The Italian's Christmas Proposition

Matteo thought it best to speed things along. He had no idea what was going on but the threat of it all blowing up was a distinct possibility and one he intended to divert with everything at his disposal. He mentally bid a temporary farewell to his Venetian villa that was waiting for him the following evening. It wasn’t going to happen.

‘So they say,’ he murmured as he thought ahead to how he intended to squash whatever machinations were afoot. ‘Comprehensively’ was the word that sprang to mind.

‘Hope we get to spend some time with the two of you before we head back to Yorkshire. Family is everything, like I say, and I wouldn’t mind raising a glass or two to celebrate young love.’

Matteo murmured, nodded, half-smiled, brushed his lips against Rosie’s hair… He exerted every ounce of charm to smooth over the sudden, alarming pot holes that had surfaced on the very smooth road. He walked them to the glass door, where they were waiting to be met, the little blonde still by his side because question time was about to begin.

Rosie watched with mounting dread as Matteo disposed of her sister with ruthless speed. He was the essence of charm, even though his hand on her waist carried the hint of a threat that sent shivers racing up and down her spine. She could hardly blame him. She listened in mutely as he smoothed over Candice’s doubts, laying it on thick until Candice was smiling and telling him how relieved she was that things were back on track, apologising for the fuss and then, somehow, laughingly blaming Rosie for having given her the wrong impression.

Rosie couldn’t believe the way events had transpired. Who knew that her five-foot-ten, ice-queen sister could let rip with such uncharacteristic drama? Candice was the one who flinched if someone raised their voice slightly too loudly in a restaurant. She moaned about people shouting into their mobile phones in public! She’d once told Emily off, when they had just been kids, for laughing too much.

Candice out of the way, Matteo dropped his hand, stood back and surveyed the blonde coldly.

‘So,’ he said flatly, ‘Let’s find somewhere nice and cosy and private and have a little chat, shall we?’

Rosie quailed. The man was sexy, dangerous…and from the expression on his face in the presence of his quarry.

‘I’m really sorry, I—I know how this must look…’ she stammered, only dimly aware that he was leading her out of the crowded foyer. She found she couldn’t quite meet those wintry eyes.

‘Do you, now?’ Matteo purred.

Where was he taking her? She cast a desperate backward glance behind her, back down to the marbled foyer with the tall Christmas tree. The low buzz of curious voices that had greeted the little scene earlier had died down but there would still be curious eyes looking to see whether it might kick off again.

‘Where are we going?’

‘Somewhere private,’ Matteo murmured, voice as smooth as silk and as razor-sharp as a knife, ‘Where we can have our cosy little chat.’

‘I’ve already apologised…’ Her legs, however, were obeying his command. She stood up and began walking alongside him, hyper-aware of his presence. There was a leashed power to the guy that made her quiver with a combination of apprehension, downright fear and a weird sort of breathless excitement that stemmed from a place she couldn’t quite put her finger on.

He wasn’t saying a word and seemed unaware of the cluster of well-heeled people around him that parted to allow him passage as if in the presence of royalty.

It was extraordinary.

She had no idea where they were going but eventually they reached a door which he slid open, standing back to allow her to brush past him.

She’d never been into this particular inner sanctum, even though she had been coming to this very resort with her parents for as long as she could remember, before they’d bought their own chalet just a bit further up the slopes.

It was a large, square room, richly panelled, with a gleaming wooden floor that was largely covered by an expanse of expensive, silk Persian rug. A cluster of deep, comfortable sofas was positioned here and there and a long bar extended along the back of one panelled wall. Rosie assumed this was the chill-out area for the senior management who ran the resort, somewhere where they could relax and unwind, away from the clamour of what might be going on outside.

She stared around her and, when she settled her eyes back on Matteo, it was to find that he had made himself at home and poured a whisky for himself. Needless to say, there was no offer of any form of refreshment for her.

‘Okay,’ Rosie began. ‘I know what you’re going to say and I’m sorry.’

‘First, you have no idea what I’m going to say, and secondly, if you’re sorry now, then you’re going to be a whole lot sorrier when I’m through with you and your accomplice.’

