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“I can only imagine.” There was a pause. “I have no doubt about your...capabilities in any department you choose to apply yourself in, Mr. De Campo. Would next week suit to visit your Tuscan operations? I’d like to do that first, then show you two of our Caribbean properties we’re reopening in St. Lucia so you can get a feel as to where Luxe is headed before we do the pitch in early August.”
“Of course. Will cowboy Jack be along for the ride to the Caribbean?”
“If you’re referring to Daniel Williams, then yes, he is the other half of the final two.”
“Perfetto,” he drawled, sarcasm lacing his tone. He was sure he could find a way for the Australian to stick his mouth in it again. It would be his pleasure. “We can do Tuscany whenever you like. Name the time.”
“How about Friday? That way I don’t miss the working week.”
His lips twisted. God forbid the workaholic miss a day churning out money for Davis Investments. “Shall I send the De Campo jet for you?”
“Thank you but I’m mandated by Davis rules to fly commercial. Demonstrates good corporate governance.”
He shrugged. “The offer’s there.”
“Thank you.”
“I do have one, nonnegotiable condition to us moving forward.”
A pause. “Which is?”
“You need to start calling me Matteo.”
He could have sworn he heard her smile. “I want your top-ten list, Matteo.”
The Chagall he’d recently purchased at auction drew his eye, a vivid splash of color against the cream entryway wall. “Over a bottle of Brunello in Tuscany, Quinn. Bring a sweater for the castello. It gets chilly at night.”
“Have you forgotten?” Her low, sardonic tone dripped across the phone line. “I’m already ice-cold.”
Low laughter escaped him. “Why, Quinn Davis, I think you have a sense of humor.”
“Don’t go imagining things.... I’ll have our admins connect on the details.”
She disconnected the call. He slipped his phone back into his pocket and shook his head. As far as standoffish women went, it was his theory that some were cold and uninviting at their core, while others just pretended to be so for a whole variety of reasons. The latter category had always fascinated him. Often proved the biggest challenge and the sweetest reward. He’d bet his Chagall Quinn was one of them.
Too bad that particular challenge was off-limits. If his vow to swear off women wasn’t enough of a reason to put Quinn in that category, his ten-million-dollar one was.
He settled in and called Riccardo, an intense feeling of exhilaration moving through him. They had made it to the pitch. That’s all he needed. No one could beat him in a room. No one.
His cold beer on the patio that night tasted very sweet indeed.
* * *
I should have taken the De Campo jet. Quinn embarked her commercial flight in Florence stiff, sleep deprived and wanting to strangle the man who’d sat beside her on the London to Italy leg, humming incessantly in her ear. She could have used the luxury of Matteo’s flying spa to actually get some work done considering she was too much of a control freak to sleep on planes. Instead, she’d done an excellent impersonation of a Quinn sandwich lodged between two overweight men on the seven-hour overseas flight, unable to move and completely unproductive. Then had come the humming.
She pulled up the handle on her carry-on and wheeled it through to the arrivals area of the tiny airport. Unproductive was the sore point here with the amount of work she had on her plate. Luxe was in far worse condition than she and Warren had ever imagined. When they’d started peeling back the layers and taken a hard look at the real financials—it was clear Luxe’s former parent company had been hiding a multitude of sins, including the fact that the restaurant wing of the chain was bleeding money at light speed. The rosy glow of Luxe’s heyday had long since passed and things were definitely on a downward spiral.
Enter Quinn Davis. Miracle worker.
She sighed and sat down on a bench to wait for her suitcase. She could do this. One step at a time, her mother had always told her when she was a little girl, fretting over some issue or another. Even at six, Quinn had been the girl waiting for the hammer to drop. Waiting for the pin to prick the bubble of her happy existence. The only girl in her first-grade class who had refused to get a dog because it might get run over by a car like her friend Sally’s had.
As if, despite all of Warren’s and Sile’s efforts, she’d known at the core of her she was different. That her life wasn’t destined to be the gilded storybook it had been presented as.
She closed her eyes against the pressure starting to build in her head. Hadn’t she proven time and time again in her short career she could do the impossible? She just needed to get this whirlwind two-day trip to Italy over with and move on to solving her real headaches. Like the handful of her restaurants that were literally falling apart because they hadn’t been renovated in so long. The local strikes that were paralyzing her Mediterranean locations. Completely incompetent management in others.
