The Italian's Unexpected Baby / Secrets Of His Forbidden Cinderella
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She swivelled sharply in her chair, her eyes widening with alarm at the sight of him looking at the screen, but when she spoke her voice was cool. ‘For when I’m no longer useful.’
‘And that is not now.’ With one brisk movement Alessandro clicked the mouse to close the document, without saving any changes. Mia’s mouth compressed but she did not protest against his action. ‘The stylist is here. You may use my office.’
Mia’s eyes flashed and he wondered what she objected to—his dismissal of her dress, or his order for a new one? Or simply his manner, which was even more autocratic than usual, because it felt like the best defence against this irritating and inconvenient attraction that simmered beneath the surface, threatening to bubble up?
Even now he found himself sneaking looks at the tantalising vee of ivory skin visible at the all too modest neck of her blouse, and noting the soft curve of her jaw, and the way a wisp of golden hair had fallen against her cheek. He itched to tuck it behind her ear, let his fingers skim to her lobe, a prospect which was too bizarre to be entertained even for a second.
He didn’t want to do things like that. Ever. Relationships were not on his radar, and sex was nothing more than a physical urge to be sated like any other. He’d always been able to find women who were agreeable to his terms. More than agreeable, so why was he feeling this strange way about Mia James?
He wasn’t. Or at least he wouldn’t. He wouldn’t let himself. Work was too important to risk for a moment’s satisfaction, even with someone as annoyingly beguiling as the woman in front of him.
‘Are you coming?’ he asked tersely, and she nodded, rising from her seat with unconscious elegance, following him with a graceful, long-legged stride. Alessandro found himself watching the gentle sway of her hips before he resolutely turned his gaze away.
A few minutes later the stylist arrived with a flurry of plastic-swathed hangers, an assistant behind her carrying several boxes and bags. Alessandro supervised their setting up before he decided to leave Mia to it.
‘Let me see your final choice,’ he instructed, and she arched one golden eyebrow.
‘To approve it?’
‘Of course.’ That was the point of this whole exercise, was it not? Still, he decided to temper his reply, for her benefit. ‘Thank you for attending to this matter.’
She pressed her lips together. ‘It’s not as if I had much choice.’
Alessandro frowned. ‘I’m offering you a dress. Is that so objectionable?’
‘It’s not the dress and you know it,’ she snapped, and surprisingly, he let out a laugh.
‘No, I suppose not.’
‘It’s your entire manner,’ she emphasised, and he nodded.
‘Yes, I realise,’ he said dryly. ‘So at least we’re in agreement about something.’
For the next few hours he found he could not concentrate on the business at hand, a fact which annoyed him as much as everything else about Mia James had done. What was it about the woman that got under his skin, burrowed deep inside? Was it simply her attractiveness, which was undeniable, or something else? The hint of defiance in the set of her shoulders, the surprising vulnerability he sensed beneath the surface? Why on earth did he care?
It was annoying. It was alarming. And it had to stop.
‘Mr Costa?’ The stylist’s fluttering voice interrupted his unruly thoughts; he’d been staring at his laptop screen for who knew how long? ‘Miss James has selected her dress and is ready for you to see it.’
‘Thank you.’ He rose and walked quickly to the office, steeling himself for whatever he was to see. Despite his best intention to remain utterly unmoved, he was still shocked by the sight of her, her slender body swathed in an ice-blue gown of ruched silk that hugged her figure before flaring out around her ankles in a decadent display of iridescent, shimmering material. Instead of back in a sedate clip, her hair was twisted into an elegant chignon. Diamonds sparkled at her ears and throat. She looked like a Norse goddess, an ice queen, everything about her coolly beautiful, icily intoxicating.
Desire crashed over him in an overwhelming wave, unexpected even now in its intensity and force. He wanted to pluck the diamond-tipped pins from her hair. He wanted to tug on the discreet zip in the back of her dress, and count the sharp knobs of her vertebrae, taste the smooth silkiness of her skin.
He wanted. And he never let himself want.
‘Well?’ Mia asked, her voice taut. ‘Will I pass?’
‘Yes,’ he answered after another beat of tense silence, barely managing to get the word out. ‘You’ll pass.’
She let out a huff of sound, turning away from him, and the stylist’s face fell a little bit at his damningly faint praise. Alessandro didn’t care. Already he was regretting his command to have Mia accompany him tonight. Already he was looking forward to it far more than he should.
