Читать книгу Modern Romance March 2019 5-8 - Ким Лоренс, Dani Collins - Страница 16

‘WOULD AN OFFER of help get my head bitten off?’ Ivo was all for self-sufficiency, but she took it into the realm of the ridiculous.

Flora, who hadn’t heard him come up behind her as she tucked the baby into his buggy and adjusted his sun hat, gave a startled jump at the sound of his voice at her shoulder.

She didn’t realise how disturbingly close he was until she straightened up and half turned, finding they were standing almost touching. The sensation that made her head spin sizzled along her nerve endings and sent her stomach into a violent dip.

Her eyes made the slow journey from mid-chest level up to his lean, dark face. There was no trace of the emotions that had blazed earlier in his enigmatic stare; his expression was inscrutable.

But now she had glimpsed past the mask she couldn’t help but wonder what else his impregnable shell of control hid besides a toxic relationship with his late father.

None of your business, Flora girl. He’s not your business. The romance is fake. It’s not your job to understand him or heal him. He’d laugh in your face at the idea he needs healing.

And maybe, she mused, he was right.

His voice cut across her internal dialogue.

‘Well, are you?’

She looked at him blankly. ‘Nervous?’

It wasn’t what he’d asked and if he was honest not something he had even considered. The acknowledgement came with a stab of guilt tinged with irritation. He didn’t need to change. He didn’t want to change. Any changing and compromise would be hers to do. Dio, why the hell did she have to be so in touch with her feelings about everything anyway? he wondered, ignoring the fact that it was this aspect of her personality—the soft heart, the desire to put the needs of others above her own—that he was relying on to deliver his nephew into his care.

Flora shrugged and dodged his dark brooding stare. If she hadn’t been nervous she was now, and not only of what waited outside.

The earlier conversation had made her think of him in a new light, not as a man who was invulnerable but someone who might actually have some weak spots. Just when she had got comfortable with thinking of him as a man who was one of life’s takers, a Callum, a man she could comfortably dismiss, a man she wouldn’t allow herself to be attracted to.

‘A bit.’

He took a half-step back and she almost wept, so intense was her relief to put a few more inches of air between them. She had to ask herself whether the problem lay with him or her... No, actually, she didn’t have to ask herself anything—and she wouldn’t.

Resurrecting a little defiance, albeit a slightly less focused version, she lifted a hand to her face and absently brushed a curl from her cheek. The braid in her hair was unravelling as fast as she was!

‘Do I have time to freshen up?’

His heavy-lidded gaze slid over the soft curves of her face, lingering a second or two too long on the plump fullness of her lips before he ventured a response. ‘You look fine to me, but if you need—’

Flustered by the way he was looking at her, she shook her head. ‘No. I’m fine.’

He watched through his half-lowered lids as she tweaked the baby’s cap, even though it didn’t need tweaking. She looked, he decided, better than fine.

A lot better!

He recognised the compulsive element as his glance slid over her slim figure, but he didn’t have an appetite to fight it.

He liked looking at her. It was a weakness he was ready to admit to and looking at her was infinitely preferable to having her loose in his head, even if he had invited the invasion by revealing far too much. He still didn’t know what madness had possessed him to make him open up that way.

During the flight, while he’d renewed his acquaintance with the pilot, he’d tried and failed to analyse why she acted as some sort of catalyst to feelings he had buried—best thing for them—and failed.

He’d settled for a slightly unsatisfactory verdict: that it wouldn’t be happening again, but he could carry on looking.

And where was the harm?

Except to his blood pressure.

Today her hair was tied again, though in a looser plait affair that left curls trailing down her neck and around her face. She had opted to wear a shift dress with a swirly pattern of soft blues and greens that showed off her slim arms and incredible legs. Looking at the slim calves reminded him of the only other time he’d seen her legs. The memory of the sizzling tension of that night still retained enough residual heat to make his skin prickle and his gut tighten.

‘Are you going to accept some help?’

She straightened up gracefully and did the flip thing with her hair. Every time she did it he thought about unwinding that plait and spreading the hair... ‘Help,’ he exclaimed abruptly.

