Читать книгу Carole Mortimer Romance Collection - Кэрол Мортимер, Кэрол Мортимер - Страница 34

IN THE ordinary course of events, she and Wolf would never have met at all. In fact, it might have been better for everyone concerned if they never had!

Cyn had been working as one of the evening receptionists at Thornton’s, the exclusive hotel the family owned in the centre of London—the same hotel Rebecca and Wolf were due to hold their wedding reception at in August, which was why they knew there would be no problem with that particular booking!

There had been a lot of day as well as night-time staff on duty that particular evening; Alex Thornton and his wife were hosting a sixtieth birthday party for his mother, Claudia, in the main function-room. Despite the fact that this was posted up on the notice-board as the guests entered the hotel, Cyn had spent the majority of the beginning of the evening directing people to the appropriate room. Not that she had seen any of the family themselves; they had been escorted into the party by the manager himself. By ten-fifteen, Cyn had been sure all the guests had to be present by now, and settled down at her computer console to complete some of the paperwork that seemed to go along with the job and which she hadn’t had time to deal with earlier, while several of the other girls on duty took a well-earned break; they had all been working extremely hard today to make sure everything ran smoothly for the Thornton party. Cyn had been quite happy to wait for her own break. Besides, she knew she wasn’t going to be too popular if the couple in Room 217 weren’t even officially registered, let alone their preference for morning newspapers logged in!

‘What did that computer ever do to you?’ queried a deeply amused voice.

Cyn looked up from her frowning concentration on the VDU, her eyes widening as she took in the appearance of the man leaning so casually over the top of the desk as he watched her struggling to squash a lengthy home address of one of the guests into the totally inadequate space given for this very purpose by the supposedly foolproof computer program; obviously they hadn’t considered people coming from Russia when they devised the program. But one look at this man and she didn’t care whether the address was legible enough, after her pruning, for the guest to be billed for any extras discovered after his departure or not. This man was gorgeous!

Tall—he had to be, to be able to lean this far over the top of the reception-desk!—with over-long blond hair that persisted in falling forward over his high intelligent forehead, eyes the colour of warm amber looking at Cyn with deepening amusement as she continued to stare at him, his features striking rather than what could strictly be called handsome, everything slightly larger than life, his cheekbones high, his nose slightly bent, as if it might have been broken at some time, his mouth— Oh, God, that mouth...!

Cyn stood up slowly, crossing to stand on the other side of the desk from him. ‘Machines and I don’t get on,’ she dismissed with a rueful shrug. ‘Can I help you?’ she offered politely, although from the look of his black evening suit and snowy white shirt, his black bow-tie spoiling the immaculate effect slightly, being not quite straight, as if he had tied it in a hurry, he was yet another guest for the Thornton party. She couldn’t help wondering if one of the other girls would know who this particular guest was. There was a list, of course, for security reasons, but that seemed to have been put to one side earlier as they were swamped with queries about the party. Cyn gave it a sideways glance as it lay on the desk by her hand, but there were so many names not crossed off that it would be impossible to know who this man was. Unless she asked him. And she couldn’t do that—much as she longed to!

‘I hope so,’ he grimaced. ‘I’m afraid I’m a little late, you see, and—’

‘The Thornton party,’ she nodded understandingly. ‘Well, I shouldn’t worry too much about being late, if I were you; there are so many people crushed into that room that I doubt if anyone has noticed your absence!’ Although if she had asked this man to a party, even if there were three hundred other guests invited, she would still have noticed his absence.

His grimace deepened. ‘I wouldn’t be too sure of that if I were you!’ He shook his head.

Ah, she thought, there was obviously a woman involved, a woman who, like her, would be well aware of his absence. A woman he obviously didn’t want to hurt, otherwise he wouldn’t have been here at all, Cyn would hazard a guess. For some reason that knowledge made her feel slightly depressed.

‘I’d forgotten it was tonight at all, you see,’ the man frowned, completely unaware of Cyn’s disappointed thoughts. ‘Until about half an hour ago. I must have made the quickest change in history, and— What is it?’ He frowned as he saw she was slowly nodding at his words.

Her cheeks felt slightly warm as she blushed slightly. ‘I was—well, I was just thinking that that accounts for it,’ she admitted awkwardly.

Dark blond brows rose. ‘Accounts for what?’ he said slowly.

