THE BRIDES OF BELLA LUCIA

A family torn apart by secrets,

reunited by marriage

When William Valentine returned from the war, as a testament to his love for his beautiful Italian wife, Lucia, he opened the first Bella Lucia restaurant in London. The future looked bright, and William had, he thought, the perfect family.

Now William is nearly ninety, and not long for this world, but he has three top London restaurants with prime spots throughout Knightsbridge and the West End. He has two sons, John and Robert, and grownup grandchildren on both sides of the Atlantic who are poised to take this small gastronomic success story into the twenty-first century.

But when William dies, and the family fights to control the destiny of the Bella Lucia business, they discover a multitude of long-buried secrets, scandals, the threat of financial ruin and, ultimately two great loves they hadn’t even dreamed of: the love of a lifelong partner, and the love of a family reunited.

It’s the wedding everyone’s been waiting for…

Max and Louise finally say, “I do!”

The Valentine Bride

by Liz Fielding

The Valentine Bride
Liz Fielding

www.millsandboon.co.uk

This book is for my daughter, Amy;

the joy of my life, my dearest friend, she

fills my head with stories and never fails to

make me laugh.

CONTENTS

THE BRIDES OF BELLA LUCIA

FAMILY TREE

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

COMING NEXT MONTH

CHAPTER ONE

‘I’VE printed out the PR schedule for this week’s lead-up to the relaunch. The City Lights tie-in—’ Louise Valentine broke off as her cell phone began to burble. ‘I’ll have to take this,’ she said, excusing herself from the Nash Group executives gathered around the conference table for her briefing. ‘I’m expecting a call from the editor…’

But as she flipped open the phone the caller ID warned her that it wasn’t editor of the country’s major ‘scene’ magazine.

It was Max.

For a moment she couldn’t think, couldn’t move, but then he’d always had that effect on her. Reducing her to a quivering wreck with a look that suggested it was a toss up whether he kissed her or strangled her. Since kissing her wasn’t an option, she’d made a point of keeping her distance other than at family gatherings. Even then, by mutual consent, they’d chosen opposite ends of the room.

Unfortunately that was no longer a choice for either of them, but clearly Max was as unhappy about that as she was. He had certainly taken his time about making a moment in his busy schedule to talk to her about taking on marketing and publicity for the Bella Lucia restaurant group now that he was in charge.

Well, too bad. Her schedule was busy, too. She wasn’t sitting around waiting for the phone to ring. On the contrary, the phone never stopped ringing. She was in demand, a success in her own right.

She hadn’t looked back since the day he’d fired her from the family business, leaving her in no doubt that, far from being an asset to Bella Lucia, as far as he was concerned she was nothing but a liability.

Okay, she’d be kidding herself if she didn’t admit that there had been moments in the last couple of weeks when she’d found herself doodling ideas on her jotter, daydreaming about what she’d do if she did take on PR and marketing of the Bella Lucia restaurants; the fact that it would mean working with Max never failed to tip the dream over the edge into nightmare territory.

Even now he was only calling her because he’d had his arm twisted; she knew he’d have refused point blank to consider it if the suggestion had come from anyone but Jack. Max’s half-brother might not have wanted to stick around and run the company himself, but as he was a major investor his suggestions carried the kind of weight that not even Max could ignore.

So far Max hadn’t been able to find the time to pick up the phone and ask her if she was interested in the job, forget actually getting to the point of sitting down and talking the future through with her. Hadn’t done one thing to make her feel she was needed, that her ideas would be welcome, let alone valued. Well, why would he? She wasn’t a genuine Valentine—

‘Louise?’

She glanced up, realised that everyone was waiting. She snapped the phone shut, turned it off, tried to recall where she’d been in her briefing. City Lights…

‘As you know, City Lights ran the offer for a limited number of complimentary tickets to the opening of your London flagship restaurant in today’s issue. Free food, live music and the opportunity to mingle with celebrities; a chance to live the aspirational lifestyle for a night.’ She looked up. ‘You’ll be gratified to learn that the response was so great that it crashed the City Lights systems, a story that was reported in the later editions of the London evening papers and will run in the diary columns of tomorrow’s dailies.’

‘Well done, Louise,’ Oliver Nash said. ‘With luck the tickets will be changing hands on eBay for hard cash by this time tomorrow.’

‘If they are,’ she replied, matter-of-factly, ‘luck will have had nothing to do with it.’

Max heard the voicemail prompt click in, then Louise’s cool, businesslike voice suggesting he leave a message, assuring him that she would return his call as soon as possible.

That would be about as likely as a cold day in hell, he thought, ignoring the invitation and tossing the phone onto his desk. Why would Louise bother to call him back? Why would she waste one moment of her time doing what he wanted? It had been years but she’d never forgotten, or forgiven him for firing her.

As if he’d had any choice.

One of them had had to go and Bella Lucia was his future, the one fixed point in his life. Even when his father had been changing wives faster than most men changed cars. When his mother had been more interested in her career, her lovers.

Everyone knew that Louise was just filling in time at the Chelsea restaurant until she fulfilled her mother’s ambition for her by marrying a title so that she could spend the rest of her life swanning around a country estate, decorating the pages of Country Life, while a nanny raised her kids…

Not that the problem had been all her fault.

The truth was that he’d never been able to think straight around Louise and it had been ten times worse since she’d returned from a summer spent in Italy with a full set of curves, blonde curls that looked as if they had been tousled by some dark-eyed Latin and eyes that seemed to mock him.

If she hadn’t been his cousin…

But she was. Family. Which meant that after college she’d joined the company, working in his restaurant, a situation about as restful as ploughing a minefield; you just never knew when the next explosion was going to happen.

The effect on the staff had been bad enough, but when a particularly disruptive outburst had involved a group of diners he’d had no choice but to fire her on the spot. No choice…

He could cheerfully throttle Jack for putting him in this position.

All the time he’d been in Qu’Arim, setting up the new restaurant, he’d been doing his best to convince himself that his half-brother didn’t know what he was talking about.

Obviously he was right about the need to bring in some heavyweight PR muscle. It was a different world from the dreary postwar era; when his grandfather had opened his first restaurant, people had flocked to eat good Italian food served in warm and welcoming surroundings. Under the control of his father and uncle, they’d grown complacent. They’d been living off reputation, history, for too long. The business had stagnated. The restaurant in Qu’Arim was just the beginning of a new era of global expansion, but to make it work they needed someone who could update the image, get them reviewed, talked about; re-define them not just as a London, but a worldwide ‘A-list’ restaurant group.

Except that it wasn’t ‘they’ any more.

The future of the company was in his hands and his alone. He needed someone. And his brother had made it clear that he didn’t just need someone with Louise’s talent to take up the challenge.

He needed Louise.

Of course, Jack, having dropped that little bombshell, had waltzed off back to New York leaving him to convince Louise to drop everything and come and work for him.

Yes, well. Having driven her away in the first place, he had to be the one to convince her to return. Whatever it took. Because it seemed to him that just at this moment Louise needed him, just a little, too, whether she’d admit it or not.

He wasn’t fooling himself that it would be easy. Louise might have been a useless maître d’, more interested in flirting with the customers than doing her job, but since then she’d carved out a brilliant career for herself in marketing and PR. Her client list included one of the most successful restaurant chains in the country. She knew everyone in the business. Everyone in the media. And her mother’s high society family gave her an in with the social elite. She was ‘A’ list.

She was also bright enough to know that Bella Lucia needed her a lot more than she needed Bella Lucia.

That he needed her a lot more than she needed him.

If the situation were reversed, if he were in her shoes, he knew he wouldn’t listen to one word she had to say until she was on her knees, begging.

He hoped, for his knees’ sake, that she wasn’t inclined to carry a grudge that far.

Fat chance, he thought, checking the time.

If he shifted himself, he should catch her leaving the office. It wouldn’t be so easy for her to ignore him face to face.

‘You are a wonder, Louise.’ Oliver Nash had waited while she locked up, walked her down to the street and now continued to hold her hand long after it had ceased to be the kind of handshake that concluded a successful meeting. ‘Are you going to let me take you to dinner somewhere special? So that I can thank you properly?’

‘You’ll get my account at the end of the month, Oliver. Prompt payment is all the thanks I need.’

‘One of these days you’ll make my day and say yes.’

She laughed. ‘One of these days I’ll say yes, you old fraud, and scare you half to death. Go home to your lovely wife.’

