Under The Tuscan Sun...: A Bride for the Italian Boss / Return of the Italian Tycoon / Reunited by a Baby Secret

“Get it on Instagram!” the blonde said as they raced out the door. “Rafe Mancini sinks to new lows!”

Furious, Rafe ran after them, but they jumped into their car and peeled out of his parking lot before he could catch them.

After a few well-aimed curses, he counted to forty. Great. Just when he thought rumors of his temper had died, two spoiled little girls were about to resurrect them.

He returned to the quiet dining room. Taking another page from Dani’s book, he said, “I’m sorry for the disturbance. Everyone, please, enjoy your meals.”

A few diners glanced down. One woman winced. A couple or two pretended to be deep in conversation, as if trying to avoid his misery.

With a weak smile, he walked into the kitchen, over to his workstation and picked up a knife.

Emory scrambled over and whispered, “You’re going to have to find her.”

Facing the wall, so no one could see, Rafe squeezed his eyes shut. He didn’t have to ask who her was. The shifts Daniella had been gone had been awful. This was their first encounter with someone trying to lure out his temper, but there had been other problems. Squabbles among the waitresses. Seating mishaps. Lost reservations.

“Things are going wrong, falling through the cracks,” Emory continued.

“This is my restaurant. I will find and fix mistakes.”

“No. If there’s anything Dani taught us, it’s that you’re a chef. You are a businessman, yes. But you are not the guy who should be in the dining room. You are the guy who should be trotted out for compliments. You are the special chef made more special by the fact that you must be enticed out to the dining room.”

He laughed, recognizing he liked the sound of that because he did like to feel special. Or maybe he liked feeling that his food was special.

“Did you ever stop to think that you don’t have a temper with the customers or the staff when Dani’s around?”

He didn’t even try to deny it. With the exception of being on edge because of his attraction to her, his temperament had improved considerably. “Yes.”

Emory chuckled as if surprised by his easy acquiescence. “Because she does the tasks that you aren’t made to do, which frees you up to do the things you like to do. So, let’s just bring her back.”

Missing Dani was about so, so much more than Emory knew. Not just a loss of menial tasks but a comfort level. It was as if she brought sunshine into the room. Into his life. But she was engaged.

“Why should I go after her?” Rafe finally faced Emory. “She is returning to America in two weeks.”

“Maybe we can persuade her to stay?”

He sniffed a laugh. Leaning down so that only Emory would hear, he said, “She has a fiancé in New York.”

Emory’s features twisted into a scowl. “And she’s in Italy? For months? Without him? Doesn’t sound like much of a fiancé to me.”

That brought Rafe up short. There was no way in hell he’d let the woman he loved stay alone in Italy for months. Especially not if the woman he loved was Daniella.

He didn’t tell Emory that. His reasoning was mixed up in feelings that he wasn’t supposed to have. He’d gone the route of a relationship once. He’d given up apprenticeships to please Kamila. Which meant he’d given up his dream for her. And still they hadn’t made it.

But he’d learned a lesson. Relationships only put the future of his restaurants at stake, so he satisfied himself with one-night stands.

Dani would not be a one-night stand.

But Mancini’s really wasn’t fine without her.

And Mancini’s was his dream. He needed Daniella at his restaurant way too much to break his own rule about relationships. And that was the real bottom line. Getting involved with her would risk his dream as much as Kamila had. He needed her as an employee and he needed to put everything else out of his mind.

Emory caught Rafe’s arm. “Maybe there is an opportunity here. If she’s truly unhappy, especially with her fiancé, you might be able to convince her Mancini’s should be her new career.”

That was exactly what Rafe intended to do.

“But you can’t have that discussion over the phone. You need to go to Palazzo di Comparino tomorrow. Talk to her personally. Make your case. Offer her money.”

“Okay. I’ll be out tomorrow morning, maybe all day if I need the time. You handle things while I’m gone.”

Emory grinned. “That’s my boy.”

* * *

At the crack of dawn the next morning, Louisa woke Dani and said she was ready to take the bus back to Monte Calanetti. She was happy to have met Dani’s foster mom’s relatives, but she was nervous, antsy about Palazzo di Comparino. It was time to go back.

