The Legend of de Marco

Gracie went cold inside and put down her cup. Frantically she rewound events in her head and froze. She’d told Rocco Steven’s real name by revealing her own. She looked at him with wide eyes.

Rocco looked almost bored, but she could sense the underlying anger as tangibly as if he’d started shouting. ‘He’s got quite an impressive rap sheet. Three years in jail for carrying Class A drugs. Not to mention the fact that he forged papers to get a job in my company so we couldn’t find out about his past. His crimes are mounting, Gracie.’

Feeling desperate, Gracie blurted out, ‘He’s not like that. He really was trying to make a fresh start, to use his intelligence and turn his life around. He did a degree. There has to be some good reason for what he’s done—he wouldn’t have risked jail again.’

Rocco was impossibly grim. ‘I think a lot of people would agree that a million euros provides quite a good reason.’

Gracie sagged back into her chair and looked down at her pale hands. They were trembling and she clasped them together. Hot tears pricked at the back of her eyes. Rocco’s mention of the astronomical sum of money struck hard. She’d almost forgotten about it with everything else that had happened. How could Steven ever come back from this? He’d spend his whole life paying it back. And that was if he was lucky enough to get the chance.

She heard Rocco sigh but couldn’t look up, terrified he’d see her emotion. He said with palpable reluctance, ‘Nevertheless, I don’t think you’re about to phone him and tell him to give himself up?’

Willing the emotion down, Gracie looked up. Huskily she admitted, ‘I did speak to him yesterday, but he wouldn’t tell me where he was, or where he was going, and when I tried to call him back his phone was switched off. I think he’s thrown it away.’ She omitted to mention that he’d said he’d try to contact her when he could. Gracie vowed then that if that happened she’d tell Steven to stay away and never come back …

Rocco stood up and held out a hand. ‘Give me your phone.’

Gracie’s mouth opened and closed. Feeling bullish now, she said, ‘Why?’

Rocco’s mouth tightened. ‘Because I don’t believe you. Because I think you’ll make every attempt to get in touch with your brother and warn him to stay away. And because if he does try and contact you then we’ll have him.’

Gracie crossed her arms.

They glared at each other for long seconds and then Rocco bit out with evident distaste, ‘Don’t make me search you again.’

Something pierced Gracie at the thought of how he’d touched her the night before and how it had obviously repulsed him. In a bid to cover up her emotion she stood up, knowing that he would just find her phone anyway.

She stalked out of the kitchen and retrieved her phone from her bag and brought it back to Rocco, handing it over with a baleful glare. ‘He won’t call me again. He knows he’s in trouble.’

Rocco pocketed the phone and then said casually, ‘I have a proposition for you.’

Gracie blinked. She was fairly certain that any proposition from him would be more like a royal decree. Unconsciously she took a step back and could breathe easier. She missed the way Rocco’s eyes flashed at her movement.

‘I don’t have a housekeeper at the moment. I need one.’ He flicked a faintly contemptuous glance up and down Gracie’s casual clothes. ‘I don’t see how you could mess up such a basic job. You wouldn’t even have to cook. I have a chef who prepares food when I need it. You’d just have to clean and manage the apartment. Deliveries, etc.’

Gracie was struggling to take this in. ‘You’re … offering me a job?’

Rocco grimaced slightly. ‘Well, it’s not so much a job as something to keep you busy while you’re here. Because you’re not leaving my sight until we have your brother.’

Gracie’s heart palpitated in her chest at the thought of spending more time with this man. She crossed her arms. ‘You can’t do this. It’s outrageous. You can’t just keep me prisoner.’

Rocco arched a mocking brow. ‘You have nowhere to go and no job. You’ve got a grand total of fifty pounds. You’re hardly in a position to assert your independence or freedom. I think you’ll find I’m doing you a favour—which you certainly don’t deserve.’

Gracie gasped. ‘You looked through my things.’

Rocco shrugged slightly. ‘Of course I did.’

Gracie felt ashamed to have her pitiful amount of money laid out betw

een them like this. She actually had slightly more than that in a bank account, but it was paltry. Since she’d finished her art degree she’d been struggling just to survive, never mind follow her dreams and ambitions. Rocco de Marco had most likely never even known what it was like to have to eke out a living.

Forcing herself to not crumble, she said caustically, ‘So you’re offering me this job out of the goodness of your heart?’

He smiled, but it was completely without humour. ‘Something like that, yes. You’re really in no position to argue, Gracie. You and your brother have got yourselves into this situation. Look at it this way: you’re worth a million euros of collateral until your brother turns up.’

Her mind frantically searched for a way out, but right then she couldn’t see one. She was well and truly trapped. As much as she was the link to Steven for this man, he was her last tangible link to Steven. And there was no way she was going to leave her brother to face this man’s wrath alone when they did find him.

Gracie straightened her spine and drew herself up, determined to regain some measure of control amidst this awful powerlessness. ‘If I’m going to be your housekeeper then I want the same amount that I was being paid in the bar. I have to keep my student loan repayments up.’

Rocco crushed down his surprise at her visible decision to stay without a fight and tried to ignore the prickling of his conscience. If she was guilty wouldn’t she be doing her best to persuade him to let her go so she could meet her brother? And, also, why would she have been stupid enough to come where Steven worked? Rocco crushed the questions. She was up to something—probably just acting this way so that he would doubt her guilt.