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‘Now, let’s see. Forgotten which room is yours…Oh, it’s coming back to me—the only one left with the en suite! Fortuitous, because you might be needing that…’
‘Oh be quiet,’ Aggie moaned. ‘And hurry up! I think I’m going to be sick.’
CHAPTER FOUR (#ulink_9f7ce589-7314-5823-8419-e931467a0ab8)
SHE made it to the bathroom in the nick of time and was horribly, shamefully, humiliatingly, wretchedly sick. She hadn’t bothered to shut the door and she was too weak to protest when she heard Luiz enter the bathroom behind her.
‘Sorry,’ she whispered, hearing the flush of the toilet and finding a toothbrush pressed into her hand. While she was busy being sick, he had obviously rummaged through her case and located just the thing she needed.
She shakily cleaned her teeth but lacked the energy to tell him to leave.
Nor could she look at him. She flopped down onto the bed and closed her eyes as he drew the curtains shut, turned off the overhead light and began easing her boots off.
Luiz had never done anything like this before. In fact, he had never been in the presence of a woman quite so violently sick after a bout of excessive drinking and, if someone had told him that one day he would be taking care of such a woman, he would have laughed out loud. Women who were out of control disgusted him. An out-of-control Chloe, shouting hysterically down the phone, sobbing and shrieking and cursing him, had left him cold. He looked at Aggie, who now had her arm covering her face, and wondered why he wasn’t disgusted.
He had wet a face cloth; he mopped her forehead and heard her sigh.
‘So I guess I should be thanking you,’ she said, without moving the hand that lay across her face.
‘You could try that,’ Luiz agreed.
‘How did you know where to find me?’
‘I watched you from the dining room. I wasn’t going to let you stay out there for longer than five minutes.’
‘Because, of course, you know best.’
‘Staggering in the dark in driving snow when you’ve had too much to drink isn’t a good idea in anyone’s eyes,’ Luiz said drily.
‘And I don’t suppose you’ll believe me when I tell you that this is the first time I’ve ever…ever…done this?’
‘I believe you.’
Aggie lowered her protective arm and looked at him. Her eyes felt sore, along with everything else, and she was relieved that the room was only lit by the small lamp on the bedside table.
‘You do?’
‘It’s my fault. I should have said no to that second bottle of wine. In fact, I was barely aware of it being brought.’ He shrugged. ‘These things happen.’
‘But I don’t suppose they ever happen to you,’ Aggie said with a weak smile. ‘I bet you don’t drink too much and stagger all over the place and then end up having to be helped up to bed like a baby.’
Luiz laughed. ‘No, can’t say I remember the last time that happened.’
‘And I bet you’ve never been in the company of a woman who’s done that.’
No one would dare behave like that in my presence, was what he could have said, except he was disturbed to find that that would have made him sound like a monster.
‘No,’ he said flatly. ‘And now I’m going to go and get you some painkillers. You’re going to need them.’
Aggie yawned and looked at him drowsily. She had a sudden, sharp memory of how it had felt being carried by him. He had lifted her up as though she weighed nothing and his chest against her slight frame had been as hard as steel. He had smelled clean, masculine and woody.
‘Yes. Thank you,’ she said faintly. ‘And once again, I’m so sorry.’
‘Stop apologising.’ Luiz’s tone was abrupt. Was he really so controlling that women edited their personalities just to be with him; sipped their wine but left most of it and said no to dessert because they were afraid that he might pass judgement on them as being greedy or uncontrolled? He had broken off with Chloe and had offered her no explanation other than that she would be ‘better off without him’. Strictly speaking, true. But he knew that, in the face of her hysterics, he had been impatient, short-tempered and dismissive. He had always taken it as a given that women would go out of their way to please them, just as he had always taken it as a given that he led a life of moving on; that, however hard they tried, one day it would just be time for him to end it.
Aggie bristled at his obvious displeasure at her repeated apology. God, what must he think of her? The starting point of his opinions had been low enough, but they would be a hundred times lower now—except when the starting point was gold-digger, then how much lower could they get?
