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With any luck he would get bored and leave early.
Hugging this comforting thought to herself, she walked across the courtyard back to the big house and found him waiting outside the porticoed entrance.
The sound of the fountain drowned out the noise her heels made on the cobbles, so she was able to study him unobserved for a few moments. He was wearing an open-necked shirt and dark tailored trousers. She was admiring the way he looked, hard not to, and reflecting that it was a shame that someone who had everything physically should be so lacking in the personality department when he turned suddenly, startling her enough to make her fall off the strappy wedge she was wearing.
He was at her side supplying a steadying hand to her elbow with startling speed. Flustered, she lifted her face to his, the pupils of her dramatic cornflower-blue eyes dilating as they connected with his dark ebony burnished stare.
She caught her breath sharply as a shimmy of sensation that slid down her spine made her shiver. The man had a sexual charisma that really was off the scale!
‘I’m not used to the heels.’ She pulled and his hand fell away from her elbow. ‘I’m afraid my car’s not very…’ Her voice faded as she picked her way with more care now across the cobbles.
Isandro had been pierced by an arrow of sheer lust the moment he had seen her walking towards him. Walking behind her gave him the opportunity to admire her delicious bottom and the long elegant line of her seemingly endless legs, revealed rather than hidden by the long skirt that clung and flowed as she walked.
‘The seat belt’s a bit…’ She took the football he held and with a grimace slung it into the back seat on top of the motley collection of toys and turned the ignition. ‘It takes a few times before it…Sometimes…’
‘Will you stop apologising?’ He nodded towards the back seat. ‘Your nephew plays football?’ He spoke not out of any genuine interest but a desire to stop himself asking her if she had a boyfriend. It wouldn’t make a difference—she worked for him and some rules he did not break. Still, there was no rule against looking.
‘Harry?’ Zoe laughed and shook her head. ‘No, Harry hates sport. The ball is Georgie’s. Harry is…quieter.’ A man like Isandro Montero would never understand a sensitive boy like Harry. Her brow furrowed. Harry was a worry; he was such an easy child that he tended to be overlooked.
She glanced towards her passenger, and her lips twitched at the thought of anyone overlooking the scorchingly handsome Spaniard. It should have been laughable to see him squashed into her Beetle, but Zoe was unable to raise even a smile. The fact they were virtually rubbing shoulders made her feel a lot less comfortable than he appeared to be.
Being in this sort of enclosed space with him made Zoe want to crawl out of her own skin.
‘It’s not far.’ Thank God for small mercies.
‘I will sit back and admire the scenery,’ he said, studying her profile. He had thought she would scrub up well and he had been proved right—she was stunning.
A few minutes later she crunched the gears and winced as she drew up outside the local convenience store.
‘Your friends live here?’
‘No, they live the other side of the village. I need to stop to get a bottle of wine.’
‘I thought you didn’t drink.’
‘I don’t, but other people do,’ she said shortly without looking at him.
‘You should have said. There’s plenty of wine in the cellar.’ Good wine was always a sound inflation-proof investment.
A small choking sound left her lips as she thought of the vintage stuff stacked in the hall’s cellar being served from borrowed glasses and drunk by people who in her hostess’s case preferred her wine mixed with lemonade.
‘Don’t worry about it. I’ll get this.’
Inside the store she snatched two of the second-cheapest bottles off the shelves and took them to the checkout.
‘Nice stuff this, so they say,’ the man at the till approved, putting the bottles into a bag for her while she dug into her purse. It became embarrassingly clear pretty quickly that she was short of cash to pay and her plastic was at home in the drawer, which had seemed the safest way to avoid temptation while she adjusted to her new straitened circumstances.
‘Sorry, it’ll have to be the Spanish one—do you mind if I change them? Fifty pence short, I’m afraid.’ She nodded towards the stacked coins.
‘No problem, it’s very nice too, love.’
Her hand had closed around the bottles on the counter when a big hand covered it. ‘Let me get those.’