It was hardly her place to tell one of the hotel guests he was less than immaculately dressed! ‘I— Well— You see—’

He frowned down at his own appearance as he realised this was what seemed to be causing her embarrassment. ‘Hell, I haven’t put odd socks on again, have I?—no, that can’t be it,’ he ruefully answered his own suggestion. ‘You can’t see as far down as my feet. All right,’ he sighed, ‘what is it? Blood on my shirt collar? Shaving foam in my ears? Blood on my shirt collar and shaving foam in my ears?’ he groaned desperately.

Cyn was laughing by this time; she couldn’t help it. Because from his self-derisive attitude to the suggestion that he might have done any one—or all three!—of those things, she had a feeling that he had been guilty of all three of them on at least one occasion! ‘None of those things,’ she assured him, still smiling. ‘Although your bow-tie is less than perfect,’ she told him with a rueful grimace.

He put up a self-conscious hand to the offending item, a long, sensitive-looking hand, the fingers long and tapered. ‘I never was any good with the damned things,’ he muttered, looking up. ‘I don’t suppose you...?’

Cyn frowned her puzzlement. ‘I what?’

‘You can’t be any worse at tying bow-ties than I am,’ he decided firmly, leaning forward over the desk once again. ‘Have a go,’ he suggested, thrusting his chin forward to allow her better access to the tie at his throat.

She stared at him in dismay for several seconds. She couldn’t just go around rearranging guests’ dress! There was sure to be a rule about it somewhere in the contract she had signed to work here at all, and as she had only been here a matter of weeks—

‘Well?’ He muttered with his jaw clenched, obviously tiring of the unnatural pose. ‘I could get a stiff neck if I have to hold my chin up much longer, and end up walking about like this all evening. Then I’ll really be popular!’

With the woman at the Thorntons’ party who was waiting for his arrival. But what was she worrying about? Cyn derided herself; she was never likely to see this man again, so what difference did it make to her who was waiting for him in that function-room!

‘OK,’ she sighed heavily, leaning forward to untie the bow so that she could start from scratch. From the look of the crushed material the rather sad-looking bow she had just undone had been far from his own first attempt this evening!

His proximity, necessarily so if she were to arrange the bow-tie at all, was more than a little unnerving! So much so that she made a complete mess of the bow herself the first time she tried. But the man was so close to her she could see the pores of his skin, the black flecks in those strange amber-coloured eyes, feel the warmth of his breath against her cheeks. How could she possibly be expected to concentrate?

‘Not so easy, is it?’ he said with satisfaction as she started again, luckily seeming to have no idea it was he himself who was making this so difficult for her.

‘Mmm,’ Cyn acknowledged as she frowned her attention on the bow-tie, her tongue sticking out between her teeth preventing her from making further conversation as she tried her best to concentrate on tying the bow rather than on the sensual magnetism of the man she was tying it on.

He gave a sudden throaty chuckle. ‘Anyone finding us like this could be forgiven for completely misinterpreting the situation— I was only joking!’ he protested as she moved sharply away, thrusting her hands behind her back as if they had been stung. ‘You can’t leave me half dressed like this!’ he groaned as he put a hand up and found the bow was still incomplete.

He was hardly ‘half dressed’, Cyn protested silently—although the suggestion did bring some rather vivid imaginings to mind, predominantly a situation where he actually could be ‘half dressed’!

‘Come here,’ she instructed impatiently, pulling him forward by the bow, her fingers moving deftly now, irritated with herself for indulging in such daydreams; this man might be slightly disorganised, but he was still someone important enough to be a guest at the Thornton party, and, as such, completely out of her league. ‘There!’ she patted the newly tied bow-tie with satisfaction. ‘You—’

‘Wolf, what on earth are you doing?’ demanded an incredulous voice.

Cyn reacted with dismay to the sound of that intrusive voice, sure she was going to be in trouble now over the incident with the man she had now learnt was called Wolf—Wolf...! What sort of a name was that, for goodness’ sake? He didn’t look in the least perturbed by the interruption, giving her a rueful grimace before turning to face the woman who had called out to him.

‘Enquiring where the party is, of course, Barbara,’ he drawled easily. ‘How’s it all going?’ He strolled across the reception area to join her.