She was suddenly too tired to give it any more thought. She half-sat up when he approached with a glass of water. She obediently swallowed two tablets and was reassured that she would be right as rain in the morning. More or less.
‘Thanks,’ Aggie said glumly. ‘And please wake me up first thing.’
‘Of course.’ Luiz frowned, impatient at the sudden burst of unwelcome introspection which had left him questioning himself.
Aggie fell asleep with that frown imprinted on her brain. It was confusing that someone she didn’t care about should have any effect on her whatsoever, but he did.
She vaguely thought that things would be back to normal in the morning. She would dislike him. He would stop being three-dimensional and she would cease to be curious about him.
When she groggily came to, her head was thumping, her mouth tasted of cotton wool and Luiz was slumped in a chair he had pulled and positioned next to her bed. He was fully clothed.
For a few seconds, Aggie didn’t take it in, then she struggled up and nudged him.
‘What are you doing here?’
Belatedly she realised that, although the duvet was tucked around her, she was trouserless and jumperless; searing embarrassment flooded through her.
‘I couldn’t leave you in the state you were in.’ Luiz pressed his eyes with his fingers and then raked both hands through his tousled hair before looking at her.
‘I wasn’t in a state. I…yes…I was…sick but then I fell asleep.’
‘You were sick again,’ Luiz informed her. ‘And that’s not taking into account raging thirst and demands for more tablets.’
‘Oh God.’
‘Sadly, God wasn’t available, so it was up to me to find my way down to the kitchen for orange juice because you claimed that any more water would make you feel even more sick. I also had to deal with a half-asleep temper tantrum when I refused to double the dose of painkillers…’
Aggie looked at him in horror.
‘Then you said that you were hot.’
‘I didn’t.’
‘You threw off the quilt and started undressing.’
Aggie groaned and covered her face with her hands.
‘But, gentleman that I am, I made sure you didn’t completely strip naked. I undressed you down to the basics and you fell back asleep.’
Luiz watched her small fingers curl around the quilt cover. He imagined she would be going through mental hell but she was too proud to let it show. Had he ever met anyone like her in his life before? He’d almost forgotten the reason she was with him. She seemed to have a talent for running circles round his formidable single-mindedness and it wasn’t just now that they had been thrown together. No, it had happened before. Some passing remark he might have made to which she had taken instant offence, dug her heels in and proceeded to argue with him until he’d forgotten the presence of other people.
‘Well…thank you for that. I…I’d like to get changed now.’ She addressed the wall and the dressing table in front of her, and heard him slap his thighs with his hands and stand up. ‘Did you manage to get any sleep at all?’
‘None to speak of,’ Luiz admitted.
‘You must be exhausted.’
‘I don’t need much sleep.’
‘Well, perhaps you should go and grab a few hours before we start on the last leg of this journey.’ It would be nice if the ground could do her a favour and open up and swallow her whole.
‘No point.’
Aggie looked at him in consternation. ‘What do you mean that there’s no point? It would be downright foolhardy for you to drive without sleep, and I can’t share any of the driving with you.’
‘We’ve covered that. There’s no point because it’s gone two-thirty in the afternoon, it’s already dark and the snow’s heavier.’ Luiz strode towards the window and pulled back the curtains to reveal never-ending skies the colour of lead, barely visible behind dense, relentlessly falling snow. ‘It would be madness to try and get anywhere further in weather like this. I’ve already booked the rooms for at least another night. Might be more.’
‘You can’t!’ Aggie sat up, dismayed. ‘I thought I’d be back at work on Monday! I can’t just disappear. This is the busiest time of the school year!’
‘Too bad,’ Luiz told her flatly. ‘You’re stuck. There’s no way I intend to turn around and try and get back to London. And, while you’re busy worrying about missing a few classes and the Nativity play, spare a thought for me. I didn’t think that I’d be covering half the country in driving snow in an attempt to rescue my niece before she does something stupid.’