After grabbing coffee at a nearby bistro, Dani walked her friend to the bus station, then spent the day with her foster mother’s family. By late afternoon, she left, also restless. Like Louisa, she’d loved meeting the Felice family, but they weren’t her family. Her family was the little group of restaurant workers at Mancini’s.

Saddened, she began the walk back to her hotel. A block before she reached it, she passed the bistro again. Though the day was crisp, it was sunny. Warm in the rays that poured down on a little table near the sidewalk, she sat.

She ordered coffee, telling herself it wasn’t odd that she felt a connection to the staff at Mancini’s. They were nice people. Personable. Passionate. Of course, she felt as if they were family. She’d mothered the waitresses, babied the customers and fallen for Emory like a favorite uncle.

But she’d never see any of them again. She’d been fired from Mancini’s. Rafe hated her. She wouldn’t go home happy, satisfied to have met Rosa’s relatives, because the connection she’d made had been to a totally different set of people. She would board her plane depressed. Saddened. Returning to a man who didn’t even want to pick her up at the airport. A man whose marriage proposal she was going to have to refuse.

A street vendor caught her arm and handed her a red rose.

Surprised, she looked at him, then the rose, then back at him again. “Grazie...I think.”

He grinned. “It’s not from me. It’s from that gentleman over there.” He pointed behind him.

Dani’s eyes widened when she saw Rafe leaning against a lamppost. Wearing jeans, a tight T-shirt and the waist-length black wool coat that he’d worn to the tavern, he looked sexy. But also alone. Very alone. The way she felt in the pit of her stomach when she thought about going back to New York.

Her gaze fell to the rose. Red. For passion. But with someone like Rafe who was a bundle of passion about his restaurant, about his food, about his customers, the color choice could mean anything.

Carrying the rose, she got up from her seat and walked over to him. “How did you find me?”

“Would you believe I guessed where you were?”

“That would have to be a very lucky guess.”

He sighed. “I talked to your roommate, Louisa, this afternoon. She told me where you were staying, and I drove to Rome. Walking to your hotel, I saw you here, having coffee.”

He glanced away. “Look, can we talk?” He shoved his hands tightly into the side pockets of his coat and returned his gaze to hers. “We’ve missed you.”

“We?”

She almost cursed herself for the question. But she needed to hear him say it so she’d know she wasn’t crazy, getting feelings for a guy who found it so easy to fire her.

“I’ve missed you.” He sighed. “Two trust-fund babies faked me out the other night. They insulted my food and when they couldn’t get a rise out of me, they made it look like I was tossing one out on her ear to get a picture for Instagram.”

She couldn’t help it. She laughed. “Instagram?”

“It’s the bane of my existence.”

“But you hadn’t lost your temper?”

He shook his head and glanced away. “No. I hadn’t.” He looked back at her. “I remembered some things you’d done.” He smiled. “I learned.”

Her heart picked up at the knowledge that he’d learned from her, and the thrill that he was here, that he’d missed her. “You’re not a bad guy.”

His face twisted around a smile he clearly tried to hide. “According to Emory, I’m just an overworked guy. And interviewing for a new maître d’ isn’t helping. Especially when no one I talk to fits. It’s why I need you. You’re the first person to take over the dining room well enough that I don’t worry.”

She counted to ten, breathlessly waiting for him to expand on that. When he didn’t, she said, “And that’s all it is?”

“I know you want there to be something romantic between us. But there are things that separate us. Not just your fiancé, but my temperament. Really? Could you see yourself happy with me? Or when you look at me, do you see a man who takes what he wants and walks away? Because that’s the man I really am. I put my restaurant first. I have no time for a relationship.”

Her heart wept at what he said. But her sensible self, the lonely foster child who didn’t trust the wash of feelings that raced through her every time she got within two feet of him, understood. He was a gorgeous man, born for the limelight, looking to make a name for himself. She was a foster kid, looking for a home. Peace. Quiet. Security. They might be physically attracted, but, emotionally, they were totally wrong for each other. No matter how drawn she was to him, she knew the truth as well as he did.

“You can’t commit?”

