Читать книгу Mills & Boon Stars Collection: Sinful Proposals - Кэтти Уильямс, Cathy Williams - Страница 14

CHAPTER SIX

SUNNY STARED AT Stefano in wide-eyed bewilderment, certain that she had somehow got the wrong end of the stick.

‘What are you saying?’ she stammered.

‘Surely I don’t have to spell it out in words of one syllable.’ His voice was husky and teasing but that thread of uncertain apprehension was still pouring through his veins, investing him with the sort of edge-of-seat feeling he had never had much time for.

His edge-of-seat feelings were all associated with times he would rather not have remembered. The edge-of-seat feelings of waiting for lawyers to try and make progress with resolving custody issues...the edge-of-seat feelings of knowing that his marriage had been a crashing mistake, a disaster that would have to be put right with a messy divorce...the edge-of-seat feelings that had always come whenever he had tried to gain access to see his daughter, half optimistic that this time his ex-wife wouldn’t mess him around, half accepting that she probably would...

Catastrophes, he had reflected on more than one bitter occasion, had a way of sharpening up and clarifying the way you looked at things.

Stefano no longer welcomed anything in his life that couldn’t be ruthlessly controlled. No situation was ever allowed to deviate from the course he determined. No one was ever allowed to overstep the boundaries he had laid down. And he never allowed himself to flounder... Ever...

Steer a clear route, make sure you didn’t stray from it, and nothing could take you by surprise because surprises were seldom good.

Except, right now, the clear route wasn’t as clear as it usually was, when it came to women.

For starters, he had chased her. Not overtly, but did that make a difference? He had noted her Keep Off signs and, instead of shrugging and walking away because the world was full of pretty faces and willing women, he had let himself be hooked in.

He had changed his routine because of her. Having hired her to work nights so that he could focus on several high-powered deals that required long hours, he had caught himself thinking about her, wanting to see her for longer than just in passing...

And when he had shown up unexpectedly and found her in the swimming pool...

That modest black bikini, which was much more her thing than the outfit she had borrowed from her friend, had turned him on more than if she had been wearing nothing but a thong...

Which just went to show the power of the imagination once it broke its leash and decided to fly. He’d been determined not to go near her, to remember that she was connected with his daughter, to not under any circumstances mix business with pleasure, so to speak, and yet here he was... Hell, he’d resolved not to venture near her in case it jeopardised his fragile truce with Flora...!

Not even her cautionary tale about her background had put him off.

It should have.

He had married a gold-digger and paid the price. Now he had no problem dating beauties who enjoyed the things he could give them, but he was always in control of a relationship, always dictated its course, always dispatched them when they were beginning to outstay their welcome.

Sunny had no money and her background beggared belief. She kept her distance and had made it clear that, given the choice, she would not have chosen to be in his company if she could help it. And yet...he had still chased her.

Which said worrying things about his valued self-control...but he was incapable of backing off. He didn’t get it. He didn’t begin to get it.

Something about the way she was put together... It wasn’t just her stupendous and unusual good looks, but the way she tried to conceal them. It wasn’t just her sharp intellect, but the soft vulnerability he could see lurking just beneath it. She had somehow gained access to Flora, a feat none of his previous nannies had come close to accomplishing, and she had done so without trying, having made it very clear that she was only in it for the money, which she needed.

On paper, it made no sense for him to be sitting here, waiting for her to come on board with the little journey he was interested in taking with her...

But hell...since when was it written in cement that he had to follow the rules that made sense? Since when was a little deviation something to be banned? And he wouldn’t be jeopardising anything. He knew what could be lost and so would also know how to avoid that happening. He’d admitted his own weakness and stepped back to see the situation from all angles.

When it came to the crunch, he would always be in control because that was just the man he was. His concerns, whilst valid, were misplaced. To know what you were dealing with was to be in charge of the situation. He knew what he was dealing with. An itch that begged to be scratched and, once scratched, would disappear. It was a relief to get that straight in his head.

‘I fancy you,’ he admitted with a slow smile that sent her senses spinning. It was liberating not to be fighting the unequal fight any longer. ‘Don’t ask me why but I do...’

Sunny felt as though she were being stroked even though he hadn’t laid a finger on her. Her tummy flipped over and for a second every principle she had held dear to her heart disappeared like water down a plughole.