‘You know me too well,’ he said, then as he bent to kiss her cheek she saw Max leaning against his muscular sports car, watching them.

‘Dumped your toy boy for a sugar-daddy, Lou?’ he asked.

Louise was thankful that the shadows were deep enough to disguise the flush that had darkened her cheeks. Even now he only had to look at her, speak to her, be in the same room, to send a shiver of something dark, something dangerous, rippling through her body. To disturb the even tenor of her life.

Not that there had been much that was even about it in the last few months.

Oliver, his hand still firmly holding hers, raised a brow a fraction of an inch and, since there was no way to avoid making introductions, she said, ‘Oliver, I don’t believe you know my…’ She caught herself. She was still readjusting to her new identity. Still forgot…‘I don’t believe you know Max Valentine. Max, Oliver Nash is a valued client; the chairman of the Nash Group.’

‘Fast food?’ Max replied.

‘Fast profit,’ Oliver replied, more amused than annoyed at being the butt of a younger man’s jealousy. ‘How’s business in the slow food sector?’

The exchange, unpleasant though it was, had given her time to recover, put up the barriers with a distant smile, and she stepped in before it deteriorated further.

‘I’ll see you tomorrow, Oliver,’ she said.

‘You’ll be all right?’ He looked up as a thin, icy rain began to fall, then at Max. ‘I’d be happy to give you a lift.’

‘Louise and I have business to discuss, Nash,’ Max intervened, his hand at her elbow, before she could be tempted to let Oliver chauffeur her as far as the nearest underground station in his Rolls. ‘Family business.’

His hand was barely touching her. Max never touched her if he could help it, not since that summer before she’d gone away to Italy; after that everything had changed.

They had changed. Become unsettlingly aware of each other in a way that, for cousins, wasn’t quite…decent.

Except that now she knew they weren’t cousins. That she’d been adopted…

Carefully lifting her arm away, she said, ‘Office hours are from ten until six, Max—’

‘It’s nearly eight.’

He didn’t look at his watch and she wondered exactly how long he’d been waiting for her to emerge from her office. Her PA had left a little after six—she had a life—and it must have been before then, or how would he have known she was still on the premises?

She refused to feel guilty about that. Or rise to his bait. She didn’t have to explain herself to him. To anybody.

‘For valued clients,’ she said, ‘office hours are infinitely expandable.’

‘Infinitely?’

She ignored the innuendo. What she did, whom she did it with, was nothing to do with him.

‘If you want to discuss business,’ she advised, ‘I suggest you call my secretary tomorrow and make an appointment. I may have an hour to spare some time next week.’

She turned to Oliver, said, ‘Thanks for the offer, but I won’t take you out of your way.’ She kissed his cheek. ‘I’ll see you tomorrow at the photo-shoot.’

Neither she nor Max spoke until the Rolls had pulled away from the kerb. Then she turned to him, said, ‘Aren’t you missing something, Max?’

‘A PR consultant?’ he offered.

She shook her head. ‘I was referring to your usual accessory blonde. I imagine they have names, but it’s so hard to keep up.’

She gained a certain amount of pleasure in seeing him clamp down hard, forced for once to hold his tongue, keep his temper in check. Taking unfair advantage of his predicament, she looked up and down the nearly empty street as if his latest airhead might have wandered off to do some window-shopping.

‘Maybe it’s a little cold for such delicate creatures to be out,’ she added, even as she mentally slapped her wrist for goading him when he couldn’t retaliate. But she owed him for that toy boy/sugar-daddy remark. ‘No, I’ve just remembered. At the Christmas party you were flirting with Maddie, but she left with Jack, didn’t she? The brother who inherited your father’s good manners.’

‘According to Jack,’ he said, ‘the only blonde I need at the moment is you.’

‘Really?’ She tutted. ‘Then you’re really going to have to try harder, aren’t you?’

And, having done with Max, she raised her hand to summon a cruising taxi. He beat her to the door, opened it, climbed in after her.

‘Excuse me but this is my taxi. You have a car,’ she reminded him.

‘We have to talk.’

‘You have to talk. I don’t have to listen.’

He didn’t wait for an answer but gave the driver her address.

‘Hijacking my taxi isn’t going to get you what you want,’ she said.

‘What will?’ he asked, sitting back in the far corner of the cab, as far from her as he could get.

That didn’t please her either.

‘Nothing. I have a thriving business, more clients than I can handle. Why would I be interested in leaving that to work for Bella Lucia? More to the point, why would I spare one minute of my time to listen to you?’

‘You’re family, Lou. That should be enough.’

‘Family? Haven’t you been paying attention, Max? That was all just a pretty fiction invented by the Valentines. Your parents, the people who pretended to be my parents. If you’re looking for a family connection you’ve come to the wrong person.’

‘Don’t be ridiculous. Of course you’re family—’

She arched a brow. ‘If you’ve come to demand my loyalty, you’re going to have to try a little harder.’

‘Not demand—’

She cut him off before he could perjure himself.

‘As I recall, being “family”…’ she made those irritating little quote marks with her fingers; irritating Max when she had the upper hand was so satisfying ‘…wasn’t enough the last time I was on the payroll. It certainly didn’t save me from the humiliation of being sacked in front of an entire restaurant full of diners. I’m sorry, Max, but I don’t see the attraction of working for you. I may be blonde, but I’m not dumb.’

‘That was a long time ago, Lou.’

‘Yes, it was, but what’s changed, hmm? You’re still treating me like some stupid girl who doesn’t know her left from her right. Insulting me in front of an important client. Ignoring my wishes. Well, I’ve got news for you: I’m not a girl, I’m a fully grown woman and I’ve built up a successful business from nothing, just the way William Valentine did. You should try it some time, then you might have a little more respect.’

She swallowed. Wished she hadn’t said that. Bella Lucia was Max’s life. He worked harder than anyone to make it a success. If it had gone down in the recent financial crisis, no one would have been hit harder, or deserved it less.

It was always the same. The minute she was with him, she lost her head, stopped behaving like a rational woman.

She leaned forward, rapped sharply on the driver’s window. ‘Pull over, please.’

The cabbie pulled into the kerb, but Max didn’t move. ‘This won’t go away, Lou.’

Probably not, but she was tired, she had another long day ahead of her tomorrow, and while a row with Max was always exhilarating she discovered that she wasn’t enjoying this one.

‘You want me to get down on my knees and beg, is that it?’ he pressed.

That was almost too tempting, but Max, on his knees, would not be a supplicant. He would simply be demonstrating—at least in his own eyes—that he was bigger than she was. That he could forgive and forget. That in clinging to her grudge, she hadn’t been able to move on. As he knelt at her feet his eyes would still be telling her that he was the winner.

‘All I want,’ she said, carefully, slowly, ‘is for you to listen to what I’m saying. I’m saying goodnight, Max.’

For a moment she thought he was going to protest, force the issue, but then without another word he opened the door and stepped out of the cab, handing the driver a note to cover her fare home—still trying to keep control—and, shrugging his collar up against the rain, he began to walk back to his car.

Louise, left in the cab, was shaking, hating Max for putting her through that, hating herself for caring.

‘Is that it?’ The driver, having clearly heard everything, turned around. ‘Do you want me to drive on? You’re not going to change your mind and want me to go after him? Once I turn the corner I’ll be locked in the one-way system and there’ll be no way back.’

Max could do nothing but walk away. Acknowledge that, having behaved like a moron, he’d got no more than he deserved. What made it worse was that he wasn’t like that; at least not with anyone else. He made an exception for Louise.

She never failed to bring out the worst in him.

He only had to look at her and he reverted from civilised man into some kind of Neanderthal.

Maybe she was right, he thought, hunching his shoulders against the icy rain that matched his mood. Nothing had changed. They hadn’t been able to work together all those years ago and time had done nothing to mellow either of them.

He’d made the offer but she wasn’t interested.

He stopped, blew out a long breath that smoked in the cold air. If someone had made him an offer like that, he wouldn’t have been impressed either.

He’d wasted a perfectly good opportunity. He’d planned to ask her to join him for a drink, a meal maybe, and when he’d turned up just after six he’d thought he’d timed it just right. It had begun to unravel from the minute he’d arrived when her assistant, who had already had her coat on, had told him that Lou was in a meeting that was likely to go on for a while, but he could wait if he wanted to.