In response to her bemused expression, Ivo nodded at the stroller where Jamie was doing his impression of a perfect baby, kicking his legs and looking cute and smiley. ‘Do you want to negotiate the steps or...?’ He arched a satiric brow and added drily, ‘In case you were wondering, this is me discussing it with you.’

Flora decided to ignore the sarcasm. Instead she nodded to the two uniformed figures waiting to carry the buggy down the steps.

‘Thanks so much.’

Ivo watched the men melt as she smiled at them.

Behind her Flora heard Ivo swear; it was an impressive bilingual effort. She half turned to look at him as the men hoisted the buggy between them, a questioning frown painting furrows in her wide smooth brow.

‘What happened?’

‘It hasn’t yet—this is the first test.’

She lifted her face and quivered nervously. ‘Test?’ It had an ominous sound and brought back the terrible weeks of revision before her finals, then the elation of passing before she’d realised that exams were only the first step. Next came experience.

She’d been lucky and got a job offer after her first interview, a firm based in Edinburgh but with their heart and much of their work in the Highlands, domestic and commercial.

She’d joined a team of young and enthusiastic architects with innovative ideas for affordable but aesthetically pleasing homes in the Highlands.

She had seen her future as mapped out and then... Well, it just went to show that you should live in the moment. She had walked away from her dream job and did she regret it? She looked at the crumpled sleep suit in her hand and lifted her chin. Not for one second did she regret her choice.

‘We are in love, remember.’

The soft words jolted her back to the moment with a thud. She dropped the sleep suit, gulped and tried to match his insouciant tone. ‘I didn’t think you’d care what the help thinks, and you’ve already told me that your grandfather doesn’t believe in love...or is that you? You know, a person could be forgiven for thinking the brooding Latin lover doth protest too much.’

‘I’m not your lover.’ The blush she had held at bay couldn’t withstand this provocation or the dark chocolate, velvety voice. ‘As for the help, just don’t smile at them the way you did those two.’

‘Smile?’ She shook her head, bemused by his comment. ‘I don’t...’ Her voice faded as he took her arm and propelled her towards the open doors and onto the metal platform in the open air. ‘My jacket!’ she protested.

She didn’t need it. The heat after the air-conditioned atmosphere of the flight hit her. She lifted her hand to shade her eyes against the sun. The men carrying the buggy were on the tarmac waiting; so were several other people. Oh, hell, she realised, a reception committee! All it lacked was a brass band and some sexy baton-twirlers.

This was more awful than any of the scenarios she had dreamt of.

‘I’d assumed low profile,’ he hissed through clenched teeth.

She felt his low chuckle, low heartless chuckle, and then his fingers tightened around her shoulder in warning, as though he had expected her to turn and run back into the plane. Serve him right if I did, she thought viciously.

‘You might have warned me there would be...’

She had half turned and was tilting her head back when his hand moved from her shoulder to the back of her head, his long fingers curling into her hair and his thumb coming to rest on the angle of her jaw, making her forget what she was about to say.

He bent forward, the gleam of intent in his dark eyes telling her what was about to happen a split second before it did.

He was going to kiss her.

Then he did, and she stopped thinking.

His mouth was warm, his kiss managed to be slow and sensitive and yet possessive, a statement saying, ‘She’s mine,’ to anyone watching.

Flora wasn’t watching, she was feeling. It was as if her nerve endings had been exposed as she fell bonelessly into the kiss and him; resisting never even crossed her mind.

The hot stream of desire coursing like wine though her body was both terrifying and the most exciting thing that had ever happened to her.

His arms were like steel, holding her close, moulding her to his hard body, very hard. Knowing he was aroused—that he wanted her—only escalated her excitement, her madness.

And then it was over. The anticlimax had the physical impact of an icy plunge pool after a sauna. She couldn’t breathe, normality still felt a long way off and her brain was blank.

‘You all right?’ he asked as she swayed.

Bit too late to be concerned now, she thought as she glared her dislike up at him. Even in the open she was conscious of the electrical charge that still surrounded them. ‘I don’t like heights,’ she retorted, swaying coltishly away from his steadying hand. The one that planted itself firmly in the small of her back was impossible to evade.

