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‘I wasn’t sure what to wear and, when in doubt, I tend to bring almost everything.’
He lifted a brow. ‘Only almost? You mean you’ve left the odd pair of wellingtons at home?’
‘Plus some luminous lime-green flip-flops decorated with rubber bananas.’
‘Big mistake.’
‘Could be, but it’s too late now.’ She reached into the Morris to retrieve her holdall. ‘That’s the lot,’ she said, turning to toss him a brilliant smile.
Matthew’s fingers tightened around the handle of his suitcase. Her smile had sent a thought hurtling through his mind: You, I would like to take to bed. Perhaps it was because he had first heard her talking about sex, or because she looked so appealing, or both—but he felt a sudden desire. An outrageous desire which made him want to drop down his load, haul her into his arms and fiercely kiss that full, tempting mouth.
And if he made love to her he could guarantee that she would not be bored. Though maybe he was deceiving himself, he thought, a moment later. Maybe she possessed a low sex drive which rendered the poor girl unmoved—and unmovable.
‘Did you put anything in the boot?’ he enquired, his tone businesslike.
The urgent tweaking of his libido had surprised him. Whilst he had his fair share of testosterone and raging hormones, he was usually in control. He preferred to be in control. He was no longer a callow youth, excited by any passing pretty girl. He was a mature male, dammit.
‘No. Or did I?’
Suddenly unsure, Kristin swung round towards the rear of the Morris, but. then swung back. ‘No,’ she decided.
As she swivelled the second time, the heel of her cream suede ankle boot skidded sideways on the wet Tarmac. She gasped, tottered and, as if in slow motion, felt herself start to fall. The holdall see-sawed, plastic bags flailed in the air, and a bundle of black silk slithered out.
‘Aaarrgh!’ she cried.
Ditching his cargo, Matthew reached forward. He made a grab for her arm and caught hold, but, with knees bent, she was swaying back. She continued to tilt and as she fell, shedding bags and unstoppably capsizing, she tugged him off balance. He swore, half straightened and, somehow, managed to stand firm. Holding her upper arm, he gently lowered her the last short inevitable distance down to the ground.
‘OK?’ he asked as he let go and stood upright.
‘No, I’m not. You big oaf!’
‘I tried to save you,’ he protested. Big oaf? He had expected her gratitude, not scathing condemnation. ‘If I hadn’t let you sit down, I’d have fallen down, too.’ He frowned. ‘And landed on top of you.’
‘But you’ve sat me in a puddle!’
‘A puddle?’ He peered down and caught the glimmer of liquid. ‘It’s a very small puddle.’
Kristin felt the water soaking into the seat of her trousers. ‘It’s large enough to give me a sopping wet backside!’
‘Oh, dear,’ he said. ‘The Goof Fairy strikes again.’
Her head jerked up. As well as the jokey comment, she had heard the rumble of amusement in his voice and now she saw that the corners of his mouth were twitching.
‘I’m glad you find it so hilarious,’ she said glacially.
Matthew readjusted his expression to one of sombre remorse. ‘No, no,’ he murmured.
‘Garbage!’
‘OK, maybe I do—a little.’
‘A lot.’
‘A lot,’ he conceded. ‘But you must agree—’
‘I don’t,’ she snapped.
‘I’m sorry,’ he said, though he knew the words were useless. He held down a long-fingered hand. ‘Grab hold.’
Tempted to haughtily refuse his offer, Kristin hesitated, but then she linked her fingers with his. In one fluid movement, he drew her upright.
‘Thanks,’ she said, stony-faced.
Sliding a hand into the hip pocket of his jeans, he pulled out a clean white handkerchief. ‘Will you blot your rear end or—’ the amusement was playing around his mouth again ‘—would you like me to do it?’
She froze him with a look. ‘I can manage.’
As she got busy, Matthew gathered up the bundle of black silk from the ground and returned it to a bag. The bundle consisted of a lace-trimmed bra, suspender belt and pair of skimpy briefs. It was the kind of underwear of which fantasies were made. He could imagine the girl stretched out on white satin sheets with her long blonde hair spread loose across the pillow and the straps of the bra drooping—
Whoa, he told himself. After a year of celibacy, his hormones seemed to be kicking in with a vengeance.
‘I bought this suit and my boots yesterday, specially for coming here,’ Kristin said, mopping determinedly at her backside. ‘The thrown-together look is usually my style, but I opted for a more professional image. Though now—’ She lifted up her jacket and turned her back to him. ‘How does it look?’
‘Pert, well-rounded and infinitely pattable. You mean your trousers,’ he went on, not missing a beat. ‘They look fine and the water doesn’t seem as if it’s going to stain.’
