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She consoled herself that at least her conscience was clear. She’d done her job. She’d given him the file. No one could accuse her of behaving unprofessionally. Now she could relax and enjoy the holidays with Jamie without suffering a nagging worry that she should have done more. Lucas had made it clear that his personal life was his own business and that was just fine with her.
Her footsteps echoed in the magnificent hallway as she stormed towards the door. There was still no sign of anyone else and she wondered why a party would have finished so early.
I told you to get out!
His words played over and over again in her head. Who had he told to get out?
Telling herself that his manners were none of her business, she pulled open the door. The cold slammed into her and she gasped and huddled into her damp coat. Even in the comparatively short time she’d been inside, the weather had turned seriously ugly. The snow was falling twice as heavily. Already her footprints were covered and her car was an amorphous white blob.
Her head still aching from her last unscheduled contact with the ground, Emma picked her way gingerly to her car and knocked the worst of the snow off the windscreen with her glove. If that much snow had fallen since she’d been in the house then the bridge she’d crossed to get here would pretty soon be impassable. Her little car wouldn’t be able to cope with the combination of the snow and the gradient.
With that thought in her head, she was about to slide into the driver’s seat and start the engine when something about the smooth, untouched mound of snow on the roof made her think of the cake. And thinking of the cake made her realise what it was that had been bothering her. The cake was untouched. Whole. It hadn’t been cut. Not a single slice had been taken from it.
Emma stood for a moment, one leg in the car, the other on the snowy ground, wondering about that. The celebration, whatever it was, had obviously stopped before they’d reached the part with the cake.
I told you to get out.
She tightened her lips and slid into the car. It wasn’t any of her business. Wrapping her freezing fingers around the key, she started the engine. Maybe he didn’t like cake. Maybe he didn’t have a sweet tooth. Maybe—
‘Drat and bother.’ Switching off the engine, she thumped her head back against the seat. He’d told her to get out. If she had any sense she’d do just that.
Slowly she turned her head and looked back at the house.
He’d said he wanted to be alone so that was exactly what she should do. Leave him alone.
She tightened her hands on the wheel.
Whatever was wrong with Lucas Jackson wasn’t any of her business.
Lucas stared blindly into the dying flames of the fire. He was drunk, but nowhere near as drunk as he wanted to be. The pain was as acute as ever. It was like lying down on the business end of a saw, feeling the teeth digging into every single part of him. Nothing he did could ease it.
Standing up, he walked to the basket of logs by the fire and pulled one out.
‘You shouldn’t be doing that. You’ll burn the whole place down if you’re not careful.’ A female voice came from the doorway and he turned, wondering if he were hallucinating.
Emma stood there. Her cheeks were pink from the cold, snowflakes sparkled and clung to her dark hair and her eyes were frosty. He wasn’t sure if he was seeing anger or defiance but he knew he was looking at trouble and he straightened slowly.
‘I thought I told you—’
‘—to get out. Yes, you did, which was very rude of you actually.’ Her tone was brisk. ‘For future reference, you deserve to be left on your own if that is the way you speak to people.’ She lifted her hand and unwound her scarf from around her neck, sending snow fluttering onto the thick rug that covered the floor of the turret bedroom.
‘That’s what I want,’ Lucas said slowly. ‘I want to be left on my own.’ He enunciated every syllable, aware that his emotions were dangerously close to the surface. ‘I thought I’d made that clear.’
‘You did.’
‘So what are you doing here?’
‘Sticking my nose into your business.’ She tugged off a soaking-wet glove. ‘For selfish reasons. I’m about to go on holiday. I don’t want to spend that time worrying that you’ve fallen into the fire in a drunken stupor.’
‘Why would that bother you?’
‘If something happens to you I’d have to look for a new job and it’s rubbish out there right now.’
‘You don’t have to worry.’ Lucas tightened his hand on the log and felt the rough bark cut into his palm. ‘I’m not that drunk, although I’m working on it.’
‘Which is why I can’t leave. When you stop “working on it” I’ll be able to go.’ The other glove went the same way as the first, the soaked fabric clinging to her skin. ‘In the meantime, I don’t want your death on my conscience.’
‘I am not about to die.’ He heard the anger in his voice and wondered why she couldn’t hear it too. ‘You can leave with a clear conscience. If you have any sense you’ll do it. Right now.’
‘I’m not leaving until you’ve told me why there seems to have been a party downstairs but you’re on your own in the house.’
‘Despite all my best attempts, I am not alone. You’re here. And frankly I don’t understand why. I’ve been rude to you. If you have any self-respect you should probably punch me and resign on the spot.’