‘I’ll go and change myself,’ he said when a few seconds had ticked by without anyone saying a word. ‘Be ready to leave in ten minutes.’
Mia nodded, not quite looking at him, and again Alessandro was captivated by the curve of her jaw, the hollow of her throat, the dip of her waist, each one begging to be explored and savoured. He turned away quickly, striding out of the office without another word.
The sooner this evening was over, the better. This desire he felt was inconvenient and overwhelming and very much unwanted. But, like everything else in his life, he would control it. It would just take a little more effort than he’d anticipated.
CHAPTER THREE
MIA FELT AS if she’d fallen down a rabbit hole into some strange, charmed alternative reality…a reality where she rode in limousines, and drank champagne, and walked into a glittering ballroom on the arm of the most handsome man there.
Of course, as PA to Henry Dillard she’d ridden in plenty of limousines. She’d drunk more than enough champagne. But it had always been as an employee, someone to serve and be invisible while she was at it. Someone to make sure the champagne was flowing, and that the limousine arrived on time. Someone who didn’t stride into parties, but sidled along the sidelines, checking that everything was going according to plan and keeping out of the way.
Tonight was entirely different. Tonight, much to her own amazement, she felt like the belle of the ball. It was beyond bizarre. It was also intoxicating, far more than any champagne she might quaff.
It had started with the stylist bringing out several exquisite dresses for Mia to choose from, and then doing her hair and make-up as well, before finishing off her incredible ensemble with the most beautiful diamond earrings and necklace Mia had ever seen.
As someone who had prided herself on always being smart and sensible, no-nonsense and pragmatic, it had felt to her as decadent as an endless dark chocolate sundae to be so pampered and primped. She hadn’t expected to enjoy it; she’d been fully intent on chafing at every opportunity, resenting Alessandro’s needless autocratic intervention, but then…she hadn’t.
She’d submitted to the stylist’s every instruction, and then she’d started to enjoy it. To relish it. Part of her was horrified by her own acquiescence, and what it might mean. And yet…it was one night. One magical night after a lifetime of having her head down, working hard. Why shouldn’t she enjoy it?
At some point she’d let her mind slide into a comforting sort of blurry nothingness, floating on a sea of ease and comfort. As she usually tried to anticipate every possibility, consider every choice, it felt wonderfully relaxing not to overthink this. She wasn’t going to wonder what Alessandro Costa wanted with her, or with Dillard Investments, or whether her job, not to mention any of her friends’, was secure. She was just going to enjoy a night like no other, because she doubted she’d see another one like it, and that was fine.
And then the moment when Alessandro had come into the room and looked her over…that moment had felt as if the world was tilting on its axis, as if everything was sliding away from the comforting security of its anchor even as it came into glittering focus.
For that one second Mia had seen a flash of masculine approval blaze in his eyes like golden fire and it had ignited her right through, as her blood heated and fizzed and her mind spun out possibilities she’d never dared to dream of.
Then he’d told her she’d pass, his voice as laconic as ever, and she’d wondered if she’d imagined it. She must have. This was Alessandro Costa, after all. The ruthless, arrogant CEO she was a little bit scared of. Not a man interested in her. Not her date.
It just felt as if he were. And, more alarmingly, she liked that feeling. She, who had steered clear of love and romance and even anything close to a flirtation, because she did not want someone to have that kind of power over her. Because her mother had fallen in love with her father all those years ago, and look how that had gone.
‘He loves me, Mia. Really. He just has trouble showing it.’
Mia had listened to far too many of her mother’s excuses before she’d died of cancer when Mia was fourteen, too broken and despairing to hold on any longer. Mia had had to wait four more years before she was finally free of her father’s sneering control. And since then she’d made it her life’s mission to stay strong, independent and alone. Safe.
But tonight she let her rules bend and even break. Tonight she let herself forget they existed. It was just a night, after all. Just one wonderful night where she could pretend, for a few hours, that she was a young woman with a gorgeous man, Cinderella with her prince before the clock inevitably struck midnight.
