Italian Boss, Ruthless Revenge. Carol Marinelli
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of her!’
‘Have they been together long?’ Caitlyn attempted to be casual but her face was burning.
‘Never seen her till tonight,’ Geoff said cheerfully. ‘I’ll give your taxi another reminder—mind you, the tennis is on. Why don’t you wait inside and I’ll call you when it comes?’
And she would have—only Lazzaro Ranaldi himself was coming through the revolving glass doors. Lazzaro Ranaldi himself was smiling at her as he walked past.
‘You’re either very late leaving, or arriving incredibly early.’
‘I’m waiting for a taxi,’ Caitlyn mumbled.
‘You’ll be waiting a while—the night match at the tennis just wrapped up.’
‘I heard.’
‘Would you like a lift?’
Just like that he said it—just like any normal person would say it. Only he wasn’t just a normal person, and Caitlyn had difficulty coming up with a normal answer. She just stood there mute for a moment as a few hundred thousand dollars’ worth of sleek silver sports car pulled up and the valet handed him the keys.
‘I was expecting the limousine!’ She put on a plummy voice and raised her nose in distaste at his stunning car—then panicked that he wouldn’t get her rather offbeat humour.
‘Sorry about that… You’ll just have to slum it in this…’ He didn’t just get it, he topped it! As Geoff opened the passenger door for her, Lazzaro peered inside at the immaculate leather upholstery. ‘I can look in the boot for a newspaper or something for you to sit on, so you don’t mess up your skirt.’
‘I’ll be fine.’ Caitlyn gave a martyred sigh and climbed into the seat, wriggling down in the baby-bottom-soft leather and returning his smile as he joined her, watching as he punched her address into the sat nav. And just like that she forgot to be nervous—just like that they purred off into the night, chatting about anything and everything—including her age.
‘How old are you, then?’ Lazzaro asked as she rattled on about her studies.
‘Twenty,’ Caitlyn lied. Then, realising he could look it up, she recanted. ‘Well, I will be on Thursday.’
He made a mental note to tell his PA to send flowers and book a table—Thursday suddenly seemed an impossibly long way off.
‘Turn left at the next roundabout and your destination is on the right,’ came the very calm voice of the sat nav.
‘The trouble with these things,’ Lazzaro said, smiling as he turned off the engine and faced her, ‘is that you can’t pretend you’re lost and prolong your journey.’
‘I know where I live,’ Caitlyn pointed out, but her heart was soaring at his blatant flirt.
‘Nice place.’ It was—amassiveold weatherboard in a very nice street, just a stone’s throw from the beach. Either there were a thousand students crammed in or, Lazzaro realised, she still lived at home. ‘Someone’s still up.’
‘My mum!’ Caitlyn frowned at the twitching curtain, wishing she’d just gone to bed, embarrassed all of a sudden and feeling about twelve years old. ‘Or my grandad.’
Only it didn’t bother him a bit—in fact, there was a certain novelty to it all. Lazzaro was used—too used—to sophisticates seductively inviting him up, having already gone down!
‘Then you’d better go in.’
He watched her face fall an inch, and, though he wanted nothing more than to reach over and kiss her, Lazzaro knew exactly how to keep a woman wanting more.
God, she was gorgeous, though, Lazzaro thought as she walked up her drive.
The front door was opening before she even got there.
Funny too, Lazzaro mused, smiling as he drove off into the night. He’d put her out of her misery and ring her on Monday—put himself out of his misery too, Lazzaro thought, shifting uncomfortably in his seat.
Once he’d dealt with Luca he’d ring her.
Luca.
His face hardened when he thought of his twin brother—he was not relishing a bit the task that lay ahead.
Monday suddenly seemed impossibly close.
CHAPTER ONE
‘YOU bit him!’ Black eyes fixed her with a stern glare as she stood at his desk. This was the very last thing Lazzaro needed to be dealing with today, and a petty row among the domestic staff was something he didn’t usually have to.
‘I didn’t bite him,’ Caitlyn snapped, and Lazzaro actually blinked. Her denial was not what he had been expecting—especially given the evidence. But her irritation, her indignation, even, told him that this five-minute problem that had landed on his desk at five p.m. on a hellish Friday was actually a rather more serious one. Jenna, his PA, had tearfully resigned on Wednesday, and her assistant was off with the flu that had swept through half his admin staff, which meant that today Lazzaro was dealing with what was usually expertly delegated. Only maybe it was just as well he was dealing with this particular scenario. It would seem that Caitlyn—he glanced down at the file on his desk—Caitlyn Bell, had a side to her story that he needed to hear.
Even if he really didn’t want to.
‘It was just a little nip.’ China-blue eyes held his—eyes that were familiar somehow…eyes that were just as blue as Roxanne’s.
Where the hell had that thought come from?
This woman was nothing like Roxanne.
Caitlyn was as blonde as Roxanne was dark, and the woman who stood before him was petite whereas Roxanne was curvaceous, but those eyes… A tiny swallow was the only evidence of his inner turmoil—he was angry with himself that even after all this time the memories, the pain, could still wash over him at the most unexpected of times.
‘It’s not as if I sank my teeth in.’
Lazzaro dragged his mind back to the conversation, grateful to escape his own thoughts, and it was quite hard not to smile at her description, quite hard not to compare it to Malvolio’s—who had roared and ranted so loudly, his hand wrapped in a handkerchief, as if it was about to fall off. He hadn’t known what to expect when he’d called her to his office. He was the last person who would normally deal with one of the hotel’s maids, and when he did they were usually cowering in the chair. But not this one.
She’d declined his offer to sit, and was instead standing at his desk—jangling with nerves, perhaps, but curiously strong. Long blonde hair that was presumably usually neatly tied back was tumbling out of its hair-tie after the incident, her arms were folded across her chest, and the blue eyes were glassy from her trying not to cry. She kept sniffing in the effort not to, and somehow, even if she was tiny, even if she was clearly shaken, somehow she was incredibly together too—her rosebud mouth pursed and defiant as she refused to relent.
‘I need more information.’
‘I really don’t see what all the fuss is about.’
‘One of my staff members has been bitten by another—’
‘Not just any one of your staff members…’
This time he deliberately didn’t blink. He held his expression in absolute check as she interrupted, and, though few usually dared, he let the fact go as Caitlyn Bell got straight to the rather awkward point.
‘Malvolio is, I believe, your brother-in-law.’
He gave a terse nod—a nod that was actually respectful, acknowledging what she had to say even while quickly disregarding it. ‘The fact Malvolio is my brother-in-law has no bearing in this matter—none whatsoever. Now, I want to hear exactly what happened.’
‘As