Sitting around in the outer office waiting for her attention wasn’t what he’d had in mind and he should have left then, but, having wound himself up to see her, he’d chosen to wait in his car.

How long could she be?

Too long.

He’d had time to dwell on the memory of the Christmas party. Another failure. He’d known how bruised she must be feeling. Discovering that you were adopted at her age must be like having the solid ground beneath your feet turn to quicksand.

He’d planned to talk to her, let her know that he was there for her, but then she’d turned up in that outrageous outfit with some underage muscle-bound jerk on her arm.

On one level he’d known that it was just her way of showing the older generation, her parents, his father, just how angry she was with all of them for lying to her and he didn’t blame her for that.

On a more primitive level…

He shook his head. He should have made more of an effort, he knew. Called her, found time for her, given her a chance to sound off and get it out of her system. He’d been busy, they’d both been busy, but how long did a phone call take?

Not that she’d needed him; the Australian might have been on the young side, but he’d had shoulders wide enough for half a dozen women to weep onto at once.

He’d just got to the stage of telling himself if he’d been there for her she wouldn’t have needed to reach for a stranger when she’d walked out of the building with Oliver Nash, at which point he’d offered a classic demonstration of how to make a fool of yourself without really trying.

Only Louise could do that to him.

He flipped open his cell phone, called Louise’s number. This is not personal, he told himself. This is not for me, it’s for Bella Lucia. If he could just stop thinking of her as a difficult, disturbing nuisance, start treating her as the talented professional she undoubtedly was, start listening instead of jumping in with both feet…

This time when the voicemail prompted him to leave a message, he said, ‘Louise, I know you’re busy.’ He paused. Whatever it took…‘When you have a moment I’d be grateful if you could spare me an hour to talk about the future, about Bella Lucia—’

‘Max…’ Lou’s voice cut in. He stared at the phone, frowned. Could you override voicemail and take the call?

‘Max!’

He spun around.

Louise was caught in the light from the store windows, raindrops glistening in her hair, on the shoulders of her long black coat.

She’d ditched the cab, come after him, and for a moment he couldn’t find the breath to speak.

‘Louise…I was just leaving a message.’

‘I heard you.’ She was almost smiling, he thought. ‘You were so polite. You must be really desperate.’ Then, when he didn’t move, she spread her hands and glanced up at the sky, said, ‘So? Are we going to stand out here in the rain, or did you have a plan?’

‘A drink? Dinner?’ he said, scarcely able to believe his luck. She’d come back. ‘I know this really good Italian restaurant in the King’s Road.’

‘Dinner,’ she said, ‘but somewhere neutral. Not Bella Lucia.’

He clamped his jaw shut, suspecting that she was trying to provoke him. Hoping he’d give her another excuse to turn her back on him.

‘Anywhere,’ he said. ‘You decide.’

The restaurant she chose was close to her office and she was greeted with warmth by the staff. This, rather than Bella Lucia, was clearly the restaurant she used to meet with her clients, with the media people she was wooing.

His failure.

They were shown to their table, served quickly and efficiently, left to themselves and, much as it pained him to admit it, on this occasion she’d made the right choice. If they’d gone to one of his restaurants, his attention would have been constantly distracted by what was happening around them. His ears tuned to the reactions of fellow diners, listening out for problems instead of to her.

He’d seen his father act that way. The business had always been more important to him than anything. Anyone.

He’d tried to emulate him in business, if not in his personal life.

Tonight he needed to focus his full attention on Louise, put his whole heart into getting her on board.

It wasn’t difficult. At seventeen, when she’d returned from Italy a newly minted woman, she’d been stunning. The years since had only added layers of character, style, polish and it was easy to see why a man of any age would want to worship at her feet. He couldn’t afford to join them.

‘How was your trip to Australia?’ he asked. ‘Melbourne, wasn’t it? Did you enjoy it? What’s it like?’

‘Is that code for would it make a suitable venue for a Bella Lucia restaurant?’

She was warning him to back off, he realised, telling him that her other, newly discovered, family was nothing to do with him. He wanted to dispute that. She was a Valentine and all her family were important. This was not the time, however.

‘Are you suggesting that I have a one-track mind?’ he asked.

She took a sip of water. Said nothing.

Obviously she was.

‘So?’ he pressed, turning her question to his own advantage. Getting her to open up about Bella Lucia. ‘Melbourne? What do you think?’

‘I think you’re leaping to the conclusion that I give a damn about Bella Lucia.’

‘It’s fed, sheltered and kept the designer clothes on your back for two-thirds of your life,’ he reminded her. ‘Paid for the apartment that Uncle John gave you when you decided it was time to leave home. I think you might give the tiniest damn, don’t you?’

It was cruel. She blushed, swallowed, but he’d got her. She might be angry, bitter, but she knew what she owed to John and Ivy Valentine. She might not want to play happy families at the moment, but she wasn’t a fool, she must know she couldn’t walk away from them that easily and if she needed reminding, he’d be happy to oblige.

But while he’d hooked her, she wasn’t happy about it.

‘How do you plan a marketing campaign?’ he asked, bowing to her expertise, using flattery to reel her in. ‘Where do you start?’

For a moment she resisted, toyed with the linguine she’d ordered. He didn’t leap in, try to push her.

‘The first thing is to establish the brand,’ she said, at last.

‘Brand?’ He frowned. ‘We’re not one of Nash’s fast-food outlets.’

She dismissed his remark with an impatient gesture. ‘Don’t be so narrow in your thinking, Max.’ Then, ‘What do you think brings someone through the door of a Bella Lucia restaurant?’

‘It depends which someone. Which restaurant. They’re each unique. Individual in style, atmosphere. A man who met his colleagues for a business lunch at Berkeley Square would probably choose to take his wife for dinner in Knightsbridge, might have a coming-of-age celebration for one of his children in Chelsea.’

‘Who would he take to Qu’Arim?’

He thought about it. Thought who he’d take there, then shook his head to clear the image he had of Louise there. With him.

‘A woman he was in love with,’ he said. Then, ‘The oasis is the very essence of romance.’

‘A very over-used word.’ She regarded him for a moment, then said, ‘If it was a fabric, what would it be?’

‘A fabric?’

‘Cotton?’ she offered. ‘No? Cashmere? Tweed? Velvet? Linen? Silk?’ She ticked them off on her fingers.

‘Silk,’ he said. ‘With a touch of cashmere.’

‘And if it was a time of day?’

‘Night,’ he said, before she could list the options. ‘Black with a sliver of moon, stars close enough to touch.’

‘Every man a desert sheikh, every woman his captive slave? That’s not romance, Max, that’s a sexual fantasy.’

‘Is that bad?’

‘Probably not,’ she admitted, a touch ruefully. ‘It’s not very PC to say this but sex sells.’ Then, more to herself than him, ‘I wonder what a woman’s response would be.’

His smile was slow, thoughtful. ‘I’ll take you there. Then you can tell me.’

‘I’m the one conducting a market survey,’ she said, swiftly evading the elephant trap she’d so carelessly dug for herself. ‘Tell me more.’

He needed no prompting to describe the setting of the resort, the undiluted luxury. ‘We’re very fortunate, Lou. Surim could have had his pick of international restaurateurs.’

‘The old school tie is still worth something, then.’

‘If you’re going to save someone from a beating, it might as well be a future head of state,’ he agreed.

Louise shook her head. ‘Sorry. I didn’t mean to be quite that cynical. I know you’re good friends. Do you still play polo in his team?’

‘Not recently. It’s tough finding time to keep match fit.’

‘You need to get out from behind the desk, Max. All work and no play—’

‘Says the lady who’s just worked a ten-hour day.’

‘Twelve, actually.’ She pulled a face, shrugged. ‘I was at the office at eight. But it’s only while I’m working on the HOTfood relaunch.’ Then, quickly, moving on before he could say anything about pots and kettles, ‘Okay, tell me about the food at the new restaurant. Mediterranean? Arabic? What is there beyond tabbouleh, hummus, the mezza?’

He smiled at her ignorance. ‘Arab cuisine was once the most sophisticated in the entire world, Louise, embraced by the mediaeval courts of Europe.’

‘Really? I like that. Tell me more.’

As she pushed him for details, forcing him to reach beyond the basics, Max actually began to relax, feel that this was, after all, going to be possible.

‘I meant it when I said I’d take you there. I’d like you to see it for yourself.’

