her when, with the crowd finally and thankfully beginning to thin out, she heard the sound of his dark, velvety voice behind her.
She spun round, only just managing to hang on to the tray she was balancing and stared.
It was a little after ten and he looked as bright-eyed and bushy-tailed as when she had last seen him at five-thirty, although he was no longer wearing his suit.
The suit had been replaced by a pair of black jeans and a fitted black jumper that did remarkable things for his lean, muscular build.
She couldn’t find a thing to say. She actually blinked several times to make sure that she wasn’t seeing things, that her mind hadn’t conjured up his image because she had been thinking so much about him.
‘So this is where you work...’
Sunny was galvanised into movement. ‘What are you doing here, Mr Gunn?’ She wasn’t in the office now and she didn’t see why she should try and modulate her voice to accommodate him. She stared at his face but she was aware of every part of him with every pore in her body. ‘Look, I can’t stop to chat to you.’ She turned round abruptly and began heading towards the kitchen, heart beating like a sledgehammer inside her.
Fi, one of the girls who worked the tables with her, the only full-time waitress among them and a bubbly brunette who specialised in having boyfriend problems, was taking a little time out to catch her breath because her stint was almost over. Sunny was very tempted to ask her whether Stefano was still outside and, if he was, whether she could take his order but then she knew that that would lead to endless curiosity and, as always, the part of her that clammed up at the thought of confiding slammed into gear.
Maybe he would get the message and leave. Maybe he’d already left. Her hands were clammy and she wiped them on her trousers as she headed back out to the restaurant, which was now practically empty.
There was no avoiding or ignoring him. His presence was so powerful that it would have been impossible to overlook him even though he was sitting right at the back. He had pushed his chair at an angle so that he could stretch out his long legs and he looked utterly composed and relaxed.
Stifling a sigh of frustration, Sunny walked towards him, taking her time.
‘I’m afraid we’ve already taken last orders,’ she said ungraciously, ‘so if you’ve come here expecting a meal, then you’re going to be disappointed.’
‘Oh, dear. And the menu looked so interesting. Perhaps another day. However, that being the case, I’m assuming you’ll be leaving shortly?’
‘How did you even find out where I worked?’ She looked at him with great reluctance and was assailed by the same unwelcome heady discomfiture she had felt before. His eyes were as dark as night and as captivating as an open flame to a moth. There was nothing safe or comforting about him but he had the sort of face she felt driven to stare at and the sort of compelling personality that wanted to suck her in and she had no intention of being sucked in.
Her memories of her mother were scattered but she remembered enough. She remembered how pretty her mother had been and how helpless she had been at the hands of men who had taken advantage of her. The roller-coaster ride that had been her childhood had built in her a capacity for self-control she never relinquished and a determination never to find herself in any situation with anyone that made her feel helpless. John had never made her feel helpless.
But something about Stefano Gunn made her feel helpless.
‘Sit.’
Sunny folded her arms and stared at him. ‘We’re not in an office now, Mr Gunn...’
‘Stefano, please.’
She chose to ignore that interruption. ‘So I feel it’s okay for me to be direct with you.’
‘I’ve always encouraged directness in other people,’ Stefano murmured. She was even more eye-catching than he remembered, even though the hair, he noted, was still tucked away and she wore no make-up.
She’d turned down his offer for dinner and rejected what he had to say without bothering to give him a hearing. She’d been pointedly polite about it but she hadn’t been able to get away from him fast enough.
He was accustomed to women bending over backwards to attract his attention. He’d never been in the position of being with a woman who so clearly couldn’t wait to escape his presence and he hadn’t known whether to be irritated or amused by that.
‘I don’t know how you managed to find out where I work...’
‘Not that difficult. I got your address from Katherine, went to your house, spoke to the girl who shares your flat with you, who told me where you worked and here I am.’
‘You spoke to Katherine?’ Sunny was outraged. She glanced round to see Claire looking at her curiously. ‘I have to finish clearing the tables,’ she muttered.
‘I’ll wait until you’re finished and walk you home.’
‘I don’t need an escort, Mr Gunn.’
‘I told you, the name is Stefano.’ An edge of impatience had crept into his voice. Her simmering hostility and mutinous stubbornness, rather than putting him off, was goading him into digging his heels in. He’d come here to talk to her and talk to her he would. Maybe if it hadn’t been for Flora, he would have shrugged off her cool refusal to listen to him although a little voice in his head was telling him that she posed a challenge and a challenge was something he had not experienced in a very long time.
Sunny didn’t bother to answer. She knew she was attracting interested looks from her friends in the restaurant and that in itself made her bristle with annoyance at him.
How dared he track her down like this?
How dared he think that he could stampede over her very clear refusal to listen to his proposition?
How dared he think he could try and sweet-talk her into bed because he was filthy rich and she was just an ordinary junior in a law firm and therefore open to persuasion?
And how dared he compromise her position in the company by talking to her boss about her?
Rage bubbled up inside her as she raced through the remainder of her chores, wiping the tables and then, finally, changing back into her jeans and T-shirt and the denim jacket she had brought along because it was now quite cool outside.
‘He’s still there, you know,’ Claire said, lounging by the kitchen door with a tea towel slung over her shoulder. She and Tom would stay on for at least another hour and in the morning they would count the takings. It had been a very good night. ‘I know you’ve made a point of pretending not to notice, but he hasn’t gone.’
Sunny flushed and scowled.
‘My darling, none of us can miss the way the guys who come in here stare at you. I don’t mean to intrude... I know you’re a very private person, but haven’t you ever been tempted to...to...?’
‘Never,’ Sunny said fiercely. ‘I don’t go for guys who are drawn to me because of the way I look.’ She remembered her foster father’s lecherous eyes following her through the house, while his invalid wife remained cheerfully oblivious, and shuddered.
‘Who’s your latest admirer?’
Sunny sighed and looked at Claire. ‘He’s not an admirer,’ she admitted. Although why else would he be here? If not to try and get her into bed? She wasn’t vain but she was realistic and being realistic protected her against having her head turned by meaningless, pretty words. ‘Don’t worry. I’ll get rid of him and I’ll make sure he doesn’t come here again.’
Claire laughed. ‘He looks rich. He can come whenever he wants, just as long as he puts his hand in his pocket and actually shows up in time to order food and drink!’
‘I’ll pass that on.’ Sunny smiled weakly. She had no intention of doing any such thing. What she intended to do