Gianni's Pride (7 page)

Gianni’s brows lifted. So the redhead was running away … from what or who? Probably a love affair gone bad … It usually was, he thought cynically.

‘I guess that means we’ll have to cohabit.’

Miranda stared at him in horror, shaking her head at his idea of a solution. ‘No … no, that’s not possible. You can’t stay. Why would you want to?’ she challenged.

‘For the pleasure of your charming company?’

Miranda gave a scornful snort and folded her arms across her chest, refusing to react to the charm.

‘The fact is my work schedule doesn’t allow … No, that’s not true—I don’t allow enough time to spend a lot of quality time with Liam.’ Actually, he realised, this wasn’t a lie. ‘Quality time—I know it sounds corny, but it’s true. I try, but not hard enough.’ Again true.

He opened the door fully and stifled a pang of guilt. He couldn’t afford to waver. When the circumstances necessitated you utilised your opponent’s weaknesses and, for all her attitude, it was obvious that the redhead’s weakness was a soft heart.

‘Look at him,’ he invited, gesturing towards Liam, who was playing with the dogs. ‘He’s having the time of his life. Sure, we could go back to London … But he’d be missing out—we both would.’ He studied her from under the sweep of his lashes, watching while she struggled.

Miranda looked at the little boy playing outside. Gianni Fitzgerald’s honesty had actually touched her. ‘I’m not sure. I’d like to take you up on your offer, but …’

T
HE
dogs barking in the yard made Miranda break off mid sentence. She heard the sound of a car door slamming, then a male voice talking to the animals, who immediately quieted.

‘Are you expecting visitors?’ Sensing victory had been imminent, he cursed the timing of the interruption, now he had lost the advantage he had gained.

Miranda shook her head and got to her feet just as a man appeared framed in the top half of the stable door. His back turned to them, he rested the box he was carrying on the top of the closed section before turning.

‘Sorry I’m late. I had some extra deliveries, but I put in some extra courgettes—we’ve got a glut—and Mum put in some of her elderflower cordial for you to try. She said thanks for the advice—the new hair cut—’

He saw them and stopped, an expression of mild surprise spreading across his handsome face. ‘Sorry, I didn’t know Lucy had visitors …?’

She saw him look from her to Gianni to the child playing now at their feet before she could explain that this was not the cosy domestic scene it appeared at first glance—it felt important to disabuse him of any embarrassing misconception. Gianni spoke up.

‘Lucy’s away.’

The other man did not appear to pick up on the note of dismissal in Gianni Fitzgerald’s voice that Miranda did.

‘She is?’

‘Yes.’

Gianni Fitzgerald, for all his smart tongue, could, it seemed, be a man of few words when it suited him; the rudeness was no major surprise.

‘Perhaps she forgot to cancel her order?’ Miranda suggested.

The newcomer gave a rueful shake of his head. ‘Much more likely my brother forgot to tell me. He helps out on sufferance—he’s more interested in getting back home to play his computer games.’

Miranda got to her feet and slid the latch holding the door. ‘Do you want to put that on the table? It looks heavy.’

‘Thanks.’

‘I’m Miranda. I’m house-sitting for Lucy.’

‘I’m Joe Chandler.’ Young, blond and good-looking, Joe brushed his hand on his jeans before offering it to Miranda. She smiled at the sweet gesture and took it. ‘Lucy takes one of our veggie boxes.’

‘She did say something about it.’

‘All organic.’

Gianni watched as the guy picked up a deformed-looking carrot from the top of the box and offered it for Miranda’s inspection as if it were the Crown jewels.

‘Lucy didn’t say she was away—she always takes a box on Mondays and Fridays.’

Miranda took the muddy carrot, displaying the sort of interest his sisters might over a pair of designer shoes. ‘Are they grown locally?’

If her interest was feigned, she was, Gianni decided, a very good actress.

‘How much are the boxes?’

The guy mentioned an amount that seemed fairly extortionate for a few vegetables but Miranda appeared impressed.

‘I’ll take the usual,’ she said cheerfully.

‘That’s great, but you’ll probably need a bigger order with the family here?’ he said with a glance towards Gianni.

‘No, he’s not with me, we’re not … the regular order will be fine, thanks.’ Her brow furrowed. ‘How much do I owe you again?’

