Surprise: Outback Proposal: Surprise: Outback Proposal

CHAPTER THREE

ROSIE’S WORDS RETURNED to haunt Lucy as she approached the Bianco Brothers stall at the market the next morning. Dom was at the front of the stand and she was about to call out a greeting when he stooped to lift a box of potatoes. He was wearing a pair of well-worn Levi’s, and the soft denim molded his butt and thighs as he lifted the heavy load. His biceps bulged, visible against the tight cotton of a long-sleeved T-shirt, and Lucy found herself swallowing unexpectedly.

Then Dom turned and saw her, and his dark eyes lit up and his straight, white teeth flashed as he smiled. His black hair was curly and unruly around his face, and he was tanned from his months in Italy.

Okay. Maybe Rosie was on to something when she said he was a god, Lucy admitted to herself as she stared at him. Maybe he is attractive.

“Lucy. Be with you in a minute,” he said, dropping the potatoes onto another customer’s trolley.

Then he grabbed the hem of his long-sleeved T-shirt and tugged it over his head. Lucy’s eyes widened as she scored an eyeful of tanned, hard belly as whatever he was wearing underneath clung to the top he was removing.

Okay. Attractive is the wrong word. Sexy. Very, very sexy.

Lucy dragged her eyes away, frowning.

She was pregnant. Having a baby. With child. She had no business ogling hot guys at the market. She cursed her sister mentally. This was all Rosie’s doing, planting stupid suggestions in her head. If she hadn’t said all that stuff about Dom last night, there was no way Lucy would be standing here right now feeling like a pervert.

“How can we help you today?” Dom said, closing the distance between them.

Lucy smoothed her hands down the sides of her skirt and shook her head slightly to clear it.

“All the usual staples. Plus I need eggplants and a whole lot of fresh herbs,” she said, consulting her list.

“May I?” Dom asked. He held out a hand for the list.

“Sure.”

She’d given her list to Mr. Bianco a hundred times. So why did it feel different giving it to Dom?

Damn you, Rosie, and your stupid teen crush.

“Sorry, did you say something?” Dom asked.

“No! At least, I don’t think I did,” Lucy said.

“The eggplants are down here. You want to come check them out?” he asked after a small silence.

“Sure.” She waited until his back was turned before she hit herself on the forehead with her open palm. Then, just in case her stupid brain hadn’t gotten the message, she slid a hand over the baby bump beneath her suit coat.

The smooth, taut curve of her belly grounded her in an instant. She was pregnant and scheduled for an important meeting with the bank. Her days of getting goofy over guys were over.

One hand on her tummy, she followed Dom.

“Nice and shiny,” Dom said as he showed her the eggplants. “Just the way we like them.”

“Definitely,” she said.

She kept her gaze focused on the dark purple vegetables in front of her.

“I’ll take three boxes,” she said.

“Not a problem.”

She stood back as Dom hefted a box from beneath the trestle table, lifting it easily onto her trolley. When all three boxes were stacked neatly, he turned to face her.

“What next?” There was a smile in his eyes and it quickly spread to his mouth. For the first time she noticed that he had a single dimple in his left cheek.

Rosie hadn’t mentioned that last night.

“Um, the herbs,” she said.

They were about to move to the other end of the stall when Mr. Bianco found them, a clipboard in hand and a frown on his face.

“Dom, you remember how much onions we order last week? Oh, hello, Lucy. You looking lovely today.”

For some reason, Dom’s father’s compliment made her blush. Which was stupid. Every morning he said something along the same lines to her. Why should today feel any different to any other time?

Because you were eyeing up his son like a side of beef five minutes ago? Because all of a sudden a part of you would like to really be looking lovely today?

She squashed the little voice with a mental boot heel. She really was going to have words with her sister for causing all this crazy, too-aware-of-Dom stuff.

“Hi, Mr. Bianco,” she said. “How are you today?”

“No complaints,” he said, patting his belly complacently. “But I interrupting. I wait.”

“It’s fine. No worries,” she said, gesturing with her hand that they should go ahead and have their conversation.

Dom shot her an appreciative look. “Two seconds,” he promised as he turned to talk with his father.

She moved away a few steps to inspect a pile of zucchini while they talked, but she was aware of lots of hand gesticulating and the frustrated tone of their conversation as father and son discussed something intently.

“Okay, sorry about that,” Dom said a few minutes later as he rejoined her.

He was frowning and the smile had gone from his eyes.

“If there’s a problem, I can wait for one of the other servers to be free,” she said.

Dom shook his head. “No problem. Just stubborn pig-headedness.”

“Right.”

He sighed, and his frown eased a little.

