So even if she didn’t resign herself, she was almost certainly unemployed. And, as a result, in financial difficulties, owing rent on her flat, and with no way to keep up payments on her car. OK, so her job had been a bore and a grind. But it had been a job. One that paid her way at least. And she had put it at risk on some foolish, impossible impulse that she couldn’t even explain to herself.
That man. The thought rushed into her mind, driving everything else before it.
It had been the sight of the beautiful man at the other side of the bar that had somehow pushed her into this crazily impulsive mood. The sort of stupid, irrational mood in which she threw up a perfectly decent job and behaved in a way that meant she just didn’t recognise herself.
For example—just what was she doing standing here, propping up this bar, when everyone else was completing the schedule of the conference before the final dinner and going home? What was she waiting for? Hoping for?
Did she really think—was she actually hoping that the stunning and exotic-looking stranger was going to come up to her and change her life?
Fat chance!
Terrie actually snorted cynically at the idiotic path of her own thoughts. She really couldn’t believe that!
Picking up her glass, she twisted on her heel, turning so that she was half facing the rest of the bar, but at an angle so that if the intriguing stranger was looking again she wouldn’t risk being seen by him. Just one experience of that furiously cold-eyed glare was bad enough. She didn’t want to go through a repeat performance.
The wretched man had actually gone!
‘Well, thanks a bunch!’ Terrie muttered against the rim of her glass as she lifted it to sip at her wine. ‘Thank you so very much!’
Foolishly, she felt as if he was responsible for the pickle she was in. She had made this crazy, impulsive gesture of throwing in her job in some non-typical response to his presence. Had stayed in the bar when she would have been far better to stick with her friends and go to the final session, however boring. Had even…
Admit it! she declared to herself. She had even hung around in the bar in the hope of meeting up with and discovering more about this man who had had such an impact on her.
And the so-and-so had got up and made his way out of the bar while her back was turned, without so much as a second look. He must have walked within inches of her and she hadn’t even noticed!
So much for changing her life at a stroke!
Scowling as much at her own foolishness as at the absent stranger, Terrie lifted her drink in a bleak parody of a toast, inclining it in the direction of the stranger’s now empty seat.
‘To ships that pass in the night,’ she muttered.
And froze as, from her right-hand side, another hand reached out, deliberately clinking the glass it held against hers in acknowledgement of the toast.
‘Salute, signorina!’ a deep, lyrically accented voice murmured in her ear.
‘WHAT?’
The shaken exclamation was pushed from her lips as her nerveless fingers lost their grip on her glass. Slipping from her grasp, it tumbled downwards, spilling its contents on the way, and crashed onto the floor, splintering into a thousand tiny pieces.
‘Oh, look what you’ve done now!’
Even as the words escaped her, she was acknowledging how irrational they were. It was her own disturbed feelings that had twisted her nerves so tight she was ready to jump like a startled cat at the slightest thing. And as for feeling that seeing him had somehow pushed her into making rash decisions about her life, well, that was just nonsense. She had been ready to make a move long before she had ever set eyes on him.
But acknowledging that fact and reacting accordingly were two totally different things. Especially when she was now up so close to him that she could see that his eyes were closer to bronze than ebony and that fascinating little gold flecks burned like slivers of flame at the heart of their irises.
‘Perdone, signorina.’
The voice was even more devastating close up, too. Pure warm, liquid honey, with just the tiniest touch of gravel in its husky undertone.
‘Forgive me…your skirt…’
A long tanned hand lifted in an autocratic summons to the bartender, and before Terrie even had time to realise just what he had in mind a clean, damp cloth had been provided without a word having to be spoken. The next moment she found herself looking at the top of the stranger’s downbent head, staring fascinated at the sheen on the night-dark strands, as he set himself to wiping away the splashes of wine from her skirt.
And this was worse than ever. The stroke of the cloth over the lower part of her body, even with the linen of her skirt acting as a buffer, made her heart thud unevenly, her breath catch in her throat. And when he moved lower, wiping away a few glistening droplets that were clinging to the fine nylon of her stockings, she shifted uneasily, uncomfortably.
He was too close. Far, far too close. If she inhaled she could breathe in some shockingly sensual scent. The tang of bergamot and lemon, mixed with the other, more intensely personal aroma of his skin.
‘No—it’s all right… Please…’
Her skin was prickling with sensation, heat racing through her veins. And when the side of his hand brushed her leg, skin almost touching skin, she had to clamp her mouth tightly shut, teeth digging into her lower lip, against the moan of response that almost escaped her.
‘It will dry!’ she declared with more emphasis than was necessary. Anything to stop him, to distract him from these disturbingly intimate attentions. ‘And it’s only a cheap suit.’
‘Then let me at least buy you another drink.’
Terrie was so relieved by the way he straightened up, tossing the cloth onto a nearby table, that she would have agreed to anything. She didn’t spot the look or gesture with which he summoned the bartender, barely heard the swift commanding notes of his order. Yet somehow he had manoeuvred her into a seat at the far side of the room, settling her on the burgundy velvet chair before taking the one opposite her in the privacy of the booth. And the next moment a full glass was brought and placed carefully in front of her.
‘It was dry white wine, wasn’t it?’
‘Oh—yes…’
Her response was even more distracted because as he lounged back in his seat and stretched out his long legs in front of him, crossed at the ankles, she discovered to her horror that her skirt had not been the only victim of the accident with the glass. The smart silver-grey trousers that were now in her view were liberally splashed with wine too—and his was only too clearly not a cheap suit. In fact, if the perfect fit, immaculate tailoring and fabulous material were anything to go by, it was an extremely expensive item of clothing.
‘But there’s no need… You don’t have to go to any trouble.’