‘That only happens in the movies. In real life no one can afford to resign on the spot and only someone with your wealth would even suggest such a rash course of action.’ Shivering, she unbuttoned her soaking coat and stepped closer to the fire. ‘And self-respect means different things to different people. Dramatic overreaction isn’t really my style, but if I walked away from someone in trouble then I’d lose all self-respect.’
‘Emma—’
‘And although it’s true that you do lack empathy and certain human characteristics like a conscience, you are actually a reasonable person to work for most of the time so resigning would be a pretty stupid thing to do. Truth is, I love my job. And as for punching you—I’ve never punched anyone or anything in my life, although I did come close in the supermarket last week but that’s another story. And anyway, my hands are so cold from scraping snow from the car I don’t think I can even form a fist.’ She flexed her fingers experimentally while Lucas watched with mounting exasperation.
Apparently wealth and success couldn’t buy a man time alone when he wanted it.
‘You love your job? In that case I am giving you a direct order,’ he said in a thickened tone. ‘Leave now or I will fire you.’
‘You can’t fire me. Not only would that be unfair dismissal but, technically, I’m now on my own time. Weekend time. How I spend it is my decision and no one else’s.’
‘Weekend time that previously you’ve always refused to work. Why pick this particular moment to break your unbreakable rule?’ Anger exploded. ‘Surely there is somewhere you need to be? What about this exciting life you live at weekends?’ He remembered the one occasion, right at the beginning of her employment when she’d taken a personal call within his hearing. ‘Why aren’t you rushing home to Jamie?’
Her eyebrows rose in surprise. ‘You know about Jamie?’
‘Nothing to do with empathy or conscience.’ Lucas was quick to dispel that possible thought before it even formed. ‘I just have a good memory.’
‘I didn’t realise you knew about Jamie. And I will be going home, once I’ve assured myself you’re OK.’
‘I’m OK. You can see I’m OK.’
‘There’s no need to speak through your teeth and actually I don’t see someone who is OK. I see a man who is drunk. On his own. A man who doesn’t usually drink. Something seriously weird is going on.’ She tapped her foot on the floor, a thoughtful look on her face. ‘Why didn’t anyone cut the cake?’
‘Sorry?’
‘The party downstairs. No one had bothered to cut the cake. And you only left the office just before me, so you didn’t even have time for a party—’ She stared at him as she worked it out. ‘It was a surprise party, wasn’t it? And you told them to get out.’
‘Not all surprises are good ones. And now I’d like you to get out too.’ His acid tone had no effect. She was like a barnacle, he thought, refusing to be chipped from the rock.
‘I assume it was Tara and her hangers-on?’ Her expression told him everything he needed to know about her opinion of the egocentric model. ‘She should not have left you like this.’
‘I ordered her to leave.’
‘Then she shouldn’t have listened. What was the occasion?’
‘Her birthday.’ He watched as her lips parted in astonishment. Soft lips, he noticed. Unpainted. She was wearing the same plain grey skirt she’d worn to work that day with a white shirt and a maroon sweater under her extremely damp coat. She looked sober and sensible. But then Emma always dressed soberly. Her hair was always smooth and neat, secured away from her face with a large clip that never failed her. She was the consummate professional in every way.
‘She threw a surprise party for her own birthday?’
‘I’d already told her this wasn’t a good night for me. Tara isn’t good at hearing no.’
‘Why?’
Lucas gave a sardonic smile. ‘Because she’s a woman?’
‘No—’ her frown was impatient ‘—I mean, why isn’t this a good night for you? I want to know why you’re insistent on being on your own and why you’re drinking your way through the entire contents of your cellar. Is it work? Has something gone wrong with the Zubran contract that I don’t know about?’
‘Why would you think it has anything to do with work?’
‘Because work is the only thing that matters to you.’
Lucas stared at her for a long moment. Then he turned and threw the log he was holding onto the fire. The flames licked at it greedily, consuming it and delivering a sudden flare of heat.
He couldn’t blame her for thinking that, could he?
She had no idea.
And that was a good thing. The last thing he was looking for was sympathy or understanding.
‘You shouldn’t be here, Emma.’
‘But I am here. And I might be able to help.’ She stood, straight and tall. Honest. Straightforward. A woman with a heart, innocent of how dark the world could be.
He made a point of avoiding women like her. Innocence had no place in his life. He was not a good guardian of innocence. Even thinking about it made his palms begin to sweat. ‘You can’t help.’ Their relationship had always been strictly professional. For Lucas, business and pleasure didn’t mix. He’d thought she felt the same way.
‘Are you upset about Tara? Is that what’s wrong? This isn’t like you. In all the time I’ve worked for you I’ve never seen you remotely emotional about a woman. I’ve come to the conclusion that they’re no more than an accessory to you. A bit like your cufflinks. You wear different ones, depending on the occasion.’
