Page 27 of Hidden Heir With His Housekeeper

He pocketed the mobile as soon as he got Joe’s thumbs-up emoji. But as he headed back into his office he knew he wasn’t going to get any work done today as the vague feeling of unease intensified.

Yeah, he’d respect Beatrice’s choices. But only if her choices didn’t involve never contactinghimagain. He needed to know if she was pregnant. But, more than that, he realised now, he also wanted to know why she’d run.

CHAPTER SIX

One week later

‘SIGNORINA,YOUMUSTbe careful—do not get any more rides with strange men,’ the kindly old farmer said in gruff Italian as Bea reached for the door handle of his truck.

Good advice from Signor Esposito, given what had happened with the last strange man she’d accepted a lift from, Bea thought wryly.

Then admonished herself for thinking abouthimagain.

She pushed a weary smile to her lips as she shouldered her rucksack.

‘Thank you,Signor Esposito, and don’t worry, I will be very careful,’ she replied in fluent Italian as she hopped out into the tourist bustle at the seafront in Rapallo.

The familiar pulse of panic was joined by a surge of loneliness as she watched him drive off. Signor Esposito had been a godsend, giving her a lift all the way to the Italian Riviera when he’d found her attempting to hitchhike for the first time in her life just outside Bobbio. His kindly, avuncular manner had made her feel safe after a terrifying few days. She’d never travelled alone before. And certainly not without considerable funds. It had been an eye-opener to discover how tough it was to get anywhere without the benefit of her father’s money, a personal tour operator or a mobile phone because she’d had hers pinched in the Gare du Nord.

She hefted her pack onto her shoulders with a perkiness she didn’t feel but was determined to fake.

Buck up, Bea. Being on your own and incommunicado is a good thing. You need to learn independence and self-reliance.

The last ten days had certainly been a baptism of fire—as she’d wound her way through France, into the Swiss Alps and eventually through the north of Italy—while becoming increasingly aware of her dwindling funds.

But her solo travels had taught her some valuable lessons already. Such as: you get a much better choice of hostel bed if you arrive early; long hair is a massive pain to wash in coach station toilets; two-euro sunblock does the same job as a two-hundred-euro designer brand; and only accept rides from men old enough to be your granddad.

She swiped her hair behind her ears, disconcerted by the savagely short cut which she still hadn’t got used to after getting it hacked off by a Turkish barber in Bern. See lessonnumero duein Bea Medford’s Lessons Learned While Panic Backpacking Around Europe.

She took a moment to absorb the bustle of the port town on the Santa Liguria peninsula—and the beauty of her surroundings. Cafés and restaurants lined the road in between the palm trees, the tables already packed with tourists months before the start of the summer season.

She’d had no destination in mind when she’d left London on the Eurostar over a week ago—back when she’d thought she could afford to splash out on train tickets. She’d been desolate and despondent—courtesy of her one glorious night with Mason Foxx and the horrific morning after—and had boarded the first train out of the UK.

She’d only ended up in Rapallo because this had been Signor Esposito’s destination when he’d offered her a lift. But as she made her way along the waterfront the rich scent of roasting garlic and seafood filled her senses and the sun warmed her skin. Lavish villa hotels and resorts dotted the hills above, contrasting with the haphazard terraces of pastel-coloured houses which lined the harbour. She stared enviously at the clear blue sea lapping against the array of fishing boats and luxury yachts docked in the bay.

Surely the Italian Riviera was as good a place as any to change her life.

Firstly, it was several hundred miles away—both figuratively and geographically—from her former life in London andhim. And it was a tourist hotspot. She needed to find work—and quickly. A tall order for someone who had never had a proper job.

She had realised, while sitting wide awake during the twelve-hour coach ride from Bern to Milan, she didn’t know how todoanything. Except speak five European languages, not all of them fluently. So a tourist resort ought to be the best place to begin looking. She hoped.

After plucking up her courage and pushing way outside her comfort zone to ask for work at each café on the seafront, she soon realised the stupidity of that assumption. Apparently, if you had no experience you were about as useful as an ex-London socialite with a backpack when it came to securing bar or restaurant work. But in the last café she tried, a young barista took pity on her and informed her the resort hotels around Portofino would be recruiting housekeeping staff for the summer.

She had no idea what ‘housekeeping’ entailed, but as she started the trek along the coastal path to Portofino, with her pack digging into her shoulders and the tiredness making her legs feel like overcooked spaghetti, she decided she had time to figure it out.

‘You must change sheets, towels, yes?’ Signora Bianchi, the housekeeping manager of the old-fashioned resort hotel tucked into the cliffs above Portofino, rattled off instructions in Italian as she led Bea into a palatial suite.

The view from the room’sterrazzowas stunning, taking in the glint of a pool below and the stepped terraces leading down to a private beach and dock. Bea got precisely two seconds to admire it before she was led into the suite’s bedroom.

‘Vacuum and polish until everything shines,’ the woman added, indicating the many marble surfaces and the worn carpet. ‘Then you must clean the bathroom, top to bottom, and replenish all toiletries. You have experience,sì?’

‘Oh, yes, absolutely,’ Bea lied, having never scrubbed a toilet in her life. But this was her new life, she decided, a life she was in control of at last. And supporting herself, however she could, was the first step on the ladder to becoming the new woman she wanted to be. And no longer the sort of woman men like Mason Foxx despised.

You’re not doing this for him. You’re doing this for yourself. Remember that.

‘The rate is eight euros an hour. Shifts start at six a.m., finish at three,’ the housekeeping manager continued. Bea nodded again. The rate was below minimum wage because the job offered room and board in a shared dorm, but that would be a major boon to her budget. ‘You will have to work on every weekend for the first two months.Bene?’

‘Sì, bene, molto bene,’she said, maybe a little over-enthusiastically when the older woman sent her a curious frown.

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