Anna had said, with incontrovertible logic, “if you’re going to have to like a person before you take him as a client, Isabella, you’re never going to make Growing Wild a success.”
True enough. And when you coupled that simple wisdom with the fact that the offer was important enough for Anna to refer to her as Isabella …
Well, that had convinced her.
Unfortunately, Izzy was here, not Anna.
Sophisticated Anna would have known how to handle the situation. She would not have gotten lost or crashed the car. She certainly would not have turned up hours late for this appointment.
And she absolutely would not have let a man like this intimidate her. She’d have known how to handle the half-dressed muscleman who was having such fun at her expense.
That smirk was still on his face.
It infuriated her. After the day she’d had, Izzy was in no mood to be laughed at, certainly not by him.
She knew his type.
Good-looking. Glib-tongued. Full of himself, especially when it came to women, because women, the silly fools, undoubtedly threw themselves at his feet with all the grace of—of salmon throwing themselves upstream.
Okay, a bad metaphor. The point was, she was not a woman to be intimidated by an empty-headed stud. She was a self-sufficient businesswoman, never mind that she wasn’t self-sufficient enough to be wearing her own clothes or driving her own car.
All that mattered was that she was here. And time was wasting. The sun would set soon, and then what?
Then what, indeed?
The caretaker was leaning against a table, hands tucked into the back pockets of his jeans. She had a choice of views. His incredible face. His incredible chest. The tight fit of those faded jeans—
Stop it, she told herself sternly, and set her gaze squarely on his chin.
“Look,” she said, “I really don’t have time for this.”
“For what?”
Was the man dense?
“Where is your boss?”
That won her a shrug. “He’s around.”
The answer, the lazy lift of those shoulders, those amazingly broad shoulders, infuriated her. All that macho. That attitude. That testosterone.
That naked chest.
Damnit, she was back to that and it was his fault. She’d have bet it was deliberate.
Izzy narrowed her eyes.
“Do you think you could possibly muster up enough ambition to find him and tell him I’m here?”
Mr. Half-Naked didn’t move. Not a muscle. Well, that wasn’t true. He did move a muscle; one corner of his mouth lifted, either in question or in another bout of hilarity at her expense.
Could you actually feel your blood pressure rising?
“One problem,” he said lazily. “I’m still waiting for you to tell me why you’re here.”
The simplest thing would be to do exactly that. Just say, I’m here to meet with Mr. D’Aquila and talk about landscaping this property.
It was certainly not a secret.
The problem was, she didn’t like Mr. All Brawn and No Brains’s attitude.
Okay. That wasn’t fair.
Just because he looked like he’d stepped off one of those calendars her roommate used to drool over in her college-dorm days didn’t mean he was stupid.
It only meant he was so beautiful that looking at him made her heart do a little two-step, and that was surely ridiculous, almost as ridiculous as this silly power game they were playing.
Who cared if it was silly? She was entitled to win at something today!
“What are you?” she said sarcastically. “His appointment secretary?”
One dark eyebrow rose again. “Maybe I’m his butler.”
She stared at him for a long minute. Then she laughed.
Rio grinned.
He was really getting to her. Good. Fine. It was a lot more rewarding to take his pent-up irritation out on the woman, whoever she was, than on a trench.
“His butler, huh?” Her chin went up. “One thing’s for sure, mister. I guarantee you’re going to be looking for another job two minutes after I meet your employer.”
Rio folded his arms over his chest.
The lady was losing her temper. Let her lose it. Let her get ticked off. Let her see how it felt to be frustrated enough to want Izzy Orsini to finally show up if only so that he could deck the jerk. If that was unfair—
Hey, life was unfair. Besides, the lady wasn’t exactly behaving like a lady.
Well, yeah, she was.
Her clothes were a mess, but they were expensive.
So was her attitude.
He was the peasant, she was the princess. Only one problem in that little scenario.
The princess had no idea he held all the cards.
Well, not quite all. He still didn’t know what had brought her here. The only certainty was that her presence could not possibly have anything to do with him.
Maybe she sold magazines door to door.
Maybe Southampton had designated her its Fruitcake of the Month.
Whoever she was, whatever she was, she was a welcome diversion. This little farce was fast becoming the best part of his long and irritating afternoon.
She was also very easy on the eyes, now that he’d had the chance to get a longer look at her.
The made-for-midwinter suit was rumpled, torn and a little dirty, but he was pretty sure it hid a made-for-midsummer-bikini body. Wool or no wool, he could make out the thrust of high breasts, the indentation of a feminine waist, the curve of rounded hips.
Rio frowned.
What the hell had put that into his head?
She was a woman, and women were not on his current agenda. He’d just ended an affair—women called them “relationships” but men knew better—and, as always, getting out of it had been a lot more difficult than getting in. Women were creatures of baffling complexity and despite what they all said, they inevitably ended up wanting something he could not, would not, give.
Commitment. Marriage.
Chains.
