‘City life can be hectic,’ Alessandro agreed. ‘Maybe I’ve been viewing these trips to Scotland in entirely the wrong light.’ He glanced around at the kitchen as though pondering whether there was more to it than met the eye, maybe a magic wardrobe concealing a lion and a witch, and then he gazed at her with his head tilted to one side. ‘For backwater, one can always read peaceful. Maybe I haven’t thoroughly explored the potential for kicking back here.’ He shrugged, still giving the matter some thought. ‘’Course, my father’s endearing ways might have detracted from the temptation to spend longer than a few minutes in the place but I sense we might be getting onto a different footing...’
‘You do?’ Laura subdued a brief flare of thrilling anticipation at the prospect of him being around, which she immediately squashed, choosing to interpret the way her heart skipped a beat as nothing more than perfectly understandable satisfaction that father and son might manage to work their way to a better relationship.
‘He has friends and a social life here,’ Alessandro mused, ‘so I’m thinking that there might be more to him than has always met the eye. Once or twice I’ve even caught a flash of humour in something he’s said and I’ve always thought that humour was something he disapproved of on principle. And, of course, I’ve seen first-hand that he’s not as intransigent with the entire human race as I’ve always been led to believe. Your grandmother knows how to wield a big stick and he obeys. Doesn’t take a genius to work out who wears the trousers in that relationship.’
‘Roberto is all bark and no bite.’
‘I wouldn’t go so far as to say that...’
Laura looked at him curiously and he returned her gaze with raised eyebrows. ‘I’ve discovered he has a healthy set of teeth. Trust me. But...’ he shrugged and slanted her a crooked smile ‘...I don’t get away much. Might do me good to discover what this part of Scotland has to offer.’
‘Why don’t you get away much? Don’t you enjoy going on holiday?’ Laura couldn’t fathom why anyone who was as rich as Alessandro didn’t feel the urge to take time out. He could afford to go anywhere on the planet.
‘Come again?’
‘You said you don’t get away much. Why not? Surely you must get tired of working all day, every day, without let-up? Your father says you never stop. He tells me that you’re always in the newspapers about closing some big, important deal or other. Doesn’t it all get a little too much?’
‘How would my father know about deals I’ve closed?’ Alessandro queried silkily.
‘Because he has a scrapbook of newspaper cuttings.’
Sudden silence filled the room, then Alessandro swirled his glass and finished the remainder of the wine. Scrapbook? What scrapbook? Since when?
‘I don’t take holidays because I don’t have time,’ he told her bluntly. He thought of the houses he owned, one in the Caribbean, another in Paris, a third in Tuscany. Aside from the occasional business trip to Paris, when he occasionally might stay in his apartment there, they remained vacant, tended by paid help, waiting in readiness for the day he decided he could take the time off.
He brought the conversation neatly back to the matter in hand, clearing his head of a sudden onslaught of uncustomary confusion when he thought of those unused holiday homes, slowly maturing as good investments but never enjoyed, when he thought of his action-packed, high-pressured life that never allowed him time to sit back and take a break. ‘Which is why it might work to come here a little more often than I have done in the past.’ He strolled towards her, wine bottle in one hand, filling his glass as he walked. He didn’t sit down, however. Instead, he chose to stand right next to her, which immediately made her feel as though she was suffocating. ‘Of course, it would help if I had someone to show me around...’
‘Someone to show you around?’
‘I only know my father’s house and whatever lies within the radius of about three miles. Even when I used to return here from boarding school, I never bothered to explore the countryside.’