No wonder it was no skin off Gianluca’s nose if she was in Ragusa or Rome or wherever.
On their floor, he keyed open a door and stepped back to allow her inside.
She had expected something like the luxury sports car he drove—state-of-the-art, a little bit flashy, lots of grunt. A Gianluca Benedetti signature.
Instead he’d booked her into a boutique hotel which seemed to be something out of a Grimm’s fairy tale, with wood inlay on the walls, cool patterned parquet underfoot and a mix of charming antique and quirky contemporary furniture. She took in the arched and vaulted doorways and windows, which would make the occupants feel they were inside something not of this era and quite wonderful. Unexpectedly she felt close to tears.
‘This is my room?’ she asked in wonder, turning around with an open look on her face. She remembered he had said something about it belonging to a friend. She wondered if she could use it as a conversation-opener, to show him she could be as charming, approachable, friendly as those silly girls downstairs.
She cleared her throat and what came out was, ‘I really must insist on paying—’
The door shut in her face with a neat click.
For a moment Ava didn’t move.
He had never actually been rude to her before, and a part of her brain said it was clearly another message. He had held that door wide for those girls. He had smiled and lingered like Prince Charming. Then turned around and slammed a door in her face.
Yes, it was difficult to ignore that door now several inches from her face.
She wasn’t sure how she got to the bathroom. She wasn’t really aware she was taking off her clothes until the buttons felt fiddly under her fingers. When they wouldn’t shift fast enough she began ripping her shirt off. It wasn’t as if she had to worry about ruining it—she had a thousand more lined up in her closet at home...
She extended her trousers scarcely more care, because really they didn’t deserve it.
Standing in her underwear, she gave her reflection in the mirror a good look. Although of simple white cotton, the set cost more than some people made in a week of work.
There was no use denying that after Gianluca had swept in to her hotel room this morning she’d set aside her usual granny undies to shimmy her way into these.
What a fraud she was.
She hit the shower cubicle, snapping on the jets. The water pounded down on her head as she lathered herself up with the luxury vanilla and clove-scented soap—as far from her own scentless plain bar of soap in her toiletries bag as could be. She washed her dust-laden hair with the complementary products and waited for the warm water to work its magic on her tense muscles.
Instead she had to do battle against the memory of hard hips and thighs between her legs, the feel of a long, broad and muscular back, the clench of rock-hard abdominal muscles under her hands.
The ache low in her pelvis taunted her.
What are you going to do about it, Ava? whispered a hateful voice. He thinks you’re uptight and frustrated and in need of a shrink.
She hung her head and let the water cascade down.
It was no use.
He was a man who dated models and actresses and hosted private parties at ritzy bars where girls wearing almost nothing draped themselves over him... She was a woman who made lists in her head during sex, when she wasn’t sucking in her tummy and trying to hide her bottom.
It would never work.
Yet he was also a man who flew helicopters in war zones, and had cared enough to try and calm her fears of the helicopter. She lifted her head. And when it had come to getting her out of a bind today he’d come through.
She tried to imagine Bernard with her on the hillside. She would have been responsible for getting them both down.
Ava snapped off the flow of water and stepped out before she drowned herself. She was feeling truly wretched by the time she’d towel-dried her hair, rubbed lotion into her skin and gone in search of fresh clothes.
She couldn’t quite bring herself to pull on another pair of long trousers, and it wasn’t as if she was going anywhere, so she stepped into the boy-leg shorts she slept in and a blue stretchy cotton camisole before brushing out her hair.
She’d order room service and phone the office, check in with her assistant, PJ.
Except it was the wee hours of the morning in Australia.
Which meant, robbed of her go-to, she would have to find something else to keep her mind occupied.
The rest of the afternoon stretched out before her...and the rest of her fearful, boxed-up life which she had come to Italy to change.
She plopped down on the bed and looked around unhappily. She’d come to the conclusion she’d stuffed this up. But was she woman enough to fix it?
* * *
Gianluca only half listened to the earnest conversation of his lawyer as he sat at a table with his legals and a Russian oligarch.