He shook his head. “My commitment is to Mancini’s. To my career. My reputation. I want to be one of Europe’s famed chefs. Mancini’s is my stepping stone. I do not have time for what other men want. A woman on their arm. Fancy parties. Marriage. To me those are irrelevant. All I want is success. So I would hurt you. And I don’t want to hurt you.”

“Which makes anything between us just business?”

“Just business.”

Her job at Mancini’s had awakened feelings in Dani she’d never experienced. Self-worth. A sense of place. An unshakable belief that she belonged there. And the click of connection that made her feel she had a home. Something deep inside her needed Mancini’s. But she wouldn’t go back only to be fired again.

“And you need me?”

He rolled his eyes. “You Americans. Why must you be showered with accolades?”

Oh, he did love to be gruff.

She slid her hand into the crook of his elbow and pointed to her table at the bistro. “I don’t need accolades. I need acknowledgment of my place at Mancini’s...and my coffee. I’m freezing.”

He pulled his arm away from her hand and wrapped it around her shoulders. She knew he meant it only as a gesture between friends, but she felt his warmth seep through to her. Longing tugged at her heart. A fierce yearning that clung and wouldn’t let go.

“You should wear a heavier coat.”

His voice was soft, intimate, sending the feeling of rightness through her again.

“It was warm when I came here.”

“And now it is cold. So from here on I will make sure you wear a bigger coat.” He paused. His head tilted. “Maybe you need me, too?”

She did. But not in the way he thought. She wanted him to love her. Really love her. But to be the man of her dreams, he would have to be different. To be warm and loving. To want her—

And he might. Today. But he’d warned her that anything he felt for her was temporary. He couldn’t commit. He didn’t want to commit. And unless she wanted to get her heart broken, she had to really hear what he was saying. If she was going to get the opportunity to go back to the first place in her life that felt like home, Mancini’s, and the first people who genuinely felt like family, his staff, then a romance between them had to be out of the question.

“I need Mancini’s. I like it there. I like the people.”

“Ah. So we agree.”

“I guess. All I know for sure is that I don’t want to go back to New York yet.”

He laughed. They reached her table and he pulled out her chair for her. “That doesn’t speak well of your fiancé.”

Hauling in a breath, she sat, but she said nothing. Her stretching of the truth to Rafe about Paul being her fiancé sat in her stomach like a brick. Still, even though she knew she was going to reject his marriage proposal, it protected her and Rafe. Rafe wouldn’t go after another man’s woman. Not even for a fling. And he was right. If they had a fling, she would be crushed when he moved on.

One of his eyebrows rose, as he waited for her reply.

She decided they needed her stretched truth. But she couldn’t out-and-out lie. “All right. Paul is not the perfect guy.”

“I’m not trying to ruin your relationship. I simply believe you should think all of this through. You have a place here in Italy. Mancini’s needs you. I would like for you to stay in Italy and work for me permanently, and if you decide to, then maybe your fiancé should be coming here.”

She laughed. Really? Paul move to Italy because of her? He wouldn’t even drive to the airport for her.

Still, she didn’t want Paul in the discussion of her returning to Mancini’s. She’d already decided to refuse his proposal. If she stayed in Italy, it had to be for her reasons.

“I think we’re getting ahead of ourselves. I have a few weeks before I have to make any decisions.”

“Two weeks and two days.”

“Yes.”

He caught her hands. Kissed the knuckles. “So stay. Stay with me, Daniella. Be the face of Mancini’s.”

Her heart kicked against her ribs. The way he said “Stay with me, Daniella” froze her lungs, heated her blood. She glanced at the red rose sitting on the table, reminded herself it didn’t mean anything but a way to break the ice when he found her. He wasn’t asking her to stay for any reason other than her abilities in his restaurant. And she shouldn’t want to stay for any reason other than the job. If she could prove herself in the next two weeks, she wouldn’t be boarding a plane depressed. She wouldn’t be boarding a plane at all. She’d be helping to run a thriving business. Her entire life would change.

She pulled her hands away. “I can’t accept Louisa’s hospitality forever. I need to be able to support myself. Hostessing doesn’t pay much.”

He growled.

She laughed. He was so strong and so handsome and so perfect that when he let his guard down and was himself, his real self, with her, everything inside her filled with crazy joy. And maybe if she just focused on making him her friend, a friend she could keep forever, working for him could be fun.

