Читать книгу The Disobedient Mistress - Линн Грэхем, Lynne Graham - Страница 8

LEONE ANDRACCHI dealt Misty a look of hauteur, his wide mouth tightening with perceptible exasperation.

Having immediately recognised her mistake in making such a facetious response, Misty had turned hot pink with discomfiture. She could not work out where those inappropriate words of doubt had emerged from. It was the effect of him again, she decided. He spooked her, put her on edge, knocked her out of the cautious business mode which she had no problem maintaining around other clients.

‘I’m sorry,’ Misty said flatly, ‘but what you just said sounded too good to be true.’

‘So you’re now willing to concede that you’re facing bankruptcy?’ Leone probed.

A chill at the very sound of that terrifying word sank into Misty’s bones and she shifted uneasily in her chair. ‘Mr Andracchi—’

‘Until you admit that reality, I will go no further,’ he warned her.

Her earlier argument to the contrary had evidently offended. She would have loved to have known what he would have done in the same position. Announced to his one last hope that his back was up against the wall? No way, he was far too clever for that, so why was he judging her for her attempt to regain his confidence? Just because he refused to credit that she could have fulfilled that contract for a year! But she knew she could have, had done the figures over and over again, had been ready to go on living like a church mouse to have done so.

‘Or leave my office,’ Leone Andracchi added with lethal cool.

‘I’m…facing…bankruptcy,’ Misty framed like a clockwork toy with a battery about to run flat. The admission hurt, made real what she had until then refused to contemplate and she hated him all the more for forcing her to that brink.

‘Thank you. As I said I have a promising proposition to offer you. It’s nothing to do with catering, although if you find yourself overcome with the urge to cook Sicilian cuisine in your spare time, I will have no objection,’ Leone imparted with a sardonic smile.

The offer had nothing to do with catering? Nothing? She hoped that swallowing his sarcasm in silence would prove to be worth her while.

‘First, I want your assurance that nothing I now say will be repeated beyond this office.’

Since the first rule of any business was respecting client confidentiality, Misty bridled at that statement. ‘Of course. I’m no gossip and I’d be a fool if I was.’

‘I need a woman to pretend that she’s my mistress.’

She heard an imaginary crash as her jaw metaphorically hit the floor. She waited on the punchline, certain he was mocking her in some way and determined not to rise prematurely to the bait.

‘You will note that word, “pretend,”’ Leone Andracchi stressed with unblemished cool. ‘I’m not into sexual harassment of my employees and you would be, in effect, my employee for I would insist that you signed a legal agreement to maintain the fiction until I say that your role is at an end.’

Misty sucked in a ragged breath and continued to stare at him, utterly silenced by that second speech. He was actually serious, yet she could not credit that he was addressing her with such an offer. What reason could he have for asking any woman to pretend to be his mistress? He had to have a little black book the size of an entire library. For goodness’ sake, wasn’t he dating an actress from a television show at present? Jassy something or other? A pneumatic blonde with the kind of curves that even other women stole a shaken second glance at?

‘I’m afraid I don’t understand,’ Misty framed very slowly and succinctly while she wondered if he were a brick short of the full load in the mental department or drunk as a skunk and just not showing physical signs of his condition.

‘You’re not required to understand. I have my own reasons and I don’t intend to share them. I know women don’t like mysteries but, in this case, discretion is necessary.’

‘If you do have some…er…need to hire a woman for such a novel role, I can’t think why you should approach me,’ Misty reasoned with enormous care.

‘Can’t you?’ A faint smile momentarily softened the tough line of his mouth.

She had no intention of lowering herself to the level of spelling out the obvious. But she wasn’t beautiful or glamorous, nor did she have the high public profile of the kind of women he was usually associated with.

‘Is this some kind of a joke?’

‘It’s on the level.’

‘But you must know hundreds of women,’ Misty protested, intimidated by his persistence. ‘Why me?’