Cyn looked closely at the other woman. She was one of the guests Cyn must have missed arriving earlier, because she didn’t remember seeing her before. Beautiful—of course she would have to be!—her features smooth and even, dominated by enormous green eyes surrounded by thick sooty lashes, her mouth a pout of red, with a golden tan to her skin that she hadn’t acquired in this country, not in the last few months, anyway. And with a cascade of ebony hair that tumbled down on to her shoulders in a style that was arranged to look completely casual but actually wasn’t—Cyn did not doubt for a moment that it had taken an accomplished hairdresser several hours to achieve the effect. And she was tall, at least five feet eight even without the high-heeled shoes she wore with the figure-hugging black dress that showed a long expanse of her silken legs below its above-knee length.

Everything that Cyn herself wasn’t, in fact, with her own almost waist-length hair secured in a single braid down her spine, and her pale elfin features that could never be called beautiful. And it had always been the bane of her life that she was only five feet tall in her stockinged feet; she had always longed to be tall and elegantly graceful. Like the woman Wolf was now kissing warmly on the cheek as he reached her side.

‘Alex is getting more and more polite as the evening goes on,’ the woman called Barbara tightly answered Wolf’s light query, their conversation more than audible to Cyn as she stood at the reception-desk a short distance away, although she looked down awkwardly at some papers on top of the desk as flashing green eyes shot her a furious glare. ‘A sure sign that he’s absolutely furious!’ the woman added with a frown.

Wolf sighed. ‘When is he anything else these days?’ He shook his head. ‘He’s going to give himself a heart attack if he carries on like this, Barbara. You know he—’

‘He’s furious with you, Wolf,’ Barbara cut in impatiently. ‘You know you should have been here with the rest of the family to greet our guests as they arrived!’

Alex? The rest of the family? Our guests? It suddenly dawned on Cyn, as she stood riveted to the spot, her stomach doing somersaults, that Wolf had to be a member of the Thornton family too, that Alex had to be Alex Thornton, the head of Thornton Industries; in effect, her own employer!

Oh, my God, she thought, and she had told Wolf no one would even notice he was missing from the party in the crush! And she had faulted his appearance before attempting to rearrange his bow-tie for him! Just who was he?

Dark blond brows rose mockingly over those amber eyes. ‘As I received a formal invitation I thought I was included in the guest list, not the family,’ he drawled derisively.

Barbara gave him a reproving frown, spoiling the beauty of her face as the frown gave her an almost primly disapproving look. ‘You know you were sent the invitation so that it served as a reminder for you to come at all. Obviously we wasted our time even trying to do that!’ She shook her head disgustedly. ‘Oh, well, better late than never, I suppose.’ She put her arm through the crook of his as she turned him purposefully in the direction of the room where the party was being held. ‘Maybe when he sees you’re here after all, Alex will start to calm down.’

‘I wouldn’t count on it,’ Wolf murmured unconcernedly. ‘Seeing me has never been known to have that effect on my too-serious brother before!’

Brother...! It was worse than she had even imagined, Cyn realised. Wolf wasn’t some obscure member of the Thornton family—which had been her fervent hope once she had realised he was related to them at all!—but was, in fact, the other son of the family, the one who had upset them all by becoming a musician or an artist, or something they considered equally unsuitable for a Thornton heir. Because that was certainly who he was—Wolf Thornton, joint heir with Alex Thornton to Thornton Industries, half-owner of this very hotel, in fact!

‘No,’ the woman called Barbara acknowledged with a rueful twist of those pouting red lips. ‘But it will give your mother pleasure to have you here, and that’s sure to help the situation.’

Wolf didn’t look at all convinced by this method of thinking, and in fact Barbara didn’t seem over-confident about it either. Having seen Alex Thornton several times, Cyn couldn’t help but think they were right to be apprehensive; the two brothers not only looked nothing alike—Alex being much darker in colouring, with pale blue eyes that almost looked grey, and not possessing the impressive height of his brother—but the two men were nothing alike in temperament either, from the little she had seen of them. Alex Thornton was austere and unapproachable, while Wolf Thornton was possessed of a roguish charm that had instantly captivated Cyn.

In fact, she looked after him a little longingly as the woman Barbara led him away towards the function-room, where he would no doubt be swallowed up completely by the family and friends he had there, forgetting completely the young receptionist who had been so forward with him. Actually, she had better hope that he did exactly that where she was concerned; she didn’t want to be sacked from this job just yet, and her manner towards him had hardly been professional!

