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It looked like the same bed, wardrobe and furnishings that he remembered.
But there was something new. Perched on the window ledge was a silver-framed photograph of a stunningly pretty slim blonde in a flimsy summer dress with legs that went on for ever.
Alexa.
Scott picked up the frame and glanced at it for a second before stashing it in the drawer of the bedside cabinet.
He had taken the photograph that first summer holiday they spent together walking in Switzerland. They were both single, in their twenties and had the whole world ahead of them.
In his eyes Alexa was the perfect woman for him. As a teenager he had watched his very different parents drift apart over the years and lead separate lives until the only thing they had in common was Freya and himself.
He wouldn’t make that mistake.
Alexa was clever, stunningly pretty and, best of all, a total sports fanatic like himself. They used to talk for hours about the things they both loved, laughing over tall tales from all of the exotic places that they had visited. They had been inseparable.
Heady with the mountain air, they had fallen in love. Over the next twelve months, they were so caught up in their engagement and the whirlwind of a top London wedding that he didn’t have time to stop and consider what married life was going to be like.
It was hard to believe that it could have ended so badly.
If Freya thought that being reminded of happier times with Alexa would help him to get over his cheating ex-wife then she didn’t understand.
There were some things a sunny disposition couldn’t fix.
Sometimes betrayal went too deep, like a bullet to the chest which lay too close to vital organs to be removed. Always there. Always catching you out when you least expected it.
A flash of memory surged through his brain, hot and wild. He could almost see Alexa reclining on this same bed, with a look of love in her eyes, beckoning him to join her. Her long straight blonde hair that he used to adore spread out across the pillow, warm, soft and inviting.
The frostbite in his fingers was nothing compared to this type of deep-seated pain.
Scott’s fingers tightened around the edge of the window frame as he looked out into the night sky, which in London was never going to be truly dark or clear.
Closing his eyes for a second, he gave way to the surge of anger and disappointment that he had buried deep inside himself since the moment he had walked into that hospital room in Rome.
It had been one of the most humbling experiences of his life. It was astonishing to see his father looking so low and depressed. Lars Elstrom had given up. Stopped trying. Beaten down by the events of the past few years to the point where he didn’t even see any point in keeping the company as a viable concern.
His speech was slurred slightly and he was going to have problems with the left side of his body for a long while, but his mind was still alive and sharp.
Suddenly the real reason why Freya had pleaded with him to come home for Christmas was only too apparent.
Elstrom Mapping was finished. Over. After two hundred years of creating maps and sea charts, the company was dead in the water.
A dinosaur.
That was the exact word that his father had managed to say to describe the family business that he had devoted his life to. An extinct creature which no longer had a place in the modern world.
His father had given up in every way possible.
How could this have happened so quickly? Two years ago, the business was not only healthy but thriving and he had almost managed to convince his father that modern technology was the best way forward. There had been plans. A budget. They had actually laughed that Elstrom would last another two hundred years.
But, of course, that was before he’d walked out on the company, leaving his stepbrother in charge.
Travis had taken over and destroyed Elstrom Mapping from the inside out. And his father had let it happen without a fight rather than admit that he had made a horrible mistake.
Now he wanted Scott to finish the job that he had started. Would he do it? Would he take over the company and be the final Elstrom at the helm? Even if it was for a short time, it would please him to think that Elstrom Mapping was still in the family.
What choice did he have? Of course he had to say yes.
He loved his sister and admired her more than he could say but there was only one thing that photograph screamed out to him and it had nothing to do with happy memories.
It was failure.
He had failed. Their marriage had failed and Alexa had betrayed him in the worst way possible. The last thing he needed today was a reminder of his past.
Just the opposite. He was going to need every scrap of positive energy he possessed if he had any hope of making good on the promise he had made to his father that afternoon. And a whole lot more.
Nothing was going to stand in his way.
He was going to have to pick up the pieces and prove that he could do what Travis couldn’t. Save Elstrom from going to the wall.
Elstrom Mapping was his. And it was not going to fail.
THREE
‘So come on. Spill. What happened last night with you and the scruffy rich lumberjack?’
‘Nothing happened,’ Toni replied with a light casual lilt.
There was a roar of boos and hisses from around the chaos of the breakfast table in the tiny apartment Lucy shared with her flatmates and, for the last few days, her pal Amy Baldoni. Usually it was clean and organised. But this morning there were three girls crammed into the small kitchen diner with all of the kit they needed for their six months gap year expedition parked in the hallway. And they were eating as though it was the last decent breakfast they would have for ages. This was probably not far from the truth.
‘Come on, Antonia—’ Lucy grinned ‘—we know that guilty look.’
‘Guilty? Moi?’ Toni replied and pressed her right hand to her bosom in the most elegant ladylike manner.
