Italian Mavericks: Forbidden Nights With The Italian. Sarah Morgan

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СКАЧАТЬ I’m too chicken.’ Ben skilfully dodged the waitress, who came sprinting into the kitchen. ‘Hey, be careful or we’ll be sending you out on the boat for more snapper.’

      ‘You’ll never guess who just turned up—’

      Fia shot a glance at Ben as she started on the next order. ‘Serve the food or it will be cold and I don’t serve cold food.’ Aware that Gina was virtually trembling with excitement, Fia decided it would be quicker and more efficient just to let her gush. She added seasoning and olive oil to fresh scallops and dropped them onto the pan. They were so fresh they needed nothing but the best quality oil to bring out the flavour. ‘It must be someone exciting because I’ve never known you starstruck before and we’ve had plenty of celebrities in here.’ As far as she was concerned, a guest was a guest. They were here to eat and her job was to feed them. And she fed them well. Expertly she flipped the scallops and added fresh herbs and capers to the pan.

      Gina sneaked a look over her shoulder to the restaurant. ‘It’s the first time I’ve seen him in person. He’s stunning.’

      ‘Whoever he is, I hope he booked because otherwise you’re going to have to send him away.’ Fia shook the pan constantly. ‘It’s a full house tonight.’

      ‘You won’t be sending him away.’ Gina sounded awestruck. ‘It’s Santo Ferrara. In the flesh. Only sadly not showing anywhere near as much flesh as I’d like in an ideal world.’

      Fia stopped breathing.

      Weakness spread through her body and then she started to shake, as if she’d suddenly been injected with something deadly. The pan slid from her hand and crashed onto the flame, the precious scallops forgotten.

      ‘He wouldn’t come here.’ He wouldn’t dare. She was talking to herself. Reassuring herself. But there was no reassurance to be had.

      Since when did she know anything about what motivated Santo Ferrara?

      ‘Er—why wouldn’t he come?’ Gina looked intrigued. ‘Seems logical enough to me. His company owns the hotel next door and you serve great food.’

      Gina wasn’t local, otherwise she would have known the history between the two families. Everyone knew. And Fia also knew that the Ferrara Beach Club, the hotel that shared her perfect curve of beach, was the smallest and least significant of the Ferrara hotel group. There was no earthly reason why Santo himself would choose to give it his personal attention.

      Her concentration shot, Fia caught her elbow on the side of a hot pan. Pain seared through her and brought her back to the present. Furious with herself for forgetting the scallops, she plated them up with meticulous care and handed them to Gina, functioning on automatic. ‘This is for the couple on the waterfront,’ she croaked. ‘It’s their anniversary and they booked this six months ago so make sure you treat them with reverence. This is a big night for them. I don’t want them disappointed.’

      Gina gaped at her. ‘Aren’t you going to—’

      ‘I’m fine! It’s just burned flesh—’ Fia spoke through her teeth ‘—I’ll put it under cold water in a minute.’

      ‘I wasn’t thinking about your elbow. I was thinking about the fact that Santo Ferrara is standing in your restaurant and you don’t seem to care,’ Gina said faintly. ‘You treat every customer like royalty and when someone genuinely important turns up you ignore him. You do know who he is? The Ferrara, yes? Ferrara Resorts. Five star all the way.’

      ‘I know exactly who he is.’

      ‘But Boss, if he’s come here to eat—’

      ‘He hasn’t come here to eat.’ A Ferrara would never sit down at a Baracchi table for fear of being poisoned. She had no idea why he was here and that lack of insight frustrated her because she couldn’t fight what she didn’t understand. And mingled in with the shock and anger was dread.

      He’d walked boldly into her restaurant at peak time. Why?

      Only something really, really important would make him do that.

      Terror rippled through her. No, she thought wildly, it couldn’t possibly be that.

      He didn’t know.

      He couldn’t know.

      With a final curious glance, Gina hurried out of the kitchen and Fia ran cold water over her burned elbow, trying to reassure herself that it was a routine visit. Another attempt by the Ferrara family to hold out an olive branch. There had been others, and her grandfather had taken each and every olive branch and snapped it in two. Since her brother’s death, there had been nothing. No overtures. No contact.

      Until now …

      Functioning on automatic, she reached above her head for a fresh bulb of garlic. She grew it herself in her garden, along with vegetables and herbs and she enjoyed the growing almost as much as she enjoyed the cooking. It soothed her. Gave her a feeling of home and family she’d never derived from the people around her. Reaching for her favourite knife, she started chopping, trying to think how she would have reacted if the circumstances had been different. If the terror wasn’t involved. If the stakes weren’t so high—

      She would have been cold. Businesslike.

      ‘Buonasera, Fia.’

      A deep male voice came from the doorway and she turned, the knife turning from a kitchen implement to a weapon. The crazy thing was, she didn’t know his voice. But she knew his eyes and they were looking at her now—two dark pools of dangerous black. They gleamed bright with intelligence and hard with ruthless purpose. They were the eyes of a man who thrived in a cut-throat business environment. A man who knew what he wanted and wasn’t afraid to go after it. They were the same eyes that had glittered into hers in the darkness three years before as they’d ripped each other’s clothes and slaked a fierce hunger.

      Those three years had added a couple of inches to his broad shoulders and more bulk to muscles she remembered all too well. Apart from that he was exactly the same. Still the same ‘born to rule’ Ferrara self-confidence; the same innate sophistication, polished until it shone bright as the paintwork of his Lamborghini. He was six foot three of hard, sensual masculinity but Fia felt nothing a woman was supposed to feel when she laid eyes on Santo Ferrara. A normal woman wouldn’t feel this searing anger, this almost uncontrollable urge to scratch his handsome face and thump that powerful chest. When she was near him, every feeling was exaggerated. She felt vulnerable and defenceless and those feelings brought out the worst in her. Usually she was warm and civil to everyone who stepped inside her kitchen. Reviews commended her hospitality and the intimate, friendly atmosphere of the restaurant. But she couldn’t even bring herself to wish this man a good evening. And that was because she didn’t want him to have a good evening.

      She wanted him to go to hell and stay there.

      He was her biggest mistake.

      And judging from the cold, cynical glint in his eye, he considered her to be his.

      ‘Well, this is a surprise. The Ferrara brothers don’t usually step down from their ivory tower to mingle with us mortals. Checking out the competition?’ She adopted her most businesslike tone, while all the time her anxiety was rising and the questions were pounding through her head.

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