Watching him now, so tall and impressive as he walked down the carpeted corridor at Barbara’s side, she couldn’t help but berate herself for not realising earlier that he had a presence, a self-confidence, that was an essential part of his make-up, had been inborn, in fact. But how could she have guessed he was Wolf Thornton? No one had ever mentioned what the other Thornton brother’s first name was. And she certainly wouldn’t have forgotten a name like Wolf if she had heard it before!

Suddenly he came to a halt, murmured something to the woman at his side, before turning and walking purposefully back towards the desk where Cyn still stood. She watched his progress towards her with increasingly widening eyes; oh, lord, what was he going to say to her now?

‘Will you have dinner with me tomorrow evening—Lucynda Smith?’ he added lightly after glancing at the name-badge on the lapel of the jacket the hotel had supplied as part of her uniform.

She swallowed hard, glancing past him towards the woman still standing in the corridor as she watched the two of them with narrowed green eyes, then hastily looked away again as she saw the venom in that glittering gaze, looking up at Wolf Thornton as if he had to have gone slightly mad—or she had; he hadn’t really just invited her out to dinner tomorrow night—had he...?

‘Cyn,’ she answered automatically, dazedly.

He grinned, showing even white teeth against his tanned skin—a tan he had acquired at the same time as the lovely Barbara had? Cyn couldn’t help wondering. Just who was the other woman? And what role did she have in Wolf’s life if he could walk away from her to invite Cyn out for the evening?

‘I didn’t have sin in mind on our first date.’ His eyes gleamed down at her with mocking humour. ‘Only dinner.’ He shrugged those broad shoulders. ‘But if you insist I’m sure I could—’

‘I meant my friends—people, call me Cyn. It’s short for Lucynda,’ she explained irritably as he still looked amused—at her expense! But who could really blame him? She was acting like a besotted teenager, not a responsible twenty-year-old.

‘Ah,’ his mouth twisted teasingly. ‘Well, Cyn,’ he drawled her name with deliberate intimacy, ‘will you have dinner with me tomorrow evening? Nothing so grand as this place, I’m afraid.’ He grimaced at their surroundings. ‘I can only suffer this particular brand of opulence every couple of months or so!’

Cyn wouldn’t have felt comfortable dining anywhere like this hotel herself. But she couldn’t have dinner anywhere with this man: he was her employer, for goodness’ sake, albeit in a non-participating capacity; she had heard that the second son of the Thornton family kept well away from the business side of things.

She shook her head. ‘I can’t, I’m afraid.’

‘Working,’ he nodded understandingly. ‘I could ask my brother to arrange for you to have the evening off,’ he said lightly, ‘but—’

‘Oh, no!’ Cyn gasped her dismay at the very suggestion. The last thing she wanted was for the head of the Thornton family to hear of her encounter with his brother!

‘—I won’t,’ Wolf finished mockingly. ‘I think the best thing to do is work out which evening you do have free, and arrange things from there, don’t you?’

Cyn looked up at him searchingly. He didn’t seem to be taunting her, and yet— Why on earth was he inviting out a little nonentity like her?

‘Do you like Chinese food?’ he added temptingly. ‘It’s my passion at the moment. If you would rather—’

‘I love Chinese food,’ Cyn told him hastily, very conscious of the growing impatience of the beautiful Barbara as she now stood in the corridor, tapping her elegantly-shod foot against the marble floor. ‘And as it happens I do have tomorrow evening off. But—’

‘Great! I’ll meet you outside here at seven-thirty tomorrow evening,’ he said economically, having glanced round to see that a man had now joined the lovely Barbara—a man Cyn recognised only too well as Alex Thornton himself! ‘I hate to eat late,’ Wolf told Cyn before striding off to join the other couple, not looking at her again as the three of them went off in the direction of the music.

Cyn stared after him dazedly. She had just been bulldozed, railroaded, bullied—in the nicest possible way!—into meeting Wolf Thornton for dinner tomorrow evening!

She should never have kept that date with him, should have realised getting to know him any better than she already had would only lead to heartache. Oh, heartache didn’t even begin to describe the pain she had suffered for daring to fall in love with Wolf Thornton!

