Her Italian Boss’s Agenda

PROLOGUE

‘FEBRUARY!’ Carlo sighed. ‘Who needs it? Christmas is over and the best of the year hasn’t started.’

‘You mean there are no pretty tourists yet,’ Ruggiero ribbed him. ‘Don’t you ever think of anything else?’

‘No,’ Carlo said simply. ‘And you’re just as bad, so don’t deny it.’

‘I wasn’t going to.’

They were twins, not identical, but clearly brothers. Handsome, in the glory of their late twenties, they stood on the terrace of the Villa Rinucci, looking down at the Bay of Naples. It was late afternoon and darkness was falling fast. In the distance Mount Vesuvius loomed ominously, and below them the lights of the city winked.

Somewhere behind them their mother spoke.

‘You would like my country, my sons. Every February, in England we celebrate the Feast of St Valentine, the patron saint of love. Flowers, cards, kisses-you two would be in your element.’

‘Instead, it’s Primo going to England,’ Carlo observed gloomily. ‘It’ll be wasted on him. All he’ll think of is business.’

‘Your brother works hard,’ Hope Rinucci reproved them, trying to sound severe. ‘You should both try it.’

This was a slander, since these young men worked as hard as they played, which was very hard indeed. But they only grinned at their mother sheepishly.

‘Why does Primo have to keep taking over firms, anyway?’ Ruggiero asked. ‘When will he stop?’

‘Come inside and eat,’ Hope ordered them. ‘This is Primo’s farewell dinner.’

‘We give him a farewell dinner every time he goes away,’ Carlo objected.

‘And why not? It’s a good chance to get the family together,’ Hope said.

‘Will Luke be here tonight?’ Carlo asked.

‘Of course he will,’ Hope declared, a little too firmly. ‘I know he and Primo have the occasional argument-’

‘Occasional!’ the twins groaned in unison.

‘All right, most of the time. But they are still brothers.’

‘Not really,’ Ruggiero said. ‘They’re not related at all.’

‘Primo is my stepson and Luke is my adopted son, and that makes them brothers,’ Hope said firmly. ‘Is that clear?’

‘Yes, Mamma,’ they both said in meek voices.

Inside the house there was warmth and the comfortable bustle of a family. But Hope looked around, dissatisfied.

‘There are too many men here,’ she declared.

Her husband and sons looked alarmed, as though wondering by what drastic means she intended to reduce the number.

‘There should be more women,’ she explained. ‘Where are my daughters-in-law? I should have six by now, and I have none. I was so looking forward to seeing Justin marry Evie, but-’ She gave an eloquent shrug and a sigh.

Justin was her eldest son, parted from her since his birth, but reunited the previous year. He’d come to Naples once with Evie, the woman he clearly loved. But then Evie had mysteriously vanished from his life, and when he’d returned at Christmas she hadn’t been with him. Nor would he speak of her.

Gradually the big dining room filled up and, despite her disapproving words, she looked around her with satisfaction. Her sons had their own apartments in Naples, and it was a great day when she could gather them together in this house.

Her eyes lit up at the sight of Primo, her stepson by her first husband, an Englishman, although he now bore the Rinucci family name in honour of his Italian mother.

‘It’s been too long since I’ve seen you,’ she said, hugging him. ‘And tomorrow you’re going away again.’

‘Not for long, Mamma. I’ll soon get this English firm into shape.’

‘Why did you have to buy it at all? You were doing good business with it.’

‘Curtis Electronics wasn’t being run properly, so I decided to take it over. Enrico wasn’t keen at first, but he finally saw it my way.’

‘I’m sure he did,’ Hope observed wryly.

Enrico Leonate had once been the sole owner of Leonate Europa, a firm for which Primo had gone to work fifteen years ago. He had learned quickly, made a great deal of money for his boss and for himself, and eventually had become a partner. Enrico was elderly and tired. Primo was young, thrusting and full of ideas. Enrico was glad enough to let him take the reins but, as he’d once ruefully remarked, it would have been all the same if he hadn’t been. Sooner or later people tended to see things Primo’s way.

Now he was telling Hope, ‘I’ll promote a few people, and tell them what I want.’

‘That’s if you can find anyone there who satisfies you. Since when did anyone live up to your expectations?’

‘True,’ he agreed. ‘But Cedric Tandy, the present manager, recommends his deputy, Olympia Lincoln. I’ll watch her closely.’

‘And promote a woman?’ Hope asked satirically. ‘You-an equal opportunity employer?’

He looked surprised. ‘I’ll promote anyone who’ll do as I say.’

‘Ah! That kind of equal opportunity.’ Hope laughed. ‘My son, you make it sound so simple.’

‘Most of life is simple if you know what you want and are determined to get it.’

She frowned, then forgot everything in the pleasure of seeing him here. As always, he had arrived at the perfect moment, not late but not too early, and elegantly dressed.

His appearance betrayed his dual heritage. From his long-dead Italian mother he had inherited dark eyes with a wealth of varied expressions, changing from one moment to the next. His English father had bequeathed him a stubborn chin and firm mouth, lacking the Italian mobility that characterised the other men.

‘Luke isn’t here yet,’ she said in a low voice.

‘He probably isn’t coming,’ Primo said cheerfully. ‘I’m not his favourite person since I poached Tordini.’

Rico Tordini was a brilliant electronics inventor, claimed by both brothers, whose business interests were in the same line. Primo had secured him for his own firm.

‘Luke says you stabbed him in the back,’ Hope reminded Primo.

‘Not a bit. It’s true he spotted Tordini first, but I made him a better offer.’

‘My dear, it’s a bad business when brothers fall out.’

‘Don’t worry, Mamma. Luke will get his chance of revenge, and he’ll take it.’

He spoke lightly. The running battle between himself and Luke had lasted years now, and provided spice to their lives. Without it they would both have felt something was missing.

Luke finally put in an appearance when the meal was almost over.

‘E, Inglese,’ Primo said, raising his glass in jeering fashion.

To call Luke an Englishman was Primo’s favourite form of insult, a way of reminding him that he was the only son in this Italian family who was completely English.

‘Better than being neither one thing nor the other,’ Luke said with a grin, referring to Primo’s dual ancestry and the fact that he was liable to ‘switch sides’ without warning.

‘I’m glad you came,’ Hope told him.

‘Naturally.’ Luke raised a glass sardonically in Primo’s direction. ‘I had to make sure we were really getting rid of him.’

Yet it was Luke who drove Primo to the airport the next day.

‘I’m coming too,’ Hope told them. ‘Someone has to stop you two killing each other.’

‘No fear of that,’ Luke said lightly. ‘It’s more fun to plot a subtle revenge. That’s the Italian way.’

‘And what would an Inglese know of the Italian way?’ Primo demanded.

‘Only what he’s learned from his mongrel brother.’

As Hope and Luke stood together watching the plane climb, she couldn’t help giving a little sigh.

‘Don’t worry, Mamma,’ Luke said, his arm about her shoulders. ‘He’ll be back in no time.’

‘It’s not that. People say how lucky I am that Primo never gives me cause for worry. But I do worry, because he’s too reliable. He’s so sensible, he never does anything stupid.’

‘I promise you, if he’s a Rinucci, he’s stupid,’ Luke said fervently.

‘Indeed? And what does that make you, since you’ve always refused to take our name?’

He hugged her. ‘I don’t need it. I’m stupid enough anyway.’