‘Accomplice?’ She gazed at him, bewildered, and then wished she hadn’t because he seemed to have the most peculiar effect on her. He made her feel as though the room was beginning to spin and if she didn’t sit down fast she would topple to the ground in an undignified heap.

‘The blonde with a voice that could shatter glass. Sit.’

A voice that could shatter glass? That was a first when it came to a description of her sister. Of either of her sisters, for that matter. Both were tall, sophisticated and impossibly beautiful in an ice-queen kind of way. Whereas she was… Rosie: short, way too plump because of the siren call of chocolate and all things sweet, with shoulder-length blonde hair that refused to be tamed, breasts far too abundant to be fashionable…

She recalled the heat of his hand so close to her breast and shivered.

Conscious of each and every one of those downsides, and aware of those cool, cool eyes on her, she haltingly headed for the closest chair and dropped into it, little knowing what was coming but all too ready to take the blame.

‘If that little scene was some half-baked attempt to screw money out of me then you messed with the wrong guy,’ he said flatly. He didn’t raise his voice or move a muscle but for all that the single sentence was imbued with threat and Rosie shivered and licked her lips.

‘I came here to do a deal that means a great deal to me,’ he continued, in the same deathly subdued, almost conversational tone. ‘Which is why I played along with whatever game you fancied you’d set in motion. I’m going to play along just until my deal is done, and then, let’s just say you’ll understand the meaning of regret.’

‘You can’t threaten me,’ Rosie objected weakly. ‘And that woman was my sister, not an accomplice!’

‘Can’t threaten you? No, you’ve got that wrong, I’m afraid. Here’s the thing, whoever the hell you are—whatever scheme you and your sister or whoever she was have concocted, you can bury it, because there’s no money at the end of this particular rainbow.’

‘Money?’

‘Did you really think that you would create a public scene to grab my attention, hurl baseless accusations against me to grab the public’s attention and then somehow manoeuvre me into a place where I would part with hard cash to shut the pair of you up?’

‘I have no idea what you’re talking about.’

‘Don’t play games with me, miss!’

‘I’m not playing games! I honestly have no idea what you’re getting at! Are you saying that you think my sister and I are out to get money from you? Why would we want to do that?’

Matteo clicked his tongue with blatant incredulity, reached into his pocket and extracted a card from his wallet, which he tossed onto her lap. Then he sat back and crossed his legs.

‘How rude!’ Rosie exploded, her face bright red. ‘Is this how you treat women? How dare you just…just fling something at me?’

‘Spare me the self-righteous outrage,’ he returned smoothly. ‘Why don’t you have a look at the card?’

Still fuming, Rosie looked at the card, which had just a name on it and three telephone numbers. She politely reached forward to return it.

‘I’m sorry but this doesn’t mean anything to me. Well, I guess it’s your name. Matteo Moretti.’ She sighed. He’d taken the card back and was obviously waiting for her to expand. His expression was unreadable and she got the impression that this was a man who knew how to conceal what was in his head and that it was something he was accustomed to doing. He emanated a certain amount of menace but she wondered whether that hint of menace wasn’t amplified by the fact that she was just so conscious of him in a way she had never been conscious of any man in her life before.

Suddenly very much aware of her physical shortcomings, she fidgeted in the chair and tried to get herself into a suitably more elevated, commanding position.

‘I suppose you’re someone important, which is why you think I should recognise your name, but I don’t know who’s who in the world of business. You must be rich, because you think that I’m some kind of master criminal who wants your money, but you’re wrong.’

‘Your sister knew my name,’ Matteo said bluntly. ‘Care to explain?’

‘Her name is Candice.’

‘Irrelevant. Just answer my question. Time is money.’

Sinfully good-looking he might be but Rosie was beginning to think that he was the most odious guy she had ever encountered. Rude didn’t begin to cover it.

‘I teach skiing here,’ she said stiffly. ‘For the season. I happened to meet your…your friends on the slopes. Pierre was supposed to be giving them a lesson but he went out last night with his girlfriend and he didn’t show up for—’

‘Get to the point!’