by Maggie Cox
‘And presumably there’s been no shortage of takers?’
Even in the dimly lit interior of the car, her blush was endearingly delightful. From the roots of his hair to the tips of his toes, Jarrett’s whole body tightened. ‘Can we talk about something else?’ he suggested lightly. ‘For instance, are you going to invite me in for a coffee? I know you implied that too much caffeine keeps you awake, but I wouldn’t say no to another cup if you’re offering.’ He knew his smile was boyishly hopeful.
Sweeping her hair behind her ear, Sophia was suddenly wary. ‘Can we do that another time, maybe? I really am feeling rather tired tonight.’
‘Why didn’t you mention that earlier?’
‘Because I was feeling fine then … it’s only just hit me now we’ve arrived home. By the way, I’ve really enjoyed our evening together and the lovely meal. Thank you. It was so nice to be taken out to dinner. I can’t remember the last time I did such a normal thing.’
‘It was my pleasure. My hope is that we’ll have many more evenings like this together. Are you okay?’ he asked, frowning. The wary look hadn’t retreated, he saw.
‘Yes, I’m fine. A good night’s sleep will sort me out, I’m sure.’
‘I’ll walk you to your door, then.’
‘There’s no need … thanks all the same.’
Sophia was already taking her keys out of her purse. As she glanced up again, Jarrett saw she appeared to be thinking hard about something.
‘Do you still see any of the women who kept you company when you were lonely?’ she quizzed him.
He might have known she wouldn’t let him off lightly. She was behaving like every other woman who had the bit between her teeth about something. But in Sophia’s case her need to know about this particular facet of his past was entirely justified, he thought—because she knew only too well the pitfalls of being with someone who couldn’t be relied upon except to hurt her.
‘No, I don’t. I already told you I never dated anyone for very long, but neither did I cold-heartedly desert them. When we parted it was always mutual. The kind of women I saw were usually from the corporate world, as time-poor as me because they were immersed in their careers, wanting to make a name for themselves. Having a romantic relationship was never going to be top of their list of priorities.’
There had been one liaison where the woman in question had got a little bit too attached to the idea of deepening her association with him, Jarrett recalled wincingly, but he had told her as diplomatically and as kindly as possible that he couldn’t consider it. She hadn’t guessed that he was holding out for the woman of his dreams, and he wondered if she would have been surprised that he secretly harboured such a romantic ideal.
‘Did you ever want more than just a mutually satisfying fling with anyone in particular?’ Sophia asked, just as though she’d read his mind.
He heard the slight condemnation in her voice and flinched inwardly. ‘No, I didn’t,’ he admitted, low-voiced. ‘And I don’t want you to think that’s because I’m some kind of devil-may-care playboy, because I’m not. The truth is I just never met anyone I fell for in that way. But that doesn’t mean I haven’t had a desire to. To fall in love, I mean.’ He hardly knew how he kept his hands off of her as he said this, because she was becoming more irresistible and important to him every time he saw her.
Like now, when her face was so bewitchingly illuminated by the gentle rays of moonlight drifting in through the windscreen.
The smooth skin between her brows puckered in thought. ‘I’m sure if it’s meant to happen it will,’ she commented, and then, leaning towards him, dropped a light kiss at the corner of his mouth.
A purely chaste kiss, Jarrett thought in frustration. Every masculine instinct he had clamoured for him to haul her into his arms and kiss her properly … to taste and ravish her mouth in the way that he yearned to do … to run his hands down over her lithe, beautiful body and build up a storm—a storm that he’d sensed had been brewing between them ever since he had first set eyes on her.
Yet he couldn’t bring himself to succumb to such a raw, elemental need when the woman he desired was still wrestling with so many fears from her past. He would just have to learn to be patient.
Already out of the car, Sophia dipped her head to give him a smile. Her long hair fell softly around her face and framed it. ‘If you want to drop round tomorrow some time and have coffee then I’d be glad to see you,’ she said.
