The Italian Billionaire's New Year Bride

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?”

She hadn’t said the words out loud but the implication was clear. An apartment at Central Park was big. A house in the Hamptons was in a whole other league.

“Have a little faith in your brother, Brianna.”

There was a loud sigh at the end of the phone. “I have a lot of faith in my brother. Both my brothers.” There was a pause for a second. Matteo had kept walking. The fresh air was calling to him, along with the spectacularly white snow. The tone of her voice softened. “How are you?”

He didn’t answer. Cold air was filling his lungs, letting his heart race a little quicker and letting him shake off the cobwebs.

It was hard to explain. The only other people to have walked in his shoes were Vittore and Brianna. No one else would ever understand. He wouldn’t expect them to. He wouldn’t want them to. And the truth was, Vittore and Brianna didn’t understand entirely either—because he didn’t want them to. He was oldest. It was his job to guard his younger brother and sister.

“Matteo?” Her voice was soft, almost a whisper.

Matteo closed his eyes. “I’m fine, Brianna. Of course, I’m fine. It’s just this place. You know that. I’m going to leave everything in Phoebe’s hands. She doesn’t see this place the way we do. She loves it. She thinks it’s great. She...she has the ability to dress it and make it sell. That’s all that we need.”

He could almost hear the shake in her voice. “Is it?”

It was as if the cold air penetrated every part of him. He wouldn’t go there. He wouldn’t have the conversation that his sister sometimes pushed him toward. He’d learned how to deal with it over the years. It was as if he owned his own set of black shutters. Push him so far and he would just slam them shut. “Goodbye, Brianna,” he said smartly as he finished the call.

* * *

Phoebe was sitting on the curved staircase. Her feet had actually started to follow him out of the kitchen, then her instincts had kicked in and told her not to. Told her to give him a little space.

Mr. Bianchi was more than a little temperamental. Was this an Italian trait?

She sighed and closed her eyes, trying to breathe in the essence of this beautiful home. Her brain instantly took her to the place she wanted to be. Right now she was recreating her own favorite musical and was tap dancing up and down these stairs in a bouffant yellow dress. She just hadn’t decided who her imaginary leading man was yet. A twinge of guilt set in.

For the first year after Jason’s death he’d been the main feature of every dream she’d had. But for the last year, several movie stars had started to creep in and take over. In a way, it had been a relief to stop waking up with her heart in her throat. That horrible little millisecond of time—the briefest of moments—where she thought everything was just the same, Jason was still here, her mom wasn’t sick yet and then, she remembered.

And that overwhelming colossal black wave swamped back on top of her, every morning, making her relive every moment and making her want to be sick all over her bed. It took months for that to fade. Months to wake up to the reality that was her life.