Page 12 of The Housekeeper's Invitation To Italy

The house was enormous. They went past several rooms, most unused and all decorated in a style that had once been elegant but now seemed stuffy and overdone. The kitchen, though, which was the heart of the place—especially since Leonard had had his stroke—was warm and inviting, with a comfortable arrangement of sofas at one end, where French doors opened out onto the extensive gardens at the back. Right now those acres of land were shrouded in darkness.

‘You were right,’ said Alessio. ‘The less stress he has, the better. And as an aside, I had some urgent business to conclude—hence my slightly late arrival.’ He looked at her and shoved his hands in the pockets of his jeans. ‘There was no need to wait up. I do actually have a key to the house, even if I don’t always choose to use it.’

‘I... I’m always up at this hour, Mr...er... Alessio. I was just disappointed because your father was...’

‘Sorry to have missed me? I’m not buying it.’ Alessio’s eyebrows shot up. ‘Now, I haven’t eaten since this morning...’ He glanced around the kitchen, and then made a slower and more thorough visual tour of his surroundings. ‘If you stick around while I get myself something to eat, we can outline how this week is going to progress.’

Sophie didn’t have to say anything, because it was clear that he’d assumed she would fall in line with his plans.

He began rummaging in the fridge, frowning, half bent over as he searched and sifted through the contents.

‘What are you looking for?’ Sophie asked politely.

Alessio glanced across at her for a couple of seconds, then resumed his search. ‘Something interesting that can be stuck between two slices of bread.’

Sophie clicked her tongue impatiently and padded towards the cupboards. Then she nodded for him to sit down.

‘I’ll make something,’ she said. ‘If you’d turned up on time, you could have had dinner when we did.’

‘Where did you put the leftovers?’

‘In the bin. On your father’s instructions.’

Alessio burst out laughing. ‘Yes, that sounds about right. So, tell me... What was his response when you spun your merry little yarn about me finding out through the grapevine that his business was in trouble? Told him that I contacted you to elicit information rather than confront him directly? Or does the food being chucked in the bin say it all?’

‘He was upset.’ Sophie began making a ragout of tomatoes and vegetables. She was a good cook. She’d had years to get it right. ‘But...’ She turned to Alessio thoughtfully, running her hand through her short fair hair, spiking it up ‘But I think, deep down, his ranting and railing hid a certain amount of relief. He’s been carrying the burden on his shoulders alone, and that’s not an easy thing to do.’

‘No...’ Alessio sat at the kitchen table, swivelling one of the heavy wooden chairs to face her so that he could stretch out his long legs. ‘And my father is not known for his ability to bear burdens alone for very long.’

‘What does that mean?’

Alessio looked at her in silence for a moment. Leonard? Coping with burdens on his own? What a joke.

He breathed in sharply, accosted by a blast from the past. A memory of that very moment when he’d been told that his father was remarrying.

Three months after his mother had died he had been dispatched off to boarding school, and six months after he’d gone there he’d been called in to the principal’s office and told that he would be given two days’ leave so that he could attend his father’s wedding.

Alessio could remember the surge of shock and hatred that had flowed through him like toxic lava when he’d been told that.

His beloved mother had barely been buried and his father was remarrying. He had been old enough to reach conclusions he had never voiced. Had his father been having an affair all along? His mother had died in a car accident. What had she been driving away from? He had thought them to have been in love...happily married. Yes, his father had always been taciturn, and his mother a ray of joyful sunshine, filled with the sort of Italianjoie de vivrethat could light up a room. But had there been cracks he hadn’t seen?

Certainly his father had changed after her death, had withdrawn into himself, but had he simply withdrawn because of guilt? Because he hadn’t been able to face his own son in the knowledge that he’d been fooling around behind his wife’s back?

Alessio had duly returned home to witness his father tying the knot with a woman nearly half his age.

His bitterness had been a solid lump inside him that had never shifted.

His father had never carried the burden of his beautiful wife’s death. Life had moved on for him faster than a speeding bullet.

Marriage number two had ended a year and a half later in a long, acrimonious and costly divorce. It was never mentioned now. Alessio could only remember a blonde with a taste for jewellery and living the high life who had come and gone in the blink of an eye. It was just something else that was never mentioned between them.

And then the years had rolled by in ever-increasing silence until here they were now.

‘It means nothing,’ he drawled, vaulting upright and strolling over to where she was stirring something in a frying pan. ‘Whatever it is you’re concocting smells very tempting.’

Sophie stiffened as she felt him peer over her shoulder. His breath was warm against her neck and she wanted to rub the sensation away.

She had asked a simple question and yet he had changed the subject effortlessly. He was a man with a lot ofDo Not Trespasssigns posted around himself, and she wondered what lay behind those signs and then quickly reminded herself that it was none of her business.

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