Czytaj książkę: «The Right Side of Mr Wrong»

Chapter One

Sorry, no matrimonial ambitions whatsoever, but great at organising …

For the ninety-ninth time that afternoon Shea Summers wondered how those few short words she’d scribbled on a postcard had catapulted her into the air. Private helicopters didn’t happen every day, even in affluent North Cheshire, at least not to her.

Brando Marshall, of Edgerton Manor, in need of a wife, applications on a postcard. Women had been fighting for the opportunity apparently. It seemed ironic that she was the one the TV company had chosen, when she didn’t give a damn about it, and had zero intention of becoming anyone’s wife.

She clutched her stomach as it gave another unnerving lurch. Beneath her white knuckles it was performing the same impromptu tango it had before her first ever dancing exam when she was seven, the same one it did every time she psyched herself up now, as a wimpy twenty four year old, for the misery of a bikini wax. And she had an idea that a bikini wax might be a walk-in-the-park compared to what she had let herself in for here. She delved into the pocket of her tailored jacket in search of fortification, and gesticulated wildly, in the direction of the co-pilot.

‘Fancy a sour worm, or a pink shrimp?’

The co-pilot, turned, ran an eye swiftly up her legs, then winked as he gave a half shake of his head. She returned his grin, slipped a sour worm into her mouth, and shuddered as the sugar hit zapped her taste buds. Then she shuddered again as she took in the panorama below. Worryingly green. Green as in rural, rolling countryside. Green as in miles from anywhere.

Damn. She definitely hadn’t expected a middle-of-nowhere scenario. Her insides squished as she recalled all the stuff she hadn’t asked. Bryony, the nice girl from the TV company, had been very persuasive and reassuring, but she hadn’t let her get a word in edgeways.

‘Just a bit of that organising you’re obviously so good at and a few pieces to camera … a new angle for the follow-up programme … Brando is very rarely there … you could make it your holiday … ’

‘Closing in now Miss Summers!’

The pilot’s gruff tones hauled her back to the present with a jerk that caused her to gulp her last pink shrimp practically whole. A weird shiver of déjà-vu slithered down her back as she peered down at the collection of stone-tiled roofs flashing gold in the autumn sun, took in a classical facade of the elegant house with its perfect rhythm of Georgian sash windows. The same spinning view of Edgerton Manor she’d last seen on the closing credits of the Country House Crisis programme. As she took in the real-life extent of the property her heart faltered. She hoped she hadn’t over-exaggerated her organisational skills. She was used to working in big houses, but this one was something else.

Dragging her eyes away from the view below, she brushed the sugar dust off the pleats of her skirt, slipped her feet back into the patent stilettos she’d eased out of earlier, and dug the spike of the heel softly into her ankle. Just enough pain to remind her she wasn’t dreaming, without the nightmare of a ripped stocking. She wasn’t sure that helicopters mixed with towering court shoes, but she knew if she could only nail that all-important first impression, the rest was usually easy-peasy.

‘Almost there now, I’ll be bringing us down on the grassy area in front of the house, Miss Summers.’

She hurled a mental pillow over the voice in her head which was yelling ‘Eeeeeeeek’, snatched up her bag and made a grab for her lip gloss and her heavily framed Dolce & Gabbana glasses.

‘Oh, lordy, look at that!’ She stifled a groan of dismay. Grassy had to be a man’s way of describing the expanse of mud where they were about to land.

Mud and high heels. Not the best combination.

Wriggling her skirt into place, she tugged her jacket into submission over her cleavage, and widened her smile to the max. So much for her impressive entrance, it was going to take a miracle just to get her to the front door.

* * *

‘Dropping women onto me out of the sky is not going to make me settle down!’

