AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Sophie, listening intently, nodded. ‘It’s good to be independent,’ she murmured. ‘It’s good not to rely on anyone for anything.’
‘You’re more than welcome to ditch the cheap motel and stay at my place,’ Alessio volunteered, appreciating the brevity of her response and startled by his unexpected foray into touchy-feely sharing, which was a gene he’d thought he had been born without.
But she shook her head without hesitation. ‘I’m fine. Can you tell me...what happens now?’
‘I’ll call Ellis first thing tomorrow—and don’t worry, I’ll make sure no feathers are ruffled in the process. I’ll get the loan that’s outstanding paid off, and then I’ll get my team to examine the accounts of his company in forensic detail. I’ll weed out the dross, replace it with people who know that they’ll be answering to me, and set things back on the straight and narrow.’
‘And all of this without your father finding out what’s going on?’
‘Nothing is beyond the wit of man.’
‘How can you achieve all that when you don’t really talk to your father, Mr...er... Rossi-White?’
‘I think, given the circumstances, we can dispense with the formal titles, don’t you, Sophie? You can all me Alessio.’
He paused. For all the time she had been working for his father, he realised that he knew precious little about her, and it was ironic that his newly born voyage of discovery into her thoughts had kicked off by her revealing the fact that she didn’t approve of him and didn’t like him very much—if at all.
‘Well, all things considered, it seems that I’ll have to have a conversation with him now, doesn’t it?’ A dark flush delineated his sharp cheekbones and he shifted in the chair.
‘Let’s hope the sudden shock of that doesn’t cause another stroke...’ she said at once.
Their eyes met and Alessio burst out laughing. The laughter soon died, but his dark eyes remained on her face and he knew there was amused appreciation in them.
‘Is that why you don’t like me?’ he drawled. ‘Because you think I’m to blame for the distance that exists between me and my father?’
Just like that the atmosphere shifted.
And that was what raced through Sophie’s head as she stared at him, mesmerised by the depths of his dark eyes. Some tiny voice inside was telling her that this drowning feeling carried a thread of danger.
Drowning was always about a loss of control, and she’d been there and experienced it enough to know that she was never going to return to that place again. She’d felt the panicked confusion of circumstances running away with her, pulling her in directions she couldn’t handle.
She’d known real fear for her future, for her sister’s future, as she’d swum in the turbulent waters of social services and GPs and school governors in the wake of her father’s death, when her mother had retreated into herself with no interest in anything outside. For weeks and months treading water had become a way of life, and even when at last her mother had shaken herself out of her stupor she had still been too depressed to really engage in all sorts of small, daily decisions. Little by little she had come to, had re-entered the world, and she had never stopped apologising for leaving her daughter to handle everything on her own when she’d been just a child, too young for the responsibility. But by then Sophie had grown up, and she had seen the ugly side of losing control and what it could do to a person.
So now...
No...this drowning feeling wasn’t good, but surely there was nothing to fear? This was just some silly reaction to a guy—nothing that could have any impact on her life.
Alessio got under her skin for a lot of reasons, and she had to concede that the way he looked had something to do with her reaction. She might have her head very firmly screwed on, but she was still a woman, after all, and for all his faults he was an extremely beautiful man. Who wouldn’t shiver in the presence of physical perfection?
Honestly, what was there to worry about just because she was a little unsettled by those fabulous dark eyes and that exquisite bone structure? She was beyond temptation on that front—of that she was one hundred per cent sure.
Self-control regained, she said, matter-of-factly, ‘I don’t have any feelings for you one way or the other, and it’s not something I’ve given much thought to.’
‘Is that right?’ Alessio mused with cool neutrality, eyebrows raised. ‘There have been times when I’ve thought that you might have been actively avoiding me by making sure you weren’t around on the occasions I came to see my father... That’s probably a wild flight of imagination on my part...’ He paused and then carried on, in the same musing, thoughtful voice, ‘Although let’s not forget youdidhave a lot to say on the matter when you confronted me earlier this evening...’
Sophie pursed her lips, but remained silent until he shrugged and sat back.
‘No matter. All finished here? Dessert? A stiff drink for the road? No?’ He signalled for the bill and looked at her from under lush lashes. ‘You may have got away with scuttling out of sight like a timid little crab whenever I’ve been to visit before...but things are going to be a little different for a while...’
Sophie resented his phraseology, but she couldn’t take issue with it because the wretched man was spot-on.
‘How so?’ she asked.
‘Well, once I’ve started the business of finding out what’s been going on with my father’s holdings I’m going to have to be on site, to make sure everything is being done my way. I don’t see any choice in the matter. His head office is based in Harrogate and I’m going to want to oversee what happens there.’
‘What...? Why?’
‘Like I said, there will be a need to clear the dross, and very often dross doesn’t particularly like to be cleared. It’s something I won’t be able to delegate—at least not at ground zero. Aside from which...’ He hesitated and flushed. ‘My father and I may not have seen eye to eye on a range of things over the years, and he may rant and rail against my being there and seeing him when he’s weak, but he’s still my flesh and blood. And this time I intend to make sure his pride doesn’t get in the way of my presence.’
