The Lady's Man

And in the course of the past hour or so two solutions had occurred to her—one quite civilised, the other rather more brutal. She would try the first one first and see if she could avoid spilling blood.

Speaking calmly and keeping her tone as matter-of-fact as she could manage, Caterina enquired, ‘Do you really think we’ll be working together?’

Matthew looked surprised. ‘I had certainly assumed we would be. You’re in charge of this project, aren’t you? And I understood from the brief that you planned to be heavily involved in its execution.’

She shrugged. ‘Yes, I do.’

‘Then we’ll be working together.’ And he smiled a maddening smile, clearly relishing this prospect.

Caterina dropped her eyes, trying to gather her thoughts calmly. She must handle this with great delicacy or it would blow up in her face. One whiff of her true motives and he’d refuse to play ball.

She told him, ‘The problem is you’re a very busy man. I know you’re involved in several projects just for my brother alone—including now,’ she added with what she hoped was a benevolent smile, ‘the organisation of the garden party. All these things take up time and, as you know, the Bardi extension’s rather urgent... I fear it might be putting just a little too much pressure on you to expect you to work on it as well...’

Was she striking the right note? She tried to judge as he sat watching her, his long, supple frame leaning casually against the chair-back, the strong tanned fingers lightly clasping the arms, his eyes fixed on her face, an impenetrable smile on his lips.

He said, ‘You’re quite right. I do have a lot on my plate.’

Inwardly, Caterina sighed a small sigh of relief. Well, at least he hadn’t instantly shot her down in flames. That mild response even suggested that she might be on the right track. She crossed her fingers mentally and carried on.

‘You’ve already done the important part by producing the winning design... Its implementation... well, that requires less talent...and you have so many companies, so many talented people working for you...’ She swallowed and finally spat out the conclusion she’d been working towards. ‘I can’t help feeling it would take the pressure off you if you were to appoint one of your employees to do the actual donkey work.’

Matthew watched her for a moment, saying nothing, seeming to give some thought to her proposal.

‘That’s certainly the way I sometimes do things,’ he confessed.

‘It makes sense.’ Reassured, Caterina hurried on. ‘I mean, you can’t be expected to do everything yourself. That would just be crazy. After all, you’re only human.’ She forced a sympathetic smile. ‘You can only stretch yourself so far. And this isn’t such a terribly important project, after all. I’m sure you have far more important ones to claim your time. So it really would be more sensible to hand this one over to someone else.’

‘I suppose there might be a kind of logic in that.’

As he nodded, Caterina congratulated herself. I’ve done it! she was thinking. And she smiled to herself, feeling a huge lift of elation.

‘Well,’ she said, relief pouring through her—for it looked as though she’d got her way without having to spill blood. ‘I’m very glad we’re in agreement about that.’

Matthew smiled a slow smile, holding her eyes with his own as he did so. ‘You know...’ he said, letting his gaze wash over her, touching her face, her neck, her shoulders, then moving down to the soft swell of her breasts in a way that was so unexpectedly yet so openly sensual that Caterina, totally thrown, found herself just sitting there, as though he had taken a hammer and nailed her to the chair.

‘You know, when you calm down a bit, when you relax, when you smile, you really are quite extraordinarily attractive,’ he told her. ‘I was thinking that this afternoon, when you were on stage at the reception. You seemed totally relaxed and you looked quite beautiful.’

‘Oh?’

Caterina forced the monosyllable between stiff lips. What she really wanted to do was tell him quite frankly that she had no wish to hear his opinion on such matters. But two things were stopping her, one she could control and one she could not.

The first was a reluctance to upset this sudden mellow mood of his. She had got what she wanted and she would be mad now to blow it just for the pleasure of putting him in his place.

But the second thing that was stopping her was the strangest sensation of somehow being mesmerised by the force of those dark eyes, a sensation somehow both pleasurable and quite intolerable at the same time. And it gripped her like a vice. She could not shake it off.

