Читать книгу Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Boss? - Нина Харрингтон - Страница 7

ONE

Scott Elstrom looked out across the sea ice and squinted as the Alaskan sun rose over the horizon and made the light covering of snow suddenly turn brilliantly white.

It was so beautiful that for a moment he forgave the brutal biting wind that came with crossing the frozen sea. There was no cover for himself or his team of nine sled dogs and he could feel his cheeks burning with frostbite under the mask covering his face.

Reaching up with gloved hands, Scott turned off his head torch to save the batteries and, stepping off the sled, he ran a hundred paces on the thick plate of ice to get some warmth into his body and then jumped back onto the sled, much to the amusement of the dogs. The lead dog, Dallas, actually looked back and seemed to grin at him.

The dogs loved this weather: bright sunshine and a clear trail ahead across the sound to the base camp on the other side of the bay.

The fact that they had only crossed this stretch of sea ice once before didn’t matter. They were happy just to be out and doing what they did best. Running.

He had been out with his dogs for thirteen days, taking mapping and geo readings at each of the twenty stations the ecological survey company had established. Sometimes that meant staying in a small town along the way but often the station was a simple wooden house or shack where he would be alone with his dogs, checking their feet and feeding them. He loved this way of life and the gentle routine that they had settled into.

Out here in the silence he felt a kinship with all of the explorers who had used Elstrom maps in the past to find a route to new worlds as well as to hunt and fish.

Now that routine was shattered. The message from his sister, Freya, had been short and to the point.

Their father was in hospital. He had suffered another stroke and, although it was a small one and the doctors said that he should make a good recovery, his father wanted to talk to him. Urgently. Come home, Scott. We need you here.

Scott rolled his shoulders and fought back a sense of guilt at his resentment at having to go back to what passed for civilization a week earlier than he had planned.

They needed him. Well, that was new!

It had been two years since his father had handed over the management of their family business to his stepbrother, Travis. And look how well that decision had turned out! Now Travis was long gone and his father had been fighting for months to save what was left of Elstrom Mapping.

For their father to even admit that he needed Scott was astonishing.

That was why Scott had taken the decision to cross the open water instead of travelling inland and taking the slower route through the frozen forest and rivers to the station where he would find a snow machine and a lift to the local airstrip.

There was no other choice. He had to cross the frozen sea ice to get to the base camp to the airbase in time to catch the weekly cargo plane—it would take too long any other way.

But crossing open salt water ice was a serious commitment. The sea froze in huge cracked and floating plates which moved and heaved under the sled, making progress slow and dangerous. The ice was always unstable and never more so in the unusually mild Alaskan February.

Scott looked over the sled and, to his horror, he could see the ice ridges flexing and cracking. A giant piece of ice had broken away and was floating out to sea. He was driving across the frozen-over thinner layer.

One crack in a weak spot and the weight of the sled would drag him and the whole dog team underwater to their deaths, never to be found again.

There was a low grunt from his lead dog, Dallas, as she picked up a scent and set off at a steady pace onto the thicker ice, the other eight dogs behind her panting and settling into a trot from months of training and working together. They would run all day if he asked them, without complaint.

* * *

The blinding sunlight made Scott squint and glance sideways towards the open water of the sea.

For the last twenty-four hours he had been travelling and had barely dozed in the wooden trappers’ cabin for the the four or five hours while the dogs rested. Now, as the sun rose higher and warmed his skin, and the dogs moved steadily forwards, his mind drifted seawards.

The only sound was from the movement of the sled on the ice and the comforting panting noises of nine dogs moving as a team.

Beautiful. Unique. Mesmerising.

This was his life now. Not central London and everything that went with it.

He had waved goodbye to that world two years ago and would quite happily not see it again unless he had to. The technology he was using for his mapping and surveying meant that he could talk to his sister and his father, if he chose to, most days and at least once a week.

Of course Freya had tried to persuade him to come home for Christmas but what had been the point?

His quiet academic father had never understood how his son preferred adventure sports and a hard outdoor life to the quiet study of the maps and charts that had made Elstrom Mapping a familiar name around the world.