‘I prefer to hire and fire rather than coax and trust,’ Leone countered without hesitation. ‘Why are you trying to dissuade me from rescuing you from your financial problems?’

Put like that, keeping quiet seemed more sensible, but she could not accept that he was serious without some idea of his motivation for such a weird offer. ‘This is very strange.’

Leone shrugged a broad shoulder in unconcerned acknowledgement.

‘I mean…seriously,’ Misty emphasised.

‘I am serious and the position wouldn’t be that easy to fill. You’d have to act the part, dress the part and convince people that we’re lovers.’

Warm colour inched up beneath her fine complexion and she glanced away from her studious scrutiny of his exquisitely tailored suit jacket. ‘I don’t think I’d be a great hit in that department.’

‘You just need the right props and the ability to do exactly as I tell you at all times. It would definitely be a case of when I say jump…you say how high?’

Misty could see herself being a major disappointment in that field too. But it was dawning on her that, peculiar as his proposition was, he was not pulling her leg. He wanted a fake mistress. What did being a fake mistress entail?

‘We are talking…. fake mistress here?’ Misty prompted in a strained undertone.

‘Do you really think that I need to pay for sex?’

Her even white teeth gritted. If she said jump to him and he said how high, she would direct him to the nearest lift shaft, but with that ego of his he would bounce back out of the fall. ‘There’s no need to get that personal, Mr Andracchi. Your private life is your business but my safety is mine.’

‘Are you trying to suggest that I might be some sort of pervert?’ Leone shot back at her in an incredulous growl.

‘How would I know? This is not a common or garden offer. Like, I don’t have rich Sicilian tycoons offering me the moon just to pretend to be their mistresses every day, do I?’ Misty snapped out in bewilderment and embarrassment.

‘And if you take that tone and attitude, you are unlikely to have even one Sicilian tycoon still interested.’

Legs cramped by the rigidity of her posture in the chair, Misty got up again and walked across the office before spinning round to face him, wide grey eyes frowning. ‘Just tell me why you’re asking me to do this…why me?’

‘You couldn’t afford to welch on any deal we would make or change the terms to suit yourself.’ He stood straight and tall, eyes hard gold and direct.

Misty flinched. Mr Mean and Tough, who, it seemed, knew exactly how she was placed and that was between a rock and a hard place. He had no shame about reminding her of that unpalatable fact. Perhaps it was a timely reminder too. Any alternative to bankruptcy and Birdie losing her home ought to be considered. But how could she possibly consider taking on a role in which she would be less than convincing? Didn’t he see that? People wouldn’t believe that she was his mistress for one minute! He specialised in beautiful women. Yes, he liked women, but why did she judge him for that?

‘I couldn’t do it…’ she muttered. ‘We mix like oil and water. I wouldn’t be at home in the sort of social life you must have. And I couldn’t possibly convince anyone that we were…lovers.’

‘Oh, I think you underestimate yourself on that score,’ Leone breathed in a different timbre, rich, dark drawl snaking round her like a husky, mesmeric spell.

Nibbling at the soft underside of her full lower lip, Misty was entrapped by the intensity of his narrowed golden stare. Gorgeous eyes, undeniably gorgeous eyes. Her mouth ran dry, her muscles tightening in response. Even his voice, liquid dark enticement of the most dangerous kind, yet another enhancement to his magnetic masculine presence. The gene pool had not been stingy when he’d been born.

Entirely against her own will, she wanted to smile, soften, be a woman in all the ways she had once allowed herself to be even if it put her at risk of getting hurt again. The atmosphere was buzzing with the sensual vibes he could put out. He could whip up the tension without effort. And no matter how hard she tried to remain impervious, excitement nibbled at her every nerve ending and she quivered as a taunting flame lit low in her pelvis and forced her to press her thighs together in shamed disconcertion.

‘Just say the word and sign on the dotted line and all your troubles are at an end.’

