As she opened her mouth to say thanks, but no thanks, he denied her the opportunity by putting both hands on her shoulders and giving her the benefit of his dazzling grin, ‘Humour me, Rosie. Please?’
She could drown in that smile, in the depths of those glittering silver eyes. That unfair charisma coupled with the warm male scent of him made her tummy flip. Wordlessly, she nodded then dipped her head, hiding her suddenly wildly coloured cheeks. In this mood she could deny him nothing.
She was a hopeless case where he was concerned, and there didn’t seem to be a blind thing she could do about it!
CHAPTER FIVE
GET changed! Into what’?
Rosie swallowed hard on a huge surge of panic. Most of her gear was back in the room Jean had rented out to her above the mini-market. And, to be brutally honest, they weren’t the sort of clothes women who lunched with Sebastian Garcia would be seen dead in!
She and Mum had been dressed by charity shops. You could pick up some real bargains. That they didn’t always fit as well as they might, and the colours and fabrics were not what they would have chosen if money had been no object, was neither here nor there when being warm and decently covered on a shoe-string was the name of the game.
But what did it matter? she asked herself glumly as she pulled a pair of well-washed, worn old jeans out of a drawer. He wouldn’t expect her to look like a fashion plate and he wouldn’t be taking her to anywhere posh.
Come to think of it, he shouldn’t be taking her anywhere at all.
He could easily have told her what his so-called plans for her were right there and then. And if she had any sense she would have firmly but politely vetoed them, whatever they were.
She could look out for herself without him telling her what to do and when to do it. She should have stood her ground, not weakly given in when he’d said please and made her go spineless and melty.
Pulling on a clean but faded turquoise sweatshirt, she wrinkled her nose at her reflection. Her first date with the kind of man who would normally be seen with a stunning, seriously loaded and beautifully dressed sophisticate on his arm, and she was dressed as if she were about to go out and dig the garden!
But it wasn’t a real date, she impressed upon herself heavily.
He was just worried about the possibility of pregnancy and was probably afraid that she’d publicly name him as the father, and he’d hate that, wouldn’t he? He wouldn’t want his fancy friends to know that he’d been sharing the cleaning lady’s bed.
Feeling low and no-account, Rosie brushed her hair until it shone like silk, painted her mouth a vivid scarlet to make herself feel better and decided that if he was going to insist she stick around like a spare part until they knew one way or another, she could always fib. She didn’t like the idea of lying to anyone, but surely, in this situation, it could be forgiven.
Her period wasn’t due for another two weeks, but he wasn’t to know that. So, in a couple of days, say, she could tell him he was off the hook, to his huge relief, and take herself off.
She couldn’t bear the thought of having him constantly watching her, his regret for what had been so beautiful growing deeper by the day, the tension between them spiralling, spoiling her memories of what they had shared. She would rather get over her love for him in her own way, in her own time.
She exchanged her old plimsolls for a fairly respectable pair of brown lace-ups and was as ready as she’d ever be, and presented a fairly composed facade as he ushered her into the passenger seat of his opulent silver Mercedes. She tried to ignore the fact that he was dressed in a classic black cashmere sweater over superbly cut stone-coloured pants and looked seriously well-heeled and impossibly spectacular.
Composure was the name of the game, she lectured herself.
They were bound to argue over what he had termed his plans for her—as if she had the mental ability of a gnat! So she had to stay calm and very controlled if she were to have any chance of impressing her rights over her own body on him.
But the cool veneer of composure cracked and blistered when, after a few wordless minutes, he brought the car to a halt on a narrow lane outside a small cottage.
‘You wanted to see the head gardener’s cottage,’ Sebastian announced quietly, turning in his seat, one arm stretching over the back of hers, his silvery eyes so intent she gave an involuntary shudder. Any particular reason? It’s an ordinary estate cottage and not on any tourist map that I know of.’
Her throat thickening with tears, Rosie pressed her soft lips together and turned her head away quickly, not wanting him to see how affected she was.
From the way he had parked she couldn’t get a good look at Briar Cottage without looking round that handsome head, the expanse of black-clad shoulders.
Fumbling fingers released her seat belt and found the door catch. Rosie slid out of the car, willing her legs to keep her upright as she gazed at her mother’s birthplace, an ache in the region of her heart.
A steeply pitched thatched roof topped a sturdy timber frame.
There were bright curtains at the small windows, a plume of smoke from the chimney and searing yellow daffodils and paler, subtler primroses growing amongst the cabbages.
A swing hung from an ancient pear tree. Had it been there when her mother was a child? Had she swung amidst the flowers and vegetables dreaming of her future? Dreams that had turned into what had to have been a nightmare of drudgery, of alienation from her parents.
‘If you’d like to see inside I’m sure Mrs Potts wouldn’t object.’
Rosie tensed. She hadn’t heard him exit the car; she’d been listening to her memories. Her mother telling her that Gran had passed away a scant year after the death of her grandfather, and later, her lovely face white with strain, explaining that following the sale of the furniture and effects—everything arranged by the estate manager and a solicitor—the proceeds, according to her Will, were to go to charity.