Brando Marshall’s loud protest down the phone to his sister was simultaneously heartfelt and indignant. ‘What part of ‘I don’t do relationships’ don’t you understand Bryony?’ Not that he was about to enlighten her, but as far as women went he had three rules: plenty of them, never at home, and no repeats, although recently he’d put business before sex too often. He raked his fingers through his hair, shuddering at the fleetingly awful thought that Bryony might have any idea of the hard, hot sex he enjoyed, or worse, the hard, hot women he enjoyed it with. Slamming a mental door on that one, quickly, he shook his head at the realisation that this time she’d almost out-witted him. He could already feel the vibrations of the approaching helicopter.

‘I’m only going to say this once, Bry! Regardless of what your motor-mouthed TV presenter boss with the hideous pink lips might have told the nation, I do not need a wife! And if I did, I certainly wouldn’t be hooking up with some fortune-seeking low-life who writes in to some down-market TV show!’

‘Okay. Take a chill pill Brando … ’

One vault took him over the sofa and to the window. He peered at the lawn in front of the house, scrutinising the descending helicopter through a flurry of leaves, as it nudged to the ground.

Damned cheek of the girl! Bryony was only flying the woman in, using his chopper!

His face cracked into a slow smile. Giving him the perfect means of escape.

He vaulted over the sofa, and grabbed the phone again.

‘Nice of you to borrow my helicopter without asking, but handy – I’m out of here! I’m off back to London right now, and you can get rid of the woman … ’

He was going with the split-second decision.

Belting along the landing, he halted for a nano-second as he reached the top of the stairs. He knew the staff went apoplectic when he did his parkour moves around the house, but what the hell? He wouldn’t be around to catch the fall out. He bent his knees, and flung himself into the air.

Whoosh. Nothing like the rush of carved balusters and deep pile carpet spinning past your face at forty miles an hour.

Three flick-flacks, an equal number of thumps and groans from ancient timbers, and he was streaking across the hall, only stopping to hurl open the huge front door.

Tearing wind slapped him head-on as he dashed into the late October cold, his t-shirt flapping wildly. With one leap, he’d cleared the stone steps outside the front door, then the gravel crunched beneath his converse as he sped on towards the grass. He pulled to a halt as he saw a figure alight from the helicopter. Someone slight, bending down now, waving their arms, holding onto their flapping jacket. A woman.

The woman.

Struggling.

He grimaced. She straightened to standing and he got a view as she spun. He clocked a suit and hair pinned back securely enough to resist the turbulence. A cabin bag-on-wheels.

‘Damn you Bryony!’ He was muttering under his breath now. ‘Why the hell have you sent an air hostess?’

He took in endless legs, heels, a nipped-in waist. His eyebrows shot upwards in immediate appreciation, and he heard himself let out a long, low whistle, with no apparent input on his part.

And wow, she was stacked. An air hostess, who was stacked!

Quick re-assessment. ‘Nice work, Bryony!’

But he was still out of here.

He dragged himself back to the scene unfolding in front of him, in apparent slow-motion. The air hostess turned. Huge black glasses, dwarfing a delicate face, took him by surprise, then a smile at least as wide as the Atlantic whacked him somewhere in the solar plexus, and surprised him some more. He felt his hand rise and he gave himself a mental kick as he realised he was waving to her. She lifted her hand off her thigh, and gave an enthusiastic wave in return.

For crazy sakes don’t grin at her you fool!

The last thing he needed to look was welcoming, dammit.

She held her hand aloft, as if she were waiting for his smile before she let it fall, but Brando had stopped thinking about smiling, and instead had his eyes fixed on the hemline of her skirt, flirting in the buffeting wind.

Bingo!

A freak gust tore at the pleats and blasted them skywards. Before she had time to react, the air hostess skirt had twisted inside out, and was billowing, wildly, somewhere around her ears.

‘Nice one!’

Brando’s face cracked into an, involuntary smile. Just what a guy needed to brighten a dreary afternoon. Maybe there was a god after all. Stocking tops, delicious dark knickers, he had enough time to make out the pattern of the lace. He gave a nod of appraisal.

