of a harshly raised voice.
Damn it all to hell and back! Why had Kate left him in the lurch in the middle of his most ambitious project to date? He didn’t want to be plagued with questions and inquiries from someone still wet behind the ears when he was working. After four and a half years, Kate knew practically all of his little foibles and idiosyncrasies, including his preferences when it came to the way he liked to work—not to mention food, music and reading material: the four essentials to make his life run smoothly, as far as Adrian was concerned. He didn’t have time to break in a new housekeeper.
‘I’ll go up to my room and tie it back.’ Liadan stepped back stiffly from the piano and turned towards him. The flush on her cheeks was no longer in evidence and her chin was raised a little, as if determined he wasn’t going to bait her. She was annoyed, and, if his own present level of irritation continued, Adrian knew he would have only himself to blame when the girl threw in the towel and left him high and dry. At this moment, the prospect didn’t seem too worrying.
‘Before I go, I wondered if you had a preference for dinner? Kate’s left me a list of options.’
‘If she’s left you a list of options, then pick one for me, Miss Willow. I don’t have time to immerse myself in menu discussions when I’m in the middle of work.’
‘Well, I—’
‘If that’s all you wanted to know, I trust you can now leave me in peace so that I can get on?’
Liadan wondered how she made it to the door without giving him a piece of her mind. The man had no manners as far as she could see, his superior, self-important tone rankled, and if she didn’t need this job so badly in order to keep her little house she wouldn’t hesitate to let him know in detail just what he could do with it! He hadn’t even thanked her for the coffee, let alone asked her if she was settling in all right.
Two hours later, having completed a thorough vacuuming of the upstairs rooms on the first floor, excluding the room that Kate had pointed out as Adrian’s—apparently that was to be cleaned once a week on a Thursday morning when Adrian generally went into town—Liadan returned to the kitchen to browse the recipe books Kate had left. Sipping a cup of camomile tea, her concentration on the list of ingredients needed to make the dish she had selected, she didn’t realise Adrian had stepped into the room until he spoke.
‘Taking a break already, Miss Willow?’
For a moment she stared into those chilly dark eyes in mute astonishment, then, when she’d gathered her wits, she pushed back a coiling strand of red-gold hair that had escaped from her hastily erected bun and frowned. ‘I’m organising what I need for tonight’s dinner, Mr Jacobs. Isn’t that what you hired me for?’
‘As long as you’re not being idle. This is a big house and it takes a lot of looking after. I take a lot of looking after.’
Was he being facetious? Liadan really couldn’t tell. Especially when his expression was about as impenetrable as the vaults of the Bank of England. Releasing a small sigh, she prayed he wasn’t always going to be this difficult, this provoking. Had the affable and dependable Kate been subject to his arrogant moods immediately when she started to work for him? If she had, the woman surely deserved some kind of endurance medal for her troubles.
‘What is it you want, Mr Jacobs? If you’ll just tell me I’ll see if I can help.’
What Adrian could have done with was a long hot bath followed by a massage. He’d been up most of the night writing, his shoulders ached, his head throbbed and he was irritated and angry at Kate’s desertion. And all because the silly woman had fallen for some probably extremely dull professor of history her father had introduced her to during the summer holidays. He’d clearly misjudged her character, because he would have sworn she wasn’t the type to fall head over heels in love like some giddy sixteen-year-old.
Reining in his thoughts on the matter, Adrian met Liadan’s apprehensive blue gaze with a deep frown. He almost had the urge to ask her to oblige him with a massage just for the hell of it. She’d probably turn tail and run out of there so fast her feet would leave a trail of smoke in her wake. He would have smiled at the thought if the consequences of such an action wouldn’t leave him in the direst straits possible.
‘Right now I need to walk and think. Did Kate show you around the grounds when she took you on her little tour?’
‘She would have done but she was in a hurry to catch her train.’ Rising to her feet, Liadan folded her arms across her thick wool sweater for protection. Adrian Jacobs made her uneasy. He had a way of looking at her that made her feel as if he knew everything and she knew nothing—a trait that hardly boded well for a smooth association.
‘Then go and put your coat on and come and join me. I’ll point out a couple of things of interest but otherwise I’d prefer not to have any conversation. If you can manage to stay quiet I think I could tolerate some company for half an hour.’
Embarrassed heat scorching her cheeks, Liadan glanced down at the clean pine table with her thoughts rioting, wondering how she managed to refrain from picking up her cup of camomile tea and throwing it at him. Of all the unbelievably rude, insufferable—‘I’d rather stay here, if you don’t mind. I really need to get my ingredients together to cook dinner.’
Jerking his head in annoyance, Adrian held Liadan riveted to the spot with the force of his steely-eyed stare. ‘Go and get your coat, Miss Willow. When I said I could tolerate some company, I wasn’t giving you the option of a refusal.’
CHAPTER TWO
THE air was so cold Liadan’s breath practically turned to ice as soon as it left her lips. With her coat collar turned up high over her thick woollen scarf, she trailed behind Adrian as he strode ahead, his shoes crunching into the deep impacted snow and his gloveless hands buried deep inside the pockets of his long black coat. The sky was so white it almost matched the snow in brightness and Liadan wished she had her sunglasses to fend off the glare. Shielding her gaze with her gloved hand, she was deeply stirred by the magical landscape that revealed itself to her. Once she could simply accept that Adrian Jacobs wasn’t going to be the most sociable or approachable boss she could hope for, then she could actually start to enjoy the wintry beauty of her incredible surroundings and take pleasure in it, she decided.
‘That tower over there is two hundred and fifty years old and the clipped Holm oaks survive from the original garden. Just beyond the oaks there’s an orangery and an ornamental stream.’
Adrian waited for Liadan to catch up with him as he turned and spoke, his breath mimicking little puffs of locomotive steam in the frosty afternoon air. Surprised by his unexpected solicitude, Liadan duly quickened her stride, her boots plunging deep into the snow as she struggled to find some kind of rhythm, all the while far too conscious of his steady dark gaze on her efforts.
‘Gardens like this must take a lot of looking after,’ she breathed as she drew level. ‘You must have a team of gardeners, surely?’
His dark eyes narrowed. ‘Just George and his son Steven. They’re here most days. You’ll probably see them around. I don’t tolerate too many people on my property, Miss Willow. On the whole, I find people demand far more than I wish to give.’
‘But this is such a beautiful place. Don’t you ever feel like sharing it?’ The question was out before Liadan gave herself a chance to consider the wisdom of speaking such thoughts out loud. It hung suspended in the frozen air, making her squirm inside when it appeared that Adrian had not the