His relief was off the scale. For a moment there he’d worried that she might put him off indefinitely.
‘What time?’
‘Don’t you have to work?’
‘Yes, but tomorrow I’m working from home … How about eleven o’clock?’
‘Eleven is fine. I’ll see you then.’
Jarrett didn’t respond with goodnight or goodbye. He merely gave her a brief nod. He guessed he wanted to avoid any reference to the fact that they were going to be parted—even if it was only until tomorrow …
A devastating nightmare had shocked Sophia awake. The icily threatening quality of the dream disorientated her, and for a moment or two she was completely unaware of where she was or even her own name.
Breathing hard, she sat up and swung her legs over the side of the bed. It jolted her to realise that she wasn’t back in the expensive London house she’d once shared with Tom Abingdon, and neither was this her bed. She hardly remembered electing to sleep on Great-Aunt Mary’s threadbare old couch, but now it came back to her. When she’d finally decided to turn in—just like on the previous three nights—it had hit her that she was all alone in the house without Charlie. It was too hard to sleep in her own bed when on the other side of the room her son’s endearing little cabin-bed with its Paddington Bear quilt was empty, and above her the rest of the cavernous rooms were full of imagined ghosts that her imagination was only too eager to make real.
The fire that she’d left alight in the grate to keep her warm during the night was down to a few glowing embers, and the large stately room she’d been sleeping in was now so cold that it frosted her breath.
In the horrible nightmare that had visited her she’d been running barefoot through eerily menacing dark woods, with Tom chasing after her, threatening all kinds of dire consequences when he caught up. When the white-hot rage that he was still tormenting her had suddenly spilled over, giving Sophia the courage to turn and face him, the cruel face that had gaped back into her eyes hadn’t been her deceased husband but his father …
A chill and queasy sensation lodged like congealed porridge in the pit of her stomach and made the inside of her mouth dry as sand. Reaching for the glass of water she’d left nearby on a table, she gulped the contents down. Before she finished the drink, the hot tears burning at the backs of her eyes were streaming in an unchecked flow down her face. She hadn’t even undressed. She was still wearing the blue wraparound dress she’d worn out to dinner with Jarrett.
With stoic determination she scrubbed away the moisture streaking down her face with the heel of her hand. Just the thought of him sent a tropical heatwave sweeping through her blood and made her ache almost beyond bearing to see him again. And, for a blessed few moments even the memory of his reassuring presence drove out the cold and fear that gripped her. Simply recollecting his sculpted handsome face, haunting blue eyes and the richly sensual quality of his mesmerising voice was enough to make her yearn to have him appear. Not only was he the most attractive man she had ever seen, to Sophia’s mind his best asset was his unquestioning ability to be kind. She’d seen plenty of evidence of that. Jarrett epitomised the very best of masculinity, where her deceased husband had epitomised the worst.
With all her heart she wished she could turn back the clock and invite him in for coffee, instead of walking into this lonely old house on her own. But her emotions had been in a distressing state of turmoil after her revelations to him about her marriage, and she’d feared she had told him too much. Confessing the details of her personal horror
story had left her feeling uncomfortably exposed, and fear of Jarrett’s unspoken judgement had made her want to distance herself from him for a while.
If only she hadn’t succumbed to that painful impulse so quickly, she thought now. If she hadn’t, he might still be here …
Jarrett had lain down on his bed fully clothed, thinking hard about the evening he’d just spent with Sophia. His mind simply refused to let him dwell on any other subject. It had done his heart good to see her tuck into her meal with such enjoyment, and he wondered how many meals she’d left uneaten or barely touched because she’d been consumed by the threat of harm her malicious ex-husband regularly seemed to have menaced her with?
His hands curled into fists down by his sides. He made himself think about something far less likely to arouse his fury. Apart from her undoubted beauty, there was so much that he admired about this lovely woman. For instance her ability to be brave in the face of the most horrendous adversity and not lose hope. Even now she was putting on a brave face, because her little son was away from home staying with his uncle and she was spending her nights at High Ridge alone.