‘What would playing your pretend mistress involve?’ Misty heard herself ask and surprised herself.

‘Living in the apartment I would supply, wearing the clothes I buy, going where I ask when I ask without question.’

Mistress as in mindless slave, she translated with a secret little shard of amusment. He was a real domineering louse. But it was interesting to note that he wasn’t suggesting any type of shared accommodation. The masquerade would only be of the public variety and would require no greater intimacy. He wanted a dressed-up doll to play a stupid role for some reason he refused to reveal. Maybe it was another Andracchi whim like the executive lunches. Or maybe it had some business purpose…which would make it an unusual job but still a job like any other.

It wasn’t as though he would be expecting her to hop into bed with him. Of course, he wouldn’t. Her face burned that she had even suspected he might. After all, he had much more attractive possibilities than her available: women who had probably forgotten more than she had even learned about bedroom pursuits. She would be as safe as houses with him but she would be selling herself, handing over her pride and her independence in return for cold hard cash support. That was cheap and nasty and the thought of it left an unpleasant taste in her mouth, but she had Birdie and her employees to think about and pride didn’t pay the bills.

‘What would you do for me?’ she whispered chokily, the humiliating request for greater clarity on that point hurting her.

‘Settle your debts, put your business back on an even keel, cover the wages of your staff while you’re working for me. Anything else, name it. I’m prepared to negotiate.’ Leone Andracchi gazed back at her, cool as ice.

Her tummy churned. She loathed him for issuing that unvarnished bribe of greater remuneration. He had it all worked out. He believed that he could buy her and it shamed her to acknowledge that she had put herself in a position where he could think that and act on it.

‘I’ll think it over this evening.’ That admission cut through Misty’s pride like the first wounding slash of a knife.

‘What do you have to think over?’

‘I think you’re underestimating my side of what you call the deal.’

His strong jawline hardened. ‘I don’t see a problem or a conflict of interests. You get to wear fabulous clothes, live in a superb apartment and enjoy the high life for a couple of months.’

‘I can see that you believe that that should be a big draw, but it’s not.’ Lifting her head with determined composure, Misty walked to the door.

‘What more did you expect?’

‘Respect…for a start.’ Misty pushed out that admission between gritted teeth.

‘That has to be earned…and I doubt your ability to earn mine.’

Did having bad luck in business make her so much a lesser person? Did he only respect successful people with big bank balances and social pedigrees? He really was obnoxious. He had had no need to make that last comment. It suggested a prejudice against her that both shook and mortified her, for he might have enquired into the state of her catering business but surely he could know very little else about her?

‘I shouldn’t have said that. I’m sorry,’ Leone Andracchi drawled flatly.

‘Don’t let it worry you,’ Misty advised, registering that he was merely concerned that he might have overplayed his hand and not truly regretful. ‘You’re self-satisfied, arrogant, manipulative and ruthless. You could have given me that contract, for I believe you’re well aware that I would’ve worked my socks off to fulfil it. However, you prefer to use my problems as a weapon against me. You have very little conscience and even less compassion. Do you really think I’m surprised that you should also be very rude?’

And with that concluding accolade Misty skimmed him a flashing glance from her silver grey eyes. He was very still. Pretty much gobsmacked by that retaliation. Hard dark eyes assailed hers in a seering look that was pure naked intimidation.

‘I shouldn’t have said that. I’m so sorry,’ Misty told him with an insincerity that more than equalled his own a minute earlier, and with that she left his office at speed.

Hit and run? Was that all she was good for? She had been scared that he might have a temper the size of his powerful personality. But biting the hand that she might end up having to feed from was real insanity. Right this very minute, he would be comforting himself with that superior awareness and thinking how stupid she had been to risk alienating him to that extent. And it was surely paranoiac of her to believe that he might have deliberately withheld that contract to put her under more pressure to agree?