She shook away the mesmeric effect his words were having on her to establish some sanity.

He fancied her!

She’d been fancied before, she scoffed. True, Stefano Gunn was a few notches higher than most but still...

Agitated, she clasped her hands together and looked away. All of that would have been easy to deal with if she didn’t, likewise, fancy the man!

‘Could the outfit have anything to do with your sudden attack of lust?’ She was proud of the casual, dismissive tone of her voice, which didn’t seem to have the slightest effect on him.

‘Not at all,’ Stefano said musingly, as though he’d considered her question and given it a lot of thought. ‘Although, in fairness, it did concentrate matters when I realised that I didn’t want other men seeing you wearing next to nothing.’

‘Well, I... This isn’t at all appropriate...’ She wanted to stand up but he was sitting so close to her that she would have had to push him back and then clamber over him.

She shrank back as far as she could go into her chair and noted the mild amusement in his eyes when he looked at her.

Why did she have to fancy him? Of all people? Why did those physical responses, which she had assumed she lacked, have to jump out and target a man like Stefano Gunn?

Why couldn’t they have targeted someone nice and kind and ordinary?

Her skin tingled and prickled with awareness. Now that she knew how he felt, it was as if a Pandora’s box had been opened. The silent, shameful charge, which she had thought had just been about her, was out in the open and it was clamouring to be dealt with.

‘Tell me why,’ Stefano murmured, his antennae picking up her nerves and processing it. She wasn’t saying anything he didn’t privately think himself but such caution didn’t stand a chance next to the demands of his wayward libido.

‘Because...I happen to be working for you!’

‘In a very temporary capacity,’ Stefano dismissed drily. ‘I’m not your boss and you’re not my employee and there are no office politics to be dealt with.’

‘Of course there would be office politics to be dealt with! Not that I intend to...to...to do anything.’

‘What office politics?’

‘This is crazy.’ She stood up, nimbly avoiding crashing into him by a whisker and then there was an awkward few seconds while she hovered, waiting for him to shift away from her and wondering whether he intended to at all, before he moved and she slipped past to pace the kitchen floor.

She should go. Of course she should! But something was holding her back, weakening what her head was telling her to do. Temptation. This was what it felt like. She had never experienced it in her life before and after John, who had been just the sort of guy she should have felt tempted by, she had resigned herself to her future being about her career. She felt uncomfortable in her own skin, confused by having her neatly ordered life turned upside down.

‘What office politics?’

She paused to stand in front of him, arms folded, mouth pursed. ‘You know what I’m talking about!’

‘I have no idea and I’m not a mind-reader. If there’s some revelation I’ve been missing, then enlighten me...’

‘Katherine,’ she muttered, hating herself for what now sounded like office gossip. She couldn’t even remember where this particular piece of office gossip had originated.

‘Katherine?’ His brows knitted into a perplexed frown.

‘Nothing. Forget it. It’s nothing.’

‘You shouldn’t start conversations you don’t have the courage to finish.’ He’d never had to work so hard for a woman. It was as though she had glanced over her shoulder, thrown him a half smile and then proceeded to lay down a bed of nails and burning embers over which he had to walk if he was to follow the glance and the half smile. And where would he get even if he followed the glance and the half smile?

Nowhere much. He wasn’t interested in a full-blown relationship. She turned him on and her unattainability was even more of a turn-on but he knew that the second he had her they would both be at the beginning of the end. Since his messy divorce and the bitter disillusionment that had come with it, he had had neither the will nor the stamina to sustain any liaison beyond a couple of months. He didn’t jump out of bed with one woman to immediately jump into bed with another, but even after periods of celibacy, sometimes lasting months, he had never had the desire for any relationship with any woman to go beyond its natural course. Which was limited.

So it was puzzling why he was so keen to pursue something that would have a very limited duration.

Sunny could have kicked herself for ever having mentioned Katherine, but wasn’t this the man he was? Sexy...powerful...wealthy...a man who thought he could chase whatever woman caught his fancy?

For all she knew, Katherine might have been busy this evening and so he’d thought he’d chance it with her.

That didn’t sit quite right but it felt good not to give him the benefit of the doubt.

Because she wasn’t going to go to bed with him. It didn’t matter whether she fancied him or not or whether he fancied her or not. Did it?

