opened her mouth, thought better of arguing and shut it again. ‘Fine. Just leave your phone on.’
Not a chance. He’d suddenly realised how bored he was, how dull and repetitive and endless his working life had become. He’d been in New York closing another deal, and he’d had six hours’ sleep in three days. He was tired, he was stifled, and he needed some down time.
And so now, today, just for a while, Nick Barron was slipping the leash.
CHAPTER ONE
IT WAS deathly quiet on the site.
Well, it would be, Georgie thought philosophically. She’d sent all the workmen home days ago, and if it wasn’t for the fact that she couldn’t sleep at night for worry, she wouldn’t have been here either, but she had nothing else to do and she’d cleaned the house to within an inch of its life since her father had gone into hospital, so she’d come down to go over the figures—again!—to see if there was a magic trick or two she’d missed.
There wasn’t.
She propped her head on her hands and sighed, staring out over the deserted site to the sea. No magic tricks, no way out, just the bank about to foreclose and her father’s health in ruins.
Not to mention her dreams.
She stood up and pulled on her coat. Sitting here was achieving nothing. She might as well check the buildings, make sure there hadn’t been any vandalism. She reached for the obligatory hard hat and wrinkled her nose. She hated the hat, but rules were rules.
Archie was at her heels, his stubby tail wriggling with enthusiasm, and his cheerful grin made her smile. ‘Come on, then, little man. Let’s go and check it all out.’
She shut the door of the site office, crossed the site in the biting March wind and unlocked the side door of the main house—the door that, without an unprecedented stroke of luck, would never now become her front door.
They climbed the stairs together, her footsteps echoing in the emptiness, Archie’s toenails clattering on the wooden treads, and finally they emerged into the room at the top of the big square tower. It wasn’t huge, but it was her eyrie, the room she’d hoped to have as her bedroom, with windows on three sides and the most stunning views over the bay and far out to sea.
It was also the best place to view the site, and she stared down over the mangled earth, the pegged-out footings, the half-finished coach-house conversions, the sanatorium as yet untouched, the chapel almost completely concealed by the trees that had grown up to surround it.
So much to do, so much potential—such a waste. Even if Broomfield came up with the money, the design was inherently flawed and horribly over-developed.
‘In your opinion,’ she reminded herself sternly. ‘You aren’t the only person in the world. Other people are allowed a say.’
Even if they had no vision, no imagination, no—no soul, dammit. She turned away in disgust, and her eye was caught by a lone figure standing on the edge of the lawn below the house, staring out over the sea.
‘Who’s that, Arch?’ she murmured, and the dog, picking up on her sudden stillness, flew down the stairs and out of the door, racing off across the site, barking his head off.
Rats. The last thing—absolutely the last thing—Georgie needed this morning was a visitor. She’d got yet more phone calls to make, because unless she could screw some kind of sensible answer out of Andrew Broomfield by the end of the day, the bank was going to take them to the cleaners.
Big time.
And now, she realised, running down the stairs after the dog, she had some random stranger wandering around all over her site, uninvited and unannounced, and the place was a minefield. The last thing—the other last thing, in fact—that she needed at the moment was someone slapping a lawsuit on her because he’d tripped over a brick!
‘Archie! Come here!’ she yelled, but the wind caught her voice and anyway, Archie had better things to do. The little terrier was on his back, legs in the air, having the tummy-tickle of his life, and obedience wasn’t remotely on his agenda. Knowing when she was beaten, she switched her attention to the man. Maybe she’d have more luck there.
‘Excuse me!’
He straightened up, to Archie’s disappointment, and turned towards her, his expression concealed by the wrap-around designer sunglasses shielding his eyes. They didn’t hide the smile, though, and her heart did a crazy little flip-flop in response.
‘Good morning.’
Oh, lord, his voice was like rough silk, and her heart skittered again.
‘Morning.’
It was the only word she could manage. She took the last two strides across the mangled drive, scrambled up beside him on the lawn and tilted back her head, one hand clamped firmly on her hard hat.
He towered over her—not that that was hard. If only he’d been on the drive, she could have positioned herself above him on the lawn; even that slight advantage would have helped, she thought, but then he peeled off the sunglasses and she found herself staring up into eyes the colour of rain-washed slate, and her breath jammed in her throat.
No. Flat on his back he’d still have the advantage. There was just something about him, something very male and confident and self-assured that dried up her mouth and made her legs turn to jelly.
If he was a representative of the bank she was stuffed. The last man they’d sent from the bank had been small and mild and ineffectual and she’d managed to bamboozle him with one hand tied behind her back.
Not this one, in his soft, battered leather jacket and designer jeans, with his searching eyes and uncompromising jaw. This one was a real handful. Well, tough. So was she, and she had more riding on it. If he was from the bank, she’d take him by the scruff of the neck and show him exactly why they needed so much money—and he’d listen. She wouldn’t give him a choice.
Anyway, he couldn’t be all bad, because Archie was standing on his back legs, filthy front paws propped up on that expensively clad thigh, his tail going nineteen to the dozen as he licked furiously at the hand dangling conveniently in range, the fingers tickling him still.
There was a possibility, of course, that he could just be an idly curious member of the public. She straightened her shoulders, slapped her leg for the dog and sucked in a breath.
‘Can I help you? Archie, come here!’
‘I don’t know yet. I was just having a look round—getting a feel for it.’
The tension eased, replaced instantly by irritation. The idly curious were the bane of her life, and this one was no exception. Even with those gorgeous eyes.
No. Forget the eyes. ‘I’m sorry, you can’t just look round without reporting to the site office,’ she told him firmly. ‘Archie, here! Now! There’s a sign there forbidding people to walk about the site without authority. Visitors must report to the site office on the way in. You can’t just crawl about all over it, it’s dangerous—!’
‘Don’t tell me—you’re the health and safety official,’
