Italian Maverick's Collection. Кейт Хьюит

I picked up a waitressing shift at the café round the corner. I’ll be back by midnight,’ she told him chirpily.

      In the doorway, Gaetano went rigid, convinced that he could not have heard her correctly. ‘You applied for a job as a waitress...’ his dark deep drawl climbed tellingly in volume and emphasis as he spoke that word ‘...while you’re pretending to be engaged to me?’

      ‘Why not? Bartending is better paid but the café was closer and the hours are casual and flexible and that would probably suit you better.’

      Brilliant dark eyes landed on her with the chilling effect of an ice bath. ‘You working as a waitress doesn’t suit me in any way.’

      ‘I don’t see why you should object,’ Poppy reasoned, thrusting her feet into her comfy ankle boots. ‘I mean, you’re still working and what am I supposed to do with myself while you’re busy all day? It’s not even as if pretending to be your fiancée is a full-time job.’

      ‘As far as I’m concerned, it is full-time and you will go to the café now and tell them that you’re sorry but you won’t be working there tonight,’ Gaetano told her with raking impatience. ‘Diavelos! Do I have to spell every little thing out to you? I’m a billionaire banker. You can’t work in a café or a bar for peanuts while you’re purportedly engaged to me!’

      An angry flush had lit up Poppy’s cheeks. ‘Then what am I supposed to do for money?’

      ‘If you need money, I’ll give it to you,’ Gaetano declared, pulling out his wallet, relieved that the problem could be so easily fixed. But seriously, where was her brain? Working as a waitress while living in a mansion?

      Poppy backed away a step and then snaked past him in the doorway to trudge down to the hall. ‘I don’t want your money, Gaetano. I work for my money. I don’t take handouts from anyone.’

      ‘But I’m the exception to that rule,’ Gaetano slotted in grimly as he followed her with tenacious resolve. ‘While you are engaged to me, you are not allowed to embarrass me by working in a low-paid menial job.’

      Outraged by that decree, Poppy whirled round to face him again, the hank of hair from her ponytail falling over her shoulder in a bright colourful stream. ‘Is that a fact?’ she prompted. ‘Well, I’m sorry, you’re out of luck on this one. As far as I’m concerned, any kind of honest work is preferable to living off charity and I don’t care if you think waitressing is menial—’

      ‘We have a deal!’ Gaetano raked at her with raw bite. ‘You’re breaking it!’

      ‘At no stage did you ever mention that I would not be able to take paid work,’ Poppy flung back at him in furious denial. ‘So, don’t try to deviously change the rules to suit yourself. I’m sorry if you see me working as a waitress at Carrie’s coffee shop as a major embarrassment. Don’t you have enough status on your own account? Does it really matter what I do? I would remind you that I am an ordinary girl who needs to work to live and that’s not about to change for you or anyone else!’

      ‘It’s totally unnecessary for you to work...in fact it’s preposterous!’ Gaetano slammed back at her loudly, dark eyes flaring as golden as the heart of a fire now, his anger unconcealed. ‘Particularly when I have already assured you that I will cover your every expense while you are staying in London.’

      ‘Just as I’ve already told you,’ Poppy proclaimed heatedly, ‘I will not accept money from you. I’m an independent woman and I have my pride. If our positions were reversed, would you want me keeping you?’

      ‘Don’t be ridiculous!’ Gaetano roared back, all control of his temper abandoned in the face of her continuing refusal to listen to him and respect his opinion. Never before in his life had a woman opposed him in such a way.

      More intimidated than she was prepared to admit or show by the depth of his anger and the sheer size of him towering over her while he gave forth as if he were voicing the Ten Commandments, Poppy brought up her chin. ‘I’m not being ridiculous,’ she countered obstinately. ‘I’m standing up for what I believe in. I don’t want your money. I want my own. And as only a few people know I’m engaged to you, I don’t see how it’s going to embarrass you. Especially as you don’t embarrass that easily.’

      ‘And what’s that supposed to mean?’ he demanded.

      Poppy dealt him an accusing look. ‘You should’ve given me some pointers on what to wear at the birthday party. Once I saw how the other women were dressed, I felt stupid.’

      Gaetano shrugged. ‘It wasn’t important. I want you to be yourself,’ he repeated dismissively. ‘As for the waitress job—’

      ‘I’m keeping it!’ Poppy incised, lifting her chin combatively because she was needled by his assurance that being the odd one out in the fashion stakes at the party was something she should simply be able to shrug off. Had that been a rap on the knuckles? Was she oversensitive? Too prone to feeling inadequate?

      ‘And that’s your last word on the subject?’ Gaetano growled as she yanked open the front side door, which serviced his wing of the house.

      ‘I’m afraid so,’ Poppy declared before she raced off at speed, pulling the door shut behind her.

      ‘If you don’t watch out, you’ll lose her,’ a voice said from behind Gaetano.

      In consternation, he swung round to focus on his grandfather, who was wedged in the doorway communicating between the two properties. ‘How much of that did you hear?’ Gaetano asked tautly.

      ‘With this door open I couldn’t help overhearing the last part of your argument,’ Rodolfo Leonetti advanced. ‘I’ll admit to hearing enough to appreciate that my grandson is a hopeless snob. She was correct, Gaetano. There can never be shame in honest work. Your grandmother insisted on selling her father’s fish at a stall until the day she married me.’

      ‘Your wife was raised on a tiny backward island in a different era. Times have changed,’ Gaetano parried thinly.

      Rodolfo laughed with sincere appreciation. ‘Women don’t change that much. Poppy’s not interested in your money. Do you realise how very lucky you are to have found such a woman?’

      In silence, Gaetano jerked his aggressive chin in acknowledgement. He was still climbing back down from the dizzy heights of the unholy rage Poppy’s defiance had lit inside him, marvelling at how angry she had made him while being disconcerted by his loss of control. His lean hands flexed into fists before slowly loosening again.

      ‘And as her temper seems to be as hot as your own it may well take some very nifty moves on your part to keep her,’ his grandfather opined with quiet assurance as he strolled back through the communicating door.

      Gaetano struck the wall with a knotted fist and swore long and low beneath his breath. Poppy set his temper off like a rocket, not a problem he had ever had with a woman before. That’s because you date ‘clingy airheads’, a voice chimed in the back of his mind, an exact quote of Poppy’s text that sounded remarkably like her. He gritted his teeth, tension pulling like tight strings in his lean, powerful body to tauten every muscle group. It was stress caused by the lack of sex, he decided abruptly. A wave of relief for that rational explanation for his recent irrational behaviour engulfed him. Gaetano didn’t like anything that he couldn’t understand. Yet Poppy fell into that category and he knew he didn’t dislike her.

      * * *

      Poppy worked her shift in the café, her mind buzzing like a busy bee throughout. Had she been too hard on Gaetano? It was true that he was a snob but what else could he be after the over-privileged life he had led since birth? But Rodolfo’s clear desire to rush his grandson into marriage had shocked Gaetano and naturally that had put him in a bad mood, she conceded ruefully. Evidently when Gaetano had suggested their fake engagement he had seriously underestimated the extent of his grandfather’s enthusiasm for marrying him off. Only an actual wedding was going to satisfy Rodolfo Leonetti and move Gaetano up the last crucial step of his career ladder. An