‘What about Katherine?’ he prompted. ‘Are you concerned that if we sleep together, she’ll find out and sack you?’

‘We’re not going to be sleeping together!’

But they were. Stefano could read the conflict inside her as if it had been written in neon lettering across her forehead and he felt a kick of pure masculine triumph.

Was this just about winning? He’d never thought of sex in those terms. But, then again, he’d never met a woman who hadn’t been eager and willing to fall into bed with him...

‘I won’t tell if you don’t...’ he murmured.

Sunny wondered whether he’d just heard what she’d said. His rampant self-confidence was a treacherous turn-on even though she should have found it repellent. She tilted her chin defiantly. ‘It’s not about whether Katherine finds out...it’s just that I wouldn’t want to step on any toes...’

‘What are you talking about?’

‘The rumour mill has it that the only reason the company got your business was because of Katherine...’

‘Is that a fact...?’

‘I don’t suppose I should be telling you any of this, but I just want to make you see why this is crazy and why...well...why...’

‘Now you’ve started telling me...what it is that you shouldn’t be telling me...perhaps you should finish... What about Katherine? What’s that rumour mill been saying?’

Hoist by my own petard, was what sprang to Sunny’s mind. She hated gossip and yet here she was, repeating it. She couldn’t even pretend that it was illuminating work-related gossip, gossip that Stefano might find useful or that he needed to know.

It was cheap tabloid gossip and she cringed with shame but he was looking at her narrowly, waiting for her to carry on. She couldn’t suddenly change the subject and start talking about the weather or the state of the economy.

‘I don’t usually listen to gossip—I don’t—but it’s been impossible to get away from. The minute everyone found out that you were going to be using Marshall, Jones and Jones, the speculation began because...it’s new on the scene and it’s small. It’s not one of the top five...which is where...you know, one might assume...well...’ She heard herself tripping over her words and she took a deep breath because now that she’d started this stupid, idiotic story she was committed to finish it.

‘One might indeed...’ Stefano murmured. He had no time for gossip and even less time for people who had nothing better to do than to spread it but he found the agonising discomfort on her face made her seem impossibly young and vulnerable, especially because she was desperately trying to keep her cool.

He also believed her when she said that she didn’t usually listen to gossip. Where two or more people were gathered, gossip became an inevitability and, in a work environment, it was almost impossible to escape it.

Unless, of course, you happened to live in an ivory tower, which, as the head of his sprawling empire, he more or less did.

‘So the rumour started that...that...perhaps Katherine was at the heart of it...’

Stefano raised his eyebrows, amazed that wagging tongues could have struck jackpot with nothing to go on but pure speculation. ‘Explain,’ he said with undisguised curiosity.

Sunny allowed herself a little sigh of relief because at least he wasn’t storming around the kitchen, threatening to have her sacked because since when was it part of her job description to gossip to the guy who would be bringing tens of thousands of pounds’ worth of business to their company.

‘Katherine’s very beautiful and someone came to the conclusion that you might have handed some work to the company as a way of...of...of...’

‘Shall I help you along with this?’

Sunny stared at him miserably. She wanted to tell him that that someone who had come to conclusions hadn’t been her. She had no idea whether the conclusions were right or wrong, but she hated the thought that he might end up being contemptuous of her. Too much protesting of her innocence, however, would surely end up not ringing true.

‘You think,’ Stefano said helpfully, ‘that I wanted to climb into bed with the very beautiful Katherine and my method of getting her to go along with that was via bringing business to the company...’

‘Stupid,’ Sunny muttered, mortified.

‘A little insulting,’ Stefano mused. He thought his mother might have been highly entertained at what her machinations had instigated. ‘I mean,’ he said softly, ‘don’t you think that I might, just might, be perfectly capable of wooing the very beautiful Katherine without having to exert a bribe...?’

‘I have no idea how that rumour started.’ She tried not to fidget in her acute discomfort.

How on earth had they got to this point anyway? It wasn’t as though she was going to jump in the sack with him! And yet, if that were the case, shouldn’t she just have laughed off his crazy proposition and headed for the door?

It was what any normal, disinterested and frankly appalled person might have done...

Perhaps not appalled, she mentally amended. Who would be appalled at having a pass made at them by Stefano Gunn? He was sex on legs and probably the most eligible bachelor in the country, if not on the planet.