‘Who’s guilty?’ Amy laughed as she waltzed in with her huge rucksack slung over one shoulder.
‘The girls are accusing me of holding out on the tantalising news about Scott Elstrom, that’s all,’ Toni replied and pressed her lips together tightly.
‘Aha. Busted. You are looking remarkably perky for a twenty-seven-year-old lady who partied late into the night,’ Amy replied and set her rucksack in a corner before taking her place at the table, loading her plate with toast and marmalade and ham and cheese croissants. ‘Go on, then,’ Amy said before biting into the toast. ‘Out with it.’
‘We did have a small interlude after you all left,’ Toni replied in a totally casual voice. ‘The man was jet-lagged, ate all the pizza and most of the pan of brownies. And no—’ she pointed to Lucy, who was just about to say something rude between eating because she always did ‘—I did not ask him to warm my toes for me or any other parts.’
‘Why not?’ Amy asked between chewing. ‘You promised that this year was going to be different. Now that creepy Peter is out on his ear, you’re young, free and single. All ready for a new date to be installed by the summer. That was what we agreed, wasn’t it?’
‘Was that at the New Year’s party?’ Lucy blinked. ‘I don’t remember much after that third cocktail. Or was it the fifth?’
‘New Year resolutions definitely have an expiry date.’ Toni laughed then caught the look that Amy was giving her. ‘Okay, I did sort of say that this year was going to be the start of new exciting things. New job. Lots more travel. New central heating boiler! Redecorating! Those things can be exciting too. So you can stop booing. A new boyfriend is an optional extra.’
‘Six months, darling sister,’ Amy replied, pointing her toast at her. ‘You said that you would be fixed up in six months. I have an excellent memory for facts and dates!’
‘Anyhow, when I surfaced an hour ago his bedroom door was open, his breakfast dishes were washed and draining in the kitchen and the house was in silence. The man had obviously gone to work on a Sunday. Either that or the sight of so many lovely ladies in their lingerie last night was more than he could stand and he took off back to Alaska.’
‘Alaska,’ Lucy sighed. ‘That’s on my list.’ Then she sniffed. ‘But not this trip. Way too cold. Bring on the sun. Oh. Speaking of which. We have twenty minutes until the boys get here.’ And with that she slurped her coffee and scraped back her chair.
‘Packing. That would be good. Be back soon. Amy, have you seen my hair straighteners?’
Toni got to her feet and started clearing away the breakfast plates as Amy chuckled into her tea and toast.
‘Hair straighteners? I think Lucy may be in for a bit of a disappointment when she gets to the campsite.’ Amy waved her hand from side to side and rocked her shoulders. ‘Apparently the electricity generators can be a bit temperamental.’
Then she looked up at Toni and grinned. ‘Don’t look so worried. I’ve packed a tool kit with a full set of screwdrivers into my suitcase. We shall—’ and she waved her butter knife in the air ‘—have power. So fear not, darling sister, the magical sat phone will be charged at regular intervals. How else am I going to be able to keep tabs on this amazing love life you promised to throw yourself into? I can see our house being turned into a real little love nest now that you’ve cleared out the lodger. Cool!’
Then she tucked into the marmalade with great gusto.
‘You are incorrigible!’ Toni replied with a grin and flicked the tea towel towards Amy. ‘Love nest? Where did you hear that expression? You know that it’s totally going to be the other way around! The boys will be falling over themselves when they take a look at you! Try not to break all of their hearts.’
‘Can’t promise a thing.’ Amy smirked and then startled Toni by wrapping her arms around her and giving her a big squishy hug. ‘I’m going to miss you but you understand why I don’t want you at the airport making a mushy scene, don’t you?’ Then, before Toni could answer, she stepped back and dropped her plate and cutlery into the sink. ‘Thanks for doing the washing-up! I should probably get dressed.’
And, with a wide-armed stretch, Amy walked slowly back to the bedroom where, from the sound of it, Lucy and two of her flatmates were already arguing about what to take in their hand luggage.
Madness. Total madness.
But she waited until Amy was out of sight before pulling out a tissue and blowing her nose. Stupid girl. She had known this day was coming since Christmas and she had promised Amy that she would not get all gooey...but look at the state that she was in!
Of course she understood. That was why she was here now instead of weeping buckets at the departure gate. But it didn’t make it any easier.
It helped if she imagined it was Scott Elstrom’s face at the bottom of the washing-up bowl.
This was entirely his fault!
Her brain had been spinning most of the night, working through the options, over and over again, weighing up the pros and cons, and the more she thought about it, the more obvious the answer had become.
She had to convince Scott that he should sit for a portrait in place of his father.
He was the new head of the company, after all. It was his duty to go ahead with the project that Freya had already paid half in advance. Wasn’t it?
