she needed was someone to let her know that she couldn’t always have her own way; someone who would demand respect from her, and get it. In short, what she needed was someone who would bring her down a peg or two—and he was going to take immense satisfaction in being the one to do it.
THE interview was over, and so was the party.
Grace breathed a sigh of relief.
The evening had gone well. In fact, Beth had taken several orders for quite a few of the paintings and sold one or two of the ceramics. The interview, too, had turned out satisfactorily, without her having to face any of the awkward questions she had been dreading. She should have been happy—and she was, she assured herself staunchly, except for that meeting earlier with Seth Mason.
She didn’t want to think about it. But as she went upstairs to the flat above the gallery, having locked up for the night, long-buried memories started crowding in around her and she couldn’t stop them coming no matter how hard she tried.
It had been shortly after her nineteenth birthday, during the last few weeks of her gap year between leaving college and starting university, when she had first met Seth in that small West Country coastal town.
She’d gone down from London to stay with her grandparents who had brought her up and who had had a summer home there, a modern mansion high in the wooded hills above the little resort.
On that fateful day that would stay for ever in her memory, she’d been out with her grandfather when he had decided to call into the little boatyard on the far side of town. She couldn’t even remember why, now. But, while Lance Culverwell had been in the scruffy little office, she had noticed Seth working on the hull of an old boat. She’d noted the way his broad back moved beneath his coarse denim shirt, the sleeves of which had been rolled up, exposing tanned, powerful arms as he’d driven rivets hard into the yielding metal, unconsciously raking back his untameably black hair, strands of which had fallen forward tantalisingly as he worked.
When he turned around, she looked quickly away, though not in time for him to fail to register where her gaze was resting on the hard, lean angles of his denim-clad hips.
He didn’t say anything. He didn’t even acknowledge her presence with a smile. But there was something so brooding in those steely-grey eyes as she chanced another glance in his direction that she felt herself grow hot with sensations she’d never experienced before just from a man looking at her. It was as though he could see through her red crop-top and virginal-white trousers to the wisp of fine lace that pushed up her suddenly sensitised breasts, and to her skimpy string, the satin triangle of which began to feel damp from more than just the heat of the day.
The faintest smile tugged at one corner of his mouth—a sexy mouth, she instantly decided, like his eyes, and the prominent jut of his rather arrogant-looking jaw. She didn’t acknowledge him, though, and wondered whether to or not. But then Lance Culverwell came out of the office with the owner of the boatyard, and she gave her smile to the two older men instead.
She didn’t look back as she walked over to the long, convertible Mercedes that was parked, top down, the gleaming silver on the gravel like a statement of her family’s position in life beside the older, far more modest vehicles that were parked there. Instinctively, though, she knew that his eyes were following her retreating figure, the way her hair cascaded down her back like a golden waterfall, and the not entirely involuntary sway of her hips as she prayed she wouldn’t miss her footing in her high-heeled sandals all the way back to the car. She even begged Lance Culverwell to let her drive, and she pulled out of that tired-looking little boatyard with her head high and her hair blowing in the breeze, laughing a little too brightly at some remark her grandfather made, wanting to get herself noticed—wanted—and by him.
He wasn’t right for her, of course. He was a mere boat hand, after all, and far removed from the professional type of young men she usually dated. But something had happened between her and that gorgeous hunk she’d exchanged glances with that day, something that defied cultural and financial differences, and the boundaries of class and status. It was something primeval and wholly animal that made her drive back from town in a fever of excitement, guessing that Lance Culverwell would be appalled if he knew what she was thinking, feeling—which was an overwhelming desire to see that paragon of masculinity who had made her so aware of herself as a woman again, and soon.
She didn’t have long to wait. It was the following week, after she had been shopping in town.
Laden with purchases for a party her grandparents were giving, she was just starting up the hill, wishing she hadn’t decided to walk down that morning but had brought her car instead, when one of her carrier bags suddenly slipped out of her hand just as she was crossing the road.
Making a lunge for it, and dropping another bag in the process, she sucked in a breath as a motorbike suddenly cruised to a halt in front of her and a black-booted foot nudged the first errant carrier to the side of the carriageway.
‘Hello again.’ The sexily curving mouth of the leather-clad figure on the bike was unmistakable: Seth Mason. She remembered her grandfather casually referring to him on the way home the previous week, and had hugged the name to her like a guilty secret. Her heart seemed to go into free fall as he spoke to her, then felt like it was beating out of control.
‘You’ve bitten off more than you can chew.’ He looked amused at her plight. His voice, though, was deep and so warm that she fell in love with it just standing there on that rural road as he bent to pick up the one bag she still hadn’t retrieved and restored it to her flustered arms. ‘You look as though you could do with a lift.’
Every instinct of survival screamed at Grace to refuse, to listen to the nagging little voice of wisdom that warned her that involving herself with this man would definitely be biting off more than she could chew! But everything about him was exciting, from his dark, enigmatic features to his hard, lean body and the heavy pulsing of the motorbike’s engine between those powerful, leather-clad thighs.
‘I’m Seth Mason…if you’re wondering,’ he stated dryly, after she deposited her bags in the pannier and sat astride the bike.
‘I know,’ she said, easing down her mini-skirt that had ridden up to reveal more golden thigh than she wanted him to see.
‘Aren’t you going to tell me your name?’ A distinct edge crept into his voice as he added, ‘Or do you think I should know it?’
Grace had laughed at that. ‘Don’t you?’ she asked cheekily.
From the look he sent over his shoulder, he wasn’t particularly impressed.
‘I’m Grace,’ she told him quickly in the light of his challenging, brooding gaze.
‘Here.’ He thrust a crash helmet into her hand. ‘Put this on.’
‘Do I have to?’
‘If you want to ride with me, you do.’
He was responsible for her safety, that was what he was saying. The thought of having his protection sent a little frisson through Grace.
Somewhat nervously she said, ‘I’ve never been on a motorbike before.’
‘Then hold on to me,’ was his firm command.