The only common thing holding them together had been the mapping company, and when his father had decided that Travis could be trusted to lead the company that link had been swept away, leaving nothing but regrets and harsh words behind.

The weather had closed in during December and made travel impossible for anyone at the research station, so he had a perfectly valid and very convenient excuse to stay in Alaska.

Way too convenient an excuse according to his sister, who’d ended up coping on her own for the holidays, being bounced between divorced parents who had drifted away from one another for years before their mother finally gave up trying to make a family with a father who was never home. Freya had spent New Year’s with their quite happily settled mother and her new boyfriend—a lawyer with a fine selection of colourful bow ties.

Scott chuckled to himself deep in the back of his throat. Freya would make him suffer for that one. He looked up and was just about to check his GPS position when his world shifted.

He felt the sled shudder and slip underneath him.

They had hit a weak spot in the ice.

Instantly every cell in his body leapt to attention, adrenaline surging through his veins.

While he had been thinking about London firesides, Dallas had slowed down, her tail high and in the shape of a question mark instead of hanging straight down. And her paws were dancing.

Scott’s heart almost stopped.

He couldn’t swim in five layers of thermal clothing and, even if he could, the water was so cold he wouldn’t last more than a few minutes. He would go down with the sled and the dogs.

The dogs would die because his father had given up the fight.

No way. Not while he still had breath in his body.

Scott snatched up the solid grab rope and dropped off the back of the sled onto his stomach, his legs spread wide so his body weight would be spread over the thin ice. ‘Dallas. Gee right. Gee right. Dallas.’

Dallas knew that this was the instruction to turn right to safety and she tugged and tugged as the team fought her, the other eight dogs desperate to run hard and straight. But she did it and after a few terrifying minutes Scott felt a ridge of hard ice under his stomach and they were back on the older solid pan ice.

The broken shards of ice ripped his right glove to shreds and his fingers instantly turned numb and blue. Frostbite. But he managed to haul himself back onto the sled and the dogs sped on to safety as the shapes of the cabins on the other side of the bay grew clearer in the growing early morning light.

He was going to make it home in time to hear what his father had to say after all.

But one thing was for sure. This was his chance to prove to his father that he was a better man than Travis could ever be. And nothing was going to stand in his way and stop him from making that happen. Not this time.

* * *

‘So let me get this straight. Those G-strings are edible?’

Toni pulled away the wrapping paper from the pink and black gift box that her sister Amy had given her and started reading the instructions on the back.

‘Of course.’ Amy shrugged and flicked the fluffy feather end of her pink whip against the packing. ‘Why else would you want to wear something that uncomfortable?’

‘I have just had a vision of what happens when those candy pieces come adrift and where they might end up in my lady parts. Amy, I love you and you are my only sister but I may save modelling this particular birthday pressie for another day.’

Amy giggled and shook her head. ‘Those knickers are not for us to ogle at. Save it for that hunky boyfriend you’re going to meet.’ She knocked her on the head with the feather whip again. ‘Very soon.’

‘Well, in that case I might as well put the box in the freezer right now and stick to eating supermarket chocolate bars.’

Amy sighed out loud and collapsed down on the arm of the dining chair next to Toni. ‘Now don’t be like that. It has been a whole year since you got rid of that skanky Peter and what did we agree? He was totally not worthy of your luscious magnificence. Right? Of course right. This is a new year and a new you, remember?’

Toni smiled and hugged the present to her new burgundy satin bra. ‘When did you get to be so clever? I’m going to miss having you around. You know that, don’t you?’

‘Of course. That’s why I’ve loaded up all these fancy gizmos on my tech so that we can talk every week!’

Amy wrapped one arm around Toni’s bare shoulders and rocked from side to side. ‘It’s only a few months and I’ll be right back in time to start university in September.’ Then she slid back and sniffed once. ‘And, for the record, I’ll miss you too but I’ll work hard to block out my pain by having the best gap year trip this world has to offer.’

Then she pointed the whip at Toni. ‘All thanks to the lovely Christmas present from my darling sister.’ She nodded over her shoulder. ‘The gals still cannot believe that you bought me a round-the-world plane ticket. Magic!’