‘Although...’ he stood up, flexed his muscles and paced the kitchen, finally pouring them both another glass of wine ‘... I’ll admit there’s a certain amount of truth behind the rumour so whoever started it must have heard something...’

Sunny felt her insides plummet. She had been shocked when he had told her that he fancied her and she knew that she must have played with the idea of sleeping with him, must have entertained the wicked thought in some small corner of her mind, because to hear him now confirm that Katherine had been the draw for him made her feel slightly queasy.

Had she turned him down? And had his eyes wandered a little further afield until they had alighted on her?

‘It’s none of my business,’ she said crisply, standing up so that he got the message that she was leaving.

‘Where are you going?’

‘Home. It’s late.’

‘I don’t want you to go.’

‘Tough.’

‘Do you?’

‘Do I what?’

‘Want to go?’ He watched her as she hovered by the door, saw the flicker of indecision on her face, saw the way she took a deep breath, as though steeling herself to clear off. ‘I would never make a pass at a woman and then, if I happen to get rejected, scout around for someone else to pick up the slack. I’m not that superficial, Sunny. I don’t want Katherine, however beautiful and capable she might be. And I’ll tell you something for free...shall I?’

‘What?’ He didn’t want Katherine. He didn’t fancy her. Relief shot through her and in that moment she knew that she wanted him, that it didn’t make sense, not at all, but something in her wanted him and that something was far more powerful than the neat, tidy part of her brain that was telling her not to be a fool.

‘What I’m doing right now,’ Stefano drawled, his deep, velvety voice curling around her with the seductiveness of the richest, darkest, smoothest chocolate, ‘is not what I usually do. I don’t usually make passes at women. I don’t usually lay my cards on the table and try to persuade a woman to share my bed. But something about you...’

Sunny was beginning to feel faint. ‘If you don’t fancy Katherine, then what did you mean when you said that there was truth to the rumour...?’ She was struggling to think straight because all of a sudden her head was filled with the most erotic images, images that had never formed a part of her life at all. Images of her making love...giving in with wild abandon to a deep vein of passion she had never known existed in her.

Stefano grinned ruefully and she blinked because he no longer looked like the intimidating, ruthless tycoon that he was. He looked sexy and tantalisingly approachable.

‘I have my mother to thank for engineering my association with your company.’

‘Not my company,’ Sunny automatically said in a distracted voice.

Stefano smiled. ‘True. My mother...’ he raked his fingers through his hair because this was as intimate a chat with a woman as he could remember having in a very long time indeed ‘...has taken it upon herself to try and find me a nice wife ever since my daughter came to live with me after Alicia died. She’s of the opinion that a girl needs a mother and, in passing, a wife would do me good.’

‘Oh...’

‘Oh, indeed,’ Stefano said wryly. ‘When my mother puts her mind to something, she can be a force of nature. She gets convenient hearing loss when I try and explain to her that a wife isn’t going to happen.’ He hadn’t envisaged, when he’d put forward his bold proposal, that he would end up explaining any of this to her but, now that he was, he thought that it might be a good idea.

He’d always made it clear to the women he slept with that he wasn’t up for grabs. There wouldn’t be long-range plans or meet and greet the relatives or any talk at all about a future that wasn’t going to be on the cards.

If any of them decided that they could somehow find a way past those clear, simple clauses then they were destined for disappointment.

But then all those women had been eager and enthusiastic. Sunny hadn’t been either of those things and, more importantly, she’d also managed to charm his wilful daughter.

It was doubly important that she didn’t see any relationship they might have as a gateway to something meaningful because of her connection to Flora.

Would she anyway? He just didn’t know. What he did know was that, underneath the veneer, she was peculiarly vulnerable because of her background.

He wondered how it was that he knew so much about her when he hadn’t slept with her. He wondered whether instant sexual gratification had always obviated the need for meaningful personal conversations or whether his interest in her had been sparked by the fact that his daughter was part of the equation. Somehow, through her association with Flora, she had managed to find a back door into parts of him no other woman had managed to access after the bitter fallout of his marriage. Was this something that had made him curiously vulnerable to the thought of bedding her? Had the very thing that should have deterred him been the match that had lit the burning flame?