Luxe had seen better days. Her dream assignment was turning into a nightmare. Fast.
The baggage belt finally coughed to life and spit out her suitcase. Pulling up the handle she wheeled it and her carry-on through the barely there customs checkpoint and out into the Tuscan sunshine. The heat of the summer day burned down on her head and shoulders. She stopped, stripped off her cardigan and wrapped it around her waist, pushed her sunglasses to the top of her head and searched for a sign with her name on it. She found Matteo instead, leaning against an atrociously expensive-looking sports car. Dressed in an Oxford University T-shirt and jeans that molded his long legs into a work of art, he looked cool, elegant and very Italian. Also scorching, singe-yourself-on-him hot.
Quinn’s hand flew to her head and the French twist she hadn’t straightened since...when? London? She must look a sight. Her slacks were creased, her shirt had a coffee stain on it from where one of the men from her personal sandwich had dumped it on her and she was pretty sure she’d forgotten to wipe the breakfast cream cheese off her face. She reached up and swiped a palm across her mouth. What was it about the Italians that made you feel incredibly gauche just from your pure lack of style?
She had not expected her ride to be him.
He strolled toward her, his relaxed, indolent stride catching the eye of about twenty women around her. Her gaze dropped to the black lettering stretching across his biceps. The tattoo. Damn if it didn’t give the whole package some serious edge.
Exactly what it didn’t need. Her husband had been a pretty boy, the Ivy League son of a high-powered lawyer Warren had admired. Not Quinn’s choice. His ego had required the kind of massive stroking it was impossible for one woman to administer. Unlike Matteo De Campo. He had it all built in. She doubted he’d had an uncertain day in his entire life.
The glitter in his gray eyes as he stopped in front of her said he hadn’t missed her lustful look. She yanked in a breath of the fragrant, rose-scented Tuscan air. She needed to squash the physical attraction between them like a bug. Fast.
“You didn’t need to come yourself,” she murmured, caught off guard when he bent and pressed his lips first to one cheek, then the other. It was like being branded by a force she had no ability to cope with.
He drew back, his mocking glance sliding across her flushed face. “You’re in Italy now, Quinn. We don’t shake hands. We kiss.”
She stepped back, wrapping her arms around herself. “You’ll have to excuse my appearance. It’s been a long day. I’m a mess.”
“If that’s a bad day,” he murmured, his lazy gaze taking her in, “most women would kill to have more of them.”
Her breath jammed in her throat. “You just can’t help it, can you?”
“No,” he agreed, smoky eyes laughing at her. “That’s what playboys do, Quinn. Play. However,” he drawled, picking up her bags and tossing them into the pitifully small backseat of the car, “I will endeavor to keep it to a bare minimum, just for you.”
“You are too kind.”
He held his hands up in a typically Italian gesture, then opened the passenger door for her. She slid in, absorbing the butter-soft interior of the car. “Fits the bad-boy image don’t you think?”
The exotic car growled as he brought it roaring to life. She had to agree as he gunned it and they sped out of the airport that yes, it was sexy and so was the tattoo, which close-up, she could now see was in Latin, the beautifully scripted symbols set in a perfectly straight line across the hard muscles of his biceps. Unfortunately the Latin was mumbo jumbo to her. She was about to ask him what it meant when she clamped her jaw shut. Deciphering Matteo De Campo’s tattoo was an activity better left for those actresses and models who were happy to let themselves fall for that type of meaningless charisma. She, on the other hand, knew better.
Matteo flicked her a sideways glance. “The castello is about an hour’s drive. Feel free to relax and nap on the way. You look tired.”
She grimaced. “I don’t sleep on planes.”
His mouth curved. “Don’t tell me, you’d prefer to be flying it?”
“However did you know?”
“Just a wild guess. If you aren’t going to sleep I’ll pick your brain.”
Pick her brain he did during the drive along the windy autostrada toward Siena. Commanding the powerful car along the highway’s twists and turns with a fearless abandon that made her heart pound, he asked a series of excellent questions about Luxe’s operations and mandate while at the same time managing to act as tour guide. His multitasking, expressive hand movements and excessive speed had Quinn grabbing for the door handle more than once.
