off by his curtness. ‘I liked him. Those were the days,’ she continued dreamily. ‘We all mucked in together at the Quinta. Not much money, but bags of hope and mega-size dreams—built on the back of the new villa developments in the Algarve which needed their gardens landscaped. We were two close families, working all hours to build up the business.’
Close families! Too damn close. Grimly he turned on the radio, not wanting to hear any more. He had enough to deal with. Memories could stay where they were.
‘You’re very grumpy. I thought you’d be interested,’ she said, sounding hurt.
He snorted but didn’t reply. Privately crushed by his abruptness, Maddy watched him scowling at the road ahead as if it deserved his revenge.
And yet despite his sullen, antisocial manner, he was quite a dish in a basic kind of way: tall, well-built and undeniably handsome.
The smell of smoke hung around him and he clearly hadn’t washed his clothes for days or cleaned his fingernails. His hands were ingrained with dirt and there were streaks of black decorating his broad forehead and strong cheekbones. Even his voice sounded husky, as if he’d chain-smoked all his life.
But his profile was to die for: a dark and brooding eye beneath a lowered black brow, the firm jut of a nose and a chiselled mouth that Michelangelo would have been proud to have created. Though, she mused, Michelangelo might have stopped short at the designer stubble, however sexy it looked.
This was a true labouring man, she decided. Rough and ready. No conversationalist. And yet passion lurked in those dark eyes. Pity Dex couldn’t be more like him instead of detached and distant. Thinking of their imminent meeting, she shuddered with apprehension.
‘If you’re cold, there’s a sack in the back you could put over your shoulders,’ he suggested sardonically.
Her mouth twitched at the caveman offer and, thinking of Debbie’s instructions to stay in character, she raked up a reply to suit her personality.
‘A sack? Moi? I’d rather freeze,’ she said with a giggle and, in the absence of a decent chat, opened her book on getting her man for some quick revision.
The truck suddenly lurched forwards and she struggled to find her place as the Hunk hurtled along the motorway with scant regard for the suspension—either the truck’s or hers.
All she needed to do, she reminded herself, dismissing her grumpy companion for more important things, was to make sure her behaviour was the exact opposite of what the book advised.
She mustn’t be a woman with wife potential. She had to be a ‘good for now’ kind of girl. That was a task she felt was within her grasp, since she’d practised on the rugby team. They’d been hugely appreciative and their delight in her company had given her confidence a huge boost.
It had been fun, too. The most fun she’d had ever. Nothing heavy, just wall-to-wall flirting and endless laughter. All perfectly harmless.
Frowning with concentration, she delved into the chapter on how to charm a man with sweetness and submission. Always agree, always defer. Hmm.
Her eyes gleamed as she planned her tactics on going completely against her character and doing nothing of the kind.
By putting a spanner in the attempted matchmaking, she was only being kind. Her subterfuge was all for the best. Dexter needed a battleaxe of a wife who’d stand up to his domineering grandmother.
Maddy smiled wryly to herself. Just as she needed a gritty, assertive husband who wouldn’t shake like a jelly when he met her stern grandfather.
None of her boyfriends had stood the Grandpa test. They had all run a mile at his first bark and hadn’t even made it to his bite. But they’d been pretty lacklustre, if she was honest.
Her face grew wistful. When would a gorgeous, independent cuss of a man ever look twice at a mouse like her? Of course, she could probably lure a guy who fell for her brassy, extrovert image, but where would that get her? She was really quiet and shy. Would she want to live a lie for the rest of her life?
She checked her useless thoughts. This was ridiculous! It was silly to even contemplate the idea of marriage. It would never happen.
Sadly she closed the book, the corners of her bright mouth drooping. She wanted to be someone’s wife. Wanted babies, loads and loads of them. Like her friends, who seemed to be forever swelling or giving birth or pushing buggies and wailing about sleepless nights. But she couldn’t have children and that was that. She knew the score.
Her hand came to rest on her abdomen. Her mouth tightened in suppressed anguish as she remembered vividly the agony of the infection which had ruined her chances of motherhood some ten years earlier, when she was just twenty.
Despite her efforts, she couldn’t stop herself reliving those mind-numbing moments when the doctor had sat on the end of her bed and sympathetically said…
‘Feel all right?’ asked the Hunk abruptly.
She jerked and hastily drew her hand away, startled that he’d noticed her mournful expression. She’d thought he’d been intent on glaring the road into abject submission.
‘OK,’ she mumbled unconvincingly, unable to lift the dullness of her voice.
Unexpected tears welled up in her eyes. Over the years she’d had to accept the fact that she’d never have a child, but somehow coming to Portugal had unsettled her emotions.
Her teeth clamped together as she tried to crush her useless, destructive thoughts. But she would have given anything to have a baby. Anything.
Without comment, he swerved to the inside lane and took an exit which led them to a small, bustling village. Struggling fiercely with her stupidly wayward emotions, Maddy didn’t recognise it at all but was too choked up to ask what he was doing.
And yet there was something calming about the twisty cobbled roads lined with crumbling white houses. The village clearly was a poor one, but roses trailed around the wonky wooden doors and geraniums tumbled down from pots on rickety balconies.
Everything came flooding back to her. This was the old Portugal, the one she’d known as a child, and far more recognisable than the smart motorway and huge villa developments they’d passed so far.
Trundling beneath the lines of washing which hung across the street, the truck finally stopped in a small square surrounded by orange trees. A wonderful silence descended, broken only by the sound of birdsong. It was heavenly.
The truck driver turned to her and scowled. ‘Out!’
Grimly he walked around and jerked at her door, the metal screeching in protest as his brute strength levered the door completely open.
She stared at his unfriendly face in dismay as it became apparent that he wasn’t intending to have a potentially weepy woman in the cab and had decided to abandon her, then and there.
He pinned her with his cold and uncompromising stare. And then anger gave her the courage to fling herself in the direction of the driver’s seat. For a moment she found herself intimately linked with the gear stick and then she was tumbling into place and switching on the ignition.
Which was just as quickly switched off by a large, warm
