Surprised by Love (4 page)

A
week later, he viewed the site and Stevenson told him that some soil
contamination had been discovered.  Alessandro agreed to buy the
contaminated land for a very low price. 

 “Mission
accomplished,” said Connie, when he told her.

 “Will
you have dinner with me tonight, to celebrate our triumph?” he asked, and was
surprised to sense some anxiety as to her answer.    

 “Thank
you—I’d love to,” she said, giving him an incandescent smile. 

 “The
Café de Paris
at the Hilton, or the
Aztec Café
at the Acapulco?”
he asked. 

 “The
Café de Paris,
please,” said Connie, and Alessandro felt a sudden rush
of pleasure that her own preference coincided with his. 

 “Do
you like dining fairly late?” he asked next, wondering what she would
say.   

Connie
smiled.  “When I spent some time in Spain, Italy and Greece, I found it
easy to adjust to their later dinner hours.  At home, I often have dinner
latish.  Please pick the time you are comfortable with.”

A
woman after my heart,
he thought, but was careful not to say this out
loud.  “I’m glad you feel that way.  I’ll pick you up at 7:30, and
we’ll have a drink at my condo here, and I’ll ask Lucien at the
Café de
Paris
to reserve us a table for 9 o’clock.  Will that suit you?”

 “Perfectly,
thank you,” said Connie.

Chapter 3.

    
Once Connie got to her suite, she decided on a long, lazy bath rather than a
shower, and mentally reviewed her dinner dresses.  Lucien ran a tight ship
at the
Café—
he expected men to wear black tie, and women to wear long or
short evening gowns.  Now to pick something that Alessandro would like,
but that would not give him the idea she was trying to impress him… 

She
smiled to herself, and thought it had been a long time since she had bothered
to think about what to wear when having dinner with a man.   Briefly,
she mused about Bob’s nagging insistence on opulent gowns she detested and
refused to wear.  She shrugged deprecatingly.  He had never
understood that less is more.

She
got out of the tub, patting herself dry.  No use choosing underwear until
she had decided on a dress.  And then she knew what she would wear—an
elegant stem of a dress in a subtle jade green silk, the skirt split at the
back to her knees.  The top had shoelace straps, the front softly draped,
the back bare to the waist.  Very retro-chic.  It had a gossamer silk
chiffon wrap, and she’d had a pair of satin sandals and a clutch purse dyed
exactly the same green as the dress.  She grinned derisively.  Bob
had wanted to ‘liven up’ the dress with an ostentatious diamond necklace and
matching bracelet, a gold mesh evening bag and gold shoes—not that he had
succeeded.   She frowned the thought away, and went to her underwear
drawer.  Not even a demi-bra with this dress.  Just a thong. 
She nodded to herself.  Yes.             

****

 Promptly
at 7:30, there was a discreet knock at her suite’s door.  Connie opened,
smiling at Alessandro—immaculate in evening clothes.  “Good evening,
Alessandro.  Will you come in?”

She
was unprepared for the audible way Alessandro caught his breath, nor for the
way he sighed, “You look stunningly beautiful.”

“So
do you,” Connie said, her smile widening.  Alessandro laughed.  She
gestured for him to sit down somewhere, but he remained standing, gazing at
her.  “I’ll just get my bag and wrap,” she said, disappearing through a
door that evidently led to her bedroom.  When she came back, clutching her
evening bag, her wrap over her arm, Alessandro smiled at her.

“I
should’ve realized—” he began, and Connie completed his remark, adding, “that
I’d clean up nicely?”  He laughed, and that restored the tone between them
to its usual level.  The sudden heat in his voice, his eyes, had unsettled
her—particularly because she had sensed in herself an answering tension of
almost sexual awareness. 
Almost?  There was no ‘almost’ about
what I felt.  Most unusual.

“I’m
glad to see that this suite is elegant and you can comfortably wait here for
Marcella to buy you a condo.  And by the way, if you need time during the
day to view one, or deal with the designer, please take the time you need.”

