Chapter 2

CHAPTER TWO

B E FRIENDS WITH HIM? YEAH right, she fumed, as she shoved her shirt off over her head and reached for the bathroom tap, turning it on and wetting her hands. She gingerly tapped at her chest—the cocktail had made her skin sticky. She looked longingly at the shower but the very idea of stripping naked in his palatial ensuite was anathema to Maddie. She wanted this to be a surgical operation—in and out of his penthouse suite in sixty seconds, if she could manage it. She dabbed at her chest, then reached for the shirt he'd handed her. Way too big, as he'd said, but with the buttons done up and the tails tucked into her jeans, it would at least do the job of getting her home without incident.

She took a few additional seconds to tame her wayward hair and out of nowhere, a childhood memory cut through her, so intense it took her breath away. Her mother, with her own riot of auburn curls, reaching out and running a hand over Maddie's. "Like wildfire," she'd smiled. "Wildfire and magic." Maddie's heart had lifted, because she loved her mom and when her mom said things like that, she felt as though she was the beginning and end of her mother's whole existence. Wasn't that the way it was meant to be? Maybe. Maybe, until it wasn't.

Until you ceased to exist, even to your own mother.

She ground her teeth and backed out of the ensuite, striding through the large bedroom with the king-size bed and panoramic views of New York city, trying not to visualize Rocco in this space, and how he would inhabit it. The bed, the room, the splendour of it all. How at home he would be, somewhere like this, in contrast to how completely out of her depth Maddie felt.

Was it any wonder he couldn't appreciate the charm and uniqueness of a row of old weatherboard two story homes with their tin roofs and peeling paint? Their wrap around decks with porch swings and ancient potted plants? Lawns that all ran together, because these houses had been built before neighbours decided they wanted to put fences up between themselves. These were houses from a bygone era, when the people you lived near were more than just friends—they were like family.

Her throat thickened but she refused to give into the sentimentality of those thoughts here. She'd entered the dragon's lair; she had no intention of letting him see her without her shields raised.

"Better?"

He'd poured two glasses of wine, ice cold, buttery yellow, in elegant crystal glasses that had a fine bead of perspiration courtesy of the temperature of the drinks.

"Thank you," she clipped out, though he was the last man on earth she felt like thanking. "I'll send the shirt back to you in the morning."

"Keep it," he shrugged. Of course. Despite the fact it was a designer brand. What did Rocco Santoro care about a thousand-dollar piece of cotton? He probably had a hundred of the things.

"Whatever." She couldn't keep the disapproval from her tone. She hesitated though before leaving, because there seemed to be something more she should say. Some line she needed to draw to clarify her position. "So…we understand each other?"

"I wouldn't say that."

"Then allow me to clarify. I want you to stay away from us."

"I can't do that."

"Of course you can," she crossed her arms and when his eyes dropped lower it had nothing to do with the spilled drink and her body's response couldn't be even partially attributed to the coolness of the cocktail. Her breath was husky when she spoke. "It's as simple as losing his number."

"I've spent tens of millions of dollars on this venture already. I have no intention of walking away, no matter how many times you huff and puff at me."

Her jaw dropped. "Are you…laughing at me?"

"I'm being honest," he said, but his lips quirked in a way that sparked fire in her bloodstream. "I want his house; I intend to get it."

"You think it's that simple?"

"Nothing worth having is ever really simple."

"How erudite. Did you get that out of a fortune cookie?"

He laughed, a gruff, low rumble. "Has anyone ever told you you're a condescending snob?"

"You're calling me a snob?" she gestured around the penthouse.

"Sure. You act like you're better than everyone, like working to make money is a sin."

She gawped at him, shocked to her core. "I don't act like I'm better than everyone," she said after a pause that crackled with animosity. "I think I'm better than you , but that's not saying much. I mean, the whole world knows that you put money above anyone and everyone and have done it all your life. You're famous for it."

"Yes, the internet is full of lovely facts about my life," he muttered, dragging a hand through his hair.

"Whose fault is that?"

"Mine, I'm supposing?"

She glared at him. "Damn straight. So?"

"So?" He reached for the wine glasses and began to prowl towards her. Yes, prowl. There was no other word for his long, intent gait. He moved with deceptive ease, as though he were relaxed, but she felt an intensity humming through him and it set her pulse quivering. When he was just across from her, he held a glass out. "Drink some wine with me."

She blanched, as if he'd just suggested making a pact with the devil. Which he might as well have. "No, thank you," she responded crisply. Primly.