‘And after Qu’Arim, what then?’ she asked, not picking up on his invitation, but not refusing it, either. ‘How far and how fast are you planning to take this?’

‘How big is the world? The Americas, Asia, Europe.’

‘Europe? Have you considered Meridia?’

‘Obviously it’s on the list.’

‘I suggest you put it at the top. Bella Lucia catered for the coronation, and now that your sister is Queen I’d have a bidding war from the gossip mags to cover the opening of a new restaurant there.’

‘We don’t display our clientele for the media, Lou. We give them privacy.’

‘Okay, I could use that as an angle. Pictures of the interior preopening offering a glimpse of something most people will never see. Mystery, privacy, the unattainable. A glimpse of lace is always more intriguing than total nudity.’

Max found himself staring at the cashmere sweater Louise was wearing. It was some complicated wrap-around thing that crossed over her breasts, offering no more than a suggestion of cleavage, a promise of hidden delights. She didn’t have to explain the allure of the unattainable to him. He’d lived with it for as long as he could remember.

CHAPTER TWO

‘THAT rather depends on who’s wearing the lace,’ Max said abruptly. ‘And what she looks like when she’s shed it.’

Louise raised an eyebrow. What was eating him?

‘You’ve spent more time in Meridia than I have,’ he went on, before she could ask. ‘What are the options for us there?’

She shrugged, let it go. ‘What are the limits of your imagination? Somewhere really sumptuous high up in the old part of the capital, near the castle. Or maybe something completely different. A place where families could sit outside and eat in the summer. Maybe somewhere with a dock, since everybody seems to have a boat.’

Seeing it in her mind’s eye, she was suddenly seized with enthusiasm, her thoughts running faster than she could say them.

‘A lakeside pavilion, perhaps. Something…’

‘Something what?’ Max prompted.

‘Um…Something simple, uncluttered, informal,’ she said, suddenly realising that she was using her hands to describe her thoughts. She’d always done that. Her mother used to say it was her Italian ancestry coming out. Nonsense, of course. There was no Italian connection; John Valentine had been born before his father had ever met Lucia. But then her entire history had been founded on lies…

‘How soon can you wind up your business and join us, Louise?’ he asked, cutting into the black thoughts that threatened to engulf her.

Bringing her back to earth.

‘Excuse me?’ Her tone was deceptively mild. Her assistant would have winced. But for a few minutes there she’d let herself imagine a different future, forget reality, but Max never let her down. Already he was assuming he’d won, but then he was a man programmed never to lose.

‘Why on earth would I give up a business I’ve built from scratch to come and work for you?’

Max smiled. ‘It’s a bit late to start pretending you’re not interested, Lou.’

‘I…’In her enthusiasm she’d leaned into the table and suddenly realised just how close they were. Close enough for her to drown in dangerously deep blue eyes that had been mesmerising her for as long as she could remember. Close enough to catch the warm, male scent of his skin. To feel the tug of something she’d been resisting since she was old enough to understand that it was wrong.

She sat back, putting enough distance between them to feel, if not safe, then in control. ‘My interest is purely professional, Max.’

There had been a time she would have died of happiness to have Max wanting her, needing her, but there was no way she’d give up her independence and crawl back under the shelter of the Valentine umbrella. Not now. She didn’t need them. Didn’t need him.

‘Apart from anything else, I’m considering branching out myself,’ she said, ‘opening an office in Melbourne, using that as my base in Australia.’

He looked as if she’d hit him with a club.

She might have enjoyed that more if she hadn’t been swept away, just for a moment, thinking what might have been. If anyone but Max were involved.

‘You have a life, a family here,’ he protested.

‘You think so? Now Dad’s skeletons have climbed out of the closet I find myself excess to requirements.’

Max looked as if he was going to deny it, but they’d both seen just how far John Valentine would go for sons he’d only just discovered existed. Even when one of them had nearly ruined the company, he’d still been sheltered, cared for. Loved.

‘Have you told your parents? That you’re considering moving to Australia?’

Louise swallowed. ‘Not yet.’

‘You’re hurting, I understand that, but don’t cut yourself off from your family, Louise.’

Family, family…He was always going on about the precious family; as a boy he’d spent more time with hers than with his own…

‘I take it the toy boy is part of the plan,’ he said, an edge to his voice that could have cut glass.

Relieved to be out of the quicksand of family relationships, she managed an arch, ‘Are you, by any chance, referring to Cal Jameson?’

‘If he’s the one who was all over you at the Christmas party, then yes, that’s who I mean.’

‘He wasn’t all over me,’ she declared.

So much for her vow to keep her cool. With Max, that was only ever going to be a temporary measure.

‘Oh, please. You arrived at the Christmas party dressed like some centrefold Santa—’

‘I always come as Santa!’

With the long-running friction between her father and Uncle Robert—Max’s father—the family Christmas party was a minefield of tension at the best of times and she’d taken to turning up in a Santa suit bearing a sack filled with clever little presents matched to each member of the family. Her contribution to peace on earth in the Valentine family; bath oil on troubled waters.

This year, though, there had been two new family members; the sons that John Valentine hadn’t known existed until a few months ago. Her only reason for pouring oil would have been to set fire to it so she’d abandoned the traditional ‘ho, ho, ho’ Santa outfit in favour of a red suede miniskirt with matching boots, a white angora crop top and a mistletoe navel ring—one that lit up and flashed in the dark.

Her cheeks heated at the memory. With the twenty-twenty vision of hindsight it was obvious that inviting Cal to kiss her under the mistletoe—purely to wind up a scowling Max—had been a mistake.

She should have anticipated that he’d ask, ‘How far under…’

‘I have family in Australia,’ she said, quickly, before Max made the kind of remark guaranteed to provoke her beyond reason. ‘A married sister.’

‘You barely know her,’ he pointed out, infuriatingly reasonable.

‘And already I like her a lot better than I like you. Nothing has changed, Max!’ She stood up, desperate to escape, desperate for air. ‘I don’t need this.’

He was on his feet, blocking her exit before she could take a step. ‘You need it,’ he said. ‘You need it like breathing. Admit it. You’re lit up with excitement at the thought of coming back.’ She shook her head, but he repeated the words. ‘Lit up like the Christmas tree in Trafalgar Square.’

‘No!’

‘You’re a Valentine, Lou. Bella Lucia is in your blood.’

She almost gasped at his lack of understanding. Where had he been the last few months? Had he any idea…?

No. Of course not. Max didn’t do ‘feeling’. He was so utterly focussed on Bella Lucia, so absorbed by it, that he didn’t need normal human emotion.

Well, she would just have to explain it to him. In words of one syllable…

‘Is that what you really think?’ she demanded.

‘It’s what I know. It’s what I see—’

‘Shall I tell you what I’ll be doing tomorrow?’ she demanded, not interested in what he could see. The question was purely rhetorical; she was going to tell him whether he wanted to know or not. ‘I’m going to be taking afternoon tea in the restaurant on the top floor of the National Portrait Gallery. Minimalist elegance, smoked salmon sandwiches and great views should conversation prove difficult.’

‘Why should it prove difficult?’ Then, barely able to conceal his satisfaction, ‘You’re kissing off the Australian?’

‘What? No…’ She swiped at the air in front of her face, pushing his interruption away, pushing him away, the pervasive power of his presence. ‘Cal isn’t…’

‘What?’

‘Cal isn’t any of your business,’ she snapped. ‘I’m meeting my mother, tomorrow.’ Then, just to be sure he understood, ‘Not your aunt, Max. Not Ivy Valentine.’ Not the woman who, all her life, she’d been told was her mother. ‘I’m meeting Patricia Simpson Harcourt, the total stranger who, it seems, actually gave birth to me. The woman who’ll be able to tell me who my father was, what he looked like, because the only thing I do know about him is that he wasn’t John Valentine.’

‘Louise—’

‘You do see, don’t you?’ she asked, cutting short his attempt to interrupt, to tell her that it didn’t matter. Because it did. ‘You do see how wrong you are? Valentine blood does not flow through my veins. Not one drop of it. The only liquid connecting me to the Valentine family is the ink on the adoption certificate.’

‘Please, Lou.’ He caught her hand, refusing to let her pass him. Escape. ‘Don’t do anything hasty. Bella Lucia needs you.’ Then, almost as if it hurt him to say the words, he finally said what she’d always wanted to hear. ‘I need you.’