In fact it was most likely that he had turned to her because some other woman had refused. A fake mistress? Why? What was Leone Andracchi up to? Such an extraordinary proposition and an expensive one if he was planning to put her in some fancy apartment and furnish her with an appropriate wardrobe. So somehow it would have to profit him. But as she went down in the lift, still shell-shocked by their interview, she could not work out how setting up a pretend mistress could possibly benefit him.

She pictured that lean dark face, breathtakingly good-looking, devastatingly cool and unrevealing. Nobody would ever accuse of Leone Andracchi of wearing his thoughts on his sleeve. A shiver of foreboding ran down her spine. As she crossed the spacious foyer on the ground floor her steps slowed. What was she doing walking away from his rescue bid?

In return for her playing some ridiculous role as his mistress, he would save her business and enable her to continue paying the mortgage on Birdie’s home as well as ensure the ongoing employment of her staff. When the rewards were so great and so many other people would suffer if her business failed, what was a couple of months out of her life? What had been the point of walking out on Leone Andracchi when in reality she had no choice but to accept his terms? She had no other options, had she?

Misty had to make herself walk back into the lift; the prospect of eating humble pie had no appeal. In the short corridor which led to Leone’s office on the top floor, she was disconcerted to see him standing outside the door in conversation with two men. She came to an awkward halt a good ten feet away, two high spots of pink forming over her cheekbones. It took her just two seconds to decide that he was deliberately ignoring her, a lowering impression only increased by the sight of him looking so infuriatingly at ease. Arrogant dark head held at an angle, his jacket pushed back by the lean hand he had thrust in the pocket of his tailored trousers, he emanated relaxation. Angry resentment stiffened her to stone.

Finally, Leone turned his head and lifted an enquiring ebony brow, lean strong face urbane.

‘The answer’s…yes,’ Misty framed with flat emphasis.

His brilliant dark eyes gleamed and he stretched out a hand. In the very act of turning away to make good her escape while he was occupied, for she really had had enough of him for one afternoon, Misty stilled. With frozen reluctance, she moved forward, horribly conscious of his companions’ curiosity as they stepped back out of her path.

His wide sensual mouth curved into a slow, charismatic smile that made her mouth run dry. He caught her fingers in his and closed an arm round her.

‘Excuse me…’ he murmured huskily to their audience, pressing open the door of his office to back her over the threshold.

‘What on—?’earth are you playing at, Misty began to say.

Warning dark golden eyes assailed hers and before she could utter one more syllable he had whirled her round and brought his mouth crashing down on hers with devouring sexual hunger. An inarticulate moan of shock was dragged from her but, in the split second in which she was incredulously aware that the wretched door wasn’t even closed to conceal them, his passionate intensity scorched her into sensual awakening. As he banded his hands round the curve of her hips and pressed her into intimate connection with every muscular line of his big, powerful body, raw excitement flamed through her quivering length like a forest fire licking out of control.

His tongue plundered the moist, tender interior of her mouth in a devastatingly erotic invasion, every explicit probe of that lancing exploration driving her sensation-starved body crazy. Her heart hammering, she was fighting for oxygen but clinging to him, conscious of the unmistakable thrust of his arousal, inflamed rather than repelled by that evidence of his masculine hunger.

A febrile line of colour accentuating his superb cheekbones, Leone released her and snatched in a ragged breath. ‘I think that was an impressive enough statement of our intentions.’

Less quick to recover, Misty pulled in a lungful of air like a drowning swimmer, her legs feeling barely strong enough to support her as she instinctively fell back against the wall for support. She couldn’t credit what had just happened between them. It wasn’t just that he had grabbed and kissed her; it was the infinitely more disturbing truth that she had revelled like a wanton in that passionate embrace. She was shattered by the betrayal of her own body, the response that he had demanded and extracted without her volition.

‘Our intentions?’ Misty framed unevenly, noting that the corridor was now empty, face burning at the appalling awareness that she, who prided herself on behaving in a professional manner in a business environment, had just committed the ultimate unforgivable sin.

