Laura had somehow eroded his perfectly ordered life and he had quickly worked out that that was because they still hadn’t slept together. He saw a lot of her...every evening she came to the house, where they would go through rooms, working out what could go, what could stay and what needed to be packed by them. And every evening, the brush of his fingers against hers as he reached for something, the slightest physical contact, sent his blood pressure soaring. It was a form of protracted foreplay that was driving him crazy. There were a thousand times when he would have taken her in whatever part of whatever room they’d happened to be in, but for his ever-present father.
Never had it taken him so long to get nowhere with any woman. And the longer it took, the more he wanted her. He couldn’t get her out of his head. Returning to London full-time and shifting the overseeing of this project to any one of the many, many capable people he could call upon was out of the question.
Now, at a little after six, he pushed himself away from his desk, stretched and sauntered to the window to stare out at a pitch-black nightscape.
There would be no Laura this evening. Parents meeting at the school, apparently. He couldn’t remember his father ever being interested in something as mundane as attending a parents’ meeting. He had always been abroad, away on business. A suitable replacement had always been sent, usually a nanny.
Realising that it would be a pointless exercise to continue trying to work, he began sorting through the lower reaches of the bookcase that stood against the wall. He’d never noticed them before but since every nook and cranny in the house seemed to contain something, he felt he wouldn’t be disappointed.
* * *
Alessandro heard the bustle of his father in the kitchen before he entered. The door was ajar and he could make him out, yet again neatly attired in formal clothes, as though the Queen might take it into her head to pay him an unexpected visit for which he had to be ready. They had dumped the formal dining room a while back for the informality of the kitchen. At least in a smaller arena the silences weren’t quite so resounding.
He inhaled deeply and glanced down at the wad of envelopes in his hand. They were sepia with age.
‘Found one or two things,’ he said, walking in, knowing that this was something that had to be confronted. He watched as his father turned around and then he strolled towards the kitchen table and dumped the envelopes down. ‘Why didn’t you tell me?’
‘Tell you what?’ Roberto adjusted his tie and cast a baleful look at his son.
‘You know what. Why didn’t you tell me about my past?’
* * *
An hour and a half later, Alessandro was on his way to see Laura. For once, he had no desire to be on his own. He and his father could have continued talking into the night but they were too accustomed to their silences for that. They had stopped talking when both had felt that everything that had been said needed to be digested.
He killed the engine of his car and sat in the darkness for a few seconds, before swinging out and heading to the front door. He half expected Edith to get it but she didn’t. Seeing him there, Laura’s eyes opened wide, then she stepped aside so that he could brush past her.
‘I’ve only just got back from the parents’ meeting,’ she said, eyeing him nervously as he prowled into the sitting room and, once there, remained standing by the window, having divested himself of his coat.
‘Where’s your grandmother?’
‘What are you doing here? She’s having dinner with friends in the village...why?’ Her heart fluttered and she wanted to ask him if he just couldn’t stand it any longer, if he had had to come because days of being in the same space, clearing out Roberto’s stuff while he’d watched like a relentless chaperone, had been as difficult for him as it had been for her.
Alessandro saw the blaze of unbidden desire in her eyes and smiled slowly. ‘Fortuitous.’ He put down his coat and walked towards her. ‘Been thinking of me?’
‘I’ve seen quite a bit of you recently so why would I...?’ Laura went bright red. Yes, she had made her mind up that this was what she was going to do. She wasn’t going to fight lust. There were so many reasons for just giving in but there was a limit to what she was ever going to admit. She certainly wasn’t going to admit that she had been thinking of him...something about that sentiment would have made her feel uneasy, although she didn’t know why because he had said it lightly, jokingly.