you’re a kid in care, you have to make an effort not to slide down to the lowest common denominator,’ Matteo told her conversationally. ‘No one has any dreams for you. You have to make sure you have dreams for yourself or you sink to the bottom fast. I was lucky. I was bright. I learned the value of education.’ He shrugged. ‘I studied. I never skipped class. I set my sights on the only thing that mattered.’
‘What was that?’
‘Freedom. When you grow up without any advantages, money is the only thing that buys freedom, and by the age of eighteen I’d come to the conclusion that I would just have to make money and a lot of it. I was gifted at maths and got into Cambridge University. Got a first-class degree and was lucky enough to get taken on by a burgeoning investment bank. By twenty-five I’d made my first million. The bonuses were insane, but that life didn’t suit me. I don’t like taking orders or working for other people. So I jacked it in and began scouting around for companies to buy. Small IT companies, mainly. That’s the long and short of it. Rags to riches.’
‘Your opinion of me must be very low.’ She thought of her cosseted background, the trust fund that kept her going, the university career she had jettisoned because she had been bored stiff.
Matteo looked at her. She had such a transparent face. Yes, he really should have a low opinion of her, but there was something about her…
‘You’re not the sort of woman I would normally be drawn to,’ he was forced to concede.
She raised aquamarine eyes to his, and his jaw tightened, because she was hurt.
‘That’s not meant to be an insult, Rosie,’ he said roughly.
‘I know that. It’s the truth. What sort of women are you drawn to, just out of interest?’
‘Career women,’ he admitted.
‘Of course.’
‘We’re poles apart,’ he reminded her. ‘I’m sure you wouldn’t, under normal circumstances, go for someone like me.’
‘Definitely not.’ Rosie tilted her chin at a mutinous angle, pride coming to her rescue, because it cut to the quick that, whether he found her sexy or not—and she hated herself for dwelling on that stupid, throwaway compliment—he would never have given her the time of day if he hadn’t been dumped into playing out this charade. ‘I’m just shocked at how easily Candice fell for the charade,’ she mused truthfully.
‘People believe what they want to believe,’ Matteo said with a shrug. ‘Human nature. Your family want what they think is best for you and someone rich, powerful and wearing a suit fits the narrative.’ He looked at her. ‘And here’s another reason why no one will question this too deeply…’
Matteo looked at her flushed, pretty face ,but then his eyes drifted down to the tightness of her jumper straining over full breasts and the curve of her hips.
The atmosphere shifted. He could feel it and he knew that she would as well. He was just looking, he thought, because he wasn’t going to encourage any further complication to an already complicated and annoying situation. He was going to be sticking around for a handful of days and then he would be off, leaving her to assert her independence and damn him for the bastard he really wasn’t at all.
‘What’s that?’ Rosie asked breathlessly.
‘The most obvious reason of all. Opposites attract…’
ROSIE COULD ONLY concede the truth behind that statement. Matteo was sinfully good-looking but he wasn’t her type. Take away the dark good looks and the perfectly honed, intensely masculine physique, and what you had was your basic businessman, the sort of guy to appeal to her entire family but not to her.
It was true that she had never met any businessman quite in this one’s league but he was still nothing like the free-spirited adventurers towards whom she always gravitated. She shouldn’t be attracted to him at all but she was.
But then, he wasn’t exactly Mr Typical Business Tycoon, was he?
That background in foster care…
Not exactly your run-of-the mill CEO…
And those cool, cool eyes…seeing everything and revealing nothing…also not typical.
And that thread-like scar…where had that come from? Surely not filling out profit and loss columns with his fountain pen?
‘She took it for granted, your sister,’ Matteo said conversationally. ‘That it was okay to break the news about us in a group family chat without asking whether you might have preferred to do the news-breaking yourself. That par for the course? Because, if it is, then you did well to put her in her place.’ He settled his gaze on her.
‘I know,’ Rosie said simply. She didn’t add that his presence had given her backbone. ‘The problem is that Candice wouldn’t have relayed the information the way I would have.’
‘Explain.’
‘You heard her. She thinks this is some great romance and that’s what she would have told everyone. I would have been a little more realistic. I would have prepared them for the fact that there was a chance this wasn’t going to work out. It feels as though things are getting more and more difficult to control.’
‘That’s the problem when a lie begins to spiral out of control.’
She was hovering.
Things had taken an unexpected turn and he could see that she was uncomfortable with the situation. Her edginess was apparent in the way her gaze was flicking towards him, then flicking away…in the way her whole body seemed alive with restlessness even though she wasn’t actually moving around. Underneath the feisty, open exterior, real apprehension was creeping in. The consequences of that little white lie were dawning on her.
‘It’s also the problem with acting on impulse but, if you think you’ve been inconvenienced, then I should tell you that the last thing I’d banked on doing was remaining here for longer than strictly necessary.’
‘I’m sure you have commitments. It’s Christmas.’
‘I don’t do Christmas. The only reason I’m here at this time of year was because of the timing on this deal. My only commitment was to retreat to my villa outside Venice and escape the madness.’
‘Escape? Escape?’ Distracted, she angled her bright, blue-eyed gaze in his direction.
‘Don’t look so bewildered.’ Matteo’s eyebrows winged up. ‘Not everyone is in love with the festive season.’
‘You have no family…’ Rosie said slowly.
‘Don’t go there,’ Matteo told her, voice dropping by several degrees.
Rosie frowned. ‘It must be a lonely time of year for you,’ she said simply and Matteo vaulted to his feet and frustratedly raked hands through his hair.
‘What
