And, most importantly of all, what will he want when—? No, don’t go there. Not yet. Not yet by a long, long way.
The hollow feeling scoured her insides. No, straightforward was the last thing it was.
‘I’ve got to know, Laura!’ Her plea was heartfelt. ‘I’ve got to know what he feels. I’ve got to know what I feel! What we feel about each other—about...about everything!’
‘Well, that’s exactly why you need to spend time with him,’ Laura Carldon said encouragingly. ‘To start finding that out! An afternoon with him here on Long Island is ideal! Show him the sights, hit the beach, go shopping in the boutiques—have a nice long, lazy lunch. Have fun!’
* * *
In the hours that followed, Eloise heard h
er employer’s admonition echoing in her head. Vito had arrived and been welcomed by Laura—she was casually dressed, but looking a carefully composed knock-out.
Laura’s aside to Eloise of, ‘OMG, he’s gorgeous!’ had been clearly audible.
And then Johnny had rushed out even more enthusiastically to greet the gleaming Ferrari Vito had rented while in the USA.
Eloise had climbed in and Vito had headed down the driveway, waving back at Johnny, hoisted up in his mother’s arms, who had waved back mightily, mouthing, Vroom! Vroom! ecstatically.
Only as they turned out on to the roadway beyond the Carldons’ extensive grounds did Eloise look at Vito in the confines of the car, punishingly aware of his presence so, so close to her. She felt her heart catch.
He was focusing on the road, and it gave her a precious moment to take in his gorgeousness—the feathered dark hair, the dark glasses, the chiselled profile, the way his cotton knit polo shirt moulded his leanly muscled torso, the glint of his gold watch at his wrist, the long length of his tanned bare forearm...
She gulped inwardly. The impact he had on her senses was as powerful—as overpowering!—as it had ever been. And by the same token she knew—had known from that first appreciative glance at her as he’d arrived—that he, too, was finding her just as appealing.
Thanks to her employer’s insistence, she was looking just the part for a day out on fashionable Long Island—courtesy of Laura’s own wardrobe.
‘I’m keeping all this for next time around, but this will fit you perfectly now!’ Laura had said, pulling out of her vast closet a pair of navy blue elastic-waisted trousers and a carefully constructed but very smart blue and white boat-necked, loose-fitting striped top, both with an extremely upmarket specialist fashion label. A pair of low-heeled white sandals and a straw shoulder bag completed her outfit.
With her hair pushed back off her forehead with a white headband, snaking down her back in a long plait, she looked, Eloise knew, both stylish and slim. And the appreciative glint in Vito’s eyes confirmed it—sweeping her instantly back to a thousand memories of his eyes lighting upon her as she walked up to him in any number of his hotels across Europe. He’d only ever had eyes for her.
As if he’d read her mind, he glanced at her now as he drove, and even with the covering of his dark glasses she felt the force of his gaze.
‘So, where shall we go?’ he asked. There was a smile in his voice...around his mouth.
‘The south coast is the most popular, and has the best beaches, but the north coast is less crowded and more historic,’ she said.
‘Well, I’ve never been to Long Island at all,’ Vito said, relaxing his shoulders into the car seat that moulded his body, ‘so it will all be great.’
He forbore to say that crossing a desert would be ‘great’ if he could do it with Eloise.
Eloise!
Her name billowed in his head, catching at his throat as his eyes drank her in, and he revelled in her presence at his side after the long, long months of being apart from her.
Did I really once take it for granted that I could spend any amount of time with her that I wanted—that she would always be there for me?
The thought was troubling. Its resolution less so. Never again, he knew with absolute certainty, would he ever take her for granted.
Did I win her too easily? Woo her too effortlessly? Did I assume she would wait to hear me out about the trap that Marlene had sprung on me—assume she would wait until I’d extricated myself from it?
Well, there would be no more assumptions about Eloise. He felt his pulse kick. She had the same impact on him now as she had had the very first time he’d set eyes on her, as she’d gazed up at him with her huge, beautiful blue eyes. He knew only that it was essential that he get this right. That they discover, once and for all, what they might be together. The most important question of all.
‘OK,’ he said, and deliberately he made his voice light and cheerful, ‘tell me everything you know about Long Island!’
Eloise was glad of the lead. Glad that they could just chat, in a friendly, unforced way, about somewhere that—just for a change, she realised—she knew more about than he did. Previously, while they’d been touring Europe, most of the cities they’d gone to she had never been to before. It had been Vito who’d been knowledgeable about them. It was curious to think that this time around it would be her telling him.
Perhaps it was more than curious—perhaps it was symbolic? Symbolic of the subtle but undeniable change in their relationship. She was no longer the compliant girlfriend, endlessly willing to be anything he wanted. For the first time she felt more... More what, precisely?