Looking from the warm hand covering her own to the face of the tall, sleek, exclusive-looking man who had moved to stand beside her, Zoe shook her head, struggling to recover her composure and painfully aware of the tingling pain in her peaked and aching nipples. She was shamed and embarrassed by her weakness.
‘No, really, I’m fine. I’m going to have the Spanish one…wine, that is…’ she corrected and promptly felt like a total idiot.
‘I hate to be disloyal, but take it from a Spaniard—that is not wine,’ he told her with a shudder.
‘It’s not a wine snob sort of party.’
He was prepared to swallow the insult, but not the wine on the shelf. ‘No, I insist, the least I can do since you are being my taxi,’ he said, taking his wallet from his pocket and handing over the money.
Short of having a fight right there in the shop, Zoe had no choice but to accept the offer with as much grace as possible.
With his hand on the small of her back he guided her out of the shop and back towards the car. She didn’t enjoy the light physical contact—actually any contact at all with this man made her feel uncomfortable—but she could tell that the natural courtesy came as second nature to him.
He held the door open for her, then went around to the other side of the car. The entire vehicle shook as she slammed the door closed. ‘Do you not drink out of choice or because you have a drink problem?’
Her lips tightened. Was the man worried that his new housekeeper was an alcoholic? ‘Neither, sir.’ She emphasised the title before adding factually, ‘I simply can’t metabolise alcohol. I get drunk on the smell.’
‘I rather think it might be more appropriate if you do not call me sir tonight.’
She shrugged and steered her car past the others parked along one side of the narrow lane. ‘Is that an order, Mr Montero?’
‘If you like, and try Isandro. It is my name. Relax,’ he recommended. ‘This is a party. I will not cramp your style…’
‘It’s not that sort of party and be careful there’s a…’ She stopped and hid a smile, adding as he surveyed his muddy shoe, ‘A bit of a ditch that side.’
Zoe had been concerned for her friends’ feelings, but slowly let down her guard as she realised that, far from looking down his nose at her friends, he was charming them. She could relax and enjoy herself; why not? Against all her expectations he was not being aloof or even icily polite. From the moment they had arrived and he had been swept away by Chloe, who had wanted to show him off, he had given the appearance of enjoying himself.
Watching Isandro talk easily with John and the local vet—who, according to Chloe, had not worn low-cut blouses before her divorce—it was Zoe who found herself feeling like an outsider. She felt her resentment rise as the red-headed divorcee threw back her head and laughed throatily at something Isandro had said, giving him an excellent view of her cleavage. Zoe’s teeth clenched—and he looked, of course; he was a man!
How predictable. Shaking her head in a combination of contempt and cynical amusement, she felt embarrassed for the woman who was being so obvious. And he wasn’t doing anything to discourage her, she thought. Her eyes narrowed as the woman’s hand came to rest on his arm and stayed there, her long nails showing as flashes of scarlet as they curved over his biceps.
Zoe couldn’t decide if the woman was pathetic or predatory…and whether she herself was embarrassed or envious.
Ignoring the laughable possibility that she wanted to touch Isandro, she directed her stubbornly critical glance over his strong, arrogant profile, pushing away the image of moving her hands over the hard muscular contours of his body, waiting for the hot hormone rush that tinged her cheek with pink to recede.
This was insane, she told herself. How could the man be all the way over the other side of the room and still manage to jangle every nerve ending in her body? His masculinity really was totally overwhelming. She sipped her drink, wishing that there were something stronger than fruit juice in it—though maybe not; the last thing she needed was her social restraints vanishing. Zoe had not exaggerated when she explained her reaction to alcohol; she had learnt after a couple of deeply embarrassing experiences that she and booze were not a good combination.