‘Meaning that your job’s more important than mine?’ Aggie was more comfortable with this: an argument. Much more comfortable than she was with feverishly thinking about him undressing her, taking care of her, putting her to bed and playing the good guy. ‘Typical! Why is it that rich people always think that what they do is more important than what everyone else does?’ She glared at him as he stood by the door, impassively watching her.
For one blinding moment, it occurred to her that she was in danger of seeing beyond the obvious differences between them to the man underneath. If she could list all the things she disliked about him on paper, it would be easy to keep her distance and to fill the spaces between them with hostility and resentment. But to do that would be to fall into the trap of being as black-and-white in her opinions as she had accused him of being.
She paled and her heartbeat picked up in nervous confusion. Had he been working his charm on her from the very beginning? When he had drawn grudging laughs from her and held her reluctantly spellbound with stories of his experiences in foreign countries; when he had engaged her interest in politics and world affairs, while Maria and Mark had been loved up and whispering to each other, distracted by some shared joke they couldn’t possibly resist. Had she already begun to see beyond the cardboard cut-out she wanted him to be?
And, stuck together in a car with him, here in this bed and breakfast. Would an arrogant, pompous, single-minded creep really have helped her the way he had the night before, not laughing once at her inappropriate behaviour? Keeping watch over her even though it meant that he hadn’t got a wink of sleep? She had to drag out the recollection that he had offered her money in return for his niece; that he was going to offer her brother money to clear off; that liking or not liking someone was not something that mattered to him because he was like a juggernaut when it came to getting exactly what he wanted. He had loads of charm when it suited him, but underneath the charm he was ruthless, heartless and emotionless.
She felt a lot calmer once that message had got to her wayward, rebellious brain and imprinted itself there.
‘Well?’ she persisted scornfully, and Luiz raised his eyebrows wryly.
‘I take it you’re angling for a fight. Is this because you feel embarrassed about what happened last night? If it is, then there’s really no need. Like I said…these things happen.’
‘And, like you also said, you’ve never had this experience in your life before!’ Aggie thought that it would help things considerably if he didn’t look so damn gorgeous standing there, even though he hadn’t slept and should look a wreck. ‘You’ve never fallen down drunk, and I’ll bet that none of your girlfriends have either.’
‘You’re right. I haven’t and they haven’t.’
‘Is that because none of your girlfriends have ever had too much to drink?’
‘Maybe they have.’ Luiz shrugged. ‘But never in my presence. And, by the way, I don’t think that my job is any better or worse than yours. I have a very big deal on the cards which is due to close at the beginning of next week. A takeover. People’s jobs are relying on the closure of this deal, hence the reason why it’s as inconvenient for me to be delayed with this as it is for you.’
‘Oh,’ Aggie said, flustered.
‘So, if you need to get in touch with your school and ask them for a day or so off, then I’m sure it won’t be the end of the world. Now, I’m going to have a shower and head downstairs. Mrs Bixby might be able to rustle you up something to eat.’
He closed the door quietly behind him. At the mention of food, Aggie’s stomach had started to rumble, but she made sure not to rush her bath, to take her time washing her hair and using the drier which she found in a drawer in the bedroom. She needed to get her thoughts together. There was no doubt that the fast-falling snow would keep them in this town for another night. It wasn’t going to be a case of a few hours on the road and then, whatever the outcome, goodbye to Luiz Montes for ever.
She was going to have his company for longer than she had envisaged and she needed to take care not to fall into the trap of being seduced by his charm. It amazed her that common sense and logic didn’t seem to be enough to keep her mind on the straight and narrow.
Rooting through her depleted collection of clothes, she pulled out yet more jeans and a jumper under which she stuck on various layers, a vest, a long-sleeved thermal top, another vest over that…
Looking at her reflection in the mirror, she wondered whether it was possible to look frumpier. Her newly washed hair was uncontrollable, curling in an unruly tumble over her shoulders and down her back. She was bare of make-up because there seemed no point in applying any, and anyway she had only brought her mascara and some lip gloss with her. Her clothes were a dowdy mixture of blues and greys. Her only shoes were the boots she had been wearing because she hadn’t foreseen anything more extended than one night somewhere and a meal grabbed on the hop, but now she wished that she had packed a little bit more than a skeleton, functional wardrobe.