‘No.’ She vetoed his suggestion, her voice thin and lifeless. The ache in her heart had spread all over her body as the enormity of what Marcus Troone had done to her mother punched home with a vengeance.
‘You were asking Sharon if she recalled the previous head gardener. And I told you I did, remember?’ Sebastian prodded gently, making the connection. ‘I remember Joe Lambert from childhood holidays spent with Marcus and my aunt. You were related?’
Rosie shivered. There was little warmth in the early March sunshine and the light breeze was cutting. And there was no point in lying about this. ‘They were my grandparents.’ Her mouth felt numb. She could barely get the words out. I was—was just interested to see where they’d lived.’
‘You never visited them.’ That seemed pretty obvious. But odd.
Sebastian’s brows tugged down. Where he came from families meant everything.
She shook her head. The wind had blown a heavy strand of hair over her eyes, blinding her. Her hand shook as she brushed it away.
‘You never met them?’ He could scarcely believe it. His own grandparents, all now sadly missed, had treated him like a prince. A glance at her pale, anguished face turned his heart to treacle. He slipped an arm around her shoulders and pulled her slight body close. She was shivering. She was cold.
With an effort, Rosie pulled herself together. She had to, double-quick. The way he was holding her was testing her will-power to the limit. She so wanted to curve her body into his warmth, wrap her arms around him, cling to the wonderful male strength of him and unburden herself, tell him everything.
She mustn’t. It would be a really stupid thing to do. He’d hurt her horribly when he’d said how much he regretted making love to her. She wouldn’t be able to take it if she tried to get closer and he pushed her away, believing she was asking for much more than his comfort.
‘Twice,’ she mumbled. Then amended, ‘They visited Mum after I was born, so I don’t remember that time. Then came again when I was ten.’
Stiff, awkward, disapproving, both of
them. They’d hardly said two words to her and the atmosphere had been really spiky.
Her mother had shot into the bathroom when they’d gone and she’d heard her muffled sobs. But when she’d emerged five minutes later she had smiled, even though her eyes had been red and puffy, and had cheerfully suggested a rare treat, a visit to the cinema where the latest cartoon film was showing, such an exciting event that the incident had been forgotten.
‘You’re cold,’ Sebastian said briskly. ‘Let’s go. The Bull in the village always has a good fire, and a passable menu.’ He had intended to take her further afield, somewhere more special than the local pub. But the poor little scrap was obviously deeply upset and he wanted nothing more than to get her warm and relaxed as quickly as possible.
He wasn’t stupid, he told himself as he started the engine and reversed back along the narrow track. He could put two and two together as well as the next man.
There had just been her and her mother. No mention of a father. It was obvious that her mother had been a single parent, and presumably Rosie’s grandparents had disapproved to such an extent that they hadn’t had their only grandchild over for holidays in the fresh country air, had probably told their daughter never to darken their doorstep, had virtually washed their hands of the pair of them.
Anger punched at his heart. He couldn’t trust himself to speak until he’d got it under control. Had her father been one of the local lads? Had he done a runner when he’d learned that his girlfriend was pregnant, unable or unwilling to face the prospect of fatherhood’?
He couldn’t understand how a man could do that and still live with himself! His stomach clenched. Madre di Dio—if he’d carelessly fathered a child on Rosie he would damned well do his duty! He’d be around for his child, make sure neither of them wanted for anything.
Had he ever seen Rosie’s mother? He must have done. He tried to remember. The summer holidays spent with Marcus and his aunt, sometimes with his parents, sometimes staying on his own, had been too full of adventures—fishing, riding, building tree-houses and generally getting into mischief—to leave much time for noticing the estate workers’ families.
But he had known that Joe Lambert had a daughter. She’d even helped her father in the gardens one summer, he recalled now.
Aware that his silence was doing nothing to make Rosie feel more comfortable, he broke it. ‘Did you take the temporary job at the Manor because you wanted to see where your mother had grown up?’
‘Partly,’ Rosie admitted. She wouldn’t tell him the rest of it; she couldn’t. All he’d ever felt for her was a lust he now hated himself for, so it wouldn’t make any difference to her if he ended up despising her for who she was. But she didn’t want him hating her poor mother for being the woman Marcus had betrayed his adored aunt with.
‘And after—after your mother left the village—where did she go? Where did you live?’ He felt strangely driven to probe.
‘From what I can gather, her parents gave her precious little support. How did she manage?’
The thought of anyone turfing a pregnant daughter out to fend for herself was utterly abhorrent to him. And in this case it felt almost personal, he admitted, the depth of his feelings surprising him into shooting her a hard, level look.
Rosie wriggled in her seat, her stomach churning. He sounded so harsh. Really disapproving. And that look—the condemning silver eyes above those hard cheekbones—had flayed her. Of course, in the wealthy, rarefied atmosphere he inhabited single mothers living a hand-to-mouth existence didn’t exist. If a rich and pampered member of his exalted circle made the mistake of getting pregnant she would be discreetly married off.
Sebastian Garcia might be wealthy beyond avarice, the intelligent driving force behind a highly successful business empire, but he knew nothing about the real world. When had he ever wondered where his next meal was coming from, or drudged all day for a pittance, or dressed in someone else’s cast-off clothing?
