скачать книгу бесплатно
Wild About the Man
Joss Wood
Nick Sherwood has no time for poor little rich girls. All he wants is to run his luxury game reserve in peace.So socialite Clementine Campbell - a tempestuous redhead with flashes of vulnerability he knows shouldn’t intrigue him – is his guest from hell! For Clem, getting dumped on live TV was bad enough. Having to kick her stiletto heels on safari whilst her PR team run damage control?She doesn’t care how gorgeous the enigmatic Nick is – she wants out! Until he gets under her skin, and dangerously close to her battered heart. Then only one question remains - what will it take to get Nick to lose his cool and finally kiss her properly?!
About Joss Wood (#ulink_7163ea8d-0333-50f4-b2fe-2132e55450f6)
JOSS WOOD wrote her first book at the age of eight and has never really stopped. Her passion for putting letters on a blank screen is only matched by her love of books and travelling—especially to the wild places of Southern Africa—and possibly by her hatred of ironing and making school lunches.
Fuelled by coffee, when she’s not writing or being a hands-on mum, Joss—with her background in business and marketing—works for a non-profit organisation to promote local economic development and the collective business interests of the area where she resides.
Happily and chaotically, surrounded by books, family and friends, Joss lives in Kwa-Zulu Natal, South Africa, with her husband, children and their many pets.
Wild About the Man
Joss Wood
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
A couple of years ago, while sitting in a hanging basket on the edge of Lake Malawi, after a long, lazy, sunshiny conversation—the only type you can really have on holiday in Malawi!—I realised that writing filled my soul and it was time that I gave it the attention it deserved. So for that conversation, and many, many others around life and love, faith and hope, this book is dedicated to our very special friends Taffy and Jen at the Norman Carr Cottage, Namakoma Bay, Malawi.
Table of Contents
Cover (#u9d25f023-1aa9-5eb7-8d07-ea3ed833cb4c)
About Joss Wood (#u567364d1-2752-5fc6-9852-4e3c78ad059a)
Title Page (#uc6dd8d8f-2365-5734-b98d-c3c419ea69e2)
Dedication (#u70cbd641-92f6-5e68-a3df-e145033b05f6)
Chapter One (#u41681116-179f-5a00-b437-35c52c3b4b6d)
Chapter Two (#ub92a0134-d06d-5a87-9eb8-b3d032d244b9)
Chapter Three (#u4d6e5c35-4c8e-5552-a3a5-538d46fd8207)
Chapter Four (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Five (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Six (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Seven (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eight (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Nine (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Ten (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eleven (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twelve (#litres_trial_promo)
Epilogue (#litres_trial_promo)
Copyright (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER ONE (#ulink_11cd3f98-3aa1-5602-8616-b747f1e38964)
Luella Dawson’s blog:
So, friends, my interview with Cai Campbell and Clem Copeland on my show, Night Drive with Luella last night was so much more than I—we all—expected. There was the announcement of their split—no surprise there—but what followed had us all agape. For the past ten years Cai has ducked the question of marrying Clem, so none of us expected to meet Cai’s new fiancée (blonde, buxom). We were just recovering from that when he told us that he’d been shooting blanks all these years—poor Clem. Who can forget that episode of The Crazy Cs where Clem told us how her infertility was eating away at her soul?
IT WAS early evening before Nick Sherwood made it to his desk, dusty, grumpy and sweaty. His mouth held all the moisture of the Kalahari Desert and he felt he was melting from the inside out. After grabbing a bottle of water from the small fridge behind his desk, he stood underneath the air conditioner, cracked the top of the water bottle and swallowed the contents in three big gulps. Tossing the bottle into the dustbin at his feet, he immediately opened another, resting the icy plastic against his forehead when the worst of his thirst was quenched. He’d spent most of the day in the seventeenth level of hell and the raging heat outside had only been a minor contributing factor to his nightmare day.
Normally he enjoyed taking the walking photo-safaris and it was a good way to connect with his guests; they loved the personal touch of having the owner of the six-star lodge conduct the tours. Except that he’d spent the last six hours walking so slowly that ants had dashed past them, constantly wondering when he’d have to give one of his overweight, red-faced charges CPR.
Of course they’d seen no animals, mostly because they couldn’t keep their mouths shut for more than five minutes. Wildlife tended to run when confronted with loud curses, shouts and laughter.
Nick understood the animals’ flight reaction; he’d considered doing the same many, many times and at various points throughout the day.
He dropped into his chair and yanked open the messy top drawer of his desk, hoping to find a container of aspirin. Eventually he found the pills and dry-swallowed three, chasing them down with the water left in the bottle in his hand.
He needed a cold beer, a swim and hot sex.
What he’d get was maintenance reports, the payroll and e-mails.
Nick pulled his computer out of standby and reached for the file on the corner of his desk. He’d barely cracked open the cover when a Skype call came in. He looked at the computer and frowned when he saw the name of his silent partner and chief investor. Hugh Copeland rarely called him and had never, in the ten years he’d known him, Skyped him.
‘Good afternoon, sir.’
Copeland was at least sixty-five, formal, monstrously wealthy and Nick was still in debt to him for a couple of million. Setting up a six-star lodge wasn’t cheap and maintaining a game reserve and an animal rehabilitation sanctuary sucked up money like an industrial Hoover.
Calling his chief investor ‘sir’ seemed appropriate.
‘Nicholas. I trust you are well.’ Copeland was standing, dressed in a three piece suit. When he placed his arms on the back of his chair and glared into the camera Nick caught a hint of a flashing temper in his light grape-green eyes.
Trouble. Nick cursed. And it was heading straight for him.
‘Very, sir. What can I do for you?’ he asked as his heart raced. He’d submitted his financial report to his office, paid the instalment—and more—on his loan … What else could he have done to earn this man’s displeasure? Copeland had a twenty-five per cent stake in his company and he mostly left Nick alone.