"Why not? You came here to talk to me, didn't you? So, let's talk."

"I came here to tell you how I feel."

"That's not how negotiations work."

"I'm not negotiating with you."

"But your grandfather is."

She sucked in a breath. "He would never sell without my agreement."

"That's true," Rocco nodded slowly. "He loves you enough to sacrifice anything for you. I'm just wondering why you don't feel the same way about him."

She gasped, reaching for the wine glass with half a mind to throw it in his face. "You don't know anything about our relationship."

He lifted one shoulder as if in silent acceptance of that, but she wasn't fooled. He was not the kind of man to let an argument go. He was just pausing to regroup, working out his next plan of attack. She took a sip of the wine, wishing it didn't taste quite so extraordinarily delicious, or that she didn't feel as though her nerves needed it quite so badly.

"He wants to sell," Rocco said quietly.

"He feels pressured to sell. That's not the same thing."

"Why are you so sure I'm wrong?"

"Because I know him," she said crisply. "He has lived in that house since before he was married. He brought his bride across that threshold, he brought his daughter home and raised her there, he raised me there. It's his home."

"It's your home," Rocco said, with a gentleness she didn't trust.

But what was the point in disputing that?

"We don't all want this," she waved around the penthouse. "For some of us, the idea of keeping something old and special in the family is all we've dreamed of all our lives."

"You want to keep the home and what? Live out your days there? Is that really the sum total of your dreams?"

She clamped her lips together on a wave of impatience. "My dreams aren't at issue." She took another sip of her wine.

"Actually, they're at the very heart of this," he contradicted with quiet surety. "If your grandfather sells to me, you'll have enough money."

"For what?"

"Whatever you want. And he'll have more than enough to move to a retirement community."

"Please, he'd hate that."

"Are you so sure?"

"Please," she repeated, more emphatically. "Stop acting as though you know him better than I do. He's my grandpa. We've spent my whole life talking about what we want, and his dream is the same as mine: to stay at Honeybee Lane."

"Dreams change," he said, sipping his own wine. "Have you asked him recently?"

"If he wanted to sell, he would have told me. Instead, he's said it's up to me."

"Because he doesn't want to pull the rug out from under you. That's not the same thing as being what he wants."

Her jaw dropped. His logic was infuriating—and impeccable. Was it possible she was wrong about her grandfather?

But…the house. The house was a grand old dame, heavy with history and memories. The record player in the lounge was the beating heart at its centre, the soundtrack to their lives. The music he and grandma had danced to after dinner, every night, lost in their own world as the crackly ancient tracks whispered into the wallpaper-lined room. Everything was just as it had been when they'd first married, with the exception of a few mobility aids Maddie had gotten installed in recent years. Her grandfather was still fit and strong, but he was a little less sure on his feet, a little more prone to slips. She had come home six months ago to find him with a gash on his forehead, and he hadn't been sure how it had happened. A concussion had been diagnosed at the local doctor's surgery—Maddie had made sure the handles and railings were installed the very next day, along with ensuring her grandfather wore a device that would call her at the press of a button, if he ever hurt himself again .

"Is this what you do?" She asked, turning it back on him. "Do you undermine people until they're so confused they sell out of a misplaced sense of altruism? As if it would be the ‘best thing' for my grandpa? He'd be bereft without that house, Rocco. Bereft."

"Him, or you?"

"Don't act as though you know me."

"You're not the first overly sentimental homeowner I've dealt with."

"Overly sentimental?" she repeated, outraged. "How dare you?"

"What would you call yourself?"

She gaped for air before getting out an indignant reply. "Appropriately attached."

Another laugh, short and sharp and totally devoid of amusement.

"It's not funny!" She jabbed her finger at his chest, then held it there, enjoying the sensation of pushing at him, surprising herself with the almost violent instinct. "None of this is funny."

"You are not thinking clearly, Maddie."

"How can you say that? I've been thinking clearly from the first moment he told me about your stupid offer, and how the rest of the street had gone gaga for the dollar signs you waved in their eyes."

"You've been feeling since then. Feeling hurt, outraged, betrayed, terrified. And you're acting on those feelings now. If you were thinking, you'd see that he can't live in that house forever, and that you're not going to want to, when the houses around it get knocked down and redeveloped."

She gasped. "You can't—you can't do that. Not if we don't sell."

"That's incredibly na?ve."

