‘But I’m not really hungry.’ Her stomach chose that moment to growl so loudly to reveal her lie that his lips twitched.
Her lips stretched into a rueful smile that reached her amber eyes and immediately lit up her face, dissolving some of the tension.
‘All right, I am starving actually,’ she admitted, pressing a hand to her stomach. ‘But I’ll be fine.’ There seemed to be plenty of tea and coffee in the kitchen area. ‘I really don’t want Jamie to wake up alone in a strange place.’ This place was so enormous that even if she was alerted by the baby intercom it would take her far too long to reach him.
‘I assumed you wouldn’t,’ he replied calmly. ‘I’ll bring up a tray for you.’
‘You will?’
Her astonishment seemed to amuse him. ‘On occasion I have been known to tie my own shoelaces. Make yourself comfortable and I’ll be back shortly.’ The advice was slung over his shoulder as he exited through the door.
What she would really have liked was to take advantage of that spectacular en suite bathroom with its copper tub massive enough that you could swim or at least float in it. It was really calling to her and she could almost hear it as she lifted a lid on first one and then another of the glass flagons. Each sweet-smelling oil had an even more gorgeously heady scent than the one before it.
She reached out and experimentally pressed a button set into the marble tiled wall, jumping when the room was filled with music. Hastily depressing it again, she stood statue-still, listening intently, her eyes wide above the hand pressed to her mouth, but after a minute she relaxed; the noise had not woken Jamie.
Resisting the bath, she stripped off her clothes and left them where they fell, suddenly too weary to care about the crumpled heap.
The fabric of the building might be ancient but it was clear that it boasted the latest technology. She ran a finger around the edge of the bath tub and allowed herself an indulgent moment to fantasise wistfully about floating in the foamy sweet-smelling suds, just to wash away the day’s grime and ease the ache of tension in her limbs, before regretfully turning her back on it.
Grabbing a towel from the pile that was neatly stacked on a chest, she headed for the shower, very conscious that she had no idea how long she had before Roman appeared with her food, and as she didn’t want to be drifting around in a towel when he did she allowed herself the minimum time under the reviving spray.
Still damp and swathed in a towel, her skin pink and tingling from the arrows of water, she tipped out her carefully packed overnight bag onto the silk cover of the four-poster bed. Rifling through the spilled contents, she extracted the clean underclothes and the jeans and tee shirt she always packed in her hand luggage after the last time her hold cases had ended up on another continent, leaving her without even a toothbrush.
At least this time her luggage was not too far away, just in the car outside, but in some ways it was equally inaccessible. She had no intention of risking getting lost or setting off some sort of alarm trying to find it.
She had the basics, but not the time; in a feverish haste she had reached the stage of dragging a comb through her hair when she heard a sound which, unless she was being visited by one of the resident ghosts the place probably boasted, was Roman.
It offended her innately neat nature but she ignored the accusing pile of clothes she could see through the open bathroom door and glanced in the mirror, wishing she had time to disguise the violet smudges beneath her eyes, before she dashed for the door, arriving in the sitting room breathless and barefoot. The latter didn’t register with her until his interest in her pink-painted toenails brought her own attention downwards.
At least it was an excuse not to look at him and it gave her heart a chance to slow to a bearable canter.
‘I was in a hurry,’ she said, her voice indistinct as she shook her wet head, sending drops of moisture flying, and wondering why on earth she sounded so defensive.
Roman wrenched his eyes clear of her denim-covered thighs, trying hard not to notice that she possessed the sort of legs that seemed to go on for ever. Her black tee shirt was emblazoned with a daisy logo and was tucked neatly into her narrow waist.
Catching the direction of his gaze and misinterpreting it, she touched the daisy with a not quite steady finger. ‘Jamie was shopping with me and he loved this one. I’m afraid the rest of my bags are still in the car.’
‘He has excellent taste.’ Roman nodded towards the door. ‘The rest of your things are there. I’ll take them through into your room.’
Her eyes flew to the stack of cases by the door that led out to the corridor, then back to his face. ‘How?’
‘I waved my magic...’ He paused, because she didn’t look in the mood to appreciate his laboured humour. ‘I brought them up for you before I collected the supper tray.’
He had been in her room, just a wall separating him from her naked in the shower... She gulped. ‘I didn’t hear you come in.’
‘Relax, I left them outside the door until I came back. I waited to be invited in.’
She felt her stomach muscles tremble in response to the