They’d ridden in a limousine to the Ritz, and Alessandro, devastating in black tie, his hair midnight-dark and his hard jaw freshly shaven, had barely said a word, which was fine by Mia because she could barely think. Dressed to the nines and even the tens in a gorgeous gown, on the arm of a beautiful man…going to the kind of party where she’d normally be holding doors or serving champagne…together, all of it, was utterly overwhelming. Intoxicating. Wonderful.
A valet had opened the door of the limousine as they’d pulled up to the front entrance of the hotel, and flashbulbs had popped and sparked as Mia had stepped out, blinking in the glare. She wasn’t used to the spotlight; she always stood to one side, watched it from afar. It felt very different to be the one basking in the bright light, especially when Alessandro had slid his arm through hers and smiled for the cameras, their heads nearly touching.
What was he doing? And why?
She still didn’t really understand the need for her presence at the ball. Yes, she knew Dillard’s clients, but she’d already given Alessandro all the relevant information in the files. And this was a charity event, not a business meeting. Surely he had someone else, a dozen ‘someone elses’, to accompany him to such a glittering occasion, a supermodel or socialite who would fit in more easily with all this well-heeled crowd? Mia didn’t know how to rub shoulders with these people; she was used to fetching them coffee. She was out of her depth, and she never felt it more so than when Alessandro approached a group of people, some of whom she knew, and introduced her as his ‘companion’.
Mia clocked the raised eyebrows, the curious smiles, the speculative looks, and like everyone else in the group she wondered what Alessandro Costa was playing at.
‘Why don’t you just tell people I’m your PA?’ she asked when they had a moment alone. She’d drunk two glasses of champagne in quick succession, more to have something to do than because of any desire to be drunk, but now her head was spinning, her tongue loosened.
‘Because tonight you are a beautiful woman who is accompanying me to a gala.’
‘But…’ She shook her head slowly, trying to discern the emotion behind his cool, mask-like exterior, his eyes like blank mirrors. The man gave absolutely nothing away. ‘Why?’
He shrugged his powerful shoulders, muscles rippling under the expensive material of his tuxedo. ‘Why not?’
‘You seem like a man who has a very clear reason for everything he does,’ Mia said slowly. ‘So your “why not?” doesn’t actually hold water with me.’
‘Oh?’ One dark slash of an eyebrow arched in cool amusement. ‘You surprise me with your perception, Miss James.’
‘If I’m your companion, perhaps you should call me Mia.’
Something flickered in his eyes, and Mia felt a shiver through her belly in response. She hadn’t meant to sound flirtatious, but she realised she might have…and she didn’t actually mind. ‘Very well,’ Alessandro said after a moment. ‘Mia.’ His voice, with his slight accent, seemed to caress the two syllables.
‘Where are you from?’ Mia asked. ‘It didn’t say when I looked online.’
His eyebrow arched higher. ‘You did a search on me?’
She shrugged. ‘After I heard you’d taken over the company, yes, of course. Information is power.’
‘True.’ His gaze held hers, his expression considering. ‘And is that what you want? Power?’
‘I want to keep my job,’ Mia said after a second’s pause. ‘And knowing my employer helps with that.’
‘Mia!’ A woman approached them in a flurry of cloying scent, kissing Mia on both cheeks while Alessandro stepped back discreetly. ‘Darling, how are you? I heard about poor Henry…’
Mia shot an alarmed look at Alessandro; his expression seemed dangerously neutral. ‘Diane,’ she said, after she’d returned the woman’s tight hug. ‘This is Alessandro Costa, the new CEO of Dillard Investments.’
‘New…oh.’ Diane Holley’s mouth dropped into a comical ‘o’ as she swivelled to face Alessandro, her eyes widening in shocked speculation.
‘Pleased to meet you…?’
‘Diane. Diane Holley.’ She took Alessandro’s outstretched hand, looking a bit dazed. As Diane shook his hand, Mia saw her expression change from surprise to admiration, her lowered gaze sweeping speculatively, and almost avariciously, over Alessandro Costa’s admittedly impressive form. ‘Very pleased to meet you too, of course…’ she murmured.
Mia felt a sharp tug of jealousy, a reaction which surprised and appalled her in equal measure. What on earth…? She had absolutely no reason to feel remotely jealous in any way. She didn’t care about Alessandro Costa. She didn’t even like the man. And jealousy was not an emotion she’d ever let herself entertain. It was so weak and needy. It was also dangerous.