His words brought her up short. She might mock his dedication, but Max had always been the one everyone else depended on. The one that everyone else turned to in a crisis. For him to admit that he needed anyone had to be a first. For him to admit that he needed her…

‘Y-you sacked me,’ she said, more to remind herself what he’d done than jog his memory. It had been a scene neither of them was likely to forget. ‘In front of the entire restaurant. You didn’t care that I was family then—’

‘That was the problem, Lou,’ he cut in. Then, more gently, ‘That was always the problem.’

‘I-I don’t understand.’

‘Don’t you?’

Of course she did. As a girl she’d worshipped him. She should have grown up, got over it. It hadn’t worked out like that. Quite the contrary. Even now he had the power to reduce her to a gibbering idiot, a mass of exposed hormones. All it took was the touch of his hand to turn her to jelly. If she didn’t get out of here now…

‘Don’t you?’ he insisted. ‘Are you really that stupid?’

‘Thanks for that, Max,’ she said, snatching away her hand. For a moment she’d thought that maybe, just maybe, they could make a fresh start but she’d been fooling herself. ‘You’ve just reminded me why I’d rather starve than work for you.’

As Louise strode towards the door a waiter held out her coat. She didn’t pause to let him help her into it, but grabbed it and as he leapt to open the door walked out into the cold rain.

She glanced up and down the street, hoping to spot a cruising cab, but there wasn’t a sign of one and, without stopping to put on her coat, she began to walk.

‘Not one drop…’

Max was rooted to the spot for long seconds as her words echoed in his head, as the reality of what that meant sank in.

‘Shall I bring the bill, sir?’

The waiter’s voice jerked him out of the moment of revelation and he realised that he was letting Louise walk away, that if he didn’t do something to stop her right now he’d have lost her, or, worse, that she wouldn’t stop walking until she was out of all their lives. Not just lost to him, but to the family who loved her.

Not bothering to reply, he tossed a credit card on the table and headed for the door.

The same waiter, apparently anticipating his reaction, was holding his coat out and the door open so that nothing should impede him.

Louise was walking swiftly along the street, the high heels of her boots ringing against the wet pavement, her coat trailing from her hand. The fact that she was oblivious to the rain now coming down in torrents, soaking her hair, soaking her through to the skin, gave him hope.

She was upset, angry. If she didn’t care, she would be neither.

‘Louise!’ His voice echoed along the empty street, but she neither slowed nor quickened her pace, made no sign that she’d heard him. ‘Wait!’

A cab turned the corner and, ignoring him, she raised a hand to hail it, forcing him to sprint along the pavement to head her off.

‘Here’s a point for you,’ he said breathlessly as he leaned against the door, blocking her escape.

She didn’t protest, just turned away as another cab appeared, but he reached out, caught her hand before she could summon it.

‘Here’s a point for you,’ he repeated more gently as with his free hand he picked a strand of wet hair from her cheek and tucked it behind her ear. Held it there. ‘You were adopted.’

‘Hallelujah,’ she said, but she didn’t move, didn’t toss her head to dislodge his hand. ‘For once in your life you were listening.’

Her words were spiky but her voice was ragged, hurting.

She was looking up at him, her eyes leaden in the street lighting, her lashes clumped together by the rain pouring down her cheeks. Or maybe it was tears and for a moment the impulse to kiss her almost overwhelmed him.

Not now…

He’d paid heed to the warning voice in his head all his adult life. Kept his distance even when the only thing in his head had been to stop her anger with his mouth, knowing that she wanted it, too; was goading him, tormenting him, tempting him to do something about the primal response that arc’d between them whenever they were in the same room; urging him to self-destruct. Now there was no impediment, no barrier, only hard-won self-restraint, some instinct warning him that this was not the moment.

‘I was listening,’ he told her, his voice cool, even though every other part of him was burning hot.

‘So?’

So kissing her suddenly seemed the most important thing in the entire world.

This is about the restaurant, not you!

He ignored the voice of common sense. This was important…

‘So you’re not my cousin, Louise.’

‘Give the man a coconut—’

Her skin felt like wet silk beneath his fingers. Her mouth was full and dark and suddenly all the wasted ‘touch not’ years crowded in on him, urging him to taste it, taste her.

‘And if we’re not cousins,’ he continued, a little shakily, ‘we don’t have a problem, do we?’

Not now, idiot! Bella Lucia is more important than scratching a ten year itch.

But…

You’ll blow the whole deal if you kiss her, because it wouldn’t stop at a kiss. She’d come along for the ride, she wouldn’t be able to help herself, but what then? She’d never forgive you…

But she’d come…

‘We don’t?’ she asked, a tiny frown creasing the centre of her forehead. She drew in a breath as if to pursue it further, then shook her head, clearly thinking better of it. ‘You’re taking me for granted, Max,’ she said.

‘No…’

He denied it, but without sufficient conviction to stop her.

‘Yes! You believe that all you have to do is turn up, snap your fingers and I’ll fall in line. I have a career, a successful business, a life of my own—’

‘I know,’ he said. ‘I know. You owe me nothing. But think of Bella Lucia. Think of your father…’

She jerked free of his touch then and he knew that in clumsily mentioning her father, he’d made things worse rather than better. She could have no idea how he’d felt as he’d watched her with her parents. Proper parents who always put her first. Doted on her…

She was hurting too much to listen to him tell her how lucky she was. How lucky she’d been all her life. Right now, he suspected, there was nothing he could say that would help. Maybe he would, after all, have been better served by less thought, more action but he’d missed the moment, allowed her to climb back on her high horse.

‘Enough,’ he said, letting it go. ‘You’re wet through.’ He took her coat, wrapped it around her shoulders. ‘You need to go home, get warm.’ He opened the cab door, saw her safely in and this time resisted the temptation to join her, but instead, on an impulse, said, ‘Would you like some company tomorrow?’

‘Tomorrow?’

Louise couldn’t think straight. They weren’t cousins. Well, she’d understood that. In theory. She just hadn’t thought through what that meant. Hadn’t anticipated exactly how she’d feel in that dangerous moment when, for a heartbeat, she’d been sure Max had been about to kiss her. Finally. At last…

‘When you meet this woman who says she’s your mother,’ he prompted, bringing her back to earth.

‘She is my mother.’

‘Is she? Really? More so than Ivy? I’m sorry, but it’s hard for me to get my head around that.’

‘Really?’ She heard the sarcasm fuelled by frustration, disappointment, dripping from her voice. Why hadn’t he kissed her? What else could he have meant when he’d said they ‘didn’t have a problem’? ‘Well, if you find it hard, why don’t you try putting yourself in my shoes?’

‘Don’t be so defensive, Lou.’

‘Defensive?’ He thought she was being defensive? ‘You think I should be sweet, biddable, good little Louise and not make a fuss, hmm?’

‘Sweet? Biddable?’ He shook his head, might have been fighting a smile; his face was shadowed and it was hard to tell. ‘Sorry, sweetheart, I know that you’ve managed to fool the older generation with that myth since you were old enough to work out that a smile would bring you more than a scowl, but you’ve always managed to keep that side of yourself well hidden around me,’ he said. Seeing her sarcasm and raising it to scorn.

About to respond in kind, tell him that if she did, it was his fault, she clamped her mouth shut. The truth was that he brought out the very worst in her, that even now, angry as she was, all she wanted was to drag him into the cab with her and be very, very bad indeed.

She took a slow breath. She was losing control. Again. She’d got away with it once this evening; she wasn’t going to risk it twice.

She’d always known she would do what he wanted, that despite everything she owed the family who’d raised her that kind of loyalty, but she hated the fact that it was Max who was doing the arm-twisting. She’d do it, but on her own terms.

Set her own price.

Not money…

And an idea slipped into her mind and lodged there.

She shook her head, forced herself to look at him. ‘I don’t need anyone to hold my hand, Max.’

‘You have no idea how you’ll feel. I won’t intrude, but if you knew that there was a friend nearby. Someone you could talk to…’

‘You?’ she enquired, coolly, rescuing him as he ran out of platitudes. ‘Can you really spare the time? With all those restaurants to run,’ she reminded him.

‘I’ll make time.’

Her only response was to raise one eyebrow. It was not original, but he got the point.

‘I promise.’

