Housekeeper at His Beck and Call

‘Don’t worry, I intend to…’

While her heart tried to beat its way out of her chest, Cade narrowed his steel-grey eyes to stare at her. He had incredible eyes that seemed to reach deep inside her. He was an incredible man. She hadn’t known what to expect when she’d hammered on his door, but it wasn’t this hard man with muscles and a tan, and shoulders wide enough to hoist an ox…a man who smelled so good she had to fight the urge to forget the CV and simply close her eyes and inhale deeply…

‘You don’t seem to have made much progress,’ he observed, glancing at the blank sheet in front of her.

‘I’m forming the phrases in my head first.’ When I’m not imagining how it would feel to have your stubble rasping against my neck…

‘You are going to write something down?’ Cade prompted.

Pulling herself together, Liv ran through the possibilities in her mind. School results: average. Golf handicap: nonexistent. Cooking skills: A+, thanks to a term at Miss Smythson’s finishing school for young ladies. Hobbies? Reading romance and watching RomCom films. Hardly Cade’s cup of tea, Liv thought with a glance at his impassive face, but, guessing he could do with a little warmth in his life, she wrote them down anyway. She wrote faster when it came to her nursing qualifications; she was really proud of them. Thirty seconds later she handed Cade the completed sheet.

He couldn’t stop staring at Liv and wondering at the strange tricks fate played. There had been no other applicants, and she was a nurse. Could anything have suited him better? He exchanged an old army sweater for the sheet of paper she handed him, registering huge relief when she slipped it on. The dun colour drained her and it was so big she wore it like a shapeless dress. It went some way to concealing her slender form, but not far enough…even with a mud-streaked face, she looked beautiful.

‘Aren’t you going to read it?’

He refocused on the piece of paper in his hand, registering the important bits like age: 22; marital status: single. ‘Well, that all seems in order,’ he said, handing it back. ‘I take it you can start right away?’

‘That’s it?’ Her jaw dropped.

‘That’s it,’ he confirmed distractedly. ‘You’re hired.’

‘I am?’ She sprang up. ‘You’re sure you’re not joking?’

‘I never joke,’ he assured her. ‘We’ll talk money later. All I’m agreeing to for now is a short trial this weekend.’

‘Oh…’ Nothing was settled, then. She would just have to make sure she excelled at everything he threw her way.

‘It’s going to be a particularly taxing weekend. Do you think you can cope?’

‘Yes…’ Her mother had always told her she would amount to nothing, and that she would never survive in the real world. Even when the cottage hospital had closed and she’d lost her job it had somehow been turned around to make it her fault. Something told her that Cade’s world was all too real and the trials he would put her through would be similarly demanding. Was her mother right? Should she have settled for marriage as quickly as possible, and to an undemanding man like Horace? No! ‘Yes,’ she said again, this time with feeling. She brushed off her misgivings. If she didn’t try to make something of herself she’d never know what she was capable of, would she?

‘Good. If you survive the weekend we’ll talk money. For now I suggest you get out of those clothes—’

‘You do?’ Liv swallowed hard, remembering the condoms in the drawer. This was all moving way too fast.

‘I’ll show you to your room.’

‘Not yet,’ she said, buying time. ‘I mean, I’d like to clear up in here first.’

‘All right…’ He seemed impressed. ‘I suppose there’s no time like the present to make a start…’

Why was Cade looking at her like that? It was making all the tiny hairs on the back of her neck stand to attention.

He rather liked the idea of Liv washing his dishes in a satin slip, rough woolly jumper and bare feet. She was a prim little thing, and shy, but her full lips were a give-away, likewise her darkening eyes too, and as for the tender swell of her breasts—

‘Rubber gloves?’

‘What?’ That caught him out. ‘Uh, no…sorry.’

‘Never mind, I can do without them this once…’ Liv plunged her arms up to the elbows in the washing-up water with relief. She could feel the chemistry between them and didn’t know what to do about it. She had dreamed of something like this all her life, and now it was happening she hadn’t a clue. Could Cade feel it too? She hoped not. She wanted this job, and if he made a move she wouldn’t know what to do, what to say, how to handle him…She could only be a disappointment. Just as her mother said she had to forget the opportunities open to other women and concentrate on the few things she was good at—like washing dishes.

