The Secret Casella Baby

As she gently began cutting away the trouser leg, apologising about ruining the lovely cloth, his head was suddenly filled with images of her naked in front of him, offering herself to him. He fidgeted and Holly looked up immediately.

‘Have I hurt you?’

He wondered how she would react if he told her exactly what was hurting him at this moment in time.

‘You’re very brave. You must tell me if I hurt you. It’s bound to but…’

She hurried off, to return seconds later with a glass of water and some tablets.

‘Painkillers. Very strong. They’ll help.’ She could feel her skin tingling as he rested his dark eyes on her flushed face. It was strange, but when he looked at her she got the funniest feeling that she was being caressed.

‘So you haven’t told me your name…’ Once again at the task of slitting the trousers, trying to ignore the strong legs slowly being revealed with their dark hair which was somehow so aggressively masculine, she launched into jumpy chatter.

‘Ah, yes. Luiz. Luiz… Gomez.’ He hoped that the head gardener who had been in charge of the grounds of the family house in Brazil would forgive him appropriating his surname, but suddenly it seemed a good idea. Here, with this woman kneeling at his feet, in surroundings so far removed from those to which he was accustomed, he would be a different person. Just for a few hours. He would no longer be a workaholic, driven by demons, in charge of an empire in which there was no time-out clause built in. There was no sin in seeking a little respite from the brutal reality of his life, was there?

‘Luiz… Where are you from?’

‘I live in London, as a matter of fact, but I come from Brazil.’ He smiled at her delighted expression and relaxed as she chattered away about the places she would love to see one day. Her fingers were nimble and she worked quickly, explaining that he would need to see a doctor, would probably need antibiotics but it wasn’t too bad, she would make sure she cleaned it thoroughly…

She laughed when he asked her whether she had been a girl guide and he enjoyed the sound of her laughter. He felt he might like to hear it more often.

‘I could stitch you up,’ she told him. ‘But I’m not sure whether you would be willing to trust me to do that. If not, I can bandage you up until we can get you to a doctor.’

Luiz half-murmured that when it came to being stitched up there had been a fair few women who had attempted the exercise.

‘Is there somewhere I could stay out here?’ he asked, looking around him as if he might just spy a cosy tavern at the bottom of the garden. Already his mind was moving ahead. Time out; this was the tonic he needed. A place where no one could find him, with a woman who had no agenda and to whom he would be no more than an injured stranger. The wealthy and powerful Luiz Casella could have a bit of peace and quiet. The man over whom women fawned could step back and luxuriate in the novelty of knowing that the health of his bank account was not a contributing factor.

And, of course, out here…

He feasted his eyes on her luscious curves, her achingly pretty face, which went pink every time he looked at her.

Holly blushed and laughed again as she straightened up, pleased with the job she had done. She was used to dealing with injuries. He was probably bruised on other parts of his body as well. She couldn’t help admiring his stoicism. Not only was he fantastically good-looking, but he wasn’t a complainer.

‘The nearest bed and breakfast is at least twenty miles away. You couldn’t have picked a worse spot to come off the road,’ she said ruefully. ‘I’ll fix you something to eat and make up the spare room. You can stay here, if you like. At least overnight, until we can get you to a hospital.’

‘I won’t be needing a hospital.’ Luiz thought that he couldn’t have picked a better place to come off the road. He didn’t know what it was about her, but already he felt calmer than he had in a long time.

‘And you still haven’t told me what you do. Or if I should get in touch with someone to tell them about your accident. A wife, perhaps…?’

Luiz could recognise a leading question when he heard one and he smiled slowly. ‘No wife,’ he murmured. ‘No girlfriend. No one to contact.’ He watched as she busied herself fixing them something to eat. The cupboards were hand-painted, cream and dark green. The tiles above the range cooker depicted children’s drawings of various animals. It was warm in the kitchen and she pulled off the sweater so that she was down to a long-sleeved tee-shirt which clung faithfully to all her curves and to breasts which were as abundant as he had suspected. She was chattering, although he wasn’t one hundred percent paying attention to what she was saying.

He knew that he was making all the right noises, and when finally she sat at the kitchen table with food in front of them—eggs and bacon and some of the best bread he had ever eaten—he knew that he was asking all the right questions.

He asked about the sanctuary, about how it was funded, about the details of how it was run, where the animals came from, the success rate at rehousing them.

She had an open, expressive face. She gesticulated excitedly when she talked about her animals. They all had names. They tried to raise money locally to keep going. Personally, he thought that it all sounded like a lot of hard work for no profit, but he enjoyed looking at her enthusiasm. He couldn’t remember being as enthusiastic as she was when he was closing his deals, which were usually worth millions. He was tempted to offer her a substantial amount of money, a thank you for saving his life, but, having told her that he was little more than a travelling salesman, that possibility was ruled out.

‘I might have to stay here slightly longer than a night,’ he finally said as she rose to clear their dishes and Holly threw him an anxious glance over her shoulder.

‘Won’t your boss mind?’ she asked, concerned. ‘Things are so tough in the economy nowadays… I hope your job won’t be under threat because you have to take time off.’ When he said stay here, did he mean stay here? In her house? Or stay somewhere locally until he was fully recovered? She thought of him in her house and a guilty thrill of pleasure rippled through her. He was just the most interesting guy she had ever met, willing to listen to what she had to say and informative on all his responses.