She peered down. ‘No, thank goodness.’ She showed him his sodden handkerchief. ‘What shall I do with this?’
‘I’ll have it,’ he said, and pushed the handkerchief gingerly into his jacket pocket.
Taking a wad of tissues from her shoulder bag, Kristin continued to blot up the wet. She frowned. She had thought her companion looked familiar and, all of a sudden, she felt certain they had met before. Where? When?
She searched her mind. She sensed the meeting had happened a long time back, but why had they met? What was the connection? A moment later the answer came...like a punch which hit between the eyes. It had been in a London restaurant, around ten years ago. She had been young, impetuous and in a state of high agitation—and he had been her victim. She swallowed. A furious victim.
At that time he had worked for an up-market Sunday newspaper as a whizkid deputy editor in charge of the colour supplement, so what position would he hold at The Ambassador? Her stomach plunged. His calm air of confidence allied with the reference to wanting a word with Sir George told her that he might be...easily could be... probably was—me newly appointed editor.
‘Are—are you Matthew Lingard?’ she faltered.
‘That’s right’
‘The new head honcho of The Ambassador?’ she asked, needing to be doubly sure.
‘Right again.’
Kristin balled the tissues in her fist. When she had so publicly attacked him all those years ago she had not known his name, but she knew it now. She also knew that he was her prospective boss! Life was full of surprises, she thought—good and bad.
She sneaked him a look from beneath her lashes. Him putting her down, ever so carefully, slap bang into a puddle had seemed like an accident, but might he have recognised her and decided to get his own back? Matthew Lingard had shown himself to be a tricky individual in the past, so the idea was not too far-fetched. And if he bore a grudge she needed to know. It was important she be aware of where she stood with him right from the start.
Yet had he recognised her? He had shown no sign and the girl who had rushed to the attack had looked very different from the young woman who faced him today.
‘Did you do it on purpose?’ Kristin asked warily.
‘Do what?’
‘Sit me in the water.’
He looked at her as if she had gone crazy. ‘You’re accusing me of putting you in the puddle deliberately? Lord, no! What kind of a guy do you think I am?’
‘Well, I—’
‘A pretty mean one, obviously. I hadn’t a clue the puddle was there. It was behind you and I never saw it,’ he said, his voice harsh with indignation and his blue eyes glittering. ‘OK, I smiled, but my sense of humour is not so warped that I go around looking for ways of—’
‘Calm down,’ she appealed. ‘I didn’t mean to offend you. It was just—’ She moved her shoulders. ‘I made a mistake.’
‘You did,’ he rasped. ‘Believe me—’ He stopped. ‘What’s your name?’
‘Kristin Blake,’ she told him, and waited.
Did he know her name from the past? Her full name? Now that he had seen her again, would it ring bells? Her stomach muscles clenched. Might he declare that there was no way he would ever agree to employ such a wayward creature?
‘Believe me, Kristin, I’m sorry you got a wet backside and I apologise again for finding it funny, but—’
‘It was funny. Sort of,’ she acknowledged wryly.
His anger evaporated and he grinned. ‘Yep.’ He picked up his suitcase and his share of the plastic bags. ‘When you’re ready—’
She retrieved her load and went with him.
As they walked between a pair of stone lions and onto a path which led towards the castle drawbridge, she cast her escort a sideways look. He bad not recognised her from the past and perhaps he never would. Their meeting might have been dramatic, but it had been brief. A mere five minutes.
Also, as the intervening years had altered him—his face was leaner and he had crinkle lines at the corners of his eyes—they had changed her. She had abandoned the closecropped elfin style and wore her hair long now. The addition of ten pounds in weight had transformed her figure from stick-insect thin to shapely, plus she had gathered up a modicum of style, of poise.
Kristin grimaced. Though she would feel a dam sight more poised if plastic bags were not banging around her knees and her bottom was properly dry.
But if Matthew Lingard’s memory should be jolted—well, the episode had happened in the dim and distant past and he would have dismissed it as—OK, embarrassing—but inconsequential. He obviously possessed a healthy sense of humour so, in retrospect, he would consider it funny. Wouldn’t he? Yes. After all, it was her life which had been disrupted, not his. He would have also accepted that her action had been understandable and no more than he deserved.
She moistened her lips. Once she had been furiously angry with him, but now, whilst there were a few sparks of remembered resentment, she was prepared to let bygones be bygones. Time had healed and grievances had been mended. Besides, what had seemed like a disaster had, in fact, inspired a change of direction for which she was eternally grateful. She had forgiven him—and he would have forgiven her.
‘Are you friendly with Emily?’ Matthew enquired.
