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If she closed her eyes for a second she could imagine how beautiful this house could be at Christmas. Lights. Trees. Decorations. Instead, it was all closed up like an unwanted present.
Phoebe tilted her head to the side. “Do you only use the house in the summer?”
Matteo shook his head. “We’ve never really used this house.”
“What?” Phoebe spun around and looked at him. “What do you mean, you’ve never used this house?”
Matteo shook his head and stuck his hands in his pockets. “It’s been in the family for a while. But...we’ve never really stayed here.” There was something odd about the way he said that.
Phoebe couldn’t help but shake her head. She couldn’t get past the fact that this beautiful house was sitting empty—and had done for years.
“Who takes care of it?”
Matteo gave the briefest shake of his head. “I have a caretaker. They come in a few times a year to clean up and maintain the place. Over the years, the electrics, heating and plumbing have all been kept up-to-date but...” he paused for a second “...I imagine there will be lots of areas in the house that need updating.”
Phoebe wrinkled her nose for a second as she stared up at the three-story building with its shuttered windows. “It looks around a hundred years old. Please tell me it’s been updated since then.”
Matteo gave a nod. “Of course it has. Just not recently.”
He pulled a large key from his pocket, along with his phone. As they approached the thick double entrance door he lifted his phone to a panel at the door side. There was a short beep before he turned the key. “Alarm,” he said simply before pushing the door open.
Phoebe smiled as she watched him pull the key from the lock. “You put in a digital alarm but didn’t put in digital locks?”
He shrugged. There was something so juvenile about it. Like a naughty teenager. “Who says I didn’t? I might just be trying to fool you.”
It was the first time she’d seen a spark of something. A glimpse of something other than the very busy businessman. A hint of what might lie beneath the surface.
Matteo stood back and she stepped inside the wide entranceway and sucked in a breath.
The air was still all around her. Silent.
But there was something else. Something almost magical.
She held out her hands and spun around. Light flooded in from the open door, allowing her to see the huge curved staircase with intricate iron railing that spiraled up through three floors of the house. Every step she took on the tiled floor echoed upward to the yellowed glass dome at the top of the house. By the time she stopped spinning and brought her gaze back down to the current floor she finally got a feel for the place. The entranceway was huge.
Matteo was looking at her curiously. There was something odd. He looked uncomfortable. She gave a little stagger and laughed as she put out her hand, grasping onto his sleeve to try and stop her head spinning. Now she could see all the rooms off the entranceway. Most of them had glass-paneled doors, hinting at what lay beyond. Her heart gave a little flutter.
She’d dreamed of getting the chance to do a house in the Hamptons. It had always been an ambition that she’d hoped to achieve. She just thought it was still at least a few years away. Her fingers were itching to touch this house. To run through every room. To suck in the atmosphere. Trying to appear cool, calm and collected was rapidly slipping from her grasp. Even though Matteo Bianchi was staring her down with that disapproving glare.
She looked to the side again. The room directly to her right was practically calling out to her. “May I?” She gestured with her head.
Matteo stopped glaring and glanced toward the room. A furrow lined his brow. “Actually, I want you to let me know what your instincts tell you.”
It was the way he said it. The tone. And the way the glare in his eyes had been replaced by a kind of mischievous twinkle. He was testing her. Or teasing her.
She tilted her chin upward. Matteo Bianchi had no idea who he was dealing with. She met his green gaze straight on. “You know you’re being unfair—but that’s fine.” She held up her hands. “I’ve already told you I think the house is around a hundred years old.” She wrinkled her nose. “About twenty thousand square meters? Maybe around eight or nine bedrooms? Probably four or five bathrooms or half baths. I expect two or three formal rooms. I expect a dining room, a large kitchen, laundry, study and a basement and wine cellar.” She put her hand on her chest. “And I’m hoping there are exceptional views over Mecox Bay from the rear of the property. Am I getting close? Can I actually get in to see the main sitting room?”
Matteo gave a nod toward the door. Phoebe didn’t wait another second; she was through that door in a flash.
