she quoted with a twinkle.
He shook his head and gave a rueful grin. ‘That Sunday supplement quote will, I suspect, go with me to my grave.’
‘Is this the way a genius travels?’
‘I am no genius and I generally find it more convenient to use a helicopter.’
The retort drew a laugh from her. ‘What about ruthless?’ she asked curiously.
His charismatic smile flashed. ‘That rather depends on who you’re talking to.’
‘I’m talking to you.’
‘What do you think?’
‘I think you can’t give a straight answer. Perhaps you should go into politics.’
‘So you want to know the man behind the trashy headline?’
She shook her head. ‘I don’t have that sort of time.’ This man was so complicated that she suspected it would take a very long time to even begin to work out the kinks in his personality. ‘This is just one dinner date.’
His dark lashes lifted from the razor-sharp angle of his sculpted cheekbones. Dervla’s stomach flipped as their eyes connected.
‘It doesn’t have to be one dinner date.’
The earthy warmth in his steady scrutiny made her stomach flip. She tried to laugh to reduce the tension that had sprung up in the confined space, but her vocal cords were paralysed.
‘You are probably right not to commit yourself. Wait and see how this evening goes.’
CHAPTER EIGHT
DERVLA wanted to tell Gianfranco that the evening was going nowhere but the excitement circulating in her bloodstream resisted her efforts. Her heart was thudding so loud that she was sure he must be able to hear it.
A few moments later their sumptuous ride drew to a halt—an abrupt halt, and equally abruptly Dervla shot forward. She gave a knee-jerk scream and closed her eyes as impact with the glass panel separating them from the driver seemed inevitable.
At the last moment she found herself pulled backwards, anchored to the seat by an arm like a steel band around her waist.
The glass partition slid down and the driver’s anxious face appeared. ‘Sorry about that. A dog ran out,’ he said, speaking excellent English but with a more pronounced Italian accent than his employer.
‘You avoided it?’
The driver nodded. ‘Lucky you were wearing seat belts back there.’
‘Very lucky,’ Gianfranco agreed, his sardonic gaze levelled on Dervla’s guilty face.
The glass partition closed and while the driver got out to open the passenger doors Gianfranco’s arm slid from her waist.
He was still so close she could feel the heat of his body and smell the shampoo he used on his silky ebony hair. She struggled against a sudden crazy impulse to sink her fingers into that lush pelt.
‘I always wear my seat belt,’ she said defensively.
‘Clearly not always …’
Her breath came a little easier as he moved away, but every nerve ending in her body remained painfully inflamed. ‘Well, always before today.’
She turned her head and connected with his dark eyes.
Her rueful smile guttered.
His eyes were blazing, a nerve beside his clenched mouth throbbing and the bruises on his forehead stood out livid against his deathly pallor. Gianfranco looked incandescent with rage.
‘Are you a total fool?’
Dervla’s first instinct was to defend herself against his blighting scorn, but it was pretty hard to defend the indefensible.
‘How many people have you seen brought into Casualty after going head first through windscreens?’
From his expression Dervla suspected he had witnessed such an event himself, maybe even been personally involved, which would explain his somewhat dramatic reaction to the incident.
‘All right, I should know better,’ she admitted, shamefaced.
‘That face could have been …’ His chest lifted as he dragged in deep before he reached across and placed one big hand around the curve of her cheek. A distracted expression drifted into his deepset eyes as he rubbed his thumb in a circular motion across the apple of her cheek.
Dervla, mesmerized, stared up at him, her eyes half closed as the friction of his thumb against her skin increased the growing liquid ache low in her pelvis.
‘Next time I might not be there to save you. Promise me,’ he demanded huskily, ‘that you will never do that again.’
Dervla had no trouble supplying the promise he demanded, but she did have trouble making it audible as her enraptured eyes stayed locked on his lean face, her throat clogged with emotion she couldn’t put a name to.
The opening of the limo door provided the necessary distraction to allow her to escape the sensual thrall that held her immobilised and break free of that intense stare.
Dervla was so flustered that she didn’t immediately register as she stepped out into the damp night that there were no eateries, casual or otherwise, in the residential square.
‘This isn’t a restaurant,’ she said, levelling an accusing glare at him as they approached the porticoed entrance of a large Georgian building.
‘This is my house.’
‘Which part?’
‘All of it.’
She rolled her eyes. ‘Of course it is.’
The door was opened before they reached it. A dark-haired woman in her thirties wearing a navy skirt smiled pleasantly at Dervla, who, impelled forward by firm hand in the small of her back, stepped forward into the elegant hallway lit by chandeliers and dominated by a sweeping staircase a full orchestra could have been neatly tucked away beneath.
Dazzled by all the gleaming splendour, she didn’t catch the name as Gianfranco introduced his housekeeper. After a brief exchange in Italian the soft-voiced older woman bid them a polite goodnight and vanished through one of the many doors that opened onto the reception area.
‘Come.’
Left with little choice Dervla did as he bid, though his autocratic manner really grated on her. He led her through a series of doors and down a long corridor. When they reached the end he opened the door and signalled for her to precede him.
Dervla stepped inside. It was a kitchen, though not like any kitchen she knew. The only place she had seen rooms like this was in the pages of glossy magazines. She ran a hand across the surface of a tall larder unit, the burred-oak finish smooth under her fingers.
