The Billionaire Affair

‘Call me Linda. I only come over Ms-ish when I’m on my dignity!’ A disarming grin then a square, capable hand was extended and was taken.

‘And I’m Caroline. Tell me, is Mr Dexter staying too, or is this a flying visit?’ She hoped it was the latter, but she wouldn’t put money on it.

‘Staying, as far as I know. He comes and goes. Usually he just drops by from time to time to keep an eye on work in progress. But this time he arrived with a heap of luggage. Now…’ a quick glance at the man-sized watch she wore ‘…I’ll get lunch on the table. It’s cold; I’m not much of a hand when it comes to cooking. Admin’s my line and there won’t be a cook in residence for another month, so you’re going to have to take pot luck, I’m afraid.’

A live-in cook as well as a housekeeper to ensure the smooth day-to-day running of the house. Dexter must have decided to make Langley Hayes his permanent home she mused as Linda left the room. Showing that the wild, penniless youngster could lord it over the village just as her father had done? Only in better style, with far more money to throw around.

Sucking her lower lip between her teeth Caroline methodically began to unpack. In a way she couldn’t blame Dexter for what he was doing. Brought up by his mother—a rather fearsome woman, she remembered—paying a small rent for the dubious delights of living in a near derelict cottage on her father’s estate which no one else would dream of inhabiting, the unconventional pair had been looked down on by the majority of the villagers. It would take a strong-minded man to resist the temptation to come back and display his new-found affluence.

Not that his motives interested her, of course. They didn’t. Her only concern was getting the job done and getting back to London.

Aware of the passage of time, she squashed the childish impulse to refuse to go down to lunch at all. Refusing to face problems wasn’t her style.

And he was a problem, she admitted as she opened the breakfast-room door a few minutes later. He was waiting for her, his back to the tall window that framed a view of newly manicured parkland. Tall, tough, beautifully built, even more compellingly handsome than he had been twelve years ago.

But there was something missing. There was no sign of the former tenderness, or the sexily inviting smile that had captivated her, had bound her to him during that lost, lazy, loving summer. The man he had become was arrogant, his slight smile insolent, the dark glitter of his eyes speaking of derision overlaid with the bleak menace of an anger she couldn’t understand. If anyone had the right to be angry it was she.

‘So you decided not to ask for a tray in your room. Bravo!’

The nerve-pricking insolence deepened his smile. Caroline went very still. This had to stop, this needling. She opened her mouth to tell him as much but her lips remained parted and silent as he gestured with one finely boned, strong hand, ‘Shall we eat?’

The small circular table had been haphazardly set with earthenware plates of cold-cut roasts and uninspired salads. But there was wine, an excellent muscat, she noted as she reluctantly took her place, vowing not to touch a drop. She needed to keep a clear head when dealing with the man who carried such an aura of danger.

She shivered suddenly and if she’d hoped she could keep that betraying reaction to herself she was doomed to disappointment.

‘Cold?’ An upwards twitch of one straight black brow. ‘I thought it was unseasonably warm for mid-April.’ He lifted the wine from the ice bucket, but she quickly placed her hand over her glass.

‘No?’ He poured sparingly for himself, his movements deft, undeniably pleasing. ‘Then do help yourself—I think we’ve been given beef.’ A semi-humorous glance at her pale, set features. ‘And I apologise for the cheap plates and cutlery. But that’s the way the cookie crumbles. Your father must have sold all the family silver along with the Royal Worcester.’

They’d eaten from Minton, not Worcester, the pieces mismatched but beautiful, the silver flatware heavy, with richly decorated handles. She felt colour stain the skin that covered her cheekbones.

‘Cut it out!’ she ground out unthinkingly, her lips tightening at his undisguised taunt. She hadn’t meant to rise, had decided to ignore any sly jibes coming from him, but it hadn’t happened; she hadn’t been able to help herself.

Her hands knotted together in her lap, she added heatedly, ‘I know why you wanted me to come here, so let’s take it as read, shall we? Then perhaps I can get on with the work you hired me for.’

The urge to get to her feet and walk out of this room was strong. But she wouldn’t do it; it would be another display of regrettable temperament, letting him know just how easily he could get to her.

So she sat mutinously still, hoping her features displayed nothing but boredom now. Until he leant back, one arm looping over the back of his chair, lazy mockery in his dark velvet voice.

‘So you tell me—why did I want you here?’

Anger kicked inside her again and she said goodbye to all her remaining control for the first time in years, huge, thickly lashed violet eyes snapping as they clashed with the black enigma of his. ‘Because my father called you the scum of the earth.’ She recalled his exact words, spoken contemptuously so long ago. ‘You stole from him, you were a danger to the morals of the village girls—’

That didn’t hurt her, not now, not after so many years! How could it?

‘You lived in squalor. So when father died, in debt, and you were able to buy up his property, you decided to drag me here and rub my nose in it!’

Suddenly running out of steam she sagged back. Since his callous betrayal of her younger self she’d learned not to have strong emotions, certainly not blind, unthinking anger. Still, she supposed, it was better said than not. Bottled anger festered, left scars.

‘Wrong,’ he said lightly, his long mouth twitching unforgivably, her tirade and character assassination not causing him a moment’s discomfiture. ‘But interesting. My mother and I lived in squalor because when we arrived in the village we couldn’t afford anything else and it gave your father a very small income while the cottage was in the process of falling down.

