She gave him a rather prim smile. ‘I’m not going to talk about it until I’ve worked it out properly. But I’ve made a list of all the places on the island I’d like to visit.’
Which sounded a little like a refusal to tell him!
‘Right,’ he said, in a rather dazed voice. ‘We’re here.’
The restaurant had clearly been chosen as much for its discreet setting as its breathtaking view of the sea, but it only reinforced Ella’s sensation of inhabiting a different world. There were women wearing a fortune in gems glittering around their necks, and she spotted a famous actress getting very cosy with a man who was definitely not her husband.
But all eyes were on them, watching as they weaved their way to a table in a candlelit alcove.
He ordered red wine, and then a steaming dish that arrived in a covered and distinctively patterned deep blue earthenware pot.
‘What a beautiful dish,’ observed Ella.
‘You like it? It is produced only in Islaroca, on the north west corner of the island.’
‘I’ve never seen anything like it before.’
‘You soon will—there’s a big export drive going on at the moment.’
It had been Nico’s baby—his attempt to change something of the island’s reputation for being just a tax haven for people with too much money. On an island with few natural resources, it seemed madness not to capitalise on the pottery industry—though Gianferro had initially opposed the expansion. His damned brother and his need to control!
When the waitress took the lid off the casserole, Ella stilled for a moment and turned her eyes towards Nico. ‘I recognise this,’ she said, sniffing.
He held her gaze. ‘That’s because I cooked it for you at the beach,’ he said softly. ‘Our national dish.’ The corners of his mouth lifted in a sardonic smile. ‘But this one probably won’t be quite as good as mine.’
He was right, it wasn’t—but Ella suspected that was because her hunger was not so honed as it had been back then.
And senses were both evocative and nostalgic—taste no less so than sight or sound. One mouthful was enough to transport her back to that time and place, to recall his kindness and his gentleness towards her. Her memory froze and then galloped forward, to rekindle even more evocative memories…
She gazed across the table towards him and felt the tiptoe of longing take slow, skittering steps up her spine.
He saw the tip of her tongue flick out to moisten her lips and felt the dry, hard ache of need as he watched her.
‘Gabriella—’ he whispered.
But his words were interrupted by a small flurry of activity at the door. Heads were raised and turned in its direction, and Nico’s eyes narrowed as a flamboyant-looking man with a shock of yellow hair beamed and began to walk towards their table.
He gave a small sigh, but Ella heard it. It was tinged with resignation and irritation, but his dark, handsome face did not make a flicker of reaction.
‘Who is it?’
‘It’s the owner and sometimes chef,’ he answered. ‘He’s a bit of a star on the island, as modern-day chefs so often are.’ He gave a cynical smile. ‘I thought he was in Paris.’
Ella stared at him as realisation began to dawn. ‘Has he…?’ She hesitated, because her supposition sounded so bizarre. ‘He hasn’t flown back all the way from Paris especially because you happen to be having dinner in his restaurant?’
His eyes mocked her. ‘Well, what do you think?’
She thought it was completely crazy, that was what she thought.
Ella watched while the owner bowed to Nico, his eyes barely giving her a second glance. As though she didn’t count. But, oh, Nico counted—that much was plain to see from the fawning bonhomie, the implication that Nico could demand a fresh strawberry flown from the Highlands of Scotland and a minion would immediately be dispatched to secure it.
After he had left, Nico studied her. ‘Do you understand a little now, Gabriella—why I did not tell you who I was?’
And Ella nodded, feeling…feeling as if she had somehow been too hard on him. Had she been guilty of looking at it from just her viewpoint, without thinking of his?
‘It must have been quite something…to be anonymous,’ she said slowly.
‘It was a taste of freedom which I found exhilarating.’ He shrugged. ‘And one which was heady enough to allow me to repress the knowledge that I was keeping something back.’