* * *

Having dinner with Gerald Harcourt that evening was much less traumatic. Gerald was easy company, flirtatious without being pushy—perhaps because he didn’t usually have to be, Cyn thought a little indulgently; Gerald’s good looks and charm would normally make it all too easy for him to make conquests. Just not Cyn. Oh, she liked him well enough, and if he hadn’t been going to be Wolf’s father-in-law, she might even have kept on seeing him on a casual basis. But as he was going to be Wolf’s father-in-law...!

‘I’m not giving up on you,’ he told her warmly when she refused his second invitation for dinner. ‘I happen to think you could be the woman who changes my opinion about marriage.’

Cyn looked up at him reprovingly as they stood inside the tiny sitting-room of the small two-bedroomed cottage she had taken a lease on a couple of years ago in the countryside several miles outside Feltham itself, Gerald having driven her home after their meal. ‘Do many women fall for that line?’ she drawled derisively.

He grinned unabashedly. ‘Quite a few, actually,’ he acknowledged derisively.

She chuckled wryly. ‘Well, not me, Mr Harcourt,’ she told him firmly. ‘If anything I’m probably less kindly disposed towards marriage than you are,’ she added.

‘You see?’ Gerald still smiled, completely unperturbed. ‘We’re perfect for each other!’

Cyn chuckled softly, warmly returning his humour. ‘Forget it, Gerald,’ she drawled. ‘Maybe we can have dinner again another time, but for the moment I prefer to concentrate on your daughter’s wedding.’

He gave a grimace. ‘Reminding me I have a daughter old enough to be married puts me firmly in my place, doesn’t it?’ he acknowledged ruefully.

She shook her head. ‘I didn’t mean it to sound that way. I— Your daughter’s very young to be getting married,’ she added as casually as she was able—when it was Wolf that Rebecca intended marrying.

Gerald frowned. ‘She’s over twenty. Admittedly Wolf is a lot older than her, thirty-five, but I’m sure they’ll be good for each other.’ He shook his head at her implied suggestion that perhaps they wouldn’t.

‘The bridegroom did seem a little—remote,’ she said awkwardly. The Wolf she had met today bore little or no resemblance to that teasing man she had met seven years ago; he didn’t look as if he knew how to tease!

‘Oh, Wolf’s all right,’ Gerald dismissed comfortably. ‘He and Rebecca are good friends.’

‘Friends?’ Cyn frowned at his choice of words. ‘Isn’t that a strange thing to say about a couple who intend marrying in four months’ time?’

‘Not in the least strange,’ Gerald disagreed. ‘I only wish Rebecca’s mother and I had been friends before we married, maybe then we wouldn’t have ended up hating each other’s guts once the initial passion wore a little thin. The same goes for you, I’d hazard a guess.’ He looked at her shrewdly.

Her eyes widened. ‘What do you mean?’ she asked warily. What did he mean? She was sure, not by word or deed, that she and Wolf hadn’t given away the fact earlier today that they had known each other years ago.

Gerald shrugged. ‘Whoever the man was in your past, who gave you the same distrust of marriage that I have, I’ll bet the two of you weren’t friends.’

It was a bet he would lose. She and Wolf had been great friends, had found a rapport existed between the two of them from the first—much to Cyn’s surprise; she had been sure the two of them could have nothing in common. But there was no way she could tell Gerald that Wolf had been that man!

She smiled dismissively. ‘I’m sure we all have disastrous love-affairs in our past that have coloured our judgement in later life,’ she shrugged. ‘We get over them.’ She held her chin defensively high, knowing she had never got over loving Wolf.

‘Some of us do,’ Gerald nodded thoughtfully, watching her closely. ‘I’ll take a rain-check on the dinner invitation, then,’ he finally accepted lightly, moving to grasp her gently by the upper arms. ‘But I really meant it when I said I’m not giving up on you.’ He kissed her lightly on the lips.

Cyn stood in the doorway of the brightly lit cottage waving goodbye to Gerald as he drove away, wondering exactly what he would make of the fact that seven years ago she had been the one about to marry Wolf!

* * *

Given time—once she finally got away from the hotel that evening, without seeing Wolf Thornton again, unfortunately—Cyn had decided that he couldn’t really have been serious about the dinner invitation. But if she had thought he hadn’t been serious, what on earth had possessed her to be waiting outside the Thornton’s Hotel at seven-thirty the following evening?