‘How else could I get you out of the house long enough to get the plumbing fixed?’ Toni grinned. ‘You’re welcome. But you do remember that there’s one condition. You have to enjoy yourself and not spend the whole time digging up bits of ancient Peru.’

‘I can guarantee it. Oh! Looks like I’m getting the signal. I think more birthday cake might be almost ready. Be back soon.’

And with that Amy got to her feet and sashayed off as though she always wore a black laced-up pink and cream frilly basque and feather-trimmed mules around the house.

Toni sat back in her hard wooden chair and swayed a little from side to side as her whole crew of pals and colleagues from the media company where she worked joined in a very loud and very out of tune version of an old hit song about an uptown girl which was playing at full volume in her honour.

There was cheap Prosecco and white wine spillages and pizza and cheesy biscuit breadcrumbs all over the tablecloth, and probably the new plum lingerie that Amy had squeezed her into as the star of her Birthday Goddess sexy party special. At some point she had lost her shoe under the table when she sat down after all the toasts had been made.

Then Amy had presented her with a crown she had made from gold paper and wire and insisted that she wear it as a party princess. At a jaunty angle, of course.

Worse. Her make-up was probably a wreck after a brief but intense crying jag when Amy had said some incredibly sweet things about how lucky she was to have her as her sister and that leaving home for the first time was not going to change a thing.

The waterworks had started again when Amy gave her a bound book of their mother’s sketches of them as children and told her how proud their late parents would have been of her and what she had achieved, which had everyone in the room reaching for the tissues, paper napkins or, in more than one case, the corner of the tablecloth. There was not a dry eye in the house. Even Amy the Strong ‘accidentally’ dropped her napkin on the floor and had to drop out of sight for a couple of minutes to find it.

Good thing that the birthday chocolate iced cupcakes had arrived just in time to prevent a meltdown of nuclear proportions.

Toni glanced up across the tables and clusters of women spread out around the room. It didn’t matter that she looked a mess and that her guests were in great danger of trashing the dining and living room of a house she was borrowing from Freya Elstrom. Not to her friends, who had come out on a cold February evening to help her celebrate her birthday.

Amy had a lot to answer for. She had told Amy for weeks that she did not want a birthday party. It would only remind her of what had happened on her last birthday, when she had found her so-called boyfriend in the shower with the Brazilian lingerie model who turned out to be his real full-time girlfriend.

The one he had so conveniently forgotten to mention during the previous few weeks when he had been dating her.

That had not been one of her life’s finer moments.

Especially since she had already stripped off and was ready to make sure that Peter was washed in all of his important places.

Hence this surprise party. Toni’s latest project had been staging professional studio photo sessions on the explosion in demand for sex toys and bedroom accessories and daring lingerie among women of all ages. Young and old.

When Toni had mentioned it was her birthday in a few days and the first anniversary of breaking up with her cheating boyfriend then the girls had insisted that they hold a party for her to mark the occasion while Amy was still in London. Complete with the full range of accessories which had been used on the show. Amy thought this was a great idea and had arranged the whole thing while Toni was at work.

These were her real friends. Her real family. Girls from the local school she had known all of her life, who had left their husbands and boyfriends at home for one evening to share her birthday party, pals from her work, students from Amy’s school. All loud, boisterous and having fun. And that was precisely how she liked it. No false pretenses here. Real people who shared her life each and every day.

She was so lucky to have them.

And she was officially on holiday for two weeks. Now that was worth celebrating. Even if she would be spending most of the time painting the company portrait of a very serious-looking businessman. According to his daughter Freya, Dr Lars Elstrom was a quiet academic used to desk work and she had talked him into sitting for his portrait while he was in the office researching some work for a client.

But there was a problem. The painting had to be painted in a specific two-week window in February before her father went back to Italy for the spring. Could she do it?

Piece of cake.

Especially when the cake came decorated with half the fee for the commission in advance.

Thank you, Freya, and thank you, Dr Lars Elstrom.