She glared at him, but the world was tilting beneath her feet. She didn't know who she was, where she was, what made sense and what didn't. She didn't recognize anything about herself, or her feelings, or the man opposite her. Feelings and emotions were flooding her body, and he was right about one damned thing: she couldn't think straight.

"I have a team of architects working on new plans as we speak. If your grandfather won't sell, we'll build around him."

That snapped her focus back where it belonged. She'd seen a movie a few years back where something exactly like that happened. A little old man had his house turned into a relic by the modern buildings that enclosed it on all sides. She didn't want that for Jack's house. "It will look preposterous."

"It's not ideal," he agreed with a smug line on his mouth that she wanted to loosen. "But you leave me very little choice."

"You have all the choices in the world. Walk away from this. Build somewhere else."

"Tear down other people's homes, not your own? That's not solving the problem, it's just moving it to someone else's lap."

Somehow, he'd managed to take an argument that was founded on love and a desire to do what was right for her grandfather and made her feel incredibly selfish. "Then don't tear down homes," she muttered. "Build things without destroying beauty and history first."

"Do you think I have no respect for the past, Maddie?"

For some reason, it bothered her that he was using the diminutive of her name. He, who was trying to destroy her life. He, the perennial bachelor. He, too suave and handsome for his own good, and all smug and patronizing. "You know what? My friends call me Maddie. You can call me Maddison. And yes, that's exactly what I think."

"Well, Maddison—," only hearing her full name on his lips was so, so much worse. She flinched at the words, at what his rich, cultured accent did to them. His pronunciation was akin to Mad-dee-sun, with the emphasis on the middle syllable, and he rolled it around in his mouth in a way that was effortlessly provocative. She dug her fingernails into her palms, little fists formed at her sides. "That shows how little you know about me. I am Italian; I grew up in a culture that is steeped in the past, in traditions and history. These things matter to me."

She made a scoffing noise.

"But these houses are not history."

Her jaw dropped.

"Not in the sense of architectural merit."

"You are so, so wrong."

He arched a brow.

"I know they're not fancy, but that's not the point. They speak of a different time, a different era."

"And there are many streets with houses just like them. To lose these will not impact the feeling of the area."

"You say that now, but what about when you and your rich developer friends get your hands on all of the houses, and knock each of them over to make way for modern progress?" How could he fail to understand the point she was making?

"We are talking about one house, one street?—,"

"I'm talking about the principle of this. Can't you see how wrong it is to destroy that beauty just because you want to make money?"

"Progress is inevitable. If it wasn't me, it would be someone else. "

"That doesn't make you sound any better to me."

"Will it bother you to know how little I care?"

She gasped. That wasn't suave. That wasn't charming. It was downright rude. "You are—just—so?—,"

"Yes?" He waited, a parody of patience.

"You'll never get his house," she said, and she jabbed his chest for emphasis. She hadn't been expecting it to be so firm, and warm, yet she didn't pull her finger away. "I felt strongly about that before I met you, but now? You can just…"

"Go to hell?" He prompted, when she couldn't find words.

"Hell would be too good for you."

He laughed then, a rich sound that caught her off guard. She felt it rumble through his chest and realized she was still pressing her finger there.

He caught it before she could remove it, and pulled it away, holding her hand at her side. Heat flooded her body in a way that made her pulse thready.

"Can't you just leave us alone?"

Obviously, he was acting on autopilot. There was no other way to explain the way his thumb padded the back of her hand, stroking it with slow, gentle intent.

"Correct me if I'm wrong, but you're the one who came to my hotel."

Her jaw dropped. That had been completely innocent—a situation of necessity. But he made it sound somehow so…sensual. Sleazy. Hot. She swallowed, contemplated pulling away from him. She should definitely pull her hand back at least, to reclaim some modicum of common sense and control of the situation. "To talk about the development," she said, then shook her head, contradicting that. "Or why there shouldn't be a development. "

His other hand lifted to her face, a finger brushing her skin as if he couldn't stop himself. The moment his fingertip connected with her flesh, she shuddered. "Why does it matter so much to you?"

"It should matter to everyone," she said, after a beat. Earlier, she'd been convinced her grandfather had told him all about her—her childhood, her abandonment by her mother, being raised by her grandparents in that simple, unassuming beach house with views for miles and a warmth in the walls that could never be replicated. But now, she wasn't so sure. If he knew why the house mattered so much, why ask the question?

"It's a matter of principle," she obfuscated, then jerked away from him. Ice cold flooded her veins, where seconds earlier, heat had sparked.

