“Selfish?” She glared at him and then walked back to the small kitchen. She poured boiling water into the mug, staring at it while the colour from the peppermint tea bag bled through the cup. “How the hell do you figure that?”
He followed behind her, and stopped just inside the doorway. He crossed his arms over his toned chest and reclined casually against the wall. As though they were discussing something banal and convivial, like the shade of yellow used to decorate the kitchen.
“Is this really how you want to raise your brother? Is this what you think your mother and stepfather would have wanted?”
Indignation burst inside of her. “How dare you?” She put the tea down on the bench and braced herself, pressing both hands into the chipped laminate surface.
“Look at this place, Emily. It is fit for drug dealers and whores. You said your brother is seven years old?”
Her mouth opened and closed as the unjustness of his accusation drained through her awareness. “Get out.”
“Not without you,” he said firmly. For the first time since arriving in her apartment, he felt like his plan might not have been wise. Like there was a very real risk that she might firmly stand her ground. He ignored the doubt. It did not serve him. “Would you really make a decision to raise Andrew here, when I am offering you a whole new life?”
“A whole new life with a whole heap of conditions,” she pointed out acerbically, rubbing her temples. She couldn’t think straight with the powerful frame of Sabato Montepulciano only feet away. Her body was still throbbing from receding desire, and her mind was exhausted.
“This is what is holding you back?” He shook his head, and walked slowly towards her. He put a hand on either side of her body, and brought his mouth towards her lips. “You think you’ll be obliged to sleep with me because I want to help you?”
Her cheeks coloured at the characterisation.
“Let me make you this promise, Emily. We will not sleep together again unless you ask for it. Does this set your mind at ease?”
It didn’t. Her insides churned. She shook her head. “Why won’t you just leave me alone?”
He lifted a hand and cupped her cheek. “Life hasn’t been fair to you, Emily, and I can tip the scales back in your balance. Why won’t you just let me?”
Her laugh was almost a sob. “Because I don’t want you to pity me, okay? I don’t want you to look at me and see someone that needs fixing.”
“You don’t need fixing,” he reproached gently. “You need help. Let me give it to you.”
“Why?” She repeated, her eyes lifting to his. “I’m no one to you. I haven’t heard from you in three months …”
He nodded. “True, but that does not mean you are no one to me.” He kissed her lips gently. “Please, cara, pack some things.”
The thought of letting someone else shoulder some of her burden for a time crested in front of her, like an enormous golden orb. She ached to walk towards it and bathe in its warmth, but she knew she would never respect herself if she fell in with his plans.
She lifted her hands to his chest and splayed her fingers across the expensive fabric of his custom made shirt. “No.”
There was iron in her eyes, a look of steely determination that surprised him.
She could feel his warmth through the fabric and it gave her courage. “I’m not your problem. None of this is. You feel some sense of misguided responsibility because of what we … shared that weekend. But you shouldn’t.” She lifted a finger to his lips, to silence his objection. “You are mistaken if you think I’m some damsel in distress. I like my life. I chose to work at your hotel because Ewan accommodates whatever hours I can work that fit in with Andrew’s needs. I chose to live here because there’s a basement I can store my canvasses. I wish that my mum and Si were still here, or that my grandparents were at a place where they could help me more. I didn’t choose for any of that stuff to happen. But I chose this. Just because my life doesn’t look like something you would like living, doesn’t mean th
ere’s anything wrong with it.”
He was drowning. The water was coming over his eyes, making his chest constrict. He could not leave her living here. He had thought … he didn’t know what he’d thought. But now that he’d seen her long bus commute and walk through less than safe streets, and the apartment that looked a fashionable lamp away from being a drug den, he knew he couldn’t leave her. The worry would consume him.
“Canvasses?” He was outwardly calm, and he latched onto the only part of her statement that he hadn’t understood.
She nodded. Pride was a wave inside of her. She rode it, relieved that she could show him something that might change his mind about her. That might make him realise she was more than just a very financially stretched housekeeper at one of his luxurious hotels. She dropped her hands reluctantly from his chest and stepped away from him. One of her sketchpads was on top of the fridge. She pulled it down for him and laid it open on one of her more recent projects. The portrait.
Sabato wasn’t looking at the thick white book she’d put on the table. He was looking at her. Beautiful, determined, frustrating Emily. Emily who shone like a diamond in the midst of this tiny, run down apartment. Her enormous blue eyes lifted to his face, her auburn hair shone like a swathe of chestnut silk.
She was looking at him expectantly, and finally, he dropped his gaze to the book. And froze. A couple was staring back at him, elderly but full of life. The woman’s hair was looped in a bun high on her head, and he could tell just by looking at it that it was soft and floss-like. The man’s eyes were lined by life’s experiences, and he seemed to be peering out of the page at him. Sabato took a step closer, rendered completely speechless for one of the first times in his adult life. The woman’s hand was clasped in the man’s, and they seemed to be sharing a secret without speaking.
“What is this?” Sabato asked finally, hovering a finger over the paper. He gave into the temptation to touch the page, to assure himself they weren’t somehow real.
Emily’s nerves stretched taut. “This is who I am,” she said simply, flicking the page to show him another of her sketches. This one was just of Milly, one hand lifting to contain an errant twist of her hair, her eyes arched skywards as she focussed on the task. Sabato swallowed, then reached past Emily, to turn another page. Sketch after sketch confronted him, each strikingly brilliant in a different way.
“You did these.”