Tempted By A Caffarelli: Never Say No to a Caffarelli. Melanie Milburne
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He couldn’t wait to get away from him, and loathed having to visit to fulfil his familial duty, such as for birthdays and at Christmas. He rarely spoke to him unless he had to. ‘You must miss her.’
‘I do...’ She ran her fingertip round the rim of her champagne flute. ‘Do you know what I miss the most?’
‘Tell me.’
Her caramel eyes met his with deep, dark seriousness. ‘Her chocolate brownies.’
Rafe blinked. ‘Pardon?’
She gave him an impish smile. ‘Just kidding. I really had you there for a minute, didn’t I?’
You had me the first moment I met you.
Hang on, what was he thinking? Had him? Had him in what way? Sure, he was attracted to her. What full-blooded man wouldn’t be? But she wasn’t his type. She was the homespun type. He was the hardboiled, been-around-the-block-too-many-times type. His world was of fast cars, fancy hot spots and easy women who knew the rules and always played by them.
Her world was a small, out-of-the-way village, baking cakes and scones and making cups of tea for lonely old gentlemen while waiting for Mr Right.
She was innocent and sweet; he was jaded and cynical.
It was a recipe for disaster.
‘I miss her for her wisdom,’ Poppy went on. ‘She taught me more about food and cooking than any hospitality college could do. The thing most people don’t get about cooking is it’s not just a collection of ingredients, and hey presto, out comes a five-star meal. It’s so much more than that.’
‘So what does make a meal special?’
‘The love that goes into it.’
‘Love?’
‘The best restaurants are where the chefs love the food they prepare and the people they feed,’ she said. ‘It’s a symbiotic relationship.’
‘So what you’re telling me is you actually love the people who come to your tearoom?’
She gave him a pert look. ‘Maybe not all of them.’
Rafe laughed. ‘So what do I have to do to win your love? Have my cake and eat it too?’
Her eyes narrowed. ‘You don’t want my love. You just want my house.’
I want much more than your house.
Rafe pushed the thought aside as Morgan approached with their meals. He had to stay focused. The goal was the dower house; that was what he was after. He didn’t want or need anything else. He wouldn’t be around long enough to invest in anything other than building a top-notch hotel that would make him loads and loads of money.
Goal.
Focus.
Win.
Sure, it would be fun to have Poppy Silverton in his bed for the short time he was here, but he wasn’t about to offer her anything else. She was looking for her fairy-tale prince, someone to sweep her off her feet and carrying her off into a happy-ever-after sunset.
Rafe’s princely attributes leaned more to the darker side.
That whole domestic scene women like Poppy were after was nothing like the life he had carved for himself. He didn’t do picket fences, puppies and sweet-smelling babies. He was never in the same place more than a week or two. He never stayed with a lover more than a month; six weeks max. He didn’t do commitment. Maybe he was more like his grandfather than he cared to admit.
Not evil, but not squeaky-clean either.
AFTER THEY LEFT the restaurant, Rafe drove Poppy back home and walked her to the front door of the dower house. She hadn’t expected to enjoy the night out, but Rafe had been nothing but charming, and even though Oliver’s restaurant wouldn’t have been her first choice of venue, in the end it had given her a sense of closure.
But it niggled at her that yet again Rafe had achieved what he’d set out to achieve. He’d got her to agree to cook for him while he stayed on site at Dalrymple Manor. It showed how incredibly shrewd he was. He knew how to turn things to his advantage, to find an opponent’s weak spot and then go in for the kill.
And she’d done exactly as he had hoped she would do. She had snapped up the bait and now was committed to seeing him every night as she delivered his food to his door. Was she so predictable, or was he particularly clever at reading her?
Poppy turned to face him on her doorstep. ‘Do you have any preferences for meals? Any particular cuisine you’d prefer over another or are you happy with whatever I come up with?’
His dark eyes flicked to her mouth for a brief moment. ‘That’s not why I asked you out tonight.’
She arched a brow at him. ‘Is it not?’
‘No.’ His voice seemed deeper than normal, almost husky.
Poppy’s eyes were almost on a level with his as she was standing two steps above him, and she was wearing her highest heels. She could see the wide black circles of his pupils in those impossibly deep brown eyes. She could see the way his lips were pressed firmly together as if he was fighting some sort of private internal battle. She could sense the tension in him and in the fragrant night air that circled them. ‘Then why?’
‘I asked you out so I could sleep with you.’
Poppy’s eyes widened at his blunt honesty. ‘You don’t pull your punches, do you?’
His mouth tilted wryly. ‘Your honour is safe, Poppy. I’m not going to have my wicked way with you tonight.’
‘That’s very reassuring.’ It was downright disappointing, but to admit that to him would be rather perverse of her.
He captured one of her loose corkscrew curls and wound it round his finger, his eyes holding hers in an intimate lock that made the base of her spine tingle like sherbet sprinkled in a glass of soda water. ‘I had it all planned. I was going to wine and dine you, flatter you with compliments and then bring you back here and have wild, bed-wrecking sex with you.’
Poppy swallowed a gulp. ‘Y-you were?’
He unwound her hair and tucked it neatly behind her left ear as if she was about seven years old. ‘You’re a nice girl, Poppy Silverton. But here’s the thing... I don’t mess with nice girls.’
Mess with me! Mess with me! ‘So...what changed your mind?’
‘I’ve had more lovers than you’ve cooked hot dinners,’ he said. ‘I don’t even remember most of their names.’
‘I bet they don’t forget yours in a hurry.’
He gave a rather Gallic shrug, as if to say that was just the way things were. ‘I’m not what you’re looking for. It would be wrong to give you the wrong impression or mislead you into thinking any alliance between us could turn into something more permanent.’
‘You’re surprisingly honourable for a playboy.’
He brushed the underside of her chin with his index finger in a barely touching movement that set every nerve alight with longing. ‘Bonsoir, ma petite.’
Poppy snatched in a scratchy little breath as she watched him walk down the path to his car. She’d been expecting another kiss. Her anticipation of it had been building from the moment they had left the restaurant. Actually, it had been building from the moment he had picked her up that evening and looked at her as if she had just stepped off a Paris catwalk. She wanted to feel that firm, cynical mouth pressed against hers again. She had been staring at his mouth all evening, wondering when he was going to do it. Maybe she should have taken matters into her own hands. What would have been wrong with a