Cara Colter - Passionate Chef, Ice Queen Boss / Rescued in a Wedding Dress

They’d laughed together this morning as they drove here. Played silly old music in the van and let themselves relax. Scarlett had let her guards down. She couldn’t seem to get them back up again.

‘They’re catering to at least a fifty-per-cent tourist clientele here.’ Lorenzo leaned in a little closer. ‘These are people who won’t be back again and again. They just want to eat and leave.’

‘It can be a tricky one, the tourist versus locals issue.’ Scarlett tried to give the issue the most careful thought she could manage.

That wasn’t a full hundred per cent, she had to admit. How could she fully concentrate on business when all she could hear was his voice? When all she could feel was the fact he was so close she could raise her hand and touch his face?

And he was looking at her as though, regardless of their purpose here, he saw only her.

Scarlett cleared her throat. ‘You, ah, with your shopping earlier—the Rosa part of it.’ Yes, that was good. Rosa was what they needed to speak about, even if Scarlett now had an almost compulsive need to be in a kitchen with him somewhere and watch him create a chocolate masterpiece.

For her?

No. Of course not.

Well, it would be rather special.

I repeat, Scarlett, no, of course not!

It would not be special. It would be dangerously intimate.

‘Um, where were we?’

The liquid brown of his eyes darkened as he gazed at her through a screen of silky black lashes. ‘We were discussing my shopping for Rosa.’

‘That’s right. We were.’ Scarlett forced a nod, but all that did was make her ponytail bounce and the forest-green ribbon brush against the skin of her back. A sleeveless sundress in a matching green had seemed a good choice this morning, but now Scarlett wondered if maybe she should have dressed in something more workmanlike. Well, workwomanlike, if she wanted to be exact about it.

Maybe a suit that buttoned up to the neck. With tights. Boring, sensible ones. And low-heeled pumps. And no ribbon in her hair. Definitely no ribbon from her collection of ribbons that Scarlett anticipated wearing each day now for that moment when Lorenzo let his gaze wander to her hair.

‘I’ve studied the way you run your kitchen, Lorenzo.’ She drew a breath that she hoped would help to steady her before she forced herself to go on. ‘From this morning’s shopping, the only noteworthy issue was that we could purchase a lot of our goods from here on a regular basis and get them for less than we’re paying to local producers from Monta Correnti and its surrounds.’

His fingers lifted as though he might attempt to smooth the puckered expression from her lips, but he dropped them back to the table and instead gave a nod of agreement. ‘You’re quite right, but Luca’s policy has been to support local business.’

‘Yet recently I saw you in a heated discussion with a local olive supplier when he brought a case of olives to the restaurant.’ Scarlett had meant to follow up on that, but had become immersed again in account records and, truthfully, had forgotten. She shouldn’t allow issues to slip away from her that way. Everything counted!

It was Lorenzo’s turn to frown. ‘The olives that grower brought wouldn’t be fit to put on a cheap mass-produced pizza from some foreign country that doesn’t have a clue!’

Scarlett grinned. She couldn’t help herself. ‘Are you having a go at my country’s food-chain pizza makers? I’m sure the last time I had an olive on one of those pizzas, it was quite satisfactory. But then, Australia produces some good olives.’

She was teasing him.

And he was looking all affronted but with a twinkle in his eyes, letting her.

Scarlett was shocked at her own behaviour, and thrilled and happy and a little giddy from his company, all at once.

Oh, she had allowed herself to relax too much with him today. That was the problem. Relax and unwind and for a little while, though the entire purpose of her presence with him was to dig into yet another aspect of Rosa’s doings in hopes of finding another edge she could trim off their bottom line, she’d simply had fun.

‘Why can’t I still loathe you, ’Renz?’ The old pet name for him slipped out without her even realising it. The question slipped out, too, straight from her confusion and interest in him. It also came from a degree of caution and the belated realisation that she really had let this day get out of her control. ‘You hurt me so much.’

‘That is something I have regretted every day for five years.’ He didn’t say that he wished he could have fixed the situation, made it better. That he wished he could have done things differently back then.

Scarlett noted that. Oh, she heard that fact loud and clear. And even then, she still couldn’t.

Had she ever hated him? Or had she only thought that she did, because being angry had been easier to deal with than the pain of losing him? The pain of him not caring for her enough to leave his wife and give Scarlett the future with him that she had hoped for?

A future that Lorenzo had promised and then not followed through on? She hadn’t known he was married at first. She’d let herself fall in love with him before he told her. He’d been going to leave Marcella. He’d done that since. Why couldn’t he have done it then? ‘It was a long time ago and maybe we both have grown up since then.’

Maybe growing up was what allowed Lorenzo to finally get out of a marriage that had made him unhappy. At least he’d done that for himself.

And Scarlett had moved on, too. Perhaps they just hadn’t been meant to be together.

When she searched his eyes she thought she would see agreement. Perhaps softness. Maybe still that hint of teasing. She didn’t expect to see shadows. Such shadows that her breath caught in her throat and she uttered his name with a question in her voice. ‘Lorenzo?’

What is it? What’s brought that hurt into your eyes?

He swallowed and opened his mouth and for some reason her breath stilled as though she was bracing for something. But he just shook his head and gestured to her plate. ‘Are you finished? If so we should probably make our way back. There’s a lot of work still to do before the day is over.’

‘Y-yes. I’m finished.’ So, apparently, was this conversation if she didn’t try…‘If you need—’

‘I’m fine, Scarlett, but we do need to head back.’ He didn’t reject her care. The gentle expression in his eyes made it clear that he appreciated it. But he shut the conversation down, just the same.

Scarlett nodded. She wanted to think about his reaction, what it could mean, but he gestured for their bill and then there was that to settle.

They were on the road again in minutes and he talked about the pros and cons of paying more for local produce, and did it with enough commitment and interest that Scarlett had to throw herself into the conversation with him.

Really, he was only being sensible, doing what Scarlett should have done from the outset today. He was trying to keep them on a business footing.

So why did Scarlett feel that with each moment that passed the tension and consciousness between them, rather than lessening, became stronger until everything between them seemed to be exaggerated a hundredfold?

She could hear each breath he took. The radio was silent. Her own breathing sounded loud to her ears. Each of Lorenzo’s words felt like the brush of his hand against her skin. When they fell silent, Scarlett remembered times in their past that they had shared such silences. Companionable, sweet silences.

If she thought this was only affecting her, maybe she would have had a good chance of squashing it back, but it was in his eyes each time he glanced her way. It was in the clench of his hands around the steering wheel and the tight set of his shoulders as he tried so hard to keep their conversation moving and work-focused.