Italian Boss, Housekeeper Bride. Sharon Kendrick
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that?’
‘No,’ she replied patiently, ‘I’m just trying to help you see it more clearly, that’s all.’
‘She should not have been mixing with such lowlife!’ he stormed.
‘She is a young woman, Raffaele. You haven’t always—’
‘Haven’t always, what?’ he prompted dangerously.
‘You haven’t always displayed the greatest judgement with some of your choices of women, have you?’
‘What?’
She met the look of smouldering disbelief in his eyes without blinking, but somehow the thought of his doe-eyed half sister breaking her heart over some gold-digger gave Natasha the courage to stand up to him. ‘I draw your attention to the woman you’re currently suing.’
‘Madonna mia!’ he exclaimed. ‘I met her twice—and there was no intimacy. Am I to be held responsible for some lying actress who wants to use my money and my reputation to boost her career? And Elisabetta is my sister,’ he continued stubbornly. ‘It is different.’
Natasha sighed. It was that age-old double standard again, which some men—particularly the old-fashioned macho breed, like Raffaele—applied to all women. That there were two types. Madonna and whore. She bit her lip. Which category would she fall into?
Her behaviour since she’d first entered the de Feretti household had been beyond reproach—but she was still a single mother, wasn’t she? And, surely, that would score negatively when measured by Raffaele’s exacting standards?
‘Why don’t you tell me what’s happened?’ she said softly.
He shrugged his shoulders restlessly. Her voice was cajoling—it was like the warmth of the sun on a summer’s day—but, instinctively, he fought against its comfort. ‘What’s to tell? This scum bled her bank account until her attention was drawn to it—and then he ran.’ His face darkened. ‘But not before he had convinced her that she loved him and that she could love no other as much as him. She stopped eating. She stopped sleeping. Her skin is like paper and her arms—they are like this…’ He joined his forefinger and thumb together in a circle to illustrate Elisabetta’s emaciated limb, and another wave of pain etched its way across his features. ‘She’s sick, Tasha.’
His eyes narrowed as he saw the look of concern on her face. Thank God, this was only Natasha he was talking to, came one sane, fleeting thought. Nobody had ever seen Raffaele de Feretti even close to vulnerable before—and, surely, this came close. At least, Tasha didn’t count.
‘Are you all right?’ asked Natasha anxiously.
The image of Elisabetta came floating into his mind—with her huge eyes and the waterfall of black hair which fell in a heavy curtain to her waist. Clenching his fists together, he thought how much he would like to be able to protect his vulnerable half sister from the knocks that life had waiting in store. ‘I should have been able to protect her!’
Natasha opened her mouth to say that modern women were strong enough not to need protectors—but that wasn’t really true, was it? Hadn’t Raffaele done just that with her? Brought her in from the cold. And hadn’t he treated her son as…well, if not as his own, then certainly as some distant and fondly regarded relative?
Had she forgotten how despairing she had been when she had thrown herself onto him for mercy?
She had rung his bell one night in answer to an advertisement in the newspaper for a housekeeper, and he had opened the door himself. Some time in the hours between Natasha deciding that there was no way she could carry on living in a damp house and working like a slave, the heavens had opened and she had been soaked to the skin.
‘Yes?’ Raffaele had demanded, ‘What is it?’
Natasha had barely noticed the autocratic and irritated note in his voice—or that his black eyes had narrowed to something approaching astonishment as he took in the sodden mess she must have made.
‘I’ve come about the job,’ she’d said.
‘You’re too late.’
Her face’d crumpled. ‘You mean, it’s taken?’
He’d shaken his head impatiently. ‘I mean, that you’re too late. Literally. I’m not interviewing any more today. See the agency and I’ll try to fit you in tomorrow.’
But Natasha was desperate—and desperation could make you do funny things. It could fire you up with a determination you didn’t know you had until your back was against the wall. Particularly, if you were looking out for someone else.
‘No,’ she said firmly, and rushed on as she saw his expression of incredulity—because it was now or never.
‘No?’ he demanded. She dared to say no? To him?
She took a deep breath. ‘If I go away now, then you might appoint someone else before me, and no one will do the job as well as me. I can promise you that, Mr de Feretti.’
‘Signor de Feretti,’ he’d corrected flintily, but his interest had been awakened by her passion and determination and by the cold light of fear which lay at the back of her eyes.
He’d opened the door a fraction wider, so that a shaft of light had illuminated her, and Raffaele’d found himself thinking that she certainly wouldn’t provide much in the way of temptation—and maybe that was a good thing. Some of the younger applicants he’d seen that day had been pretty conturbante—sexy—and had made it clear that working for a single and very eligible bachelor was at the top of their wish-list for very obvious reasons. And the ones who’d been older had seemed itching to mother him. ‘So what makes you think you’d do the job better than anyone else?’ he’d demanded.
There was no possible answer to give other than the unvarnished truth, and Natasha had heard her voice wobble as she told him.
‘Because no one wants the job as much as I do. No one needs it as much as I do, either.’
He had seen she’d been shivering. Her teeth had been chattering and her eyes had a kind of wildness about them. He thought at the time that he might be offering house-room to someone who was very slightly unhinged, but sometimes Raffaele allowed himself to be swept along by a gut feeling that was stronger than logic or reason, and that had been one of those times.
‘You’d better come in,’ he’d said.
‘No! Wait!’
He frowned, scarcely able to believe his ears. ‘Wait?’
‘Can you give me a few minutes and I’ll be back?’
As Raffaele’d nodded his terse agreement he’d told himself he was being a fool—and he didn’t even have the fool’s usual excuse of having been blinded by a beautiful face and body. She was probably the head of some urban gang—the innocent-looking stool-pigeon who had arrived ahead of her accomplices who were even now bearing down on him.
But Raffaele was strong and fit and, deep down, he didn’t really think the woman was any such thing. Why, she was little more than a girl and her desperation sounded real enough, rather than the rehearsed emotion of some scam.
He’d tossed another log on the fire, which was blazing in his study, and poured himself a glass of rich, red wine. He’d almost given up on her coming back and thought that it was probably all for the best—though, his curiosity had somehow been whetted.
And then came the ringing on the door—only, this time it was even more insistent. His temper had threatened to fray as he’d wrenched it open.
‘You are not showing a very good example in interview technique!’ he’d grated, and then had seen that the woman was carrying a bundle—evident, even to his untutored eyes, as being a sleeping child—and there’d been a buggy on his front step. ‘What the hell is this?’
Without thinking, he’d pulled her