do anything about it right now, in a broken-down car on the side of a quiet Scottish road.
Sí, not one of his smarter moves.
He began to think about leaping into ice holes in Reykjavik, of losing to a lesser team, about the very real possibility that a photo of him making out like a teenager with this girl might all too easily end up on the internet.
But what should have killed his desire stone-dead was the wave of tenderness that came over him as she drew away and hid her face in his neck in a gesture of embarrassment that oddly, crazily, had a rush of male protectiveness surging up from nowhere.
He found himself stroking the back of her neck, the urge to be affectionate with her amazingly strong.
Fragile, he told himself again. She’s fragile.
Lulu was aware that Alejandro was moving away from her and she had nowhere to hide. One minute she’d been trying to control her panic, the next she’d been tipped into something she hadn’t had a lot of in her twenty-three years—the feel, the scent, the excitement of a man kissing her. And not just any man. This man. This very masculine man, who knew exactly what he was doing.
Her heart had slammed against her chest as his mouth had slid against hers. It had been the most invigorating experience of her life.
She waited for him to say something, because for the life of her she had nothing. Zero.
‘All fixed now,’ he said, dropping the words into her lap as if he’d tossed her his hotel room key.
It wasn’t his words but the deliberation with which he wielded them that had her gaze flying to meet his. And then his meaning became clear.
Fixed? Lulu floundered with the concept. He’d done it on purpose? He hadn’t been carried away like her at all?
Mon Dieu, what a little fool she was.
Her heart was still galloping like a wild horse, and now it picked up pace for all the wrong reasons.
She was aware of him watching her from beneath hooded eyes...aware that he now knew a great deal more about her than he had minutes ago. More than any man knew, to her deep embarrassment. And he’d set her up. He’d done it to humiliate her.
Her hand shot out but he caught it before she found her target. ‘No slapping, mi belleza.’
Alejandro watched the struggle on her face and, as much as he welcomed the status quo between them being lodged once more in place, he knew he’d acted like a bastard.
And that was when he heard it. The rumble.
His attention moved across to the side rear-vision mirror and he saw what was coming.
Lulu wrenched her wrist out of his hold and wiped her mouth with the back of her hand to give him the message. ‘You’re never to do that again.’
‘Fine.’ He kept his eye on what was coming.
‘There’s a name for men who force themselves on unwilling women.’ She addressed him directly, unbuckling her belt.
That had his attention.
‘I didn’t use any force, querida.’ He was frowning at her. ‘You were with me the whole way. It’s called chemistry.’
‘I know what it’s called.’ She opened her door.
‘Where the hell are you going?’ he growled, not liking her spin on this.
‘Somewhere far away from you.’ Which was when she gave a shriek and slammed the door shut again.
Around them a sea of black-faced sheep surged, like something out of a biblical plague. The car rocked slightly with the force.
‘I probably should have mentioned that,’ Alejandro drawled, winding down his window. ‘We’ve got company.’
I’M GOING TO DIE.
Lulu went stiff as a board as all around her the road just seemed to fill up with sheep.
‘Welcome to Scotland,’ said Alejandro, propping one arm casually on the door, as if floating in a sea of sheep happened regularly in Argentina.
A whimper had buried itself at the base of her throat, and she just knew that if she opened her mouth it would come out and humiliate her. But, really, how much worse could it get?
She had to speak. To make something happen.
‘Drive, why don’t you?’ she hissed at him a little desperately.
‘Where?’ He gestured at the woolly tide. ‘This is Scotland, chica. Here we give way to sheep.’
Lulu didn’t know if this was true or just more of him tormenting her. She suspected a little of both.
‘Besides,’ he added, ‘the back tyre’s shot.’
Forget the tyre! She was shot. Her mouth pulsed from his kiss and her body felt oddly light, but that might be shock setting in. Because those big, woolly mammoths with their black faces were turning her tummy to cold liquid and her pulse was going so fast she thought she might pass out.
This was worse than a two-hour flight from Paris to Edinburgh, or letting a man she had only known for a few hours at most plant a kiss on her.
This was her worst nightmare.
Because she couldn’t escape. And the knowledge that she was only inches away from a full meltdown in front of this man was probably the only thing keeping her upright and frozen in her seat.
She knew she should never have got in this car with him.
She had no more control over her anxieties than she’d possessed this morning before the flight, when she’d knelt over the porcelain bowl at home in her flat and lost her breakfast.
Dieu, what if she was sick again? In this car? He wouldn’t be kind. There wasn’t a kind bone in his body.
There was a click, and Lulu realised he’d opened his door.
‘What are you doing?’ she almost shrieked.
He looked surprised by her vehemence. ‘I’m going to have a word with the farmer,’ he said mildly. ‘It’s a damn sight better than sitting here. Come on.’
‘No!’ She clutched hold of his arm.
‘Or we could stay here and neck like a couple of teenagers,’ he said dryly.
Lulu let him go in a flash, and discovered she really was between a rock and a hard place.
‘Come on,’ he said more patiently. ‘Stretch your legs.’
Lulu flailed around for a reason not to—any reason. ‘I don’t like sheep. They’re smelly, and—’ she cast about for something...anything ‘—and I’ll wreck my shoes.’
He gave her a look that in all honesty she knew her comments deserved and her toes curled under inside said shoes. The last of the confident, take-on-the-world Lulu died inside her. The Lulu who had sprung to life in his arms and kissed him back barely had time to take flight. She was back to being useless.
What made it worse was that he shrugged, as if it didn’t matter to him either way, which she guessed it didn’t.
‘Suit yourself, chica.’ He swung open his door and Lulu realised he was serious.
He was also back to calling her chica.
Lulu watched in tense dismay as he took off in easy strides down the road, all shoulders and masculine confidence, shouting out something to the two men driving the sheep. Obviously magic words, given they waited for him and then stood around conversing with him like old friends.
She sat forward, her nose almost