It was like a moment out of time. She blinked as a memory of a movie she’d watched flooded through her senses. The hero and heroine had flitted back and forth between modern day and fifty years before. Phoebe felt as if she were currently standing by their side.
She couldn’t help but touch. Tiny slivers of bright light tried to edge their way around the shutters. Phoebe didn’t wait, she walked over to the nearest set and gave them a tug.
Nothing happened.
She tried again. This time there was a creak. A squeak. She slid her hand up the side, checking for any extra latches or bolts. Once she was sure there were none, she pulled with all her might.
Two seconds later she was flat on her back on the carpet as the winter’s day light filled the room. She laughed as Matteo moved above her, holding his hand out toward her. “Are you okay?”
She kept laughing and stayed on the floor, shaking her head. “I’m still dreaming, aren’t I? Because this dream just seems to get kookier by the minute.”
He frowned, staring at his outstretched hand, as if he were trying to figure out what was wrong with it. “I have no idea what you mean.”
“Oh, come on.” She leaned up on her hand, still staying on the carpet as her gaze swept across the room. “You phoned me this morning and offered me a quarter of a million dollars for a few weeks’ work, dressing a home in the Hamptons. Every designer’s dream. Then you bring me here. The house to end all houses.” She was shaking her head again now. “Then, we come in, and it’s a time warp. A perfect time warp.” She held up her hand as her eyes tried not to goggle in amazement at the contents of the room.
“I still don’t know what you mean.”
She pushed herself up onto her bottom. “This place. This furniture.”
Matteo shook his head. “I know. I know. Everything will need replacing it’s all so out of date. Don’t worry. I’ll give you a credit card with no limit. You can buy whatever you need to dress the house.” He waved his hand. “As long as you keep receipts, of course.”
“Are you crazy?” She couldn’t believe what he was saying. She reached out and touched the chair next to her. “This stuff is pristine. Perfect. People would pay an absolute fortune for things like this. And I won’t need to. Because it’s all here. Matteo, don’t you realize how fantastic this place already is?”
He was looking at her as if she were out of her mind.
She grabbed his hand and pulled herself up as she paced quickly around the room. “This—this is why I think I’m still dreaming. See this? This nineteen-fifties chair? I paid over a thousand dollars for one of these last time I dressed a home. You’ve got six.” She touched the L-shaped sofa in the corner. “I might get this reupholstered but the style and shape is just fabulous.”
Her heart skittered across her chest as she took in all the fixtures and fittings. The lamps, the shades, the telephone, the vases. She shook her head again as she murmured, “It’s like interior design heaven. That’s why this must be a dream. Things like this don’t happen to me.”
She spun around and gasped. Matteo had walked right up behind her. He was closer than expected and was watching her with the most curious expression on his face. Her dream from earlier had been filled by Hugh Jackman. If she were still dreaming, wouldn’t Hugh be the man that had brought her to this house instead of Matteo Bianchi?
“Pinch me,” she said firmly.
“What?”
“Pinch me. I have to know this isn’t a dream.”
He was right in front of her. Staring her down with those green eyes. Part of him looked amused, part of him looked annoyed. Or maybe she was just misreading him. The hint of aftershave was distracting her. It was subtle. She’d never smelt it before. Amber, musk and oak moss. People didn’t realize that interior designers knew that scent was everything. Half of all homes sold on scent alone.
“Go on,” she urged. “Just do it.”
He pulled an exasperated face then lifted his hand to her arm.
“Yeowwww!” She jumped backwards, rubbing her wrist. “Okay, then. Turns out I’m definitely awake.” She shot him a suspicious glance. “You’ve got sisters, haven’t you? Or a sister.”
“How on earth do you know that?”
“Believe me.” She kept rubbing her smarting wrist. “A girl can tell.”
He stared at her curiously for a second. “And for the record, I have one sister. One is enough.”
She took a deep breath. This was it. This was where she found out if this really was the dream job. “Tell me, is every room as good as this one?”