‘Oh, right. So tell me, Max, would that be like the time you promised to escort me to my school prom?’ She didn’t wait for Max to come up with some plausible excuse for leaving her all dressed up, without a date, for the biggest night of her young life. Her father wouldn’t let her out that late with anyone else. Not that she’d wanted anyone else. ‘At the very moment when all the phones in the world apparently stopped working,’ she added.

‘You know what happened,’ he protested. ‘Dad was shorthanded in the restaurant.’ And he was the one thrown back on the defensive, dragging fingers through his thick, cropped hair in a gesture that was achingly familiar. ‘Before I knew it, it was gone ten and there was no way I could get there in time. You know what it’s like—’

‘Yes, Max, I know.’ She knew only too well what his promises were worth. ‘It was like the time you promised to pick me up and take me to the airport.’

He frowned.

‘No? Well, you didn’t remember then, either, but don’t worry, it’s not one of those once-in-a-lifetime, never-to-be-repeated experiences; there’s always another plane.’ She suspected she was hurting herself more than him by dredging up all the times when, caught up in work, he’d let her down. But for once he was forced to listen and she persisted. ‘And as for the time you left me stranded—’

‘I’ll be there, Louise,’ he said, cutting her off. ‘I’ll be there,’ he repeated, but gently.

Gently, she thought, he might just destroy her. She couldn’t allow him to be gentle.

‘If nothing more important comes up.’

But she was safe. Something always did. She knew that once he was working Max forgot everything, everyone else. That he always put the success of the restaurants, his responsibility towards the staff, before his personal life. Maybe that was the reason for the constant stream of girlfriends. It didn’t, as she could testify, do much for a girl’s self-esteem to be stood up for a restaurant.

‘I won’t hold my breath.’

Not waiting for more protestations of sincerity, she reached forward and pulled the door shut, gave the driver her address and huddled down beneath her coat, her teeth chattering as reaction set in.

Max watched as the taxi pulled away, disappeared into the murk of a wet January night, hard pressed to decide whether he was angrier with Louise for being so unreasonable, so prickly, or himself for not doing better. Not that there was anything he could do about it now.

What he could do, must do, was return to the restaurant and make his excuses for their abrupt departure. And give his card to the waiter who’d impressed him with his quick thinking, tell him to call if he ever needed a job.

Even as he did it, he knew that if she could see him Louise would curl her lip, give him the look that said, ‘See? Business first, last and always…’

Maybe she had a point, but tomorrow she was guaranteed his undivided attention. Even if the roof fell in at all three London restaurants at the same time he would be there for her and not only because he would do anything to get her on board.

He’d be there because she was in grave danger of cutting all family ties, walking away. Her anger, her sense of betrayal, was clouding her judgement. But then she’d never been without two loving parents. Never, in her whole life, known what it was like to feel alone. Never would, if he had anything to do with it.

At least with him she’d never been afraid to show her feelings. Quite the opposite. And he smiled. For once, that might be a good thing.

Taking his own advice, he thawed out under a hot shower, running through the ideas Louise had tossed out over dinner. He’d just seen expansion as more of the same, but she’d seen the danger of turning Bella Lucia into an upmarket chain, with the expectation that each one would offer the same menu, the same experience, no matter where in the world you happened to be.

That wasn’t what they did. Each of their London restaurants was different in atmosphere, style, clientele. They had to carry that across the globe. Use that individuality as their ‘brand’.

Already questions were piling up, ideas he wanted to bounce off her; he wanted to be able to pick up the phone now and carry on where they’d left off before he’d blown it all with one careless phrase. What was it she’d said? That she’d rather starve than work for him?

Despite the frustration, he grinned.

Starve? He didn’t think so. Bella Lucia had been part of her life since she was old enough to lift a spoon; she’d have come back like a shot if Jack had stayed to run the company.

She didn’t have a problem with the business. She had a problem with him.

So what would it take to get her to swallow that bitter pill? What would tempt her to work for him? Keep her from leaving the country and starting up again on the other side of the world?

There had to be a way. There was always a way. For anyone else it would simply be a question of money; how much would it take? But this was more than a job for Louise, just as it was more than a job for him.

For him it had become his life.

What could he offer her that she wouldn’t be able to turn down?

And the same internal voice that had warned him so violently against kissing her was now taunting him, saying, If you’d kissed her she’d be all yours…

What did you wear to meet your birth mother for the first time? Something sweet and girly? The kind of clothes that a mother would want to see her daughter wearing? The kind of clothes that Ivy had bought for her. Pretty clothes. Good girl clothes. Hair bands, pie-crust frill blouses, modest skirts, an embarrassingly modest sugar-pink prom dress that had made her look exactly her age, rather than all grown up. A dress she’d modified so that the minute she reached the safety of the hotel she was going to replace the ghastly sweetheart bodice with a black strapless top that would knock Max for six.

She’d never been quite the Little-Miss-Perfect that her mother had believed her to be. Even at sixteen, she’d wanted Max to look at her, to hold her, to desire her. Her deepest longings, darkest thoughts, had always involved him.

How bad was that?

She’d been exhausted when she’d finally fallen into bed, but her sleep had been disturbed by a continuous flow of ideas for Bella Lucia. She should be totally focussed on the final run-up to the HOTfood launch at the end of week, but her sleeping mind had moved on; it was only when she’d tried to interest Max—always too busy to listen—that she’d been jerked awake, shivering.

She had to forget him, forget Bella Lucia, she told herself as she flipped through the classics that were the mainstay of her wardrobe these days. Elegant dresses for the evening, designer suits.

She’d temporarily abandoned them when she was in Australia; staying with Jodie she’d gone beach-girl casual, not just in her clothes, but in her attitude to life. Well, that hadn’t lasted long before she’d been summoned home when her father had found a great big hole in the tax fund account. Already it seemed like a lifetime away.

Then her hand brushed against her shock-the-family red suede miniskirt.

It had worked, too.

Her mother had definitely not approved but she hadn’t said a word. Just tightened her lips and forced a smile. Even welcomed Cal to the family party.

Max, of course, as always, had curled his lip and kept his distance.

She could never decide whether that was better or worse than his insults. On this occasion he’d quickly turned to flirting with Maddie, ignoring both her and her outrageous Christmas outfit.

From the way he’d reacted last night, however, it was obvious that he’d taken in every detail. And despite everything she smiled as her fingers lingered against the softness of the leather; no question, he’d noticed.

‘Pitiful,’ she muttered, pushing the skirt away, trying to push away the memory. Disgusted with herself for behaving so badly.

Certain that Max’s perfect recall would be missing when it came to his promise to turn up this afternoon.

He’d have a million more important things to do than hang around an art gallery in the unlikely event that she might need one of his broad shoulders to cry on.

As if.

Not that she cared. It mattered not one jot to her whether he turned up or not. Any more than it mattered which suit, which shoes, she wore today.

She didn’t need anyone. Not the mother who’d given her away, not the mother who’d lied to her and definitely not the man whose promises were about as reliable as the forecast of sun on a public holiday.

She blinked back the tears and, catching sight of herself in the mirror, pulled a face.

Oh, for goodness’ sake! Who did she think she was kidding? Today of all days she had to look fabulous and twenty minutes later she was on her way to the office wearing a head-turning dark plum suit with a nipped-in waist, a silk camisole a shade or two lighter and ultra high-heeled suede peep-toe shoes that had cost a mint, but exactly matched her suit.

The luscious matching silk underwear she wore purely for her own pleasure.

‘You’re cutting it fine, Lou.’ Gemma, her PA, held out her coat, pointedly. ‘There’s a taxi waiting for you.’

‘Thanks. If Oliver calls back about—’

‘I’ll handle it. Go.’

‘But you’ll need…’

‘Go!’

‘Okay! I’m gone…’

She’d thought the day would drag, but in truth it had flown by with barely a moment in which to draw breath. Cramming in a last minute meeting had left her with no time to clock-watch, ponder the coming meeting, how it would be to come face to face with the woman who’d given birth to her before surrendering her to a stranger. Suddenly that didn’t seem such a great thing. Excitement, anticipation churned with fear in her stomach and she wanted time to slow down. Wanted to put this off…

Wanted someone to hold her hand.

Would he be there? Max…

The clock on the tower of St Martin’s-in-the-Fields had already nudged past four as she paid off the taxi and walked through the door of the National Portrait Gallery.

