‘It’s where I live.’ He watched her carefully from under his lashes. He watched to see whether she would make any connections. In Italy, his name would be quickly recognised. Even here, in this country, many people would have heard of the Baresi name, if only because of its association with the wine. The House of Baresi was legendary, as was the formidable wealth of its aristocratic family. Luca Baresi had lived his life in the spotlight of his noble ancestry. His social circle was huge but around it was a protective circle, a dividing line that mere mortals were seldom allowed to cross. It wasn’t of his devising. It was the way it was, and if there were moments when he longed to walk out of that circle and never look back, then he was accustomed to quickly closing them down because he knew where his duties lay.
His friends, the members of his extended family—they were all, to varying degrees, as privileged as he was. To the best of his knowledge, the only commoner to have ever broken through those rigid walls had been his mother and that tale had hardly had a happy ending.
This was an avenue of thought he was, likewise, accustomed to shutting down whenever it happened to make an uninvited appearance and he did so now, with ruthless efficiency.
‘Tuscany,’ he offered. ‘Have you been there?’
‘I don’t often leave Cornwall,’ Cordelia admitted and she grimaced at his expression of incredulity.
She met so few people, she realised. Life was so predictable for her and yet she was still young. Twenty-four years old! She should be enjoying all sorts of new and life-changing experiences. Everyone in the village knew her back story but now, the urge to confide in someone new, someone from a faraway and exotic place that she would probably never visit, at least not in the near future, was overpowering.
‘Why is that?’
He paused to look at her and she stared back at him in silence because suddenly everything, the bits and pieces and nuts and bolts of her life, seemed so overwhelming. She thought about all the things that had happened to her. All the things locking her into this one place. Keeping her there as securely as if she had been trapped in a cage. How on earth could she unpick all those pieces of her past and put them into a few casual sentences? It was crazy anyway. Forget about silly urges! She barely knew the guy. She wouldn’t know where to begin when it came to answering that simple question he had asked.
He stretched and, in one swift movement, flung aside the covers and swung his legs over the side of the bed. ‘I need to move around,’ he threw over his shoulder, as he headed to the wardrobe and the only place his clothes could be. ‘And change back into my own clothes.’
Cordelia nodded mutely, riveted to him. To start with he had more or less hobbled, hanging onto her father’s arm to make his way to the bathroom, and even when, after day one, his strength had begun to resurface, he had still moved slowly, hesitantly. It was obvious that he was well on the road to rude health because his movements now were assured and graceful and captivating.
She felt that her mouth might be hanging open. Her jaw certainly dropped to the ground when, without warning and with his back still to her, he began stripping off without the slightest hint of inhibition.
She looked away. Her mouth had gone dry and she could feel the hot burn of colour suffusing her face.
‘You can look now.’ There was amusement in his voice a couple of minutes later and she slowly turned round to face him.
Her cheeks were still pink with embarrassment.
Her body language shrieked her discomfort. Luca had seen nothing like it before. Had there ever been a time in his life when he had been with any woman who had seen his semi-naked body and acted as though the ground would be doing her a favour if it opened and swallowed her up? He couldn’t help the spurt of curiosity about her. So beautiful and yet could she possibly be as innocent as she looked?
And what about never leaving this place? How did that begin to make sense?
‘How old are you?’ he asked suddenly.
‘Twenty-four just. Why?’
Luca shrugged. ‘You say that you seldom leave here?’
‘It’s a beautiful part of the world. You’d be surprised how many people who live by the sea find it impossible to stray far from it.’
Not her, though. No, not her, but something inside her felt compelled to defend herself against his curiosity.
He let that non-answer go and instead looked around him. He had no recollection of being brought into the house and he hadn’t spared a single second to so much as glance outside the bedroom window. He rectified that now and what he saw was a limitless view of grey sea, a ribbon of road, currently empty, and the tangle of greenery at the side of the road, stretching out towards what seemed to be a gentle incline down, he guessed, to the ocean front. Everything was shrouded in a cloud of fine, persistent drizzle. The remnants of the storm that had capsized his boat.
Then he looked around him, taking in his surroundings fully and for the first time.
Luca rarely noticed his surroundings, at least not the mansion in which he lived or any of the other expensive properties he owned. They were lavish. He knew that. But a lifetime of wealth had made him immune to their impact. Nor did he pay much attention to any of the houses in which his friends or relatives lived. They all ran along the