‘Too good an opportunity to miss,’ Leone quipped, slumbrous dark eyes veiled by his lush black lashes.

She was so enraged by that explanation that she wanted to slap him into the middle of the next week. ‘You said that you weren’t into sexually harassing employees.’

‘If you think that we’re likely to convince anyone that we’re intimately involved without an occasional demonstration of lover-like enthusiasm, you must be very naive,’ Leone countered drily. ‘But it will only be for public consumption. In private the act dies.’

‘You don’t need to tell me that.’ Not trusting her temper in his vicinity and bitterly conscious that she had burnt her boats without taking the time to consider the potential costs of such a role, Misty compressed her lips hard. ‘May I leave now?’

Leone flicked her a considering glance. ‘Yes. I’ll see you at my hotel tonight at nine and we’ll get the remaining details ironed out. I’m staying at the Belstone House hotel—’

‘Tonight doesn’t suit me,’ Misty said facetiously, unable to resist the temptation.

‘Make it suit,’ he advised. ‘I’m returning to London tomorrow.’

With a rigid little nod of grudging agreement, Misty walked back out again, her slender spine ramrod straight. But she was even more angry with herself than she was with him. How could she have lost herself like that in his arms? But then she had never felt like that before with a man, no, not even with Philip in the first fine flush of love. She paled, suppressing that unfortunate thought. What she had felt at nineteen was hard to recall three years on. Leone Andracchi had caught her off guard. Self-evidently, he possessed great technique in the kissing department, but why hadn’t her loathing for the man triumphed?

Colouring and confused by what she could not explain to her own satisfaction, Misty climbed into the van in Brewsters’ car park and drove to the premises she rented on the outskirts of town. There she joined her three staff in the clean-up operation that concluded every working day. It was after five by the time she locked up and all she could think about was how her business had become so vulnerable that one lost contract could finish it off.

Carlton Catering was just over a year old. She had started out small, doing private dinner parties and the occasional wedding. Nothing too fancy, nothing too big and her overheads had been low. But when, five months ago, her supplier had mentioned that there was a tender coming out for providing lunches at Brewsters, the biggest, swankiest company on the industrial estate, she had been eager to put in a bid and expand. On the strength of that trial contract, she had borrowed to buy another van and upgrade her equipment.

However, disaster had struck soon afterwards. Her premises had been vandalised and the damage had been extensive but her insurance company had refused to pay out, arguing that her security precautions had been inadequate. That had been a bitter and unexpected blow, for the repairs had wiped out her cash reserve and from that point on she had been struggling to stay afloat.

‘Your need to reduce your personal expenditure to offset that loss,’ her bank manager had warned her only six weeks earlier. ‘In spite of your cash-flow problems, you’re continuing to pay the mortgage on a house that doesn’t belong to you. I respect your generosity towards Mrs Pearce, but you must be realistic about the extent of the drain on your own resources.’

But sometimes being realistic utterly failed to take account of circumstances and emotional ties like love and loyalty, Misty reflected painfully as she drove home. Birdie Pearce lived in a rambling old country house called Fossetts, which had belonged to her late husband Robin’s family for generations. Unable to have children of their own, Robin and Birdie had chosen to become foster parents instead. For over thirty years the kindly couple had opened their home and devoted their lives to helping countless difficult and disturbed children.

Misty had been one of those foster kids and she too had been unhappy, bitter and distrustful when she had first gone to Fossetts. She had been twelve years old, hiding behind a tough front of not caring where she lived or who looked after her, but Birdie and Robin had worked hard to gain her trust and affection. They had transformed her life by giving her security and having faith in her, and that was a debt she knew that she could never repay but, above all, it was a loving debt, not a burden.