And yet…she was wearing a beautiful dress, and he’d looked at her, for a brief second, with desire in his eyes, and for a single evening she’d felt like someone else entirely, someone transported into a fairy tale, from the shadows to the spotlight.
Perhaps one evening was too much, after all. The last thing she needed to do was lose her head, even for an evening, over Alessandro Costa. The man was too dangerous, and too much was at risk. Not just her job, but her very self. She couldn’t let Alessandro Costa affect her. Make her want. Make her weak. Not even for a moment.
Then he put another flute of champagne into her hand, and her fingers closed around the fragile crystal stem automatically. ‘You looked as if you were a million miles away,’ he murmured, his voice low and honeyed. ‘Don’t you like hearing about Diane Holley’s corgis?’
‘Corgis?’ Blinking, Mia realised Diane must have been chatting to Alessandro for a few minutes at least and she hadn’t taken in a word. The older woman, the wife of one of Dillard’s most important clients, had already moved on. ‘She told you about her corgis?’
‘I asked about them. You mentioned them this afternoon.’
‘Did I?’
Alessandro arched an eyebrow, looking more amused than annoyed—for once. ‘You really haven’t been paying attention, have you?’
‘Of course I have. I always do.’ She took a defiant sip of champagne. ‘Diane has four corgis, and one of them has digestive issues.’
‘She didn’t mention those tonight, thankfully.’
‘You were lucky, then.’ Mia’s breath came out in a surprised hiss as Alessandro took her elbow, his hand warm and dry and so very sure as he steered her towards another cluster of people. ‘Where…where are we going?’
‘To mingle, of course. That’s why we’re here. You’re going to introduce me to all these people, and then tell me their secrets.’
‘I thought I’d already done that this afternoon. Besides, I don’t know any secrets.’
‘I still need to put names to faces. And I think you know more secrets than you realise…always working behind the scenes, listening in the shadows.’
‘You make me sound like a snoop.’
‘No, someone who is smart.’ His gaze lingered on hers for a tantalising second as his hand had moved from her elbow to her waist, his fingers splayed across her hip. Heat flooded Mia’s body, and once again she was in danger of drifting along this lovely tide of feeling. ‘Mr Costa…’
‘You must call me Alessandro.’
‘You must stop acting like I’m your date.’ She knew she never would have said the words if she hadn’t had two glasses of champagne, and just chugged half of her third. If she wasn’t so afraid of how much he affected her.
‘Why? You are my date.’ He sounded utterly unruffled, like someone making a simple statement of fact.
‘No…’ Her breath came out in a rush. Her head spun. People were looking at them. Wondering. ‘I’m not. Not really…’
‘Yes, you are.’ They’d reached the group of people, and Alessandro kept his hand on her waist as he stretched out his other one. ‘Alessandro Costa, CEO of Dillard Investments.’ In turn, everyone shook his hand, with varying expressions of pleasure, speculation, or snobbery. It made Mia wonder yet again about Alessandro. What was he doing here, exactly? Why did he want her with him? Who was this man at her side? And how much did she want to know?
The chit-chat washed over her as she took in Alessandro’s easy, urbane manner. The man could be charming when he chose, a fact that alarmed her. If Alessandro Costa affected her when he was blunt and brusque, heaven help her when he was easy and affable.
She knew a few people in the group through Dillard’s, and somehow, her mind still spinning, she made chit-chat, introduced Alessandro to a few others, and stumbled through the evening, feeling as if she were acting a part in a play, desperate now to get to the end of the evening without embarrassing herself or losing her head entirely over the man at her side.
When they were alone again, and she was finishing her third glass of champagne, she rather recklessly asked him about it all.
‘I can make conversation, if that’s what you mean,’ he answered as he sipped his own champagne.
‘What do you want from these people?’ Mia asked, her tongue well and truly loosened by now. ‘Why did you buy Dillard Investments, really?’
A guarded look came over his face before he shrugged, the movement clearly meant to be dismissive. ‘Why do I buy any company?’
‘You tell me.’
The tiniest of pauses. ‘For financial gain.’
‘But you said yourself Dillard’s was operating at a loss.’
‘That doesn’t mean it always has to.’
‘Still…’ She shook her head slowly. ‘A man like you…’
‘A man like me?’ Alessandro’s voice sharpened. ‘What does that mean, exactly?’
