His sharp intake of breath was followed by an equally audible sigh of frustration and her insides knotted.
‘I’m still here.’ Irritation was evident in every syllable. ‘Tomorrow night it is, then. Give me your address and I’ll send my driver to pick you up and bring you to my office. It’s close to the West End, and I’ll book us somewhere nice for dinner.’
‘You don’t have to send your driver. I can easily get the train into London.’
‘Are you always this bull-headed?’
Even though Drake was probably still irked with her for trying to thwart him, disconcertingly he chuckled, and the husky sound sent shivers cascading up and down her spine like sparks from a firework.
‘Because if you are, Layla, then I think I might have just met my match …’
SHE was half an hour late.
Having already been into his secretary’s office twice to see if Layla had left a message, Drake now found himself in front of the coffee machine on the landing outside his office, pressing the button for yet another cup of strong black Americano he didn’t really want.
Time had moved through the day like silt through reeds—slowly and painfully and laboriously, going nowhere fast. Whenever he thought about seeing Layla his insides were seized by alternate sensations of excitement and disagreeable anxiety. And several times that day a couple of colleagues had enquired if anything was wrong.
He hated the idea that they could see he was unsettled by something. Usually he endeavoured to keep his feelings strictly to himself—sometimes to the point of unsettling them because he expressed none of the usual emotional ‘ups and downs’ as they did. Yet he was quick to sing their praises when they did a good job for him, or worked overtime to help meet a deadline. Having built his reputation not on just designing builds to wow his clients but also by advising on and overseeing a project right up until the finish, Drake had ensured the people he employed were trustworthy and reliable team players. He might have grown up the quintessential ‘loner’ but he couldn’t do what he did without them.
Glancing down at his watch, it jolted him to see the time. Damn it all to hell! Why hadn’t he insisted that Layla let him send Jimmy to collect her instead of allowing her to make her own way here? He hadn’t because he’d got the feeling if he had she would have cancelled their date altogether and told him just to forget it …
‘Your visitor has arrived, Mr Ashton.’
The quiet, knowing tone of Monica, his secretary, broke into his unhappy reverie. To his dismay, he knew she’d guessed that the woman he was waiting to see was no run-of-the-mill visitor … that she was in some way special. If he quizzed her she’d call this instinct women’s intuition, and Drake couldn’t for the life of him understand why women had the gift in abundance and men didn’t. At any rate, he intensely disliked people expressing curiosity or interest in his private life—and that included unspoken interest.
Monica’s announcement that Layla had arrived had him turning towards her so fast that the scalding coffee in his polystyrene cup splashed painfully onto his hand. He uttered a furious expletive.
The secretary’s smile was replaced by an immediately concerned frown. ‘You’d better get some cold water on that straight away,’ she advised urgently, stepping towards him to relieve him of the cup.
‘Where have you put her?’ Drake barked, the sting of his scald aiding neither his temper nor his impatience.
‘In your office.’
‘Well, make sure she’s comfortable and tell her I’ll be there in a couple of minutes. I’m going to the bathroom to run some cold water over my hand.’
Staring at his reflection in the mirror over the sink, and not particularly liking what he saw, Drake scrubbed his hand over the five o’clock stubble that darkened his jaw and ignored the throb of his burn with stoic indifference. Knowing he was going out to dinner, he ought to have shaved—but it was too late now. His date would just have to take him as she found him, even though he more closely resembled a dishevelled croupier who’d been up all night rather than a successful and wealthy architect. At least he was wearing one of his hand-tailored suits, with a silk waistcoat over a white open-necked shirt. That should help him pass muster.
Muttering out loud at the agitation that rendered him nowhere near relaxed, he straightened his shirt collar and spun away from the mirror. He refused to put himself through the grinder about anything else tonight. Work was finished for the day and he was going out to dinner with a woman who had rendered him dangerously fascinated the instant his gaze had fallen into hers …
As he made his way back to his office an older colleague attempted to waylay him with a query. Drake was so intent on seeing Layla that he stared at the man as if suddenly confronted by a ghost.
‘Ask me about it tomorrow,’ he muttered distractedly. ‘I’m busy right now.’
‘Sorry if I interrupted something important.’
Looking bemused, his fellow architect exited the glass-partitioned landing and Drake continued on into the executive office suite that was his private domain. Standing outside the semi-open door, he sucked in a steadying breath before making his entry. Just before his gaze alighted on the woman he’d been waiting all day to see his senses picked up the sultry trail of her perfume, and the alluring scent made his blood pound with heat. When his eyes finally rested on the slim dark-haired figure standing by his desk, dressed in a classy cream-coloured wool coat over a black cocktail dress, he could barely hear himself think over the dizzying waves of pleasure that submerged him. His little waitress looked like a million dollars.
‘You made it,’ he said, low-voiced.
‘Yes. Though I don’t know why I came.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘I mean that I haven’t accepted an invitation to dinner from a man in a very long time, and I’m still not sure why I accepted yours.’
‘Well, I’m glad that you did. You look very beautiful tonight, by the way.’
‘Thanks.’
His compliment had clearly discomfited her, Drake saw.
‘I don’t normally dress like this,’ she dissembled, ‘but I didn’t know where we were going so I—Anyway, are you annoyed that I’m late? The tube was delayed in a tunnel for twenty minutes … I don’t like to think why. I’m sorry if I kept you waiting.’
‘There’s no need to apologise. Although I did recommend that my driver pick you up rather than you getting the train, remember?’
‘Recommend? Is that what you did?’ Shaking her head, Layla forgot her previous awkwardness and emitted a throaty chuckle.
Already entranced by her beauty and presence, Drake was all but undone by the sound.
‘As I recall,’ she continued with a wry smile, ‘it sounded more like a royal command. But then I expect you’re used to telling people what to do and having it done?’
He kept quiet, because what she said was perfectly true. Yet he didn’t want her to gain the impression he was insufferably overbearing and demanding and not give him a chance to display some of the less ‘insufferable’ sides to his nature … For the first time ever he was suddenly unsure of his ground with a woman. The percentages that afforded him command of any relationship were usually stacked in his favour—sixty-forty at least …
‘Anyway,