Page 17 of 2 Books in One Bundle

‘You’ll enjoy it,’ he said. ‘I promise.’

Promises were fraught things. They led to so much expectation yet often failed on delivery. Bitter experience with her mother had taught her not to believe in them.

‘Isn’t there a quote, promises were made to be broken?’

‘I don’t break mine.’ It was said as a fact she should simply accept. ‘And I told you I have a few surprises for you when we get there.’

He didn’t say anything more, yet the faint, self-satisfied smile on his face as they reached an ornate iron gate, which opened before them like magic, told her that he was pretty pleased with himself.

The car’s tyres crunched on a gravel drive that followed the lake. Soon, they pulled up outside a magnificent two-storey villa, painted a warm ochre with blue-shuttered windows. The gardens surrounding were clipped and restrained, unlike the wild tangle of Easton Hall. Yet whilst it was all so unfamiliar, something about the surrounds eased a tension inside her. It was as if her whole body could let out a sigh. The privacy of it all. Expansive lake on one side, tree-covered hills to the other.

He opened the door of the car, got out. She followed.

‘Home sweet home,’ she said.

‘As I’ve said before, I don’t have a home. Not as you define it. This is a convenient base when I have to take care of business in Italy.’

‘Then why have it at all?’

‘It was good value.’ He shrugged his broad, strong shoulders. ‘I contemplated turning it into one of my hotels.’

He led her towards the front door of the villa. She took a moment to stop, look out over the gardens terraced down to the lake beyond. Sucked in a deep breath. The air here was warmer than home. Scented with jasmine and citrus blossom. To the right of the door sat a plaque: Villa Arcadia.

Arcadia was the name of his hotel chains.

‘Which came first?’ she asked, nodding to the sign. ‘The house or the hotels?’

Something triggered in the back of her brain. Arcadia meant something. Louisa couldn’t remember what. She’d have to look it up.

‘The house. It’s the first I ever purchased.’

He unlocked the door and led her inside to an entrance hall with a marble floor topped with a Persian carpet runner. Furniture, the warm honey of polished antiques.

‘Why nowhere in the UK?’ she asked. She would have thought his first property purchase would have been there.

‘I have an affinity here. My heritage is Italian.’

That admission surprised her. ‘How do you know?’

Back when she was young, her mother used to speak of the benevolence of Matteo’s adoptive parents. How they’d taken in a foundling as their own, as if it was some great charity. Yet in her family’s eyes, it hadn’t made him a true Bainbridge.

‘Family history DNA.’ He shut the front door behind him and all of him seemed to shut down too, close off with the clear warning that this wasn’t something he wanted to talk about, so she didn’t press.

‘I thought you’d want to see your surprises,’ he said. ‘Come with me.’

Matteo gave her an encouraging smile to accompany the deft change of subject, focussing on her once more. Another smile that didn’t reach his eyes. He showed her through the house, in many ways like his hotels with its neutral colours. Bright with sunlight in every room. Yet this place was burnished with age. The eclectic combination of antiques with modern touches giving the villa an elegantly casual nudge into the present, which strangely felt like him.

‘I-it’s beautiful.’

Most rooms she saw opened onto a view of gardens or the lake, with expanses of glass. There was simply no place for any darkness here.

‘Thank you. I hope you’ll enjoy it.’

He led her up an internal staircase to the second floor, down another corridor, to a closed door.

‘This is your room,’ he said with almost a flourish as he pushed the door open and she walked inside.

Louisa took a few moments, scanning the space. The room had another glorious view of the lake but that wasn’t what held her attention. The space disoriented her because, whilst there was a different view outside, the inside seemed achingly familiar. Her heart stuttered.