'I hope you don't think that I drink this much when I'm preparing food for clients,' she said during a comfortable pause as she cleared away the prawns and began doing last-minute things to the main course. 'Because I don't.'
'Some of the finest meals are cooked while under the influence of good wine,' Angelo commented. 'That starter ranks up there.'
'You don't mean that.' With her back to him, she could feel her face glowing with pleasure. 'Do you?'
'Does it matter to you what I say?'
'Yes. You're a prospective client of mine. Of course it does!' Francesca could feel her voice rising, unnaturally bright. A bit like the colour spreading across her cheekbones. 'I'm always pleased when our food is complimented.'
Another brick wall. Three steps forward and two steps back, and every step back made the urgency inside him stronger. He didn't know what was driving him on to want this woman. He just knew that he did and if his reasons weren't exactly noble, then his awesome powers of reason were insufficient to steer him off course.
The one thing he did know was that this time it would be different for him. He would be utterly in control. He would get her out of his system and would be able to walk away from her without looking back.
But first he would have to break down the barriers between them. Swallowing back a sigh of frustration, he embarked on the least provocative line of conversation he could think of, asking her questions about the catering business generally, watching as she transferred food from saucepans and pots to basic white casserole dishes.
'Do you keep in touch with anyone from the modelling world?' he asked, when she had finally sat down and indicated to him that he should help himself.
Francesca laughed. 'Lord, no! I couldn't wait to get out of it in the end. For a start I was beginning to be the mother figure to a new crop of girls, all still in their teens. Some of them even had the adolescent spots to show for it!'
'I thought spots weren't allowed on models.' He didn't remind her that his offer for her to quit modelling, to move to London with him, had met with blank refusal.
'They're not. Hence the army of make-up artists who follow in the wake of every model. I've never met any spot that can't be successfully camouflaged under some expert face paint.' He was listening to every single word she was saying, giving her nonsense small talk his undivided attention. She had forgotten what a huge part of his charisma that was-the ability to listen.
'That used to irritate you, if I remember.'
Francesca's eyes skittered away from his dangerously good-looking face. 'I didn't miss it when I left. My face probably did, though!'
'You look better than you did then, if anything.' He willed her to actually look back at him and she did. 'Your hair suits you shorter. This chicken is very good, by the way. You do yourself a disservice when you say that Jack is the talent behind the cooking.'
'He thinks up unusual combinations. I know my limits. I stick to the things I know.'
'I don't believe you,' Angelo murmured. 'Only cowards stick to what they know. The predictable path is always the boring one.'
His voice was mesmerising. She tried to break the spell by eating, but, as always, the business of preparing the food had left her without any particular desire to sample it.
'I don't always stick to what I know,' Francesca retorted. 'But if the business is to succeed I can't just do exactly what I want, when I want!'
'And what would that be if you could?'
'What would what be?'
'What would you like to do if you weren't buttoned down chopping onions and preparing the same recipe over and over again because you've decided to leave the imaginative stuff to your boyfriend?'
'I am not buttoned down!' She jumped up from the table and began clearing up some of the used pans, her movements jerky. 'I might have known it wouldn't last!'
'What?' Angelo said tightly. He knew what. He had blown it. Just when he had actually got her to the point of dropping some of those damned defences, he had put her back up all over again. He should just drop this crazy idea, just realise that some challenges were a little too challenging.
'The politeness!' She folded her arms and glared at him.
'Oh, for God's sake!' He raked his fingers through his hair and glared right back at her. 'Being rooted in one place seems to have given you a keen sense of paranoia.'
'Paranoia?' She felt fired up with anger and safe within it. 'I'm not attacking you! I'm asking you if there are things that you still miss.'
You! The word shrieked in her head and she blanched. 'Like what?'
'Like travelling. Seeing the world.'
'I'm building a business. I haven't got the time or the finances to travel and see the world. Anyway, I did all that when I was younger.' She turned away abruptly and began filling the sink with soapy water for the dishes. She missed him. Yes, she had always known that, had always felt a little opening there in her heart, like a crack in the door just big enough to let a breeze laden with old memories blow through. What she hadn't realised until now was that the breeze was really a gale just waiting for the crack to get bigger.
'So now you've sampled my cooking, it's time you left.'
Maybe, just maybe, he would take the hint and actually do what she asked, so that without looking around she would simply hear the click of the front door closing and know that he had gone.
She wasn't aware of him approaching her until she was caged in by the sink, one strong, muscular bronzed arm on either side of her.
'You mean maybe it's time I left before I can say anything that you might not want to hear,' Angelo grated. 'And turn around and look at me when I'm talking to you!'
Francesca squeezed herself as far back as she could against the lip of the counter and manoeuvred herself round so that she was facing him.
'Don't you dare come into my house and tell me what to do! I want you to go now!'
'What else do you want me to do?'
'I have no idea what you're talking about!'
'Don't you?'
She knew he was going to kiss her. In that split instant the past and the present came crashing together as he lowered his head, raising one hand to curl into her hair. She thought that she might have whimpered a no but she couldn't push him away. Not when every nerve in her body was screaming for him to touch her.
His mouth collided with hers in a kiss that was scorchingly hot and hungry. God, it had been for ever and yet it felt like just yesterday. All that raging passion. She raised both her arms and wound them around his neck, pulling him against her, tasting him with the desperate urgency of a drought survivor tasting water.
Her eyes were closed when he finally pulled back, sucking in a deep breath of air. She followed suit, but reluctantly.
'The washing up can wait until later. Right now I want to continue this upstairs.'
Francesca nodded.
'That's not good enough. I want to hear you say it.'
'Take me upstairs, Angelo.'
It was all he needed to hear and it was music to his ears. With one swift movement he scooped her up, as though she weighed nothing, and headed out of the kitchen and up the stairs. Finding the bedroom was easy. There were only two and the door to hers was flung open, as though ready and waiting to invite them both in.
He barely took in the décor, the low bed with the uncompromising leather headboard, the long burgundy curtains that draped down to the floor, the series of photos on the walls which had been enlarged and framed, pictures of places she had been to in the past. He didn't even notice the one of Venice, a view which they had both enjoyed a million years ago.
He only noticed her. The way she looked at him as he deposited her on the bed, giving her time to change her mind and not knowing what the hell he would do if she did. Her eyes were hot and slumberous and they watched as he began stripping off his clothes. She probably didn't know it but it was the biggest turn-on he had had since … since.
He had slept with this woman before, had done the most intimate things with her, and yet he felt like a teenager all over again, getting undressed in front of a woman for the first time. Crazy.
The shirt hit the floor, followed by the belt, which he yanked out in one swift movement.
His hand hovered imperceptibly on the button of his trousers and Francesca couldn't help herself. She moaned. Very softly but not so softly that he didn't pick it up.
The trousers joined the shirt and belt on the floor and the state of his arousal was all too obvious against the fine cloth of his boxers. Right now he just wanted to rip her clothes off and plunge into her, satisfy this need that had taken him over and was killing him, but that, he knew, he couldn't do. Most of all, he wanted to pleasure her, very, very slowly.