“You see that clipboard he’s holding? That’s the complete record of our stock on hand for the week,” he said.

Lucy’s gaze took in the many feet of frontage the Bianco Brothers occupied, all of it filled to overflowing with fresh produce.

“You’re kidding me.”

She carried a tiny fraction of the inventory the Biancos did, and she kept it all neatly organized via a simple computer program. She couldn’t even imagine how Mr. Bianco kept track of his stock with paper and pen.

“It gets worse. He’s the only one who can read his own handwriting. So whenever Vinnie or I or one of the others needs to check on something, we have to find him and get him to interpret for us.”

“Wow,” Lucy said.

“Yeah,” Dom said, a world of frustration in his voice.

“Driving you crazy?” she guessed.

“Just a little. There’s so much stuff we could be doing.Even having an up-to-date list of what’s available on a Web site would be a huge bonus. We get fifty phone calls a day from customers asking what we’ve got on hand. But Pa thinks that because his way has worked for thirty years, there’s no reason to change.”

He ran a hand through his hair, his gaze distant as he looked down the aisle. Then his eyes snapped back into focus and he gave her a rueful smile.

“Sorry. This isn’t getting your order filled, is it?” he said, pulling her list from his pocket again.

“It’s okay. I can barely have a conversation with my mother these days. I can’t even imagine working with her,” Lucy confessed.

Dom’s gaze instantly flicked to her stomach. She felt heat rise into her face. Yesterday when she’d seen him, she’d deliberately been vague when he’d asked about her husband. But she could tell by the awkward silence that had fallen that he knew the truth. There were precious few secrets in the close-knit Italian community they’d grown up in, and she should have known he’d soon find out she was single. Why she’d even bothered to cover yesterday she had no idea. At the time, it had seemed … messy to try to explain about Marcus and the fact that she was all alone.

At least be honest with yourself if you can’t be honest with anyone else, Lucia Basso.

The truth was that she’d been embarrassed. She stopped short of labeling the emotion she’d experienced shame. She wasn’t ashamed of her baby. She refused to be. But there was no getting around the fact that she was a good Catholic girl who was having a baby on her own because her boyfriend had abandoned her for another woman.

She opened her mouth to try to explain her omission, then swallowed her words without speaking them. Dom wouldn’t care. Her being pregnant or not or married or not meant nothing in his world. They had a business relationship, nothing more.

But still she felt uncomfortable. And the feeling seemed to be mutual. Dom shoved a hand into the back pocket of his jeans and shifted his feet.

“She’ll come around. Once she sees that little baby, she’ll be putty in your hands,” he said.

It was too complicated a situation to explain over a trestle table of zucchinis. Lucy smiled and waved a hand.

“It’s fine. We’re fine. It’s all good,” she said.

Dom hesitated a beat before nodding. “Okay, let’s get you those herbs.”

They were both careful to keep things surface-level for the rest of the transaction, and Lucy left the stall feeling oddly depressed. Which was as stupid as blushing over Mr. Bianco’s compliment. There was nothing in her relationship with Dominic Bianco that she had any reason to feel depressed about.

Still, she found herself going over their conversation again as she broke up her stock into separate orders in the back of the van prior to her first delivery of the day.

It was the fact that he’d confided about his father that had made her drop her guard, she decided. Dom had always been friendly, but in a professional way. Today was the first time that either of them had offered each other anything beyond polite small talk.

“Ow.” Lucy looked to where she’d caught her knee against the corner of one of her crates.

Great. She’d been so distracted thinking about Dominic that she’d put a run in her panty hose. Now she’d have to find the time to buy a new pair and wriggle into them before her bank appointment that afternoon.

A surge of nerves raced through her as she thought about the bank and the loan and what it meant for her future.

Get your head together, girl, because you will not get a second chance to get this right.

It was a scary thought—more than scary enough to sweep any other thoughts away. She didn’t have the luxury of being distracted right now.

Grimly determined, she finished breaking up her orders.

LATER THAT AFTERNOON, Dom stood in the refrigerated storeroom Bianco Brothers rented and broke the tape seal on the small box in front of him. Inside was a state-of-the-art handheld data unit, ideal for inputting stock information and orders for a wholesale company like his father’s.

Dom had picked up the unit yesterday after work, and today he was determined to start phase one of his plan to modernize the business. His father was going to be resistant to change, he knew that. But Dom would show him how much easier and more efficient life could be. In essence, that was what phase one was all about—massaging his father into letting progress do its thing.

It wasn’t like he was asking his father to take on the burden of learning the new software himself. Dom would do all that. At worst, Tony would have to learn how to pilot one of these handheld units, and the literature promised that they were as simple to use as a pocket calculator.

