Sharon Kendrick Collection

‘Sure. This is the perfect opportunity to demonstrate that we’re not completely ruled by our hormones—’

‘That’s a very nice way to put it!’

‘Sabrina, there isn’t,’ he told her bluntly, ‘a nice way to put it.’

‘So you’re saying that the relationship will be platonic?’

‘No, that’s not what I’m saying at all,’ he countered. ‘I’m not promising anything.’

Sabrina began to get a glimmering of understanding about what he meant. Put two people who were sexually attracted to each other in a flat, and in the end it all came down to who cracked first. And who didn’t. Control, that was what this was all about. Power and control. But she said nothing more as her mother had begun to walk back towards the table.

Nothing more was said on the subject during the drive back to her house, and Sabrina felt an unwilling sense of emptiness as Guy said goodbye to her mother, then turned to her, his enigmatic grey eyes glittering darkly.

‘Goodbye, Sabrina.’

‘Goodbye, Guy. Thanks for lunch.’

He gave a brief hard smile before climbing into his car.

Sabrina and her mother stood and watched the powerful car move away.

‘You aren’t going to go, are you, darling?’ asked Mrs Cooper. Sabrina carried on looking, even though the tail-lights had long since disappeared.

‘I don’t know, Mum,’ she said honestly. ‘I just don’t know.’

CHAPTER EIGHT (#ulink_77833b60-9d58-50f1-abdb-c2d9e1400cb9)

SABRINA’S pulse was hammering as she punched out the number, and it hammered even more when the connection was made and a rich, deep voice said, ‘Guy Masters.’

She opened her mouth but no words emerged.

The voice sounded impatient now. ‘Guy Masters,’ he repeated irritatedly.

‘Guy. It’s me—Sabrina.’

There was a two-second pause which seemed like an eternity.

‘Sabrina Cooper,’ she rushed on. ‘Remember? We met—’

‘Yes, of course I remember you, Sabrina. How are you?’

For a moment she was tempted to hang up and forget the whole stupid idea, but she had spent the last few weeks changing her life around. She couldn’t back out now.

‘I’ve managed to get a transfer!’ she said, and then, in case he had completely forgotten his proposal, rushed on, ‘To the London branch of Wells. They’ve said I can work there for six weeks. The bookshop,’ she added, just in case he had forgotten that.

‘Oh.’ There was a pause. ‘Good. So, when are you coming to stay?’

He did remember. Thank God. ‘I can start first thing on Monday.’ Sabrina crossed the fingers of her left hand and pulled a ghastly grimace at herself in the mirror. ‘If it’s all right with you, I thought I’d come on Sunday afternoon.’

‘This Sunday?’

‘If that’s a problem—’

‘No.’ The deep voice sounded thoughtful. ‘No, that shouldn’t be a problem.’

She thought he might make the effort to sound a little more convincing. Or pleased about it. ‘Are you sure?’

‘Have you got a pen?’ he asked tersely. ‘I’ll give you directions how to get here.’

She scribbled down his home address, instantly noting that it was in Knightsbridge. So she would be staying in one of London’s most affluent areas.

‘What time will we see you?’

‘We?’ she questioned, feeling suddenly frozen by nerves.

‘I’m having a few friends for brunch—but they’ll probably have gone by teatime.’

‘Then I’ll come at teatime,’ she promised hoarsely.

She struggled onto the train on Sunday with her two suitcases and then onto the tube, where she had to stand for the entire journey because it seemed that the whole world and his brother were heading for Knightsbridge and the museums.

So by the time she reached the outrageously exclusive address which Guy had given her she felt as grimy and bedraggled as a cat which had been left out in the rain all night.

His flat was situated in a quiet square, several streets back from the main thoroughfare of Knightsbridge. In the centre of the square was a gated garden, and Sabrina put her suitcases down and peered in through the railings.

Beneath the trees, daffodils waved their sun-yellow trumpets, and she could hear the sound of birdsong. And despite her misgivings, Sabrina felt a sudden sense of freedom. Picking up her cases with a renewed determination, she walked up the steps of the house, rang the doorbell and waited.

Sabrina glanced down at her watch as she waited. Four-thirty. Most people’s idea of teatime, surely? What if the unthinkable had happened and Guy had forgotten that she was coming? What would she do if he wasn’t in?

She lifted her finger to the doorbell once more and just at that moment the door opened and there stood Guy. She swallowed down the lump which had risen in her throat.

His dark hair was ruffled, and he wore an old pair of jeans with the top two buttons left undone, revealing a provocative downward arrowing of dark hair. He had clearly just dragged on a black T-shirt which clung to every perfectly defined muscle of his chest. He looked, Sabrina thought with a sudden stab of anxiety, as if he’d just got out of bed.

His eyes narrowed with an unmistakable look of surprise as he stared down at her, and then he said, very steadily, ‘Sabrina!’

Her heart thumped faster. ‘You had forgotten I was coming.’

He didn’t miss a beat. ‘Of course I hadn’t forgotten.’ He stole a glance at his watch, which gleamed gold against the faint blur of hair on his wrist, and frowned. Hell, was that the time? ‘It’s later than I thought. Come on in. Let me take your cases. We’re just finishing brunch.’

‘At this time?’

‘Why not?’ he said softly. ‘It’s Sunday. No deadlines.’

‘If you’re busy I can go away and come back later,’ she said, although as soon as the words were out of her mouth she realised how ridiculous they sounded—because where on earth would she go on a late spring afternoon in a city where she knew nobody?

He smiled as he took the suitcases from her, thinking how cold she looked. How she always looked as if she needed protecting. His protection. ‘Don’t be silly,’ he said softly. ‘Come on in. You look frozen.’

Well, she was shivering, yes, but that had more to do with the reality of seeing him in the glorious, living flesh. Of hearing his rich, deep voice. It had only been a few weeks, but it seemed like a whole lifetime since she had last seen him. How could she have so easily forgotten the impact he had on her—as compelling now as when she had first set eyes on him?