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He frowned as he thought what that could be. Stretching out his legs, he rested them on the desk and crossed his booted feet. It had been a long, hard day, with non-stop negotiations, but the deal was done. It was the biggest yet for his company, and he was ready to cut himself some down time, and yet he’d hardly touched the glass of whisky at his side, because he was waiting for Jen to say: ‘Come now,’ he realised. It would be even better had she added, ‘Please don’t wait until next week—I need to see you now—I need to talk to you—I need to feel your arms around me.’ That was the way women usually behaved around him, and he had always found some excuse to keep his
distance, but not this time, because this time he was hooked. And all Jen was giving him was silence. ‘Something wrong, Jen?’ he probed.
‘We have a problem,’ she said tensely.
He lowered his feet and sat up. ‘Go on...’
‘I can’t catalogue some of these gemstones.’
‘What do you mean? Can’t you find any reference to them?’
‘No. I mean they’re stolen, Luca. I think you’d better get back here right away.’
* * *
Jen sat waiting tensely for Luca to arrive. It was early evening and still warm in the kitchen of the guest house. She was wearing the jeans and T-shirt she’d been wearing all day. It seemed more important to get the records she had compiled for him finished and printed out, rather than to put on any sort of show for Luca. He wouldn’t appreciate it. Not today, because today he needed the business-orientated person she had fast become, not some fluffball swooning at his feet. She had a full set of records for him to study set out on the kitchen table in front of her with those entries that concerned her marked in red. There were a lot of entries marked in red.
Jen felt marked in red. She felt as if there were a big red cross on her forehead, marking her out as a gangster’s moll, and the dupe of his father Don Tebaldi. What would her parents think of her now? What would Lyddie think? Her mother’s career had been of the highest order, and blemish-free. They’d be heartbroken to think that what Jen had discovered could mean the end of her career. Any hint of dishonesty was the kiss of death in the world she hoped to enter, and she was sitting in front of a list of stolen property that, at her rough calculation, would be valued conservatively at several hundred million. How would Luca react to that? If he was implicated she’d know right away. She could read him.
How would she react to Luca when she saw him again after his absence? Her emotions were so pent up inside, she had no idea. She had dreamed about him every night. During the day when she was working, she’d weave fantasies around living a normal life, and maybe even building a happy family together. She always had been a dreamer, Jen concluded. Glancing at the damning list in front of her, she knew she couldn’t even have told Lyddie about it. What she’d discovered was far too shocking. She was disappointed in herself for not seeing the risk sooner. No distinction would be made by the prosecution service if the stolen gems were discovered on Luca’s property. Everyone involved would inevitably be tarred with the same brush. Jen’s reputation would be ruined. No smoke without fire, they’d say at the auction house. No one would defend her. She could just imagine the directors running for cover.
‘Jen?’
She sprang to her feet at the sound of Luca’s voice. She had been so lost in thought that she hadn’t heard him arrive. Her determination to challenge him with what she’d found counted for nothing when she saw him. She flew to him and threw herself into his arms. ‘I’ve missed you!’
‘And I missed you,’ Luca said fiercely, holding her close. ‘You have no idea how much.’
‘You’re squeezing the life out of me—’
‘Then, I’ll kiss you instead.’
He smothered her with kisses. Tears threatened, she was so pleased to see him. Losing herself in his familiar strength and heat was pure joy. He smelled so good, and looked amazing, but then Luca always did, even when he’d come straight from the office. There was no sign of a power suit jacket, and his shirtsleeves were rolled up, but he was still wearing the suit trousers. Had he been as keen to see her, as Jen had been keen to see Luca? The thought thrilled her. But now she had a duty to show him what a mess his father had left behind. As she pulled away from his embrace she felt terrible for him. Luca had taken on so much since his father had left for Florida. Maria had told her this, emphasising that he still had his own business to run. It couldn’t be helped, Jen thought, picking up the records she’d compiled. Luca had to know sooner or later that his father’s hidden cache of jewels contained more than one secret.
‘Luca, I’m so sorry, but I’m afraid your father has left more than you might have bargained for.’
He huffed a wry smile. ‘Nothing you can tell me about my father will come as a surprise to me. Don’t worry. I’ll handle it. How have you been this past month? You look tired.’
Jen exhaled with weary amusement. ‘I was going like a train, until I discovered this...’ Concern covered her face as she handed Luca the papers.
‘I appreciate your hard work,’ he said, ‘but I’ve travelled a long way—and to see you, not these.’ He put the papers down and turned to her. ‘Seems to me, my task is to make you forget them for one night.’
