One Bridegroom Required!

She thought that he didn’t sound as though he was exactly bursting over with enthusiasm about it. ‘So why the upheaval? The big change from savannah to rural England?’

He hesitated as he wondered how much to tell her. His inheritance had been unexpected, and he had sensed that for some men in his situation it could become a burden. He was Luke—just that—always had been. But people tended to judge you by what you owned, not by what you were; he’d met too many women who had dollar signs where their eyes should be.

Yet it wasn’t as though he feared being desired for money alone. He had had members of the opposite sex eating out of his hand since he was eighteen years old. With nothing but a pair of old jeans, a tee shirt and a backpack to his name, he had always had any woman he’d ever wanted. And a few he hadn’t, to boot. Even so, it was important to him that he had known Caroline before he had inherited his uncle’s estate. And what difference would it make if Holly Lovelace knew about his life and his finances? He wasn’t planning to make her part of it, was he?

‘Because my uncle died suddenly, and I am his sole heir.’ He watched her very carefully for a reaction.

Holly’s eyes widened. ‘That sounds awfully grand.’

‘I guess it is.’ He sipped his tea. ‘It was certainly unexpected. One morning I woke up to discover that I was no longer just the manager of one of the most beautiful game reserves in Kenya, but the owner of an amazing Georgian house, land and property dotted around the place, including this shop.’

‘From ranch hand to lord of all he surveys?’

‘Well, not quite.’

‘But a big inheritance?’

‘Sizeable.’

‘And you’re a wealthy man now?’

‘I guess I am.’

So he had it all, Holly realised, simultaneously accepting that he was way out of her league—as if she hadn’t already known that. There certainly weren’t many men like Luke Goodwin around. He had good looks, physical strength and that intangible quality of stillness and contemplation which you often found in people who had worked the land. And now money, too. He would be quite a catch.

She let her eyes flicker quickly to his left hand and then away again before he could see. He wore no ring, and no ring had been removed as far as she could tell, for there wasn’t a white mark against the tan of his finger.

‘You aren’t married?’ she asked.

Straight for the jugular, he thought. Luke was aware of disappointment washing in a cold stream over his skin. He shook his tawny head. ‘No, I’m not married.’ But still he didn’t mention Caroline. He could barely think straight in the green spotlight of her eyes. ‘And now it’s your turn.’

She stared at him uncomprehendingly. ‘My turn?’

‘Life story.’ He flipped open the packet of biscuits and offered her one.

Holly gave a short laugh as she took one and bit into it. ‘You call that a life story? You filled in your life in about four sentences.’

‘I don’t need to know who your best friend was in fifth grade,’ he observed, only it occurred to him that ‘need’ was rather a strong word to have used, under the circumstances. ‘Just the bare bones. Like why a beautiful young woman should take on a shop like this, in the middle of nowhere? Why Woodhampton, and not Winchester? Or even London?’

‘Isn’t it obvious? Because, unless you work for yourself, you have very little artistic control over your designs. If you work for someone else they always want to inject their vision, and their ideas. I’ve done it since I left art school and I’ve had enough.’

‘You’re very fortunate to be able to set up on your own so young,’ he observed. ‘Who’s your backer?’ Some oily sugar-Daddy, he’d bet. An ageing roué who would run his short, stubby fingers proprietorially over those streamlined curves of hers. Luke shuddered with distaste. But if that was the case—then where was he now?

‘I don’t have a backer,’ she told him. ‘I’m on my own.’

He stared at her with interest as all sorts of unwanted ideas about how she had arranged her finances came creeping into his head. ‘And how have you managed that?’

She heard the suspicion which coloured his words. ‘Because I won a competition in a magazine. I designed a wedding dress and I won a big cheque.’

Luke nodded. So she had talent as well as beauty. ‘That was very clever of you. Weren’t you tempted just to blow it?’

‘Never. I didn’t want to fritter the money away. I wanted to chase my dream—and my dream was always to make wedding dresses.’

‘Funny kind of dream,’ he observed.

‘Not really—my mother did the same. Maybe it runs in families.’

She remembered growing up—all the different homes she’d lived in and all the correspondingly different escorts of her mother’s. But her mother had always sewn—and even when she’d no longer had to design dresses to earn money she had done it for pleasure, making exquisite miniatures for her daughter’s dolls. It had been one of Holly’s most enduring memories—her mother’s long, artistic fingers neatly flying over the pristine sheen of soft satin and Belgian lace. The rhythmic pulling of the needle and thread had been oddly soothing. Up and down, up and down.

‘And why here?’ He interrupted her reverie. ‘Why Woodhampton?’

‘Because I wanted an old-fashioned Georgian building which was affordable. Somewhere with high ceilings and beautiful dimensions—the kind of place that would complement the dresses I make. City rents are prohibitive, and a modern box of a place wouldn’t do any justice to my designs.’

He looked around him with a frown. ‘So when are you planning to open?’

‘As soon as possible.’ There was a pause. ‘I can’t afford not to.’

‘How soon?’

‘As soon as I can get the place straight. Get some pre-Christmas publicity and be properly established by January—that’s when brides start looking for dresses in earnest.’ She looked around her, suddenly deflated as the enormity of what she had taken on hit her, trying and failing to imagine a girl standing on a box, with yards of pristine ivory tulle tumbling down to the floor around her while Holly tucked and pinned.

‘It’s going to take a lot of hard work,’ he observed, watching her frown, wondering if she had any real idea of how much she had taken on.

Holly was only just beginning to realise how much. ‘I’m not afraid of hard work,’ she told him.

Luke came to a sudden decision. He had not employed Doug Reasdale; his uncle had. But the man clearly needed teaching a few of the basic skills of management—not to mention a little compassion. ‘Neither am I. And I think I’d better help you to get everything fixed, don’t you? It’s going to take for ever if you do it on your own.’

Holly’s heart thumped frantically beneath her breast. ‘And why would you do that?’

‘I should have thought that was fairly obvious. Because I have a moral obligation, as your landlord. The place should never have been rented out to you in this condition.’ And that much, at least, was true. He told himself that his offer had absolutely nothing to do with the way her eyes flashed like emeralds, her lips curved like rubies when she smiled that disbelieving and grateful smile at him. ‘So what do you say?’

She couldn’t think of a thing. She felt like wrapping her arms tightly around his neck to thank him for his generosity, but the thought of how he might react to that made her feel slightly nervous. There was something about Luke Goodwin which didn’t invite affection from women. Sex, maybe, but not affection. ‘What can I say?’ she managed eventually. ‘Other than a big thank you?’

‘Promise me that if you can’t cope, then you’ll call on me.’

‘But I don’t know where you live.’

‘Come here,’ he said softly. He gestured for her to join him by the window, where the yellow light was fast fading like a dying match in the winter sky. He pointed. ‘See that house through the arched hedge?’

It was difficult not to—the place was a mansion by most people’s standards! ‘That’s yours?’ she asked.

‘Yes, it is. So if it all gets too much, or if you change your mind, then just walk on right up to the door and knock. Any time.’ Blue eyes fixed her with their piercing blaze. ‘And you’ll be quite safe there—I promise. Okay?’

‘Okay,’ Holly agreed slowly, though instinct told her that seeking help from a man like Luke might have its own particular drawbacks.

CHAPTER THREE (#ulink_639252ce-f668-5d82-a944-ee51654fd775)

AS SOON as Luke got home, he phoned Doug Reasdale, his late uncle’s letting agent—a man he had just about been able to tolerate down the echoed lines of a long-distance phone call from Africa. He suspected that this time around he might have a little difficulty hanging onto his temper.