But there was something else which kept whirling around inside her head every time she’d punched her feather pillow to try and find a comfy spot.
Freya had come running to her to ask for help. It had to be a Baldoni. No one else would do!
Surely that had to give her some bargaining power?
Toni scrubbed extra hard on the frying pan. Now all she had to do was pluck up enough courage to insist on it the next time she saw Scott.
Toni’s hands closed around the cool edge of the sink and she closed her eyes for a few seconds.
She didn’t have any choice. That portrait had to be finished, one way or another.
She needed the rest of the money to pay for Amy’s university fees in the autumn.
Girlish laughter broke through her thoughts and Toni smiled as she stacked the cups and plates.
Amy was right.
This was her chance to make a new start and claim her life.
The little girl who she’d promised to take care of the morning their parents died was a young woman now with her own life.
Amy was amazing and was going to go far in life. She knew exactly what she wanted and how she was going to get it. It had been Amy’s idea to talk to the university professors who were going to be teaching her and find out what kind of expedition would suit the coursework. Thinking ahead. Planning her future.
She had taught her sister well.
They had watched the dawn come up together in the garden of their little family house early on New Year’s morning and made promises to one another that could not be broken.
In three months’ time both of their lives would be completely different. Amy would be in Peru and working hard. And she would have finished this portrait, cleared out the clutter from their little house and redecorated every room. All ready for their cute London house to be rented out for the next three years while Amy was at university.
This was her chance to take her photography career to the next level and she was ready to grab it with both hands and do what it took to learn from the best. Travel. Live a little. Maybe even find the time to enjoy herself.
It was scary to think of the transformation that was going to take place but it was make the change now or stay locked in the same groove forever.
She chose now.
By the time she was thirty, her plan was to have the Antonia Baldoni photographic studio up and running. No more working for someone else. No more being taken for granted. No more being used by other people.
Three more years’ experience and training and she would be ready to start out on her own.
Starting with this portrait.
This was not the time to let one man who refused to have his portrait painted get in the way of Amy’s education.
Scott Elstrom was not going to escape that easily. And if she had to become a total pest to make that happen? Then so be it.
Because the new and improved version of Antonia Baldoni had decided to make some changes in her life and it all kicked off today.
Look out, world. Here I come. Bring it on.
* * *
Scott strode down the busy London pavement in the light morning sleet, wincing in pain.
His senses were assaulted by a cacophony of noise which seemed to come from every direction. Cars, buses, taxi cabs and motorcyclists. And people. So many people all crushed together. Jostling and pushing and manoeuvring around one another.
What were they all doing here at this time on a Sunday morning? Strange. He had forgotten what the barrage of noise and bustle of city life was like. Right now, his life in Alaska seemed like a distant dream. A fantasy of calm and quiet and beauty and...
He jumped out of the way as a cycle courier flashed across the path in front of him at high speed with only inches to spare. The light sleet mixed with loose snow that had been falling most of the night had made the pavements treacherous for cyclists.
Control. In Alaska he was in control of where and what and how he lived his life. The climate and the harsh conditions were all part of the job. He respected that. But here? Here, he had to battle very different challenges.
And every one of them was just as tough as climbing a mountain range or crossing sea ice.
But that was what he was here for.
He had promised his father and sister that he would give the family business six months of his life and stay in London until early September.
Six long and arduous months which right at that moment felt like an eternity of living in the city.
It was Freya who’d filled Scott in on the details when they had taken off to the hospital café to leave their father to rest.
The plan was to sell the building to property developers, who would give them a serious amount of money to build apartments in such a prestigious address. Any remaining charts and maps would be snapped up by collectors and specialist museums. With the money from the sales there would enough to pay off the debts and have some left over for their father’s retirement.
Because otherwise? Otherwise, things were going down so fast that it would mean bankruptcy and their father couldn’t tolerate the idea of not paying his bills to the suppliers who had been so loyal for the past few years.
Last resort? They had an amazing offer from a marketing company who wanted to create tacky mapping merchandise using the Elstrom company name.
Freya had been quite shocked at his expletive-laden reply to that suggestion and had to ask him to lower his voice.
No way. He was not going to see two hundred years of his family heritage handed over as a prestige symbol on cheap magnifying glasses and plastic rulers.
Little wonder that Freya had telephoned him to ask him to come home. His baby sister certainly knew what buttons to press to bring on even more guilt.
Lars Elstrom had just handed him the keys to the shop. He would be damned if he was going to be the one turning the lights out on the day they closed for good.
But it was more than that and he knew it.
It had been his decision to walk away and leave the company two years ago when things went off the rails in his life. He could have fought his father’s decision to appoint Travis to run the company through hard evidence and facts.
Instead, he had forced his father to choose between his apparently charming and talented and inspirational new stepson, Travis, and the angry man who Scott had become.
And that one decision had cost the company.