Cursing out loud, because that particular thought was apt to inflame him and rob him of his sleep entirely, Jarrett got up, quickly shed his clothes, then got back into bed again, dragging the duvet up over his head to block out any disturbing glimpse of light. Then he turned his face into the pillow and willed sleep to rescue him from the too tempting images of Sophia that his mind seemed determined to taunt him with …
Jarrett wake up … you must wake up. I need you!
Sophia’s voice—urgent and low—was right against his ear, shockingly stirring him from the deep, dreamless slumber that he’d fallen into. Immediately turning on his side towards her, Jarrett’s heart hammered hard. Feeling as if he’d been cruelly cheated of the one thing that he longed for above all else when he realised the space beside him was empty, he reached towards the bedside lamp, almost knocking it over in his haste for illumination. Impatiently he switched it on. As light flooded the room, he sat up, scrubbing the sleep from his eyes with his knuckles.
The sound of her voice had been so real. Even more disturbing to his peace of mind was that it had sounded so frightened—desperate, even. Was she in trouble? I need you, she’d cried. Had that bastard of a father-in-law discovered her whereabouts and was right now threatening her?
Not even taking time to dwell on the sense of the action he intended, or be remotely concerned that it was the dead of night, Jarrett rushed into the dressing room adjacent to his bedroom, grabbed a pair of jeans and a sweatshirt from out of the bank of mirrored wardrobes that contained his clothes and quickly dressed. Returning to the bedroom, he pushed his feet into the pair of loafers he’d left by the bed, then grabbed the leather jacket he’d thrown onto a chair and hurriedly exited the room as though the hounds of hell themselves were snapping hungrily at his heels …
CHAPTER EIGHT
THE sudden thumping on the front door reverberated warningly through the house like the violent rumble of thunder heralding a storm. Clutching the folds of her dress anxiously to her chest, Sophia’s blood turned to ice. Who on earth would bang on her door like that in the middle of the night unless something was terribly wrong?
Her thoughts naturally flew to her son. But surely if something untoward had happened to Charlie, her brother would have notified her with a phone call first? He wouldn’t just turn up out of the blue and knock her door down! The next fear following close on the heels of the first one was that her father-in-law had found her and was waiting outside to confront her with a demand to see his grandson … to take him away from her. What if he’d brought help with him to do just that? She wouldn’t put it past him to hire a couple of heavy-set thugs to accomplish what he was too cowardly to accomplish himself.
When she rose to her feet a surge of adrenalin pumped through her veins, rendering her almost too weak to stand. Quickly slipping her feet into the plain black leather pumps she’d worn to dinner, she stole a cursory glance at the fire now blazing brightly in the grate, thanks to the fresh ash log she’d added, and on the spur of the moment grabbed one of the heavy iron tongs in the stand beside it. Squeezing her eyes shut tight for a moment, she murmured a quick heartfelt prayer beneath her breath, then left the room to step out into the dark, cavernous hallway that led to the front door.
The porch light there had automatically come on, and she nearly fainted with fright at the sight of the tall shadow that loomed up behind the decorated glass panels.
‘Sophia! Sophia, are you there? It’s me, Jarrett.’
‘Oh, my God.’ Her reaction was as though someone had careened into her back with a battering ram. Her body felt weak and winded all at the same time.
Trembling hard, but this time with relief instead of stark cold fear, she laid the heavy iron tongs carefully down on the floor, glad to be free of their threatening weight now that she knew that she wouldn’t have to employ them in self-defence. But her heart still pounded at the realisation that her night-time visitor was Jarrett … the man whose presence she’d been desperately longing for ever since she’d decided not to invite him in for coffee.
With fumbling fingers she undid the latch and the bolts at the top and bottom of the door. By the time the cool night air rushed in to greet her and she came face to face with her visitor Sophia hardly had the strength to hold herself upright. The shock she’d received at the pounding of the door had robbed her of every ounce.