She had felt very conspicuous standing outside on the pavement, several people entering the hotel eyeing her curiously as she did her best to look casually unconcerned by the obvious fact that she was waiting for someone. Someone who, by seven-forty, still hadn’t arrived!

He hadn’t been serious, she realised with a sinking heart, wondering how she could slip away without drawing any more attention to herself. The doorman, a man she had come to know over the last few weeks, had been watching surreptitiously to see just who her date was for the evening. How awful that the ‘date’ hadn’t turned up!

‘Thank God I caught you!’ gasped a breathless voice behind her. ‘I thought I was going to be too late.’

Cyn had been in the act of quietly slipping away from the front entrance of the hotel, but she turned sharply at the first sound of Wolf Thornton’s voice.

If she hadn’t been sure what to wear for their date, formal or casual, then Wolf seemed to have been even less sure. He was wearing no jacket at all, despite the brisk breeze on this April evening, and his shirt had come adrift from the faded denims he wore—and he seemed to have the remains of a meal down the front of the pale blue shirt! At least—she frowned at the vivid red and green streaks—she presumed it was a meal?

His appearance was certainly much less formal than it had been on Saturday evening, and his hair was hopelessly windswept, not with that deliberate casualness that was so much in fashion nowadays, but actually blown in complete disarray by the breeze.

A fact he seemed to become conscious of as she continued to look at him silently, putting up an impatient hand to smooth the errant dark blond locks from his brow. ‘I really am sorry I’m late for our date, Cyn,’ he told her with a rueful grimace. ‘But I— Well, I got caught up in work, and—’

‘You work on a Sunday?’ She couldn’t help her surprise.

He grinned at her reaction. ‘I work every day, Cyn.’ He took a firm grasp of one of her arms. ‘Let’s go and eat—we can talk over our meal,’ he suggested cajolingly.

He thought she was going to refuse to have dinner with him at all because he was over ten minutes late! Cyn realised dazedly. She hadn’t been very happy about having to stand in such a conspicuous place as she waited for him, she admitted—and, now that he had arrived, Ron, the doorman, was completely agog at just who had turned up to meet her, obviously recognising Wolf from last night!—but she was far too curious about this enigmatic man to change her mind about having dinner with him just because of that. And from Ron’s almost stunned expression, the sooner they moved away from the hotel the better!

‘I thought you might have already eaten...?’ She frowned up at Wolf as she moved with him to the taxi he had signalled to come over to them.

Wolf gave the driver an address before joining Cyn in the back of the taxi, looking puzzled as he turned to look at her. ‘What on earth gave you that—? This isn’t food,’ he dismissed with a laugh as he saw the direction her gaze had taken, putting up a self-conscious hand to the marks on his shirt. ‘I should have changed before coming to meet you,’ he acknowledged with a grimace. ‘But I was so caught up in what I was doing, it was almost seven-thirty before I even remembered our date—I didn’t put that very well, did I?’ He winced as he saw her mockingly raised brows.

She laughed softly, starting to relax now that they were away from the hotel; it was the worst possible place they could have agreed to meet, although she acknowledged that, at the time, they hadn’t had much time to think of another location. ‘It wasn’t the most flattering thing you could have said,’ she shook her head with a rueful smile.

Wolf’s hands moved to clasp one of hers. ‘Once you’ve known me for a while, you’ll realise that flattery is one thing I never give,’ he told her with intensity. ‘In fact, I’ve been accused of the opposite on more than one occasion.’ He seemed to deliberately lighten the conversation. ‘I hope you don’t mind, but I’ve asked the driver to take us to my flat; I really should change before taking you out to dinner!’

Cyn didn’t care where they went; her body was doing strange things just at the touch of his hand on hers, and she could see that awareness reflecting in the warm amber of Wolf’s eyes as they made the journey to his flat.

The flat, as she should have guessed, was in Mayfair, and Wolf took her up in the almost silent lift to the penthouse apartment at the top of the building. But the furniture, she saw as they stepped straight into the luxurious lounge, ebony and chrome, the suite of dark brown leather, somehow didn’t look like Wolf at all. Which was a ridiculous thing for her to think. What did she know of this man’s tastes in—?

‘Barbara’s idea of what my apartment should be furnished like,’ Wolf told her with a dismissive grimace as he seemed to guess her thoughts.