‘I’ll get that,’ Gianni said, getting to his feet.

Miranda watched him frown as he began to search the pockets of the jacket slung over the arm of the kitchen chair and a switch suddenly clicked in her head.

Could she be guilty of missing the signs the way she had with her father?

The experience had made Miranda more sensitive to signs others might well have missed and she had already been puzzled by the contradictions: he wore expensive clothes, but drove a wreck of a car, but had driven, in Liam’s words, a ‘big, big car’, now the ‘lost’ wallet—all suggested someone who had suffered a recent change of fortune …

Was it possible he wasn’t being awkward for the sake of it but simply because he had nowhere else to go? Maybe like her father he had lost his job, possibly even his home. He wouldn’t be the first man, as she knew only too well, who found the subject difficult to discuss.

Miranda made an impulsive decision. ‘It’s all right,’ she said quietly. ‘I’ve got it,’ she added, extracting the notes from her purse, and handed them to Joe before she made a few more admiring noises about the contents.

‘Shall I bring the usual delivery on Monday, then?’

‘Yes, please, that would be lovely.’ She followed Joe out into the yard discussing the next delivery.

Her thoughts very much on the man indoors and his possible
situation, it took her a moment to respond to Joe’s surprise invitation.

‘A drink in the pub?’

‘About eight-thirty. I’m meeting a few friends. I could pick you up if you like …?’

On the point of refusing, she suddenly thought,
Why not?

Back in the house she got straight to the point. ‘Look, I’ve been thinking and you’re right—there’s plenty of room for us all here.’ She reached for the coffee pot and filled her mug. ‘In fact you’d be doing me a favour.’

Startled by this sudden turnaround, Gianni stared at her suspiciously.

‘I would?’

‘Yes … this place is a bit in the middle of nowhere, and I’d be nervous at nights here alone …’

Convinced he was missing something, but not sure what, Gianni put his hand over his mug before she ladled sugar into it. ‘You do not strike me as the nervous type.’

Her eyes slid from his. ‘Well, I am. Look, do you want to stay or not?’

His brow furrowed. ‘I want to stay,’ he admitted.

‘Fine, well, I’m sure we can manage without getting in each other’s way—it’s a big house.’
Who are you trying to convince, Mirrie?
‘Look, I’ll leave you to … I’ll just go muck out the horses.’

It was delaying the inevitable but she spent the rest of the morning with the animals. At one point Liam joined her, wanting to ride on the donkey, but before she could respond his father appeared.

‘Come on, Liam.’

‘Oh, he’s fine with me.’ It was the father who she was anxious to avoid; the child was a joy.

Gianni took his son’s hand. His eyes were inexplicably
cold as they brushed her face. ‘I don’t need a babysitter. Liam is with me.’

Mirada watched him stride away, almost dragging the reluctant boy, fuming at his rudeness. What was his problem? The way he had acted you’d have thought she was about to steal the boy!

Well, as far as she was concerned he could go … well, go anywhere where she wasn’t.

Having stretched her chores outside as far as lunchtime, she went indoors, but only to get her car keys. Lucy had mentioned the weekly farmer’s market in the nearby town. Miranda had planned to visit it and the idea of escaping the house at the moment was an extra incentive to bring forward her plan.

There was no sign of her house guests, though she did not look too hard. Instead she left a note on the kitchen table explaining where she’d gone.

The market was every bit as good as Lucy had said and she spent a few pleasant hours wandering around the colourful stalls.

It was after six by the time she returned to find the remains of a supper were on the kitchen table and there were sounds coming from the adjoining sitting room.

She dropped her bags, pulled out the sweets she had bought for Liam and went into the sitting room. For a few moments she stood unobserved in the doorway feeling a quiver in the region of her heart as she watched Liam, already in his pyjamas, shrieking with excitement, being chased around the room by his dad, who was on all fours pretending to be a bull.

When Liam saw her he ran to her, wrapping his arms around her legs in a hug in a gesture of childish spontaneity. ‘Come play, let Daddy catch you, Mirrie!’

‘Not just now, Liam,’ Miranda said, glancing towards the older Fitzgerald, who was not looking so pleased to see her.

He dragged dark hair back from his broad brow with an impatient hand. ‘Not now, Liam, go upstairs. It’s bedtime.’

