Charley knew that he was, but she wasn’t prepared to give in.
‘My parents—’ she began defensively, only to be stopped when Raphael spoke again.
‘Whatever your parents or anyone else might have said, whatever they might have believed, ends now and is in the past. Only the weak blame their past for the faults they find in their present; the strong acknowledge the effects of their past and then move on from it. We are all free to choose whether we will be weak or strong.’ His gaze challenged her to make her choice.
Charley took a deep breath. She felt dizzy again, light-headed, sort of untethered—as though something within her was floating free. As she struggled to understand what she was feeling she heard Raphael addressing the hovering saleswoman.
‘We will take everything.’
‘But I haven’t tried everything on yet,’ Charley tried to protest.
‘There’s no need. I am sure they will all fit perfectly—and besides, it’s nearly two o’clock and as yet we haven’t had any lunch.’
Charley could see that there was no point in trying to argue or protest.
By the time she had changed back into her own clothes everything was arranged. Her new things would be packed up and delivered to the apartment, and would be waiting for her when she returned there.
They had lunch in a small restaurant down an alleyway that opened out into a courtyard basking in sunshine, with tubs of spring flowers in bright bloom, but despite the relaxed ambience of the setting it wasn’t a pleasant lunch. Raphael barely spoke to her, responding to her attempts to make conversation by asking him about the city with such terse replies that Charley lost her appetite, along with the desire to continue trying to converse with him. He was obviously bored with her company, and her heart turned over inside her chest and went leaden with pain when she saw him looking in the direction of a stunning redhead who was walking past their table. No doubt he was wishing that he was with the redhead instead of her, Charley guessed miserably.
She tried not to let her feelings show as he flicked back his cuff and glanced at his watch, as though impatient for their lunch to be over. She’d been a fool to hope as they left the shop that he might offer to show her something of the city.
It had been a mistake to bring Charlotte here to this small restaurant for lunch, Raphael recognised, irritated with himself for the way his desire for her was weakening him. The intimacy of the restaurant made him ache for the even greater intimacy of his bedroom, and Charlotte naked in his arms on the bed within it. There was no logical reason why she should have this effect on him. He had, after all, known and resisted far more openly sexual women. But the sunlight striking through the windows warmed the pale skin of her throat, making him want to touch it, to possess the tiny pulse he could see beating at its base, to possess her. This was madness. He couldn’t allow himself to be controlled by his desire for her. It would be breaking all the rules he had made for himself.
‘I have some meetings this afternoon.’
At last Raphael was speaking to her, even if his voice was abrupt and cold. Charley focused on him as he summoned the waiter and asked for the bill. Was it because of this morning and the clothes? Was he already regretting allowing her to work on the project? She made herself think about how she would feel if he were to change his mind. The surge of emotion within told her immediately. She wanted desperately to work on the garden project, she realised. She wanted to prove herself—wanted to be herself.
The same sense of shock and recognition she had felt staring at her new reflection in the mirror of the changing room hit her again now, bringing with it an awareness that deep down inside herself she had longed for the opportunity to overturn the conceptions about herself that imprisoned her; had secretly yearned not to be clumsy, awkward Charley, but someone else instead. Before she had told herself that that was impossible, that she was what she was. Now, though, she was suddenly able to see that Raphael had been right when he had said that what she had been was what others had forced on her. The prospect of shedding that persona and its restrictions might be uncomfortable and alarming, but it was also exciting, Charley recognised, and was filled with new possibilities, new goals, new ambitions—just as she had been filled with a sense of mingled anxiety and delight when she had come face to face with her new image in the mirror. She was filled with those same feelings at the knowledge of what she could be if only she had the courage to seize the opportunity life and Raphael had given her.
She had always longed to visit this part of Italy and now she was here; she had always ached and yearned for a job that would allow her to express herself artistically, and now she had one. She wanted desperately to learn more and grow as a person now she had that opportunity. Like tiny bolts of lightning her thoughts darted through her head, illuminating the darkest corners of her secret self. She could improve her Italian, explore the countryside, soak herself in Florence’s artistic history, feel herself grow with the garden, do everything, be everything she had ever wanted to do and be. Except for wanting Raphael. That she could not and must not do. That was a closed door and must remain so. If with the birth of the new Charlotte that was happening within herself there was to come a desire to embrace her sexuality by taking a lover, then she must accept that that lover could not be Raphael.