‘Twelve out of ten for that bottom – at the very least.’

A tug at the base of Brando’s stomach, and a constriction of denim in the groin area, indicated that the skirt wasn’t all that was rising.

Resist the urge to help a damsel in distress.

Given he would be leaving as-soon-as, there was no point in complicating the issue. He looked away. Next time he looked she was bent double, her arms wrapped around her knees, skirt firmly in place, feet solidly planted, but her body was gyrating.

She almost looked as though her feet were …

It took two blinks for Brando to know she was about to lose her balance, and one more for him to shoot across the grass, and grab hold of her before she crashed to the ground.

‘Watch out!’

It was a shout, but the helicopter blades spun his words away.

The fact that he’d ended up cradling her bottom in his crotch was incidental. The important thing was he had saved her the embarrassment of a face-plant. Her body jack-knifed against him, stiffened, then the warmth of her soft buttocks passed straight through her skirt pleats, and set his groin on fire.

‘Sorry about … ’

Damn. Now he was pulling her onto a huge hard-on, and the fact that he could feel her breasts folding onto his hands somewhere round her front was making matters worse. From the vibrations in her torso, she was obviously saying something. Still grasping her tightly he pressed his ear closer to her mouth, struggling to hear what she said over the roar of the engines. He was rewarded with a brush with a pillow-soft cheek, and a spiky jab in the eye from her specs.

‘What are you playing at?’

Was that what she was saying?

He couldn’t be sure. He tried to disentangle himself, but felt her lean into him. What the hell? She was pointing to her feet now, twisting, gesticulating, shouting words he still failed to grasp.

He looked down.

Lots of mud, all over her shoes. And those surely had to be eff-me shoes, if ever he’d seen them. And right this moment, his blood was all heading one place, making damn sure he was ready to oblige. Yes Siree!

He needed to get a grip here. A grip of the situation, rather than the woman would be useful. It took a moment to disengage his brain from his libido, then it hit him.

‘You’re stuck?’

She grimaced at him, stuck fast and unable to move with both hooker-high heels firmly impaled in his lawn.

Through the huge lenses of her glasses, her panicky eyes were smoky purple. And she smelled of summer. That was it. Summer.

Summer and sex.

‘Hang on to me!’

He dipped down, shivered as her hands closed around his head to steady herself, then he prised one foot at a time out of her shoes.

And not just any sex, hot sex.

His libido thrust into overdrive, and once more he made a valiant attempt to disengage it, as he wrenched her shoes out of the ground, stood up fast, and rammed them into her hand.

‘I’m just leaving … ’ He was yelling, but she shrugged back at him.

Jeez, he’d come here to get in the chopper, get the hell out of here, or better still, to wave the woman back to wherever she’d flown in from. So why wasn’t he pressing ahead and doing just that? He blinked away the miniscule twitch in his left eye. That tiny giveaway. His unfailing, gut-fuelled instinct kicked in.

‘Looks like this is the only way … ’

As he bent his knees, braced himself, and grasped hold of his air hostess, he saw her eyes go bright with surprise.

When the hell had she become his air hostess?

Up close now, he clocked the strawberry curve of her lips as they parted in astonished protest, and knew he was on the right track. He swung her easily into his arms, and turned, and strode towards the house, with his jaw set. Whatever was happening to him, he was determined to shake it off fast.

* * *

Feet dangling.

Cheek rammed unceremoniously against the rocky shoulder of a man who smelled delectable, and seemed in no hurry to put her down.

Not quite how Shea had planned her entrance to Edgerton Manor.

Her heart was still pounding from the shock of being literally swept off her feet, but at least that had solved the immediate problem of how to cross the sea of mud and reach the house without damaging her shoes further.

‘You can put me down now, thanks.’

For a fleeting moment she was dizzied by the whole male proximity thing. She’d almost forgotten how it felt. Come to think of it, she’d never been man-handled like this. There was something appalling about the raw thrill vibrating through her. She didn’t have herself down as a sucker for caveman tactics.