It was such a perceptive comment that had he not been struggling with his black mood, he might have laughed. He certainly would have been impressed. As it was, he just wanted her gone and if she was going to ignore his request for her to leave then it was time to employ other methods.
‘Maybe it is like me. Maybe you don’t know what I’m like. Maybe you don’t know me at all.’ Lucas prowled over to her, watching as she registered the threat in his tone. And because he was watching, because he was experienced, he sensed she was struggling not to step back.
‘Don’t intimidate me. I’m trying to help, Lucas.’
‘And I don’t want help. Not yours. Not anyone’s.’ If nothing else would work, then this would. Telling himself that he was doing her a favour, he flattened her back against the exposed brick of the wall. Her shallow breathing was the only sound in the room apart from the occasional crackle from the blazing fire. Next to them a window looked down at moonlit snow but his attention was on the soft curve of her mouth. Her hair smelled of flowers and wood smoke.
His body stirred, his response to her primitive, powerful and entirely inappropriate.
Her eyes were fixed on him, wide and shocked.
And he couldn’t blame her for that. He was shocked too. Shocked by the concentrated rush of raw desire that ripped through him, shocked by the degree of control he had to exert over himself to prevent himself from doing what he was suddenly burning to do.
In a few brief seconds the nature of their relationship had shifted. Here, outside the glass walls of his office, the barrier had lowered.
Not boss and employee.
Man and woman.
He hadn’t expected that. He certainly didn’t want it. Not tonight and not with this woman.
It was the drink, he thought. Damn the drink, because he didn’t want that barrier lowered. Not just because that was a line he never crossed with someone who worked for him, but because he knew that what he had to give wasn’t what she would want.
Not trusting himself to be this close to her, he was about to step back when she pushed at his chest and escaped from his grasp. ‘I’ll leave you to sober up.’
She seemed as brisk and efficient as ever, but Lucas knew that she wasn’t. He heard the shake in her voice and saw the way her hands clutched at her wet coat as if she were trying to hold herself together.
He’d unsettled her.
Maybe he’d even scared her a little.
And that had been his intention, hadn’t it? He’d wanted her to walk away.
So why, in those few tense seconds as she stalked towards the door, did he find himself noticing things he hadn’t noticed before? Like the fact that her hair was the same rich glossy brown as the wood panelling in the tower bedroom and that she was one of the only women he knew who was still capable of blushing.
He found himself wondering about Jamie, the man she was rushing home to.
All he knew about the guy was that she’d been with him for the whole time she’d worked for him. Two years. And that confirmed everything he already knew about her.
Emma believed in love.
And with that thought he reached for another bottle of champagne.
For the second time that evening, Emma stomped down the stairs into the main hallway. The only difference was that this time she was shaking. Her knees shook, her fingers shook. Even her stomach shook.
From the first day she’d taken the job, she’d tried not to think of Lucas Jackson as a man. He was her boss. Her employer. Someone who paid her salary. Of course she couldn’t help but be aware of his appeal to women because she fielded his calls—and she fielded a lot—but somehow she’d managed to view his sex appeal in a detached way, a bit like admiring a valuable painting in a gallery that you knew you’d never be able to hang on your own wall.
And then suddenly, out of nowhere, had come this rush of sexual awareness that she absolutely didn’t want to feel. She was happy with her life. Happy doing her job and going home to Jamie. She didn’t want to jeopardize any of that. She couldn’t afford to jeopardize any of that. Especially not for a rude, totally selfish human being like Lucas Jackson.
Sexy eyes, a great body and a brilliant mind didn’t make up for serious deficiencies in his personality. He didn’t care about anyone. And that, she told herself firmly, was not an attractive trait.
And she was well aware that the incident back in the cosy turret bedroom had been about control, not chemistry.
He’d been trying to unsettle her. Trying to get her to back off. Well, that was fine. She’d backed off, hadn’t she?
But she wasn’t leaving. There was no way she could leave another human being in that state.
Trying to forget the way he’d looked at her as he’d pinned her to the wall, Emma reached the bottom of the stairs and stared at the decorations, so tacky and out of place in the elegant hallway. Something about the surprise party had upset him. Or maybe he’d been upset before he’d arrived home. Whichever, it was the first time she’d ever seen him drunk.
Deciding that the decorations were presumably as unwelcome as the party, she set about removing them. As she liberated a streamer that had been twisted around the ornate frame of a painting, a memory came at her from nowhere.
It wasn’t the first time she’d seen him drunk, was it? It was the second time. And the first time would have been—when? Trying to remember, she twisted the streamer between her fingers. There had been snow on the ground then too. It would have been around the same time of year as this.
Last year.
She’d worked late and assumed she was on her own in the building apart from Security, but when she’d walked into his office Lucas had been there, sprawled on the sofa with an empty bottle of whisky next to him.
