‘Hm! Well, I suppose that’s true. I know how efficient you always are.’

Alex made a wry face. As a tribute ‘efficient’ lacked something. But David had never been a man for emotional pronouncements. Once she had liked that about him. Now it struck a jarring note.

‘Just leave everything to me,’ she said.

He laughed suddenly. ‘I begin to feel sorry for them. They don’t know what they’ve taken on.’

She joined in his laughter, but she would have preferred to hear it put some other way.

‘Take as long as you need,’ David said. ‘I’ve got your work here covered so you don’t need to give it another thought.’

‘Thank you, but of course I think about it all the time. And you. It’ll be lovely getting back to you.’

‘We’re going to have a lot to talk about,’ he assured her.

Rinaldo heard her laughter and it chilled him. Without consciously eavesdropping-so he told himself-he had contrived to hear enough to alarm him.

This man was a lover, in her thoughts all the time. She called him ‘darling’ and longed to return to him.

He began to appreciate the true dimensions of the threat to everything he held dear, and he called himself a fool for underestimating the danger.

His eyes narrowed as he came to a swift resolution. Alex was hanging up, turning back to him, and he swung away from her so that she shouldn’t see his thoughts reflected in his face.

When he was ready to face her again he was smiling.

‘Come,’ he said, taking her hand. ‘This way to my car.’

‘I can’t go with you. I have to stay here for the break-down truck.’

‘Nonsense. Just leave the keys in the ignition. Nobody can steal it, since the car can’t move. Now come on.’

He was making his way to a car on the far side of the parking lot.

‘Come where?’ she asked.

She tried to pull away but his grip, although light, was unbreakable.