thankfully at a less ridiculous pace, and she reluctantly fell into step with him.
‘Taking a bit of time out to get a breath of fresh air.’
‘You seem to do quite a bit of that, don’t you? Breathing in the fresh air and covering great distances in the process?’
‘Yes, I like walking!’
They had reached his house. Actually just a few more minutes of running would have seen her safely to his front door instead of up a tree, not that that option was particularly appealing either, but at least her expensive skirt would still have been intact. Now it was fit only to join the beaded silver shoes in that great wardrobe in the sky.
‘You’ll have to get out of those things. You’re filthy.’
‘I want to go back to the house. I have to go back there. My clothes are all there.’
‘I’m not taking you. You’ve put me out already.’
‘I know it’s quite a walk, but you can drive me there, can’t you? I mean, you must have a car tucked away somewhere.’ Amy suddenly felt close to breaking-point. She wrapped her arms tightly around her body and kept herself very still so that she didn’t burst into tears.
‘I’ll run you a bath.’
‘Please take me back to the house. Please.’
‘You’re in no fit state,’ Rafael told her without preamble. ‘Never mind the state of your clothes, you look as though you’re about to collapse. You need to get yourself together. Now sit down. I’ll run you a bath and, while it’s running, I’ll make you something hot to drink.’
The woman was a nuisance but Rafael felt a twinge of concern if only because the same tiring feistiness that got on his nerves was so obviously missing in action.
Before she could launch into another round of pleading to be taken back to the house, he was heading up the stairs so that he could run her a bath. Then he fetched a clean towel from the cupboard and one of his shirts, which she would have to wear whether she liked it or not. He would stick her clothes in the wash and they would be clean in time for her in the morning. After that, he would send her on her way so that she could, presumably, continue to ruin her life by falling in love with inappropriate men.
He returned to find her slumped on the ground in the sitting room.
‘I didn’t want to get your nice clean furniture dirty,’ she said, meeting his questioning eyes. ‘I’m disgusting.’ She stood up. ‘I give you yet another pair of ruined shoes. Two in one day. A record even for me,’ she told him gloomily, dangling her sorry sandals in one hand.
‘What happened to pair one?’ Rafael found himself asking.
‘Waterlogged in a kayaking incident this morning.’
‘Right. What else? The bathroom is upstairs. Leave your clothes outside the door and I’ll stick them in the wash. They’ll be ready by morning.’
‘I can’t spend the night here.’ She hovered, tapping one bare foot behind her.
‘Have a bath. We’ll discuss it when you come out. I’ve left one of my shirts for you to put on.’
Well, there was nothing to discuss. Amy emerged twenty minutes later, feeling refreshed and wearing only her underwear and his white shirt, which reached a respectable mid-thigh level. It might seem odd to whoever happened to still be up that she was returning to the house in a man’s shirt and not much else, but with any luck the place would be dead. Probably aside from James, who would still be gambolling somewhere in the woods with his lady friend. She felt another attack of self-pity threaten and willed it away.
Rafael, looking disgustingly bright-eyed and bushy-tailed, was waiting for her in the sitting room with a cup of hot chocolate on the table, which he pointed at as soon as he saw her.
His shirt drowned her and she was slight enough to begin with. She had scrubbed off all the warpaint and her skin was satin-smooth with a faint golden tan that must have accumulated over the summer. Her eyebrows, in contrast to the vanilla-coloured, unruly hair, were dark. He wondered whether it was this unlikely contrast that lent her face such animation, even when she wasn’t speaking. Such as now.
‘Feel better?’
‘Not much. Thanks for asking.’ Amy curled her legs under her and reached forward for the mug, enjoying the creaminess of the drink. She hadn’t had hot chocolate for ages. It reminded her of her childhood.
Rafael frowned, a little disconcerted by the bluntness of the reply to a perfectly polite question.
‘Your clothes are in the wash,’ he informed her, skirting around his reluctant curiosity. ‘So, I suppose I could drive you back but the car is parked a walk away.’
‘Why?’
‘Why what?’
‘Why is your car parked a walk away? Don’t your employers think that you might want to go out now and again? You might be a very diligent gardener, but don’t they think that you might want a bit of time out now occasionally?’
‘Easier to park it behind the copse on the lane out of the grounds. The alternative would be to drive over the lawns or, of course, through the trees. The grounds were designed with aesthetics in mind and, believe it or not, a strip of tarmac winding across the manicured gardens wasn’t considered particularly fetching.’
‘Do you ever stop being sarcastic?’ She sniffed, aware that her composure was very fragile and the gardener was not the sort to make a sympathetic listener.
Amy looked at him. He was leaning forwards, elbows on knees, his hands dangling lightly between his legs. For someone who had been unexpectedly dragged out of a deep sleep, he seemed very well dressed, in a pair of khaki shorts and a short-sleeved shirt, with some worn tan loafers.
‘You weren’t sleeping, were you?’ she asked, to distract herself from thinking about her reasons for being in his house. ‘I didn’t drag you out of bed with my yelling, did I? You don’t look like someone who’s been interrupted in the middle of a deep sleep.’
‘I was…working, as a matter of fact…’
‘You were working?’ She grinned, forgetting the trauma of her evening for a few minutes. She noticed the sprinkling of dark hair visible just where his collar was open and hurriedly averted her eyes. She wasn’t sure why exactly she was aware of the man, but she was. She put it down to his barefaced arrogance, which would get under anyone’s skin. ‘Working on what?’ she asked, still grinning. ‘No, don’t tell me…that plot of yours to get rid of the bugs in the rose bushes! Why did you tell me that I’d woken you up? Did you want to make me feel even more guilty than I already felt?’
‘There are two bedrooms but one’s not made up. I’ll take that one and you can have my bed.’
‘No way. I’m not sleeping in your bed!’
‘Why not?’ Rafael asked wearily. ‘Come on. Drink that up and go upstairs.’
Amy flushed. He had used that tone of voice with her before. In fact, he seemed to have made