His face brightened. He had been wrong thinking fate had brought him a nurse; fate had brought him an angel. She was going to transform the suppurating pit he had returned to into a nice clean house. It had been so long since he’d properly smiled, his facial muscles creaked.

‘Aren’t you going to help?’ The words were out of her mouth before she could stop them. But anything was better than Cade watching her with that narrowed wolf gleam in his eyes. ‘Don’t you have any clean tea towels?’ Maybe that was the reason he was holding back. ‘Look—there’s one here,’ she said, handing it to him.

He was shocked into accepting it.

‘Don’t worry—we’ll put some more on the list for when I go shopping.

‘We will?’

She smiled at him. ‘Pass me the rest of those things, will you?’

He picked up the pile of cutlery, but as he handed them to her they slipped out of her soapy hands into the bowl, splashing water everywhere. As she shrieked and jumped back he was forced to steady her. ‘Here…wait until I’ve wiped the floor, or you might slip on the tiles in your bare feet. He hunkered down. Her feet were splashed with soapsuds too, and he decided to dry them before turning his attention to the floor. Her nails were like shells, painted the palest pink, in honour of the wedding, he presumed. They were the softest, tiniest feet he’d ever seen on a woman. Balling up the tea towel, he very carefully blotted them dry. The room went very quiet; so quiet he could hear her breathing. Tension was like an electric current joining them. Lifting one of her feet, he rested it on his knee. When he lifted it again to blot her sole she gave an excited whimper. ‘Ticklish?’

She didn’t answer; he wasn’t sure she could.

Lowering that foot, he put himself through the same torture with the other. The temptation to massage her feet and show her just how sensitive they were was overwhelming him.

She had to lean on the sink for support. It had nothing to do with keeping her balance and everything to do with the feelings that were flooding her. She had never known she was capable of such strong sensations…and all Cade was doing was drying her feet, though in reality he was doing so much more. She wanted to moan and let her feelings out…She wanted to think straight and breathe steadily. But neither was possible. She had to hide her thoughts and pretend this wasn’t happening. He was drying her wet feet, and that was all.

Her feet, for goodness’ sake! Feet were for walking with, useful for kicking a ball with, and occasionally ornamental in the summer in a pair of strappy sandals. Feet were not erotic hot-spots…were they?

He couldn’t believe he was doing this. He couldn’t believe it was turning him on to this extent. He had to stop now. He must stop now…‘Let’s leave this,’ he said, ditching the towel as he stood up. ‘I haven’t shown you round yet.’

‘Oh, that would be great,’ she said with huge enthusiasm, thankful for the reprieve and forgetting her earlier determination to stay in the kitchen until everything was straight. ‘So there is accommodation with the job?’

‘Of a sort.’ He grimaced. ‘It isn’t the Ritz.’

‘That’s okay.’

Liv hesitated by the door, overcome by the sense of taking a step into the unknown with a man she didn’t know. And when that man was Cade…

But she must at least try for this job, or else be content with her mother’s assessment of her. Gathering her courage, she followed Cade into the main part of the house.

Far from being the stately home she had imagined Featherstone Hall was suffering badly from neglect. ‘How sad,’ she murmured as Cade led her past a deserted ballroom. She could imagine it must have rung with music and laughter at one time, but now it was just a vast, empty space providing accommodation for a colony of spiders, judging by the cobwebs.

‘Come on,’ Cade urged, as if it saddened him too and he didn’t want to linger.

Or was that her imagination working overtime again? Liv wondered as they headed upstairs.

There were several flights of stairs, starting with a grand sweeping staircase, and ending in a narrow flight of steps winding up to the attic rooms. ‘Servants’ quarters?’ she asked him dryly.

‘That’s right—’

This was worse than she had imagined. The room Cade showed her into looked as if it hadn’t seen a lick of paint in centuries. And he expected to keep his staff? But then he could hardly be expected to keep everything up to date while he was off fighting for his country, Liv reminded herself. She gazed round the bare room with its tiny window and sloping ceilings and mentally girded her loins. She had been spoiled long enough, lived in comfort long enough. ‘This is fine.’

Judging by Cade’s expression, he was seeing the room through her eyes, as if for the first time, and he didn’t like what he saw. ‘Are you sure this is okay for you?’