‘Are you okay? Tell me!’
Jarrett’s face looked pale, haunted almost … as if he too had received the most disturbing shock. The dim porch light highlighted the hard cobalt glitter of his mesmerising gaze.
Fastening his hands round her slim upper arms, he stared down into her face as if to make an urgent assessment of her state of mind. ‘I heard you call out my name as if you were right there beside me. I wasn’t dreaming, Sophia … your voice was as real as can be and you sounded distressed.’
‘What did I say?’
‘You said … you said, “I need you.”’
Had her longing been so powerful that it had transcended time and space and transmitted itself straight to Jarrett?
But even before he’d confessed what he had heard Sophia had already been overwhelmed by the heat and solidity of his reassuring male body, and she couldn’t help breathing out a heartfelt sigh as she gazed steadily up into his eyes. ‘How strange that you heard that. It’s true. I do need you, Jarrett. I had the most terrible nightmare. I dreamt that Tom and his father were coming after me. I haven’t had a dream like that for a long time, and it was even harder to bear after such a nice evening. It really shook me up.’
Her legs buckled a little with the force of emotion that swept through her at the memory of the distressing dream and also at Jarrett’s timely but altogether unexpected appearance … all because he’d had some kind of psychic intuition that she needed him.
Her handsome visitor didn’t hesitate to catch her as her balance faltered, and he lifted her up high into his arms to hold her safely against his chest as though she weighed nothing. Then he carried her into the dimly lit hallway. Its scant illumination came from the warm light that drifted out through the open drawing room door at the end of it. Inside, Sophia had left one small lamp burning, and the fire she had lit to chase away the chill of her nightmare still emitted a welcoming bright blaze.
Kicking the front door shut with the heel of his boot, Jarrett made a beeline for the softly lit room. Once inside, he headed straight for the old-fashioned couch where Sophia had left her quilted eiderdown to drape over her as she slept, and dropped her carefully down onto a cushion, still cradling her in his arms.
‘I’m glad you lit the fire. The warmth and light will help—especially after that nightmare,’ he said with gentle authority, his fingers tenderly brushing back some long skeins of silky chestnut hair that had partially drifted over her face.
His touch was divine. Straight away S
ophia sensed a delicious melting sensation in the nether region of her stomach. The scent from his body was sexy, warm and compelling, and the tough denim of his jeans couldn’t disguise the iron hardness of his strong, muscular thighs. He’d already intimately acquainted her with how strong he was, making light work of lifting her up into his arms and carrying her, and since he’d swept her up against his chest even the icy tentacles of the dreadful nightmare that had visited her had lost most of their power to hold her in their chilling grip. Right now the only thing that was unsettling her—but in a good way—was Jarrett.
‘I’m sorry if I frightened you, banging on your door like that, but when I thought you might be in danger I had to come to you.’ The palm of his big warm hand settled against her cheek and tenderly cupped it.
‘I’m glad that you did.’ Her soft voice was a little breathless.
‘Do you want to tell me about the dream? It can sometimes help to dispel the memory if you talk about it rather than just bottle your feelings up inside.’
‘I’d rather not, if you don’t mind. I’m already feeling better because you’re here … honestly.’
A muscle flinched in the side of his unshaven cheek. ‘I’m glad about that. I really am. But you must know that sooner or later you’re going to have to confront this bully of a father-in-law of yours, or else he’ll be intimidating you for the rest of your life … and maybe Charlie’s too.’
‘I know—and you’re right.’ Sophia agreed with a sigh. ‘I do need to confront him, and to let him know that I refuse to be bullied by him any longer. God knows I spent enough miserable years being bullied by his son! The thing that worries me is that he’ll bring the whole weight of the judicial system down on my head until he gets the outcome that he wants—and that’s Charlie.’ She laid her hand over her chest to calm her racing heart. ‘If the case goes to court I can’t afford a good defence lawyer, and trust me … it’s going to take someone very special and clever to face the intimidating might of Sir Christopher Abingdon.’
