‘I…I could probably start a week on Monday.’
He looked unimpressed.
‘Is that the earliest?’
‘What did you expect? That I’d be able to start tomorrow?’ she retorted, with some spirit.
He considered her with a smoulder of amusement.
‘Are you always this…abrasive, Miss Emma Stuart?’
‘I’m sorry. I didn’t intend to sound…rude.’
‘That’s better. I like my employees humble, Miss Stuart. Remember that.’
It was difficult to tell if this was his quirky sense of humour talking, or if he actually meant it. Her smile was saccharine-sweet.
‘Oh, I will, Mr Fleetwood.’
‘Then a week on Monday it is,’ he agreed, with an air of finality. He glanced at a slim Rolex on his dusky wrist, and Emma felt dismissed. ‘Mrs Shields will be here to let you in, if I’m tied up in court. Make yourself at home.’
He held out his hand, and she put her own into it with a ridiculous tremor of apprehension.
‘But don’t use up all the hot water on a Friday night,’ he added, with a wicked gleam in his eyes. ‘See you, Miss Stuart…’
Emma escaped into the crunchy gravel sweep of the drive, and dived into her red Renault 5. His hand had seemed to burn her. She was trembling all over. A strong sense of panic was invading every inch of her body.
It wasn’t too late, she told herself desperately as she pressed her foot on the accelerator and left the manor behind. She could still ring and say she didn’t want the job. She could still get herself out of this, before she was in too deep to think straight…
But she did want the job, she realised in dismay. She wanted the job more than she’d ever wanted anything.
When she’d heard that Fleetwood Manor needed an archivist, her first reaction had been one of bitter curiosity, an urgent need to go and see for herself where Sir Robert Fleetwood had wrecked her parents’ lives…
Now all she seemed to be able to think of was the thrill of those ancient documents awaiting discovery in the Fleetwood attics. And Dominick Fleetwood’s mesmerising blue gaze.
She felt angry with herself, and frightened and bewildered by her reaction to the man she’d just met.
And she felt more alone, and more confused than ever…because how, in the name of God, could she feel such a frisson of awareness, such an unmistakable shiver of desire, towards a man who could well be her half-brother…?
EMMA swung her reading glasses off and laid them carefully on the desk, beside the faded parchment. She rubbed a grubby hand shakily over her face. She was tired, hungry, stiff with sitting for so long. The attic room was cold. It felt like the cold of centuries of unheated stone, and the small Calor-gas fire flickering beside her hadn’t a hope of dispelling it. And yet inside her excitement warmed her, burned like a secret flame…She felt a consuming urgency to continue working. End of daylight spelled end of work, and she was so engrossed she didn’t want to finish yet…
She caught her breath sharply, struck by the complexity of her present situation. Here she was, poring over ancient papers in the dusty, ghost-filled attics of Fleetwood Manor, deciphering letters to Sir George Fleetwood, written over four hundred years ago, back in the sixteenth century. The old iron casks and wooden boxes overflowed with a treasure-trove of historical detail…
And judging from the faded ink and parchment, Sir George’s character bore lamentable similarities to his more recent descendants. Sir Robert, Dominick’s father, could have been an uncanny reincarnation of his reprehensible ancestors. And Dominick…? She shivered a little. Remembering the lazy, speculative gleam in his eyes at their last encounter gave her the distinct impression that family traits lived on in the present generation…
A footstep at the door made her swivel round quickly. She’d expected to see Jamie, Mrs Shields’ grandson. But Dominick Fleetwood stood there. Her stomach lurched alarmingly.
‘Still at it?’ He checked a slim gold watch on his wrist, and tilted a wry smile at her. ‘Isn’t this beyond the call of duty?’
She stood up slowly. She suddenly felt conscious of her appearance. She hadn’t seen Dominick for the entire fortnight she’d been here. He hadn’t come down from London last weekend. Deeply involved in her work, she’d almost forgotten that it was Friday night again, and that there was a possibility he might arrive. Now here he was, darkly devastating in dove-grey suit and charcoal silk tie, radiating aristocratic elegance, and making her feel like an unkempt maid-servant…
‘It’s riveting stuff,’ she confessed, with a short laugh. ‘I just can’t stay away from it!’
‘Letters and bills and inventories and rent arrears, spanning the last five and a half centuries?’ he mocked softly. ‘Worth starving and freezing to death over?’
Emma reached a hand up to smooth her hair. It was caught up in a thick ponytail, with strands escaping around her face, and she knew it must look a mess. Just as she must look a mess. She had pins and needles in her right foot from hooking it around the rungs of the chair for hours on end. She shook it, and stamped on it surreptitiously.
‘I might be in danger of freezing, but certainly not of starving,’ she retorted lightly. ‘Mrs Shields and Jamie keep me supplied with a regular flow of home-made flapjacks and mugs of tea!’
‘I’m glad to hear it.’ She felt the cool gaze slide consideringly over her. She stiffened, her embarrassment deepening. In old jeans, a thick, baggy black polo-neck, a strawberry-pink checked shirt worn open as a jacket and clumpy Doc Marten boots she was hardly femme fatale material. But did she want to be? a small voice cautioned. This job, in spite of her muddled bitterness about the Fleetwood family, had proved irresistible.
It was a gem of a job. The kind every historian must surely dream about. Not just for the unique archives, but for the magnificent working environment. She’d felt deeply privileged, having the freedom to explore the old manor, admire the ancient beauty of the place. There was even a fifteenth-century Great Hall, complete with minstrels’ gallery. But the idea of finding Dominick Fleetwood dangerously attractive hadn’t occurred to her. It was a complication she simply hadn’t considered…A sick feeling of panic crept into her stomach.
‘What’s wrong with your foot?’
‘It’s gone to sleep!’ she confessed, with a grimace. ‘I have this habit of twisting it round the chair when I’m sitting for a long time…’
‘I told you I didn’t want a Cinderella, slaving away night and day,’ he rebuked softly. ‘You look as if you haven’t slept since you started two weeks ago!’
‘Thanks a lot!’ Her cheeks felt hot. How dared he make personal remarks about her appearance?
‘You need some exercise,’ he judged coolly. ‘How do you normally keep fit?’
‘I…I swim,’ she heard herself saying vaguely, too taken aback by his abrupt interrogation to protest, ‘and sometimes I play tennis. Or jog. But I really don’t…’
‘Have you got a swimming costume with you?’
‘Well, yes, but I really…’
‘Tennis racket?’
‘No! And honestly, I…’ She was reeling under his patronising directness.
‘There’s