‘I said you can put me down!’

She forced her eyes beyond the line of the sensuously stubbled jaw inches above her face, and caught a view of a ceiling as high as the sky, and the twinkliest chandelier she’d ever seen. When she looked back again, he was motionless, staring down at her, and her gaze locked onto slate-hard grey eyes and a quizzical smirk that made her stomach flip.

‘If you insist on putting your head in the wolf’s mouth, you can expect to get bitten!’ His growl was rough as bitter chocolate. ‘Your choice. Don’t say I didn’t warn you!’

Before she had time to work out what he meant by that, the world swung, and he lowered her legs, setting her down gently. Then backed away.

So much for keeping a professional distance.

Shea wriggled, took a minute to wrestle her crumpled jacket into approximately the right places, smooth her box-pleats into order. Muddy feet, or muddy shoes? She went with the stilettos, and gained the immediate five inch boost she needed.

‘That’s more like it!’

She flicked a tentative smile at the guy who had retreated a pace or two, but was still watching her with chilling determination, a large dose of disdain and an even larger dose of mental undressing. And the way his eyes locked onto her boobs brought her nipples out to graze the inside of her bra cups. She gave a shudder, as she looked back at him. Her eyes took in a broken-down t-shirt which she already knew covered the hardest of bodies, jeans ripped through in places, and low-slung, pretty much to the point of indecency. She pulled herself up sharply for letting her gaze linger a second too long on the most indecent bit, chided herself for the shiver rush that zinged down her spine when she took in the size of things in that area, becoming more defined by the moment. She shuddered again when she remembered she might be slightly responsible for that.

Crikey! Shea didn’t know where this lusty inner woman had appeared from, but she needed to be slapped back into line, and fast.

‘And what an amazing chandelier!’

She flipped a random space-filler comment, and a sparkly smile in his direction, hoping to nudge a response, as she assessed him. Way too good looking for his own good, and everyone else’s, not that his threadbare appearance fooled her. Not only was there the flagrant mental undressing thing going on, but there was a super-arrogance to his swagger, the kind of major, understated confidence, that was only ever claimed by hugely successful men. Whatever promises had been made to her about his absence, the vagabond who studied her now, with that mix of veiled animosity and contempt, not to mention the double dose of white heat, had to be Brando Marshall.

So. Now she had the measure of him – to be handled with extreme care, keeping boobs and bottom out of his sightline if at all possible – she could afford to introduce herself. Let’s face it, someone had to make the first move here, and it didn’t look as if it was going to be him.

‘Hi, I’m Shea. Shea Summers.’

She checked the brightness of her smile, extended a slim hand towards him, giving it a little rub in passing to make sure she’d got the mud off.

He tilted his head slightly, slid those dark-lashed, lingering eyes off her chest, and up to her face. And dammit for the way that made her stomach lurch. But otherwise he didn’t move.

A strange confidence, founded on familiarity, was seeping through her, filling her with warmth and strength.

Wealthy, and reluctant?

Brilliant. Something she encountered on a daily basis, apart from the flagrant sexuality obviously, which frankly she couldn’t remember meeting anything like, ever. Dealing with that disarming and alarming trait was something she’s have to think about hard. Later. A lot later. But she’d cut her teeth on stroppy Manchester footballers, regularly won over billionaires who had more attitude than sense, loved nothing more than the challenge of a recalcitrant businessman. Here was someone she could handle without a problem. In theory. So long as she got his out of control libido into line. She noted the sullen curl of his far too sensuous lip, and couldn’t help smiling more. Stamping on the tiny part of her brain that asked what it would feel like to be snogged by a guy with a mouth like that, she wondered where the hell her professionalism had gone. Probably left beside the helicopter, along with her self-respect, when she got dragged off by a caveman.