“Any chance you can slow down?” she muttered after one particularly terrifying turn. “Or is that too much to ask of your playboy persona?”
His smile flashed white against his olive skin. “Too much. Driving in Italy is a blood sport. You’d be asking me to emasculate myself.”
Not a chance, she thought grimly. It wasn’t possible. Not with those mouthwateringly muscled thighs flexing beside her, drawing her attention every time he shifted gears. Or his big, beautifully tapered hands that looked as if they’d be masterful at any activity he pursued.... He was the type of ultradangerous male you wouldn’t know you were in trouble with until you were way, way gone.
She lifted her gaze to the road, to the vibrant red poppies dotting a sea of green on its edge. That was enough of that.
Quinn focused on the information Matteo was imparting about Montalcino, the town where the castello was located. It had a bloodthirsty history, warred over for decades by its powerful foreign neighbors and even her own neighboring city-states back in the days before Italy had become a nation. The castello was actually a fortress, he relayed. It had played a strategic role in the struggles between the Sienese and the invading powers.
“The cellar is actually the old dungeon where the prisoners of war were held. It’s quite a showpiece. We think it gives it great atmosphere.”
That was one way of putting it. “They actually locked people up down there?”
“Si. Some of them died.” He laughed at her horrified expression. “When my grandfather bought the castello and we renovated, we found two old skulls we keep on display.”
She recoiled. “How very macabre.”
He shrugged. “Wars happen. Have since the beginning of time.”
They swept around a turn and a magnificent stone building came into view, perched on the top of a hillside, towering over the mountainous forests that surrounded it. Quinn gasped. “Is that it?”
He nodded. “The Castello De Campo. Dates back to the Middle Ages.”
She took in the sprawling brawn of the imposing burnt-orange structure, its square turrets and tall watchtower like something out of a movie. “It’s incredible.”
Matteo pointed toward the terraced vineyards that extended from the top of the mountain to the bottom. “The De Campo estate is actually a constellation of vineyards. The different slopes and elevations of the mountain offer each varietal the optimum growing conditions. Some of the whites such as the Chardonnay, for instance, are planted further above sea level, where the nights are cool and the ripening season long, whereas the Brunellos, the king of our reds, thrive at a lower level.”
“Margarite is obsessed with your Brunello.”
“Who?”
“My head sommelier.”
“So she should be,” he murmured cockily. “We’ll have one tonight.”
She was so exhausted she might fall flat on her face if she drank anything. But Margarite would kill her if she passed up the opportunity to try the famous, lusty De Campo red.
“The scale is breathtaking,” she said to him. “How many varietals do you produce?”
“Fifteen.” He flicked her a glance. “Do you ride? I thought we would do the tour by horseback tomorrow.”
“Not well,” she admitted. She was suspicious of horses. They were big, heavy, unpredictable animals. Kind of like men. She didn’t need either of them in her life.
It was impossible not to think how much more history De Campo had than Silver Kangaroo as Matteo parked the car in front of the magnificent castello and carried her bags inside. It was everywhere. In the century-old, mature vineyards surrounding the castle, in the family crest on the building as they came in, in the third generation of winemakers producing the glorious vintages here. Silver Kangaroo was only twenty years old. Although there was something to be said for such a young winery winning so many awards in such a short amount of time, it couldn’t compare to De Campo in lineage.
Matteo led her into the magnificent tiled hallway of the west wing which was the personal residence of the De Campo family. With its cathedral ceiling and stunning frescos it was truly amazing. Like she’d walked into the home of royalty.
Matteo introduced her to Maria, the Italian housekeeper who had run the De Campo household since he was a boy, then led her up a winding staircase to a turret bedroom that took her breath away. The exposed brick walls of the castello extended into a double-arched stone wall that separated a sitting room with a fireplace from the bedroom and its huge canopied bed. The beautiful, rich fabrics covering the room cast everything in a golden, luxurious hue that might have been a royal princess’s bedroom.