For the past fourteen months, a fair proportion of Misty’s earnings had gone towards ensuring that Birdie could remain in her own home. Not that Birdie knew that even yet, for her husband had once managed their finances and Misty had taken over that task after the older man’s death. Misty had been shocked to discover that Fossetts was mortgaged to the hilt. When Robin’s investments had failed and money had become tight, he had borrowed on the house without mentioning the matter to anyone.

Now over seventy, Birdie had a bad heart and she was on the waiting list for the surgery that would hopefully ensure that she lived well into old age. But in the short term, without that surgery, Birdie was very vulnerable and her consultant had emphasised how important it was that Birdie should enjoy a stress-free existence. Birdie loved her home and it was also her last link with Robin, whom she had adored. From the outset, Misty’s objective had been to protect the older woman from the financial worry that might bring on another heart attack. But even Misty had not appreciated just how much it would cost to keep Fossetts running for Birdie’s sake.

It was a tall, rather Gothic house with a steep pitched roof and quaint attic windows. Built in the nineteen twenties, it sat in a grove of stately beech trees fronted by a rough meadow. Parking the van, Misty suppressed a troubled sigh. Fossetts was beginning to look neglected. The grounds no longer rejoiced in a gardener. The windows needed to be replaced and the walls were crying out for fresh paint. Although it was far from being a mansion, it was still too big a house to be maintained on a shoestring.

Yet the minute Misty stepped into the wood-panelled front hall, she felt for a moment as though all the troubles of the day had slipped from her shoulders. On a worn side table an arrangement of overblown roses filled the air with their sweet scent and dropped their petals. She walked down to the kitchen, which was original to the house and furnished with built-in pine dressers and a big white china sink.

Nancy was making salad sandwiches for tea. A plump woman in her late fifties, Nancy was a cousin of Robin’s, who had come to live at Fossetts and help out with the children almost twenty years earlier. These days, she looked after Birdie.

‘Birdie’s in the summer house,’ Nancy said cheerfully. ‘We’re going to have tea outside.’

Misty managed to smile. ‘Sounds lovely. Can I help?’

‘No. Go and keep Birdie company.’

It was a beautiful warm June evening but Birdie was wrapped in a blanket, for she felt the cold no matter how good the weather. She was a tiny woman, only four feet eleven inches tall and very slight in build. Her weathered face was embellished by a pair of still-lively blue eyes. ‘Isn’t the garden beautiful?’ she sighed appreciatively.

Misty surveyed the dappled shade cast by the trees, the lush green grass of early summer and the soft pink fading show of the rhododendron blooms. It was indeed a tranquil scene. ‘How have you been today?’

Birdie, who hated talking about her health, ignored the question. ‘I had visitors. The new vicar and his wife. They’ve hardly been living here five minutes and already they’ve heard those silly rumours about how I’ve been reduced to genteel poverty by some greedy former foster child.’ Birdie tilted her greying head to one side, bright eyes exasperated. ‘Such nonsense and so I pointed out. Where on earth are these stories coming from?’

‘That business with Dawn, I expect. Someone’s heard something about that and got the wrong end of the stick.’ Misty neglected to add that the more curious of the locals had evidently noted the visible decline in the Pearce fortunes and put the worst possible interpretation on it. But then over the years that the Pearces had fostered, more than one pessimistic neighbour had forecast that they would live to regret taking on such ‘bad’ children.

And sadly, the previous year, Dawn, who had once been fostered by the Pearces, had come to visit and had stolen all Birdie’s jewellery. Birdie had refused to prosecute because Dawn had been a drug addict in a pitiful state. Since then, yielding to Birdie’s persuasions and her own longing to reclaim her life, Dawn had completed a successful rehabilitation programme but none of the jewellery had been recovered.

‘Why do people always want to think the worst?’ Birdie looked genuinely pained for she herself always liked to think the very best of others.

‘No, they don’t,’ Misty soothed.

‘Well, what have you got to tell me today about that handsome Sicilian at Brewsters? I would love to get a peek at a genuine business tycoon. I’ve never seen one except on television,’ Birdie said naively, for all the world as though Leone Andracchi were on a level with a rare animal.