He wondered whether Alicia, the mother of his child, had ever had any real access to him or whether their doomed relationship had generated something that had seemed personal at the time but which, in retrospect, had just been the sort of intimacy that warring partners sometimes had. Intimacy of the wrong kind.

The roundabout cycle of pointless questions was irritating and he focused on the here and now.

‘She knows Katherine’s mother,’ he elaborated with a shrug, ‘and she promptly decided that a love match was on the cards.’

‘And you went along with it?’ Sunny was puzzled because that element of softness was not what she associated with him.

The conversation seemed to be getting more rather than less personal and Stefano hesitated before dismissing the distant sound of alarm bells ringing.

‘I am close to my mother,’ he told her neutrally. ‘I may not agree with her efforts to find me a suitable bride but I thought that it would cost nothing to place some of my business with your company and meet the woman, rather than staging a flat-out refusal and upsetting my mother, who, at the end of the day, is just doing what she feels is best for myself and my daughter. Naturally, I did all the necessary checks to ensure that the company was capable of delivering what I wanted of them. I wasn’t about to sacrifice my money for the sake of my mother’s whimsy.’

‘Naturally.’ Sunny cleared her throat. If he had gone full-steam ahead and tried to seduce her with his sheer overwhelming physicality she would have resisted, or at least she hoped that she would have resisted. Instead, they were talking and she got the feeling that she had, for whatever reason, been allowed into an inner circle to which not many were invited. She had no idea where that impression came from. Maybe because underneath the casual tone of his voice there was something ever so slightly...hesitant. As though he was picking his words carefully because he was in foreign territory.

It was fanciful, of course. For all she knew, this could be a tried and tested ruse to get what he wanted. State his intentions...switch tactics to persuasive conversation...then stake his claim... It helped to be cynical but not even that could kill her curiosity.

‘Your parents must have a very close marriage,’ she said wistfully. ‘I’ve always thought that people who are happily married are the ones who recommend marriage...’

‘My father’s dead but yes, they had a very happy marriage.’ He was bemused at the twists and turns their conversation was taking, whilst telling himself that exchanging a few personal details wasn’t anything of earth-shattering importance, even if those personal details were not ones he’d ever exchanged with the women who had flitted in and out of his life in the past few years.

‘Girls need a mother—’ Sunny thought of her own mother and all her tragic failings and she thought of all the allowances she had made for her ‘—so maybe your mother has a point.’ She shrugged, just in case he thought that she was overstepping the mark in giving an opinion.

‘In an ideal world—’ Stefano thought that this might be the perfect opportunity to get a few things straight ‘—Flora would have a delightful and adoring mummy, but it isn’t an ideal world. A delightful and adoring mummy would necessitate me having a wife and that’s a country I’ve visited once and have no intention of returning to.’ He drained his glass, stood up, strolled towards the wide windows that overlooked the extensive back lawns before turning to face her. ‘I’ve been married once,’ he said flatly, ‘and it was an unmitigated disaster. That’s something I need not tell you, but it might explain why there is no Katherine on the face of the earth who could entice me back into thinking that marriage is anything but a train wreck waiting to happen.’

‘That’s very cynical.’

‘You think? I’m surprised we don’t share the same sentiment.’

‘You mean because of...my background?’

‘Yes.’ Stefano was curious enough to prolong the conversation. ‘Surely you can’t tell me that you believe in fairy stories and happy endings when your mother was, from all accounts, a failed and unhappy woman and your father...was a bloke who did a runner before you were born and never looked back...?’

Sunny flushed. He wasn’t pulling any punches, was he? But there was nothing disdainful or pitying about his remarks. He was saying it like it was and, weirdly, she didn’t seem to mind that.

‘I’ve never thought about it one way or the other.’ She felt the nervous beat of the pulse at the base of her neck. His eyes resting lazily on her seemed like the whisper of a promise of things to come and every nerve in her body was on full alert, throbbing with barely contained excitement.

‘Are you asking me that because you want to warn me not to get involved with you?’

Stefano shot her a curling smile because there was unspoken acquiescence in that question, although he was certain that she barely realised that herself.

