Chapter 1

CHAPTER ONE

T HERE WERE MANY REASONS Dante Santoro enjoyed coming to this villa high on a cliff on the edge of Lake Como whenever he could, and in no small part it was because nobody in the world, including his family, knew that he owned this place.

He had bought it when he'd thought he would go mad with grief, when he had needed to be completely alone with the heartbreak and desolation that had come from losing his wife and daughter in the most unimaginable of ways. Even now, five years after their deaths, the tentacles of grief were firmly wrapped around him, so as he looked out at the brooding winter-scape of this famous part of Italy, saw a thick fog rolling across the steel-grey water, and he was glad. Glad for the weather matching his mood, glad for this time of year when the sky was dark and leaden, glad that the hordes of cheery tourists who descended upon Como in the summer months were thin on the ground. And glad, most of all, for his villa's remoteness and virtual inaccessibility—on a hook in the lake, a narrow, steep road was the only ingress, so perilous that only those with knowledge of the villa would dare attempt to use it.

Which was why, as he looked out on the decidedly moody vista, a palette of greys and muted alpine greens, and glimpsed a flash of colour, he leaned forward, his body tightening with a strange sense of adrenaline.

What was it? A balloon? A drone?

There it was again!

Bright red, flying in the fast-moving wind. Fabric? Yes. Fabric. He relaxed. It could be from anywhere, anyone. It was not a person. He was still alone.

Only, just as that reassuring thought spread through his mind, he saw more movement, this time, a turquoise jacket, attached to a body that was chasing after the scarf with an elegance he could appreciate even at this distance. Elegance? A child? For surely this person was a child, or perhaps, he supposed, a diminutively-built adult.

Fight or flight responses were beyond anyone's control and Dante's had been honed by the accident that had claimed his family.

He would not see another person hurt on his watch.

Something tightened his gut as without another moment's thought he turned, striding through the building, grabbing his coat at the door then breaking into a sprint. His villa was elevated with a huge drop right where this person was running fast. They were so intent on chasing the fabric that he knew the person was only seconds from disaster.

He ran faster, his heart in his throat.

Not again.

Georgia laughed—God, it felt so good to laugh—as she reached for the errant scarf once more, shaking her head at how the fabric seemed to have taken on a life of its own. "You bloody thing. Get back here this minute," she muttered, employing the tone of voice she might have used on the twins when they were younger, in an (often futile) attempt to corral them into order. But the scarf was as receptive to her scolding as her younger brothers had been, so she stopped, out of breath from a ten minute chase, standing with her hands on her hips and staring as it snagged on a branch well and truly out of reach.

But as a child, Georgia had been an exceptional tree-climber. Her father had taught her to always have one hand connected to a branch, but so long as that grip was stable and you could get a good foot hold, the sky was the limit. She was just about to begin her ascent when a pair of hands closed around her shoulders, gripping her tightly and spinning her around, bringing her face to face with a pair of eyes that were so impossibly dark they reminded her of midnight. He was too close to make out his features with any clarity, but there was a look in his eyes that caused her spine to tingle.

"What the hell are you doing?" He asked in English, though his voice was accented. How did he know she wasn't Italian, she wondered in the back of her mind, as she found she could only stare back at him. Her brain, and mouth, wouldn't work.

"Do you speak English?" He asked in Italian now, so she nodded. She'd studied Italian for years, when she could, because she'd known that as soon as the boys went off to college, Italy would be the first place she'd visit. Just as she'd wanted to back then, before the accident had fundamentally altered the entire course of her life.

"My scarf came loose," she said, quirking a brow upwards, as if to indicate the location of said scarf. "I have been chasing it down for over ten minutes but it doesn't seem to want to be caught. Perhaps it doesn't like my perfume," she attempted a joke, but the man's face was tense, his eyes cold.

"This is not funny."

She frowned. "What's not?"

"Do you have any idea how close you are to the edge?"

She glanced over her shoulder and her lips quirked downwards. While she was, in fact, nearer than she'd realized, there was still a meter or so between herself and the cliff.

"An inch is as good as a mile, I always think."

