Sophie Weston - The Millionaire's Daughter

It had certainly never been intended to reflect someone like Annis. Her short dark hair had been turned black by the rain and was now plastered to her head like a skullcap. The only good thing about it was that the wet hair was also plastered over the ugly scar that ran from her eyebrow to her hairline. Realising it, she scowled horribly, then saw that he was laughing at her again.

Hurriedly Annis readjusted her expression.

‘I always try to keep an open mind,’ she said lightly.

He hardly pretended to believe her.

‘Sure you do.’

Her reflected brows snapped together in a frown of irritation. Annis saw it in despair. Her frowns were notorious. There never seemed to be anything that she could do about them, either.

She struggled to forget that she was over-tired, underdressed and that her minimal make-up had run in the rain. And that the Lord Byron look-alike in front of her had noticed every detail. She even tried to hide how thoroughly jangled she was to find the promised family supper transformed into one of Lynda’s find-Annis-a-man fests. After all, none of that was Konstantin Vitale’s fault, she reminded herself.

‘Sorry,’ she said. ‘Put it down to end-of-the-week neurosis.’ She squared her shoulders, pinned on a polite smile, and tried to retune her mind to social conversation. ‘So what does my father think we have in common?’

The sardonic expression was very evident. ‘To be honest it was Mrs Carew who said you and I ought to get together.’

‘Surprise me,’ muttered Annis.

‘Excuse me?’

She shook her head, annoyed with herself. ‘Nothing.’

His eyes were speculative. ‘She respects you a lot.’

But not enough to accept that I can live without a man. There was a pregnant pause while Annis closed her lips over that one.

‘No, really. She’s a real fan. She was telling me how smart you are. What a great stepdaughter.’ It was almost a question.

Annis knew she was not reacting like a great stepdaughter. ‘That was kind of her,’ she managed in a stifled voice.

‘And unusual.’

Quite suddenly Annis realised she had run out of the ability to pretend. It was something to do with Friday-night tiredness. But more, much more, to do with that seductive voice and the horrible feeling that she was being sucked into something she could not control.

‘No,’ she said on an explosive little sigh. ‘No, it’s not unusual. Lynda does a terrific marketing campaign.’

‘What?’

She fixed the tall dark stranger with a baleful eye. She had been in this situation before. Experience told her there was only one thing she had never tried. Take a firm line straight from the start and hang on to it.

She took a deep breath and did just that. ‘Look, I don’t know what Lynda has told you. But let me set the record straight.’

He looked politely intrigued.

Annis drew a deep breath. ‘I’m twenty-nine years old, I live for my work and I don’t date.’

The man had high cheekbones and strange, slanting green eyes. They did not blink. Not blinking, he said a lot.

Ouch, Annis thought. I don’t think I meant it to sound like that.

She added hastily, ‘Nothing personal.’

It was not, perhaps, brilliantly tactful. The green eyes narrowed almost to slits.

‘That’s a relief,’ he said with a dryness that made her wince.

The deep voice had just a hint of a foreign accent. A very sexy accent. And he was taller than she was. Annis did not usually have to look up to people. It threw her off balance in every way.

‘I don’t want anyone to get the wrong idea. I mean I just like to make things clear. In general.’ She was floundering. Come on, Annis, you can do better than this. ‘Sometimes Lynda can be a bit misleading…’

He did not say anything, maintaining his air of gentle interest. Annis ran out of excusing generalities.

She tried the truth. ‘I—er—I mean I’m a bit of a workaholic.’

She made a despairing gesture. Too big a gesture, as always in this room of objets d’art. Champagne fountained from the glass she’d forgotten she was holding. At the same time a gold-painted plinth swayed at the impact. Konstantin Vitale steadied it. She saw he was looking deeply amused.

Amused! Great!

Of course, she could have said, My stepmother has set me up once too often. She thinks it would be nice for me to meet you. And when she says meet, she means dine with, dance with, holiday with, sleep with and, in the fullness of time, marry. Because my stepmother cannot get her head round the idea that any woman of my age might have other priorities. She thinks I’m scarred and difficult and on the shelf. She wants to help. You’re just the latest in a long, long line of unattached men she thinks might be good for me.

Oh, yes, she could have said that. It was there, every furious word, seething on the tip of her tongue.

Except, Annis was realising uneasily, he did not look like the latest in a long line of anyone. Nor, on consideration, like the sort of man who was likely to be good for the woman of the moment. Challenging, exciting and unpredictable, yes; cynical, certainly. Not, good.

Annis looked into the handsome, world-weary face and was assailed by doubt. Surely even Lynda, who thought she had a moral obligation to throw unmarried people together, wouldn’t imagine she could matchmake for a sophisticate like this?

She said gropingly, ‘Lynda did say she wanted us to meet?’

He was straightening the abstract sculpture on the plinth she had nearly sent flying. He glanced down at her, green eyes glinting.

‘Those common interests of ours, I guess.’

He looked perfectly solemn but Annis knew he was laughing.

Annis’s doubts disappeared. So her first suspicions had been right after all. She was oddly disappointed. She did not want him to be the sort of man to date a millionaire’s daughter, sight unseen.

‘Oh, yes?’ she said freezingly.

He was bland. ‘Meet another workaholic.’

And he held out his hand again.

To her own annoyance, Annis found herself taking it as if he had mesmerised her. It was not the light, social brush of the fingers of that first handshake either. It was a purposeful grasp, as if he were giving her a message.

Startled, she looked down. His hand was tanned and strong. It looked as if he had been working outdoors somewhere in the sun. Her ringless fingers were as pale as water engulfed in his clasp, and looked about as weak, Annis thought in disgust. Was that his message? Indignant she lifted her head and glared right into those strange eyes.

There was a moment’s silence.

Then, ‘Yeah,’ he drawled. As if she had asked him a question. Or as if she were a strange girl he was sizing up across a fairground or the floor of a nightclub. Sizing her up, what was more, with lazy appreciation.

Appreciation? Ridiculous. He had to be mocking her.

Annis tugged her hand away in pure reflex.

She half turned away and spoke at random. ‘If you’re a genuine workaholic, what are you doing at a party? There’s at least another four hours’ working time left tonight.’

It wasn’t a very good joke and Konstantin Vitale didn’t laugh.

‘I could ask you the same thing,’ he said slowly.

Annis was curt. ‘Family.’ She was not going to admit that her stepmother had got her here under false pretences, though. It made her look a fool. So she added lightly, ‘Lynda’s dinner parties are a three-line whip. Besides, I haven’t seen my father since Carew’s half-year results.’

Konstantin Vitale glanced across at his host, currently holding forth by the fireplace. His mouth curled.

‘You work for Carew’s? I thought your stepmother said you were independent.’