Matteo raised his eyebrows. “You mean, is every room in the same kind of time warp as this one? Oh, I can guarantee that, Phoebe.” He was looking at her as if he couldn’t quite understand why she thought this was a good thing. But Phoebe was off. Tearing through the next few rooms of the house to check them out. A dining room. A huge kitchen. A laundry room. Another sitting room. A study. Two bathrooms—they might need a little work. And a phenomenal room at the back of the house with windows and glass doors that looked out over Mecox Bay.
Matteo stayed behind her, following her from room to room. “Phoebe... Ms. Gates. Does this mean you’ll take the job?”
She could hardly speak. Room after room, there were so many thoughts clambering in her brain about how gorgeous she could make this place that she could hardly form words. Her dream job. The job that could change her whole career. A chance to pay off her mother’s medical bills. A chance to move forward. A chance to pull herself out of the fog that had hung around her for the last few years.
“Phoebe.” His voice grew sharp and he gave her arm a pull, tugging her around to face him. Her hands rested on his upper arms. She couldn’t help herself. She almost wanted to give him a kiss on the cheek. She let out a laugh.
“Do I want the job? Hell, yes. Now I’ve seen it, this place is mine. Matteo, I’m going to do such a good job, you’re never going to want to let me go.”
It was the briefest of seconds. A wash of sadness seemed to sweep his face. A whole host of something she really didn’t understand. But as soon as it had appeared, the shutters came down in his eyes again. Matteo Bianchi had the perfect mask. The perfect face for business.
The edges of his lips curved upwards. For the first time since she’d met him, the tension in his shoulders actually looked as if it disappeared a little. “Phoebe, quarter of a million dollars for four weeks’ work, and I will let you go.”
Chapter Two
FOR THE FIRST time in years Phoebe actually felt lucky. It was a strange concept. Unfamiliar.
Lucky had been something she’d taken for granted for so long. Then Jason, her fiancé, had been killed in a freak flying accident. They’d only just got engaged and started to make plans for the future. All of those things wiped out in the blink of an eye—or the failure of two engines at once. She still couldn’t even think about it. But Phoebe hadn’t needed therapy. She was strong. Or so she’d thought. She’d been devastated to lose her fiancé, but she’d picked herself up and continued to go through the motions.
Then her mother had got sick. Cancer. Surgery. Chemotherapy. Radiotherapy. And a million scans. Phoebe had been determined to take her to every appointment, every treatment. And she had. Running herself into the ground while she did it. Forgetting to eat. Forgetting to sleep. And eventually having to hit therapy. Because she did need it. She just hadn’t wanted to acknowledge it.
It was just lately that she’d felt as if she was starting to come out the tunnel she’d been hiding in. Her mom was doing better. They only had to settle the medical bills now. But work had picked up. The apartment near Central Park had been a real coup for her. But this? This was the icing on the cake. Better than that. This was the sugar on the sprinkles, on the chocolate, on the icing on the cake.
She wasn’t the slightest bit perturbed by Matteo telling her he’d let her go. She’d been on a high. She still was. He was somewhere behind her as she rushed from room to room, throwing open shutters and taking photo after photo with her phone. Occasionally she stopped to make a few notes. But only for a second. The essence of this house was invading her senses. The myriad of bedrooms. The bathrooms that could do with a little updating. The totally and completely gorgeous central yellow glass dome. And the kitchen. She could do so much with the kitchen that she almost wanted to start this very second.
Matteo’s mood seemed a little odd. Almost sedated if that made sense. She got the distinct impression he didn’t want to be here at all. It was almost as if he didn’t even like the place.
By the time she returned to the main room Matteo was back on his phone. She should probably be paying some kind of deference to him since he was going to be paying her enormous salary, but she was far too excited for all that.
She walked straight over to him. “I still hurt from where you pinched me.”
He was mid conversation and raised one eyebrow at her. After the briefest of pauses he pulled the phone away from his ear. “I’m in the middle of something.”
“So am I. And you spent all the time in the car on the phone.” There was something about this guy. He was obviously far too wealthy for words. He was clearly a workaholic. But there was just something in his eyes. He liked someone to challenge him. He was amused by her. And somehow she already knew she wanted to earn his respect. If that meant demanding his attention, then she could do that.