‘All about first impressions, cara,’ he whispered, running his lips up the curve of her neck. ‘There are people here who will be reporting back to my grandfather.’

She was dimly aware in the distance of Jamie making his own first impressions as he kicked off—loudly!

‘Jamie...’

He nodded and speared his free hand through his hair, wondering as he did at what point he had actually thought he was in control.

He was acting like some sort of hormonal teenager...or his father.

Short of hugging an iceberg, nothing could have exerted a more blood-cooling effect than the second possibility.

Flora listened as he responded to a question from someone standing inside the plane with what sounded like orders issued in his native tongue. She used the moments to gather her wits.

‘Sorry about that,’ he murmured as the person vanished.

‘For kissing me?’ she said, managing to sound cool, even slightly amused.

Was he sorry?

He ought to be. She was, it turned out, exactly the sort of woman he’d spent his life avoiding, the sort of woman of whom he could imagine men becoming reliant on the sound of her voice to start the day.

He wasn’t one of those men. He had no emotional connection, it was just sex...or it had the potential to be.

‘You’d be insulted if I said yes.’

Flora met his dark, hypnotic gaze and was lost. Great big holes appeared in the composure she had managed to gather around herself. Lowering her gaze was the only protective option left and that wasn’t as easy as it should have been. By the time her eyes were safely fixed on her toes her skin was covered by a fine sheen of perspiration.

‘I’m sure you enjoy performing to your adoring audience but, like I said, I’m not good with heights.’

‘Come on. Watch your step.’

His hand stayed an inch clear of her elbow as she walked straight-backed down the steps, close enough to steady her should it be required and far enough away to avoid having another of her displays of pig-headed independence.

* * *

The meet-and-greet, the VIP fast route—actually everything that happened between walking down the metal stairs and getting into the middle one of the half-dozen cars that seemed to be reserved for their party—was a bit of a blur.

Was this what it felt like to be a celebrity? If so, Flora couldn’t for the life of her work out why so many people wanted this dubious status.

She knew she’d been introduced to people she’d never seen before, and wouldn’t know again, even though their names were drifting like flotsam through her head. She knew she’d smiled in what she hoped were appropriate moments.

Ivo spoke to the driver for a few moments before the screen separating them slid silently into place. He leaned back in his seat.

‘That went well.’

Flora held out a toy, zooming it in to tickle the baby’s tummy and nuzzle his cheek to distract him.

Ivo’s proximity was bothering her too much. She really hoped this was a short journey. ‘I think your idea of well and mine might be pretty far apart.’

‘The kiss?’ Head against the deeply padded leather rest, he turned his head.

‘Yes, the kiss.’ She had decided to treat it just like any other line that had been crossed. Making a big thing of it would make it big thing or, and that was what she was afraid of, make him realise that it had been a big thing for her—nothing short of a revelation.

He had tapped into a passion inside her. A hunger that she hadn’t known existed. Even when she had imagined herself in love with Callum she had never considered herself a particularly sexual person. If she had been she might have been less appreciative of what she had idealistically assumed was his consideration. She’d realised later, of course, that he simply hadn’t been into her that much.

‘You want me to ask next time?’

‘A little warning would have been appreciated, and maybe a breath mint.’

She was just feeling pleased with herself for keeping things light when he laughed; the deep vibrant sound sent illicit shivers down her spine. Then he touched her cheek and the contact seemed both natural and intimate. His eyes dropped to her lips. ‘You tasted like strawberries.’

She fought the magnetic pull with a shocked little gasp to break the contact, before flopping back in her seat, breathing hard.

‘So, what happens now?’ she said, putting all the cool and practical at her command in her voice.

‘Try catching up on some sleep.’

Her eyes went to the baby. ‘I couldn’t.’

‘It might help some of those frown lines smooth out.’

‘I suppose I might come across as a bit overprotective.’ The concession came reluctantly and drew a short, hard laugh from her travelling companion.

‘You think?’

She gave a little shrug. ‘He’s my responsibility and I was worried about him flying.’ Not worried enough, she thought with a fresh rush of guilt.