‘And as for stealing from him…’ long fingers played with the stem of his wine glass, the dark, hypnotic depths of his eyes holding hers ‘…I was fourteen when we came here and was under the mistaken impression that the trout in the stream that ran behind our hovel were free for the taking. Your father put me right with the aid of a rather threatening shotgun.

‘That said…’ his mouth hardened ‘…I didn’t bring you here to rub your disdainful little nose in my financial success. Your presence here is a necessity.’

‘Now,’ he inserted coolly, handing her the platter of cold meat, ‘I suggest we eat, and then you can get down to work.’

Once, he’d told her she was necessary to his happiness; now, her expertise was the only thing he wanted from her. She swallowed convulsively, wishing her mind didn’t stray into the past, comparing it to the uncomfortable present. Another impulse came to cut and run. But Edward would not be pleased, and that was putting it mildly. Dexter was paying handsomely for her presence here. Walk out and the gallery would lose a potentially valuable client, acquire a black mark against its venerable name.

Grimly, she speared a slice of beef, added a tomato and wondered if she’d be able to force any of it down. He hadn’t countered the claim that he’d been a moral danger to the village girls simply because he couldn’t.

Did he know he’d left at least one fatherless child behind him when he’d disappeared from the village, richer by the several hundred pounds her father had paid him to leave, an amount that must have seemed like a fortune to him back then? Of course he did. Maggie Pope had told him her baby daughter was his. He hadn’t wanted to know.

‘As I’m here to sort out the dross from the remaining good pieces, perhaps you would tell me where you’d like me to start. Or do I have a free hand?’

She did her best to sound brisk and business-like, to put the regrettable disturbance of the personal behind her. But recalling the part of her life that had left her disillusioned, hurt and betrayed had sapped her energy, had made her feel drained.

She was hardly in a fit condition to endure the long appraisal he gave her expensively tailored, slim jacket, the fine fabric and sophisticated style discreetly announcing a coveted designer label before he stated, ‘Start at the top and work down. I don’t think the contents of the attics have been looked at in years. And, I’ll warn you, you’ll find a fair amount of builders’ rubble—part of the roof had to be retiled—among the dust and grime of decades. It can be properly cleaned out once you’ve decided if there’s anything up there worth keeping.’

He finished the wine in his glass and said with a flicker of impatience, ‘If you’ve finished mangling your food perhaps you would make a start.’

He was vile! Caroline thought as she stood in the open attic doorway. He had looked at the way she was dressed and had deliberately sent her up here.

It was even worse than she’d remembered, lumps of fallen, crumbling plaster littered the cobweb-shrouded disintegrating boxes, weighed down the laughably named ragged and torn dust-sheets that only partly covered old, unwanted bits of furniture.

She had removed her stockings and replaced the high heels with Gucci loafers but they, and her suit, would be ruined.

Had he guessed that the things she’d brought with her were all beautiful and expensive, that she’d been determined that if he should show up he would see a cool, elegantly sophisticated career woman—in direct contrast to the wild, uninhibited young thing she had been when he’d held her in his arms, had made love to her, whispering of his adoration.

How he had changed! But, there again, maybe he hadn’t. That streak of cruelty had been inherent in his nature. He couldn’t have used and betrayed her, lied to her, if it hadn’t. Or abandoned the woman who had given birth to his child.

She turned abruptly on her heels and backtracked down the twisty attic staircase. Linda was at the kitchen table, making notes in a ledger.

Taking in the new quarry-tiled floor, the huge state-of-the-art cooking range, immense dishwasher and commercial-sized fridge, Caroline wondered briefly if Dexter intended to settle down to marriage, raise an enormous family, then dismissed that from her mind as something of no consequence and asked, ‘Do you have an overall I could borrow? I’ve been asked to clear out the attics.’

‘Oh lord, they’re filthy, aren’t they?’ Linda laid down her pen and gave her a sympathetic smile as she got to her feet. ‘I said the whole lot should be put on a bonfire, but the boss said there might be something of sentimental value. Apparently, this house was owned by some monumental old snob—been in the family for generations. He’s dead now, but there was a daughter. The boss said to leave it as it was. She might come back some time and be gutted if she found family stuff had been destroyed.’

Had Dexter really been that thoughtful? Something twisted sharply inside her. Had he really believed she might return at some time in the future? Had he taken his opportunity to force her to return to the family home when they’d eventually met up again because he wanted her to have anything of sentimental value?

And where did that leave her theory that his prime motivation was to turn the tables on her?

But she was too shaken by what she’d heard to try to work out his motives. She said heavily, ‘Then, he can’t have sent me to work in the attics solely because he wanted to see me get my hands dirty. I am the daughter of that monumental old snob.’

A heartbeat of silence. Linda gave her a startled look. ‘I’m sorry. I had no idea—’

‘Don’t worry about it. He was an incurable snob. He believed he had a position to uphold, but the problem was he didn’t have the wherewithal to sustain it.’

That had been common knowledge, he hadn’t known that the people from the village had laughed at him behind his back. She didn’t add that he’d been authoritarian, cold and unloving. He had been her father, after all. She owed his memory some loyalty.