"Ridiculous. You know nothing of this place. The clifftops are not always steady. Landslides happen. You were not even looking."

While all of that was true, she couldn't help but be aggravated at the high handed tone of this man she'd never met in her life.

"Yeah, well, what does it matter to you anyway? It's my life. If I want to fling myself down into Lake Como, so what?"

A muscle throbbed low in his jaw and his fingers tightened on her arms, though she suspected he didn't realise it.

"This is my land," he ground out. "If you have a death wish, take it somewhere else."

"Your land?" She stared at him, perplexed. "How could I have known that? There are no signs, there's no fence. I just followed a path."

"There is no path."

"Well, okay, not exactly a path, but I found my way through the trees?—, "

He made a snorting sound.

"I don't have a death wish," she sobered. "I really was just trying to catch my scarf."

Georgia was strong. She'd had to be, raising the boys from when they were thirteen years old and the alternative had been sending them to a foster home. She had dealt with all sorts of things, and had learned to keep her temper even when it was sparking inside her belly, and she tried to do exactly that now. But the truth was, there was something about this man that was unsettling and infuriating and Georgia struggled not to react.

"Your scarf is gone. Unless you plan to—," he swore under his breath. "That's what you were about to do, isn't it?"

"What?" Her voice was mutinous.

"Climb the damned tree? For a scarf?"

"It's my favourite," she said, not telling him that it had also been her late mother's. There was nothing about this arrogant man that made her want to confide in him. "So if you wouldn't mind unhanding me, I'll get it back and be on my way."

"You have got to be kidding me."

Her eyes widened. "I thought you said this isn't funny?"

"Why do I think you are deliberately goading me?"

"Perhaps you're someone who thinks the world revolves around you?" She asked with mock innocence, as though truly trying to help him figure out his question. "And I told you, let me go."

He dropped his hands immediately, as though he'd been burned, staring at her shoulder with a look of consternation that stupidly made her want to reassure him that he hadn't actually hurt her, but she didn't.

"You are not to climb that tree."

"Oh yeah? Who's going to stop me?"

He crossed his arms over his chest. "You really need to ask?"

"I want my scarf back," she said, not moving.

"You can buy another scarf."

"No, I can't."

He frowned. "It's a piece of fabric."

"So?" She lifted one shoulder. "I'm not asking you to climb the tree, though a gentleman would have offered, instead of shouting at me."

"I was not shouting." He gestured to the sky beyond the trees. It was growing thicker and darker by the minute. "A storm is coming, and it's predicted to be bad. I would suggest that instead of worrying about a damned scarf, you get the hell off my land and back to wherever you're staying. It's not safe to be out in this."

"It's just a storm," she said with a lift of her shoulders. "Believe me, I've been through worse."

He ground his teeth. "And here we are, back at the question of your death wish."

"For a guy who looks like he's part-Gladiator, you really are a bit of a wuss."

At that, the man laughed, and the sound was so unexpected, so ridiculously warm, that Georgia's eyes flew wide open and she stared at him as though she'd never heard laughter before. It was over as quickly as it had begun.

"You are conflating common sense with cowardice. What a silly thing to do." He leaned closer then, his face only inches from hers, so she saw that she'd been wrong. His eyes were not pitch black; there were flecks of amber around the pupil, and a woody brown that made them fox-like.

She rolled her eyes. "Okay, whatever. I'm not leaving without the scarf so if you want me off your property, give me a leg up."

"I'm not going to be a party to this."

"Fine, have it your way," she muttered. But as she took a step backwards and turned away from him, his hand came out, snaking around her wrist.

"Don't."

She pulled her arm free.

"I will come out once the storm has passed. If the scarf is still there, I'll retrieve it and have it sent to your accommodation."

"How kind of you," she drawled, and even though it was kind, her tone dripped with sarcasm. "But I think I'll save you the trouble. Excuse me."

She heard his curse though it was uttered under his breath, but she ignored him. At the base of the tree, she looked up, realized the scarf was higher than she'd first appreciated and a frisson of fear ran down her spine. But no way was she going to show even a hint of that in front of this guy, who'd been so arrogantly smug.