Luiz was on the phone when she joined him in the sitting room but he snapped shut the mobile and looked at her as she walked towards him.
With all those thick, drab clothes, anyone could be forgiven for thinking that she was shapeless. She wasn’t. He had known that from the times he had seen her out, usually wearing dresses in which she looked ill at ease and uncomfortable. But even those dresses had been designed to cover up. Only last night had he realised just how shapely she was, despite the slightness of her frame.
Startled, he felt the stirrings of an arousal at the memory and he abruptly turned away to beckon Mrs Bixby across for a pot of tea.
‘Not for me.’ Aggie declined the cup put in front of her. ‘I’ve decided that I’m going to go into town, get some fresh air.’
‘Fresh air. You seem to be cursed with a desire for fresh air. Isn’t that what got you outside last night?’
But she couldn’t get annoyed with him because his voice was lazy and teasing. ‘This time I’m not falling over myself. Like I told you, I enjoy snow. I wish it snowed more often in London.’
‘The city would grind to a standstill. If you’re heading out, then I think I’ll accompany you.’
Aggie tried to stifle the flutter of panic his suggestion generated. She needed to clear her mind. However much she lectured herself on all the reasons she had for hating him, there was a pernicious thread of stubbornness that just wanted to go its own merry way, reminding her of his sexiness, his intelligence, that unexpected display of consideration the night before. How was she to deal with that stubbornness if he didn’t give her a little bit of peace and privacy?
‘I actually intended on going on my own,’ she said in a polite let-down. ‘For a start, it would give you time to work. You always work. I remember you saying that to us once when your mobile phone rang for the third time over dinner and you took the call. Besides, if you have an important deal to close, then maybe you could get a head start on it.’
‘It’s Saturday. Besides, it would do me good to stretch my legs. Believe it or not, chairs don’t make the most comfortable places to sleep.’
‘You’re not going to let me forget that in a hurry, are you?’
‘Would you if you were in my shoes?’
Aggie had the grace to blush.
‘No,’ Luiz murmured. ‘Thought not. Well, at least you’re honest enough not to deny it.’ He stood up, towering over her while Aggie stuffed her hands in the pockets of her coat and frantically tried to think of ways of dodging him.
And yet, disturbingly, wasn’t she just a little pleased that he would be with her? For good or bad, and she couldn’t decide which, her senses were heightened whenever he was around. Her heart beat faster, her skin tingled more, her pulse raced faster and every nerve ending in her seemed to vibrate.
Was that nature’s way of keeping her on her toes in the face of the enemy?
‘You’ll need to have something to eat,’ was the first thing he said when they were outside, where the brutal cold was like a stinging slap on the face. The snow falling and collecting on the already thick banks on the pavements turned the winter-wonderland scene into a nightmare of having to walk at a snail’s pace.
Her coat was not made for this depth of cold and she could feel herself shivering, while in his padded Barbour, fashioned for arctic conditions, he was doubtless as snug as a bug in a rug.
‘Stop telling me what to do.’
‘And stop being so damned mulish.’ Luiz looked down at her. She had rammed her woolly hat low down over her ears and she was cold. He could tell from the way she had hunched up and the way her hands were balled into fists in the pockets of the coat. ‘You’re cold.’
‘It’s a cold day. I like it. It felt stuffy inside.’
‘I mean, your coat is inadequate. You need something warmer.’
‘You’re doing it again.’ Aggie looked up at him and her breath caught in her throat as their eyes tangled and he didn’t look away. ‘Behaving,’ she said a little breathlessly, ‘as though you have all the answers to everything.’ She was dismayed to find that, although she was saying the right thing, it was as if she was simply going through the motions while her body was responding in a different manner. ‘I’ve been meaning to buy another coat, but there’s hardly ever any need for it in London.’
