Unwilling Surrender

He let that provocative remark hang in the air until she snapped nervously, ‘What on earth are you talking about?’

‘Can’t you guess?’ His lips curled cynically. ‘Maybe you got me up here because you thought that in this isolated splendour you might be able to pick up the strands of the relationship which you wanted all those years ago, and which never got off the ground.’

She could feel the colour drain out of her face, and somewhere at the back of her mind she knew that she was trembling, on the brink of losing control. But that she wouldn’t do. Let him insinuate whatever he liked.

‘I won’t bother to answer that. I’ll only say that you have the biggest ego I’ve ever seen if you could think that—’

‘You still want me after all these years?’

‘Yes! I...’ She took a deep, steadying breath. ‘How was I to know that Fiona decided against coming here?’

‘Female intuition? Or is that one of those things missing in your life?’

There was a deadly silence and then Christina flushed. One of those things missing in your life. One of how many things? Looks, perhaps. Sex appeal. Was that what he was referring to? Were those the other things missing from her life?

He pulled down two mugs from the cupboard and she watched in silence as he poured them both some coffee, then proceeded to sit at the kitchen table drinking it, cradling the mug in his hands.

Neither of them had removed their coats and after a while he said neutrally, ‘I’ll have to get some logs in and do something about lighting a fire or else we’ll both freeze to death here.’

Christina wished that she could summon up the self-control to respond to him, but his implied insult, his fantastic speculations, had winded her. Instead she continued to watch him covertly over the rim of her mug, taking in his strong hands, the width of his shoulders, the powerful body.

He inspired confidence. However dynamic and impressive he was in the field of business, that did not mean that he could not cope in a situation such as this. If he said that he would get logs and make this place warm, then he would do so, even if it meant felling a tree in the process. Somehow, from somewhere, he would find the ability to perform the impossible.