The grey eyes smiled. ‘I hope you’re going to be like this this evening. Then we can really enjoy our dinner together.’

Caterina blinked. She had almost forgotten about the dinner. She was expected to partner him, as winner of the contest, to the celebratory dinner at the Town Hall this evening. That fact flicked her back to reality, for she’d been dreading the dinner, and that feeling of being mesmerised abruptly vanished. Though she kept her expression sweet. She must not antagonise him. And, anyway, the prospect of dinner no longer seemed so ghastly. It would, after all, be the last unpleasant chore that she would be required to perform with him.

With a smile she put to him, ‘Perhaps we can discuss at the dinner tonight who you might like to replace you on the job? You might even want to make an announcement to the other guests at some point?’

And she sat back in her seat. The whole thing was virtually sewn up.

But Matthew’s expression had changed. ‘An announcement?’ he was saying. Then he shook his head. ‘You’ve got it wrong, I’m afraid. There’ll be no one replacing me. I intend to do the job myself.’

‘But you said—’ Suddenly Caterina was sitting up very stiffly in her seat. ‘Wh-what do you mean?’ she stuttered. ‘You just said you would!’

‘I said no such thing.’ His expression had hardened again. ‘All I said was that your suggestion contained a kind of logic. But it’s always been my intention to see this project through personally.’ He smiled a harsh smile. ‘Sorry to disappoint you.’

So he had tricked her. Caterina glared at him, quite speechless for a moment. He had known all along why she was trying to edge him out—not out of concern for his heavy workload at all, but because she couldn’t stand the prospect of working with him.

And he refused to play ball. Well, that was to be expected. But the matter wasn’t settled yet, even though he seemed to think it was. She’d tried the soft approach first; now it was time to get tough.

She fixed him with a direct look. ‘I think you’re making a big mistake.’

‘A mistake?’

‘It wouldn’t work.’

He feigned innocence. ‘Why on earth not?’

‘You really need to ask?’ Caterina grimaced as she elaborated, ‘We’re not even capable of conducting a civil conversation. How on earth could we possibly contemplate working together?’

‘It might be hard, I confess.’ He smiled. ‘Think of it as a challenge.’

Caterina did not smile back. ‘There are challenges and challenges. And this one, I’m afraid, just doesn’t appeal to me. No, you and I will not be working together.’

One dark eyebrow lifted. ‘I’m sorry to hear that.’ He regarded her narrowly for a moment then put to her, ‘I take it this means you’ll be handing over to someone else?’

‘No, it doesn’t mean that. This project is my baby. I wouldn’t dream of handing it over to someone else.’

‘In that case, you’ve lost me.’ The dark eyes regarded her unblinkingly and it was impossible to tell what was going on in his head. ‘If neither of us is planning to hand over to someone else, surely that means we’ll be working together?’

‘No, it doesn’t. You see, whether you like it or not, you won’t be doing the Bardi job.’

‘Won’t I?’ His tone was low but had a definite edge to it. ‘You’re going to have to explain why. I’m afraid that makes no sense to me.’

As she faced him, Caterina’s heart was thumping inside her. And now that the moment had come she found herself hesitating. It was harder than she’d thought, playing the heavy.

‘Quite frankly,’ she said, ‘I’d hoped to avoid this sort of unpleasantness—’

‘Unpleasantness?’ He continued to watch her.

‘What kind of unpleasantness are you talking about?’

Caterina swallowed hard. Damn and blast him, she was thinking. Why did he have to cross my path in the first place? But she couldn’t back down now, even though what she had to do came far from naturally. She simply had to get him off the job.

She swallowed again. ‘The sort of unpleasantness, I’m afraid, that could ruin your career and have you thrown out of San Rinaldo. You see,’ she hurried on before her nerve deserted her, ‘I know things about you... things you wouldn’t want made public...and I’m prepared to use them against you unless you withdraw from this job.’

