In The Billionaire's Bed

Jane looked at him in panic. ‘Zach! You must have read the deeds! Tresanton Manor and Tresanton Island—’

‘No!’ He glared. How could she have ever thought this place was suitable? ‘That’s what I employ you for. To summarise everything. To identify the crucial points. And I think I’d call an island a crucial point, wouldn’t you? Where’s the road across?’ he rapped out.

‘There isn’t one,’ Jane replied in a small voice. ‘We have to walk from here—’

‘We what…? I don’t believe this!’ he muttered. ‘You expect me to park my Maserati here in the open—when I eventually get it back from the garage—to be vandalised by any idle yob who passes?’

‘I don’t think it’s that kind of area…’ Jane began nervously.

‘Every area is that kind!’ Zach muttered, thoroughly disenchanted with Edith’s house already. He could imagine what it would be like, stuck here on a wet wintry day with his bored son, unable to walk straight from an integral garage into the warmth of a welcoming house. Hell. Now what? He’d promised Sam a house with a garden. ‘I can’t stay here. I’ll have to hunt for something else,’ he added.

‘But you can’t do that, remember?’

Zach groaned. He recalled Edith’s peculiar requirement, which had seemed typically nutty but acceptable at the time:

…bequeath Zachariah Talent my house and all its contents, to live in for at least a year, otherwise the house is to be given to the first person he sees when he sets foot on the island.

Unbelievable. The milkman could end up owning two million’s worth of real estate! If there was a milkman in this uninhabited outback, he thought sourly.

‘OK. So I’ll come just on weekends and camp out,’ he growled.

He couldn’t disappoint Sam. But this wasn’t what he’d had in mind at all. He wanted proximity to burger bars, cinemas and zoos. How else did you entertain an eight-year-old?

‘Jane!’ he exclaimed suddenly. ‘What the devil are those scruffy boats doing there?’ he demanded, an extraordinary depth of disappointment making him want to lash out at anyone and anything.

She followed his scowl which directed her to the huddled boats, further down-river.

‘Canal boats. Or are they called narrow boats? I believe Inland Waterways allows them to tie up there,’ she replied helpfully.

Zach’s mouth hardened like a trap. They’d be a security risk. Slowly he scanned the area, his expression becoming grimmer as he realised that Jane had also conveniently omitted to tell him that the house was in the middle of nowhere. The jagged pains in his head increased.

This was an unbelievable mess! He’d made a terrible mistake in delegating something this important!

Cursing himself for letting Jane handle everything, he was pragmatic enough to know that there wasn’t much he could do for now.

All right. He’d grit his teeth and use the house on weekends for the required year, but no way was he going to rest until there were decent paths and safety rails to stop his son from falling into the river.

Nor was he going to live permanently on an island where goodness knew who could easily leap from a boat and merrily rob him of his entire art collection.

‘Get on to the garage and have my car delivered here as soon as possible,’ he rapped out. ‘I’m dealing with this mess personally, so cancel any engagements till further notice. I’ll e-mail you with the improvements that I decide will be necessary before the house goes on the market. And find me something more suitable in the meantime where I can live and secure my valuables. In a city. Near restaurants. A gym. Theatres. Understand? Keys!’ Peremptorily he held out his hand, knowing he was being unreasonably curt. ‘Please,’ he growled as the flustered Jane fumbled anxiously in her bag.

She was a good PA. But ever since she’d viewed Tresanton Manor there had been a light in her eye that had boded ill. She was ready to nest and he was in her sights. But he sure as hell wasn’t going to choose sofas and curtains with anyone ever again.

Choking back an urge to rant and rail that his plans had gone awry and his son was unlikely to bond with him in this rural hell, he grabbed his laptop, bade Jane a curt goodbye and strode over the bridge, wondering with some desperation if he would ever win his son’s love.

He’d been banking on this house to help achieve that goal. And only now did he realise how important it was to him that he was loved by his child. Of course, he’d talked about his son’s indifference to Edith, but he’d never let her know how deeply he was hurt. Or even admitted it to himself.

He felt a heavy ache in his heart. Pain tightened his mouth and burned in his charcoal eyes. One day his son would hug him, he vowed, instead of treating him with cool reserve.

Women he could do without in his life. All the ones he’d met socially had rung up pound signs in their eyes when they knew who he was.

And none of the women he’d dated had been able to cope with the realities of his hectic work-load. Nor had his ex-wife. But he wanted to give his son financial security, and you didn’t get rich—or stay rich—dancing attendance on females and taking them out shopping.

In a thoroughly bad mood at the collapse of his dreams, he stomped along the muddy path, occasionally ducking his head to avoid being attacked by the boughs of apple trees. You didn’t have such problems with pavements.

He couldn’t understand why Edith had thought she was doing him a favour by forcing him to live here for a year. How could she call this place a paradise? he wondered grumpily.

And then he noticed the woman.

CHAPTER THREE

SHE was walking ahead of him through the orchard. No, drifting. He stopped dead in his tracks, brought up short by what he saw.

She must have heard his approach because, slender as a flexing wand, she slowly turned to face him, her small face so delicate and fey that he wondered if he was hallucinating. Tiny and graceful, she stood up to her ankles in a sea of buttercups and she looked as though she had just stepped out of a medieval illustration.

Not normally fanciful, he tried to understand why he’d had this impression. It could have been her long, close-fitting skirt flaring out from below the knee, or the long-sleeved soft cream top that hugged her slim figure like a second skin.

Or perhaps it was the hair that made her look like a modern day Guinevere. It was black and cascaded in thick waves down her lissom back from an imprisoning twist of…

He narrowed his eyes in surprise. She’d caught up her hair at the nape of her long neck with a rope of living greenery. Ivy, or something. Entwined with real flowers. Weird.

A hippie flower child, he decided, and scowled. Maybe from one of those boats. Spying out the land. Instinctively he fingered the scar on his forehead.

After the unpleasant experience of a burglary and two muggings—one of which had involved a woman who’d diverted his attention with a plausible sob story—he’d learnt to be suspicious where itinerant strangers were concerned. Even medieval hippies as tiny as this one.

In London you didn’t look strangers in the eye. Never wore an expensive watch. Walked quickly everywhere, locked your car while driving, kept the car revved at traffic lights and stayed alert at all times. That’s how you survived in the City.

‘You’re on my land!’ he growled, deliberately projecting menace.

Her placid expression didn’t alter. She remained very still and calm, as if waiting for him to approach. Much to his surprise, he did. Usually people came to him.

As he glowered his way towards her a small hand came out in a meek greeting.

‘I’m Catherine Leigh. How do you do?’

It was a sweet, gentle voice and before he knew it he had taken the dainty, fluttering fingers in his and was muttering less irritably, ‘Zach Talent.’

Had he noticed how nervous she was? Hastily she retracted her fingers from the firm, decisive grip and clasped them behind her back so that he didn’t see how badly they were shaking.

‘You…said this was your island,’ she began huskily, her face puzzled.

‘Apparently it is,’ he replied, his mouth clamping shut into a hard, exasperated line as if that fact didn’t please him one bit. His intimidating frown deepened and it seemed that his eyes glinted with shards of icy anger.

‘Oh!’

She considered this, deciding that she’d rather deal with the woman with egg-whisk hair and killer heels than this elegantly clad grouch. Then she brightened. The woman must be his wife. Better to wait and talk to her. ‘Are you on your own?’ asked the owner of the frown.

He turned to scan the undergrowth as if marauding bandits might leap out at any minute.