He felt filthy. He had lived in filth so long he still felt dirty underneath his skin even though the outside was now clean.
He felt uncivilised. His childhood had been a black hole of despair. He had wanted to die at times rather than endure it. His anger and rage at the world had been like a cancer growing inside him. He had hit out at everyone. He hadn’t trusted anyone to do the right thing by him. He could not afford to get his hopes up only to have them brutally dashed down again. It had been so much harder to summon the will to live after a let-down.
Bella had grown up with every privilege. She had never wanted anything she couldn’t have had at the click of her finger. She had never had to fight to stay alive.
He was still fighting his demons. They plagued him when he was awake and they tortured him when he was asleep.
Sometimes he wondered if he would ever be free.
It was late in the afternoon before Bella saw him again. She was coming back from a walk to the lake when she saw him up on a ladder doing something to one of the second-storey windows. She would have walked past without acknowledging him but the ladder shifted as he reached for one of the tools on his work belt, and her stomach suddenly lurched at the thought of him falling to the icy ground below. ‘Do you need me to hold the ladder steady?’ she said.
He gave her a brief glance and turned back to the task at hand. ‘If you like.’
She watched from below as he shaved some wood off the casement with a plane. The muscles of his wrists and forearms bunched as he worked. He looked strong and fit and every inch a man in his prime. She tried not to think about what she had seen that morning but it was impossible to rid her mind of the image of his aroused body. Her insides were still smouldering with lust. She had been trying to ignore it all day but it was like a switch had been turned on inside her and she had no idea how to turn it off.
The ladder started to shudder again as he came down. She leaned her weight into it and only stepped away once he was safely down. ‘What was wrong with the window?’ she asked.
‘Water damage,’ he said, wiping some wood dust off his forehead with his forearm. ‘We had a big snowfall a few weeks back. The wood’s swollen with moisture. It’ll need replacing eventually.’
‘Why don’t you get a professional to do this sort of stuff?’ Bella asked.
‘I enjoy it,’ he said as he gathered his tools.
‘That’s beside the point,’ she said. ‘What if you had a fall? There would be no one around to help you. You could break your neck or something.’
His eyes met hers as he straightened. ‘That would be quite convenient for you, wouldn’t it?’
She frowned at him. ‘What do you mean by that?’
‘You’d get the manor back,’ he said. ‘That’s what you’d like, isn’t it?’
‘It’s my home,’ she said, shooting him a resentful look. ‘Generations of Havertons grew up here. I don’t see why a blow-in like you should take it away from its rightful owner.’
‘Not happy with your four-storey mansion in Chelsea and the millions of pounds in assets?’ he asked.
She glowered at him. ‘That’s beside the point. This is where I grew up. This is where I expected my children to grow up. You don’t belong here. I do.’
‘Your father obviously thought differently,’ he said.
‘He should have consulted me about it,’ Bella said. ‘The least he could have done is put it in both our names.’
‘Would you have been happy living with me here?’ he asked.
‘No, I would not,’ she said. ‘Would you?’
‘I don’t know,’ he said with a glinting smile. ‘It could prove to be quite entertaining.’
She gave him a flinty look. ‘I can assure you that if you get sick again I will not be racing to your aid in the middle of the night. You can jolly well fend for yourself.’
‘Suits me.’
She pressed her lips together for a moment. ‘Nor will I allow you to take advantage of me like you did this morning.’
‘How did I take advantage of you?’ he asked. ‘You were in my bed.’
‘Not because I wanted to be.’
His smile was arrogantly, irritatingly confident. ‘No one forced you into it. You came of your own free will. And I have a feeling you’ll be back before too long.’
Bella glared at him. ‘Do you really think I’m that much of a pushover? I don’t even like you. I hate you. I’ve always hated you.’
‘I know, but that’s why it will be such great sex,’ he said. ‘I can hardly wait to feel you come. I bet you’ll go off like a bomb.’
Her cheeks fired with heat and she clenched her hands into fists. ‘I am not going to have sex with you.’
He ran his eyes over her leisurely, heating her with the caress of his gaze as if he had physically touched her. She felt her breasts tingle, she felt her insides contract and shamelessly weep with want. ‘It’s going to happen,’ he said. ‘You can already feel it, can’t you?’
‘I feel nothing,’ she bit out.
He took half a step to shrink the distance between their bodies. Bella had nowhere to move as the garden bed was behind her. She drew in a breath as he trailed a lazy finger across the sensitive skin stretched over her left clavicle. Her nerves leapt and danced and shimmied under his mesmerising touch. ‘Can you feel that?’ he asked, locking his gaze on hers.
She swallowed tightly as a host of sensations coursed through her like a shivery tide. ‘You have no right to touch me,’ she said, although her voice wasn’t as strong and determined as she had intended. It sounded breathless and husky.
‘You give me the right every time you look at me like that,’ he said, tracing a pathway down the neckline of her top.
She felt her breasts tighten in anticipation. Her breathing stalled. Her heart stuttered like an old diesel engine inside her chest. She scrunched her eyes closed, fighting for strength of will. ‘I’m not even looking at you, see?’ she said.
He leaned in closer. She felt him. She felt his thighs brush against hers, and a wave of heat went through her like a knife through soft butter. She felt the sexy breeze of his breath against the skin of her neck. She breathed in the warm, male scent of him: the sweat, the musk, the complex cologne with its intriguing layers of citrus, spice and wood. The hairs on the back of her neck lifted one by one as his lips moved against her skin in a caressing nibble that shot an arrow of need straight to her core.
Bella made a little whimpering sound in her throat, a mixture of frustration and acquiescence. ‘I don’t want you,’ she said.
‘I know you don’t,’ he said, brushing his lips against hers in a teasing touch and lift off caress.
‘I hate you,’ she said, but the words somehow lacked conviction.
‘I know you do,’ he said and sucked softly on her lower lip until her legs threatened to fold beneath her.
Bella grasped his head between her hands, seeking his mouth in blind passion. The hot press of his mouth on hers detonated her senses and sent them into a fiery tailspin. She pushed her body against his, hungry for him in a way she had never thought possible. She ached for his possession, an urgent pulsing ache that was centred at the feminine heart of her.
He gripped her hips and ground against her shamelessly as his mouth worked its masterful magic on hers. It was so raw and primal. She felt the hot, hard heat of him throbbing against her stomach. It awoke every earthy sense in her body.
His