The bill paid, Raphael told her, ‘I suggest you spend the afternoon getting to know your way around the city, as that will be essential if you are to work efficiently. There will be occasions when you will have to come here alone—which reminds me that you will need a car.’
‘Only something inexpensive…’ Charley put in. She had cost him so much already, but she was determined that the work she would do for the garden would more than repay that expenditure.
‘And small, please,’ she added, remembering the narrowness of the streets.
A waiter was hovering, ready to pull out her chair for her, and Raphael stood up, signalling that it was time for them to leave.
As they walked out into the sunshine of the courtyard Charley warned herself that she would need to buy herself some decent sunglasses to replace the cheap pair she had brought from home. Raphael was already reaching for his—c
lassically shaped, with a discreet Cartier logo—and their dark glass completely obscured his eyes. If he had already looked male and dangerous, the sunglasses brought a sharper raw edge to that look, making her heart turn over and her senses thrill with female sensual speculation and expectation. Coupled with a desire to make him equally aware of her it brought a new strand to everything else that she was discovering about herself. It was just as well, she decided, that Raphael quite plainly did not find her attractive—otherwise this new desire to explore and adventure could take her very quickly out of her depth, because if Raphael were to indicate that he wanted her, then…
Then what? Charley asked herself as they parted outside the restaurant and she turned to make her way to the square, following one of the many helpful signs. Then she would fling herself into a brief sexual affair with him with hedonistic abandon, relishing the opportunity to give in to what she had already been feeling? Her heart thudded—not with apprehension and shock, but with excitement and anticipation.
Deep in her own thoughts, she didn’t see the good-looking young man coming the other way until she had bumped into him. Flushed and guilty, she began to apologise, but instead of merely walking on the young man removed his sunglasses to smile at her, revealing white teeth. His voice was as liquid with warmth as the look in his eyes as he told her, simply and approvingly, ‘Si bella, signorina,’ and then swept her with a look of meltingly delicious male approval before moving on.
He had been little more than a boy, really, probably still in his late teens, his early twenties at the most, with a mop of dark curls and that male lankiness that young men possessed, but his compliment had still boosted her confidence, Charley admitted as she continued to walk down the street.
Watching her from the pavement a few yards from the restaurant, Raphael frowned and then turned on his heel. What did it matter to him if other men found Charlotte Wareham attractive?
CHAPTER EIGHT
SHE had had a wonderful afternoon, Charley reflected as she sat in a small café, drinking her cappuccino. One glance at the queues of people waiting to visit some of Florence’s most famous sites had told her that with only an afternoon at her disposal her time would be put to its best use if she simply wandered around and got a feel for the city—which was exactly what she had done. She had walked down from the Via de Tornabuoni to the River Arno, and then along its embankment until she reached the Ponte Vecchio, wandering by the long queues for the Uffizi to gaze in delight at everything in the Piazza della Signoria. Picking up a free map from a tourist office, she had strolled at her leisure, pausing frequently to admire her surroundings and to drink in the wonderful atmosphere of the city. Inside her head she had removed its modern-day crowds and re-peopled its streets with men and women of the Renaissance, imagining them going about their everyday business.
Now, though, it was nearly four o’clock, and she still had an hour to spare before she had to return to the apartment. A girl walking past, dark hair swinging on her shoulders like liquid silk, caught her attention. Italian women had such lovely hair… She reached up and touched her own. She’d tied it back again during the afternoon, but the new Charlotte who was emerging from the old Charley wasn’t satisfied any longer with the plain practicality of simply pushing her hair out of the way. She wanted a hairstyle that matched her new self. She’d passed any number of hair salons on her stroll—but how to find the right one? She could see the store where Raphael had taken her down the street to her left. Determinedly, before her courage could desert her, Charley finished her cappuccino and, having paid for it, made her way towards it.
If the saleswoman who had served them earlier was surprised by her request she gave no sign of it, listening calmly instead, and immediately announcing that she knew the very place and that if Charley would kindly wait for a second she would telephone them herself, on Charley’s behalf.