That fee had bought Amy’s round-the-world plane ticket and was paying to have the boiler replaced in her little house. Hot water! Central heating she could rely on! Bliss. Apparently any tenant thinking of renting her house would expect plumbing that worked. Amazing. Some people had no appreciation of character properties.

Toni glanced out of the dining room window at the flurries of February snow which were forecast to be with them for a few days to come. Not the weather to be modelling fancy lingerie in her freezing terraced house. It might only be thirty minutes away on foot but it might as well be in another world. Brr.

No. Much better to do it here in this nice warm house.

Freya had a lovely home and Toni was going to enjoy living here for the next two weeks rent-free. And with all of the hot water she could use.

She loved patrons who believed in carrying on old traditions! Especially when that tradition meant that the CEO of the company always had their portrait painted by a Baldoni. And since she was the last in the line... Result!

A warm glow of happiness and contentment spread from deep inside her like a furnace that pumped the heat from her heart to the very ends of her fingertips. She had not felt so safe and secure for years. Protected. And cared for and part of a very special community of friends who looked out for one another.

She grinned across at Amy’s best friend, Lucy, who was demonstrating the finer points of how to tie a sarong. They had known one another since they were at primary school together just a few streets away. It was hard to imagine that Amy, Lucy and the other girls parading up and down in various stages of undress would be flying out tomorrow, all ready for trekking through rough terrain in South America.

It was actually happening. Her baby sister was going around the world with her best friends. One month travelling. Four months on an archaeological dig in Peru then another month relaxing. Six months. Three girls. Three boys. All great teenagers she had known for years. But six months? The longest they had lived apart since their parents died was over a year ago, when she’d worked in Paris for five weeks but came home most weekends.

They might have had the training and they all spoke excellent Spanish but the hard reality of what they would be facing made her shudder.

But no sniffles allowed. Time to start living a bit. Right? That was what they’d agreed at some mad hour on New Year’s Day. A new start for both of them. Pity that Amy was insisting that a new boyfriend was part of the package.

Maybe turning twenty-seven was not so bad after all when she had friends like these in her life. So what if she didn’t have a mega career as a fine artist? She had something much better.

And somehow she knew that her father would understand that trying to scrape a living as a portrait painter had never been the life she wanted and never would be. That had been her father’s dearest wish, but it wasn’t hers. No. This portrait for Freya Elstrom would be the last. No more commissions as the last of the Baldoni family. It was time to say goodbye to foolish ideas like that and start focusing totally on her photography career.

Amy sashayed forward with a plate with a cupcake on and leant sideways and rested her head on Toni’s shoulder. ‘I stashed two of the red velvet specials, which I happen to know are your favourite, in the washing machine.’

‘Clever!’ Toni replied and popped a little finger loaded with creamy chocolate icing into her mouth and groaned in delight. ‘Delish. And have I said thank you yet again for arranging all of this? It’s amazing and I love it.’

Amy laughed out loud and gave her a one-armed hug. ‘Several times. It’s the wine, you know. Causes short-term memory loss in older women.’

Then Amy started rubbing her hands together and mumbling under her breath. ‘Now. Back to the important stuff. What totally outrageous thing have you decided to do while I’m away? Remember the rules—it has to be spontaneous, the opposite of what you would normally do, and fun! Points will be awarded for the most ingenious solution!’

‘Dance on the table? Toni suggested then shook her head and waved her arms around. ‘No. Forget that one. The table legs wouldn’t cope with my current body weight and this food is too good to waste. Something outrageous. Um...’

Then she looked over Amy’s shoulder back towards the door leading to the hallway and her breath caught in her throat.

Standing not ten feet away from her was one of the most remarkable-looking men that she had seen in her life.

She was five foot nine so he had to be at least six foot two, from his heavy working boots and quilted jacket to the black cap pulled low over long, crazily curled dirty blond hair.

Slim hips. Broad shoulders. Long legs.

Her gaze tracked up his body before the sensible part of her brain clicked in to stop it.

‘Oh, Amy—’ she breathed in a low hiss of appreciation ‘—I owe you big time.’

‘This is so true! But what particular thing have I done now?’ Amy replied between mouthfuls of cake.