Common sense told her this was about hormones. She’d just have to accept it as an uncomfortable fact, like a pollen allergy, and deal with it. No point whatsoever in overanalysing the primitive physical response he had awoken in her, and it didn’t really matter if this was all about timing or that he had been the catalyst for kicking her dormant hormones into life. She would treat it as an inconvenience rather than a disaster. There were always coping mechanisms and for the rare occasions there weren’t, you avoided the problem. Like her body’s inability to cope with alcohol—she didn’t touch it; she wasn’t going to touch Isandro. Simple.
What would be a disaster or at least an unwanted distraction would be to think too much about the primitive hunger she sensed was somewhere inside her. She should acknowledge it and forget about it. She was human; she had rotten taste in men. But she must not go there.
The vet, on the other hand, had clearly no such qualms about going where God knew how many women had been before, Zoe thought, her lips moving in a grimace of distaste as the older woman and her curves moved in closer. She had all but trapped him in the corner now…not that he showed any inclination to escape.
Her lips were still tightened in a cynical sneer of superiority when, without warning, Isandro turned his head slowly as though sensing her scrutiny. His dark eyes sought and connected with hers across the room. It was as if he possessed some radar that told him exactly where she was standing…where she was staring.
Their eyes locked, and for a long, heart-thudding moment Zoe could feel her own pulse over every inch of her skin, the vibrations reaching her tingling fingertips. She stopped breathing. Her stomach muscles quivered; her legs felt weak and oddly heavy; her knees literally shook.
The contact might have lasted moments or an hour, she didn’t have a clue, but by the time she managed to bring her lashes down in a protective fan her insides had dissolved. Her throat was dry as she raised her empty glass to her lips and struggled to regain some semblance of self-control.
She closed her eyes, her lashes brushing her cheeks. As she willed her body to relax they shot open at the sound of her name.
‘Sorry, I was miles away. How are you?’ she asked Chloe’s elderly aunt who was lowering her bulk into a chair.
‘I can’t complain, but of course I do. Thank you, dear,’ she added as Zoe retrieved her stick that had fallen to the floor. ‘Unless you want your man going home with someone else I’d get over there, Zoe.’
Blushing, Zoe followed the direction of the old lady’s sharp-eyed stare to where Isandro stood, looking like the personification of a predatory male. And the hunter was still being hunted, she saw, her mouth twisting as she watched the redhead lean into him and stroke his sleeve. ‘I’m his taxi, not his date. He’s my boss.’
‘In my day it was most girls’ dream to marry their boss. I did—not, of course, that George ever looked like that.’ She saw Zoe’s expression and gave a chuckle, adding, ‘I’m old, child, not blind.’
‘And I’m not thinking of getting married.’
If she ever did it would not be to a man like Isandro Montero, she thought, summoning a mental picture of a man who would treat her as an equal, a man who would love the twins as much as she did. Her brow furrowed as her employer’s face superimposed itself over her mental image, causing her eyes to drift across the room to where…he was no longer standing, and neither was the voluptuous vet.
Maybe she wouldn’t have to put up with his aggravating company on the return journey…?
‘Very wise. Of course, in my day it was different. You couldn’t have sex outside marriage…if you were a nice girl, that is. We didn’t have your freedom.’
‘Actually, I don’t believe in casual sex. Not for me anyway.’
Zoe was wondering why she felt the totally uncharacteristic need to discuss her feelings on the subject, when she realised that the old lady was not looking at her, but past her.
Her stomach quivered; she knew without turning who was standing there. Had he heard what she’d said?
His expression told her nothing.
‘I was wondering if you are ready to go home?’
‘I thought you’d already left.’
‘What gave you that idea?’
‘You make friends very easily.’ The moment the remark left her lips she regretted it. She glanced guiltily over her shoulder to where a distinctive throaty laugh placed the vet. The woman had by all accounts been dumped by her husband of fifteen years for a younger model. Who only knew what insecurities her flirtatious behaviour masked?
Zoe felt a stab of shame. The woman was vulnerable and needed sympathy, not catty remarks behind her back. She actually deserved admiration—she had come out fighting after being kicked in the teeth.
