CATHERINE GEORGE - His Defiant Mistress - The Millionaire's Rebellious Mistress / The Venetian's Midnight Mistress / The Billionaire's Virgin Mistress

Sarah nodded reluctantly, wishing she could say no.

Dan walked past her, looking impressed as he took in the proportions of the room. ‘God, Sarah, what a place!’

‘It was a music room originally, but I made some modifications.’ Which was an understatement for a work programme which had started with tearing up lino and treating floorboards, progressed to building the windowseat and sleeping platform, and finished with the installation of her double row of shutters.

‘But where do you sleep?’

‘Up there,’ Sarah said, waving a hand at the platform.

He raised an eyebrow. ‘Romantic, but not much room for overnight guests.’

‘None at all,’ she said shortly. ‘Why are you here, Dan?’

He smiled, moving closer. ‘To get my request in early for your company at dinner tonight. Not the Pheasant again,’ he added quickly. ‘The weather’s good, so we could drive to a place I know near Ross.’

She shook her head. ‘That’s very kind of you, Dan, but I’ve got something on tonight.’

‘Two nights running with Alex Merrick?’ he demanded, his bonhomie suddenly gone.

‘As it happens, no.’ Her chin lifted. ‘But even if it were it’s my business, Dan, no one else’s.’

His mouth twisted. ‘Oh, I get the message. The Crown Prince of Merrick strikes again. Alex always had the girls running after him. That smell of family money on him attracts them like flies. But he’s a slippery customer; never gets hooked.’ He caught her hands, sudden malevolence in his eyes. ‘Did he score any better with you than I did?’

Sarah glared in disgust and tried to wrench free, but Dan jerked her into his arms and crushed his mouth down on hers. In furious, knee-jerk reaction she sank her teeth into his bottom lip, and he pushed her away with a howl of pain, a hand clapped to his mouth.

‘Something wrong, Sarah?’ said Harry, stepping through the window with his ladder. ‘I thought I heard voices. Oh, it’s you, Daniel.’

Dan was too taken aback at the sight of him to reply, his face like thunder as blood dripped down his chin.

Sarah fished a crumpled tissue from the pocket of her jeans. ‘You’d better have this. You’re bleeding.’ She looked Harry in the eye. ‘Dan tripped and caught his lip in his teeth.’

‘Better get off home, then, Daniel,’ advised Harry grimly. ‘I’ll see you to your car.’

‘No need, Harry,’ said Sarah. ‘I’ll do that.’ She opened her door and waved Dan through, then marched across the hall to the main door. ‘Is that why you came here, Dan? Because you heard I had dinner with Alex Merrick last night?’

He shrugged, his eyes like hard blue pebbles as he dabbed, wincing, at his lip. ‘By the law of averages it might have been my turn to get lucky tonight.’

Sarah clenched her fists, itching to hit him. ‘Not tonight, not ever, Dan Mason. Just go, please.’

‘In my own good time,’ he snarled.

‘Right now, please, or I’ll get Harry to speed you on your way.’

‘What the hell’s he doing here, anyway? Another of your conquests?’

‘Oh, grow up, Dan,’ she said wearily, and moved to close the main door, but he held up a hand.

‘Be very careful where Alex Merrick’s concerned, Sarah. At a stretch you could say you’re both in the same line of business. But there’s just one of you, while he’s got his entire bloody group behind him.’ He swore under his breath as Harry came out with his ladder.

‘I’ll just stow this in the pick-up before I have that coffee, boss.’ Harry gave Dan a straight look. ‘On your way now, are you, lad?’

Dan shot a venomous look at him as he stalked away to his car, then with a growl of the powerful engine he drove off, barely stopping to check for traffic as he shot out into the road.

‘Ed Mason spared the rod too much with that boy,’ said Harry, walking back to Sarah. ‘I was ready to haul him off you by the scruff of his neck, but you sorted him yourself. Good girl.’

‘I try to be,’ she said with a sigh. ‘Let’s have that coffee. I could even rise to a sandwich or two if you’ve got time to stay for a bit.’

After Harry left Sarah locked up her gleaming flat and went out. The incident with Dan had left a nasty taste in her mouth which would be best cured, she decided, by a trip into Hereford to buy herself something new to wear on Sunday. While she’d been working on the cottages an hour or two on a Saturday afternoon was the only time off she’d allowed herself, and she felt like a child let out of school as she drove into town on a week day.

After a tour of the chainstores in High Town, and diversions along narrow side streets to pricier shops, Sarah bought some delicacies from a food hall to add to her collection of carrier bags, found a couple of paperbacks after a browse in a bookshop, and finally drove out of the city just as rush hour was getting underway. When she got home she put the food away, and then climbed up the steps to put the rest of her shopping on the bed. It was at this point, she thought with a sigh, that she missed having a girlfriend on hand to give an opinion on the clothes she’d bought, or to try out the new lipstick.

Sarah shook off the mood. She had been the one desperate to work in a man’s world, so she had no one to blame but herself. She had quite literally made her bed, so now she just had to lie on it. Alone, unfortunately. Unfortunately? She frowned as she hung up her new clothes. When she was building the platform had she deliberately given herself space for only a single bed, like a nun in a convent? Sarah snorted with laughter and went down to make supper.

Later, after Caesar salad and cherry tart bought earlier, Sarah took a stroll in the gardens before tackling a small mountain of ironing. At last, feeling pleasantly tired, she had just stretched out on the sofa to watch television when Alex rang.

‘Hi,’ she said, quite shaken by her delight at the sound of his voice. ‘How’s life in the big city?’

‘Noisy. I miss the green and pleasant land of Herefordshire. What have you been doing today?’

‘Cleaning, shopping—nothing much. How about you?’

‘Meetings and more meetings.’ Alex yawned. ‘Sorry. Any progress on the barns?’

‘The survey is booked for first thing in the morning, and the inspector promised to ring me with the result before sending me a written report.’ She sighed. ‘I’m an impatient soul. I couldn’t bear the thought of a whole weekend without any news.’

Alex chuckled. ‘So what will you do the moment you hear? Rush over to Westhope and press a cheque into Bob Grover’s hand?’

‘I shall conduct the sale in my usual businesslike manner.’

‘Of which I have experience. You drove a hard bargain over the cottages.’

‘Oh, come on, admit it. You got a really good deal there.’

‘Fair, maybe, but I draw the line at really good! Now let’s change the subject. Things have gone better today than expected, which means I’ll be back on Saturday morning. Can you make it over to my place in time for dinner?’

‘Instead of lunch on Sunday?’

‘As well as, not instead of. Don’t worry,’ he added. ‘I’ll let you go home in between.’

‘An offer I can’t refuse.’

‘I hope so.’

‘Then I won’t.’

‘Won’t come?’

‘Won’t refuse.’

‘Seven sharp, then,’ he said after a pause. ‘Don’t be late.’

Sarah went for a long walk next morning, while the inspection was taking place at Westhope Farm. But the phone in her pocket remained obstinately silent as she strolled through intersecting lanes she’d never had the time—or energy—to explore when she was working on the cottages. Eventually her route brought her back past the Post Office Stores. She bought a newspaper and bread and milk, chatted for a while with the owners, then started back at a leisurely pace. She was at home before her phone finally rang.