‘You didn’t tell me that you hired a lumberjack male stripper.’

‘Who? What?’ Amy looked up and whirled her head around like a meerkat before it froze in the same direction Toni was focusing on.

‘Oh. I see what you mean,’ she said with a cough and started taking photographs with the small digital camera that Toni carried with her everywhere.

‘I have no idea who that is and he is nothing to do with me, but what are you waiting for? Go and find out who he belongs to and if he’s available—nab him for yourself before any of the other gals do.’

And with that Amy pranced off towards her friends in her frilly lace-trimmed corset, which was going to be of zero value on an archaeological excavation in the Andes.

Leaning against the door frame, the mystery man didn’t move an inch. The very tall, very rugged, very cold-looking mystery man.

He was a fashion stylist’s idea of what would pass for an Indiana Jones style adventurer—after the action. In fact she would go so far as to say that he was quite scruffy.

Conscious that she was standing there ogling his long denim-clad legs, Toni’s gaze ratcheted up to his face just as he glanced in her direction. Blue eyes gazed at her so intently from under heavy dark blond eyebrows that she almost blushed under the fierce heat of that focus.

With cheekbones that sharp he could have passed for a male model if it was not for the heavy, definitely non-designer dirty blond and grey beard and the blue strapping that was bandaged around his right hand. His clothing was practical. Stained and well used. If this was a costume then it was entirely authentic!

He had not said one word to anyone but in those eyes and on that powerful face she recognised something very special. Confidence oozed out of every pore of this man’s body. He knew exactly who he was and what he wanted and what he was doing there.

That must be nice!

The way he simply leant against the door frame enjoying the view, as though he walked into a lingerie party every day of the week, screamed someone who was so totally comfortable in his own skin that it was sickening.

While she was dressed in a tiny purple satin push-up bra and matching shorts.

Oh, what? Not funny. So not funny.

Toni grabbed her kimono from the back of the sofa and pushed her arms into the sleeves faster than she’d thought possible!

Okay, some of these girls were used to wearing lingerie in front of the camera for a living, but she wasn’t. She didn’t like the idea that some stranger was standing there getting a good eyeful of a catwalk show.

Wait a minute. What the hell was he doing here? And who had invited him? Freya never said anything about having a boyfriend.

Perhaps he was just passing and someone left the door open!

‘Man alert!’ Toni cupped her hands around her mouth and yelled, ‘Unaccompanied male in the room, girls!’

The screaming and squealing had to be heard to be believed.

Utter chaos erupted on all sides as the girls scattered to the wind, mostly upstairs to the bedrooms from the sound of it.

Righty. Time to sort this out.

Toni narrowed her eyes and pulled the edges of her kimono tighter together.

She tried to stomp over to the hulk but it was a tad tricky in feather mules so she ended up mincing across the room instead. Head high, chin forward.

And those blue eyes focused on every tiny step she took.

She cleared her throat and looked him straight in the eye.

‘Okay. You look like the kind of guy who likes straight talk. I’m Antonia Baldoni, house guest of Freya Elstrom. This—’ and she waved one hand towards the abandoned articles and some very odd bedroom toys ‘—is my birthday party. And you are?’

He moved slightly away from the wall to an almost upright position so that when he spoke the sound came from several inches above her head.

‘Tired. Hungry. Surprised. And delighted to make your acquaintance, Antonia Baldoni. House guest.’ He rolled back his shoulders and exhaled very slowly through his nose. ‘Strange. I’ve just come from Freya and she never mentioned anything about a house guest.’

There was a definite squeak and a giggle from behind Toni’s back and one side of this man’s mouth twitched just once before he breathed, ‘Make that house guests. And just when I thought this day could not get any more bizarre.’

‘You’ve just seen Freya?’ Toni looked at him with her eyes narrowed and her head tilted to one side. ‘Really? You have to forgive me, but I find that a little hard to believe. Freya was invited to my party tonight but sent her apologies from Italy. So. Perhaps it’s time for you to start talking before I throw you out. Let’s start with the big ones. Where exactly did you say you met Freya? And what are you doing here? And who are you?’