He glanced at his phone, but didn’t continue with that conversation. The edges of his lips curved again. “You asked me to pinch you. I only did what you asked.” There was a cheeky hint in his tone.
“When do I get to meet your sister? I can already tell that I’ll be bruised from that pinch and I want to compare notes with her.”
He paused and disconnected the call. “The very last person I’m introducing you to is my sister. Brianna is even crazier than you are. You’d be a lethal combination.”
Phoebe folded her arms across her chest. “Brianna. I like the sound of her.” She nodded her head. “You don’t need to worry. I’ll meet her. And I promise to be on my best behavior.” She held up her hands. “Now, the house. I have so many ideas. So many plans. Let’s walk through and I’ll talk you through them. I can draw up something more formal in a few days. I’ll need to check if any of the people I regularly use are free to help out.” She raised her eyebrows. “For some people, this is the holiday season.”
Matteo frowned and shook his head. “No, no. I’ll leave all that to you. I don’t need to see plans. I don’t need to know your thoughts. I can give you contacts for teams to assist.”
Phoebe stood back a little and looked at him incredulously. “You are joking, right?”
He gave her a stern stare. “Why would I be joking?”
She couldn’t believe what she was hearing. “Mr. Bianchi, usually clients want consulted on the plans, the overall look for their home. Often they want consulted on any major purchases.” She couldn’t help but frown. “People are generally passionate about how their homes are marketed—what they look like. They usually want to be involved to ensure they get the best price possible.”
Matteo gave an ironic smile. “I take it you’re used to clients who generally care about their homes—and the price they achieve. I care about neither. I just want this place off my hands.” As he finished his phone started ringing again and he strode out of the room, pressing it to his ear, leaving Phoebe wondering whether to laugh or cry. It was clear the conversation was over.
* * *
He’d picked a crazy woman. At one point he’d thought Phoebe Gates would start cartwheeling around the place. She was barely managing to keep her excitement simmering beneath the surface. Her joy at having this job seemed to emanate from every pore in her body.
That actually made a tiny little part of him happy. There was something nice about her enthusiasm and straightforwardness. In his line of business he was used to fake smiles and poker faces; somehow he didn’t think Phoebe Gates would know how to do either one.
But Phoebe obviously had very different ideas from him. She’d thrown open shutters and flooded this dusty old house with light, her face brightening as she’d practically run from room to room. He was surprised that she loved the ancient furniture and fittings. He’d been sure any interior designer would just skip the contents of the house and redecorate the place from top to bottom. Phoebe had obviously decided to take a different tack.
He’d reached the kitchen by now and let out a long sigh. The sooner he got out of here, the better. He only had one association with this house. And it was one he had no intention of revisiting.
He stared around the kitchen for a few seconds as something flashed through his brain. A long-forgotten memory. His mother. Those memories were so fleeting. So scant.
Her dark hair and bright eyes. Dressed in a swirling red dress. She’d been excited. Just the way that Phoebe was. Full of ideas and plans for what she could do to the house. The house they’d just bought that was stuck in a time warp. It had been owned by an elderly actress who had died a few months earlier. His mother could hardly wait to bring it up to modern-day living.
He remembered his father leaning against the double sink and folding his arms, smiling and watching Matteo’s mother the way he’d always watched her—with love and adoration in his eyes.
When Matteo blinked, the memory was gone. He inhaled deeply and leaned back against the sink—just the way his father had. Was the memory even real? He would only have been around five when they stayed here for a few weeks. Brianna was only a few weeks old and Vittore around three.
But everything changed. The house was boarded up and they moved with their father back to Rome, flitting between the capital and an apartment in New York City, then London for a while. The house in the Hamptons was never mentioned. Ignored.
Too many painful memories. It was only now, thirty years later, the family had decided it was time to sell.
Phoebe floated into the kitchen. Literally, floated. Her smile spread from ear to ear, showing off her straight white teeth and enhancing her glowing coffee-colored skin. Her hair bounced as she walked, tight corkscrew curls resting on her shoulders. There was something about her. An aura. She made him want to smile. He couldn’t even remember the last time he’d felt like that. For a few seconds she’d even made him forget where he actually was. But the truth was, he just couldn’t shake the sense of this place. The dark memories. The secrets he’d learned to keep. The ones that kept him locked away.
