Kate Hardy - His Forbidden Conquest

He ignored her. ‘Is there anything you’re allergic to or hate eating, or shall we just have the special?’

‘Special?’

‘Dante’s menu is the same, regardless of where the restaurant is, but then the chef at each restaurant has a corner of the menu that’s just his or hers, a dish that’s a local speciality or what have you,’ he explained. ‘It changes whenever the chef feels like it. That way my chef gets to enjoy the creative side and feels that he or she has an input to the menu.’

‘Your staff really matter to you, don’t they?’ she asked.

‘This is a service industry. Without your staff, you’re nothing. You can produce the best food in the world, but if the service is poor the customer won’t come back. So it’s important that your staff feel they have a stake.’

She said nothing.

‘You know nothing about your staff, do you?’ he asked softly.

‘Not yet,’ she admitted.

‘You need to know who works for you and what their job involves. The best way to do that is to spend a few hours doing every single job in your business, so you know the challenges your staff face and can empathise with them.’

‘Is that what you did?’

He nodded. ‘I still do it, every so often. It keeps me in touch with the staff and the business, and they respect me for it.’

‘Every job?’ she tested.

‘Every job,’ he emphasised, ‘from waiting tables to pot-washing to cashing up last thing at night to peeling vegetables. And, yes, I clean toilets as well.’

‘Right.’ She looked utterly shocked.

Ha. He’d just bet she’d never cleaned a toilet in her life. And even when she’d been living in London, he was pretty sure that she hadn’t cleaned her own flat. She would’ve paid someone to do it. Princesses didn’t soil their hands.

‘The special will be fine, thank you.’ She paused. ‘Um, would it be OK for me to have a shower?’

‘Sure.’ Dante had to hold back the idea of joining her in there. ‘The bathroom’s next door. There are clean towels in the airing cupboard. Help yourself to what you need.’

‘Thank you.’

He scooped up his own crumpled clothes and headed for the kitchen to give her some privacy. While she was in the shower, he rang the restaurant and ordered the special.

He’d just switched the kettle on to make coffee when she walked in. She hadn’t pulled her hair back again and his heart skipped a beat; like this, she looked younger than her twenty-eight years, slightly vulnerable.

And the thought hardened his heart. She didn’t need his protection. She already had people looking out for her. Always had. Not like the way he’d been, half a lifetime ago.

‘I’ve ordered the special. It should be with us in twenty minutes.’

‘That’d be good. So does your chef recommend red or white?’

He shrugged. ‘No idea. I don’t drink.’

She blinked. ‘What, not ever? Not even on your birthday or at Christmas?’

He thought back to his childhood. Christmases, his father’s birthday. Grappa , followed by the anger and the pain and the tears. ‘Not ever.’ He forced himself to relax. It wasn’t her fault that his father had been a mean drunk. ‘But if you want wine, sure, I can order some.’

‘No, water’s fine by me.’ She placed her hand on his arm. ‘Dante, are you OK?’

‘I’m fine,’ he lied. ‘Coffee?’ He gave her his best professional smile.

‘I …’ For a moment, he thought she was going to argue. To push him. But then she gave in. ‘Thanks. That’d be good.’

He busied himself making coffee. ‘They’ll buzz me when the food’s ready. Come and sit down.’

Dante had just gone distant on her. And Carenza didn’t have a clue why. She thought it might be something to do with his comment about not drinking. Ever. Was he a reformed alcoholic? If so, it must be difficult owning a restaurant chain; he probably had to eat out as part of his job, and every business meal she’d ever attended had always involved wine.

Though, since his barriers were well and truly up, she didn’t feel that she could ask him.

This wasn’t a relationship, she reminded herself. They were too different for it to work. She simply took the mug of coffee he offered her and followed him into his living room.

It was incredibly minimalist. There was a small dining table with four chairs; the laptop sitting on the table told her that he used the room as another office. There was a comfortable-looking sofa—but no television or games console, she noticed. And the picture on the wall looked as if a designer had chosen it for him. Bland, bland, bland.

There were no ornaments on the mantelpiece. Just a clock—and two photographs.

Knowing she was intruding, but unable to stop herself, she went over to take a closer look. One was of Dante with an older woman who looked enough like him to be his mother, and the other was a woman who might’ve been a couple of years older or younger than him, holding a baby. His sister, maybe? A cousin? Or maybe his mother holding him as a baby?

‘Your family?’ she asked.

‘Yes.’

He didn’t elaborate. And there was no sign of his father. Dead, like hers? Possibly not, or Dante would’ve had photographs, the precious last memories, as she did herself. Estranged? Never known him? Again, she couldn’t ask. Dante was sending out ‘off limits’ signals all over the place.

Dante could see his flat through Carenza’s eyes, and he didn’t like what he saw. Boring. Stuffy. Minimalist.

But he didn’t do ornaments. He’d seen his father smash too many of them in temper to want that kind of thing in his flat.

He wished she’d put the photographs down. He had a nasty feeling that she was going to start asking questions. If she did, he’d stonewall her. He didn’t want to talk about his mother or his sister. And as for why his father wasn’t there—he definitely wasn’t talking about that. The man who’d made his childhood a misery; the man whose shadow still haunted him. None of the fear had gone away; it had just refocused. Dante wasn’t scared any more that he’d be hurt; he was terrified that he’d be the one doing the hurting.

The silence between them stretched so long that it became painful.

And Dante was exceedingly relieved when his phone rang.

‘Thanks, Mario.’ He looked at her as he ended the call. ‘Back in a second.’

The swordfish with lemon and oregano was perfect, the fresh vegetables were al dente, just as he liked them, and her eyes widened in appreciation at the white chocolate cheesecake. ‘Wow. Your chef is brilliant. Please thank him—or her—for me.’

‘Him. Sure.’

She sighed. ‘You’ve gone all closed on me again.’

He shrugged. ‘I’m your business mentor.’

And her lover.

But what was happening between them was nothing to do with love. It was just sex. Lust. Desire. She supposed he was right: she didn’t need him to open up to her. This wasn’t a relationship.

‘All right. Your homework,’ he said.

‘Homework?’

‘The next three days, you do a stint in every single job. Get to know the business. And then on Saturday you can tell me about your customers. Who they are, what they want, what your best-sellers are and why.’

‘Got it.’ She paused. ‘So I don’t see you until Saturday.’

‘No.’

‘Can I call you if I get stuck?’

He’d rather she didn’t. He wanted a little distance between them. So he could get himself back into a more disciplined and controlled frame of mind. One where she didn’t tempt him so much. ‘If you absolutely have to. But I’d rather you called me with solutions than problems.’

‘Got it.’ She took a deep breath. ‘Can I do the washing up?’