The Cinderella Valentine. Liz FieldingЧитать онлайн книгу.

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       Table of Contents

       Cover

       Excerpt

       Title Page

THE CINDERELLA VALENTINE

       Copyright

THE CINDERELLA VALENTINE

      Polly had allowed herself plenty of time. She was leaving nothing to chance. She’d even used two alarm clocks, set at five-minute intervals, both of which had performed on cue. Emma Valentine had come through for her with a life and a sanity-saving job at Bella Lucia, her famous family’s chic, elegant, A-list group of restaurants. Hard work, but big tips. This was not the day to turn over and go back sleep.

      The bus—incredibly—arrived on time and dropped her off at a spot a mere two-minutes walk away from the classic, ornate Georgian building in the heart of Chelsea, where the first of the fabulous Bella Lucia restaurants had opened fifty years earlier.

      For once in her life, Polly hadn’t messed up.

      Even the sun was shining.

      “Excuse me?” Polly turned to see a harassed mother encumbered by a three-year-old, a baby and a buggy struggling to get off the bus. “Would you mind …?”

      In an all’s-right-with-my-world glow, Polly took the buggy and did what she’d done a hundred times when babysitting her nieces and nephews—flicked it open.

      The buggy didn’t open. It sprang wide like a hungry tiger, taking a chunk out of her tights. As she bent to check the damage, the three-year-old generously thrust the rusk he’d been chewing into her. A thick beige smear appeared on the front of her waistcoat. She was already off balance when a speeding motorbike, skimming the curb to dodge the traffic, finished the job and dumped her in the road.

      It could have been worse.

      She could have fallen under a bus.

      All was not lost, Polly thought, as she picked herself up. She was early. With luck she’d be able to slip into the staff washroom, clean up and change into the spare pair of tights that she’d fortuitously slipped into her bag before Mr. Valentine saw her. She scooped up a strand of hair that had sprung loose, tucked it behind her ear, rang the bell on the wrought-iron gate that guarded the rear entrance and was buzzed through.

      It was only then that she discovered what she should have known the minute the buggy attacked her: she had carelessly left her luck, like a forgotten umbrella, on the bus. Not missed until the heavens opened up and she actually needed it. Right now the sun was shining, but, as the man blocking her dash to the staff washroom slowly turned, she could have sworn she heard a clap of thunder.

      Maybe that was because he bore more than a passing resemblance to the devil himself.

      His hair, a pelt of thick, crisp curls, was a glossy black. His nose proclaimed that his ancestors had once ruled the known world. His brows were bold, straight, dark and not even the sensual curve of his lower lip could override the impression that he was more used to giving than taking orders.

      All he lacked was a pair of little horns, although curls that thick could hide a lot. His eyes, the colour of warm treacle, might have softened the image, but they were regarding her with a long, critical look that took in her hair—she could feel her own curls springing free of pins loosened by her fall—the sticky smear of rusk decorating her left breast, her torn tights.

      “Polly Bright,” she said quickly, getting that in before he could voice what he was so plainly thinking. She met his eyes head on, and offered her hand in the manner of a woman whom, despite appearances to the contrary, knew what she was doing.

      He did not take it.

      Wise move, she decided, realizing too late that, in her attempt to save herself, she’d placed her hand in a patch of oil.

      “It’s my first day,” she added, but with rather less conviction.

      “No, Miss Bright,” he replied as, with the slightest movement of one hand, he addressed her appearance, “it is not.”

      Polly, entranced by the soft, seductive, fall-into-bed accent that matched the Roman nose and Mediterranean colouring, was, for a moment, oblivious. Then what he’d actually said sank in.

       Not?

      Not! Oh, no, she wasn’t going to take that, allow this long-legged demon to dismiss her without even giving her a chance to explain. This job was too important. It was an opportunity to get back on her feet, to prove to her family that she wasn’t a complete screw-up. It was a chance to start again …

      The familiar sounds of a kitchen gearing up to serve a hundred plus diners reached her and, name-dropping like mad, she said, “Emma Valentine will vouch for me.”

      Polly had met Emma Valentine, the Chelsea BL’s chef, when she’d been booked to give a cookery master-class at Polly’s catering college. Not that Polly was taking part; her exclusion was punishment for a piece of nonsense involving an ice sculpture. Polly had found Emma in the student washroom, throwing up from nerves; she’d fetched her some ginger ale, distracted her with the woeful tale of “Little Willy,” made Emma laugh so much that she’d taken Polly into the class as her assistant leaving the principal with no option but to accept this fait accompli.

      “Or Mr. Robert Valentine,” Polly continued. Emma would be up to her eyes at this time of day. “He interviewed me.”

      “Mr. Valentine is at the Mayfair office this morning and his daughter is in Meridia organizing the coronation banquet.”

      In other words, what kind of nerve did she have thinking either of them would have spare time to pull her irons out of the fire?

      “Max Valentine is in the office,” he offered, with a touch of amusement. “Maybe you’d prefer to have this conversation with him?”

      “No!” She’d met Max when she’d come for her interview. He was scary, unlike his father who was a sucker for a smile. “No,” she repeated, “I’m sure he’s busy.” “Then I’m sorry, Miss Bright, but all you have is me.”

      Well, if life gave you lemons, you made lemonade. She tried the “sucker” smile.

      “And