She didn’t linger, didn’t look around to see if Max had, for once, kept his word. She wanted it too much. Better not to know, to be able to pretend he was there in the shadows watching over her. And if, by some miracle he was there, she wouldn’t want him to know how much it mattered. How scared she was. So, looking neither to left nor right, she headed straight for the lift, punched the button for the top floor where the restaurant provided a rooftop view of Trafalgar Square, distant Westminster, the Eye…

She’d heard all about her mother from Jodie, of course, although she suspected that her half-sister had glossed over the bad bits—and there were always difficulties in the mother/ daughter relationship—wanting her to be able to make up her own mind. Knew what to expect. In theory.

She’d seen photographs.

She’d always thought she looked like Ivy Valentine; everyone, even the few members of the family who’d known the truth, had always said how much like Ivy she was—perpetuating the lie.

Once she’d seen a photograph of Patricia Simpson, however, she’d seen the lie for what it was. Here, in the shape of the eyes, the way her hair curved across her forehead, something about the chin, was a genetic imprint that unmistakably linked them and she’d never doubted for a moment that she was looking at her birth mother.

She stepped from the lift, hesitated. Took a moment to steady her breathing, slow her heart-rate, just as she did before a big presentation. Putting on a show…

Then she walked into the restaurant.

She’d imagined looking around, hunting her mother out, but there was no missing her. She might be in her early fifties, but she was still a head-turner.

Her red hair, no doubt kept that way with chemical assistance these days, slid sensuously across her cheek. Her long, finely muscled dancer’s legs were crossed to advantage, showing off high insteps, exquisite shoes.

She was sitting by the window, but she wasn’t looking at the view. Instead she was chatting to a man sitting at a nearby table, chin propped on her hand, her throaty laugh reaching across the room. He couldn’t take his eyes off her and neither could Louise.

Seeing the reality was like the difference between an old black and white movie and Technicolor.

For a moment she couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t move.

A waiter hovered to seat her, but she ignored him. The rest of the room disappeared. There was only her mother and, as if somehow sensing her presence, Patricia Simpson Harcourt looked up and their eyes connected.

CHAPTER THREE

LOUISE had tried to imagine this moment. Picture it in her mind. What would she say? Would they shake hands? Hug?

Her mother stood up in what appeared to be slow motion and Louise began to walk towards her, barely conscious of a floor that felt like marshmallow beneath her feet.

Neither of them said a word, they just reached for each other, clung to each other for what seemed like an age, until gradually the sounds of the restaurant, other people talking, the clink of a spoon, began to impinge on the small bubble of silence and they parted, Patricia holding her at arm’s length.

‘Well, look at you!’ she finally said. ‘You’re so beautiful.’ Then, with a grin, ‘And you have such great taste in shoes!’

Louise shook her head. Shoes? ‘It’s obvious where I got it from…’ she began, hesitated, her tongue tripping over the word she’d been rehearsing, but there was no way she could call this glamorous woman “Mother”, or “Mum”. ‘I don’t know what to call you,’ she said.

There was only the briefest hesitation before she replied, ‘Patsy, darling. Call me Patsy.’ She turned away quickly, smiled and nodded at a hovering waiter. ‘I’ve already ordered,’ she said, sitting down. Then, head slightly to one side, ‘Louise? It suits you. I was going to call you…’

‘What?’

‘Nothing. Pure indulgence.’ Then, ‘Zoë. I was going to call you Zoë.’

‘I’d have liked that.’

‘Yes, well, it wasn’t meant to be.’

Louise waited. She wanted to ask the big question. Why? Instead she said, ‘I only found out that I was adopted a few months ago. If I’d known, I’d have looked for you before.’

‘Things happen for a reason. Ten years ago I was not the person I am now; I might have been bad for you.’ She smiled. ‘The earth turns, things change. Now is the right time for us to get to know one another.’

‘Maybe…’ But it wasn’t her mother she was thinking about. What had happened had been out of her control. With Max things were different. It was her decision.

Everything would be so different this time…

Without warning her body seemed to tingle with anticipation, excitement.

‘Louise?’

She gave a little shiver. ‘Sorry?’

‘I said that there’s no point in dwelling on what might have been.’ Then, looking at her more closely, ‘Are you all right? This must all have come as something of a shock to you.’

‘No. I’m fine.’…we don’t have a problem…‘Can I ask you about my father?’

‘Oh, well…There’s not a lot to tell.’

‘His name?’ she prompted.

‘Jimmy. Jimmy Masters.’ She gave a little sigh. ‘He rode a motorbike, wore a leather jacket, smouldered like a cut-price James Dean. He was totally irresistible. Not that I tried very hard,’ she confessed, with a rueful smile. ‘To resist him. He took off, never to be seen again, the minute I told him he was going to be a daddy.’ She shook her head. ‘I didn’t want to give you up, Louise. It was hard, I had no idea how hard it would be, but everyone said you’d have a better life with a good family.’ She leaned forward and took her hand. ‘I’ve only got to look at you to know that I made the right decision.’

She did? That wasn’t quite what Louise had wanted to hear. She wanted regret, remorse. Instead, beneath that bright, confident smile, Louise realised, Patsy needed to be reassured, to be told that she’d done the right thing.

Just like everyone else, her birth mother wanted her to understand, absolve her from her guilt…

‘I’ve had a lovely life,’ Louise said.

It was true, she had.

She’d been cherished, loved, given everything she’d ever wanted. Everything except the truth. The companionship of a sister she hadn’t known existed…

They’d all known. Her grandparents, Max’s parents. And they’d all lied. The bitterness was as strong, as tangible as the aloes her nanny had painted on her fingernails to stop her from biting them.

But she couldn’t get past the fact that she’d had a blessed life. That she owed them for that. She’d always intended to help with Bella Lucia—once Max could bring himself to ask nicely. She would repay them with her time, her skill and then she would be free to do whatever she wanted. Be whoever she wanted to be. The only thing she wasn’t prepared to do was give up the business she’d worked so hard to build, give up her independence.

It more important than ever now.

Her rock.

And, in a heartbeat, she understood a little of what Bella Lucia meant to Max. It had been the one fixed point in his life. When his parents had packed him off to boarding school to get him out of their hair, when Aunt Georgina had disappeared for months on end on some painting expedition with her latest lover, when his father had been drooling over his latest wife, Bella Lucia had been his rock…

While she had two mothers who cared about her, who had ever been there for him? They’d been so close once…Because of what her family had done, their lies, he’d lost that, too.

Without warning tears stung against her lids, not for herself this time, but for Max and to distract her she picked up her bag, opened it, said, ‘I’ve brought you some photographs. If you’d like them?’

And suddenly they were both blinking and laughing as she produced a little wallet filled with her firsts: first steps, first birthday, first day at school in a blazer a size too big with her hat set just so, so that the badge showed…

‘Oh, please, put them away and look at them later, or we’ll both end up with panda-eyes,’ Louise said, torn between laughter and tears. ‘I want to hear about you, Patsy. Jodie told me you’ve just got married again. Tell me about Derek.’

She lit up. ‘Every woman should have a man like Derek Harcourt in her life.’ As she poured the tea the blaze of diamonds on her left hand caught the lights. ‘He really cares about me. Keeps me on the straight and narrow with my diet—I’m a diabetic, did you know?’ she said, pulling a face.

‘Jodie told me.’

‘You’ll need to keep an eye on your own health. It’s hereditary.’

‘I’ll take care.’ Then, ‘Tell me about your honeymoon trip. You went on a cruise?’

‘It was heaven…’ Once she was off, the conversation never lagged.

They talked about Jodie, Australia, Louise’s business. About everything but the Valentine family. It was like talking to someone she’d known all her life. But eventually the conversation came back around to her.

‘I have my Derek and Jodie has her Heath. What about you, sweetie?’ Patsy asked. ‘They say everything happens in threes. Is there anyone special in your life?’

In that split second before she spoke, Louise remembered the way that Max had looked at her. The way she’d felt…

‘No,’ she said, quickly, but even as the word left her mouth a little voice was saying, No problem. No impediment. Nothing to stop you…

Her mother raised one perfectly groomed brow and Louise distracted her with tales about old boyfriends. The ones she might have married if they’d asked.

‘Just as well they didn’t ask,’ she said, laughing. ‘It would have been a total disaster.’

She didn’t tell her about the one she’d convinced herself was everything she was looking for in a husband: the one who’d told her to stop fooling herself before he’d walked away.