Sir George had told him he planned to ask some business associates to join the newspaper guests and said that Emily, his teenage daughter, would also be present. Kristin Blake’s talk of a flatmate and—his eyes dipped to her left hand—lack of wedding ring indicated she was not a business wife, so he assumed she must have been invited to keep the girl company.
‘Sorry? Oh, yes,’ she said absently, and returned to her thoughts.
As Matthew Lingard had not recognised her name from the past, neither had he recognised her as a possible future member of his staff. At her interview, Sir George had explained the editor was away and yet she had thought that, in the meantime, he would have told him all about her in glowing terms.
Perhaps the proprietor had not wished to disturb his editor’s holiday. Or perhaps Matthew had been told, but in the hustle-bustle of organising the new-style Ambassador he had forgotten. She looked at her escort again. Whilst he must be under all kinds of pressure, his lapse was not exactly flattering. Nor encouraging.
Kristin was wondering whether she should refer to her interview when a man in late middle age appeared from beneath the portcullis, followed by a youth who was pushing a luggage trolley. The man wore a black jacket, pinstriped trousers and starched white shirt. His thinning hair was brilliantined back, his carriage was stiff and his smile gracious. As he started towards them along the drawbridge, she felt a bubble of delight.
‘Oh, gee,’ she whispered. ‘A butler.’
‘You haven’t come across a real live butler before?’ Matthew enquired.
‘Never.’
‘It’s a first for me, too,’ he said, sotto voce, and their eyes met in shared amusement.
‘But essential if you live in a castle,’ she said, out of the corner of her mouth.
‘As oxygen,’ he declared.
‘Miss, sir, may we take your bags?’ the man said, in a plummy voice. ‘Sir George is dealing with a business crisis and looks like being tied up for at least the next hour, but please allow me—Rimmer, the butler—to welcome you.’
Although it was generated mostly by nerves, Kristin needed to swallow down a rising giggle. As real Frenchmen often spoke and gesticulated like comic Frenchmen, and as Italian waiters invariably flirted, so he was the perfect English butler stereotype and beyond invention.
She slid her companion another glance and saw from the gleam in his eyes that he was thinking what she was thinking.
‘Thank you,’ she said, and was relieved when the youth stashed her plastic bags onto the trolley with as much solemn care and aplomb as if they had been a set of matching antique leather suitcases.
‘Our pleasure, Miss Blake. I know you must be Miss Blake because Sir George described you in the most flattering terms,’ the butler said, and smiled. He spoke to her companion. ‘Good evening, Mr Lingard.’
‘Good evening, Rimmer,’ Matthew replied, and arched a brow. ‘Sir George described me in flattering terms, too?’
The older man chuckled. ‘What he said, sir, was that you were a tall, dark-haired gentleman who was bound to be wearing jeans.’
‘Is there something wrong with jeans?’ he enquired.
‘Sir George considers them to be a little...casual, sir. Though that’s only his view.’ The butler turned to Kristin. ‘What is your opinion, miss?’
‘I think they’re entirely acceptable so long as they’re well-cut and—’ she gave a wicked smile ‘—you have a pert and infinitely pattable backside, like Mr Lingard.’
Matthew burst out laughing. The retaliation was welltimed and he liked her sense of fun.
‘The biter bit,’ he said.
‘Drinks will be served in the drawing room from seventhirty, with dinner at eight-fifteen,’ Rimmer informed them. ‘Now if you would kindly follow me.’
Kristin turned, studying herself in the full length mirror. One of the perks of working for a women’s magazine was that you came into contact with fashion designers who, on occasion, were willing to let you borrow a creation. So she was wearing a chocolate-brown satin evening dress with a scoop neck, narrow shoulder straps and lace panel down the back. Brown was, she had been gravely informed, the new black and a touch of lace was de rigueur this season.
She frowned at the curves of her breasts. Although the lace panel excluded the wearing of a bra, the bodice was as painstakingly engineered as a motorway bridge. Yet the neckline did dip alarmingly low—lower than anything she had ever worn before. Should she play safe and change into the white beaded tunic and palazzo pants which she had brought? Rimmer had advised that their host expected the ladies to dress for dinner.
Her reflection kicked out a high-heel-sandalled foot
‘Strut your funky stuff, baby,’ it said, by way of a pep talk.
This evening she wanted to be visible and make an impact, and in this dress—boy, oh, boy—she would.
On being shown to her room, she had first unpacked. She had marvelled at the carved four-poster bed with its silver-pink drapes and matching coverlet, gazed out at the formal gardens and the rolling Kent countryside which unfurled beyond, then gone through to the luxurious en-suite bathroom.