Barbara again. Cyn couldn’t help wondering exactly where the other woman fitted into his life—because she obviously did fit into it somewhere. Somehow that knowledge made her feel strangely depressed.

Wolf seemed unaware of her feelings this time. ‘Give me a few minutes to change and I’ll be with you,’ he promised lightly. ‘Help yourself to a drink,’ he waved vaguely in the direction of the drinks cabinet across the room. ‘And feel free to peruse the bookshelves,’ he added before hurrying from the room, already unbuttoning his shirt as he went.

Cyn took a few minutes to catch her breath before taking him up on either of those offers; being in the company of Wolf Thornton was a little like being ushered along by an express train!

But when she did finally look at the extensive bookshelves along one wall of the room—she wasn’t interested in the drink, she rarely drank alcohol anyway, and never on an empty stomach—she found Wolf’s taste in books as lively as his mind, the subject matter ranging from poetry, autobiographies, both historic and fairly recent, to art and history. His taste in fiction was almost as varied; thrillers, fantasy, mysteries, even the occasional novel which she would have classed as romance. Admittedly the latter were usually the classics, but nevertheless Cyn still thought it would be difficult to tell the nature of the man from his taste in books. And even in the short time she had known him, it had become very important to her that she should come to know more about him, much more about him.

But Wolf’s ‘few minutes’ stretched into much longer than that, until a glance at her wristwatch told her he had been gone at least half an hour. Surely it didn’t take him this long to change his clothes? Even if, at the last minute, he had decided to shower and shave before he put on fresh clothes, it surely wouldn’t have taken him as long as this?

‘Wolf?’ she called out tentatively. ‘Wolf!’ she said more firmly when she received no answer to her first call. Still no answer. What on earth was the man doing?

She didn’t exactly feel comfortable with the idea of going into his bedroom, but if he wasn’t going to answer her when she called...! Besides, for all she knew, he might have fallen or something, and be unable to answer her. It wasn’t very likely, she admitted, but something had to be delaying him.

The ‘something’ turned out to be a total surprise. Cyn had had no idea...!

Wolf’s bedroom—another room she would say hadn’t been decorated or furnished by him, the cool blues and heavy ornate furniture not suiting him at all—was empty of the man himself, as was the adjoining bathroom. But the other adjoining door she discovered across the room proved more fruitful.

She entered the room slowly, tentatively, her eyes widening as she found herself in a studio, an artist’s studio. Paintings finished and half finished, leant against every bit of wall-space. The roof of the room was mainly glass, to allow the maximum of light, Cyn would guess, light needed to paint the vivid scenes that assaulted all the senses, not just the optical ones, as she gazed around the room at them in increasing wonder. The paintings were good, very good, even to her untutored eye. And Wolf had painted them...

The man himself sat with his back towards her, obviously totally engrossed in the half-completed canvas in front of him, the woman in the picture lying like a siren across the grey rocks as the even greyer sea thundered around her, trying to tear her into its silky depths. Silver-blond hair swirled in the savage wind, the woman’s pale blue dress clung wetly to the sensual curves outlined beneath. Cyn’s gaze returned to the woman’s face, to the serene expression, the elfin face dominated by deeply violet-coloured eyes... There was something familiar about the woman, something— My God, she thought, it was her!

She must have gasped out loud at the realisation, because Wolf turned sharply, his gaze glazed and unseeing for a few brief seconds, and then he seemed to focus on her, shaking his head self-disgustedly. ‘My God, I’ve done it again, haven’t I?’ He stood up abruptly, wiping paint from his hands on to a cloth that looked as if it wasn’t the first time he had done so today, what had once been a white cloth now covered in— It was paint Wolf had on his shirt too, Cyn suddenly realised; he must have been working on this painting before he came to meet her. This was the reason he had forgotten their date.

And the woman in the painting was her, she was sure of it...

Wolf saw the puzzlement in her face, as he crossed the room to stand in front of her. ‘Yes, it’s you,’ he confirmed softly. ‘It’s the main reason I was late meeting you this evening.’

Cyn still stared at the half-finished painting. ‘You were busy working on it,’ she nodded dazedly.