‘I’ve been trying to contact you since this morning.’
Hell.
‘I was on a walking safari, I’ve just got in.’ Nick decided to bite the bullet and get it over with. ‘What’s the problem and how can I fix it?’
‘I am sending Clementine to you.’
Clementine? Who was Clementine? Nick shook his head. ‘Who?’
‘My daughter, Nicholas. She’s landed herself in a spot of bother and needs a place to escape to. Somewhere private and isolated and remote.’
Nick lifted dark eyebrows. ‘What type of trouble?’
If she’d murdered someone or needed rehab, he’d rather not take her, millions owing or not.
He’d rather not take her, period.
‘Press trouble. They want her blood. Her common law husband of a decade introduced her to his new fiancée on a nationally syndicated television chat show.’
Nick worked through that, and then winced in sympathy. Ouch. He searched his memory bank and recalled that his partner had a daughter living with Cai Campbell who, in his opinion, was a mediocre musician at best.
And what was with all the names starting with the letter C? Clem, Cai. Copeland. Campbell.
Nick snorted. Typical Hollywood. There were another twenty-five letters in the alphabet.
So Campbell dumped his ex-model partner for a newer version … and she was now his problem. In what universe was that fair?
‘She’s coming here?’
Copeland must have heard the doubt in his voice because his gaze sharpened. ‘Is that a problem?’
Nick folded his arms and nodded. ‘Actually, sir, yes, it is. We’re one of a handful of six-star lodges in Africa and we’re booked up to a year in advance. We do not have any vacancies and my next opening is next year.’
She can come back then, Nick thought. And she, like everyone else, could pay for the privilege.
The old man cursed, rather eloquently, Nick thought. ‘You have nothing at all?’
‘Two dormitory-style beds in a room in the junior rangers’ house.’
Those piercing eyes narrowed. ‘Don’t you have a spare room in your house?’
Hell, no!
‘Uh—’
‘Well?’
‘I don’t think my house is up to her standards. I mean, it’s OK, but not like the rooms in the Lodge.’
‘She’ll cope. And if she doesn’t, then she can just deal with it.’
Nick closed his eyes and counted to ten. He opened his eyes to see that Copeland was now sitting on the corner of his desk. He stared at Nick and tapped his finger against his thigh. Nick didn’t need him to voice the obvious:
Ten years ago I was the one person prepared to listen to a twenty-five-year lunatic who had nothing more than a Masters degree in Zoology, the shirt on his back and a piece of land adjoining the Kruger National Park. I took a chance on you … You owe me.
Nick sighed. Message received, loud and clear. ‘When does she arrive?’
Copeland looked at his slim watch. ‘In about thirty minutes; she’s flying in on my jet into your airfield.’
Oh, so he’d never really had the option of saying no.
‘Fine.’ It wasn’t but what could he do?
‘Thank you, Nicholas. I do appreciate this.’
Nick tipped his head back to look at the ceiling above his head. What had he done that warranted him being sentenced to sharing his house with a society princess—born with not a silver spoon but a canteen of diamond encrusted cutlery in her mouth—and who had a doctorate in being a rich man’s arm candy?
He rested his forehead on his desk. All he wanted was a cold beer, a swim and sex. Really, was that too much to ask?
In her father’s jet, Clem Copeland yawned, stretched and blinked away the last remnants of a brief restless sleep. She tucked her long legs up under her and caught the eye of her best friend, and personal assistant, who sat in the chair opposite her, eyeing her with quiet sympathy. Jason had been with her since her modelling days and he knew her inside out and upside down. As the memories of the past thirty-six hours rushed back to pummel her, she was grateful for his shoulder to lean on.
Tears, hot and angry, fell.
‘Sweetheart.’ Jason sighed, handed her a bottle of water and patted her knee.
‘It wasn’t just a horrible dream, was it?’
‘Sorry.’ Jason pursed his lips and shook his head. ‘Selfish, narcissistic ass.’
Clem saluted him with her bottle. ‘Careful, Jace, or else I’ll start to think that you don’t like him.’
‘I’ve never liked him! And I told you that he was planning something.’ Jason shoved both hands into his bleached blond hair, visibly frustrated.
‘I thought that if we could part amicably, then the press would shrug it off. After all, they’ve been predicting our breakup for years!’ Clem protested.
‘Cai has all the morals of an alley cat. He’s lied to you for ten years and yet you still fall for it!’ Jason poured himself a glass of wine and downed the contents in one long swallow. Clem reached for a tissue and wiped her eyes, light green and surrounded by long tinted lashes. Wet from her tears, they were even more startling than normal. ‘I’m not crying because I’m sad, I always cry when I’m angry!’
‘Mmm.’
‘I swear this time I could just boil him in oil.’ Clem gripped the bridge of her nose. ‘How long do you think he’s known her for and when did he propose? Two weeks? Three? That was quite a ring he’d bought her.’
‘You’re avoiding the subject.’
Damn right she was. That Cai had announced their breakup and introduced the world to her replacement and had proposed to her was humiliating enough, but the other bombshell he’d oh-so-casually dropped rearranged every atom in her body.
‘At least I vomited into her designer tote. That had to be a highlight.’
‘On national TV. But you did hide most of your face in her bag so you did it very discreetly.’
‘Thanks for pulling me off the show during that commercial break.’
‘Yeah. I’ve never hit anyone in my life but I came close to decking him.’
Clem tried to smile but her lips refused to cooperate. She dropped her legs and rested her forearms on her knees. She stared at the plush carpet beneath her knee length boots. When she looked up, she saw Jason’s occasional grimace as he worked on his laptop.
‘I’ve accessed the onboard Internet service,’ he explained.