“That’s
generous of you, Alessandro, and if I have to, I’ll do as you suggest, but in
general I hope this condo buying and designing will not interfere with my
work.  Lance Dumaresq will only phone me at night with suggestions, or
come by with samples, whatever.  Marcella will only want me to take one
look at the condo she chooses for me, and that can be done in the evening as
easily as during the day.  But thank you.” 

“Shall
we go?” he asked, adding, “I thought my penthouse might be more restful than
some so-called intimate bar where you can hardly find your drink in the Stygian
darkness.”  He smiled at her.  

“I
think your penthouse is an excellent idea,” said Connie happily.  “I’m not
much for the bar scene anyway, and what you say is quite right, these places
are kept so dark that you can hardly see your host’s face.”

“And
I wouldn’t be able to see my guest, and that would be a great shame,”
Alessandro added.  “Do you want to wear your wrap?  Let me help
you.”  He gently wrapped her in the folds of translucent chiffon, put an
arm around her waist and walked to the door.    

Connie
was of course familiar with the private elevator to Alessandro’s offices, but
she had never taken it to his security floor.  No one needed to, unless
invited to Alessandro’s penthouse.  When the elevator doors opened on the
security floor, one man went over instantly, and a man at a desk seemed very
alert.  A third man held back, half hidden in a niche.  The moment
they recognized Alessandro, the man who was walking over stopped in his tracks,
and the man at the desk relaxed.

“Evening,”
said Alessandro.  “This is Ms. Sherwood, and if she ever comes up to this
floor, I want you to assist her instantly to my penthouse.  No frisking,
checking briefcase, any of that.  Be sure to tell the others.”

The
men nodded, mumbling, “Yessir.”  Alessandro guided Connie to an elevator
in the far corner.  He put his hand against what seemed to be a
photo-sensitive square beside the elevator, and slid a keycard into a slot.

The
elevator went up one floor, and when the doors flew open on the penthouse
floor, Connie sucked in a breath.  She was deeply impressed by the
spacious hallway opening into a big, airy living room, with ivory silk sofas
and comfortable chairs in a pale green.  The furniture was of an unusual,
light wood. The walls were covered with a paler green silk.  Paintings
were suspended from a plate-rail about a foot below the ceiling. 

Connie
recognized the bronze standing lamps and table lamps on side tables as being
originals—Louis Comfort Tiffany.  She loved the serenity and the subtlety
of Alessandro’s living room. 

“It’s
awesome, Alessandro,” she all but whispered.  “The understated elegance,
the light…  You must be happy living here.”

He
smiled at her.  “My housekeeper will put in an appearance any…ah, there
she is.”  He nodded to Connie.  “My housekeeper, Mrs. Reid.”  He
turned to the woman.  “Mrs. Reid, this is Ms. Sherwood.  I haven’t
had the time yet to find out what she’d like to drink…”  Turning back to
Connie, he said, “Mrs. Reid makes a mean
martini,
or a
mojito?” 

Connie
smiled.  “I’m not much for strong drinks.  I’m better with
wine.  You said you prefer drinking wine at this time of the
evening.  Your choice will be fine for me.”

“If
you leave the choice to me, I would like us to drink some
Krug.”
 
Nodding to Mrs. Reid, he said, “
Krug,
please, Mrs. R.”  She nodded
and hurried away.

When
she returned, she had a tray with two crystal flutes and a silver ice-bucket in
which rested a bottle of champagne.  Mrs. Reid started fiddling with the
wire holding the cork in place, but Alessandro said, “I’ll do it, Mrs. R. 
Thank you.”  She nodded and left. 

In
no time at all, Alessandro had managed to get the cork out with a discreet
‘plop’ and no foaming excess.  He poured two flutes, gave one to Connie
and lifted his own to hers, touching rims.  Connie sipped and smiled up at
him.  “It is as delicious as I remembered from a dinner at Tom’s.”
  

He
sat down beside her again, careful not to sit too close.  He smiled to
himself.  Usually he had to guard against some woman crowding him, but
that was not the case here, nor would it ever be, he figured.  As a
business man, he could only be grateful that Connie had decided to keep men at
a distance—yet, he couldn’t help wishing that in time she would encourage a
closer relationship.