“I can’t pay a hostess an exorbitant salary.”

“So give me a title to justify the money.”

He sighed. “A title?”

“Sure, something like general manager should warrant a raise big enough that I can afford my own place.”

His eyes widened. “General manager?”

“Come on, Rafe. Let’s get to the bottom line here. If things work out when we return to Mancini’s, I’m going to be taking on a huge chunk of your work. I’m also going to be relocating to another country. You’ll need to make it worth my while.”

He shook his head. “Dear God, you are bossy.”

“But I’m right.”

He sighed. “Fine. But if you’re getting that title, you will earn it.”

She inclined her head. “Seems fair.”

“You’ll learn to order supplies, check deliveries, do the job of managing things Emory and I don’t have time for.”

“Makes perfect sense.”

He sighed. His eyes narrowed. “Anything else?”

She laughed. “One more thing.” Her laughter became a silly giggle when he scowled at her. “A ride back to Louisa’s.”

He rolled his eyes. “Yes. I will drive you back to Louisa’s. If you wish, I will even help you find an apartment.”

Leaving the rose, she stood and pushed away from the table. “You keep getting ahead of things. We have two weeks for me to figure out if staying at Mancini’s is right for me.” She turned to head back to the hotel to check out, but spun to face him again. “Were I you, I’d be on my best behavior.”

* * *

The next morning, she called Paul. If staying in Italy was the rest of her life, the real rest of her life, she had to make things right.

“Do you know what time it is?”

She could hear the sleep in his voice and winced. “Yes. Sorry. But I wanted to catch you before work.”

“That’s fine.”

She squeezed her eyes shut as she gathered her courage. It seemed so wrong to break up with someone over the phone and, yet, they’d barely spoken to each other in six months. This was the right thing to do.

“Look, Paul, I’m sorry to tell you this over the phone, but I can’t accept your marriage proposal.”

“What?”

She could almost picture him sitting up in bed, her bad news bringing him fully awake.

“I’m actually thinking of not coming back to New York at all, but staying in Italy.”

“What? What about your job?”

“I have a new job.”

“Where?”

“At a restaurant.”

“So you’re leaving teaching to be a waitress?”

“A hostess.”

“Oh, there’s a real step up.”

“Actually, I’m general manager,” she said, glad she’d talked Rafe into the title. She couldn’t blame Paul for being confused or angry, and knew he deserved an honest explanation.

“And I love Italy. I feel like I belong here.” She sucked in a breath. “We’ve barely talked in six months. I’m going to make a wild guess that you haven’t even missed me. I think we were only together because it was convenient.”

Another man’s silence might have been interpreted as misery. Knowing Paul the way she did, she recognized it as more or less a confirmation that she was right.

“I’m sorry not to accept your proposal, but I’m very happy.”

After a second, he said, “Okay, then. I’m glad.”

The breath blew back into her lungs. “Really?”

“Yeah. I did think we’d make a good married couple, but I knew when you didn’t say yes immediately that you might have second thoughts.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be sorry. This is just the way life works sometimes.”

And that was her pragmatic Paul. His lack of emotion might have made her feel secure at one time, but now she knew she needed more.

They talked another minute and Dani disconnected the call, feeling as if a weight had been taken from her shoulders, only to have it quickly replaced by another one. She’d had to be fair to Paul, but now the only defense she’d have against Rafe’s charms would be her own discipline and common sense.

She hoped that was enough.

CHAPTER NINE

HER RETURN TO the restaurant was as joyous as a celebration. Emory grinned. The waitresses fawned over her. The busboys grew red faced. The chefs breathed a sigh of relief.

Annoyance worked its way through Rafe. Not that he didn’t want his staff to adore her. He did. That was why she was back. The problem was he couldn’t stop reliving their meeting in Rome. He’d said everything that he’d wanted to say. That he’d missed her. That he wanted her back. But he’d kept it all in the context of business. He’d missed her help. He wanted her to become the face of Mancini’s. He didn’t want anything romantic with her because he didn’t want to hurt her. He’d been all business. And it had worked.

