‘So, Aisling.’ He curled the name around his lips as if he were playing with a cherry, prior to biting into it. ‘I am pleased. More than pleased. Once again, you have found just what I was looking for.’
‘That’s the aim.’
‘Your initial choice of candidates was a surprise, I admit it,’ he conceded, and he raked careless fingers through his thick black hair. ‘But, as usual, your favoured applicant was perfetto.’
She inclined her head. ‘Thank you.’
He frowned. Even in her thanks she was lukewarm! ‘You enjoyed the party last night?’ he demanded.
‘Very much, thank you.’
‘I didn’t see you leave.’
‘I slipped away. You looked like you had your hands full.’
‘You should have stayed. There were a few people you could have met. We went out for dinner afterwards—you could have come.’
‘That’s very sweet of you, Gianluca—but I had some paperwork I needed to do.’
Gianluca’s eyes narrowed. He didn’t like being described as sweet! Sweet was for those men who had manicures and were in touch with their feelings. He thought, not for the first time, how you would never know what was going on her in head—not from that unruffled face she always presented. Was she deliberately mysterious, he wondered, or was that simply a mask she wore for work? And what happened when the mask was removed? ‘And business is good?’ he enquired softly.
Should she tell him that business was booming? That his name had brought in a whole stack of new contracts? ‘Oh, I can’t complain. I have plenty to keep me busy,’ she said softly, automatically tugging at the dark hem of her neatly tailored skirt, so that it covered the inch of knee it had been revealing.
Gianluca watched the unnecessary movement. The skirt was hardly indecent—didn’t she realise that a man liked to look at a woman’s legs? She was always like the schoolmarm, he thought impatiently. Even last night she had been wearing some stiff-looking gown—appropriate and yet glaringly dull.
Gianluca had never met a woman like Aisling Armstrong before. Was that why he found her strangely fascinating?
Women rarely intrigued him; their reaction to him was predictable. They wanted him. They wanted his wealth and his lips and his lean, hard body. They wanted a shiny gold band on their finger and they wanted his babies. When Gianluca was around, they pulled out all the stops to make him aware of them, with their tight skirts and their lowcut tops and hair tumbling down over bare shoulders while their lips pouted in provocative invitation. But not this one, it seemed.
‘And that is what pleases you?’ he mused, meeting her brisk reply with a lazy question in his eyes. ‘Mmm? To keep busy all the time? How is it you say—like the hamster on the wheel?’
She wondered if he realised the effect he was having on her—how being in the crossfire of that stare was making her feel as weak as a hamster! Aisling gave him a tight smile. ‘It’s a question of necessity, Gianluca. I’m sure you know more than anyone that success doesn’t come without a price-tag of hard work.’
‘Ah, but the trick is in recognising when to take time off, surely?’ His eyes narrowed. ‘Tell me, when did you last take some time off?’
‘I don’t really think that’s—’
‘When?’ he persisted.
‘I don’t remember.’
‘You don’t remember? Then it has been too long.’ Gianluca turned his head to glance out of the floor-to-ceiling windows which filled one end of the large, contemporary office at the top of the magnificent building which was situated right in the heart of the Rome. ‘It is such a beautiful day,’ he mused, and waved his hand with careless pride. ‘See how magnificent the city looks when she is bathed in sunshine. Alive and carefree—like a young girl in love.’
Aisling’s expression didn’t change. ‘Yes. I suppose that’s one way of describing it.’
Black brows were elevated. ‘You are planning to stay on, perhaps?’
‘No. Just until tomorrow. We’re flying out first thing.’ She wished he would stop looking at her that way—as if she were a specimen in a laboratory that he was just about to dissect.
‘Really? That’s a pity.’ He ran a thoughtful finger over the hard line of his jaw, which already held just a trace of new growth, and stared at her pale face and her set features with something approaching frustration. ‘Doesn’t Italy tempt you, Aisling?’ he demanded. ‘Doesn’t the successful conclusion of a lucrative contract make you want to take a holiday once in