‘I think I’ll be able to wing it on that score,’ Luiz murmured. For a second, he felt a twinge of guilt at his creative manipulation of the truth but it didn’t last long. He reasoned that she would be intimidated had she known the extent of his influence, power and wealth. She would respond far more quickly and openly to a travelling salesman type, someone safe and unthreatening.

‘So getting back to you staying here…’ Holly said uncertainly. ‘I’m not sure what you mean, exactly…’

‘Of course, I would insist on paying you. You could consider yourself the most convenient bed and breakfast, and I assure you, you would be generously compensated. In fact, you can name your price. I… I’m quite sure my boss would not hesitate to make whatever generous donation you might want towards your animal sanctuary.’

‘I wouldn’t dream of taking money from you!’ Holly was horrified that he might think her so mercenary that she would try and charge him for what anyone else would have done in her situation.

‘Even though, from all accounts, your animals don’t exactly pay the bills?’ Luiz was enjoying the unexpected novelty of this situation more and more. He couldn’t think of a single woman who wouldn’t have taken money from him. In fact, he was quite accustomed to lavishing presents on his women: diamonds, pearls, cars, holidays… Naturally, had she known the extent of his personal fortune, she would not have hesitated to take advantage of his generosity. He knew enough about women to be sure on that count. Her scruples would only have kicked in at the thought of depriving a struggling salesman who might or might not be in danger of losing his job.

‘I know a bit about computers…’ He had to conceal a smile when he said that, for he owned several IT companies and probably knew more about the workings of computers than most of the people he employed. ‘Do you have a website? Because I could set one up for you…’

Not only did he not complain, not only was he interested in what she did, not only was he the perfect gentleman in offering to compensate her for her simple act of kindness, but here he was, doing his best to make himself useful! He just seemed to know everything. Perhaps computers were his thing.

‘The main thing is that you get better,’ she told him firmly. ‘Would you like some tea? Coffee? And then I’ll show you up to your bedroom. In the morning, I’ll get in touch with Abe. The snow doesn’t seem to be getting any heavier. He has a Jeep. He should be able to make it out here.’

‘Are you always this upbeat?’ Luiz wondered aloud and she favoured him with one of those smiles that he found strangely transfixing.

‘I have a lot to be thankful for. This place, a job I love, lots of friends…’ She placed the cafeti?re on the table along with two mugs and some milk and sugar. ‘I no longer have my parents. My mother died when I was a kid, and my dad died a few years ago, but I like to think that they were very happy…’

‘And that works for you?’ Luiz’s mouth twisted cynically at her innocent, sunny acceptance of what he, personally, had found unacceptable—of the event which, in a strange way, accounted for him sitting right here in this kitchen with a woman the likes of whom he had never known existed.

‘Of course it does. What did you mean when you said that you were getting rid of some of your demons?’

Had anyone else asked him that question, Luiz would have shot them down with a glance, but as he stared into those sympathetic blue eyes, he felt that ache in his gut uncoil again.

He told her: he was just Luiz Gomez, a travelling salesman, allowed, for a brief window in time, to reveal his feelings. It wasn’t easy. He was not a man given to sharing or confiding. When you were the power house, the person shouldering the responsibility and running the show, confiding about anything to anyone was not a desirable thing to do. It was a sign of weakness and, as one of those kings of the concrete jungle, weakness was not allowed.

But she made a damned good listener. He forgot about his leg, the incipient aches all over his body, his wrecked car, and at the end of an hour he had made his mind up.

Holly George was going to be his lover.

CHAPTER TWO

HOLLY LOOKED AT the little wrought-iron table with matching chairs on the stone flagged patio which overlooked the open fields at the back of her cottage and felt a little knot of nervousness and excitement. She had laid everything out neatly. The bottle of wine—from the supply which was permanently re-stocked by Luiz, who was fussy with his alcohol—was chilling in the wine cooler. A dish of cruditеs was covered over, as were the little homemade savoury cheese biscuits. Midges; flies; they always came out in summer and it was still very warm, even though it was nearly six-thirty in the evening.

Any minute now, Luiz would be arriving in his taxi, and after nearly a year and a half she would still feel that giddy craving that always overwhelmed her the second she laid eyes on him.

This weekend, though, was going to be different. Holly smoothed her hands over her summer dress and hurried inside to hover by the window in the front room.

A wave of dizziness washed over her and she suspected that it was the heat. Recently, she had been prone to such waves of dizziness. It was an extremely and unusually hot summer. All her animals were lethargic. Her chickens, which usually pestered her by the kitchen door in search of scraps, took themselves off to shadier spots. Even her assortment of dogs was less interested in running around than finding a cosy niche underneath the nearest tree where they could lie, tongues lolling, dreaming about running around.

She was lethargic. For the past three weeks, getting out of bed in the mornings had been a struggle. Normally up with the larks, she had found herself yearning to lie in a couple of times and she had had to make a mammoth effort to get going.

Yorkshire, she had told Luiz, wasn’t designed for searing temperatures. It was designed for the cool, bright colours of spring, the chill of autumn russets or the breathtaking cold of a winter wonderland. Luiz had laughed and told her that she should get some air-conditioning installed in her cottage and she wouldn’t feel so uncomfortable in the heat.

She teased him about his practicality. She told him that he needed to cultivate some romance, but in truth their personalities blended beautifully together. She would never have believed that after that initial meeting, when she had first looked at him and concluded that he was just the most spectacular guy she had ever seen, he would come to fill her world, all the corners of it.