Total pages in book: 159
Estimated words: 157450 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 787(@200wpm)___ 630(@250wpm)___ 525(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 157450 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 787(@200wpm)___ 630(@250wpm)___ 525(@300wpm)
* * *
I’ve set aside all the condolence letters and e-mails to answer at a later date—I cannot face them yet. And how the fuck did Kit manage to get his head around farming subsidies and animal husbandry and all the other crap that goes with cultivating and grazing thousands of acres of land? For a fleeting moment, I wish I’d taken farm management or business studies at university, rather than fine art and music.
Kit had been reading economics at the LSE when our father died. Ever the dutiful son, he’d dropped out of the LSE and enrolled in the Duchy of Cornwall’s university to study farming and estate management. With thirty thousand acres to oversee, I now understand that it was a sensible decision. Kit was always sensible, except when it came to riding his motorbike in the middle of winter through Trevethick’s freezing lanes. I put my head in my hands as I remember his broken body lying in the mortuary.
Why, Kit, why? I ask for the thousandth time.
The worsening weather through the glass wall reflects my mood. I stand and walk over to look at the view. On the river there are a couple of barges heading in opposite directions, a police launch cruising east, and the river bus heading to Cadogan Pier. I scowl at the scene. During all the time I’ve lived this close to the pier, I’ve never taken the river bus. As a child I’d always hoped my mother would take me and Maryanne, but it never happened. She was always too busy. Always. And she never instructed our various nannies to take us. That’s another grievance I have against Rowena. Of course, Kit wasn’t with us then—he was already at boarding school.
Shaking my head, I walk around the piano and spy the sheet music I’ve been working on all weekend. The sight of the pages lifts my mood, and to take a break from my computer, I sit down to play.
* * *
Of the three kitchens Alessia cleans, this is her favorite. The wall, base cupboards and worktops are made of pale blue glass that is easy to wipe down. It’s sleek and uncluttered—so different from the haphazard rural kitchen of her parents’ home. She checks the oven, just in case the Mister has baked something, but she finds it’s still pristine. Alessia suspects it has never been used.
She is drying the last plate when the music begins. She stops, recognizing the melody immediately. It’s from the manuscript she’s seen so many times on his piano, but the melody goes further than she’s read, the notes soft and sad, falling in mournful blues and grays around her.
This she has to see.
With quiet care she places the plate on the worktop and sneaks out of the kitchen toward the living room. She peers in and sees him at the piano. Eyes closed, he’s feeling the music, every note expressed on his face. As she watches him—his brow furrowed, head tilted, lips parted—he takes her breath away.
She’s captivated.
By him.
By the music.
He’s talented.
The piece is sad, full of longing and grief, and the notes echo through her head in subtler tones of blue and gray now that she’s watching him. He really is the most handsome man she’s ever seen. He’s even more handsome than—No!
Ice-blue eyes stare at me. Furious.
No. Stop thinking about that monstrous man!
She halts the memory. It’s too painful. And she concentrates on the Mister as the melancholic melody draws to its end. Before he spots her, Alessia tiptoes back to the kitchen—she doesn’t want to make him cross again by being caught peeking and not working.
As she finishes washing the worktop, she replays his composition in her head. And now the only room she has left to clean is the living room—where he is.
Plucking up her courage, she grabs some polish and a cloth, ready to face him. She hovers at the entrance while he stares at his computer. He glances up and sees her, his face registering pleased surprise.
“It is okay, Mister?” she asks, and waves the can of polish in the direction of the room.
“Sure. Come in. Do what you need to do, Alessia. And my name’s Maxim.”
She gives him a quick smile and starts with the sofa, plumping the cushions and sweeping the odd crumb onto the floor with her hand.
* * *
Well, this is distracting….
How can I possibly concentrate with her moving about in such close proximity? I pretend to read the revised cost-to-complete for the remodeling of the Mayfair mansion blocks, but really I’m watching her. She moves with such easy, sensuous grace; bending over the sofa, lithe, toned arms reaching out and delicate, long-fingered hands cupping the crumbs from the seat cushions and brushing them off. A frisson runs through me, and my whole body is suddenly humming with a delicious tension, attuned to her presence in the room.