It evoked a strange feeling in Quinn. She’d spent much of her life feeling like the imposter princess. Her birth father, a factory worker in Mississippi, even now worked two jobs to make ends meet for his family. She knew because she’d hired a private detective to find them and learned the real truth about her adoption. Unlike the story she’d been fed by a well-meaning Warren and Sile, it hadn’t been as simple as her mother having an affair with a married man and giving her up because of the complications of their relationship. Her mother had gone on to marry her father and they’d had another girl. Her sister.
To replace the girl they’d given away.
“Quinn?” Matteo was looking at her with a raised brow. “Everything okay?”
She blinked. “It’s stunning, thank you. I can’t imagine what it must have been like to grow up in a castle.”
“I have stories.” A wry smile tipped his mouth. “You can imagine the hiding spots three industrious boys found.”
She smiled. “Some impossible to find ones, I’ll bet. Will I get to meet your parents tonight?”
He shook his head. “Unfortunately, no. Antonio serves on the boards of a couple of major corporations. He’s in London right now for meetings and my mother is in Florence where she prefers to stay.”
Interesting arrangement. While her mother was alive, Warren would fly all night to get home to her. They hadn’t spent a night apart that wasn’t business. Her stomach twisted. In many ways, Sile’s tragic death at a far-too-early age had turned her father into a different man. Taken the small amount of softness Warren possessed with her, his anger at her death so raw and all-consuming.
“Does seven suit for dinner?” Matteo asked. “If you sleep after that you should be able to get into the time.”
“That’s perfect, thank you.”
“Fino a stasera. Until tonight...”
And why did even that sound sexy? She closed the door behind him and blamed it on the accent. Accents were always sexy on a man. His, particularly so.
She looked longingly at the bed. Just a couple more hours, she told herself, intending on showering first and catching up on email. But her eyelids burned from fatigue and she felt as if her body had been pummeled in a boxing match. Maybe a few minutes with her eyes closed on the high canopy bed in the beautiful, fairy-tale-ish room would refresh her enough to make it through dinner.
Help her figure out exactly how she was going to avoid the inescapable attraction she felt toward her host. Her reaction to him, she decided, curling up on the satin comforter, was probably due to the fact she hadn’t looked at a man since Julian had left. Had buried herself in work lest the humiliation of it all become simply too much to bear. She hugged the pillow to her. Quinn never intended to feel that kind of humiliation ever again. From any man. So she was missing the gene that allowed her to be truly intimate with another person.... The way she’d survived in this world, the way she’d survived as a Davis was to shield her heart. To not let herself feel.
It was easier that way. To not need anyone. And she wasn’t changing her strategy now.
* * *
Matteo knocked on the heavy wooden door of Quinn’s suite just after seven, his game plan firmly in place. Ply her with an incomparable Brunello, impress her with the history and atmosphere of De Campo over dinner in the cellar and, most importantly, find out why she’d ranked them fourth on her list.
A piece of cake, as the Americans would say.
When there was no response to his knock, he rapped again, harder. Nothing. Strange. Quinn seemed like the overly punctual type. He was knocking on the two-inch-thick door a third time when it flew open and she stood before him, bleary-eyed, dark hair flowing over her shoulders in a jumbled mass of curls.
“I’m so sorry,” she murmured. “I fell asleep.”
He wasn’t. She had the face of an angel when she wasn’t frowning. Her big green eyes had a sleepy, muted golden edge to them, an intense vulnerability he couldn’t tear his gaze from. He had the feeling this was the real Quinn Davis. The softness behind the hard edge she liked to present to the world. Unfiltered.
His gaze drifted down over the flushed, rosy skin of her cheeks, her full, pouty lips that were the kind a man imagined wrapped around a certain part of his anatomy...
Matteo’s body temperature soared. Quinn cleared her throat. The flicker of sexual awareness that replaced the vulnerability in her eyes slammed into him with the force of a hammer. Merda. Where had he ever gotten the impression this woman was cold? Or maybe it was just that she was a perfect combination of fire and ice?
Quinn dropped her gaze to somewhere around his shoulder and waved a hand at him. “Give me five minutes and I’ll be ready.”
He nodded. The click of the door brought back his sanity. Bringing Quinn Davis to her knees in that particular fashion might have been the natural order of things for him—but, regrettably, he needed to use his brain on this one, not his body.
