Under the Italian's Command Read Free Page B

Tate…’
     
    They were in Lorenzo’s office. He was seated; she was standing in front of him like a recalcitrant child. She kept her expression carefully neutral. It wasn’t that she had suddenly become immune to the power storm swirling round Lorenzo, but the fact that her feet were killing her. She had made a real effort to conform to the image she imagined he would have in mind for a successful female applicant for the Unicorn scholarship, and if that involved wearing the type of heels that were almost impossible to come by for farmyard feet, then that was what she would do.
     
    ‘You’re a front runner for the scholarship,’ he said. ‘You do know that, don’t you?’
     
    Say yes, and be damned for complacency, or say no and appear a wuss . She decided not to comment and straightened her back, assuming what she hoped he would take for a determined stance. And while she did that she gave full rein to her lust. Playing poker face was an area in which she excelled.
     
    ‘You do realise what’s hanging on your performance over the next few weeks?’
     
    She might have known Lorenzo wouldn’t give up until he had forced an answer out of her. Thinking about her parents made a clean sweep of her mind and the lust. Her parents had talked of nothing but the scholarship for months now, and both the bridge club and golf club were waiting agog for news of her latest triumph, apparently.
     
    ‘Ms Tate.’ Lorenzo snapped her out of the reverie.
     
    ‘Yes?’ She held back on the temptation to salute.
     
    ‘Do I have your total commitment to this project?’
     
    ‘One hundred per cent.’
     
    ‘Good.’ He relaxed a little, which was enough to give her a grandstand view of his socks…as well as just a hint of the tanned and deliciously muscular hairy legs above them. Her cheeks fired up like warning beacons when he caught her staring.
     
    ‘Something wrong?’ he said.
     
    ‘No…of course not—’
     
    ‘That outfit won’t do,’ he said, turning his attention to her clothes. He wrinkled his nose as he scrutinised the same suit he’d seen lying in the gutter. She had sponged it down since then with a pungent though effective mix of hot water and vinegar. She had wanted to look her best for this momentous first one-on-one meeting with her pupil master, except, of course, this wasn’t their first one-on-one encounter. ‘I’m sorry about your car—’
     
    ‘Never mind that now,’ he said impatiently. ‘I expect you to deal with that in your own time. This is my time, and while you’re under my tutelage I expect you to prove you’re a lawyer worth sorting out.’
     
    ‘Oh, I am,’ she said eagerly. Her cheeks fired as her body entertained some frenzied notions involving Lorenzo sorting her out. ‘What I mean is, I won’t disappoint you—’ The fire in her cheeks went up a notch when she noticed his interested gaze lingering on her breasts. Her suit jacket wouldn’t close over them and was hanging open, revealing a paper-thin shirt that had seen much better days. ‘I’m ready to be sorted out,’ she blurted recklessly. ‘And I promise to try and find something more suitable to wear.’ As she spoke she clutched the edges of her jacket in a last-ditch attempt to make it close.
     
    ‘Be sure that you do.’
     
    Carly couldn’t tell if Lorenzo was amused or angry as he turned his attention to the documents on his desk, but now it was her turn to study him. The fine wool of his dark, bespoke suit clung attractively to his powerful frame, and she guessed he would have to have suits made for him as the spread of his shoulders was so wide—
     
    Looking up, he snapped, ‘I thought I told you to go home and change?’
     
    Change into what? Ally McBeal ? She was wearing a thrift-shop find, and going home to change her clothes would involve donning another thrift-shop find. She had to come clean and explain. ‘I would, but—’
     
    ‘But?’ Lorenzo let the word hang like a dead