don’t have to explain yourself to me,’ she said, making an effort to get a grip, put some stiffeners in her knees.
Not at all.
‘I’m glad to hear it.’ West let go of the door and every cell in her body gave a little jump—of nervousness, excitement, anticipation—but he was only settling himself more comfortably, leaning his shoulder against the frame, crossing strong, sinewy arms and putting a dangerous strain on the stitches holding his T-shirt together. ‘I thought perhaps you were attempting to make a point of some kind.’
‘What?’ Sorrel realised that she was holding her breath... ‘No,’ she said, unable to look away as one of the stitches popped, then another, and the seam parted to reveal a glimpse of the golden flesh beneath. She swallowed. Hard. ‘The frequency of your correspondence is none of my business.’
‘I know that, but I was beginning to wonder if you did.’ The gleam intensified and without warning she was feeling anything but cold. Her head might be saying, ‘He is so not your type...’ She did not do lust at first sight.
Her body wasn’t listening.
It had tuned out her brain and was reaching out to him with fluttery little ‘touch me’ appeals from her pulse points, the tight betraying peaks of her breasts poking against the thin silk...
No, no, no, no, no!
She swallowed, straightened her spine, hoping that he’d put that down to the cold air swirling up from the open freezer. She continued to cling to it, not for support, but to stop herself from taking a step closer. Flinging herself at him. That was what her mother, who’d made a life’s work of lust at first sight and had three fatherless daughters to show for it, would have done.
Since the age of seventeen, when that legacy had come back to bite her and break her teenage heart, she had made a point of doing the opposite of whatever her mother would do in any circumstance that involved a man. Especially avoiding the kind of rough-hewn men who, it seemed, could turn her head with a glance.
Sorrel had no idea what had brought Alexander West back to Maybridge, but from her own reaction it was obvious that his arrival was going to send Ria into a meltdown tizzy. Worse, it would cause no end of havoc to the running of Knickerbocker Gloria, which was balanced on the edge of chaos at the best of times. The knock-on effect was going to be the disruption of the business she was working so hard to turn into a high-end event brand.
Presumably Ria’s absence this morning meant that she was having a long lie-in to recover from the enthusiastic welcome home she’d given the prodigal on his return.
He looked pretty shattered, too, come to think of it...
Sorrel slammed the door shut on the images that thought evoked. It was going to take a lot more than a pair of wide, here-today-gone-tomorrow shoulders to impress her.
Oh, yes.
While her friends had been dating, she’d had an early reality check on the value of romance and had focused on her future, choosing the prosaic Business Management degree and vowing that she’d be a millionaire by the time she was twenty-five.
Any man who wanted her attention would have to match her in drive and ambition. He would also have to be well groomed, well dressed, focused on his career and, most important of all, stationary.
The first two could be fixed. The third would, inevitably, be a work in progress, but her entire life had been dominated by men who caused havoc when they were around and then disappeared leaving the women to pick up the pieces. The last was non-negotiable.
Alexander West struck out on every single point, she told herself as another stitch surrendered, producing a flutter of excitement just below her waist. Anticipation. Dangerous feelings that, before she knew it, could run out of control and wreck her lifeplan, no matter how firmly nailed down.
‘What, exactly, are you doing here?’ she demanded. If the cold air swirling around at her back wasn’t enough to cool her down, all she had to do was remind herself that he belonged to Ria.
She was doing a pretty good job of cool and controlled, at least on the surface. Having faced down sceptical bank managers, sceptical marketing men and sceptical events organisers, she’d had plenty of practice keeping the surface calm even when her insides were churning. Right now hers felt as if a cloud of butterflies had moved in.
‘That’s none of your business, either.’
‘Actually, it is. Ria supplies me with ice cream for my business and since she has apparently left you in charge for the day...’ major stress on ‘apparently’ ‘...you should be aware that, while you are in a food-preparation area, you are required to wear a hat,’ she continued, in an attempt to crush both him and the disturbing effect he and his worn-out seams were having on her concentration. ‘And a white coat.’
A white coat would cover those shoulders and thighs and then she would be able to think straight.
‘Since Knickerbocker Gloria is no longer in business,’ he replied, ‘that’s not an issue.’ Had he placed the slightest emphasis on knicker? He nodded in the direction of the cartons she had piled up on the table beside the freezer and said, ‘If you’ll be good enough to return the stock to the freezer, I’ll see you off the premises.’
It took a moment for his words to filter through.
‘Stock? No longer in... What on earth are you talking about? Ria knows I’m picking up this order today. When will she be here?’
‘She won’t.’
‘Excuse me?’ She understood the words, but they were spinning around in her brain and wouldn’t line up. ‘Won’t what?’
‘Be here. Any time soon.’ He shrugged, then, taking pity on her obvious confusion—he was probably used to women losing the power of speech when he flexed his biceps—he said, ‘She had an unscheduled visit from the Revenue last week. It seems that she hasn’t been paying her VAT. Worse, she’s been ignoring their letters on the subject and you know how touchy they get about things like that.’
‘Not from personal experience,’ she replied, shocked to her backbone. Her books were updated on a daily basis, her sales tax paid quarterly by direct debit. Her family had lived on the breadline for a very long time after one particularly beguiling here-today-gone-tomorrow man had left her family penniless.
She was never going back there.
Ever.
There was nothing wrong with her imagination, however. She knew that ‘touchy’ was an understatement on the epic scale. ‘What happened? Exactly,’ she added.
‘I couldn’t say, exactly. Using my imagination to fill the gaps I’d say that they arrived unannounced to carry out an audit, took one look at her books and issued her with an insolvency notice,’ he said, without any discernible emotion.
‘But that means—’
‘That means that nothing can leave the premises until an inventory has been made of the business assets and the debts paid or, alternatively, she’s been declared bankrupt and her creditors have filed their claims.’
‘What? No!’ As her brain finally stopped freewheeling and the cogs engaged, she put her hand protectively on top of the ices piled up beside her. ‘I have to have these today. Now. And the other ices I ordered.’ Then felt horribly guilty for putting her own needs first when Ria was in such trouble.
Sorrel had always struggled with Ria’s somewhat cavalier attitude to business. She’d done everything she could to organise her but it was like pushing water uphill. If she was in trouble with the taxman, though, she must be frightened to death.
‘That would be the champagne sorbet that you can’t find,’ Alexander said, jerking her back to her own problem.
‘Amongst other things.’ At least he’d had his ears as well as his eyes open while he’d been ogling her underwear. ‘Perhaps they’re