There, she had said it, and as she stopped speaking her blood was pounding. Breathing carefully, she watched him, waiting for his response.

She did not have long to wait. He began to rise to his feet. In a voice like sandpaper he said, ‘So, that’s what this is all about? Well, I think I’ve heard enough.’ He flicked her a look as hard as granite. ‘But you’re wasting your time. I won’t be withdrawing.’

‘Oh, yes, you will. You’ll have no choice in the matter once my brother gets to hear the things I know. And that’s what I’m going to do. I’m going to tell him everything. Unless,’ she stressed again, ‘you drop out of the Bardi job. If you’re prepared to do that, I won’t say a thing.’

Matthew said nothing for a moment, then he fixed her with a stony look. ‘Blackmail’s an ugly thing, you know. It doesn’t really suit you.’ Then, as she looked away, fighting a blush—for he was right, this didn’t suit her—he added in a tone grown suddenly heavy with contempt. ‘No doubt this is one of the unsavoury little tricks you learned in the course of your association with Orazio?’

It was like a slap across the face. Caterina’s sense of unease vanished. She looked back at him now, seeing only the hated face of the man who had been responsible, with his lies and his slanders, for all the emotional hurt she’d recently suffered.

Her heart filled with bitterness. Why should she feel uneasy about employing a bit of blackmail on a man like Matthew Allenby—a man who, in spite of the high moral tone he was taking, was far from being a stranger to such methods himself? Why, his hands were as black as the blackest corners of his soul!

She told him, her tone cutting, ‘No, I didn’t learn it from Orazio. I’m simply using the sorts of tactics that I feel sure you’re familiar with.’

‘Well, they won’t work, I’m afraid. Face facts. You’re a novice.’ The dark eyes flayed her. ‘I’m way out of your league.’

Quite possibly he was, but he was still not as invulnerable as he believed. As he started to turn away, she angrily informed his back, ‘I’m not bluffing, you know. I know all about you. And I have evidence in my possession. Real, tangible evidence. I shall expose you for the cheat and the charlatan that you are.’

Matthew was almost at the door when she finished the sentence. Unhurriedly, he turned round and looked into her face and his eyes were a pair of steel hooks tearing into her.

‘You know,’ he informed her, ‘you’re making a big mistake. I’m really not the best man to pick a fight with. People who pick fights with me invariably end up regretting it. And I guarantee,’ he added in a tone like a whiplash, ‘that you will be no exception to the rule.’

Never before had Caterina seen such a look in a man’s eyes. A look without mercy. Black and menacing. But instead of feeling scared, or outraged, or angry, what she felt was a sudden flare of reckless excitement and a trickle of anticipation like cool fingers down her spine. She was going to thoroughly enjoy the fight ahead.

Matthew continued to watch her, then, with a quick, cynical smile, he inclined his head briefly in his usual parody of a salute.

‘Goodbye for now, Lady Caterina. Until dinner this evening.’

Then he turned and strode swiftly from the room.

There was only one thing for it after that encounter with Matthew Allenby—a nice long bubble bath laced with oil of patchouli to help restore her frayed and tattered nerves.

‘Help!’ she’d told Anna, her personal maid, when she’d returned to her private quarters still seething with anger. ‘Be an angel and run a bath for me. I think I’m going to explode!’

And that was where she was now, up to her chin in scented bubbles, listening to Anna happily singing to herself next door as she got Caterina’s things ready for the dinner this evening. Though she was only listening with half an ear. Most of her attention was focused on trying to sort out the hopeless jumble in her head. Her brain felt as though it had been attacked by an electric blender.

Damn Matthew Allenby! Damn him to infinity! What had she ever done to deserve this blight on her life?

She lay back, letting her hair trail in the water, and gazed up at the painted and gilded ceiling with its pictures of water nymphs and seashells and dolphins. In a way, she felt appalled by the stance she’d been forced to take with him, threatening to ruin him and have him kicked out of San Rinaldo. She must have sounded like some heavy in a second-rate gangster movie! But what alternative did she have? She simply could not work with him. And anyway, after what he’d done to her, he deserved every nasty thing she could fling at him.