After studying the instructions for a few minutes, Dom powered up the unit and experimented with a couple of functions. Satisfied that he had the basics sorted, he turned to the stacks of crates towering around him. He’d catalog the stock in the storage space, then download the data into the new software program on his computer, then he’d show his father what they could do with the information. His father was stubborn, maybe even a little scared and intimidated by new technology, but Dom was confident that the old man would switch on to computerizing once he understood the benefits.

His thoughts drifted to Lucy as he began to punch in data. She’d looked good today, if a little pale. The bulge of her pregnancy was still in the burgeoning stage, cute and round rather than big and heavy. She’d always been beautiful, but being pregnant had added an extra dimension to her appeal.

He shook his head as he caught his own thoughts. He was not hitting on a pregnant woman. He’d already decided against it. She was vulnerable, for starters. Abandoned by her boyfriend, running a business on her own. She had too much at stake and inserting himself into the mix was only going to make things worse. Plus—pure selfishness here—he didn’t want to have any doubt about why Lucy was attracted to him. If that miracle ever happened. Not that he figured her for the type of woman who would seek out a man to provide security for herself and her unborn child, but he didn’t want there to be any confusion around the issue.

Once again they were the victims of bad timing. But maybe when she’d had the child, when her world was more settled. Maybe then he’d make his move, try his luck.

“Dom. We’re starting to close up. You ready in here?”

Dom turned to find his father standing in the doorway, his body a dark silhouette against the pale winter sunlight. There was a small pause as his father’s eyes adjusted to the difference in light, and Dom didn’t need to see his father’s face to know that he’d spotted the handheld unit.

“What you doing?” Tony asked. His voice was flat, absolutely expressionless.

Bad sign.

“I picked this up yesterday on the way home from work,” Dom said, facing his father. “I wanted to show you what it can do.”

“I told you, we not interested. Vinnie and me have discussed.”

“But, Pa, we can do so much more with this software in place. Project sales, pick up on trends. Cut down on spoilage.”

Dom hated that he sounded like a beseeching child trying to cajole a parent into taking him to an amusement park. This was a smart business decision and he should not have to cajole his father into anything. He was part of Bianco Brothers, too. It was time his father and uncle started respecting his opinion more.

“Take it back. I hope they give you money back,” Tony said dismissively.

“Why don’t you come over and take a look at what it can do? I’ve just entered this whole wall of stock in about five minutes,” Dom said. “It’s every bit as fast as writing it down on your clipboard, and everyone can have access to the data.”

“Don’t talk like I am little child,” Tony said. His voice was sharp. “I not idiot. Your uncle not idiot. We know how to run business. You bide time, be good boy, and one day you will run. Until then, you do things our way.”

Dom flinched from the tone and intent of his father’s words.

“Speaking of talking to people like children. In case you hadn’t noticed, I’m not a boy anymore,” he said. “Also, just so you know, Luigi Verde and his son have installed a computer system. And the Kerrimuirs have had one for two years. We’re going to be left behind if we don’t step up now and start offering our clients more services.”

He hadn’t meant for things to get this heated so quickly, but he also hadn’t expected his father to be so adamant on the issue. At the least, he’d expected his father to be curious, to explore the idea a little before rejecting it.

“It not matter. Our clients are loyal. They not forget us.”

Dom couldn’t help himself: he laughed.

“Pa, welcome to the twenty-first century. There’s no such thing as loyalty anymore. As soon as our customers know they can get a better deal or more value for money from one of our competitors, they’re gone. Don’t believe for a second that they come to you and Uncle Vinnie for any other reason except that it lines their pockets.”

His father waved a dismissive hand in the air and made a spitting noise.

“What you know? Your generation not understand. You not understand sticking to something, making work no matter what. You think if something hard, must be wrong. You walk away from commitments like mean nothing.”

Dom went very still.

“You’re talking about me and Dani, aren’t you?”

If his father wanted to throw accusations around, Dom was going to be damn sure they both knew what they were talking about.

Tony shifted his bulk, then tucked his thumbs into the waistband of his apron and just stared back at Dom. His stillness was his answer: yes, he thought his son had given up on his marriage rather than do the hard yards to fix it.

Hot anger stiffened Dom’s neck and squared his shoulders. He’d known that his father was unhappy about the divorce, but not this unhappy.

“I guess I should thank you for the honesty. At least we both know where we stand.”

“You think your mother and I not have hard times? You think I never look at other women and wonder if they wouldn’t be easier to love?”

Dom held his hand up. “Wait a minute. You think I cheated on Dani? Is that what you’re saying?” he asked. His voice had slipped up an octave.

