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Amelia turned, her eyes filled with such hope—hope that was worryingly close to the way she had looked up at him that night in Hong Kong, as if she were half afraid that he’d say no to their one night and half afraid that he’d say yes. Just as it had that night, her gaze had cleared and a truth had come pouring into her gaze.
‘Yes.’
Could he do it? Start afresh with her?
Hehadto. She was carrying his child. Their child. And no, he would never trust her. That bond had been broken irrevocably. But that didn’t mean they couldn’t at the least be cordial. Whatever happened, he would ensure that his child grew up in a world nothing like his own childhood. He would do whatever it took.
‘Who?’ he demanded, forcing to push through the exchange, because his first goal was to make sure that Rossi Industries didn’t fall because the mother of his child had sabotaged it.
‘I don’t think you’re going to like it.’
‘There’s a lot that I don’t like at the moment. This will be the least of it, I’d imagine.’
She had the grace to look away.
‘Who?’ he demanded again.
‘Sofia Obeid.’
He pinched the bridge of his nose. ‘Amelia,’ he said, not knowing whether he was cursing her or begging her.
‘I know what you think of her,’ she said, her hands gesturing for patience or peace, he wasn’t sure which. ‘But hers is the only company with the capital to help see Aurora to fruition within the timeline and without incurring incredibly painful financial penalties.’
He glared up at her, frustration and intense irritation coursing through him. Sofia Obeid had a reputation for being incredibly difficult and impossible to work with. Not that RI would know as she had refused to take a meeting or even a phone call from the Rossi cousins before now.
‘What makes you think you can get a meeting with her?’
‘Because I can,’ she replied simply.
He scowled as he took in the way the sun streamed in the window and slipped through the linen shirt to outline the subtle curves of the woman not only carrying his child, but who had clearly been sent to test him to his very limits.
‘Please. I want a chance to fix this, but I also want a chance to start again,’ she said, courage and something like hope shining in her eyes. ‘A chance for our child to have more than we did.’
And he was helpless to refuse. ‘Okay. But before we do anything, we need to get you some clothes of your own.’
CHAPTER SEVEN
ALESSANDROWOULDUSUALLYhave driven himself, but he needed all his wits around him with Amelia present, so had reached out to the driver he kept on staff. In the distance he could see their destination, the city of Orvieto, sitting on a large stretch of rock rising dramatically and almost vertically from the surrounding landscape.
While they were out, his staff would air the main part of the house and fill the kitchen with whatever they might need for the next week and disappear as if they’d never been there. No matter what she said about wanting to rectify her sabotage, Alessandro wanted to keep the people Amelia interacted with to a minimum. He still couldn’t be sure that she was telling him the truth.
Liar.
He refused to acknowledge his conscience’s taunt. He disliked that her desire to make amends had softened his response to her, but her solution? He pressed a closed fist lightly against his mouth. Sofia Obeid. Of all the people that Amelia could have offered up as a new partner on the Aurora project, why did it have to be the one woman who had refused until now to give them even the time of day? Alessandro and Gianni had considered and discarded her before the start of the project because of that. Amelia wasn’t wrong—she was their best option, and if Amelia could get Obeid to sit down with them then who was he to argue?
Alessandro wanted to speak to Gianni. But he’d tried his mobile again last night and couldn’t get through. Deep down, Alessandro knew that he could have tried to reach him on St Lovells, Gianni’s private island, but what would he have said? That he’d not only opened them up to sabotage, but he’d managed to get their enemy pregnant? He didn’t need to speak to Gianni about the project because he knew what his cousin would say.Do what you need to do. And get it done.Alessandro didn’t need Gianni’s permission—he needed absolution.
Amelia sat in the car beside him, picking at the bed of her thumbnail, and he wanted nothing more than to slap her hands apart and tell her to stop. Because the sign of deep worry made him feel like a monster. Because...his mother had used to do the same exact thing, each night while she waited for his father to come in from the vineyards. But he was nothing like his father and she was nothing like his mother. Amelia Seymore was hardly an innocent in all this.
Her mobile phone beeped and he resisted the urge to try and check the screen in case it was a message from her sister. Instead he looked out of the window as they drew closer to the city famous for the defensive walls built from the same rock on which it sat, the stunningly beautiful duomo with its striking white and green façade, and some reasonably decent wine. Certainly, better than anything his father and uncle had produced on their vineyards.
I don’t care if your fingers are bleeding or your back hurts. You will not stop until these grapes are harvested, do you hear me, boy?
‘Alessandro? Did you hear me?’ Amelia’s soft voice punctuated the hold his memory had on him and he turned to look at her. A shadow passed across her face before she turned back to her phone. ‘Sofia has agreed to meet. But the window is tight. She says she is considering a similar proposition—’
Alessandro scoffed. ‘Doubtful. There is nothing remotely similar out there to Aurora.’
Amelia nodded in agreement. ‘She’s willing to meet us in Marrakesh tomorrow, but she has warned us not to get our hopes up.’
