‘There’s no way I’ll be doing that,’ she said swiftly. ‘What about Vivi?’

Josh tilted back in his chair. ‘You won’t have to worry. You’ll be safe. Tell him you have a little mouth to feed and he’ll take one look at your big blue eyes and crumble. Italians are crazy about kids.’

Something like a major earthquake redistributed her insides. ‘Yeah?’ she said faintly. ‘Where’d you hear that? Surely every nationality is crazy about their kids.’

Josh’s eyes, as blue as her own, were earnest. ‘No, honestly. It’s true. Genuine Italians-the real Italians from Italy-are particularly family oriented. I know, because there was an article about it in last month’s Alpha.’

Amidst the laughter that followed, no one would have noticed that hers had a false ring. She’d read those things about Italians too. Their horror of broken families and children brought up without both parents. The sacrifices even the poorest of families were prepared to make to clothe and educate their children with the finest money could buy, as a matter of family honour. And what if they were a proud, aristocratic family? Would a marchese be happy to leave his child on the other side of the world?

Now that crunch time had arrived, would she be telling him about Vivi, and what exactly? The scenarios that opened before her if she did were frightening to contemplate. Six years were a long time. The things she’d understood about Alessandro then with such certainty were now all adrift. It was clear she’d never known him at all.

He had a right, of course, to know about his child. But what if he were one of those men who snatched their children and whisked them out of the country? Vivi wasn’t a little tree who could be uprooted and transplanted across the world in London, or Venice. She was five, for heaven’s sake. A baby. She only knew Newtown and her grandma, her school, the park…The King Street shops and the library, her little friends…

After Alessandro’s reaction to her this morning, Lara needed to decide what to tell him, and how. Calm, brisk and unemotional would be best, of course, if she could be like that. The interviews could start at any minute. If she could just work out something she could say-maybe write it down and rehearse it…

Er…By the way, Alessandro, I think you should know…Incidentally, Alessandro, have I mentioned…?

The interviews started after morning tea. People either came back with worried expressions, or exclaiming over things Donatuila had said. How sinister Alessandro was. How scary, how gorgeous.

They found themselves speaking in whispers. ‘Oh, my God. Did you see his eyes? Those lashes are an inch long, I’ll bet.’

‘And his voice. That accent. What is it, London mixed with Italian?’

‘That’s not ordinary Italian. That’s Sicilian. Betcha.’

A frightening rumour did the rounds that David from Finance had been told to empty his desk and given his marching orders.

The usual small congregation around the photocopier failed to materialise, and for once everyone resisted getting coffee from the machine between breaks to take back to their desks. Lara waited for her turn, struggling to work while she contemplated the things she would say to the stranger who was the father of her child.

She declined going out for lunch with the others. Her boots pinched her feet, and, anyway, who could eat?

Beryl’s head jerked around Alessandro’s door. ‘Excuse me, Mr Vincenti, the builders are here.’

Alessandro thanked her, gave Tuila leave to break for lunch, then rose and stretched his long limbs before walking outside to meet the architect. He shook hands with the man, then they strolled along, discussing the layout of the rooms while the workmen wandered ahead, pencils tucked behind their ears, pointing out things about the wainscoting, measuring up floor space and window spans.

With the present layout, the rooms were too cramped, Alessandro explained, pausing outside the editorial office to indicate through the glass partition the number of desks crammed into the narrow space.

The room was empty of staff. Appeared to be, that was. Until, while the architect was examining the walls and suggesting ways of dealing with the problem, Alessandro caught sight of a blonde head bent over the coffee machine in the corner of the room.

That sensation again, as if something were crushing the air from his lungs.

He saw Lara Meadows turn to make some smiling response to one of the workmen, and for the second time that day the immediacy of her struck the chords of his memory like an assault. The pale fresh skin of her cheek. The grace of her hands…

That way she had of teasing a man with her laugh without any attempt to flirt. Dio, love the woman or hate her, her honesty and openness were still so appealing.

Despite the firewalls erected around his heart, desire, quick and hot, licked along his veins and stirred his loins with the old treacherous urgency.

To quell the bittersweet surge, he moved away from the partition. The architect talked and Alessandro listened, nodded, made the appropriate responses, all the while wrestling with devil fire. A temptation burned in him to take one more look at her, but he fought it. Steeling himself to ignore the craving, he concentrated on the conversation.

Discipline was what was needed. There was no denying her presence was a lighted fuse in his imagination. Now that he’d talked to her, seen her such a short distance from his office, he would have to think of a way to neutralise her effect. Regardless of his brain, his will, his body was plainly still in a time warp.

It didn’t have to be difficult, he mused on the walk back to his office after he’d finished with the architect. The way was clear. Keep her at a distance until he was used to the idea of her again. Avoid hearing her voice, smelling her perfume…

Don’t allow that laugh of hers to affect him. Don’t give her the chance to beguile him with her wiles until he was ready for her.

Ready for her? an evil little unbidden voice chimed in. He was ready now.

Ridiculous, his reason stormed to defend the barricades. He was a civilised man. He’d never been a guy driven by his lusts.

Unless it was lust for Lara Meadows, the voice fired back with sly persistence.

Alessandro ran a finger around the inside of his collar. Dio mio, why had he come up with the interview scheme? Already she was invading his thoughts again, distracting him, infecting his bloodstream like a poisonous narcotic. The only way to ensure against her insidious way of creeping through the steel walls of his determination was to hold her at arm’s length.

In fact, he should cancel her interview altogether. He had no desire to risk being alone with her again, had he?

As the afternoon wore on Lara’s suspense grew. Everyone from Editorial had been invited except for her, and now people from other sections were being called in. Was Alessandro making her wait on purpose?

What if he expected her to stay after five to make up for her late arrival? Her mother would be waiting with Vivi, anxious to be released for her oboe lesson.

It was all very well for Signor Vincenti to insist on rules and punctuality. He wasn’t a mother, with an eager five-year-old waiting for her dinner and bursting to share the excitements of her big day at school. Certainly he might, unknown to him by some quirk of fate, be a father, but in the current situation that was a mere technicality. In fact, from certain angles his ignorance of that small detail could be viewed as a plus.

For one thing it gave her a breathing space. Instead of her leaping to inform him at once, like a trusting fool, the responsible thing would be to suss out the lay of the land.

Weigh up his attitudes. See if he even liked children. After all, could she seriously contemplate inviting him into Vivi’s life if he was likely to be a negative influence? And what about his wife? Vivi’s stepmother?