‘I hate to say goodbye,’ Patsy said as, finally, they walked towards the lift. Then, when she didn’t immediately respond, ‘You do want to see me again?’

Louise, momentarily distracted by the back view of Max, apparently absorbed in a painting, said, ‘Yes, yes, of course I do.’

He’d come.

He’d actually turned up, had waited in case she needed him.

‘I, um, want to meet Derek, too.’

The lift arrived and Patsy stepped in, holding the door. Louise forced herself not to glance back and stepped in beside her, arranged dinner for the next week, then hugged her mother goodbye on the pavement before seeing her into a taxi.

‘You’re sure I can’t give you a lift?’ she asked, from the back of the cab.

‘No. I’m fine. I’ll give you a call about next week.’

She waited, waved as she drove off. Then turned and walked back into the gallery, took the lift back up to the top floor.

When the doors opened, she saw that Max had not moved and she didn’t know whether she was irritated by his certainty that she’d come back, or warmed by the fact that he’d waited for her. There were no clear cut lines with him.

‘I thought it was best to stay put,’ he said, as she held the door and he stopped pretending, joined her in the lift, ‘or we might have been chasing one another around the houses for the next ten minutes.’

‘Only if I came back,’ she pointed out, trying not to smile, but without much success.

‘True.’ He seemed to be finding it easy enough to keep a straight face. Then, ‘You’re very like her.’

‘Yes. It’s strange. All my life people have been telling me I’m like my…Like Ivy Valentine…’

‘She’s still your mother, Lou. She was the one who raised you. And you are like her. Okay, some of it’s superficial, chance. Your colouring, height. But it’s not just that. You hold your head the way she does, you use the same gestures. You have her class.’

‘You don’t think Patsy has class?’

‘Patsy?’

‘It’s a bit late in the day to start calling her Mum, don’t you think?’ She shrugged, as if it didn’t matter. ‘She asked me to call her that.’

‘It suits her,’ he said, taking her arm as they headed for the door.

She stiffened momentarily, then forced herself to relax. If she pulled away, he’d think that what he said, did, mattered to her.

‘What’s that supposed to mean?’ she asked, once they were outside, but keeping her voice light.

He held up his hands in mock surrender. ‘She’s classy.’

‘Not quite the same thing.’

‘What can I say? She’s a real head-turner, Lou.’ Then, with a wry grin, ‘Don’t let her near my father. He has a fatal weakness for that chorus-girl-fallen-on-good-times look.’

‘Your father has a fatal weakness for women full-stop.’

‘Life has never been dull,’ he agreed, and it was Louise who found herself reaching out to him, tucking her arm through his as they walked away from the square. ‘I don’t think you understand how lucky you’ve been. How much I envied you the sheer ordinariness of your family.’

‘Ordinariness?’

‘It’s what boys yearn for. Parents who don’t attract attention.’

‘Oh, dear. Bad luck,’ she said, laughing. ‘How is Aunt Georgina? Where is she?’

‘In Mexico, painting up a storm. Apparently the light is magical. She’s living with someone called Jose who’s half her age.’ He looked at her. ‘Ring Ivy, Louise. Don’t abandon something precious to chase rainbows.’

She shook her head. Unwilling to admit that he was right. But Max had been no more than a toddler when his parents had split up. Since then there had been a succession of stepmothers, half-siblings, step-siblings from his father. Drama and lovers from his mother. No one, she thought, had ever put Max first. It was scarcely any wonder that he had given all his heart, his loyalty to the business. Bella Lucia had never hurt him.

She looked up, but not far; in her high heels her eyes were nearly on a level with his.

‘I will call her,’ she promised.

‘When?’

‘Soon.’ Then, because all that hurt too much to think about, ‘Chorus girl fallen on good times?’

‘The glamour, the clothes, the diamonds in those rings…’

‘So what you’re saying is that she’s a classy “broad” rather than a product of the finishing school, debutante system? Now I’m afraid to ask what I owe to nature as opposed to nurture.’

It was the height of the rush-hour and Max, sensing approaching quicksand, used the excuse of looking around for a cruising cab to avoid her direct gaze.

‘Well?’ she demanded.

‘I thought you didn’t want to know.’

‘Oh, please…’

‘It’s not something I could put into words,’ he said.

How could you possibly quantify the smoke and mirrors of sex appeal? Pin it down, list the components. Item: hair, the colour of ripe wheat rippling in the wind. Item: two eyes, blue-grey, unless she was angry, when they were like storm clouds threaded with lightning. Item: one mouth…

He found himself staring at her mouth. Parted slightly, as if she were on the point of saying something outrageous. On the point of laughing. Dark, rich, enticing. The colour of the small sweet plums he picked in his Italian grandmother’s family home on rare and treasured holidays, when he’d been taken along to keep his half-brother Jack from getting into mischief. To give his father time to spend with wife number three…

‘Do you think there’s any chance we’ll find a taxi at this time of day?’ he asked, abruptly.

She lifted a hand and, as if by magic, a black cab materialised alongside them.

‘Where are we going?’ she asked as he opened the door.

We? That was promising.

‘Mayfair. My office,’ he said, taking advantage of the opportunity she’d given him. ‘I’m going to make you an offer you can’t refuse.’

‘Oh, this should be good,’ she said, climbing in without argument.

Something of a first, that, but he was too busy enjoying the view to comment on it. Item: one pair of finely boned ankles that drew the eye upwards in an appreciation of her long legs…

Pulling himself together, he told the driver to take them to Berkeley Square, the home of the Mayfair Bella Lucia and the company offices, and then climbed in beside her.

She was glowing, he thought. Happy. A transformation from her arrival at the gallery. She hadn’t seen him, but he’d arrived before her, seen how tense she’d looked. The meeting with her mother had gone well. Maybe that was a good thing. Patsy lived in London…

‘What do you think it will take?’ she asked, breaking into his thoughts.

‘Sorry?’

‘I’m interested in what you believe you’ll have to offer, before I can’t refuse?’

‘If I told you that, you’d know more than I do.’

‘No, Max. I already know what it’ll take. You’re the one who has to find the perfect combination.’ She was smiling, but her face offered no clues. ‘I hope you’ve got nothing else planned for the rest of the evening.’

He tried to forget the mountain of paperwork on his desk as he said, ‘I cleared my diary. I’ve got as long as it takes.’

To say that her expression changed would have been an exaggeration, but for a split second he thought he’d found the key. Then, she glanced out of the window, as if the passing traffic was of more interest than anything he had to offer. Then, ‘Try, Max.’

‘Try?’ he repeated, confused. She wanted him to open negotiations here, in the back of a taxi?

‘To put it into words. What I owe to Patsy.’ She turned to face him. ‘What I owe to nature.’

He had the uncomfortable feeling that she was playing with him. That she knew exactly what she wanted and that when she was ready she would tell him; in the meantime she was enjoying making him sweat a little.

‘Sorry, Lou,’ he said. ‘I have an aversion to having my face slapped.’

‘I would never slap your face, Max.’ Her lashes swept down as she did her best to hide a satisfied little smile, demonstrating beyond any doubt that sex appeal was so much more than the sum of its parts. Describing it was like trying to catch mist. Or trying to explain a smile when the difference between the mechanics—some magic movement of muscles that lifted the mouth and went all the way up to the eyes—and the combined effect were so utterly indescribable…

‘You were quite prepared to throw a fully loaded vase at my head,’ he reminded her.

‘That was a long time ago, Max. And I didn’t actually hit you.’

‘Only because your aim was so lousy. As it was you wrecked the table behind me. Dinner and dry-cleaning bills on the house, for eight.’

‘I’m surprised you didn’t deduct the cost from my wages when you fired me.’

‘My mistake. Dad took the damage out of mine.’

She shook her head, biting on her lower lip to stop herself from laughing. He couldn’t take his eyes off it. He wanted to tell her to stop, pull her lip free, kiss it, bite it…

‘I’m sorry.’

‘Believe me, it was worth every penny to get you out of my hair.’

‘Careful, Max…’

‘You were a terrible maître d’, Louise. Be honest. I did you a favour.’

She smiled. ‘Yes, I suppose you did.’ Then, ‘I can’t even remember what you said that made me so mad.’

‘Everything I said made you mad.’

‘True.’ Suddenly sobered, she said, ‘So why are you so anxious to have me come and work for you?’

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