Closing her eyes for a second and praying, as she always did, for her mother's strength and her father's protection, she jumped up to the lowest branch, delighted and relieved in equal measure when her hands wrapped around it and held. The bark was slippery and rough but tree climbing was a definite super-hero strength of Georgia's. Though she hadn't done it for years, muscle memory was a formidable thing, and her general fitness and athletic abilities meant she had an advantage he hadn't appreciated. She was relishing the prospect of showing him how wrong he'd been.

Dante watched with a knot in his gut and a grudging sense of amazement. He hadn't seriously expected her to go through with this, nor, in fact, for her to be able to go through with it, for the simple reason that the lowest branch was fairly high off the ground. If he'd thought she was serious, he would have insisted on going up the tree himself, even though it was clearly a terrible idea. Only, he hadn't anticipated the way she'd spring off the ground, cat like, and grab hold of the branch, swinging back and forth, dangerously close to the cliff's edge, until she could hook one leg over a slightly higher branch and pull herself up. From there, the branches were close enough together that she was able to move almost as one might climb a ladder. Fast, nimble, genuinely fascinating.

It was no surprise he'd thought she might be a child at first. She was slim and petite, probably only a little over five feet, maybe five and a half, and her hair—a long, dark blonde—was pulled back into the kind of ponytail his parents' goddaughter Sofia used to wear when she was about ten years old.

She wore fitted jeans and a thick, padded jacket with a hood that hung down her back. Her lack of gloves was unwise in this weather, though it clearly made the tree-climbing easier.

"There," she said, triumphantly, turning to look down at him, but too fast, so her foot slipped and her eyes widened in alarm. He swore, moving instinctively into the position that would enable him to catch her, mentally calculating how many branches were between her and him and how likely it was that her head would connect with at least one of them, when she stabled herself by leaning forward, and let out a small laugh. "Whoopsies. That was close."

"Whoopsies," he muttered, anger rising in him like lava and flame. He wanted this woman off his property. She might not have a death wish, but she sure as hell invited it with her idiotic decision making.

"I'm coming down," she called unnecessarily, putting the scarf around her throat, catching her ponytail in it, as she began her descent. It was as nimble as her climb up the tree. Fast and assured, she moved from branch to branch almost as though she had been a primate in a past life. On the lowest branch she sat, dangling her legs, assessing the best spot to jump down to, but there, Dante drew a line.

"I'm here," he muttered. "I'll catch you."

Her eyes flew to his. "That's not necessary."

His temper sparked. "Could you not argue with me about everything?"

"I'm not, I'm just saying?—,"

"Get down here," he interrupted curtly. "The storm is coming. If you want to get back to your accommodation before it hits, you need to leave now. "

"Fine." She glared at him though, placed her hands on either side of her hips, then pushed off the branch with a neat little leap that would have looked at home in an international gymnastics arena. Despite his request, she aimed to the side of him. Foolish, foolish woman. The ground there was covered with moss, not grass, and it was slippery from the moisture in the air. Her feet connected and she turned to him with a look of triumph and slipped, one ankle twisting as she rolled towards the ground. He caught her without a moment's forethought or rational consideration. He caught her because he was close enough to reach his hands out and steady her, bringing her body back to standing, close enough to see the way she winced a little and knowing she'd hurt her ankle.

He closed his eyes in frustration. " Are you okay?"

"I'm fine," she responded, shaking her arms, but for some reason Dante didn't let her go. She was so warm. The contrast to the feeling of her body against his and the icy cold day was doing something totally foreign to his pulse. Something he hadn't felt in a long, long time was stirring inside of him. It was that which made him drop his grip and step back, angry with himself now, and with her, and the whole damned situation.

"I hope the scarf was worth it."

"It was."

His eyes narrowed. "You should leave," he muttered. "The road will be at risk of fallen branches. I would suggest you drive carefully but I suggest doing anything with care is beyond your skillset."

And with that, he turned and left, determined to blank the woman completely from his memory banks. A storm was coming, and Dante wanted nothing more than to sit inside and stare out at it, to feel the heavens open up and weep, to join him in his state of perpetual misery. And for that, he wanted solitude.