His parents had known he and Dani were trying for children, that there had been problems, but Dom had never discussed the finer points of the issue with them. He’d never quite known how to explain to his father that thanks to the case of mumps he’d had when he was twenty years old, he was sterile and would never be able to father children of his own. He’d figured he’d get around to it, eventually.

And now his father was suggesting that the reason his marriage had fallen apart was because he’d strayed. So. Not only was Dom a man who couldn’t go the distance and honor his commitments, he was a cheat, too.

“Why else marriage break up? Dani was nice girl. She would never cheat,” his father said.

Dom rocked back on his heels. “This is unbelievable. How long have you felt this way, Pa? How long have you thought your son was a no-good sleaze?”

It was his father’s turn to rock back on his heels. “That not what I said. You never talk, you never say anything. You come to me and your mother and say marriage over. What we supposed to think?”

“Shit, I don’t know. Maybe the best of me? Maybe that there was a bloody good reason for my divorce and that I’d tell you once I could handle talking about it?”

“Talk now. Tell me now,” Tony demanded, thumping his chest.

“Why would I bother?” Dom said. “You have your own ideas about me, and you obviously like them a lot more than the truth.”

He grabbed his jacket and strode toward the doorway. He couldn’t remember ever being more furious with his father—and they’d had some rip-roaring fights over the years.

His father held his ground until the last possible moment, then stepped to one side.

Dom thrust the handheld unit at him as he passed.

“Do what you like with it. You won’t hear another word from me on the subject,” he said.

Then he marched back toward the stand. There was work to do, after all. He’d hate for his father to think his no-good son was adding shirking to his list of crimes.

“I CAN’T BELIEVE they said no.”

Lucy forced a small smile. “Well, they did. Apparently I’m a bad risk. No assets, no security.”

“But you’re making a profit. And you’ll make a bigger one once you get the site up and running and you attract more business,” Rosie said.

“Said all that. They didn’t care.”

“Crap,” Rosie said. Then she sat straighter. “We’ll try another bank. There’s got to be someone out there with a bit of vision.”

“Rosie, I have my van lease with them, do all my banking through them. If they don’t want to do business with me, no one else is going to step up to the plate.”

“You don’t know that. We have to try.” Rosie pulled her cell phone from her bag. “What’s the name of that new bank, the one advertising all the time?”

“I’ve already called the other three major banks, and two of the building societies,” Lucy said.

“And?”

“Like I said. No one wants to take a risk on me. And that’s before they’ve gotten an eyeful of this.” She indicated her belly.

Rosie stared at her, clearly at a loss as the facts sank in. “Crap,” she said again.

“Oh yeah,” Lucy said.

A waiter appeared at their table and Rosie waved him away.

“No, wait. I need chocolate,” Lucy said.

“Good idea,” Rosie said.

They both ordered hot chocolates and cake before returning to the crisis at hand.

“There has to be some way around this,” Rosie said.

Lucy pushed her hair behind her ear. She was tired, exhausted really, but she was hoping the chocolate would give her a much needed kick. Crawling into bed and sleeping for a day was not an option open to her right now.

“I’ve been doing some sums. If I save my ass off between now and when the baby is due, I can put aside enough to cover my bills for three months. Ma mentioned the other day that Cousin Mario is looking for work. I thought I could offer him the driver’s job for three months. He can take my wage, I’ll live off my savings. It might work.”

Rosie was staring at her. “What if you need more than three months? What if Mario won’t do it for what you pay yourself? Which, let’s face it, is a joke.”

Lucy felt the heat of threatening tears, and she clenched her jaw. “I guess I’ll cross that bridge when I come to it.”

“No. It’s a make-do, Band-Aid plan, and it’s not going to cut it. You need that twenty thousand.”

“Really? Do you think?” Lucy said. She so didn’t need her sister pointing out the obvious to her, not when she was trying to be stoic.

“We’ll lend it to you,” Rosie suddenly announced, slapping her hands onto the table so hard she made the sugar dispenser jump.

“What?”

“Andrew and I have got some money put aside for renovations at the office. We can put them off and lend it to you instead,” Rosie said.

Lucy stared at her sister. “God, I love you, you idiot, but there’s no way I’m taking money from you and Andrew. Forget about it. I’ll talk to Cousin Mario tonight, get something else sorted. It’ll be fine.”

“Listen to me,” Rosie said, leaning across the table until she was right in Lucy’s face. “That money is just sitting there. We’ve been talking about hiring an architect for years and it hasn’t happened. We’ll draw it up like a loan, if that makes you feel any better. You can pay us interest, make regular payments. We’ll be just like the bank, only nicer.”