hotel, including the post code, in case they got lost and needed to use his satnav. After fifteen minutes of slow driving, they finally saw a sign—a real sign this time—and Aggie breathed a sigh of relief when they swung into the courtyard of a small but very elegant country house. Under the falling snow, it was a picture-postcard scene.
A few cars were in the courtyard, but it was obvious that business was as quiet here as it had been at Mrs Bixby’s bed and breakfast. How many other people were slowly wending their way north by car in disastrous driving conditions? Only a few lunatics.
Her nerves gathered pace as they were checked in.
‘Since this was my suggestion…’ She turned to him as they walked towards the winding staircase that led to the first floor and up to their bedrooms. ‘I insist on picking up the tab.’
‘Have you got the money to pick up the tab?’ Luiz asked. ‘There’s no point suggesting something if you can’t carry it out.’
‘I might not be rich but I’m not completely broke!’ Nerves made her lash out at him. It wasn’t the best strategy for enticing him into her bed. ‘I’m doing this all wrong,’ she muttered, half to herself.
‘Doing what all wrong?’ Luiz stopped and looked down at her.
‘You’re nothing like the guys I’ve been out with.’
‘I don’t think that standing halfway up the stairs in a hotel is the place for a soul-searching conversation about the men you’ve slept with.’ He turned on his heels and began heading upstairs.
‘I don’t like you being like this with me!’ Aggie caught up with him and tugged the sleeve of his jumper until he turned around and looked at her with impatience.
‘Aggie, why don’t we just go to our rooms, take some time out and meet in an hour for dinner? This has already turned into a never-ending journey. I’ve been away from work for too long. I have things on my mind. I don’t feel inclined to get wrapped up in a hysterical, emotional conversation with you now.’
Luiz was finding it impossible to deal with his crazy obsession with her. He wondered if he was going stir crazy. Was being cooped up with her doing something to his self-control? It had not even crossed his mind, when he had made a pass at her, that she would turn him down. Was that why he had watched her with Betsy and Gordon and all those kids and the only thing he could think was how much he wanted to get her into his bed? Was he so arrogant, in the end, that he couldn’t accept that any woman should say no to him?
The uneasy swirl of unfamiliar emotions had left him edgy and short-tempered. He would have liked to dismiss her from his mind the way he had always been able to dismiss all the inconveniences that life had occasionally thrown at him. He had always been good at that. Ruthlessness had always served him well. That and the knowledge that it was pointless getting sidetracked by things that were out of your control. Aggie sidetracked him and the last thing he needed was an involved conversation that would get neither of them anywhere. Womanly chats were things he avoided like the plague.
‘I’m not being hysterical.’ Aggie took a deep breath. If she backed away now, she would never do what she felt she had to do. Falling into bed with Luiz might be something she would never have contemplated in a month of Sundays, but then again she had never had to cope with a sexual attraction that was ripping her principles to shreds.
She had come to the conclusion that, whilst she knew it was crazy to sleep with a guy whose attitude towards women she found unnerving and amoral, not to sleep with him would leave her with regrets she would never be able to put behind her. And, if she was going to sleep with him, then she intended to have some control over the whole messy situation.
A lifetime of independence would not be washed away in a five-minute decision.
‘I just want to talk to you. I want to clear the air.’
‘There’s nothing to clear, Aggie. I’ve done what you asked me to do, and I’m pleased you seemed to have had a good time seeing all your old friends, but now it’s time to move on.’
‘I may have made a mistake.’
‘What are you talking about?’
‘Can we discuss this upstairs? In your room? Or we could always go back downstairs to the sitting room. It’s quiet there.’
‘If you don’t mind me changing while you speak, then follow me to my room, by all means.’ He turned his back on her and headed up.
‘So…’ Once inside the bedroom, Luiz began pulling off his sweater which he flung on a chair by the window. Their bags had been brought up and deposited in their separate rooms and he began rummaging through his for some clothes.
‘I never wanted to make this trip with you,’ Aggie began falteringly, and Luiz stilled and turned to look at her.
‘If this is going to be another twenty minutes of recriminations, then let me tell you straight away that I’m not in the mood.’ But, even as he spoke, he was seeing her tumble of fair hair and the slender contours of her body encased in a pair of the new jeans and deep burgundy jumper that was close-fitted and a lot sexier than the baggy jumpers she seemed to have stockpiled. Once again, his unruly lack of physical control made him grit his teeth in frustration. ‘I’m also not in the mood to hear you make a song and dance about paying your own way.’
‘I wasn’t going to.’ She pressed her back against the closed door.
‘Then what was it you wanted to tell me?’
‘I’ve never met anyone like you before.’
‘I think,’ Luiz said drily, ‘you may have mentioned that to me in the past—and not in a good way—so unless you have something else to add to the mix then I suggest you go and freshen up.’
‘What I mean is, I never thought I could be attracted to someone like you.’
‘I don’t do these kinds of conversations, Aggie. Post mortems on a relationship are bad enough; post mortems on a non-relationship are a complete non-starter. Now, I’m going to have a shower.’ He began unbuttoning his shirt.
Aggie felt the thrill of sudden, reckless excitement and a desperate urgency to get through to him. Despite or maybe because of her background she had never been a risk taker. From a young age, she had felt responsible for Mark and she had also gathered, very early on, that the road to success wasn’t about taking risks. It was about putting in the hard work; risk taking was for people who had safety nets to fall into. She had never had one.
Even in her relationships, she had never strayed from what her head told her she should be drawn to. So they hadn’t worked out. At no point, she now realised, had she ever concluded that maybe she should have sat back and taken stock of what her head had been telling her.
Luiz, so different from anyone she had ever known, who had entered her life in the most dubious of circumstances, had sent her into a crazy tailspin. She had found herself in terrifying new territory where nothing made sense and she had reacted by lashing out.
Before he could become completely bored with her circuitous conversation, Aggie drew in a deep breath. ‘You made a pass at me and I’m sorry I turned you down.’
Luiz, about to pull off his shirt, allowed his arms to drop to his sides and looked
