Surrender Your Love (Surrender Your Love #1)(27)

I wanted him. Badly. But right now I also wanted him to go away so I could gather some self-control to do my work and stop being so unbelievably horny. This whole thing, whatever it was that just made me feel so attracted to him, had to be reined in because it was taking up all space in my head.

“I’ll get the file back to you ASAP.” My tone ended up harsher than intended. His finger flinched away from me and he put a few inches between us. I ignored the sudden urge to reach for his hand and tell him that I didn’t mean to be so abrupt.

“I’ll be upstairs in my private office. Second door to the right.” He barely looked at me as he turned around and left, closing the door behind him.

I breathed out, relieved, and yet not quite able to feel at ease. I doubted I’d ever feel relaxed with Jett in the same room, or with him in the same house. The guy was a mystery. One moment he picked up a drunken woman from a bar and ended up nak*d in her bed; the next he claimed he didn’t take advantage of women under the influence of alcohol. For some reason I had believed him last night when we were sitting outside on the balcony, right before he helped me get into bed, barely touching me in the process. Either he was inventing and changing his own rules as we moved along, or he was playing some sordid game pursuing the incentive of—

What incentive would that be, Brooke?

I had signed the contract and was willing to sleep with him. What else could he possibly want?

Groaning, I shook my head at my own thoughts. It had always been like this. Whenever a guy I liked showed the slightest bit of interest in me, I couldn’t take it at face value, and my brain concocted some morbid story about everything else he might want from me: attention, getting over an ex, easily available sex. Never just me. I thought they couldn’t possibly want me for who I was. In the end I always ran, and ended up with someone like Sean, an emotionally unavailable narcissist who’d dump everything and anyone as soon as he saw a benefit elsewhere.

At least Jett was honest and didn’t pretend to have feelings that weren’t there. What was wrong with me? Why couldn’t I stop looking behind a guy’s intentions and just enjoy his attention? Was it because I still couldn’t trust a guy after all that happened in the past?

Opening the Lucazzone file, I gulped down a glass of water to get rid of the dry sensation in my mouth, and focused on the task at hand. Alessandro Lucazzone, the current owner, was one of the most well-known and respected men in the area. He inherited the Lucazzone estate, including hundreds of miles of vineyards, forests, and fields, from his father who in turn inherited it from his father, and so forth. The estate had been handed down from generation to generation for centuries, withstanding revolutions and recessions. The Lucazzone family hadn’t always been rich. A few times they lost most of their money in bad investments and gambling, but they always bounced back from their financial hardships, usually by marrying a rich spouse. Alessandro Lucazzone had managed to keep the estate in order and the vineyards thriving through World War II with the help of his wife’s money. He and Maria had no children, and when she died of cancer he never remarried. At ninety-seven the old man was dying, leaving no apparent heirs behind. According to Jett’s research, the estate would fall into the hands of local charities, and I couldn’t help but feelthey deserved the money. They could certainly put the grounds to better use than Mayfield Properties. Besides, it felt wrong to tamper with the possibly last wish of an old man who seemed to believe in a good cause.

Taking a sip of my lukewarm coffee, I almost choked on it as I flicked the next page, finally realizing why my boss would be so interested in a remote estate in Italy where the price of acquisition and upkeep made no sense in terms of profit. My fingers slowly traced the jagged contours on the map. The west side was situated around a private lake about the size of Lake Geneva, with mountain views surrounded by untouched nature. Combine that with the sunny Mediterranean weather, a clean beach, and lots of privacy—and you had prime real estate ready to cater to the rich and famous.

I pulled out the architectural plan and shook my head in disbelief. Mayfield Properties was planning to build ten homes: each a five-room, three-bath, mansion-like holiday home, with ground to ceiling glass windows overlooking the shoreline and mountains in the distance. Each property would boast a large tiled hallway, a lounge, dining room, study, several bedrooms with walk-in closets, and bright open-plan kitchen and living areas. They would have a private garage, a swimming pool, a security system worthy of the White House, and a level of privacy ensured by high gates to protect the owners from prying eyes. Basically, they were about to rebuild the Hollywood Hills amidst the Italian countryside. Another oasis for the rich and famous. Given that the Italian government wasn’t known for their cooperation, it was an ambitious project. However, a multi-million dollar corporation like Mayfield Properties always finds a way. No doubt about that.

I tossed the sheet aside, disgusted with the company’s plans to destroy parts of the Italian countryside. Disgusted I had to help them make it happen. This was the reason why I had been more or less happy working for James. He wasn’t hell-bent on finding and annihilating the last spots of untouched nature on Earth to build a few houses for people who already owned more than they needed. I wasn’t your usual environmentalist, but I prided myself on recycling my garbage and not supporting the chopping down of trees and the asphalting of mountain paths by greedy corporations. And Mayfield Properties was one of them.