Phoebe moved in front of him. She’d shed more layers. Now he could see the way her green fine-knit jumper and fitted black trousers clung to her curves. Many of the women Matteo came across in New York were skeletally thin. It was a look he’d never appreciated. Italian men much preferred women with curves—and Phoebe wore them well.
Her perfume drifted up around him as she fixed her chocolate-brown eyes on him. She paused for a second, with an amused expression on her face. It was clear she was contemplating how to phrase her words.
“Ms. Gates?” he prompted.
She gave a nod. “How about we settle on Phoebe and Matteo? I think that might make things a bit easier. After all, we will be seeing a lot of each other.”
There was a sparkle in her eyes.
He slid his hand into his pocket and pulled out a credit card. “I’m not sure that will be necessary. But I’m happy to call you Phoebe if that’s what you prefer.”
She took the credit card without a glance, merely sliding it into the back pocket of her trousers.
“We need to talk about this place, Matteo. We need to discuss my plans.” It was clear that persistence was one of her traits.
He was curt. “No. We don’t.”
He turned on his heel and walked out of the kitchen, heading in the direction of the front door. In the space of few seconds it almost felt as if the walls were closing in around him.
The cool air almost bit into his skin as he stepped outside and he blinked at the brightness. He hadn’t realized quite how blinkered the house had been.
His phone started ringing. He pulled it from his pocket—Brianna. He might have guessed. They were closer than some families. He spoke to both his brother and sister a few times a day. A few female companions in the past had commented on it—finding it strange. But Matteo had never cared for other people’s opinions on his family. They hadn’t lived his life, they didn’t know that he and his siblings were the glue that held their splintered family together.
“Did you get one?” Brianna was speaking rapidly in Italian. She was probably doing ten things at once.
“I did.”
“And? Are they good?”
Was Phoebe Gates good? He didn’t really know. He’d called her both on a whim and out of desperation. Captain Monaghan had been one of the most interesting men Matteo had ever had the pleasure of meeting. But his apartment had been a cluttered, claustrophobic mess. Rudy Monaghan was clearly a hoarder. He’d sailed the seven seas and collected just about everything he’d ever seen.
Matteo had never met Phoebe, but Rudy had been full of praise for the beautiful, enthusiastic and, most importantly, respectful interior designer that he’d hired. The crew she’d hired to assist her had been given very clear instructions. Carefully pack up everything without a yellow sticker. Walls had been painted, windows shined, pictures moved and rehung. She’d stripped the place bare but kept its heart and essence.
No, she’d kept Rudy Monaghan’s heart and essence.
Matteo had dropped in one evening just before he knew Rudy was due to move out and been struck by the enormity of the changes. Rudy had been sitting in his wooden rocking chair, his genuine ancient ship’s wheel still next to him, bathed in the orange setting sun, watching the view of Central Park. That sight would stay with Matteo forever.
He took a deep breath. Now he remembered the transformation he almost wished he’d called Phoebe first. He couldn’t help but smile. He could just imagine how she’d have been if he’d called her at seven instead of eight. “They’re not good, Brianna,” he said deliberately.
“What?” she shrieked from somewhere in New York.
“They’re great. She’s great.”
There was silence for a few seconds. He waited for the tirade of abuse from his sister for momentarily teasing her but it didn’t come.
“Matteo, who is she?”
There was something about his sister’s tone. Her curiosity. He instantly felt a prickle down his spine. Brianna was nosey. Brianna was beyond nosey. He probably shouldn’t have said anything at all.
He kept his voice brisk. “She’s Phoebe Gates. Remember Rudy’s apartment at Central Park? She did that one. She’ll do a good job for us.”
He could almost hear the cogs and whirrs of Brianna’s brain. “Yeah, I remember the apartment at Central Park. It ended up as part of a bidding war, didn’t it?”
“Well, if that’s what you heard, it must be true.”
“So, we know Ms. Gates can dress an apartment—but can she dress a Hampton house?”