the impact of his words truly hit her. With a gasp, she splashed to a halt and dropped her skirts. A horse stood tethered near the pony cart they had used to transport stone and supplies, and striding down the slight incline towards the water came Mateo Cardea.
Tall and strong, with sun glinting off his dark curls and shining boots, he advanced with a purposeful tread. Portia’s mouth gaped open as he failed to stop at the shore’s edge, but the chiselled lines of his face were set and determined. Without hesitation he strode right into the water and towards her. She stared, noting his furrowed brow and the large straw hat dangling from his fingers.
Water sloshed around her knees as he drew to a halt in front of her. Her breath caught.
And then he smiled.
Unfair! The cry emanated from the vulnerable part of Portia’s soul, the one that she had spent just this morning locking away. It was a nonsensical notion, but the sudden pounding of her heart felt eerily like the bang of a fist on a closed door.
Where was the angry, brooding man who’d hurled insults at her last night? She searched his face, but the stormy countenance and dangerous gaze had fled like clouds before sunshine. And left only the visage that had fuelled her adolescent dreams for years.
The real irony was that it was a face that might have been made for anger and brooding. Bold, dark eyes flashed under arched brows and amidst a longish, angular face. The great Cardea nose might have overwhelmed any other man’s features, but on Mateo was balanced beautifully by his wide, sensual mouth and irresistible tangle of curls. Masculine splendour shone down on her, warmer than the rays of the sun. And suddenly Portia wobbled, as weak in the knees as if she truly had spent too long in the heat.
Mateo stepped close and grasped her arm.
Billings snorted as he sloshed past them. ‘Coming through, Mrs Tofton.’
Newman followed without comment, and without turning his gaze in their direction. Portia barely noticed. She watched, mesmerized, as Mateo’s other hand lifted, rose and disappeared above her head. She jumped, startled at the gentle touch of his fingers moving in her hair.
‘Forgive me,’ he said softly. ‘But—’ Brown and capable, his hand hovered before her face, holding a large chip of stone. Comprehension dawned, along with a flush of embarrassment. She suppressed it and watched him toss the thing into the water. Grasping the straw hat where it dangled beneath their arms, he offered it up. ‘You’ll want your hat, Peeve,’ he said quite casually. ‘Your nose is turning red.’
She lost her fight with the advancing tide of warmth. And just the thought that he might notice turned a simple blush into a spiralling wave of heat. She tried calling herself to task. She’d meant to demonstrate her complete indifference to his anger, to present a picture of a woman occupied with her own pursuits, fully capable of commanding her own destiny. She had not meant to blush like a girl at his first words or to meet him standing knee-deep in the lake.
But this was the Mateo of her youth—and somehow their bizarre situation seemed fitting. He towered over her, one eyebrow elevated, a matching wry grin pulling at the opposite corner of his mouth. Portia drew a long, shuddering breath. It struck her hard—that oh-so-familiar gleam in his dark eyes, full of good-natured mischief and just the smallest hint of irony.
She pulled abruptly away from his touch and struck out on her own for the shore. ‘Don’t call me that, please.’
He followed, literally in her wake. ‘I will not, of course, if you dislike it. But I assure you that today at least, I meant it only in affection.’
‘Nevertheless.’ Portia climbed the springy bank, bent down and grasped her shoes.
‘Shall I call you Mrs Tofton, then?’ he asked with a quizzically raised brow.
She heard the unasked question. He wondered why she did not use her hereditary title. And deliberately she did not answer. ‘That is my name,’ she answered in the same tone. ‘But why don’t you just call me Portia, as you used to?’ She summoned a smile. ‘I beg your pardon for meeting you in such disarray. My foreman said we had to act quickly to prevent further damage to the bridge, and I’m afraid I cast all other considerations aside.’
She lowered her gaze as he drew close, and caught sight of his ruined footwear. ‘Oh,’ she gasped, ‘your boots!’ She glared up at him. ‘Whatever possessed you, Mateo? There was no need of that.’
‘But it was necessary—after my display of spectacularly bad manners, I feared you would strike out for the opposite shore at the sight of me.’ He still held her floppy hat. With delicate movements, he lifted it high. Moving slowly, as if he worked not to frighten her, he settled it on her head.
She stood stiff and ram-rod straight. He followed the line of ribbons with his fingertips and began to tie them under her chin.
‘I suppose I could not have blamed you if you had,’ he spoke low and his jaw tensed. ‘I owe you an apology, cara. No matter the situation, I should not have lashed out at you like that.’
She flinched at the old endearment. He was too close. She was too flustered. She’d wanted him to look at her, see her, but she’d imagined it at more of a distance. Portia’s heart began to flit inside her chest like a bird in a cage.
She pushed his hands away and stepped back. ‘I’m perfectly capable of tying my own ribbons, thank you,’ she said irritably. She breathed deep, needing to regain control of her wayward emotions and the situation. You aren’t a love-struck young girl any more, she reminded herself fiercely.
‘There is no need for an apology.’ There, that was better. Her tone, at least, sounded tightly controlled. ‘The circumstances are highly unusual. I suppose anyone might have jumped to the conclusions you did.’
His dark gaze roved over her. He said nothing for a long minute, just watched her closely while she fiddled with half-tied ribbons. ‘Ah, but I begin to see now,’ he said. ‘Anyone might have suspected the worst, but you didn’t expect it of me.’
Some heavy emotion weighted his voice. Guilt? Sorrow? She wished she knew which she would have preferred it to be.
‘And that changes much of what I thought would pass between us.’ His brow furrowed as he stared down at her. ‘And what do I do with you now, I wonder?’
Portia stiffened. ‘Not a thing! It’s not your place to do anything at all with me. In fact, I’d say the shoe was quite on the other foot.’
He winced. ‘I deserved that, did I not?’
‘And far more.’ She raked her gaze down the length of him. ‘Hard as you may find it to believe, Mateo, I’ve had important things on my mind—and not a one of them involved a scheme to trap you into marriage.’
He returned her speculative gaze. ‘Do you know—I think it would have been better for me, had you been the villainess I suspected you to be.’
How was she supposed to answer that?
‘Portia! Are you down here still?’
The shrill call saved her from the necessity. She glanced up and caught sight of a glimpse of colour through the trees. Many times over the years, she’d had reason to be grateful to Dorrie, but she could recall nothing like the great tide of relief that swept through her now.
‘Portia?’
‘Here, Dorinda!’she answered with a wave as Dorrie erupted from the trees at a trot.
‘Portia,’ Dorrie called, urgency alive in her expression, as well as in the unusual quickness of her step. ‘Vickers tells me a rider was spotted %h; ’ Her gait faltered. ‘Oh, yes. I see I’m too late.’
Portia fidgeted as the heavy weight of her companion’s gaze fell on her.
Dorrie let out an audible moan. ‘Oh, Portia, dear! How could you?’
From beside her came an unexpected, but