The Rich Man's Mistress

‘Who,’ the voice said from above her, ‘the hell are you and what are you doing here?’

Less of a question and more of a demand for an immediate explanation. Miranda opened her eyes and found herself staring upwards at the harsh angles of an aggressively dominant face and at narrowed cobalt-blue eyes that were staring back at her with a mixture of suspicion and hostility.

He was wearing a baggy and very faded dark blue and white striped tee shirt and a pair of loose grey jogging pants that, like the shirt, seemed to have seen better days many moons before.

She forgot the pain in the ankle in the face of this overwhelming show of rudeness.

Never before in her life had any man ever reacted to her like this before! True, she probably wasn’t looking her best right at this very moment, but still. She felt her mouth droop into a petulant scowl which only made her unwelcome saviour narrow his fierce eyes even more.

‘Are you going to answer me?’ he demanded harshly.

Miranda sat forward and then winced as the pain shot straight from her ankle to the remainder of her body. ‘My foot!’

The man’s eyes travelled from her face to her foot and for a second she thought that he might ignore her expression of pain, but he didn’t. He removed his hands from his pockets and bent over to slowly ease her foot out of her ski boot; then he muttered something that sounded very much like an expletive as he saw her swelling ankle.

‘What happened?’ His long fingers were pressing against various parts of her burning, painful skin. They were cool and skilful and, combined with the relief of not being skewered by those dangerously blue eyes, she sank back against the arm of the sofa and stared upwards at the lofty ceiling.

‘I was skiing and I fell,’ Miranda said in a small voice and he muttered another impatient oath under his breath. ‘I’m sorry,’ she felt compelled to add defensively.

‘Keep still. I’ll be back in a moment.’

She watched his departing back and only felt herself relax when he was no longer in sight.

Trust her to stumble helplessly into a man, the first ever, who intimidated her. He was too tall, too powerfully built, too raw and far too grim. She wondered whether he had disappeared to find something to help her or whether he had simply gone in search of a map so that he could point her in the direction of the nearest other place of occupation and thereby save himself the inconvenience of having her around.

‘I don’t think it’s broken,’ he said, emerging with a box in his hand. ‘Badly sprained but not broken. How long have you been travelling on it?’

‘About half an hour.’ Miranda frowned. ‘I think. Look, you don’t have to do this,’ she said as he opened the box and began unravelling a strip of bandage. ‘I’m capable of seeing to my own ankle.’

‘You mean like you’re capable of skiing without injuring yourself? You bloody beginners should stick to the nursery slopes instead of thinking you can ski off-piste because it’s more exciting.’ He ripped the bandage with his teeth and began stretching it around her ankle, working very slowly and expertly.

‘I am not a beginner,’ she said coldly. ‘I happen to be an extremely good skier.’

The man briefly looked at her with cool disbelief before returning to his task, and Miranda clamped her teeth together firmly. He might have the manners of a warthog but she would not sink to his level. For a start, whether she liked it or not, she was now dependent on him, at least until she could make a phone call and get someone to come and fetch her. She was also too well-mannered to breeze past the normal rules of common courtesy the way he obviously had no qualms about doing.

‘How do you know it’s not broken?’ she asked and he glanced at her again.

‘Because I just do,’ he said curtly.

‘You’re a doctor, then, I take it?’

‘No, I’m not.’

‘Then, who and what are you?’

He didn’t answer. Instead he finished with her ankle while she continued to simmer with growing irritation at his attitude. And when he had finished he stood up and strolled towards the chair closest to the fire.

‘Are you going to answer me?’ She pulled off the woollen hat and her long blonde hair spilled over the arm of the sofa like a sheet of cream silk.

‘Let’s get one thing straight. You’re in my house and I’ll ask the questions. Got it?’

Miranda stared at him open-mouthed.

‘When I’m finished asking the questions and I’m satisfied with the answers, you can go and have a bath and get into some of my clothes.’

His arrogance hit her like a sledgehammer and left her speechless.

‘First of all, tell me just how you happened to be skiing here. Have you any idea how dangerous the vertical slopes to this place are?’

‘I—I got caught in an avalanche…’

‘Where?’

‘Where…what?’

‘Where was this avalanche?’

‘Near our Val d’Isère resort, as it happens. I…had a bit of an argument with my boyfriend…and…I went skiing to take my mind off things which was when the avalanche happened. Not a very big one but big enough to throw me off course…’

‘Bloody irresponsible woman,’ he muttered scathingly.

Miranda ignored the interruption. If she had been in possession of her limbs, she would have stormed out of his damned cabin even if the alternative had meant a night on a slope. Unfortunately the option was not available and she bit back her anger.

‘Before I could get my bearings, I found myself stuck in a blizzard and, after a while, I didn’t have a clue where I was. I—I saw a clump of trees and decided that I’d be better off there if the worse happened and I had to spend the night outside. I was so desperate to get there that I didn’t see where I was going and I fell over a protruding stump of tree and sprained my ankle. I then saw the light from your cabin and hobbled over.’

‘So no one knows where you are.’

Miranda didn’t like the sound of that. She propped herself up on her elbows and looked at him nervously. It occurred to her suddenly that he could be anyone. It was a little technicality that had been overlooked in her relief at being rescued from the driving snow and the prospect of hypothermia.

And he was not someone she could fight off should she need to. She was tall, standing a good five feet ten in stockinged feet, but she would put him at least three or four inches taller than her and there was a muscled strength to him that would add power to his height.

She had a sinking feeling when she met his blue eyes that he could read every wayward thought flitting through her brain.

‘So…’ Miranda cleared her throat ‘…have I answered all your questions satisfactorily?’

‘Oh, I haven’t asked the most important one yet…’ He smiled slowly and linked his fingers on his lap, stretching out his long legs in front of him.

‘And what’s that?’

‘Your name…’

Miranda gritted her teeth in frustration. He had obviously seen the apprehension on her face and had decided to have a little fun at her expense, allowing just sufficient hint of a threat behind his silences to send her nerves skittering.

‘Miranda. Miranda Nash.’

‘Nash…’ He tilted his dark head to one side and Miranda nodded vigorously.

‘That’s right. You may have heard of my father. Lord Geoffery Nash.’ Her voice implied that whilst it might very well be true that no one knew her whereabouts, then it was also true that, should anything happen to her, there would be serious consequences to be paid.