younger self, long forgotten, for lost dreams, a lost child.
She blinked them away and straightened her spine. She never thought about the past.
‘Bad news?’ Ben put an arm round her shoulders.
‘My stepfather died,’ she answered tightly. ‘I’m driving down to Gloucestershire tonight, before the roads turn into a skating rink.’
‘I’m sorry.’ His arm tightened around her, pulling her close. ‘And who was the guy on the phone?’
‘Does it matter?’ she said irritably. He was acting as if he had rights in her life. Then she relented, sighing, ‘Jason, my stepbrother. I hardly know him.’
And wasn’t that the truth! The man that other, forgotten self had believed she loved with all her heart and soul had never really existed. Out of loneliness and lovelessness she’d created a fantasy lover, a perfect being, and had suffered for that juvenile folly. Yet for a few seconds the sound of his voice had affected her savagely, as if the dumpy teenager who had loved him for so long and so frenziedly had suddenly come alive again, and was fighting for recognition within her adult body.
Which was nonsense.
‘Would you like me to drive you?’ Ben asked solicitously. ‘If you’re in a state—it wouldn’t be a problem.’
She compressed her lips, not wanting to throw his kindness in his face, and said very politely, ‘No, thank you. And, truly, I’m not in a state.’
Ben thought no woman was capable of driving, that the entire female sex should be kept off the roads by law. He’d been horrified when she’d splurged on the racy sports car she’d hankered after for years, but she was in no mood to see the funny side right now. She thrust the jar of coffee at him. ‘You came for this, remember?’
‘Yes, well—mind how you go. Don’t drive like a maniac.’
‘Stop trying to mother me.’ She gritted her teeth.
‘You know, or should do by now, that I don’t want to be a mother to you.’ His arm tightened around her shoulder again, and this time he wasn’t offering comfort. ‘Why don’t you give me the chance to show you just what I do want to be? You never know, you might surprise yourself and like it!’
Georgia stiffened. Hadn’t she told him, at least a dozen times, that she had no intention of starting a sexual relationship with him, or any other man? Ever.
Sex ruined relationships. It had made Jason treat her like a mistress for one night only and then despise her. It had made her mother resent her from practically the moment of her conception, because the man she’d been engaged to had taken to his heels when he’d learned there was a baby on the way. Vivienne had always regarded her as an unwanted encumbrance, a blight on her life.
And sex had been the only thing on Harold’s mind that last fateful day at Lytham, which had ruined everything for her at the time. Yes—she had long decided she could live without sex.
She pulled briskly away from Ben. If he hadn’t got the message by now he never would. She refused to waste any more breath on the subject.
‘I have to pack. Close the door behind you.’
Georgia drove fast, but safely, with flair and confidence, perfectly attuned to the powerful engine beneath the long, sleek bonnet of the low-slung sports coupé.
It was like a part of herself, and when she was behind the wheel inner tension was released, the distinctive growl of the engine, as the black, aerodynamic, bullet-shaped car ate up the miles, speaking to her of freedom, taking her away from herself. Driving was the only release she allowed herself. And speed was addictive.
Headlights cut through the night, raking the wet black tarmac. She kept her foot down, stayed in the fast lane and only reluctantly eased off the accelerator slightly as she left the M5 at Brockworth and headed for deep country. And Lytham Court. And Jason.
Jason. Was he spitting tacks because he hadn’t been remembered in Harold’s will, full of resentment because she, the despised one, had?
And what was he expecting of her? Her mouth curled with slight, cynical amusement as she allowed herself to think about it.
A soppy sort he could push around? Someone he could lay down the law to concerning that legacy and then walk away from, arrogantly satisfied that she would do as she was told?
And physically? If he gave that aspect a glancing thought would he expect to encounter an older version of that besotted eighteen-year-old? The billowy curves—the plague of her young life—already solidified into premature middle-age spread? Mousy hair still cropped boyishly short because she didn’t know what else to do with it? Dog-like devotion swimming in her eyes, ill-fitting chainstore clothes?
Boy, was he in for a surprise!
The muted yet full-throated growl of an unfamiliar engine broke the deep silence of Lytham’s isolation. Jason gathered the sheaf of papers together and pushed them back into the wall safe, locked it and pocketed the key, then walked to the open study door.
A couple of hours, she’d said. A glance at his watch confirmed she’d made it in ten minutes under. He waited. Made a conscious effort to relax coiled shoulder muscles. Waited and wondered.
Wondered if he’d manage to discuss tomorrow’s funeral arrangements, and how she could best handle the huge fortune that would come into her possession after probate, without displaying the bitter contempt he felt for her.
Wondered if she would still have the nerve to look at him with big, limpid eyes. Wondered yet again how he could ever have been fooled by such a seemingly malleable sweet innocence.
Waited and wondered if she’d walk right in—this house was hers, or as good as, after all. Or would she ring the bell, as timid and self-effacing as ever, on the surface at least, yet self-seeking underneath, doing what suited her and hang the consequences?
She walked right in. She stood in the open doorway and stared at him.
He stared right back through narrowed grey eyes, unable to release the almost arrogance of her glittering golden gaze, unable to believe what he was actually seeing.
CHAPTER TWO
MEETING his eyes, Georgia sucked in her breath. Seven years had stamped authority on those harshly handsome features, on the wide-shouldered, lithe male body. And although she never looked back, not ever, there was nothing she could do now to stop her mind flying to the hollow echoes of the past. Just seeing him again made it happen…
She was eighteen years old and besottedly in love. Had loved him ever since she’d first set eyes on him at her mother’s marriage to his adoptive father, Harold Harcourt, three years before.
He liked her; she knew that. On his occasional visits to Lytham Court, the luxurious family home, he made a point of spending time with her, unfailingly interested in her, always kind. And what gave her hope that liking her might develop into something more was the snippet of information that Mrs Moody, the battleaxe housekeeper, had let slip: Jason never visited Lytham while she was away at the boarding school her mother had packed her off to as soon as she’d married money.
So
