place is crawling with my ancestors,” she said, waving a hand in the air as though there were groups of them hanging around all up and down the cliffs and caves.
“No kidding?” He looked around at the rock wall behind them, willing to join in her conceit if she would let him play. “Why don’t you introduce me?”
She laughed softly. “What do you care about my musty old Nirolian ancestors?”
“You’d be surprised. I’ve got a few of my own.”
She cocked a sleek eyebrow. “Do you?”
“So they tell me.”
At last there was a spark of interest in her manner. He supposed she’d be even more interested if he told her he was King Giorgio of Niroli’s illegitimate grandson.
But it had never been a point of pride with him. In fact, he’d been raised with the vague feeling that it was really something to be ashamed of. There was no doubt that his maternal grandparents thought it was something his mother should be ashamed of. But then, they had always thought just about everything his mother did should be hushed up. And since they’d pretty much raised him on their Kansas farm, it was an attitude that lingered stubbornly in his psyche, no matter how hard he tried to deny it.
“But I thought you just came from New York,” the graceful woman was saying.
“That’s right. I’ve never been here to Niroli before. But my father was … Nirolian.”
“Ah.”
She stretched the syllable out as though that explained everything—and not in a good way. He frowned. Her attitude was beginning to get on his nerves. But before he could probe it further, Jeremy shrieked and the dog barked. He rose, looking down to see what was going on.
“Jeremy, leave that dog alone,” he called down. He didn’t know if his son had actually done anything to the animal, but he thought he might as well cover all bases.
“His name is Fabio,” she said coolly.
“Who? Oh, the dog?”
“Yes.”
“Okay.” He turned and called down again. “Jeremy, leave Fabio alone.”
“You aren’t very good at it, are you?” she said dryly as he sat down again.
He looked at her, startled. “At what?”
“Parenting. You don’t seem to have the knack for it.”
He stared at her. Now he was sure of it. She hated him. What right did she have to decide to hate him at first sight anyway? He was a decent guy. And she was damn annoying.
“What do you know about my parenting skills?”
“I can hear it in the way you talk to him. You shouldn’t talk to a boy that age the way you do. You can’t order him about as though he were a soldier.”
He couldn’t believe this. She actually thought she could tell him how to raise his kid. “He needs some discipline,” he said, pointing out what was obvious to the rest of the world.
“Why aren’t you disciplining him, then?”
He stared at her. Was she purposefully goading him? “That’s what I’m trying to do!”
She shook her head. “There you go, raising your voice again.”
And he thought he’d been frustrated before? “What do you prefer?” he shot back, making a Herculean effort not to let his voice get harsher. “Do you think I should hit him?”
“Of course not. I think you should give him some structure.” She sighed. “I’ll bet you don’t know him very well, no matter how often you have him around.”
She turned toward him in that odd way she had. He wished she would take off those dark glasses so he could read more in her eyes.
“But it’s not often, is it? And you came to Niroli thinking you could get closer to your son just by being here with him.”
She had certainly hit the nail on the head with that guess. In fact, she seemed almost eerily clairvoyant. But he hated to admit she was right about anything. “What if I did?”
She shrugged her slender shoulders. “Well, I don’t think it’s working. And if you don’t improve your technique, it’s not going to work, no matter how loud you get.” She looked at him with pity. “You need help.”
He stifled the angry answer that sprang to his lips. She was just plain wrong, but arguing about it wasn’t going to get him anywhere. “Okay,” he said instead, opting with difficulty for sweet reason—giving charm one last chance to make a difference. “Help me, then.”
Her smile was meant as a reaction and not a way to draw him in. “I think not.”
Her superior tone was maddening. She was dismissing him again. Well, if she was such a damn expert …
“So how many children do you have?” he asked pointedly.
She raised her head, amused at how angry he was getting, and at how hard he was trying to hide it.
“Not one.” She said it without a hint of embarrassment. “I don’t even have a husband at this point.”
“Then why the hell should I listen to you?”
She tossed her head. “You’d better listen to someone. Your intuition doesn’t seem to be doing you any good at all.”
There, Elena Valerio thought coolly. That ought to do it. Now he would get up and storm off and she would be rid of him. And that was exactly what she wanted. wasn’t it?
She wished she could see him. That didn’t happen often these days. She’d accepted her blindness years ago and she had worked out so many ways to compensate, she almost felt it an advantage at times. But from the first, his brusque voice and his cocky manner had triggered something in her she couldn’t explain, and she wished she could put a face to the image she was getting.
She heard impatience and a world-weary cynicism that she didn’t like. He was a user—that was what she heard. His arrogance was only exceeded by his need to control those around him. At the same time he seemed to want to charm her, she sensed a strange coldness inside him that chilled her. He was everything she disliked in a man.
But he was still here. What was he waiting for? She sighed.
“Okay, mister. Here’s a free tip. Relax.”
“Relax? Why should I relax?”
“Didn’t you come to Niroli to refresh yourself?”
“No. I came on business.”
“Ah, that explains it. You should let that tension go. It’s tying you in knots. Your son can sense that, so he doesn’t trust you. It’s no wonder he defies you.”
Adam