‘Only that you must always have your eye on the bottom line.’
‘True.’ He eyed her thoughtfully. ‘So what did you learn about me, during that online cyberstalking session?’
Mia let out a choked laugh. ‘I was hardly stalking.’
‘Weren’t you?’
‘Gathering information. Big difference.’
‘Hmm.’ She felt dizzy with the turn in their conversation. It almost felt as if…as if they were flirting. But of course they couldn’t be. ‘So,’ Alessandro asked, stepping closer, ‘what did you learn about me, Mia?’
Alessandro hadn’t meant to ask the question. He surely didn’t mean to bother with the answer. He was curious despite his determination never to be curious about anyone. Curiosity implied caring, and he didn’t care. And yet… ‘Anything interesting?’ The words sounded provocative.
Mia licked her lips, her tongue looking very pink as she touched it to her full, lush lips, the instinctive movement causing a dart of desire to arrow through him, unsettling in its intensity. ‘Not really.’ Her gaze skittered away from his. ‘Not much.’
‘Tell me.’ His voice was low, the words a command, but with a thread of something dark and rich running through it, a promise he hadn’t meant to make. Mia turned to look at him, her eyes widening, looking very blue and clear. Eyes he could drown in if he let himself. He stepped closer. ‘Tell me,’ he said again.
‘Well…’ Again her tongue touched her lips. ‘You have a reputation for being ruthless. You take over companies, strip them of their assets, and fire about ninety percent of the staff before absorbing the company into Costa International.’
That was the gist without being entirely true, but Alessandro wasn’t about to defend his actions. They spoke for themselves.
‘Are you going to do that with Dillard’s?’ Her chin lifted a little. ‘Fire everyone? Get rid of it all?’
He eyed her for a moment, considering what to tell her. For some contrary reason he didn’t like the thought of her thinking badly of him, which was ridiculous, because he’d been thought of far worse by the furious CEOs he’d displaced.
‘I’m not going to fire everyone,’ he said at last. ‘I never do.’
‘Ninety percent, then.’
‘Your percentages are a bit off.’
‘Do you enjoy it?’ she asked, her voice choking. ‘Ruining people’s lives?’
He stared at her for a moment, fighting the urge to explain the truth of his mission. But, no. He was not going to justify himself to her. He was certainly not going to care about her opinion. ‘Does it seem as if I do?’ he asked, meaning to sound dismissive.
Slowly she shook her head. ‘You don’t actually seem cruel.’
‘No?’ He tried to keep his voice disinterested.
‘The media portrayed you as a bit of a cowboy…someone who came from nowhere and had a meteoric rise. Not entirely respectable, but not cruel.’
‘Well, they were wrong,’ Alessandro said lightly, even though her words were like razors on his skin. ‘I’m not at all respectable.’
‘Is that why you took Dillard’s over? To seem respectable?’
The question grated. As if he wanted to don Dillard’s shabby suit and call himself a gentleman. ‘Not at all. I don’t care one iota if I seem respectable or not.’
‘Then why bother with them? Where is the profit?’
‘In the clients I keep.’ Although Alessandro suspected there would be little profit indeed. Profit was not why he did what he did, at least not in regard to companies such as Dillard’s.
‘And what about all the employees? Innocent people…don’t you care about them?’
More than she would ever know. ‘You’re sounding like a crusader, Mia,’ he warned her. He did not wish to discuss this any longer. ‘It’s quite dull.’
Her eyes flashed. ‘So sorry I’m boring you, but people’s lives are at stake. Besides… I would have thought you might understand how they felt.’
He tensed, the perception in her eyes like a needle burrowing into his skin. ‘Oh?’
‘The media said you came from a poor background…the slums of Naples.’ He angled his head away from her, not trusting the expression on his face. ‘Is that true?’
‘Slums is such a pejorative word, but I suppose, in essence, yes.’ He did his best to sound bored. He was bored.
The last thing he wanted to talk about was his pathetic past…the endless chaos of moving from grotty flat to grotty flat, the stints in foster care when his mother had lost custody of him, the endless jobs she’d taken cleaning office buildings, the countless boyfriends she’d had in a desperate bid to assuage the despairing sadness of her life. A childhood he’d done his best always to remember, to remind him of how he would be different, even as he pretended to forget.