She was on the point of protesting that he must look at them now, but Luca’s rapidly darkening stare stopped her.
‘Don’t you think I can distract you?’ he said.
The hint of a smile on that firm, sexy mouth gave her no alternative.
‘I wouldn’t be surprised if you could,’ she said.
* * *
They made love as if it were the first time, only now it was so much better, because now they knew each other’s bodies, and she was at ease with Luca, and confident with him.
‘I love you,’ she murmured as they lay facing each other side by side. She laughed when Luca raised an amused brow. ‘I’m sorry if that’s too much information.’
‘I love you too. And I’m not sorry if it’s too much information,’ Luca countered as he turned her beneath him.
Jen’s world expanded like the unfurling petals of a flower. With those words, anything seemed possible. She wanted to say more to Luca, but he made words impossible. He was deep inside her, where she wanted him to be, and when they were one like this nothing else mattered.
Except that he loved her, Jen thought, basking in the knowledge, and that was all she had ever wanted—trust, closeness, oneness, and the rightness of being with the man she loved. It was enough for her. Nothing else could even come close. Words could never express how she felt about Luca, and she didn’t need to tell him anything more, when her eyes must be telling him everything he needed to know.
They fell asleep in each other’s arms with their limbs entwined in contented exhaustion. When she woke to the new day it was to find sunshine streaming through the open window. It was such a happy sight, she felt renewed in spirit in spite of her concerns about the jewels. It was as if anything was possible now Luca was back.
She couldn’t remember ever being so optimistic, Jen thought as she crept out of bed. She didn’t want to wake him as she went to grab a bottle of water from the console table by the wall. He looked so peaceful, lying with his arm above his head, and most of his magnificent body on show beneath the rumpled sheet. She stared at him for several moments. How could she resist him?
She couldn’t, Jen concluded as she tiptoed back to bed.
Luca had laid an ambush, and now he shot up from the bed to drag her, screaming with happy excitement, into his arms.
‘Did I frighten you?’ he growled, teasing her unmercifully with the rasp of his stubble, and the touch of his hands.
‘You know you did,’ she accused, shrieking with thrilled outrage.
He swung her onto the bed at his side. ‘So what are you going to do about it?’ he challenged.
‘It’s what you’re going to do about it that I’m interested in,’ she said. ‘I can only think that you will have to make up for shocking me with a prolonged exercise in pleasure.’
‘No,’ Luca protested as he covered his eyes with his forearm. ‘Please don’t send me to the salt mines again.’
‘Then, make love to me instead,’ she commanded.
‘If I must.’
‘You’d better,’ she warned, laughing as Luca moved on top of her.
* * *
Was there anything better than this? Luca wondered as he rested his chin on the heel of his hand to watch Jen sleep. She was curled up in his arms where she’d drifted off. She hadn’t stayed awake long enough to tell him he could stop. He smiled, doubting she
would ever tell him to stop. He was inexhaustible and she was insatiable. It was an explosive combination, and one he had never found before. This was special. Jen was special. But relationships had to be founded on trust, and they had so many secrets. Jen telling him about his father’s stolen gems had shocked him, whatever he’d said to her at the time, but at least she’d been absolutely straight with him, while his father had left him a criminal mess to sort out. Everything about her said that Jen would never try to trick his brother. The only thing he could do was to ask her straight what she knew about Raoul’s will. His feelings for Jen were too strong to leave it any longer. He had to be as honest with her as she had been with him. She had saved him more trouble than she knew by spotting the discrepancies in the gemstones, and then telling him so promptly. He definitely owed her for that.
* * *
Luca was amazing. Not only was he amazingly gorgeous, and the best lover imaginable, as well as clever and funny, and warm, he was amazingly effective when it came to sorting out problems with the authorities. By mid-morning the identities of the missing stones had been confirmed, and recovery had been arranged through Luca’s security company so they could be returned to their rightful owners.
‘You can stop worrying now,’ he said as he cut the line to the last of the insurance companies. ‘And you can still have your exhibition.’ He came around the desk.
They had hunkered down in his study to get things sorted. Jen had been tensely perched on the edge of a chair throughout, but now she got up to exhale with relief.
‘There are plenty of gemstones left for you to create the most fabulous display,’ Luca reassured her, taking her into his arms. ‘A couple of the insurance companies even suggested approaching the owners of the recovered stones to ask if you could exhibit them along with the rest. It would add to their notoriety and thus to their value, which in turn means higher insurance premiums for their owners.’ He laughed as he said this. ‘Win-win all round.’