A low thundering sigh rumbled low in this big man’s chest and Toni stepped back as he slung his body forward as though it was taking a huge effort and strode past her into the kitchen, looking around as he did so from side to side, leaving an aroma in his wake which made her waft the air with one hand.

‘Hey. Wait a minute. I didn’t invite you in,’ Toni said and shuffled after him in her mules.

‘You don’t have to,’ the blond said and pointed to a framed photo on the wall between the cabinets. It was one of a collection of what looked like holiday snaps which Toni had not had time to admire. Until now.

By going up on tiptoe Toni could get a better look at what seemed to be a family photo of people gathered around a dinner table. She recognised Freya and an older man who looked so much like her that he had to be her father, Lars Elstrom. And standing behind them, grinning for the camera, was a tall handsome blond man with broad shoulders and blue eyes the same colour as...

She whipped around, blinked at the man standing with his arms folded and then back to the photo.

Her shoulders dropped. He nodded very slowly up and down. Once.

‘Scott Elstrom. Freya’s brother. And I live here.’

Then he sniffed and gestured with his head towards the worktop. ‘Is anyone going to eat that pizza?’

Toni stared at the photograph and then glanced up at the serious expression on his face before returning back to the framed snapshot of the man, scowling at her at some sort of winter sporting event.

It was definitely him. No mistaking the dirty blond hair and physique.

It was definitely on Freya’s kitchen wall.

And, just like that, the effects of two hours of wine-drinking and general merriment popped like an overstretched balloon and what was left of the rational part of her brain kicked right back in.

Not a male stripper.

Not a birthday present in the shape of a hunky lumberjack.

He was Freya Elstrom’s brother.

Nightmare!

Toni closed her eyes and pinched the top of her nose. She gestured back towards the party, which had magically returned to full swing inside the dining room, with the flat of her hand. ‘As you can see, this is my birthday party. And I’m rather occupied at present.’

His slightly bloodshot blue eyes locked onto hers. ‘I’m not going anywhere.’

At this distance all she could focus on were the thin pale tan lines radiating out from the corners of his eyes and the dark stubble and grey-blond beard above that full, sensuous upper lip.

But there was nothing polished about this man. Far from it. His cheeks looked more sunburnt than tanned and his jacket and trousers were designed for hard use and had seen it. Unshaven. Unkempt.

Inhaling was a mistake. He smelt of leather and travel and acrid sweat mixed with wet dog in a combination which perfume manufacturers could bottle as instant girl-repellent.

Smelly did not quite cover it. This man was seriously in need of a long soak and a shave and several cans of deodorant.

Then the right side of his mouth turned up into what was probably meant to be a reassuring smile.

And every sensory switch inside her body turned on to maximum power.

Just like that. Completely out of the blue and totally, totally not what she wanted to happen. Especially not now.

Speech was impossible and for what seemed like minutes, but was probably only seconds, they both stood there in silence. Breathing in air which positively crackled with electricity. Neither of them willing to shift an inch.

It was almost a relief when someone’s mobile phone started ringing. The ringtone was the theme song for a popular Italian coffee shop. Amy had been playing with it earlier that day; she loved coffee and wasn’t sure when she would see her next cappuccino.

‘I think it’s yours.’ He blinked, breaking the connection, stepping back and folding his arms.

Toni turned away and sucked in some air because apparently she had stopped breathing. She reached into the tiny evening bag she had left on the kitchen worktop and found the phone in the inside pocket, flipping open the tiny, silver, high-tech unit as a familiar voice hissed down the line.

‘Sorry to interrupt, but are you coming back in?’ Amy whispered. ‘Lucy is just about to light the candles on the birthday cake and we’re frightened of the fire risk. You can bring the hunk with you if you’d like to help.’

‘Be right there,’ she replied and closed the phone.

Sucking in a long breath, Toni lifted her head and stared into the face of one of the strangest-looking men she had ever met in her life.

Hell. Who was she kidding? He was smelly, bandaged and glaring at her. And totally gorgeous.

‘Stay right where you are. Help yourself to the pizza. I’ll be back soon and we can sort all of this out.’