Misty smiled at the little woman, but a great surge of loving tenderness made her eyes prickle and she had to look away. She told herself that she ought to be copying Birdie’s sunny optimism, turning her problems round until a silver lining appeared in the clouds. And, lo and behold, Leone Andracchi began looking more like their saviour! So why the heck was she still festering with anguished loathing over one stupid kiss? Was she turning into an appalling prude?

‘Actually…Mr Andracchi’s offered me work in London.’ Misty’s gaze was veiled, for she could not have looked Birdie in the eye and told that partial truth. ‘How would you feel about me going away for a month or two?’

‘To work for a handsome millionaire? Ecstatic!’ Birdie teased after she had recovered from her surprise at that sudden announcement.

After tea, Misty went upstairs and opened the wardrobe which contained the clothing that Flash had insisted on buying her in an effort to lift her out of her depression after Philip had broken off their engagement. Fancy frivolous designer garments that had not seen the light of day in over two years. She selected a turquoise faux snakeskin skirt and top and a pair of spiky-heeled shoes. After a quick bath, she dug out her cosmetics, which dated from the same period and which had been similiarly shelved after she had said goodbye to her brief foray into Flash’s glitzy, unreal world.

Flash had transformed her into a rock-star chick and she had learned how to make the best of her looks. Not that it had been much comfort then to see a sexy, daring image in the mirror when the man that she had loved had rejected her. It had wrecked things between her and Flash too, she acknowledged with pained regret. The day Flash had made her fanciable on his own terms had seemed to be the beginning of the end of their friendship. He had stopped thinking of her as a sister, stopped seeing her as the skinny little kid who had shared the same foster home with him for almost five years and had decided that he wanted more.

Making use of the elderly car that only Nancy used now, Misty drove over to the country house hotel where Leone Andracchi was staying. The gracious foyer exuded expensive exclusivity, and when she enquired at the desk she was informed that Leone was in the dining room.

While she hovered, working out whether she ought to wait or seek him out in the midst of his meal, a fair-haired male emerged from the lounge bar and stopped dead at the sight of her, reacting in a similiar vein to the doorman, who had surged to open the door for her, and the male receptionist, who had tripped over a waste-paper basket in his haste to attend to her.

‘Misty…?’

For a split second, Misty thought she was dreaming for, even though it had been three years since she had heard it, she recognised that hesitant, well-bred voice immediately and she spun round in shock. ‘ Philip?’

‘It’s been so long since I’ve seen you.’ Philip Redding stared at her; indeed, his inability to stop staring was marked. ‘How a-are you?’ he stammered.

‘Fine…’ Her lips barely moved as her silver-grey eyes lingered on him for, although they still lived within miles of each other, she had been careful to avoid places where they had been likely to meet and, apart from seeing his car on the road occasionally, had been very successful in ensuring that they had not run into each other again.

‘You look…you look quite incredible.’ His colour heightened as he found himself forced to tilt his head back to meet her gaze. ‘I’ve often thought of calling in at Fossetts—’

‘With your wife and children?’ Misty enquired in brittle disbelief.

Philip paled and stiffened. ‘Just the one child…Helen and I are getting a divorce, actually…it didn’t work out.’

Twenty feet away, Leone Andracchi stilled, stunned by the vision of Misty Carlton shorn of her shapeless grey suit. With her wealth of copper hair tumbling loose, eyes that gleamed like polished silver were soft on the face of the man she was regarding, her wide peach tinted mouth parted to show pearly teeth. Leone could not quite work out what she was wearing. The top seemed to be held up by the narrow chains bisecting her slight shoulders. The rich fabric gleamed beneath the lights accentuating the thrust of her breasts, the slender indent of her waist, and screeched to a death-defying halt above long, long, endless legs capable of stopping traffic.

‘Misty…?’