‘I have been since I got home last night.’ He was also looking at the painting. ‘But it wasn’t just that.’ He moved to gently clasp her shoulders, his expression intense as he looked down at her. ‘While I was working on the painting time seemed to stand still, go nowhere, and I—’ He shook his head. ‘When I told you earlier I’d forgotten our date, I didn’t mean I’d really forgotten it, only that the time had slipped away from me. God, I’ve been longing to see you again since I left you last night. Do you believe in destiny, Cyn?’ he prompted forcefully, shaking her slightly when she didn’t immediately answer him. ‘I’m not sure that I did. Until last night. Painting is my life, Cyn, I’ve wanted to do nothing else—have done nothing else—since I can remember.’ He was talking quickly, desperate in his need to make her understand. ‘And I’ve been satisfied, even pleased at times—no mean feat, believe me; I’m my own hardest critic!—with some of the work I’ve done in the past. But last night, when I could finally get away from the party, I was inspired. I knew I had to put you on canvas, knew exactly how I had to put you on canvas too.’ He gazed across the room at the painting. ‘It’s good, Cyn.’ His face glowed with the satisfaction of knowing he spoke the truth.

And he did, Cyn couldn’t argue with that. The painting was beautiful, hauntingly so. But what did it mean? Why had Wolf painted her in that way?

‘I’m getting these paintings ready for my first exhibition due to take place in the summer,’ he told her now. ‘I wanted—needed—something special as the main subject of that exhibition.’ He looked back at the painting. ‘This painting is going to be it.’

Cyn dragged her own gaze away from the hauntingly hypnotic painting, looking up at Wolf as he once again became engrossed in the half-completed canvas; it was obvious, even now, that it was going to be a painting worthy of the title ‘something special’, and that had nothing to do with the fact that Wolf had painted her to look so beautiful. There was a magic quality about all Wolf’s work, but this one...! Cyn didn’t doubt that the exhibition was going to be a success for him, that the name Thornton was going to be associated with much more than the business world by the end of the year, that Wolf Thornton, the artist, was going to become known worldwide.

‘I’m glad meeting me was able to give you that,’ she told him shyly.

He turned to look at her, shaking off the hypnotic quality of the painting, a warm smile lighting his perfectly hewn features as he once again clasped her arms. ‘Oh, it gave me much more than the painting, Cyn,’ he assured her firmly. ‘It gave me the woman I’m going to marry!’

She felt as if all the breath had been knocked from her lungs. Her mouth went dry, every muscle in her body was tense with disbelief. He couldn’t really have said...

‘Destiny, Cyn,’ he reminded her teasingly, laughing down affectionately at her pole-axed expression. ‘I wasn’t just talking about the inspiration for the painting,’ he rebuked gently. ‘It was meeting the woman I wanted to make my wife that gave me that inspiration!’

‘Me?’ she squeaked. She couldn’t believe this man—his background as a Thornton apart, if it ever could be!—a man who, if he really believed in destiny, must know he was destined to be one of the greatest artists of the day, actually wanted to marry her.

He didn’t know anything about her, or her early years in an orphanage, even more years than that in different foster-homes, the time after that when she had struggled to attain even enough secretarial qualifications to get suitable work. Her job as receptionist at Thornton’s Hotel was her most prestigious yet. And now the man who half owned that hotel was telling her he had taken one look at her and decided he wanted to marry her. It was unbelievable!

‘You, Lucynda Smith,’ he confirmed determinedly. ‘And before my exhibition goes on I’m going to convince you that you want to marry me too!’

* * *

And he had convinced her, effortlessly; it had been impossible not to fall in love with him, to be there when he needed her. The two of them spent every moment they could together from that very first night, to make sure he didn’t forget to eat altogether when he became engrossed in his painting—she had finally gone out that first evening and bought them a take-away Chinese meal!—to marvel in the passion of his lovemaking, their physical response to each other almost overwhelming in its intensity.

By the end of their first month together the painting of Cyn had been completed even to Wolf’s own exacting demands—and Cyn had proudly worn his engagement ring on her finger.

She knew exactly what had happened to that sapphire and diamond engagement ring; she had given it back to him only weeks later.

But what had happened to the painting of her? And the other paintings he had had completed in his studio too? Because there had been no exhibition of Wolf’s work during that summer, or any other as far as Cyn was aware. And she had looked out for Wolf Thornton paintings during the following years, had both dreaded, and longed, to see his work again. But there had been no Wolf Thornton paintings on display, ever.

What had happened to Wolf...?