They
sat companionably together, sipping, idly chatting.  At one point, he
said, “I’ll have to go to Italy some time soon—not merely for business, but
also to see my
Nonna—
who is a bit frail—and my mother, who has been slow
to recover from influenza.”  He smiled whimsically.  “In a way that
was a bit of relief for me—from her never-ending attempts to get me married off
to one of her friends’ daughters.  Deeply boring young women,
convent-educated and born to shop.”

Connie
nodded.  “Your father is no longer alive?”

He
shook his head.  “No.  A heart attack, out of the blue, as far as we
could tell.  His doctor later said that he had been warning my father to
live a bit more carefully—but that wasn’t his nature.”

“I’m
sorry for your loss,” Connie said quietly. 

Alessandro
nodded.  “Thank you,” he said almost formally.  His voice changing
back to its usual friendly tone, he asked, “Tell me something about
yourself?  All I know about you is that you’re a widow, and that your
husband turned out not to be worth grieving for, and it made you decide never
again to let a man into your life.  I can’t help wondering what terrible
thing he did to you that caused your total aversion to men—would you mind
telling me?”

Connie
put her flute down and turned fully to Alessandro.  “Of course I’ll tell
you.  You realize that when someone has been in a terrible, fatal
accident, the authorities keep the body for an autopsy, until they are sure
what happened.  In this case, they soon realized that my husband died in a
chain-reaction pile-up, and they delivered the body quickly to the funeral
directors I had hired.  They organized a visitation—closed casket—and then
a memorial service and cremation.  Of course I was deeply upset that Bob
had to die in that horrible way, although I must confess that deep down I
thought that I could get rid of that ostentatious house, and find real work
again.”  Connie reached for her flute and took another sip.

“The
day after the memorial service, a young woman came to the house.  The
butler—yes, of course Bob had a butler—came to enquire whether I wanted to
receive the person.  That butler was as big a snob as Bob, and the way he
said ‘the person’ made me realize he didn’t approve of her for some
reason.  So of course I said I would see her.”  Connie glanced at
Alessandro, but he sat quietly beside her, all his attention on
her.   She went on. 

“She
was a very pretty young woman, who introduced herself as Violet Griffiths. I
thought she was some relation of Bob’s who had just missed his memorial
service.”  Connie shook her head.  “No.  She explained that she
was Bob’s wife, and she apologized for bothering me, his ex, but Bob had told
her he had to visit Ocean Breeze and sort something out with his ex.  And
she hadn’t seen him since.  Could I tell her where he had gone after
sorting out whatever it was with me and my lawyer?”

She
glanced at Alessandro, whose sudden intake of breath indicated his shock at
what he was hearing.

She
went on.  “Violet was so
nice,
and so obviously deeply in love with
Bob.  How could I tell her that he had married her bigamously, that I was
his legal widow?”  Connie shook her head.  “No.  I let her
continue to think I was his ex, and told her that he had been in a terrible
accident on his way back to her.  It didn’t occur to her to think that it
was passing strange his body had not been delivered to her.  She seemed
quite naïve—apparently she thought that the authorities had done the cremation,
and I let her believe that.” 

Connie
sighed.  “One thing I can tell you—when I realized that Bob had been
systematically unfaithful to me with Violet, I ceased mourning him in a
hurry.  Did Tom tell you that?”

Alessandro
nodded.  “Only that something had happened that made you stop mourning
your husband right then and there.  Forgive me if telling me all this has
upset you all over again.  I wouldn’t want that for anything—”

Connie
gave him a brilliant smile.  “It doesn’t bother me, telling you about
this.  As you have no doubt guessed by now, the marriage was not very
happy, at least from my point of view.  I felt deceived, because if Bob
had told me before the wedding that he would want me to stop working, I would
not have married him.  Our life was one ostentatious occasion after
another.  You’ve seen the outside of the house?”  When Alessandro
nodded, she said, “The inside matches, believe me.  He tried to get me to
wear pretentious gowns and too much jewelry…”  A corner of her mouth lifted
for a moment.  “Not that he succeeded.  But as you can understand, I
was unhappy—and he must’ve been too, to marry Violet bigamously.”