Jackie Braun - By Request Collection 1

‘D AWN. and in front of us the idyllic English country scene. Smell that grass. Look at that thin stream of sunlight driving night-shadows down the velvet hills—’

How long did he have to stay here?

With an exasperated roar, Heath flipped channels, silencing the farming programme. All he’d smelled so far was cow dung. And it was raining.

Resting his chin on one arm, he slammed his foot down on the accelerator. The Lamborghini roared drowning out the bird-song. Perfect. He missed the concrete jungle—no smells, no mud, no cranky plumbing. Why Uncle Harry had left him a run-down country estate remained a mystery. Heath was allergic to the country—to anything that didn’t come with dot-com attached. His empire had been built in a bedroom. What did he need all this for?

And it was only after asking himself that question that he spotted the tent someone had erected on a mossy bank just inside the gates … spotted the small pink feet sticking out of the entrance. Forget hating the place. He felt proprietorial suddenly. What would he do if someone pitched a tent outside the front door of his London home?

Stopping the car, he climbed out. Striding up to the tent, he unzipped it.

A yelp of surprise ripped through the steady drum of falling rain. Standing back, he folded his arms, waiting for developments. He didn’t have long to wait. A strident pixie crawled out, screaming at him that it was the middle of the night as she sprang to her feet. Red hair flying, she stood like an irate stick insect telling him what she thought of him in language as colourful as the clothes she was frantically tugging on—a camouflage top, and shot-off purple leggings that displayed her tiny feet. One furious glance at his car and he was responsible for everything from frightening the local wildlife to global warming, apparently, until finally, having got over the shock of being so rudely awakened, she gulped, took a breath, and exclaimed, ‘Heath Stamp…’ Clapping a hand to her chest, she stared at him as if she couldn’t believe her eyes.

‘Bronte Foster-Jenkins,’ he murmured, taking her in.

‘I’ve been expecting you—’

‘So I see,’ he said, glancing at the tent.

Expecting Heath to arrive? Yes, but not her reaction to it. He wasn’t supposed to arrive at dawn, either. Around midday, the postmistress in the village had suggested. Heath Stamp, hip, slick, rugged, tough, and even better looking than his most recent images in the press suggested. This was a vastly improved version of someone she’d dreamed about for thirteen years, two months, six hours, and—

‘You do know you’re trespassing, Bronte?’

And as delightful as ever.

The years melted away. They were at loggerheads immediately. She had to remind herself Heath was no longer a wild youth who’d been locked up for bare-knuckle fighting, and who used to visit Hebers Ghyll on a release programme, but a successful Internet entrepreneur and the new owner of Hebers Ghyll, the country estate where Bronte had grown up, and where her mother had been the housekeeper and her father the gamekeeper. ‘The estate has been deserted for weeks now—’

‘And that’s an excuse for breaking in?’

‘The gates were open. Everything’s gone to pot,’ she told him angrily.

‘And that’s my fault?’

‘You own it. You tell me.’ Heath’s inheritance had a special hold on her heart for all sorts of reasons, not least of which she considered the estate her second home.

While Heath had gained nothing in charm, Bronte registered as he turned his back, he clearly still couldn’t care less what people thought of him. He never had.

He’d walked off to give them both space. Seeing Bronte again had floored him. Since the first time he had visited the estate—where ironically his real-life uncle Harry had used to run a rehabilitation centre for out-of-control youths—there had been something between him and Bronte, something that drew the good girl to the dark side. He’d tried to steer clear, not wanting to taint her. But he would think about her when he sat alone and stared at his bruised knuckles. She was light to his darkness. Back then Bronte had represented everything that was pure, fun and happy, while he was the youth from the gutter who met every challenge with his fists. He’d worshipped her from afar, had she only known it. That buzz between them surely should have died by now.

‘That tree was struck by lightning, and no one’s moved it,’ she said, reclaiming his attention.

He hadn’t even realised he’d been staring at the old tree, but now he remembered Uncle Harry telling him that it had stood on the estate for centuries.

‘It’ll stay there until it rots, I suppose,’ she flared.

‘I’ll have it moved.’ He shrugged. ‘Maybe have something planted in its place.’

‘It would mean more if you did it.’

He threw her a glance, warning her not to push it. But she would. She always had. Bronte loved a campaign whether it was free the chickens, or somewhere for the local youth to hang out.

‘And just think of all the free firewood,’ she said casually.

She was working on him. When hadn’t she? And now it all came flooding back—what she’d done for him—and how he used to envy Bronte her simple life on the estate with her happy family. He’d felt a hungry desperation to share what they had but had never allowed them to draw him in, in case he spoiled it. He’d spoiled everything back then.

And now?

He was still hard and contained.

And Hebers Ghyll?

Was in the pending file.

And Bronte?

Heath raked his hair with impatience.

This was all happening too fast, way too fast. She hadn’t expected to feel as shaken as this when she saw Heath again. Heading for the shelter of some trees where the thick green canopy acted like a giant umbrella, she sucked in some deep steadying breaths. She had to remind herself why she was here—to find out what Heath’s plans for the estate were. ‘I heard the new owner was going to break up the estate—’

‘And?’

‘You can’t.’ Bronte’s heart picked up pace as Heath came to join her beneath the branches. ‘You don’t know enough about the area as it is today. You don’t know how desperate people are for jobs. You haven’t been near the place for years—’

‘And you have?’

Bronte’s cheeks flared red. Yes, she’d been away, but her travels had been geared towards putting what she had learned at college into practice. As a child she had dogged Uncle Harry’s footsteps, trying to be useful and asking him endless questions about Hebers Ghyll. He’d said she was a good lieutenant and might make a decent estate manager one day if she worked hard enough. When she left school Uncle Harry had paid for her to go to college to study estate management. ‘I’ve been away recently,’ she conceded, ‘but apart from that I’ve lived on the estate all my life.’

‘So, what are you saying, Bronte? You’re the only one who cares about Hebers Ghyll?’ Heath’s chin dipped a warning.

‘Well, do you care,’ Bronte exclaimed with frustration, ‘beyond its value?’

‘I’d be foolish not to care about its value.’

‘But there’s so much more than money here.’ And she had been prepared to camp out on the road leading up to the old house for as long as it took to prove that to him. ‘Why else do you think I scrabbled round my parents’ attic to find the old tent?’ Heath’s dark gaze flashed a warning, which she ignored. ‘Do you think I like camping out in the rain?’

‘I don’t know what you like.’

The gulf between them yawned. It might have been easier to explain and convince Heath if she had seen him recently. The shock of seeing him again after all these years was something she hadn’t anticipated. It wasn’t how tall he was, or how good-looking—it was the aura of danger and unapologetic masculinity she found so unnerving.