‘I’m Shea,’ she carried on, infusing her voice with a cheery ring of confidence, ‘that’s S-H-E-A, as in day. And I’m here to help!’

She could hardly keep the laughter out of her voice now, as she noted his left eyebrow arch in surprise above his deepening scowl. She readjusted her expression to hide her delight. Boy, was she going to have fun here. She gave her mouth-obsessed brain another sharp kick. It was all too much to keep in line here; this guy, his illegal body, not to mention her own totally out of character reactions.

He leaned nonchalantly on the elegantly turned newel post at the bottom of the expansive staircase now, rubbing a thumb absently across his chin. Quite why that made her think of stubble rubbing across the tender skin of her inner thigh was beyond her. At least he couldn’t see her thought bubbles, although from the way he was scrutinising her, she couldn’t be one hundred percent sure of that. When he made no move to greet her, she forced herself to push on, airily.

‘You’re Brando, I presume? I’m sure we’ll be seeing a lot more of each other in the next few days.’

She waited, watching to see his reaction, and saw a wicked grin spread across his face, obliterating all traces of bad temper, simultaneously doubling up on the lust. ‘Whatever you say, Miss S-H-E-A-rhymes-with-day! I’ll look forward to that, very much, especially bearing in mind that some of us have seen quite a lot already, by way of a preview!’

His left eyebrow shot up, and he gave her a meaningful nod, and another blast of undiluted lust. Men who were this hot shouldn’t be allowed out in public. She was usually impervious, but this was something else.

Shea felt the flush burn across her cheeks as she mentally rewound, flashed back to see her skirt flapping around her elbows. Damn. She’d walked into that one.

She whipped her brain into gear, searching desperately for a snappy reply, but before she’d found one, he’d sprung forward, and seized her hand, his strong, broad fingers wrapping around her own for a second.

‘No worries!’ His hand landed on her arm for a fleeting, searing moment. ‘What’s a stocking top between friends, after all?’ His grin had spread, and he was laughing now, showing beautiful, not-quite-perfect teeth, but along with the laughter there was something else brooding in those dark, sooty eyes.

Shea reeled, as she took in the smoulder. Pure unadulterated desire, if ever she’d seen it, oozing, from each and every delectably rugged pore. Then she reeled again, as an electric aftershock zigzagged up her arm where he’d touched her hand.

‘So, I’m here to … ’ Before she could claw herself out of the cavernous hole she was in, he interjected.

‘We all know why you’re here.’ He sounded almost belligerent now. ‘I wasn’t sure you were going to be needed, but given what I’ve seen thus far, I’ll make an exception. That’s if you’re up for a couple of days of play before you leave?’

The way he growled the word play sent a shower of anticipation down her spine. Anticipation? She wasn’t an anticipator, dammit, because she didn’t participate. Full stop. In fact the merest thought of participating sent an undertow of guilt to tug at her stomach. So what the heck was going on? Something in the way he narrowed his eyes as he waited for her reaction, told her he was pushing her. She blocked out the messages in her brain that were urging her, or rather commanding her, to hurl her body straight into his arms. Instead she watched him carefully, sizing up the opponent, knowing he’d already twisted this into some sort of game. One she wasn’t completely sure she was winning right now.

‘So, let’s get this straight. I’m here to tidy – tidy and organise. That’s all. And from what I hear there’s a lot to go at. As I understand it, that’s what I’ve been engaged to do … ’ She noted the tiniest flinch of his cheek as he heard the word ‘engaged.’

Perhaps it was that flinch, that miniscule indication of weakness that made her do what she did next. That, combined with her instinct for reading difficult men, and her ability to bring them, whimpering, to heel, in record time. Mr Intense Hunk here was so far outside her experience she didn’t feel confident to lump him in that manageable category, but whatever, there was no other explanation for what happened next. She heard her voice, loud, confident, and resonant, echoing around the hallway before she even knew she was going to speak.