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Beside him, Amelia opened the door of the limousine and stepped out, her gaze scanning the impressive vista before her with something like awe. He exited the vehicle and, with a knock on the roof, the driver departed, leaving just the two of them standing on the sandy driveway facing off against each other.
‘Why am I here?’ Amelia demanded, only a slight tremble in her voice.
‘To face the consequences of your actions,cara,’ he growled in warning.
‘Funny.’ The word sliced out through tightly clenched teeth. The paleness of her skin serving to highlight the slashes of anger painting her cheeks red. ‘I was about to say the same to you.’
CHAPTER FOUR
DESPITEHERFIERYRESPONSE, the sun heated Amelia’s skin to the point of discomfort and her mouth was dryer than a desert. During Issy’s online investigations, she had found mention of the estate that the Rossi cousins shared, but there were no photographs or plans anywhere online. From the scarce descriptions her sister had been able to cobble together though, it could only be where Amelia was now.
Alessandro had discovered who she was and brought her onto his territory—a move calculated to cause her the maximum amount of disturbance. He clearly thought she was at his mercy. But he had also, clearly, underestimated her.
This was her mess and she had to fix it. Her first priority was to make sure that her sister was okay. The last message she’d had from Issy was a picture she’d sent yesterday of her in a luxurious room on the yacht she’d obtained to lure Gianni Rossi away from contact. Everything in her wanted to grab her phone and call Issy immediately. But she had to play this carefully. Once she knew that her sister was okay, Amelia would identify exactly what it was that he knew, what hethoughthe knew, and what damage she could still do. She just needed to get him talking.
And the best way to do that? Make him think he was the one in control.
She looked around. In the distance she caught sight of a wall that ran the length of the estate from what she could tell. On the far side of the large wildflower meadow was a villa—similar in design to the buildings behind her, but with slight differences. She narrowed her gaze, recognising Gianni’s flair for the dramatic in contrast to the starker, more serious lines of property that suited Alessandro’s personality. But she was surprised that he had chosen to bring her to such a private place—hishome.
She shaded her gaze from the midday sun and craned her neck to look up at Alessandro, who had, once again, chosen to hide behind his sunglasses.Coward.He gestured behind her to a small stone pathway leading away from the main building. Fighting him on such a small thing would be foolish. She was going to have to be very careful and very clever.
They turned their back on the drive and skirted the edge of the main building. Large trees provided blessed relief from the Italian sun and in the near distance she spied what could only be their destination—a low-slung building beside an azure-blue pool. Floor-to-ceiling gently tinted windows wrapped around the structure, making it one of the most lavish pool houses she’d ever seen.
Only the best for the Rossis, her sister’s voice reminded her.
From here Amelia could just make out a large open-plan kitchenette and lounge to one side and a glass-fronted shower with a half-wall that presumably hid a toilet. Her eyes returned to the shower, where butter-coloured marble stood stark against powerful lines of dark granite. It suited Alessandro to perfection. She could just imagine him hauling himself from the pool, stripping out of his costume and prowling straight into the shower and—
‘Is there a problem?’ Alessandro asked with faux civility.
She had stopped walking. At some point in the midst of her daydream she had actually stopped walking. Shehadto get better control over herself.
‘You mean aside from the fact that you have, to all intents and purposes, kidnapped me and I am now trapped in a foreign country with no money or clothes?’
He notched his head to one side. ‘You have your phone?’
‘Yes, of course I...’
He held out his hand.
‘No. Absolutely not,’ she said, punctuating it with a shake of her head.
‘No one will help you,cara. You are mine until I find out exactly what you’ve done and how you can fix it, before I remove you from my and my cousin’s lives for good.’
‘I still think I’ll be keeping hold of it,’ she said as she pushed past him and continued towards the pool house, hastily pressing the call button for her sister. In her peripheral vision she saw him take out his phone and press a button. Instantly the signal bars on her phone disappeared. What the—?
He had a signal jammer?
‘You actually blocked the phone signal?’ she demanded.
‘Of course. You are a threat and you need to be contained.’ Despite his words, his tone was painfully civilised and that, Amelia knew, was when Alessandro was at his most dangerous.
Panic nipped at her pulse, but she ignored it as they reached the pool house, the glass door frame sliding back as if ready for their arrival.
‘Would you like some lunch? I had my staff prepare something,’ he said as he walked towards the clean, simply designed kitchen.
If he had staff, then...
‘BeforeI gave them all the rest of the week off,’ he added, as if reading her mind.
