Ella’s heart pounded in her chest. Never had a man had such an effect on her before. And never had her mind betrayed her with the errant thought that rang through her entire being.
This man is going to break my heart.
The shock and sheer ridiculousness of the thought made her shake her head, causing the figure to stop in his tracks. Ella used the brief respite to breathe. Despite his imposing stature, she couldn’t sense any form of threat coming from him.
‘I’m sorry about Dorcas—she gets excited when we meet other people.’
At this, the beast—Dorcas—decided its master’s command had been lifted and she unfolded her giant frame and came close enough to nudge Ella’s hand with her nose. As Ella absentmindedly stroked the huge hound, it took a moment for her tired mind to understand the source of her confusion because, although she understood him completely, she couldn’t quite understand why he’d spoken in Russian.
Interpreting her confusion, the man pressed on. ‘Je suis désolé, vous m’avez surpris.’
He smiled apologetically, as if this strange encounter were his fault and not hers for walking through the woods at some awful hour of the morning dressed in...dressed in... Oh, God! Ella almost groaned, but turned it into a rueful laugh.
‘Perhaps we could continue in English, if you speak it. It’s been a...long day.’
‘It is only six o’clock in the morning, so I must assume a very long day.’ He looked her over and she suddenly realised that he could quite easily misinterpret the reason for her appearance, which made her think of all the reasons she was in the woods in a ball gown and red velvet cape after spending twelve hours by her grandmother’s bedside.
The forest’s dew had soaked into the cloak and, more than its heaviness, she now felt cold. Cold and hungry and tired. But as she began to shiver she realised that it was not from the damp or the temperature, but the effect of being this man’s sole focus.
‘Where are you going?’ he asked gently, as if not wanting to scare her further.
‘My grandmother’s house. It’s just up the path and not far.’
She braced herself as Dorcas leaned into her, almost at waist height.
‘Dorcas!’ the man almost growled at his dog in warning, yet the dog only answered with a playful yip before collapsing in a heap at Ella’s feet and showing her belly as if to say, Here. Rub here.
‘Stop flirting, Dorcas,’ came her owner’s somewhat exasperated response as he tucked the lead he’d been holding into the pocket of his wax jacket.
Ella couldn’t help but smile at the interaction and it felt almost strange and unfamiliar on features that had felt so weighed down by worry and stress. She bent down to rub the massive beast at her feet and laughed as she realised that Dorcas had trapped her cloak beneath her and effectively pinned her in place. But in truth she felt more trapped by the steady gaze of the man whose name she still did not know.
‘Out past your curfew?’ he asked.
‘I... I was at a party in Moscow when I got a phone call to say that my grandmother had been taken to hospital.’
His frown deepened and for a heartbeat Ella wondered what he might look like when not frowning. She could sense a barrage of questions building between them but he asked the most important.
‘Is she okay?’
‘I don’t know,’ she replied honestly, catching a moment of concern in his stunning eyes before something fell over them, closing off whatever she might have seen there.
‘Are you?’ he asked. Incapable of answering that question, of putting words to whatever it was she was currently feeling, she shook her head. ‘We’re going that way if you would like the company?’ the beast’s owner pressed on.
Dorcas elegantly leapt from the forest floor as if punctuating her master’s query with excitement and joy, bringing yet another unfamiliar smile to Ella’s features.
‘Yes, that would be nice,’ she replied truthfully, and suddenly she felt she might buckle under the exhaustion she’d held at bay for the last twelve hours.
‘Roman,’ he said, holding out his hand.
‘Ella,’ she replied and felt a jolt of electricity snap through her body from where her hand met his. He laid his other hand on top as if holding hers in place when she would have pulled away and, rather than feeling uncertain or awkward, she simply felt...safe.
The short journey to her grandmother’s cottage passed almost in silence and Ella found herself unusually at peace in Roman’s company.
They came to the edge of the forest and followed a dirt track leading towards the little chocolate box cottage that Ella loved so much. Her hand naturally went out to caress the small stone pillars either side of the short driveway, as she did every single time she came here. Almost on autopilot, she went to the large, worn wooden door and pushed it open—her grandmother never having once locked the entrance