Memories of her mother’s tired, pale features, her unfailingly cheerful smile, floated into her mind. No one would belittle her, no one!
Staring ahead at the unwinding country lane, she said proudly, ‘Mum was tough and so was I. The way we lived would probably have killed the likes of you! We had a council flat and we made it nice, despite the surroundings—the graffiti-spattered walls, the broken lifts and stinking stair-wells.’
‘Mum worked hard cleaning offices, and as soon as I was old enough I worked early evenings and Saturdays at Jean’s corner shop. We managed on our own without the benefit of tiaras, fancy clothes, flash cars and servants to shield us from the contaminations of daily life!’
She almost added a childish ‘so there’ but stopped herself in time and stuck her lower lip out mutinously as they drew up in front of an ivy-clad pub on the outskirts of the village.
Exiting the car and skirting the bonnet, Sebastian hid a grin. In spite of her aura of fragile vulnerability, Rosie Lambert had mountains of spirit when it came to something she really cared about. He liked that.
He wanted to tell her to be proud of her mother, of herself, but thought better of it. She would only accuse him of patronising her.
He wanted to tell her that there were things great wealth could never buy: love and loyalty, for instance. But she obviously already knew that.
So he kept his mouth shut.
She was sitting in the car as if permanently welded to the seat, her arms crossed over her slender midriff. The grin threatened again. Suppressing it, he opened the door. She didn’t bat an eyelid. She didn’t need to say she didn’t want to be here, didn’t want to have lunch with him. Her body language said it for her.
Leaning forward, he reached in to undo her seat belt, since she obviously had no intention of doing it for herself. The back of his hand brushed the soft, sweet undercurve of her breast and his heart raced with carnal sensation. Infierno! What she did to him!
He stood back quickly, outraged at his body’s treachery. He had made one unforgivable mistake. He wasn’t going to repeat it.
‘Hurry,’ he ordered briskly. ‘Before the heavens open.’ Black clouds had raced in, heavily obliterating the earlier clear blue skies, and the wind had risen, a precursor of the storm to come.
Averting his eyes, he waited while she edged reluctantly out of her seat and stood beside him. The top of her silky gold head barely reached his shoulders. Her hair smelled of fresh air and flowers.
He brutally slapped down the temptation to bury his mouth in it and turned abruptly, striding over the forecourt, past the wooden seats and tables that flanked the open door. He waited, his hands bunched into his trouser pockets while she caught up with him, then, nodding towards the bar where an open fire burned brightly in the brick inglenook, strode to too-brusquely request coffee and a menu from the landlord.
Selecting a round table nearest the fire, Rosie held her hands out to the welcoming blaze and forced herself to relax. The cold was gradually seeping out of her veins. Sebastian was talking to the man behind the bar. How gorgeous he was. She could hardly believe she was here at his invitation, especially after all his retrospective disgust at the way they’d both behaved. Had Sir Marcus brought her mother here? Given her lunch? No, of course not. He’d been a married man and would have insisted that their meetings were a dark secret.
Not wanting to lumber herself with all that anger again—she had stopped being annoyed with Sebastian at last because it wasn’t his fault he’d been born with a drawerful of silver spoons in his mouth—she pondered happier things. Like, had her mother sat with her friends on those benches outside on warm summer evenings, chatting and laughing, drinking fizzy pop out of bottles, eating crisps and talking about hairstyles, teachers, exams and pop stars?
She liked to think so, to believe that for the first eighteen years of her life—until the fateful day when she’d fallen in love with Marcus Troone—her mother had been happy and carefree—
‘Warmer now?’ Sebastian pulled out a chair and
sat opposite her, laying down the typed menu, pushing aside the ashtray and the broken-handled mug that held half a dozen daffodils.
Her eyes were sparkling, her pale cheeks brushed with tender colour. He stared at her, his silvered gaze intense between narrowed lids. His heart kicked. She was beautiful. Dress her in decent gear and she’d be an absolute stunner.
He swallowed. Hard. Having her with him where he could keep an eye on her, make sure she didn’t simply disappear taking his maybe-child with her, was the only viable option, but it was going to be difficult. Keeping his hands off her would be the main stumbling block.
He thrust the menu at her. ‘Choose what you’d like to eat,’ he said brusquely, and saw the immediate stubborn set of her lovely mouth, the way she set the typed sheet aside without even glancing at it, and silently cursed himself. He was handling himself badly; he knew that. He had never been in this situation before. He had never met a woman who could make him behave like a reckless, callow youth, ruled by his hormones.
He’d never had unprotected sex before, run the risk of an unwanted pregnancy. But was it unwanted? The thought of her beautiful body blossoming and ripening for him, of holding their child in his arms, made everything inside him melt, his brain turn to fog.
Infierno! What was happening to him?
The arrival of their coffee came as a relief. He ordered cottage pie for both of them as it appeared to be the only home-made item on offer, decided against wine, and got himself firmly back on track. The mover and shaker. The man in control.
‘Do you have a passport?’ he asked with studied politeness and not a great deal of hope, and struggled not to applaud her spirit when she came back proudly.
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