Torn between annoyance and amusement, she had hoped he’d realise how ridiculous he was being. Maybe laugh. She couldn’t see his eyes, but his generous mouth seemed made for laughter.
He did neither.
She’d left her bag at the foot of the wall and, without so much as a by-your-leave, he picked it up and began to go through it.
‘Hey!’ she protested as he took out her phone. The nerve of the man! ‘Didn’t your mother tell you that you must never, ever, under any circumstances look in a lady’s handbag?’
‘First we have to establish that you are a lady,’ he replied, glancing up from his perusal of her messages, regarding her for a moment as if he was considering whether to search her, too.
‘Don’t even think about it,’ she warned.
Maybe the silky scoop-necked designer T-shirt she’d teamed with cropped Maybridge market jeans convinced him that there wasn’t room to hide as much as a teaspoon about her person. Or maybe he was saving that pleasure for later.
It was a thought that should have made her feel a lot more nervous than it did.
Whatever the reason, he returned his attention to her phone, going through her messages, then her emails. Pausing at one, he looked over the top of his glasses at her with a pair of ink-dark eyes.
‘Have you found him yet, Sarah Gratton?’
For a moment she was mesmerized by the way he said her name. The vowels long and slow, like thick cream being poured from a jug. The man exuded sensuality. Every movement, every syllable seemed to stroke her …
‘Him?’ she repeated, before she began to purr. No … That wasn’t right. She was looking for Lucia …
‘The “dark-eyed Italian lover”?’ he prompted.
Oh, great. He’d found Lex’s email. But no one who taught a mixed class of teenagers could afford to betray the slightest sign of embarrassment. The first hint of a blush and you were toast.
You had to look them in the eye, stand your ground, come back with a swift riposte that would make the class laugh with you, not at you.
‘Why?’ she asked. ‘Are you interested in the job?’
It would have been spot on if it had come out sharp and snappy as intended, but something had gone seriously wrong between her brain and her mouth. Between concept and delivery.
It was his eyes. Dark as night but with the crackle of lightning in their depths …
Under that gaze, sharp had lost its edge, snap had turned to a soft, gooey fudge and, apparently taking it as an invitation, he reached out, slid his fingers through her hair, cradling her head in the palm of his hand. There was a seemingly endless pause while she frantically tried to redial her brain. Send out a call for the cavalry.
Her brain was apparently engaged, busy dealing with a bombardment of signals. The sun hot on her arms, her throat, her breasts. The sensuous sweep of the mouth hovering above her own. The scent of warm skin, leather …
The world seemed to have slowed down and it took forever for his lips to reach hers. Somewhere, deep inside her brain the word no was teetering on the brink. All she had to do was move her lips, say it, but her butter-soft mouth seemed to belong to someone else.
When it parted, it was not to protest and as his mouth found hers a tingle of something like recognition raced like wildfire through her blood, blotting out reason. Her body, with nothing to guide it, softened, melted against him, murmured, ‘Yes …’
It wasn’t enough and she clutched at his shoulders, fingers digging into hard flesh as she began to fall back, leaving gravity to take them down into the soft thick grass on the shady side of the wall.
For a moment she could feel it, was breathing in the green, sweet scent of grass, herbs crushed beneath them. The weight of his body, the sweep of his hand beneath the silk, lighting up her skin as it moved over her ribs. Her nipple, achingly hard in anticipation of his touch.
There was a sickening jolt, like that moment when you were on the point of falling asleep and something dragged you back.
‘Lucia …’
‘What did you say?’ he asked.
Sarah opened her eyes. She was still sitting on the wall, not clinging to this stranger but being supported by him, as if he thought that she was about to fall.
‘Are you all right?’ His voice seemed to be coming from under water.
‘What? Yes …’
She was back from wherever she’d been, whoever she’d been—because she wasn’t the kind of woman who invited total strangers to kiss her.
‘This was where they said goodbye …’ she whispered.
Lex had taken her photograph and kissed her and they’d made love there in the soft thick grass of early summer one last time before he’d taken the path down into the village. Flown away.
She turned and looked behind her to where her hat was lying in the grass. Not the sweet and green grass of early summer—
‘Sarah!’ the man said, rather more urgently.
‘It’s dry,’ she said. And a little shiver ran through her. ‘The grass.’
‘It’s autumn.’
‘Autumn?’ She shook her head, forced herself to concentrate.
‘Are you all right?’ he repeated, eyes narrowed.
‘Yes.’ Pull yourself together … ‘Yes, of course I am.’
He touched a thumb to her cheek, his hand cradling her face as he wiped away a tear. ‘Then why the tears?’
Tears? She swiped her palm across her cheek. ‘Hay fever,’ she said, grabbing for the first answer that came into her head.
‘In autumn?’
Had he actually kissed her?
Her lips still tingled with a lingering taste of the perfect kiss but had it been a fleeting fantasy? A phantom conjured up by the place, by old memories, by her own loss?
She blinked, saw a tiny smear of lipstick on the corner of his mouth. Of course he’d kissed her. She’d practically begged him to. What on earth had possessed her?
There were no answers, but her brain finally picked up, answered her call for help. Speak. Move. Get out of here …
‘I’m allergic to chrysanthemums,’ she said, sliding down from the wall, forcing him to step back. ‘It’s hereditary.’ Her knees buckled slightly as she hit the ground, her legs unexpectedly shaky beneath her and he caught her elbow to steady her. ‘Great interview, by the way.’ She took a breath, reached for her bag. She really needed to get out of here, but he was blocking her way. And he still had her phone. ‘Leave your number with my secretary and I’ll let you know.’
She’d made a stab for crispness but her voice could have done with longer in the salad drawer.
He continued to look at her for a moment, as if half expecting her to crumple at his feet.
She lifted a brow. The one guaranteed to bring a sassy fifth year into line.
Apparently reassured that she wasn’t about to collapse, he said, ‘Don’t wait too long. I’m not short of offers.’ But his voice, too, had lost its edge and the accent seemed more pronounced, as if he was having a chocolate fudge moment of his own.
‘My phone.’ She held out her hand, praying that it wouldn’t shake. ‘If you please.’
‘When I’m done.’ Then, ignoring her huff of outrage, he turned away, propped his elbows