And now the stepson was long gone, the money had run out and suddenly his father needed him to step in and help the company with as much peace and dignity as he could.
How ironic was that?
But one thing was not so clear. Had he come back in time to save Elstrom Mapping? Because that was precisely what he intended to do. Or go down trying.
It was going to take all of his strength and ingenuity to survive the next six months.
Just as he had survived when his world was destroyed two years ago. Taking things one day at a time.
Starting right now.
Head back, chin up, Scott stopped outside the antique facade of Elstrom Mapping and glanced up at the old three-storey building which had been his playground and school as a boy, his centre in the middle of his parents’ divorce and then his chance to get close to his father again when he came to work here.
It had been two years since he had stood outside this door and waved goodbye to Freya as casually as if he were heading to the pub instead of a series of long arduous flights to a remote environmental survey base in Alaska.
It felt a lot longer.
Freya had organised a very casual meal out for the family before he took off and he had been a bear the whole evening. Bad-tempered and sullen and quiet. He couldn’t even recall why. Probably some snide remark his father had made about how much the business needed him to bring some new orders—with Travis managing the company they could use someone experienced to work with clients on operational mapping projects in the field.
Scott could see that now in hindsight but he had been blind to just how overwhelmed his father had been at the time by everything that had happened.
Two stubborn men. As different as possible from one another. It was hard to believe that they were even related.
They were from different planets which only collided in astrological time zones.
Neither of them ready to admit that the other person might need help.
Neither of them willing to talk about the real problem that was never going away.
No way was his father going to lower himself to plead with Scott to give up a paying job and a contract he had signed to come back to London and dig Elstrom out of a large hole which had nothing to do with him and everything to do with his own bad judgement.
Scott clenched his fingers tight around the elaborate key set that Freya had passed him and braced his jaw as he turned the three keys, one after the other.
His feet hesitated for just a fraction of a second before he brushed the fear away.
Time to find out just how bad things had become. Because, for better or worse, he was in charge of Elstrom Mapping now and things were going to have to change. And fast.
* * *
Two hours later, Toni stepped down from the red London bus and darted under the shelter of the nearest shop doorway. The February rain had swept in and was pounding on the fabric awning above her head and bouncing off the pavement of the narrow street in this smart part of the city.
Her gaze skipped between the pedestrians scurrying for cover until it settled on the elegant three-storey stone building across the street.
What was she doing here? She was a commercial photographer and wannabe studio business owner.
Toni closed her eyes and wallowed in ten seconds of self-pity and shame before shaking herself out of it. This had been her decision. Nobody had forced her to take Freya Elstrom’s offer when she’d called. But Freya had kept going on about how important it was to her father that a Baldoni had to paint the last of the Elstroms. It meant a lot to him and he was willing to pay her a special bonus if she could drop everything and work on the portrait in the next few months.
Now she knew the reason for the sudden urge to have his portrait painted was nothing to do with artistic appreciation and a lot more to do with the fact that the poor man was ill.
The last of the Elstrom family. A shiver ran across Toni’s shoulders. She didn’t like the sound of that.
Like it or not, she and Amy were the last of the Baldoni dynasty. Her father had been an only child and the only male cousins were far more interested in IT than fine arts.
Perhaps she had more in common with Scott Elstrom than she was prepared to admit?
Now all she had to do was convince him that the best thing for the business was to have his portrait painted. She couldn’t return the fee. The money had already been spent on Amy’s round-the-world plane ticket. And she needed the rest of the fee to help her through university.
So Scott had better get used to the idea.
Being immortalised in oil and acrylics was quite painless really.
Oh, yes. A man who chose to work in Alaska in the middle of winter was really going to go for that idea.
Now that did give her the shivers. That and the rivulet of rain water spilling out from the awning.
She was doomed!
Toni dropped her shoulders and shoved her free hand into the pocket of the practical but not very elegant all-weather coat she used for outdoor photo shoots.
The things she did for her sister!
Two weeks. She had two weeks’ holiday to sketch the portrait and work in at least two full sittings before heading back to work. She could finish the portrait at home over the next few weekends and collect the rest of her fee. With a bit of luck, there might be a little left over from paying Amy’s university fees to squeeze in a quick holiday somewhere warm and sunny.
Now that—she shivered in the icy wind—would be nice.
Exhaling slowly, Toni glanced from side to side to find a gap in the stream of people who had their heads down, their umbrellas braced forward against the driving sleet and rain and oblivious to anyone who might walk in their way.
Seizing on a momentary lull, Toni dashed out onto the road in the stationary rush hour traffic. She had almost made it when she had to dive sideways to dodge a bicycle courier and planted her right foot into a deep puddle. Dirty cold water splashed up into her smart high heeled ankle boots and trickled down inside, making her gasp with shock.