education.
With money in the bank she would be able to get to university, an ambition she had had to abandon when her mother had become ill four years previously. She would be able to throw herself into the art course she had always wanted to do without fear of finding herself begging on street corners to pay for the privilege.
She would be able to make something of herself—and that meant a lot, because she felt that she’d spent much of her life being buffeted by the winds of fate, carried this way and that with no discernible goal propelling her forward.
But she’d taken one look at the store and one look at the house she had inherited—full of charm despite the fact that it was practically falling down—and she’d dumped all her plans to sell faster than a rocket leaving earth. Art school could wait—the store needed her love and her help now.
Anthony Grey, the lawyer who had arranged to see her so that he could go over every single disadvantage of hanging on to what, apparently, was a business on its last legs and a house that was being propped up only by the ivy growing around it, had talked to her for three hours. She had listened with her head tilted to one side, hands on her knees, and had then promptly informed him that she was going to try and make a go of it.
And that, first and foremost, entailed getting to know what it was she intended making a go of. Which, in turn, necessitated her working on the shop floor so that she could see where the cracks were and also hopefully pick up what was being said by the loyal staff who suspected that their jobs might be hanging in the balance.
A couple of weeks under cover and Maddie was sure she would be able to get a feel for things.
Optimism hadn’t been her companion for a very long time and she had been enjoying it.
Until now. She’d jumped to all sorts of conclusions and screwed up. She pinned a smile to her face, because the way too good-looking man staring down at her, with the most incredible navy blue eyes she had ever seen in her life, looked rich and influential, even though he was kitted out in a pair of faded black jeans and a polo shirt.
There was something about his lazy, loose-limbed stance, the way he oozed self-confidence, the latent strength of his body...
She felt it again—that treacherous quiver in the pit of her stomach and the tickling between her thighs—and she furiously stamped it down.
‘Your mother...’ She picked up the pot and squinted at it. ‘She’d love this. It’s thick, creamy, and excellent at smoothing out wrinkles.’
‘Are you just reading what’s written on the label?’
‘I’m afraid I’ve only been here a short while, so I’m just getting the hang of things.’
‘Shouldn’t you have a supervisor working with you in that case? Showing you the ropes?’
The man looked around, as though expecting said person to materialise in front of him. He was enjoying himself. It was clear this stranger was so accustomed to women fawning over him that the novel experience of a woman not caring who he was or how much he was worth was tickling him pink.
He rested flattened palms on the glass counter and Maddie shifted back just a little.
‘Dereliction of duty,’ he murmured.
‘I beg your pardon?’
‘You need to tell your boss that it gives the customer a poor impression if the people working on the sales floor don’t really know what they’re talking about.’
Maddie stiffened at the criticism. ‘You’ll find that everyone else on the shop floor has worked here for a very long time. If you like, I can fetch someone over here to help you in your...your quest for the perfect face cream for your mother.’
‘I’ll let you in on a little secret,’ the man said with a tinge of regret, his navy blue eyes never once leaving her face. ‘I lied about wanting the cream for my mother. My mother died when I was a boy.’ Sincere regret seeped into his voice. ‘Both my parents, in actual fact,’ he added in a roughened undertone.
‘I’m so sorry.’
Maddie still felt the loss of her own mother, but she had had her around for a great deal longer than the man standing in front of her had had his. Her father had never been in the picture. He’d done a runner before she was old enough to walk.
Maddie knew scraps of the story that had brought her mother from Italy to the other side of the world. There had been an argument between her mother and the grandfather Maddie hadn’t ever known which had never been resolved. Harsh words exchanged and then too much pride on both sides for any resolution until time took over, making reconciliation an impossibility.
Her mother had been a strong woman—someone who had planted both feet and stood her ground. Stubborn... But then she’d had to fight her way in Australia with a young baby to take care of. Maddie felt that her grandfather might have had the same traits—although she had no real idea because she’d never been told. Secretly she wondered if the grandfather she’d never met might have attempted to contact her mother, only to have his efforts spurned. Parents were often more forgiving with their children than the other way around.
Her eyes misted over and she reached out and impulsively circled the man’s wrist with her fingers—and then yanked her hand back because the charge of electricity that shot through her was downright frightening.
He raised his eyebrows, and for a second she felt that he could read every thought that had flashed through her head.
‘No need,’ he murmured. ‘Have dinner with me.’
‘I beg your pardon?’
‘I’ll pass on the face cream. Frankly, all those wild claims can’t possibly be true. But have dinner with me. Name the place, name the time...’
‘You’re not interested in buying anything in this store, are you?’
Maddie’s voice cooled by several degrees, because he was just another example of a cocky guy who wanted to get her into bed. She’d been spot-on first time round.
‘And as for a dinner date... That’ll be a no.’
Dinner with this man? How arrogant was he?
Her eyes slid surreptitiously over him and she understood very well why he was as arrogant as he was. The guy was drop-dead gorgeous.
Lean, perfectly chiselled features, dark hair worn slightly too long, which emphasised his powerful masculinity rather than detracting from it, a tightly honed body that testified to time spent working out, even though he didn’t look like the sort of man who spent much time preening in front of mirrors and flexing his muscles. And those eyes... Sexy, bedroom eyes that made her skin burn and made her thoughts wander to what a dinner date with him might be like...
She forced herself to conjure up the hateful memory of her ex—Adam. He’d been good-looking too. Plus charming, charismatic, and from the sort of family that had spent generations looking down on people like her. Well, that whole experience had been a learning curve for Maddie, and she wasn’t about to put those valuable lessons to waste by succumbing to the phoney charm of the man in front of her with his sinful good looks and his I could make your body sing bedroom