Miranda watched the little boy bounce from the room and held out the bag of sweets to Gianni. ‘I thought he might like these? You know, he might go to sleep a little easier if—’

‘I’m sure your knowledge of childcare is second to none, but I know Liam and he doesn’t eat sweets.’ He pushed them back at her, his fingers brushing her arm.

Miranda jumped as the light contact sent an electric surge through her body. Stepping backwards with a gasp, she knocked a half-full coffee cup off the dresser. She caught it but the contents tipped over her top.

His dark eyes brushed hers. The predatory gleam in the dark depths sent her stomach into a diving spin. His manner as cold as his eyes had been hot, Gianni made no comment as he left the room.

To the casual observer, she realised, the scene would be one of cosy domesticity: a woman washing up the supper dishes while the dogs played around her feet.

What the casual observer would not see was the general turmoil in her head. The ‘cosiness’ did not even go skin deep, she reflected, glancing at her forearm—it still tingled. She gave a shiver and plunged her hands deep into the hot water.

‘Down!’ None of the dogs responded to her half-hearted rebuke.

It was never going to work, she decided, wishing she had not given in to the spontaneous impulse that had made her agree to this crazy house share.

For all she knew her instincts might be totally off. It wasn’t as if he came across as some sort of charity case.

Would she have been quite so keen to have him around if he hadn’t been, on a scale of one to ten, a solid fifteen?

‘No!’ Miranda said, rejecting the idea with a firm shake of her head as she lifted her hands from the water and blew the suds from her pink fingers. ‘I am not that shallow.’

But I am talking to myself
.

It was true, though, and the knowledge that she had never been a person influenced or attracted by a pretty face made her feel moderately better about her motivation, if not the situation.

She closed her eyes and saw the gleam of raw male appreciation glittering in those dark depths and felt her stomach flip. She opened her eyes and thought,
I felt like a woman, a pretty woman
.

When was the last time that happened?

Did he manage to make every woman he met feel as if she were the only woman on the planet? If so it was quite a gift and the fact he had seemed to like what he saw when he looked at her had been soothing to someone whose ego had taken several rounds of bashing recently.

The memory of the hungry, predatory gleam she had seen in his eyes surfaced and before she could push it away a rash of goose bumps erupted on the surface of her suddenly too hot skin. She felt a flash of shame, guiltily aware that she was getting turned on by the thought of a man she didn’t even like.

She wasn’t even sure that her half-baked suspicions were true. She’d invented an entire tragic back story on the flimsiest of evidence … It wouldn’t be the first time her soft heart—or soft head, according to her less gullible twin—had got her taken for a ride.

This could be like the time she had opened her purse to give the homeless guy with the sweet dog some change and been mugged, her purse and phone taken all over again. The
homeless guy turned out not to be homeless and he’d stolen the dog.

Now it wasn’t a dog, it was a cute kid. At least on this occasion the kid wasn’t stolen. She glanced at her watch and frowned.
He’s here and you’ll just have to work with it, Mirrie
, she told herself, adopting a brisk expression as she folded the damp tea towel. Her expression morphed into annoyance as she registered the time. Another hour and Joe would be here. She glanced down at her soiled shirt, her lips moving in a moue of distaste. She needed to change and move her things, which were still in the bedroom adjoining Liam’s.

Feeling an extreme reluctance to enter the room while Gianni was liable to walk in any moment, she chewed the plump curve of her lower lip, wondering if she should clear out her stuff now or wait until he had finished settling Liam.

How much longer was he going to be?

A bang on the ceiling above followed by the unmistakable sound of small running footsteps and childish laughter overlaid by a deeper base tone suggested that the answer was not any time soon.

She struggled to feel any sympathy for the man who was having trouble persuading his son it was time to go to bed. Even though she was not normally a person who took pleasure from the trials of others, Miranda did feel a small—all right, quite large—stab of ‘I told you so’ satisfaction … Only she hadn’t had the chance to tell him anything—he had cut her off at the knees when she had dared to offer advice.

When Miranda entered the bedroom she had used the previous night a few minutes later, the laughter had been replaced by sobs, so loud and inconsolable she gave a grimace of sympathy. Ashamed of her previous spite, she even felt a flash of admiration. She couldn’t hear what Gianni was saying, but
she was able to recognise the even-tempered soothing quality in his deep voice.