‘I’m not looking for involvement with anyone,’ Sunny dismissed. She glanced jumpily at him and licked her lips, which were dry and tingly. ‘And maybe you’re right. Maybe I’m not really interested and haven’t actually thought about it because of my background.’ She gave him a sad, twisted smile. ‘Maybe it’s because I don’t exactly have the right role models to fall back on. How could I believe in fairy tales and happy endings when I never knew what that sort of thing was like in the first place? Maybe you just can’t crave what you’ve never had or experienced.’ She wasn’t sure whether she really believed that or not. She knew that when she’d thought she’d found her soulmate she had desperately wanted the happy-ever-after ending except the soulmate hadn’t quite worked out as planned.

Since then, had she toughened up? Turned into the sort of cynical career woman who had no time for love and romance?

She’d thought she’d given up on having the sort of capacity for a physical response that was necessary for any sort of relationship, but she was wrong, wasn’t she? Turned out she did have the capacity for a physical response...

So was she kidding herself that she never thought about the future and what it might hold for her with a guy? Should the right guy come along one day?

If Stefano was warning her off getting ideas about him, as if that would ever happen in a million years, then to tell him that, for all the chaos and heartache of her background, she still believed in the enduring power of love would be a mistake.

He’d get cold feet and run a mile and—why kid herself?— she didn’t want that.

‘You don’t have to warn me off,’ she said huskily, daring to step into the unknown and feeling a shiver of molten excitement, ‘because, like I said, the last thing I would want would be involvement...’ She laughed, heady with the sensation that she was no longer talking to the formidable, feared and respected Stefano Gunn, the man who could make heads of finance quake in their shoes, whose ability to close deals and predict the stock market swings was legendary, who could command immediate attention with the snap of his fingers...

She was talking to a man who fancied her and right now she was no longer the junior in a law firm in the presence of the toughest guy in the concrete jungle. They were both adults working their way towards sleeping with one another.

It was...thrilling. It made her realise how predictable her life was. She had spent so long making sure to impose order and control, so that she would never have a runaway future, that somehow the present had become lost in the process, as had fun.

‘And especially involvement with a guy like you,’ she completed with utter honesty.

Stefano, relieved as he was to know that they were both singing from the same song sheet, was a little irked by the speed with which she had established her distance and he was particularly irked by her statement that there was no way she could become involved with someone like him.

Of course he could understand it. If she happened to be someone on the lookout for a committed relationship. But she wasn’t and he believed her. Experiences shaped people and hers had been frightful.

‘Because I would be unable to return whatever involvement you wanted?’

Sunny laughed and then looked at him with narrowed, amused, speculative eyes. ‘You’re really arrogant, aren’t you...?’

Stefano frowned, taken aback by her blunt criticism. It was rare for him to meet a woman who wasn’t either intimidated by him or else desperate to impress him. With the exception of his mother.

‘I don’t mean to be offensive,’ Sunny hurriedly expanded, ‘but there’s no way I could ever get involved with someone as rich and powerful and driven as you...’

‘Since when are money and ambition turn-offs?’ he asked incredulously.

‘When I was thirteen,’ she mused, looking back into the past, ‘I got a scholarship to go to one of the top boarding schools in the country. I met lots of girls there who...came from gilded circles, probably just like you. They talked very loudly in cut-glass accents and laughed a lot and flirted like mad with all the boys. What they would have wanted to end up with would have been someone rich and powerful and driven. If I ever find my soulmate, he probably won’t have much money and he’ll be kind and thoughtful and measured...’ And he’ll have to be able to do what you’re doing now...he’ll have to be able to fire me up until I feel like I can’t breathe for the excitement...

‘Forgive me while I stifle a yawn.’

Sunny wanted to be angry at the casual way he had dismissed her heartfelt dreams but when she caught those dark, amused eyes she felt her lips twitch.

‘Thoughtful and kind can be very sexy traits.’ She lowered her eyes, while the heat of their mutual chemistry sizzled around them.

‘Maybe,’ Stefano murmured. ‘But in the meanwhile...’ He tugged her to her feet and she bumped against his hard, muscular body.

She knew this was what it must feel like when swooning women said that they went up in flames.

Her whole body was burning, on fire. Her nipples, scraping against her bra, felt insanely sensitive and the dampness between her legs was hot and slick, making her want to reach beneath her underwear so that she could rub herself out of her wet discomfort.

‘Yes?’ she squeaked, as far removed from the efficient and sexless professional she assumed herself to be as was possible.

‘Let me show you what someone raw and elemental can do for you...’