The man was standing to one side of his car, out of the glare of the headlights, so she could not make out his features. But she noted his exceptional height. He was easily several inches over six feet tall. His superbly tailored sheepskin coat emphasised the width of his broad shoulders. Although she could not see him clearly, she sensed his air of wealth and sophistication, and she wondered what on earth he was doing in this remote area. The nearest village was miles back down the road, whilst ahead stretched the vast Northumberland moors. She glanced down at his leather shoes, which were covered in snow, and immediately dismissed the idea that he might be a hiker. His feet must be freezing.
Even as the thought came into her head he stamped his feet, as if to get the blood circulating, and pulled a mobile phone from his pocket.
‘No signal,’ he muttered disgustedly. ‘Why anyone would choose to live in this godforsaken place is beyond me.’
‘Northumbria is renowned for its unspoilt beauty,’ Emma felt compelled to point out, feeling a tiny spurt of irritation at his scathing tone.
In her opinion, anyone who chose to drive across the moors in a snowstorm should have the sense to pack a spade and other emergency supplies. Personally, she loved Northumberland’s dramatic landscapes. When she had been married to Jack they had rented a flat in Newcastle, but she hadn’t enjoyed living in a busy city and had missed the wildness of the moors.
‘There are some wonderful walks through the National Park—although it is rather bleak in the winter,’ she conceded.
Sensing the man’s impatience, she continued, ‘I’m afraid my phone doesn’t work out here either—few of the phone networks do. You’ll have to get to a village before you can call a garage, but I doubt anyone will send a truck to tow your car out until tomorrow.’ She hesitated, instinctively wary of offering a complete stranger a lift, but her conscience nagged that she could not leave him stranded. ‘I’ve got one more visit to make and then I’ll be going back to Little Copton, if you want to come with me?’
He had no choice but to accept the woman’s offer, Rocco realised as he walked around his car and saw that the back wheels were submerged in three feet of water. Even if he could clear the mound of snow that had collapsed on top of the roof, it would be impossible to drive up the side of the ditch; the wheels would simply spin on the ice. There was nothing for it but to find a hotel for the night and arrange for his car to be rescued in the morning, he concluded, reaching over to the back seat to retrieve his overnight bag.
He glanced at the bulky figure of the woman in the four-by-four and guessed that she was from one of the farms. Maybe she had been out to check on livestock: he couldn’t imagine why else she would be driving across the moors in the snow.
She was certainly well built, he thought, as he climbed up into the car and squashed himself into the small space on the seat beside her. But her woollen hat was pulled low over her brow, and a thick scarf covered most of the lower half of her face, so it was impossible for him to guess her age.
‘Thank you,’ he murmured, closing the door and feeling a welcome blast of warm air from the car’s heater. It was only now sinking in that he was lucky not to have been injured in the crash, and that he could have faced a long, cold walk to find civilisation. ‘I was fortunate you were driving this way.’
Emma released the handbrake and carefully pulled away, her hands tightening on the steering wheel when she felt the car slide. She rammed the stiff gear lever into second gear, and tensed when her hand brushed against the man’s thigh. In the confines of the vehicle she was even more aware of his size. His head almost brushed the roof, she noted, darting him a lightning glance. The collar of his coat was pulled up around his face, hiding his features, so that all she could really see of him was the dark hair which fell across his brow.
In the warm car the spicy scent of his cologne teased her senses. It was an evocatively masculine smell and stirred an unbidden memory of Jack. Her mouth tightened as the image of her husband’s handsome face, his shock of blond hair and his lazy grin, flooded her mind. Jack had been a natural-born charmer who had loved the finer things in life, she remembered bleakly. She had bought him his favourite, ruinously expensive aftershave the last Christmas they had spent together, naively unaware that he probably wore it when he slept with other women.
She slammed a brake on her thoughts and became aware that the stranger was staring at her.
‘What did you mean when you said you have to make one last visit? It’s not a good night to be out socialising,’ he said, glancing through the windscreen at the snowy lane illuminated by the car’s headlights.
The area was familiar to Rocco. He knew there was only one more house ahead before the road dwindled to a track that wound across the moors. It was a stroke of good luck that his rescuer was heading in the direction of his destination, but he was puzzled as to where she was going.
Once again Emma felt a little quiver run down her spine at the man’s husky, innately sexy accent. Definitely not French, she decided, but possibly he was Spanish or Italian. She was curious to know why he had been driving along a remote Northumbrian country lane in a snowstorm. Where had he come from and where was he heading? But politeness and her natural diffidence prevented her from asking him.
‘I’m a district nurse,’ she explained. ‘One of my patients lives out here on the moor.’
Beside her, she felt the stranger stiffen. He snapped his head towards her and seemed about to say something, but at that moment a stone gateway loomed out of the darkness.
‘Here’s Nunstead Hall,’ Emma said, relieved to have arrived in one piece. ‘Enormous, isn’t it? The grounds are beautiful, and there’s even a private lake.’
She turned onto the driveway and stared up at the imposing old house that was in darkness apart from one window, where a light was shining, and then glanced at the forbidding stranger, wondering why he made her feel uneasy. His brows were drawn into a deep frown, and she was puzzled by his tangible tension.
‘Does your patient live here?’ he demanded tersely.
It was too dark to see the expression in his eyes, but something about his hard stare unnerved her.
‘Yes. You can probably phone the garage from the house,’ she told him, assuming that he was frowning because he was anxious about his car. ‘I have a door key so that I can let myself in. I think it would be better if you stay here while I ask Mrs Symmonds if you can use the phone.’
She reached over to the back seat for her medical bag and seconds later felt a blast of cold air rush into the car. ‘Hey!’ Irritation swept through her when she saw that the stranger had ignored her instructions and climbed out of the four-by-four. He was already striding up to the front door of the Hall, and she hastily jumped out and ran after him, stumbling in the thick snow that covered the ground. ‘Didn’t you hear what I said? I asked you to stay in the car. My patient is elderly and might be frightened at the sight of a stranger on the doorstep.’
‘Hopefully I’m not that terrifying a sight,’ he drawled, sounding arrogantly amused. He brushed off the snow-flakes that were settling thick and fast on his coat. ‘Although if you don’t hurry up and open the door I’m going to look like the Yeti that’s reputed to stalk the Himalayas.’
‘It’s not funny,’ Emma snapped. She did not care for the hard glitter in his eyes, and wished that instead of rescuing him from the roadside she had phoned Jim at Yaxley Farm, which was the closest neighbour to Nunstead Hall, and asked him to bring a tractor to tow the stranger’s car out of the ditch. She gave a startled gasp when the man took the key from her fingers and slotted it into the lock. Her anger turned to unease. For all she knew he could be a criminal on the run, or a lunatic! ‘I must insist that you return to the car,’ she said firmly. ‘You can’t just stroll in as if you own the place.’