He glanced back at her as he refilled the glass.
‘Are you telling me that you flew from California
‘Overnight. I slept most of the way,’ he assured her. The first-class sky-bed he could afford these days was a very different experience from his early cattle-class flights.
‘Even so, you shouldn’t be working with machinery. What about Health and Safety?’
‘Goods and Services, Health and Safety? What are you, Annie? A lawyer?’
‘Just a concerned citizen.’
‘Is that so? Well, if you don’t tell, I won’t,’ he replied flippantly, refusing to think about how long it had been since anyone, apart from his mother, had been concerned about him. It was his choice, he reminded himself.
‘I’m serious,’ she said, not in the least bit amused. ‘I wouldn’t forgive myself if you were hurt fixing my car. It can wait until tomorrow.’
‘You’re
‘Is that supposed to make me feel better?’
‘It’s supposed to make you feel grateful,’ he said, determined to put an end to the conversation and get out of there. ‘Since you’re so eager to be on your way.’ Then, as he noticed her glasses lying on the draining board, he frowned. ‘And actually,’ he said thoughtfully as he picked them up and, realising that they were wet and muddy, rinsed them under the tap, ‘I’m hoping a taste of the real thing will encourage her to reconsider a career as a motor mechanic and finish school.’
‘Always a good plan,’ Annie agreed. ‘How old is she?’
‘Sixteen.’
He picked up a dish cloth and, having dried the frames, began to polish the lenses.
‘In that case, she doesn’t have much choice in the matter. She can’t leave school until she’s seventeen.’
‘I know that. You know that. Which may go some way to explain why she went to so much trouble to get herself suspended from her boarding school.’
Annie frowned. ‘She’s at boarding school?’
‘Dower House.’
‘I see.’
She could sympathise with her father’s lack of enthusiasm at her career choice after he’d sent her to one of the most expensive boarding schools in the country. The kind that turned out female captains of industry, politicians, women who changed the world. The school where, two years ago, she’d given the end-of-year address to the girls, had presented the prizes.
She clearly hadn’t made that much of an impression on young Xandra Saxon. Or maybe the haircut was worse than she thought.
‘Obviously she’s not happy there.’
‘I wanted the best for her. I live in the States and, as you may have gathered, her mother is easily distracted. It seems that she’s on honeymoon at the moment.’
‘Her third,’ Annie said, remembering what Xandra had said.
‘Second. We didn’t have one. I was a first-year student with a baby on the way when we got married.’
‘That must have been tough,’ she said.
‘It wasn’t much fun for either of us,’ he admitted. ‘Penny went home to her mother before Xandra was due and she never came back. I don’t blame her. When I wasn’t studying, I was working every hour just to keep us fed and housed. It wasn’t what she’d expected from the son of George Saxon.’
‘I’m sorry.’
‘So am I.’
Then, because he clearly didn’t want to talk about it and she didn’t much want to hear about a youthful marriage that appeared never to have had a chance, she said, ‘So, what did she do? Xandra. To get herself suspended.’
‘She borrowed the head’s car and took it for a joyride.’
‘Ouch.’ Sixteen years old, so she wouldn’t have a licence or insurance. That explained a lot. ‘Attention- seeking?’
‘Without much success. Presumably anticipating something of the sort, Penny had the foresight to switch off her cellphone.’
‘Then it’s just as well Xandra has you.’
His smile was of the wry, self-deprecating kind. ‘I’m the last person she’d have called, Annie. Much as I would have wished it otherwise, I’m little more to my daughter than a signature on a cheque.’
‘You think so?’
George held the spectacles up to the light to check, amongst other things, that they were smear-free before looking at Annie.
‘I know so. I’m only here because my father had a heart attack,’ he said, taking a step towards her and, as she looked up, he slipped her spectacles back on her nose, holding them in place for a moment, his thumbs against the cool skin stretched taut over fine cheekbones.
Her lips parted on a tiny gasp but she didn’t protest or pull away from him and for what seemed like an eternity he simply cradled her face.
There was no sound. Nothing moved.
Only the dark centre at the heart of eyes that a man might drown in widened to swallow the dazzling blue. He’d have had to be made of ice to resist such a blatant invitation, but then, according to any number of women he’d known, he was ice to the bone…
‘The first rule of wearing a disguise, Annie…’ he began, touching his lips briefly to hers to prove, if only to himself, that he was immune.
Discovering, too late, that he was not.
CHAPTER FIVE
ANNIE’S lips were soft, yielding, as they parted on a little gasp of surprise. Not the response of a seductress bent on luring a man to his doom, he thought, more the reaction of a girl being kissed for the first time.
Arousing in a way that no practised kiss could ever be.
And when, slightly breathless, he drew back to look at her, her eyes were closed and the mouth that had tempted him to take such outrageous liberties was smiling as if it had discovered something brand-new.
‘The first rule of wearing a disguise,’ he tried again, his voice barely audible as he struggled not to kiss her again, ‘is never to let it slip, even for a moment.’
It took a moment for his words to get past the haze of desire but then her eyes flew open and he felt the heat beneath his fingertips as colour seared her cheekbones. Whether at the way she’d responded to his touch or at being found out in her deception, he’d have been hard put to say.
‘H-how did you know?’ she asked, making no effort to put distance between them, which appeared to answer that question. The innocent blushes had to be as fake as her glasses.
‘Since you weren’t wearing them when you checked your messages, it seemed likely that they were purely for decoration,’ he said.
‘Decoration?’ The beginnings of a smile tugged once more at the corners of her mouth. ‘Hardly that.’
‘I’ve seen prettier,’ he admitted, struggling not to smile back.
‘The wretched things fell into the potato peelings. I put them on the draining board and then forgot all about them.’
As clear an admission of guilt as he’d ever heard.
‘You should have tossed them into the bin with the peelings.’
‘I doubt they’d have added much to the compost heap.’
