She could play it tough with the guys back home, because they knew her and she knew them, but the count didn’t have the slightest interest in her as a woman, or as a companion. She should be pleased. No. She should be relieved. But being rejected as unfit for purpose wasn’t great.
But if that was how it was going to be, she would keep everything on a business footing. Catching up with him at the door, she offered him her hand. ‘Eva Skavanga—’
He ignored the gesture.
Swallowing her pride, she tried again. ‘I didn’t expect for us to—’
‘Meet like this?’ he interrupted, hostility rippling off him in big, ugly waves. ‘Who would?’
Hostile was far too mild a word to describe the count. And, yes, she’d trespassed on his land, but was that a hanging offence? She’d taken a swim in his pool, but so what? What was the big deal? What was riding the count? What was his problem?
The count exuded power and menace and sex, in more or less equal quantities, and admittedly that was fascinating, but it was also intimidating and she had shivers running up and down her spine. But at least she had accomplished something, if only the fact that she had tracked him down.
‘Well, at least we’re standing face to face,’ she said as he opened the door to the palazzo.
‘Is that meant to be funny, Ms Skavanga?’
‘No. It’s merely a statement of fact.’
‘Well, here’s another fact. Your intrusion in my home is not welcome, and as soon as it can be arranged—’
She pre-empted him. ‘As soon as we’ve talked, I’ll go.’
‘Go where?’ he said, standing back to let her go through the doorway. ‘You really haven’t thought this through, have you? You rushed here to confront me, without any thought at all, because you’ll stop at nothing to get your own way at the mine.’
‘Do you blame me when you will never agree to see me? I had to come here. You might not care about Skavanga or the people who live there, but I do. All that’s at stake for you is your money.’
‘So pumping in my money to keep the town and mine alive, saving people’s jobs along the way, means nothing to you?’
‘You’ll just leave us with a desolate site when you’ve taken what you want.’
‘You don’t know what you’re talking about, Ms Skavanga. Now are you coming inside or not?’
She couldn’t risk alienating him. Had she forgotten that?
He led the intruder across his spacious orangerie at a rate of knots. He didn’t welcome unexpected visitors to his sanctuary on the island, least of all trouble-making girls with an agenda.
‘I’m not a whinger or a troublemaker,’ she shouted after him. ‘I’m simply concerned about the speed of your drilling programme.’
He stopped dead. ‘Do you have an alternative suggestion, Ms Skavanga?’
She almost cannoned into him.
‘Maybe...’ Her cheeks flushed red when she realised how close she’d come to touching him. ‘I don’t have an engineering background like you,’ she admitted, surprising him with the speed of her recovery. He was also surprised she had done her research. ‘I don’t have as many academic qualifications, either,’ she added, ‘but I do have local knowledge.’
And a good degree, he remembered, wondering why she had never used it.
‘Let me reassure you, Ms Skavanga, that the finest minds have assembled to make this project a success.’
‘The finest minds, maybe,’ she agreed, growing heated. ‘But no one local is involved at a decision-making level, so you run the risk of applying the wrong criteria to your thinking.’
‘What about your sister, Britt?’
‘Britt is just a figurehead—a sop to keep the locals quiet.’
He drew back his head to stare at her. ‘How sad that you don’t know your own sister.’
‘I know enough,’ she blustered, but there was guilt in her eyes.
‘Your sister is an excellent businesswoman. Decisive and clear-thinking, Britt had led the family business in the absence of your parents and her brother, and now she runs the mine for the consortium—’
‘I know all that.’
And he knew Eva had lost the mother who might have softened her at a critical age. Reports said that she now liked to think of herself as a frontierswoman, happier under canvas than in a bed. Or, as others described her, the sister who was all balls and belligerence and a crack shot with a gun. Britt worked for the consortium on merit alone, while Eva had positioned herself against them. Eva didn’t want things to change, and had made it widely known that she believed the future of Skavanga lay in the type of tourism that would preserve and pay homage to her unique Arctic landscape, rather than mining, which could only scar the land. He believed the two could co-exist.
‘Your sister Britt is a lot more valuable to the future of this project than you seem to think. Perhaps you should speak to her.’
Now she looked thoroughly miserable. He’d found her Achilles heel. Eva cared passionately about her family and the mine, more than she cared about herself.
* * *
She was reeling, both at the shock meeting with the count and him inviting her into his fabulous home. They had crossed the gracious glass-walled building opening onto the pool, and had entered a grand, light-filled entrance hall, complete with a sweeping marble staircase that housed a grand piano beneath its curve.
The fabulous setting and the fact that she was wearing a towel had really thrown her. This wasn’t her debating outfit of choice, and she felt even worse about the fall out with Britt since the count had made a point of talking about her sister. She knew what Britt had achieved at the mine and couldn’t have admired her sister more. Why did everything always come out wrong? Why couldn’t she control her tongue for once? For the sake of the mine, she had to try to make amends. ‘All I’m asking for is the chance to talk to you, and then I’ll go.’
A flash of humour lit his eyes. ‘Do I have your word on that?’
‘The sooner the better, as far as I’m concerned,’ she fired back, unsettled by his worldly, mocking stare.
‘And what am I supposed to do with you until then?’
‘Listen to me?’ she suggested, lashing out again before she could stop herself.
‘I set the terms, Ms Skavanga. I speak. You listen.’
As the count’s lazy gaze washed over her, every part of her warmed. However much she resented him and his autocratic ways, her body remained incredibly impressed.
‘And now, as much as I have enjoyed talking to you, I have a wedding to get back to. So if you will excuse me, Ms Skavanga?’ He moved towards the stairs.
‘Don’t worry. I’ll still be here when you get back.’
‘Oh? Will you?’
She watched in fascination as he ran strong, tanned fingers through his thick black hair. The count was fiercely masculine. He had just enough polish to keep him this side of barbarian, but it was a close run thing. All the designer clothes in the world couldn’t hide his warrior frame. He’d been born to fight, and it was hard to imagine him in some cosy aristocratic setting—
‘Done staring at me, Ms Skavanga?’
She gave a start. She hadn’t realised she was examining him quite so intently. And that smile was back on his mocking lips. Her throat dried. She was used to straightforward emotions: black and white. She was not accustomed to this level of sophisticated banter.