She sighed. In the beginning, of course, she hadn’t realised he was such a viper. She’d known little about him, other than that he worked for her brother, and their paths had crossed only on brief and rare occasions so that the two of them had remained virtual strangers. He had really only become of interest to her when Orazio had opened her eyes.

Orazio. Her gaze still fixed on one of the water nymphs, she paused in her thoughts and let her mind settle on Orazio.

She had thought she was in love with him, but now she suspected she never had been. She had got over him far too quickly for it to have been love. But she had been fond of him. He had been fun and a decent and caring person, and he definitely hadn’t deserved to be treated as he had been.

The whole disaster had happened, of course, because of what he knew about Matthew Allenby. For he had a friend, he had told her, who had once worked for Matthew and who had told him all about the way he went about his business. Bribes, intimidation, secret handouts, blackmail. These were the methods by which he had got where he was. And, of course, by the careful courting of those with influence and power.

‘Your brother can’t possibly realise what kind of man he’s got tied up with. For God’s sake warn him,’ Orazio had advised her just a short while after they’d started seeing each other.

And she had. She’d gone to Damiano and told him everything and her brother’s response had been very clear and simple. ‘Accusations without proof are worthless,’ he’d told her. ‘Show me some evidence and then we can start talking.’

And so Orazio had set about gathering together what they needed—files and letters and tapes and photographs—and they had planned that, as soon as he’d gathered enough, Caterina would present the whole lot to Damiano. She’d gone along with this plan not out of any malice towards Matthew Allenby, for at that stage she’d had nothing personal against him, but because she loved and wanted to protect her brother.

But neither she nor Orazio had realised they were playing with dynamite.

The first hint of the shambles that lay ahead had been when Damiano, who didn’t normally interfere in her private life, had started expressing disapproval of Orazio—not saying anything specific, just that he considered him unsuitable—and brother and sister had exchanged sharp words on the subject. But Caterina had not been prepared for the avalanche that was to follow.

It had happened quite out of the blue. Damiano had called her to his office and proceeded to regale her with a list of accusations against Orazio.

‘He’s a crook,’ he’d told her, ‘a two-bit crook and a lowlife, and I can’t allow you to continue to see him.’

Caterina had been outraged. She’d refused to listen. How dared he make these false accusations?

‘I know the real reason!’ she’d stormed at him. ‘It’s because he’s a commoner! Well, I won’t stop seeing him and you can’t make me!’ Then she’d added, just out of bravado, because she was so damned mad at him, for really there had been no such intention in her head, ‘I might even marry him if I decide it suits me!’

That had been when Damiano had, almost literally, exploded. ‘Take my word for it,’ he’d warned her, ‘that that will never happen!’ And there and then he had ordered her to break off the romance immediately or he would cut her off without a penny.

He’d meant it, too. But that hadn’t stopped Caterina, as she’d swung out of his office in tears of helpless rage, retorting defiantly, ‘I don’t care! I won’t stop seeing him!’

For she could be as hard-headed as Damiano and, besides, it was a matter of principle. She would not be dictated to in this fashion.

And she would have stuck to her guns if Orazio hadn’t talked her out of it and insisted on making a discreet withdrawal.

‘I can’t let you make this sacrifice,’ he’d told her. ‘I’d never be able to live with myself if I did.’

Besides, he’d no longer had a job nor much hope of finding another one. Word was already being circulated that he was persona non grata—Damiano hadn’t wasted any time there—and it really hadn’t looked as though there was much of a future for him in San Rinaldo. So within a week he’d been gone, in spite of Caterina’s pleas that he stay on and at least fight to redeem his good name. ‘I’d rather sacrifice my good name than bring you embarrassment,’ he’d told her. And that had been the end of the romance.

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