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The idea was foreign. Unwelcome. What would she do if not this? What else was she good at? And yet – her heart felt immediately lighter at the idea of not having to look into another pair of grief-filled eyes for a long, long time.
She shook her head, brushing it away. “Aren’t we meant to be having fun?”
He frowned, no doubt because he saw her response for what it was – her pushing him away again, shutting down their line of conversation. But it wasn’t because she wanted to keep him at a distance, so much as because she needed space to think about her work. There was no easy solution there.
He pushed the bowl aside and reached for her hand, threading their fingers together as he’d done in the citrus grove. He squeezed her hand and leaned forward, far enough that he could brush a kiss over her lips. “I’m here if you want to talk.”
Before his words could even settle within her ears she mentally rejected the offer. She was still pushing him away but she knew that there were certain things she had to keep locked up if this was going to work. She couldn’t expose all of herself to him, wouldn’t become vulnerable to him.
He turned away to add the pasta to the water, his back to her for long enough that she was able to regain her composure.
“What about you?”
He threw a gaze over his shoulder. “What about me?”
“You work in your family business?”
He made a throaty noise of agreement. “I oversee most of our European acquisitions.”
“You buy things?”
He laughed. “I evaluate corporate and commercial opportunities, yes.”
“Such as?”
“Well, at the moment I’m negotiating a deal to buy a private bank.”
“To buy…a bank?”
He nodded.
“That sounds…I didn’t even know individuals could do that.”
“We’re a company,” he said. “But yes, depending on the size of the asset and debt list.”
“So how do you decide it’s a good buy?”
“I look at the figures first, then work out the potential. This bank has under-expanded, and invested badly.”
She shook her head, amazement obvious in her eyes. “I can’t even imagine where you’d begin with something like that.”
“I’m sure you could. Don’t forget, I grew up with Gianfelice instructing me in this, and then studied business at university.”
“So you’ve always wanted to do this?”
He threw his head back and laughed. “Hell, no. I used to want to be a rock star.”
She laughed with him, but her mind was flooding with memories of the night she’d found him playing the piano, the way he’d seemed to create music as most people did words. “That’s not even in the ballpark of being the same thing. What changed your mind?”
“Gianfelice.” He sobered. “My parents were a cautionary tale to a certain lifestyle. He was adamant we wouldn’t turn out like them and apparently me going on tour with just a guitar was not his idea of reassuring.”
“I can’t imagine anyone telling you what to do, to be honest.”
“It wasn’t like that,” he said with a sexy, dishevelled shake of his head. His hair was still damp, dark and clinging to his brow. “He would have supported me but I got it. I loved him. I didn’t want to disappoint him, I guess.” He shook his head. “No, that’s not it.” His laugh was a little uneasy. “Why the hell do I find myself telling you things I’ve never even admitted to myself, Lauren?”
She stared at him quietly, her heart turning over in her chest because she had thought exactly the same thing about him, many times.
Ignoring the implications of that, she ran her fingers over the stem of her wine glass and sought a subject redirection. “Do you even play guitar?”
