed part of the jigsaw puzzle but she would hang on until more of the pieces came together. It was only fair. He was a desperately concerned father, worried about a daughter he barely knew; to add yet more stress to his situation, when she wasn’t even one-hundred per cent sure whether what she had found would prove significant in the end, seemed downright selfish.
The lingering embarrassment she had brought with her after the mini-skirt-wearing episode faded as the silence lengthened between them, a telling indication of his state of mind.
It would have cost him dearly to confide the personal details of his situation with his ex-wife. No matter that he had been practically a child at the time. No one enjoyed being used and Alessio, in particular, was a proud man today and would have been a proud boy all those years ago.
Her heart softened and she resisted the temptation to reach out and stroke the side of his cheek.
‘I’m making you feel awkward,’ Alessio murmured, breaking the silence, but not opening his eyes or turning in her direction.
Lesley buried the wickedly tantalising thought of touching his cheek. ‘Of course not!’
‘I don’t suppose you banked on this sort of situation when you agreed to the job.’
‘I don’t suppose you banked on it either when you decided to hire me.’
‘True,’ he admitted with a ghost of a smile. ‘So, where do you suggest we go from here? Quiz Rachel when she gets home day after tomorrow? Try and find out if she has any idea what’s going on?’ He listened as she ran through some options. He liked hearing her talk. He liked the soft but decisive tone of her voice. He liked the way she could talk to him like this, on his level, with no coy intonations and no irritating indications that she wanted the conversation to take any personal detours.
Mind you, she had so much information about him that personal detours were pretty much an irrelevance: there really weren’t that many nooks and crannies left to discover.
His mind swung back to when he had caught her wearing that dress and his body began to stir into life.
‘Talk to me about something else,’ he ordered huskily when there was a pause in the conversation. This was as close to relaxation he had come in a long time, despite the grim nature of what was going on. He had his eyes closed, the sun was on his face and his body felt lazy and nicely lethargic.
‘What do you want me to talk about?’ She could understand why he might not want to dwell ad infinitum on a painful subject, even one that needed to be discussed.
‘You. I want you to talk about you.’
Even though he wasn’t looking at her, Lesley still reddened. That voice of his; had he any idea how sexy it was? No, of course not.
‘I’m a very boring person,’ she half-laughed with embarrassment. ‘Besides, you know all the basic stuff: my brothers; my dad bringing us all up on his own.’
‘So let’s skip the basics. Tell me what drove you to try on that dress.’
‘I don’t want to talk about that.’ Lesley’s skin prickled with acute discomfort. The mortification she had felt assailed her all over again and she clenched her fists on her lap. ‘I’ve already apologised and I’d really rather we drop the subject and pretend it never happened. It was a mistake.’
‘You’re embarrassed.’
‘Of course I am.’
‘No need to be, and I’m not prying. I’m really just trying to grasp anything that might take my mind off what’s happening right now with Rachel.’
Suddenly Lesley felt herself deflate. While she was on her high horse, defending her position and beating back his very natural curiosity, he was in the unenviable position of having had to open the door to his past and let her in.
Was it any wonder that he was desperate to take his mind off his situation? Talking relentlessly about something worrying only magnified the worry and anxiety.
‘I—I don’t know why I tried it,’ Lesley offered haltingly. ‘Actually, I do know why I tried it on. I was never one for dresses and frocks when I was a teenager. That was stuff meant for other girls but not for me.’
‘Because you lacked a mother’s guiding hand,’ Alessio contributed astutely. ‘And even more influential was the fact that you had five brothers.’ He grinned and some of the worry that had been etched on his face lifted. ‘I remember what I was like and what my friends were like when we were fourteen—not sensitive. I bet they gave you a hard time.’
