Rival's Challenge

With the utmost reluctance, Orla described overhearing her father talking and her resolve to be there for him. To shoulder the responsibility of being his only heir.

‘The fact is,’ Orla pointed out before Antonio could say anything, ‘I loved it. I used to sit in on his meetings and take notes, pretending to be his secretary. And then as I got older, I took notes for real.’

Antonio sat back a little, those enigmatic eyes unreadable. ‘What about your mother?’

Orla tensed and pushed away her starter plate. She avoided Antonio’s eye. ‘My mother … just isn’t really interested in the business side of things. She used to be though, when I was small. I’d see her and my father working late, going over figures, deciding on interior decoration … which hotel to invest in next.

‘But then …’ Orla shrugged and tailed off, not wanting to reveal how her mother had been seduced by their wealth as it had grown, to the point where that was all she cared about now.

To her relief a waiter came and cleared their starters, cutting her off. When they were alone again Antonio asked, ‘Do you have a home in London?’

Orla breathed a small sigh of relief that he wasn’t going to pursue the last topic of conversation. She shook her head and felt a familiar pang. ‘No, I live here at the hotel. We’ve always lived in the hotels … one or other of them. The one here in London for the past twenty years, since it was opened.’

‘You’ve always lived in your hotels?’

She nodded again. ‘Didn’t you?’

He shook his head. ‘We have a family home outside London. We grew up there … although we did run riot around the hotel here all our lives. Drove our parents crazy, of course.’

Orla felt wistful and heard herself admitting, ‘I missed not having siblings.’

Antonio’s expression became enigmatic again. ‘I had too many and you had none. We’re never happy, are we?’

An efficient waiter reappeared with their main courses and Orla smiled her thanks. Antonio’s comment about never being happy reverberated inside her.

Orla speared some lamb. It was succulent and gorgeous but her taste buds had suddenly dried up. Their conversation felt far too…. easy, yet with a delicious edge of tension.

They concentrated on their food for a few minutes and a ridiculous ripple of pride went through Orla when Antonio commented that the steak was one of the best he’d ever tasted.

After the brief lull, almost against her will Orla found herself blurting into the silence, ‘I always wanted a house. A family home. I was so envious of my friends when I’d go back to their houses. That they could shut the front door and not have to deal with hundreds of strangers right outside their door.’

Embarrassed now, Orla flushed and avoided Antonio’s gaze. ‘Don’t get me wrong. I know how lucky I was—I had an incredibly privileged upbringing. But sometimes … I wished that I had my own space. That when I came back to my bedroom after school the bed wouldn’t be turned down with a sweet on the pillow and all my things tidied away.’

Antonio said nothing for a moment and then, ‘We might have had a home … but we were cut off from the outside world to a large extent. Shuttled from exclusive boarding schools back to a huge bleak house filled with nannies and housekeepers. Our parents were invariably in one of the hotels…. We were pretty much left to our own devices and then our mother left when I was fifteen.’

Orla felt a pang near her heart. Everyone knew the story of Liliana Chatsfield walking out on her family all those years ago only to vanish into thin air, leaving b

ehind a baby and her six older children. That was when the gilt edges had started crumbling from the Chatsfield empire.

As much as her own mother drove her to distraction now, she’d been there for Orla her whole life.

‘That must have been rough. And you never saw her again?’

Antonio wiped at his mouth with a linen napkin and shook his head quickly. Orla had the distinct feeling that he wasn’t about to elaborate on that part of his life. She had a memory flash at that moment of being about eighteen or nineteen and seeing Antonio splashed all over the tabloids emerging from a nightclub with a bevy of semi-naked beauties.

She could remember how devilishly gorgeous he’d been, but far younger and more innocent looking than the man in front of her now. Which was why she hadn’t recognised him. That had been just before he’d disappeared off the scene completely and then one by one the other Chatsfields had grown up and started to take his place in the papers with regularity.

As recently as a few weeks before, his youngest sister, Cara, who was stunning and irrepressible, had been in the headlines for doing something debauched. Orla found herself wondering, what must it have been like for him to take on the burden of responsibility so young? Much like herself.

She’d never in a million years have felt like she’d have anything in common with a privileged Chatsfield. The revelation was uncomfortable.

‘I presume you didn’t see your sisters and brothers much since you went away?’

Antonio didn’t move a muscle, but Orla could sense him tensing. He took his wine glass in his big hand and rolled it, making the rich red liquid swirl hypnotically.

‘No,’ he answered finally. ‘I didn’t. They were all pretty much grown up when I left, except for the twins, Orsino and Lucca, who were finishing school, and Cara, who was ten.’

His mouth tightened to a bitter line. ‘But as my father pointed out to me, he was their father not me. Even though it only suited him to be a father every now and then. I had a fight with him on a day when evidently it had suited him.’