"I suppose we'll have to agree to disagree."

"What does that even mean?"

"That you won't see my side, and I won't see yours. So, we're at an impasse."

"Sure, but you're still going to harass my grandfather until you get his house, right?"

"It's not harassment to offer an old man a fortune to sell a home that's too big for him."

"It's—God, you are impossible. It's my home, too, Rocco."

"Your name is not on the deeds."

"No, but it's where I live. Where I've lived for—a long time."

"What do you do, Maddie?"

Her eyes widened. "I'm—what?"

"What do you do, for a living?"

Her jaw dropped. "I can't see what business that is of yours."

"It's just, you're what? Twenty-four? Twenty-five?"

She ground her teeth. She'd turned twenty-five a month ago. "So?"

"So, I presume you live with him by choice, perhaps because you think he needs you. Wouldn't a part of you be excited to be freed from that responsibility? To be able to take some money and live your own life?"

"You just pointed out, it's his money, not mine. And believe it or not, I don't see living with my grandfather as anything other than a privilege." She tilted her chin with angry defiance. "I love him and would do anything for him. I guess that's a concept way above your paygrade though."

And with that, she turned on her heel with the intention of fleeing Rocco Santoro for the second time that night.

He caught her at the door though, his long stride an easy match for hers. "Why do you think you can throw insults at me and then walk away?"

He stood blocking the door—and her escape route. "Oh, really? You're going to hold me hostage?"

"That's not a terrible idea," he muttered. "Your freedom in exchange for the house. Do you think your grandfather would go for it?"

Her jaw dropped. "You're kidding, right?"

"I don't joke about business." He crossed his arms. "I have no interest in holding you hostage, except that, in my experience, negotiating a deal starts with dialogue. You're talking at me. Throwing accusations at me, insulting me, rather than speaking to me about what you want."

"I think I've made that clear; I want you to leave us alone. "

"And I've said, that's not going to happen. The sooner you accept that, the better for all of us."

She made a noise of frustration.

"You are in a commanding position, Maddison."

She fought an urge to ask him to call her Maddie after all—way less threatening to her equilibrium.

"While I am prepared to continue with the development minus your grandfather's house, it's far from desirable—for any of us. Let's take it as a foregone conclusion that at some point, you'll accept my offer. Tell me what would make that worthwhile for you."

"Nothing."

"I don't believe you."

"There's nothing you have that I want."

"I'm very wealthy."

She rolled her eyes. "Well, gee. That's just a wonderful conversation starter."

Silence crackled between them. "What happened in your life to make you so caustic?"

Caustic? He spoke English with a heavy accent but could grasp a word like ‘caustic'? She thrust a hand onto her hip. "Oh, sure. It has to be that I'm caustic, not that you're abrasive?"

"Perhaps it's both."

"Which sounds like a recipe for disaster to me."

"It's a recipe for something," he muttered under his breath, and with a flick of his eyes, he glanced at her lips and her whole body reacted as if struck by lightning. She felt as if her feet were smoking. It was just a look. A fleeting glance! Yet there she stood, in virtual flames.

Was he right? Was this kind of animosity a recipe for something other than enmity?

"Whatever," she replied, but her voice trembled a little. "You just…you need to stay out of my life, and I'll stay out of yours."

"Is that what you want?" He asked and damn it if he didn't lift his hand and place it on the wall to her side, like some kind of power move, trapping her where she was in a way she knew she should hate. But really, really didn't. Up close, he was just so hyper-masculine. So incredibly…attractive.

"I want?—,"

He reached for her chin, pressing a finger there, tilting her face up. His eyes on her lips now were more than a mechanism for heat; they were a prelude. A promise. She held her breath, the world tilting sideways.

She wanted him to kiss her. No way was she going to admit that to him. No way could she ever let him know. But to herself, she was honest. It scared the heck out of her just how much she wanted to feel his lips on hers.

How much she craved that physical connection.

How long had it been since she'd been touched by a man? Kissed? Looked at in this way?

Desire flooded her body, but she knew better than to trust it. She knew better than to trust any of her instincts when it came to men. The breakup with Brock might have happened years ago, but the mistakes she'd made back then were burned into her brain. So was what he'd done to her afterward—the pain of that betrayal was something that had changed her for life. She had never known what men were capable of until then.

"I want you to get out of our life," she muttered. "I wish I'd never heard the name Rocco Santoro."

"But you have," he said, his voice dangerously soft. "And I'm guessing you won't be forgetting it anytime soon."