Her reply was to lift her flawless chin and cross her legs. Sam took in a flash of long tanned legs ending in peep toe low wedge sandals made out of plaited strips of straw and transparent plastic. Her toenails were painted in the same pale pink as her nails, which perfectly matched her lipstick and the colour motif in her dress.
She was class, elegance and designer luxury and for a fraction of a second he wanted nothing better than to pick her tiny slim body up and lay it along the bonnet of the car and find out for himself whether her skin felt the same under his fingertips.
‘What makes you think that I am here to give you an interview?’ she replied with a certain hardness in her voice which plunged him back into the cold waters of the real world. ‘Perhaps I am here to congratulate you on your engagement? Has your fiancée come with you from Los Angeles and my wedding invitation is in the post? I can see that you would want to give me heads-up on that.’
He reeled back. ‘My what?’
‘Oh—didn’t you announce your engagement in the Los Angeles press? Or is there another Samuel Patrick Richards, investigative reporter and photojournalist of London, walking the streets of that lovely town?’
Sam sucked in a breath then shrugged. ‘That was a misunderstanding. My girlfriend at the time was getting a little impatient and decided to organise a wedding without asking me first. Apparently she forgot that anything to do with weddings brings me out in a nasty rash. It’s a long-standing allergy but I have learnt to live with it. So you can save your congratulations for another time.’
Amber inhaled very slowly before speaking again. ‘Well, it seems that this garage is not the only thing that hasn’t changed, is it, Sam? You do seem to make a habit out of running out on girls. Maybe we should all get together and form a support group.’
She raised both of her arms and wrote in the air. ‘“Girls Sam Richards has dumped and ran out on.” We could have our own blog. What? What is it?’
Sam crossed the few steps which separated them and gently tugged at her cardigan. ‘Your arm is in plaster. Hell, Bambi, what happened? I mean, you have to play the piano...’
She pulled her cardigan over the plaster, but lifted her left arm across her chest.
‘I broke my wrist a few weeks ago and I’m officially on medical leave. And that is strictly off the record. My career is fine, thank you. In fact, I am enjoying the holiday. It is very restorative.’
Sam shook his head. ‘Must make your daily practice interesting...but are you okay? I mean there won’t be any lasting damage?’
She parted her lips and took a breath before answering, and for some reason Sam got the idea that she was about to tell him something then changed her mind at the very last minute. ‘Clean break, no problem. The exercises are working well and I should be as good as new in a few months.’
‘Glad to hear it. This brings us right back to my original question. What are you doing here?’
He stepped forward and stood in front of her, with one hand on each arm of his dad’s old wooden chair, her legs now stretched out in front of her and trapped between his. He was so close that he could feel her fast breath on his cheek and see the pulse of her heart in her throat.
Her mouth narrowed and this time it did connect with the hard look in her eyes.
But, instead of backing away, Amber bent forward from the waist, challenging him, those blue eyes flashing with something he had never seen before. And when she spoke her voice was as gentle and soft as a feather duvet. And just as tempting.
‘Okay. It goes like this. I understand that you want to interview me in the light of my recent press release concerning my retirement. I’m curious about what it is that you think you can offer me which is so special that I would want to talk to you instead of all the other journalists who are knocking at my door. You have never been the shy or modest type, so it must be something rather remarkable.’
‘Absolutely. Remember that dream I used to talk about? The one where I am a big, important investigative journalist working at that broadsheet newspaper my dad still reads every day? Well, it turns out that to win the editor’s desk I have to deliver one final celebrity interview.’ Sam pointed at Amber with two fingers pressed tight together and fired his thumb like a pistol trigger.
Amber nodded. ‘I thought it might be something like that.’ Her eyebrows went skywards. ‘I take it your editor doesn’t know about our teenage fling?’
‘Fling? Is that what you call it? No. He certainly doesn’t, or he would have sent me to your last known address with a bunch of supermarket flowers and a box of chocolates as soon as I walked into his office. No. That part of my life is filed under “private”. Okay?’
She gave him a closed mouth smile. ‘Why? I know you must have been tempted. I can see the headline now. “The real truth about how I broke Amber Du Bois’ heart”? Yes, there are plenty of television reality shows who would love to have you on their list. I could hardly sue, could I?’
‘I suppose not, but let’s just say that I was saving that for a financial emergency. Okay?’
‘An emergency? You were saving me to get you out of some money crisis? I don’t know whether to be flattered or insulted. Or both. I’m not sure I like being compared to a stash of used notes which you keep under the mattress.’
‘Oh—is that where you keep yours? I prefer banks myself. Much more secure.’
Her eyes narrowed and she licked her lower lip as though she was trying to decide about something important.
He could remember the first time he’d kissed those lips. They had just come out of a pizza restaurant and got caught in a heavy rain shower. He had pulled her under the shelter of his coat, his arm around her waist and, just as they got to the car, laughing and yelling as the rain bounced off the pavement around them, she had turned towards him to thank him and her stunning face was only inches away from his. And he couldn’t resist any longer. And he had kissed her. Warm lips, scented skin, alive and pungent in the rain, and the feeling of her breath on his neck as she rested her head on his shoulder for a fleeting second before diving into the warm, dry car.
Not one word, but as he’d raced back to the driver’s door, there was only one thing on his mind.
She was the passenger and he was the driver. Her chauffeur. The hired help. And that was the way it was always going to be. Unless he did something to change it.
Which was precisely what he had done.
Except to Amber he would always be the rough diamond she broke her teeth on. Girls like this did not date the help.
Sam stepped back and chuckled as he tidied away the polishing kit.
‘Relax, Amber. It takes a lot of hard work to become a journalist in today’s newspaper business. I earned this new job in the London office. Besides, I don’t need to trawl through my past history to score points with my editor. Frank Evans is far more interested in what you are doing in your life right now. Not many people retire at twenty-eight. That’s bound to cause some interest.’
‘And what about you, Sam? Are you interested in what I am doing in my life right now?’
He looked up into her face, which was suddenly calm, her gaze locked on him.
Was he interested? A wave of confusion and a hot, sweaty mixture of bittersweet memories surged through Sam. His breathing was hot and fast and for a fraction of a second he was very tempted to lean back and give her the full-on charm offensive and find out just what kind of woman Amber had become by being up close and personal—and nothing to do with his job.
Fool. Eyes on the prize.
‘The only thing I am interested in is the promotion to the job I have been working towards for ten long years in the trenches. Sorry if that disappoints you, but there