The possibility that the tiny defect in his heart detected at Sami’s twenty-week scan and confirmed at birth might make air travel an issue had not occurred to her until after Ivo had left that first morning.

Obviously she had contacted the family GP immediately, who, declaring himself unable to see a problem, had in turn checked with the paediatric cardiac consultant who had overall responsibility for Jamie’s care.

His advice had been the same: there was no reason Jamie could not fly.

‘Babies fly all the time.’

It was annoyance at his dismissal that made her toss back, ‘Not all babies have a heart defect.’

The indolent pose he’d adopted vanished as his posture stiffened. ‘A heart...’ His chest lifted as he inhaled deeply before training his accusing stare on Flora. ‘Why am I just learning of this?’

‘Possibly because you never asked, or maybe because it’s none of your business?’ she charged back, angry at his display of how very dare you? hauteur.

The muscles in Ivo’s brown throat rippled as he swallowed. He was still in the grip of shock, not just because of the information she had casually dropped into the conversation, but because of the overwhelming surge of protectiveness that had hit him without warning.

‘Is he...is it bad?’

She shook her head. ‘At Sami’s twenty-week scan they discovered a small defect in the baby’s heart. Something they call a VSD, and the rest of us call a hole in the heart. Sometimes it’s vanished by birth, but Jamie’s hadn’t. He was referred to a top cardiac paediatrician.’

It took a supreme effort but Ivo managed to stop himself asking any of the myriad questions that were hovering on the tip of his tongue. He knew that letting her speak would tell him what he wanted to know quicker, and she was being concise as she gave the information in a carefully neutral voice.

‘It isn’t that rare. In more severe cases they surgically intervene on infants. Jamie’s isn’t severe and there is every chance it will close spontaneously over the next few years. It’s a wait-and-see policy at this stage and he has no symptoms.’

‘So he is in no immediate danger.’

‘No, the doctors are quite relaxed about it.’

‘But you’re not,’ he said, leaning back into the leather and half closing his eyes. ‘You have to relax. Babies pick up on that stuff.’ He opened one eye and saw she was looking at him in astonishment. ‘I’ve been doing a bit of research.’

The slightly embarrassed look on his face as he made the admission made her smile. It was weird—she had never known her emotions to be on such a roller coaster and it was all the unpredictable man’s fault. One moment he was yelling at her and being totally unreasonable, the next he was being disarmingly sweet.

Her smile deepened as she realised she’d just thought of Ivo Greco and sweet in the same sentence.

‘I did a lot of research when I first...’ Her eyes skittered away from the understanding in his. ‘When I became guardian. I knew nothing about babies. I never thought I’d be a parent. I never had a five-year plan or anything. I just sort of fell into things—right place, right time.’

She made it sound as though she had sleepwalked into a great job at an incredible firm of architects and graduated in the top three in her class quite accidentally. God save me from British self-deprecation!

Scottish self-deprecation, he could almost hear the pride and reproach in her voice as she put him right—as she undoubtedly would do, were he reckless enough to voice his complaint.

He opted for a middle ground.

‘Modesty... I don’t come across that very often.’

She scowled. He made her sound like some sort of old-fashioned freak. ‘And definitely not when you look in the mirror.’ Her eyes flew wide, her hand going to her lips in an attitude of comical dismay. ‘Sorry. I didn’t mean that as an insult.’

Amusement danced deep in his eyes as he studied her face and then faded like a snuffed-out candle as he found he was able to see all too clearly her checking and double checking on the sleeping baby, her glorious hair swinging loose around her narrow shoulders, tense from the burden that had fallen on them. He could almost see the individual lines of worry etched on her youthful, beautiful face as she searched fearfully for signs and symptoms the doctors had told her to look out for.

Fighting his way free of the uncomfortably empathic moment, he managed a forced smile.

‘God help me when you do mean it, Flora Henderson.’ His glance slid to the baby lying between them just as his head lolled; this time he didn’t jerk himself awake as he had on the last half-dozen times.

‘Why don’t you take a nap while he’s asleep?’

‘I couldn’t,’ she said, meaning it.

Two minutes later he heard her breathing deepen.