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‘Ah, Rosa.’ He gestured for Cherry to precede him up the stone steps and she found she’d forgotten how to walk. ‘Would you take the signorina upstairs to one of the guest rooms and make sure she has everything she needs? And perhaps you would like me to try the hire c
ompany for you?’ he added to a bemused Cherry, who was trying not to gape at the palatial interior.
The light, cool hall, with a marble floor and white walls hung with exquisitely framed paintings, was huge, its air scented with bowls of fresh flowers and several chairs and tables dotted about the vast expanse. And the staircase stretching in front of them was a thing of beauty in itself, made of the same pale green marble as the floor and curving upwards to two levels, giving the impression that the hall itself was an inner courtyard.
Speechless, she followed the maid up the stairs and halfway along a landing, whereupon the young girl opened a door, allowing Cherry to precede her into a vast bedroom. ‘Please to call if you need anything, signorina,’ the maid said in broken English as she walked across and opened the door to an en-suite bathroom. She waved at open basketwork shelves holding neatly folded fluffy towels and toiletries and then left the room, shutting the door quietly behind her.
‘Wow!’ Cherry breathed out softly as she stood surveying her surroundings. The cream, stone and taupe colour palette of the room was offset by the blaze of colour coming from the open full-length windows leading on to a balcony thick with purple, red and white bougainvillaea and holding a small table and two chairs. It was obviously a guest bedroom—there were no personal belongings of any kind when she furtively opened one or two of the doors of the wall-to-wall wardrobes and drawers. Imagine what the rest of the house must be like, Cherry thought weakly. She’d been right. He must be absolutely loaded.
She padded across to the balcony. It overlooked an enormous garden stretching away from the back of the villa for what seemed like miles to her stunned gaze. It was bursting with tropical trees and shrubs and manicured flowerbeds, and the ancient walls which enclosed the garden from the olive groves were brilliant in places with cascade upon cascade of more bougainvillaea. An Olympic-size swimming pool glittered blue under the clear cerulean Italian sky, and orange, apricot, almond and fig trees lived in harmony in a small orchard at the very rear of the grounds. She had never seen anything like it.
Double wow! She breathed out slowly. Triple. What an oasis. How the other half lived!
As she continued to gaze out she noticed what must be Vittorio Carella’s gardener, tending a flowerbed next to a lush flower-covered bower, but otherwise the sun-soaked grounds were still, slumbering in the heat of the afternoon.
One thing was for sure, Cherry thought with wry humour as she stepped back into the bedroom. Vittorio Carella was no ordinary olive farmer. And she supposed if she had to be stranded anywhere for a few hours she could have picked somewhere a darn sight worse than Casa Carella.
Becoming aware she had been lost in contemplation when she should have been freshening up, Cherry hastily walked into the gorgeous en-suite bathroom of cream marble. The mirror which took up all of one wall showed her just how grubby and bedraggled she looked. She groaned softly. No wonder he’d thought she was a young kid playing at being grown-up. Urgent repair work was needed.
The bathroom held everything from hairbrushes and cosmetics—still in their wrapping—to male and female perfume and other such niceties. Clearly the guests of Vittorio Carella had their every need met. But she wasn’t a guest. Not in the traditional sense anyway.
Cherry stood in front of the mirror, decorum warring with vanity. Vanity won. After washing her face, and brushing her hair until it shone like silk with one of the brushes she’d unwrapped, she opened a tube of mascara and a pot of eyeshadow. Not for the first time she blessed the fact she was a female and had make-up at her disposal. She might have entered the house as a little lost waif and stray. She certainly didn’t intend to leave as anything less than a full-grown woman!
CHAPTER TWO
WHEN she opened the door of the bedroom to go downstairs the little maid was hovering at the end of the landing, fiddling with the huge bowl of sweet-smelling roses on a small table under the magnificent arched window which flooded the space with light. Cherry smiled at her.
‘Ah, signorina. If you will come this way? The signore, he is waiting,’ the young girl said politely.
Cherry nodded and followed the immaculately dressed maid as she led the way down the stairs and across the hall. After knocking on a door the girl opened it and then stood aside for Cherry to enter. The drawing room was even more beautiful than she’d prepared herself for: the ceiling high, the light wood floor scattered with thick rugs, the gracious furniture and drapes clearly wildly expensive and the white walls covered with exquisite paintings. The huge French windows were open to the scents of the garden beyond, and on the patio immediately beyond the windows a fountain tinkled in the afternoon heat.
But all this was on the perimeter of her consciousness. Her senses were caught up with the man who had risen from an armchair at her entrance and was now saying, ‘Come and sit down and take some refreshment. Would you prefer coffee or perhaps a cold drink? Orange juice? Pineapple? Mango?’
‘Coffee will be fine, thank you.’ He remained standing as he waved his hand at a chair opposite his. A coffee table was groaning with an array of cakes and pastries, and the aroma from espresso coffee was rich. His loose-fitting trousers and silver-grey cotton shirt were clearly expensive, and the way they sat on the lean male body was guaranteed to make any female heart beat a little faster.
He didn’t sit down again until she was seated, and then he poured her a coffee before gesturing at the cream, milk and sugar. ‘Help yourself.’
‘Thank you. I take mine black.’
‘It is the only way.’ He smiled in agreement.
Her heartbeat—which had just returned to normal—quickened again. He really was the man with everything, she thought weakly. It was a shame that included an ego to match.
He picked up the cakestand and offered it to her, and as she gazed at the sweet delicacies she found she was hungry. She selected one of the small iced sponge cakes filled with cream and jam which she knew were called sospiri—sighs in English—and sighed herself inwardly. What must it be like to enjoy such a privileged life, free from the cares and trials which afflicted most people? He only had to crook his little finger and his every need was catered for. Heady stuff to the uninitiated.
‘I spoke with the hire company while you were upstairs, but they will not be able to send another car for twenty-four hours.’
Cherry almost choked on the cake. ‘Twenty-four hours?’
‘This is not a great problem, surely? You had no pressing engagement?’ he asked with silky smoothness.
He knew she didn’t. ‘No, but—’ She paused, wondering how to say she had no intention of staying in this house for twenty-four hours—if that was what he was suggesting. ‘But I can’t impose on your hospitality—’
‘Please do not speak of it. You are more than welcome to stay for as long as you like. I am desolate you have had such a bad experience whilst visiting my beautiful country. Let me make amends by offering you the safety of my home until the new car arrives.’
Oh, hell. What could she say to that?
In the event she wasn’t called upon to say anything, because the drawing-room door opening with a flourish caused both their heads to turn to the voluptuous young woman standing in the aperture, her hands on her hips and her eyes flashing fire. Cherry didn’t need to speak the language to understand the thrust of the outburst in Italian which followed. For some reason the girl was furious with Vittorio, and not afraid to tell him so in spite of his darkening face. Cherry found she was beginning to enjoy herself.