‘Actually, I don’t.’
The comment brought her attention back to the tall Spaniard. It was clear he had not been canvassing the sympathy vote, simply stating a fact.
‘I think you’ve made a few today.’ Not a single person she had spoken to had had a bad word to say about him, and several had told her how lucky she was to be working for him.
Frankly, all the rave reviews were beginning to grate. People were so superficial they didn’t look past the handsome face, perfect body and incredible smile. How many people but her had noticed him empty his glass of wine into the pot plant? Possibly the ones who hadn’t taken their eyes off him all night? No, they acted as if he’d done them a favour by deigning to show up.
Zoe had been forced to bite her tongue on several occasions. She’d hoped he’d behave well and not upset anyone but she hadn’t bargained on him turning the entire community into his devoted fans, who wouldn’t believe that the man had sacked her within two minutes of setting eyes on her, that he was still looking for an excuse. Oh, yeah, he really was a great guy!
Friendship required trust. Isandro did not consider his inability to trust easily a character flaw; rather he valued his true friends all the more because he knew how rare they were.
His eyes brushed her face and he was struck again by the directness of her blue stare. ‘I have many acquaintances, but few friends.’
And you’re not even an acquaintance, Zoe. You’re an employee. The taxi driver, not the date. ‘I suppose it’s difficult to tell if someone loves you or your bank balance.’
‘I do not require love.’ His brows lifted. ‘Or are you talking about sex?’
‘Sex?’
By some horrid twist of fate her yelped echo coincided with a lull in the conversation.
Oh, let me die now, Zoe thought as everyone turned to look at her.
‘Strange how that always happens.’
‘Not to me, it doesn’t.’ She struggled to see him as gaffe prone. ‘If you’ll excuse me, I see…’ She made a vague gesture and headed across the room, accepting a few good-natured teasing comments as she went.
‘What I need,’ she muttered, ‘is to cool down.’
‘God, yes, it’s warm in here, isn’t it? Try one of these.’ Once again her comment had reached more than its target audience—herself.
She looked at the tall glass that clinked with ice in her hand, and opened her mouth to ask the person with the tray what it was, but he was gone.
Walking out through the open French windows, she sniffed it warily before picking out a floating strawberry to taste. The overwhelming flavour over and above the fruit was pineapple. It seemed innocuous enough, and a tentative sip reinforced this analysis. Satisfied it was one of the delicious mocktails that Chloe had made, she took a swallow.
She passed a group of men chatting, then wandered out onto the steep sloped lawn shaded by a row of tall oak trees in the field beyond. She sat down on the stump of a recently felled tree and swallowed some more of the fruit concoction. It was actually so delicious it made you wonder why people bothered with alcohol.
Tipping her head back to look at the starry sky, she thought that a person really should stop occasionally and just enjoy being alive. Lie on the grass and feel the earth…and why not?
Lying flat on her back, staring up at the stars, she began to hum a little tune softly to herself before she closed her eyes. Did she drift off?
‘I can’t, I really can’t take this…’ She half lifted her head at the sound of John’s voice. Why was he ignoring her? She let out a small giggle and thought, Because he can’t see me! I’m lying down.
‘Yes, you can. Just think how much better it will be for Chloe and Hannah if they have you there to support them.’
This deeper voice with the sexy accent—she recognised that, too!
John and Isandro.
‘I don’t know what to say.’ There was the sound of crinkling paper and a gasp. ‘Hell, that’s too much…no…I couldn’t.’
‘All tax-deductible. The only thing is that I’d prefer this was private between you and Chloe and me. I’m not comfortable with…’
‘Understood. We won’t forget this.’
Zoe lay there turning the conversation over in her head. It took her foggy brain a little while to process what she had overheard, but when she did tears of emotion sprang to her eyes. Isandro had just given John the money he needed to join his family in Boston—and more than enough, by the sound of it.
‘That is so, so incredibly lovely!’
