he spoke. ‘You’re a woman of hidden talents, Arabella. These are good. At least your skill with design and creation will mean there’s half a chance of fixing the mess you’ve made.’
She had almost relaxed into his praise. Now she pulled herself stiffly upright. ‘Mess? What mess?’ How dared he say she had made a mess?
‘You’ve gone from modelling, to coercing middle-aged ladies out of huge amounts of money in business ventures that have no guarantee of succeeding.’ Accusation tightened every contour of the sculpted face. ‘You must really be proud of yourself.’
‘Modelling was only ever a job to put money on the table for me and my sis—’ She stopped abruptly as she heard herself attempt to justify her earliest choice of career to him.
Then the rest sank in. ‘What do you mean? I haven’t coerced anybody, and what’s it got to do with you, anyway?’ Bella had hammered out a deal with Maria Rocco, had agreed to bring her designs exclusively to Maria’s and keep them here on a five-year contract, only if Maria purchased her year’s worth of already-created stock up front, but it was a reasonable agreement, because Bella intended to succeed.
‘Maria Rocco is my aunt.’ As Luchino said it, he watched her face for her reaction. ‘That makes this very much my business.’
Bella pulled her face into a tight mask to cover her shock and uncertainty. Maria was Milanese, it was true, but the older woman had lived in Australia almost all her adult life. ‘Maria is a Rocco, not a Montichelli, and she told me she has no family.’
Bella clung to that knowledge, even as she noted that Luchino did indeed share some similarities of feature with Maria. That had to be just happenstance, though. What was a nose, after all, or the tilt of a chin?
‘My aunt left Milan, left the family and changed her name long ago. She no doubt considered herself alone.’ Harsh anger radiated from him as he went on. ‘I’m sure you saw that as an advantage when you set out to rob her of a vast amount of money.’
‘I did not! How do you even know about the agreement I have with her?’ She stopped, didn’t want to reveal anything to him. But he clearly knew something.
Luc’s hand rose to touch a spot above his heart—as though to assure himself of the presence of something in his shirt pocket? And yes, a faint square outline showed there—a photo, perhaps.
Before Bella could wonder about it, the mouth that had once offered soft seduction, had once whispered hungry words, love words to her that were oh, so false, tightened again into a strong, determined line.
‘I told my new finance manager I wanted to meet Maria. He’d heard Maria took on a protégé. When he mentioned your name, I asked him to get details for me.’
‘That’s an invasion of Maria’s privacy, and of mine!’ One that Luchino had apparently taken in his stride.
‘It was a timely intervention.’ He accompanied the declaration with a squaring of his shoulders. Low warning filled his tone. ‘Estranged or not right at this moment, I won’t see Maria go under financially because of you.
‘You somehow bullied her into buying a year’s worth of designer gowns at an astronomical price with no guarantee whatsoever that any of them would sell, and no way for her to get her money back if they don’t. On top of that, you talked her into employing you here to make more gowns which also may not sell.’
His face darkened. ‘A five-year contract where Maria carries the burden and risk, and you swim along on the high tide of all that money she’s handed to you. Don’t bother to deny it.’
Bella frowned. She had slaved over that three-page agreement herself. Luchino made it sound one-sided but it wasn’t an unfair arrangement, because Maria knew Bella’s only aim was success for both of them. Bella pushed the inkling of unease aside. ‘It’s an agreement, actually, not a contract.’ She hadn’t wanted the expense of a lawyer, but Chrissy’s past boss, Henry Montbank, had helped Bella to make sure the agreement was water-tight.
‘It’s robbery in the guise of a work arrangement.’
‘You’d call me a thief? How—how dare you?’ While Bella simmered in fury, questions vied for space.
Despite Maria’s indications to the contrary, she had a family? That family was the Montichellis?
One fact lodged deep: Luchino had investigated not only Maria, but also Bella. ‘You’ve pried into my life, behind my back, as though you had every right to do that. Just what did you find out about me, about my sisters? How far did you dig around, expose us—?’
‘I investigated your finances, Arabella, the work you’ve done in the years since I last saw you. And I learned everything there is to know about your arrangement with my aunt. I won’t apologise for doing that.’ He said the last with a hard glare in his eyes.
‘I intend to reclaim Maria as my aunt.’ His expression softened a little as he said this. ‘She’s family and…I want that bond with her if it’s at all possible. I’d have arranged to meet her before now if she hadn’t been out of the city.’
A hunger for family was bizarre, given his history. Yet he seemed sincere. Bella needed to remember he could be both convincing and duplicitous!
Bella glared right back at him, but sudden weariness tugged at her. Her hands ached from the hours spent in the adjoining sewing and consultation room, meticulously stitching Chinese cloisonné beads to the fitted sleeves of her latest creation while Maria’s sales clerk took care of customers. Bella wanted to go home, slip into one of her black catsuits and indulge in an hour of Pilates in front of the TV.
Instead she had to deal with an angry man she had hoped never to see again, a man who believed she meant his aunt financial harm. ‘Despite what you say, you mustn’t have investigated very well, Luchino, because Maria is in no financial danger from me.’
‘On the contrary, the purchase of your stock almost bankrupted her.’ Luchino raked a hand through his thick, dark hair.
Glossy, silky hair with a tendency to wave…
Bella pulled herself up straighter and gave Luc the benefit of her coldest stare. It was a lot of money, but she had needed a strong capital injection to enable her to buy the best fabrics and accoutrements to create more gowns, and her designs justified the cost.
It might take a few years, but Maria would get back her investment, and much more, eventually. ‘Your aunt is very wealthy, Luchino. She owns a penthouse apartment in the best part of the city, drives the latest-model luxury car and goes on overseas buying trips every other week.
‘Maria didn’t hesitate to agree to my terms, and she can afford to carry things along until my gowns start to really pay for her.’ Bella’s employer walked and talked affluence and until this moment Bella had seen no reason to doubt her.
Luchino shook his head. ‘Maria has spent beyond her means for years. The apartment is rented, the car is a lease and those buying trips have put her heavily into debt.’ His gaze darkened as he looked around the store. ‘She was in no position to buy into a speculative venture like yours.’
‘My gowns will sell. Maria has made a good investment, and I intend to prove that.’ Yet even as Bella said it, her stomach knotted.
She hadn’t asked Maria’s financial status. She had assumed it on the evidence in front of her. Now doubt formed and Bella experienced that hated feeling of losing control. If Maria really had no money, just a pile of debts…
‘I can’t fail.’ The words were a stark statement, because she simply couldn’t. Failure had ceased to be an option when their parents unforgivably abandoned her, Chrissy and Sophia while her sisters were still in high school. Every struggle since then had underscored that abandonment, and underscored Bella’s condemnation of the man before her because he had mirrored her parents’ actions.
Bella had striven to succeed, and she had done it. For her sisters, and to assure herself