over a little boy in her social group and Sybella had sat down and had the talk with her. Physically hurting someone was wrong. Whatever the provocation, she must use her words, not her fists. And here she was, mother of the year, trying to slug a perfect stranger!
She’d had provocation all right, but that wasn’t an excuse.
She needed to apologise to him but Sybella found herself struggling because he’d implied something, and he hadn’t taken that back. Which was very different from saying it was none of his business.
‘Six years ago my husband kissed me and climbed into his van and drove it out to the Pentwistle Farm,’ she said in a low voice, ‘and on the road between the farm and the turn-off he was struck by another car coming over the rise.’
Nik was looking at her with an expression she hadn’t seen before in this man.
As if he were taking her seriously.
‘So no, Mr Voronov, my husband has no idea what I’m doing nowadays—but I do. I wish I hadn’t tried to hit you. I can’t take that back. But you don’t get to say things like that to me. I don’t deserve your contempt, or do you just have a problem with women in general? I suspect you do.’
Sybella had no idea where all those words had come from or her ability to say them or even if they were true. But nothing had just ‘happened’ here tonight. It had been building since he’d held her in his arms outside in the snow and all the sensuality latent in her body had woken up.
She resented it, and she resented him. But none of that was his fault.
‘I suspect I have a problem with you, Mrs Parminter,’ he said slowly. ‘But I am sorry for what I said.’
‘You should be.’ She held his gaze. She could see her words had affected him and she could also see some grudging respect in his eyes and that gave her the grace to say, ‘I’m sorry too.’
She forced the apology out, because as wrong as her actions were she couldn’t yet let go of them, or the feelings that had provoked them. None of this had made her feel better; she felt worse. She wrapped arms around her waist as best she could in her ridiculous parka.
He was looking at her as if she deserved some compassion. He was wrong. She deserved a good talking-to for all the mistakes she’d made in dealing with this house.
‘You’re cold,’ he said. ‘You need to take off your wet things.’
‘I don’t—’
‘You can dry them in front of the fire, or I can have them laundered.’
‘Please don’t bother.’ She passed a hand over her face. ‘I’m going to take them back to Climb and Ski tomorrow for a full refund.’
‘Are you all right?’
She blinked, taking her hand away from her face to find him watching her as if she might keel over. ‘I guess so.’
Which was when her eyes filled with tears. Oh, blast.
Tired, wet, in some serious trouble over her activities in this house, and yet troublingly aware of Nik Voronov as a man and her own deficiencies in that area, Sybella wanted nothing more than to wriggle out of her wet things and cast herself down in front of the fire and sleep for a hundred years.
But she didn’t get the fairy-tale option. She should be practising a better apology.
There was a rattle and clatter as Gordon, who ran the household, entered from a side door, wheeling the drinks trolley.
Saved by the man with the alcohol!
A long-time bachelor, Gordon was her ally in the house, having worked here for almost thirty years under the previous owner. He gave her a guarded look of surprise but didn’t say anything. He was too good at his job.
Her host meanwhile had signalled to Gordon he could deal with the drinks.
Sybella wondered if she could just slip out with the trolley. But the fire lured her and she turned away to deal with her wet things, surreptitiously sniffing and wiping at her eyes with her wrist. She stripped off her parka and then her cords, feeling self-conscious in her tights but not exposed. They were of a durable denier and thick enough to act as leggings. Frankly, it was a relief to be able to move her body freely again.
She laid out her jeans before the fire and had just straightened up when a towel dropped over her head.
She gave a start but with a gruff, ‘Hold still,’ her host began to vigorously but not roughly rub dry her damp hair.
After an initial protest of, ‘I can do this,’ she gave in, because really he was impossible to argue with.
But this was her role. For five years she’d been the caregiver. It was disconcerting to find herself the one being cared for. And as his strokes became more rhythmic Sybella found herself going quiescent, some of the tension of the crazy evening leaving her.
It had been so long since her needs were seen to by someone else. She’d forgotten it could be like this. Even when Simon had been alive he’d been so busy with his new veterinary practice in the few months they were married they had seemed only to bump into each other at night in bed, and Sybella could feel her skin suffusing with heat because another man’s hands were on her, if only drying her hair. But when she looked up and clashed with his grey eyes she was shocked into feelings so raw and insistent she barely recognised them as the gentle, awkward finding their way she’d had with Simon...
‘That’s enough,’ she said, her voice a little rough with the sudden upsurge of feeling beating around in her.
He paused but then continued to dry her even more vigorously.
‘If you collapse from pneumonia in a few days’ time—’ he said gruffly.
‘You don’t want it on your conscience?’
‘I don’t want a lawsuit.’
Sybella snorted, she couldn’t help it, and she felt rather than saw him smile.
‘I’m not a lawyer,’ she said, ‘and I don’t have the money for a lawyer.’
‘What do you do,’ he asked, removing the towel so that her head came back and she could see him, ‘besides haunt this house?’
She didn’t miss a beat. ‘I could give you a list?’
A slow grudging smile curled up his mouth, taking Sybella’s entire attention with it. ‘Why don’t you do that?’
As if he had all the time in the world to listen to her life story. As if like before she’d spill her guts.
Instead she asked, ‘Why don’t you visit your grandfather more often?’ It was the one thing that really bothered her, and it was more important than anything to do with the open house and how much trouble she would be in.
He reached out and gently smoothed the drying ringlets back from her face.
‘I would have visited earlier,’ he said, ‘if I’d had any idea something so beautiful was here.’
Then his gaze dropped to her mouth.
She relived that moment in the snow and realised it hadn’t been her imagination. There was a very strong attraction between them.
Only she didn’t do things like this.
Given the last man to kiss her existed now only in her memory of him.
She wasn’t even sure what she would do if he...
His mouth covered hers. He gave her no opportunity to back out, or overthink it, he just made it happen. One hand sliding around the back of her head to cradle her, the other at the small of her back. His hand was so broad he could span her waist from behind.
In a flurry of sense impressions, Sybella had never felt so delicate, so utterly aware she was a feeling, sensate woman and, as exciting and dangerous