Taken aback by Philip’s blunt admission that his marriage was heading for the divorce courts, Misty shifted her attention to the tall dark male poised several feet away. Leone Andracchi. She collided with sizzling golden eyes that seemed to burn up all the available oxygen in the atmosphere and instantly she tensed, butterflies fluttering in her tummy. But even as she reacted to his vibrant presence her mind was marching on to make uneasy comparisons between the two men. Leone was much taller, more powerfully built and strikingly dark next to Philip with his boyish fair good looks.

‘Sorry if I’ve kept you waiting, amore,’ Leone murmured smooth as silk, moving to her side to place an infuriatingly possessive hand on her spine.

‘Philip Redding…’ Philip shot out a hand with all the easy friendliness that was natural to him. ‘Misty and I are old friends.’

‘How fascinating,’ Leone drawled in a tone of crushing boredom that made the younger man flush. ‘Unfortunately, Misty and I are running late.’

‘Look, I’ll call you,’ Philip told Misty, giving Leone a bewildered look, quite out of his depth when faced with such a complete lack of answering courtesy.

‘Don’t waste your time,’ Leone advised before Misty could respond, shooting Philip a derisive glance of cold menace as he pressed her over to the lift and hit the call button with one stab of a punitive finger. ‘She won’t be available.’

Her face flaming but her lips sealed, for she could not intervene when she did not want Philip to phone Fossetts and upset Birdie, Misty stalked into the lift while listening to Philip mutter in disconcerted response, ‘Well, I must say…really, for goodness’ sake…’

‘Do you like behaving like the playground bully?’ Misty enquired dulcetly as the lift doors whirred shut.

‘While you’re with me, you don’t talk to other men…you don’t even look at other men,’ Leone delivered with simmering emphasis.

Misty clashed head-on with brilliant golden eyes that went straight for the jugular and a bone-deep charge of grateful excitement surged through her long, slender length for the very last thing she wanted to think about just then was Philip, whose rejection had torn her apart with grief and despair for longer than she cared to recall. ‘Is that a fact?’

‘Particularly old flames…’ Leone decreed, impervious to sarcasm.

Misty tilted her copper head back and shrugged a slim shoulder, glorious silver eyes wide and mocking, the knot of sexual tension he had already awakened licking through her like a dangerous drug in her bloodstream. ‘Then you had better watch me well.’

‘No. I’m paying for total fidelity and the illusion that you have eyes for no other man,’ Leone imparted without hesitation. ‘Flirting with Redding was out of line.’

‘Flirting…?’ An involuntary laugh empty of humour was wrenched from Misty, the emotions roused by that unfortunate encounter with her ex-fiancé breaking loose of her control. ‘Philip’s the last man alive I’d flirt with!’

‘I saw the way you looked at him,’ Leone said with grim clarity.

‘And how was that?’ Misty queried unevenly, curious in spite of herself.

‘Do I need to draw pictures?’

Her silver-grey eyes darkened as a shard of bitter pain from the past assailed her but she veiled her gaze in self-protection. So for an instant she had recalled happier times when Philip had meant the world to her, but those days were very far behind her. And why was she so sure of that reality? Three years earlier, she had only been engaged to Philip for six weeks when a drunk driver had crashed into Philip’s car. Although Philip had sustained only a concussion, Misty had suffered internal injuries and had required surgery. Afterwards she had learned that she might never be able to conceive a child and Philip had found the threat of a childless future impossible to accept. But never let it be said that Philip was unfeeling: after all, he had had tears in his eyes when he’d ditched her, when he’d told her that he’d still loved her but that she wasn’t really a proper woman any more…

‘Redding was all over you like a rash—’

‘He didn’t even touch me!’

‘He didn’t get the chance.’

As Leone rested a lean hand on Misty’s spine to prompt her out of the lift again, she jerked away and flung her bright head high, sending him a warning look from bright silver eyes. ‘I don’t see an audience, so keep your hands to yourself!’