A Moment on the Lips(12)
‘Maybe you need to find yourself another mentor.’
‘There isn’t anyone else I can ask. If Nonno thinks I’m struggling, he’ll take over again and that’s not fair. He’s seventy-three. He deserves a chance to relax with Nonna and have some fun.’
‘What about your old boss in London?’
She shook her head. ‘She’s ill. It wouldn’t be fair to ask her. And I’m not asking Emilio Mancuso.’
‘What’s wrong with him?’
‘I …’ She grimaced. ‘Nothing I can put my finger on.’
‘But your instincts tell you no.’
She nodded. ‘So there’s only you I can ask.’
‘Scraping the bottom of the barrel, hmm?’
‘No. You were my first choice. You know what you’re doing. I could learn a lot from you.’
‘But?’
She sighed. ‘But it doesn’t help when you turn up looking like sex on legs. When you feed me ice cream from your spoon and give me smouldering looks.’
He raised an eyebrow. ‘Are you saying you want to do me, Princess?’
God, yes. She shivered. ‘I don’t normally behave like this.’
‘No?’
So he did know about London. She felt her face redden. ‘You provoked me.’
‘Not that much. You could’ve called a halt at any time.’
Yes. Which was exactly what she’d planned to do. But the touch of his skin against hers had pushed everything out of her head. Besides, it hadn’t been completely one-sided. He’d started it. And if he was that uninterested, why was he touching her now? ‘Your hands are still on my bottom,’ she informed him. ‘And there are …’ She gave a delicate cough. ‘Other signs, shall we say.’
‘So there are.’ He sighed. ‘OK. I admit it. I have the hots for you. And, judging by last night, it’s mutual.’
‘We don’t even like each other. You think I’m a spoiled princess.’
‘You are. And, since we’re telling it like it is, you think I’m … ?’
‘A workaholic. Someone who wouldn’t know how to begin to have fun.’
‘A dull boy, hmm?’ He shrugged. ‘Bottom line, Princess, this isn’t going to work. You’re looking for someone to give you a good time. And I don’t have space in my life for someone who’s going to stamp her foot every time I’m late for dinner, or when I don’t want to go to a party because I have more important things to do with my time than listen to tedious people spouting their opinion about something they know nothing about, or talking drivel about trivial things.’
‘I don’t stamp my feet,’ she said, glowering at him.
‘Metaphorically, you’re doing it right now.’
‘So why did you agree to be my mentor?’ She still didn’t quite understand that.
‘Because I owe Gino.’
‘You owe Nonno? Why?’
‘He gave me a break when I was younger, taught me a few things about business. So helping you out of trouble is kind of payback.’
She felt deflated. So he wasn’t doing this because he liked her.
‘You’re right. I don’t like you,’ he agreed—as if she’d said it out loud. Or maybe it was written all over her face. ‘I don’t like what you stand for. The way you were quite happy to take your allowance and swan off round the world, then almost never came back to see your grandparents.’
‘And how would you know anything about that?’
‘Because I saw the wistfulness in Gino’s face whenever he talked about you.’
Her grandfather had talked to Dante about her?
‘He missed you.’
Guilt flooded through her. She hadn’t been fair, but her grandparents had never complained. She didn’t have to give him any explanation for her behaviour; but on the other hand she didn’t want him to think she was completely selfish and spoiled. ‘I was eighteen, Dante. I knew there was a big wide world out there. I wanted to see it. I wanted to know what else there was outside Naples. So, yes, I travelled. I went to Rome, to Milan, to Paris. To Sydney and New York and LA.’
‘Style capitals.’ He didn’t look impressed.
‘Yes, I’ll give you that. The fashion drew me, at first. But then I went to London. To meet my mother’s family. To find out about that side of me. Wouldn’t you have been curious, in my shoes? Wouldn’t you have wanted to meet the side of the family you’d never met?’