But with her return playing out around him, his heart rumbled at the injustice. He hadn’t lied when he said he didn’t want her back for himself, that he didn’t want something romantic between them. His fierce protection of Mancini’s wouldn’t let him get involved with an employee he needed. But here at the restaurant, with her looking so pretty, helping make his dream a reality, he just wanted to kiss her.

He reminded himself that she had a fiancé—

A fiancé she admitted was not the perfect guy.

Bah! That fiancé was supposed to be the key weapon in his arsenal of ways to keep himself away from her. Her admission that he wasn’t perfect, even the fact that she was considering staying in Italy, called her whole engagement into question. And caused all his feelings for her to surface and swell.

She swept into the kitchen. Wearing a blue dress that highlighted her blue eyes and accented a figure so lush she was absolutely edible, she glided over to Emory. He took her hands and kissed the back of both.

“You look better than anything on the menu.”

Rafe sucked in a breath, controlling the unwanted ripple of longing.

Dani unexpectedly stepped toward Emory, put her arms around him and hugged him. Emory closed his eyes as if to savor it, a smile lifted his lips.

Rafe’s yearning intensified, but with it came a tidal wave of jealousy. He lowered his knife on an unsuspecting stalk of celery, chopping it with unnecessary force.

Dani faced him. “Why don’t you give me the key and I’ll open the front door for the lunch crowd?”

He rolled his gaze toward her slowly. Even as the businessman inside him cheered her return, the jealous man who was filled with need wondered if he wasn’t trying to drive himself insane.

“Emory, give her your key.”

The sous-chef instantly fished his key ring out of his pocket and dislodged the key for Mancini’s. “Gladly.”

“Don’t be so joyful.” He glanced at Dani again, at the soft yellow hair framing her face, her happy blue eyes. “Have a key made for yourself this afternoon and return Emory’s to him.”

She smiled. “Will do, boss.”

She walked out of the kitchen, her high heels clicking on the tile floor, her bottom swaying with every step, all eyes of the kitchen staff watching her go.

Jealousy spewed through him. “Back to work!” he yelped, and everybody scrambled.

Emory sauntered over. “Something is wrong?”

He chopped the celery. “Everything is fine.”

The sous-chef glanced at the door Dani had just walked through. “She’s very happy to be back.”

Rafe refused to answer that.

Emory turned to him again. “So did you talk her into staying? Is her fiancé joining her here? What’s going on?”

Rafe chopped the celery. “I don’t know.”

“You don’t know if she’s staying?”

“She said her final two weeks here would be something like a trial run for her.”

“Then we must be incredibly good to her.”

“I gave her a raise, a title. If she doesn’t like those, then we should be glad if she goes home to her fiancé.” He all but spat the word fiancé, getting angrier by the moment, as he gave Dani everything she wanted but was denied everything he wanted.

Emory said, “I still say something is up with this fiancé of hers. If she didn’t tell him she’s considering staying in Italy, then there’s trouble in paradise. If she did, and he isn’t on the next flight to Florence, then I question his sanity.”

Rafe laughed.

“Seriously, Rafe, has she talked to you about him? I just don’t get an engaged vibe from her.”

“Are you saying she’s lying?”

Emory inclined his head. “I don’t think she’s lying as much as I think her fiancé might be a real dud, and her engagement as flat as a crepe.”

Rafe said only, “Humph,” but once again her statement that her fiancé wasn’t the perfect guy rolled through his head.

“I only mention this because I think it works in our favor.”

“How so?”

“If she’s not really in love, if her fiancé doesn’t really love her, we have the power of Italy on our side.”

“To?”

“To coax her to stay. To seduce her away from a guy who doesn’t deserve her.”

Rafe chopped the celery. His dreams were filled with scenarios where he seduced Daniella. Except he had a feeling that kind of seducing wasn’t what Emory meant.

“Somehow or another we have to be so good to her that she realizes what she has in New York isn’t what she wants.”

Sulking, Rafe scraped the celery into a bowl. Why did he have to be the one doing all the wooing? He was a catch. He wanted her eyelashes to flutter when he walked by and her eyes to warm with interest. He had some pride, too.

Emory shook his head. “Okay. Be stubborn. But you’ll be sorry if some pasty office dweller from New York descends on us and scoops her back to America.”