Melissa James - Daring to Date the Boss / The Tycoon Who Healed Her Heart - Daring to Date the Boss / The Tycoon Who Healed Her Heart

Relieved she’d jumped back on the light, playful path, he winked at her. ‘Ah, but you’d have to catch me first. Rather hard to manage from that position.’

And before she could retort in kind he moved the lower half of his body so they began sliding down the baby slope together on private, non-resort land far from the fun, romantic night-skiing he’d established years ago for his regular clients. He held her so that when she wobbled he could steady her; he moved them in as close to perfect sync as he could, slowly enough so that she wouldn’t feel loss of control.

And when she was moving on her own, with her inexpressibly kissable mouth stretched in a wide smile of discovered poise and the simple joy of living, he had to move. He had no choice, really. It was move or kiss her, because if there was ever a kissing moment it was this one.

So he pulled away far enough to hold her hand. ‘It’s time to see what you’re capable of.’ After a few panicked wobbles, he said encouragingly, ‘You’re a natural at this. You’re a snow queen. You can do this, Rachel. I know you can.’

Her astonishment, so clear even behind her goggles, and obvious in her open mouth, almost made him lose balance. ‘I—Thank you. Nobody ever …’ She gulped, gulped again. ‘Nobody,’ she whispered, and shook her head.

Nobody ever said that to me before.

And, instead of the wrong parts hurting, now it was his heart that ached for her—ached for the sweet, real ‘doc with empathy’ who seemed so overcome by a few words of faith. And he wished he hadn’t used words he’d said before to a hundred female guests.

‘It’s true,’ he said just loud enough for her to hear. ‘Rachel, look at where you are. You are doing it.’

She looked down at her twisting body, at the tiny slope she was conquering. ‘Oh,’ she whispered, and her whole face grew alight with radiance. ‘Armand, I’m doing it. I’m skiing.’

It wasn’t the moment to correct her, or even to say that snowboarding was thought to be the harder discipline. He smiled. He smiled because he couldn’t help it. His life had been dark and complicated for eighteen years and yet this woman, who was on the run from her life—a woman who’d suffered probably far more than he’d ever know—filled him with light and made him feel heartfelt bliss in this simple achievement. ‘Yes, you are.’

‘I feel like Lois Lane,’ she said as they passed his ‘start’ line, making small S-slides down the slope. ‘You know that scene when Superman let her fly just by holding her hand?’

‘Yes,’ he said, resisting the impulse to break the moment by asking if that made him Superman. She’d certainly made him feel that way.

‘I feel like I’m flying, Armand.’ She held onto his gloved hand as if she was about to drop off a cliff, not even realising she was all but doing everything she needed to on her own. ‘You make me feel as if I can do anything.’ She glanced at him; he knew because he couldn’t keep his eyes from her muffled form. He felt as if he was imbibing her sparkling happiness, clear as new wine, just by being with her. ‘Thank you, Armand, thank you.’ Her voice was choked.

He didn’t say it was nothing, because it wasn’t, not to her. ‘It’s my privilege to be here with you, Rachel.’

‘Darn, my goggles are fogging up again,’ she mock-complained, trying to smile. ‘Let me ski, will you?’

He laughed and said no more. It was enough for both of them.

But as they took his private cable-car back up the slope and snowboarded back down, he kept hold of her hand. He’d promised not to let her fall and she’d had enough of broken promises. And falls.

There are some falls nobody can control.

Even as he steadied her and taught her to find her natural rhythm and ability on the slopes, the words continued to whisper to him—because she wasn’t talking about physical injury.

The words haunted him because he knew she was right. Rachel wasn’t fair game, and he didn’t know how to be the kind of man she needed. He didn’t even know if he’d want to when these few weeks were over. He was cynical, jaded, had never known how to believe in any woman outside of his family, always looking for the ‘exit’ sign from the night he met any woman. This awakening faith, this need to be with Rachel, was too new for either of them to trust in.

Being near her felt like touching heaven, but he couldn’t let this go beyond the odd half-friendship it was now. The thought of never seeing her again, never having another night like tonight, didn’t work for him. He wanted to keep her in his life. But Rachel deserved love, babies and ‘for ever’, and a man who could go the distance.

She deserved a man who wouldn’t lash out when times got hard. Could he do that? Damn it, he just didn’t know—and risking it would destroy her.

What he wanted was to be Rachel’s friend—to grow older, still exchange calls, emails and cards with her—a friendship that lasted the distance. Always to have her remember him and their time together with a smile. To have her want to see him again without pain, without complications.

So he’d do his level best to stop them both from falling.

‘It’s simple attraction, nothing more. I am not falling for Armand. I am so not falling for him. I refuse to fall for him!’ Satisfied, Rachel turned from the bathroom mirror where she’d wiped a clear bit in the shower-misted glass with a wet hand. She peered at herself every morning with almost anxious paranoia, but so far she was still doing well. There were no signs of that sickly-love face she’d had during those first months with Pete. She looked happy, sure, but why not? If she still wasn’t trying to get pretty for Armand—trying to lose weight or impress him with flirty banter that would never work, because she wasn’t one of those waiflike models he was usually seen with—then she was safe. Safe from infatuation, nothing more.

She wasn’t about to make a fool of herself over a man who was merely being kind to her. Armand deserved better than the infatuation of a needy woman he was helping out. So she wouldn’t do it. Simple as that.

‘Good, done. That’s the way, Rachel,’ she told herself, looking back for a last glimpse. No sickly-face … Oh, the relief every time she looked!

Minutes later she skipped out of the bathroom in jeans and a long-sleeved T-shirt, her hair damp and tangled. Nope, she didn’t care what he thought of her looks at all. ‘If you can’t compete, stay out of the race’, Daddy had always said.

After putting away her bathroom essentials and pyjamas—no way was she going to exasperate him by taking over his bathroom with her products or clothes!—she found him in the kitchen tossing eggs, tomatoes and mushrooms in a skillet. ‘Good morning, Rachel.’ He smiled at her. ‘Great T-shirt,’ he commented, looking at the logo. ‘Where do you get your shirts?’

‘I get all my T-shirts custom made.’ She smiled back, convinced she’d remained cool and calm, even if he was like something from a magazine matchmaker-ad in those casual trousers and woollen pullover, cooking with supreme ease. Let me find you the perfect man …

‘Could you butter the toast, please, and just take the coffee pot off the stove? Thanks.’

The words were so prosaic, yet so intimate. Sharing daily tasks gave a pretty illusion of togetherness. But even after that amazing night-skiing, where she’d found she could actually stay upright while she was in his hold, she refused to believe in it. Any woman would find Armand attractive, and it was no more than that.

As far as she was concerned, love was an invention of men to trap women into cooking and cleaning for them and warming their bed while they did whatever they wanted. It was a truth she’d known for a long time. If her father hadn’t totally destroyed her faith in happily-ever-after, with his casual affairs and insistence on lies even when he’d been found out again, Pete had knocked all belief in fairy-tale endings from her. And he’d done it long before he’d broken her wrist. His self-absorbed use of her skills to promote his own agenda without a thought for her needs and had put her heart and her confidence in a hiding-place she’d only rediscovered since leaving him. She’d let it happen without even really noticing until it was far too late.