With a twist of his full lips he cocked his head and cast that searing glance over the champagne label. ‘This was not a mistake, however. This was a nice choice.’ He glanced back at her, laughter glinting in his eyes. ‘At nine hundred dollars a bottle, you’re not afraid to set your value high.’
What? Merle nearly choked again.
‘It cost how much?’ Her voice faded in a welter of shyness.
Ash smiled and Merle just about died. The transformation from serious sex god, to smiling sex god made every muscle inside her squeeze. She could only stare—yet again rendered stupid. He met her gaze square on. But as her brain slowly came back online she registered a tired edge in his eyes that meant that his smile didn’t quite ring true. Drawing in a deep breath, she dragged her gaze back to the bottle and regretted ever thinking it was okay to accept the offer to have anything she wanted from the cellar.
‘I had no idea. I’m sorry,’ she mumbled, even more mortified. Nine hundred dollars? It was incredible to her that a bottle of anything could possibly cost that much. ‘Mr Castle said I could—’
‘Look, sweetheart, you fill your bath with it for all I care,’ Ash interrupted her embarrassed explanation with an almost dismissive boredom. ‘Bathe in every last drop if you want.’
But then his gaze skimmed across her shoulders and something else gleamed again.
She had the scandalous sensation that he was envisaging licking the droplets from her skin. And she wanted him to. Merle—who’d never wanted any man near her—suddenly wanted the biggest playboy of all to do what he wanted with his tongue and her skin, and how was it possible that she was slithering beneath some wordless spell?
Instinctively sinking lower into the water, Merle felt that awful softening deep inside. It was shockingly inappropriate, and she was appalled by herself as much as she was by him. Merle didn’t feel hot and bothered by anyone. Yet she was unable to tear her gaze away from Ash Castle. It was as if she’d met a mythological creature—something rare and impossible. People simply didn’t look like this in real life. Not with glinting strength and sinfully arching dark eyebrows and casually tousled, slightly too long hair that fell just so. Not with sharply defined jawlines, even when masked by the stubble of a long day, not with full, sensual mouths that curved upwards in invitation even when in repose.
But now his expression clouded as he gazed back at her. As she watched—too flummoxed to be able to do anything else—a heated heaviness filled the atmosphere between them. Neither of them moved. Merle didn’t even breathe as his expression intensified. If she weren’t already going crazy, she’d think he was as captivated by her as she was him.
‘Do you like the taste?’ he muttered. ‘Because I like the look. Very much.’
She simply couldn’t reply.
‘And I must be tired,’ he muttered as he lifted the champagne and took a long swig straight from the overpriced bottle, his hot gaze not leaving her face. ‘I’m so tempted—’
‘I’ve been hired by Mr Castle to sort out your father’s collections,’ Merle blurted quickly, knowing her cheeks were blazing with a dreadful blush.
Ash stilled for a second, then slowly set the bottle back down on the side of the bath. ‘Pardon?’
She didn’t believe the laziness in his tone, not when she saw the lethal alertness that had sprung into his eyes.
‘Mr Leo Castle hired me to sort out your father’s things,’ Merle mumbled miserably, barely able to inject volume into her voice and utterly unable to hold his gaze. ‘I’m an archivist. I’ve been staying here since Wednesday. I’m working on the papers in the boxes first.’
‘An archivist?’
She hesitated, taking in a breath to summon the equilibrium to explain further. She hadn’t spoken this much in days. ‘Aside from the rare books, there are several dozen boxes stacked in the garage. I’m also cataloguing the art and the wine collections, though expert valuers will deal with those once I’ve done the detailed lists. I’m only doing the storage and destruction plan for the papers.’ She paused for breath and glanced up to find he wasn’t really listening to her explanation anyway.
‘That’s why you’re in my bath?’
‘I didn’t know it was your bath,’ she said. ‘I didn’t want to use the main bedroom. I thought this was one of the guest rooms.’
Something flickered in his expression before he shut it back to bland. ‘I guess in recent years that is what it has been. But a long time ago it was my room.’ He stared at her a little longer. ‘I feel surprisingly disappointed.’
Her jaw dropped. She ought to be outraged, but the awful thing was she actually felt a touch flattered. Maybe the champagne had already had more of an effect on her than she’d realised?
‘How long are you here for?’ His forehead wrinkled.
She had to swallow before she could answer. ‘Six weeks. But it might run a little longer as there’s more than was initially listed...’
He lifted one of the large, fluffy white towels from the rack and placed it beside the champagne bottle. ‘I didn’t realise Leo had got that underway.’
‘Mr Castle seemed to think the place would be empty for the duration of my contract.’
‘Ordinarily he would’ve been right.’ Ash’s mouth tightened. ‘Maybe it’s best if we continue this conversation downstairs. Ten minutes, okay?’
She stared at him, shocked. Wasn’t he going to apologise for thinking she’d been hired as his evening’s entertainment?
He stared back at her, his head tilting as he read her expression, and that wicked smile flashed again, banishing what had barely been a hint of remorse. ‘Unless you’re happy to negotiate terms in here...?’
‘Of course not,’ she mumbled.
‘Don’t be embarrassed. I’m not.’ He seemed amused by the colour she knew was climbing her cheeks again. ‘Sex work is legal in this country.’
‘I’m aware,
