British Bachelors: Fabulous and Famous: The Secret Ingredient / How to Get Over Your Ex / Behind the Film Star's Smile

Bad head.

Bad heart.

Bad need for contact with his man.

Bad, full stop.

‘What? Was it something I said? Or have you found a new hobby down there?’

Lottie hesitated before replying, desperate to avoid the harsh truth, so she started gabbling instead of ogling.

‘I love my bakery so much it’s hard to imagine living in hotel rooms full time, no matter how splendid the view.’

Rob chuckled. ‘Don’t worry about it. I’m used to living out of a suitcase.’

For a moment she wanted to run into Rob’s arms, feel the strength of his body against hers, and tell him how attracted she was to him.

But she wouldn’t. Because he was leaving and she was staying, and that was a recipe for disaster in anyone’s cookbook.

No. She had to control herself, and fight this powerful attraction. She just had to. His life was in the fast lane of the cities she had left behind her.

Time to put the mask back on, drink her coffee, and swallow down her feelings. And get the hell out of there before she did something stupid. Like pounce on him.

Lottie watched in silence as Rob poured the coffee.

‘That smells divine.’

‘Special import from one of the hotel’s best coffee roasters. Oh, if you’re hungry for dessert you’ll find some soft amaretto biscuits in that tin. My Italian pastry chef claimed he made them himself, but I know your standards are pretty high so I await the expert opinion.’

Rob watched as Lottie flicked open the clasp on the steel canister and brought it up to her face, inhaling deeply.

‘Oh, this is heaven. Did Dee tell you that I adore Italian food? Or did you have a premonition?’

‘Serendipity. It seems that we share at least some of the same passions, Miss Rosemount,’ Rob whispered as Lottie slowly closed her lips around a piece of the soft round almond-and-apricot biscuit and groaned in pleasure, her eyelids flickering as her face twisted in delight.

It was the sexiest thing Rob had ever seen in his life.

His chef was going to have to hire extra staff to cope with all of the takeaway orders coming to this apartment, because there was no way he was going to sit opposite this woman in a restaurant if she was going to act out a movie scene with her food.

He froze, stunned, as he tried in vain to control his breathing...and various other parts of his anatomy that seemed to have woken up to the fact that he was within arm’s reach of an amazing woman, and they were alone in this apartment.

Once they recognised him as the chef who they had seen on the TV, women tended to either get stuck into the whole celebrity lifestyle and the second-hand fame that came with being photographed hanging on to his arm, or hit on him straight away for the extra points on the famous name scoresheet.

He gave them what they wanted and they gave him what he wanted. Simple, straightforward. No grey areas; always black and white.

Lottie was as multicoloured as a rainbow. She was totally unfazed by his star ratings and had challenged him from the first moment they met in the gallery.

He admired her for making him change his routine and cut out his usual public performance.

In fact, he liked that more than was good for him.

Maybe it was going back to the Beresford hotel and then the catering college, but the fact that she had crept under his guard tonight to the point where he had blurted out his life story rankled him deeply.

He never told his story. Not to the press and certainly not to strangers. It was way too risky and likely to end up in a tell-all story in some sleazy newspaper, which Sally would have to pay to suppress.

So what did that say about Lottie?

Could he trust her? Dee was a special girl and his brother adored her, but Lottie was very different. Clever, witty, and on the surface an excellent businesswoman.

After a lifetime in the hotel business he prided himself on being able to judge people and every instinct in his body was screaming at that moment that she was someone who had no guile or hidden agendas. And yet there was something sad lingering under that very lovely surface.

Hell. He knew all about that. But it was strange to see the sadness and regret so openly on Lottie’s face when she thought he wasn’t looking.

Even stranger, it made him all the more attracted to her.

His heart was racing, hard and fast, as he stepped across to the refrigerator to bring out the milk, and took a breath of cool air, fighting to regain his composure. This was getting out of hand, and all he was doing was looking at Lottie!

It had been a very long time since he had wanted to be with a woman as much as he did at that moment.

Lottie chewed and hummed gently to herself as he pretended to move the meagre contents of his huge refrigerator around.

Was this what it would be like to have someone who loved you, and wanted to be with you, not just for an afternoon between international flights, but seven days a week? He had only met this woman a few days ago, and the connection was... What was it? A crush? Because it was a lot more than physical attraction, that was for sure.

In a few days he would go back to his normal life across the Atlantic. This apartment would be rented out, and his time here would be a memory. Left to his imagination.

If this was what Lottie did with biscuits, what would she be like in his bed? Naked, with his hands running over the soft skin of her stunning body, giving her pleasure.

Suddenly Rob found an excellent reason to plunge his head inside the chiller.

‘I have white wine if you would like some,’ he asked, casually waving the sealed bottle the sommelier had sent up. ‘Or perhaps a twenty-year-old tawny port?’

‘Thank you, but I have to be up early tomorrow morning and I am already starting with a headache. This has been a long day.’

He closed the door and looked at her, slack jawed. ‘You’re serious. You are actually going back to work on a Sunday?’

‘Of course. One of my very special customers at the bakery is celebrating her fiftieth wedding anniversary tomorrow and I promised that I would bake a very special decorated cake and deliver it in time for their tea party.’ And without asking or waiting for a reply she dunked an amaretto biscuit in the hot coffee, slid off the stool, and held a piece of it in front of his mouth so quickly that without thinking he leant forward and closed his lips around her fingertips.

Sweet, warm, intensely flavoured almond exploded onto his taste buds. It was superb.

It was one of those special moments when the food and the company and the location came together and he knew that the next time he tasted that biscuit anywhere in the world he would remember how Lottie looked at that moment. Her face was flushed with excitement and sparkling energy, her lips warm and plump and soft, and those stunning eyes were focused completely on his face.

The silence between them opened up.

Then the coffee machine pinged to tell him the milk was hot and he swallowed, suddenly desperate to keep Lottie close to him as long as he could stretch out the precious time they had left together. ‘I am going to have to give that man a raise. But tell me more about this cake of yours. Why is it so important to you?’

‘Why? Oh, that’s easy. Lily used to be our housekeeper and the woman who taught me how to bake. I owe my entire career to the one person who made my childhood bearable. I think that’s worth a cake. Don’t you? And these biscuits really are so good.’

She turned her back on him, scrabbling to open the spring lid on the canister, only her trembling fingers let her down and the biscuit fell to the floor.