‘That must keep you busy. Does it?’
‘Have I asked you what you do?’ Miranda retorted hotly feeling defensive at the realisation that, if he knew the truth about her idle lifestyle, he wouldn’t be very impressed.
‘So it doesn’t keep you busy, I take it,’ he replied calmly.
‘I never said that!’
‘Oh, but your lack of answer tells me that you don’t spend your days earning a crust as an interior designer. Which leads me to conclude that you really do nothing with your life except…what…party? Have fun holidays wherever the in crowd happens to be? I know your type.’
‘It’s important to enjoy life,’ Miranda said for the sake of argument, even though she knew that she was on losing ground.
‘You’d better go and get changed.’ He stood next to her and then grasped her arm with his fingers, help that she reluctantly accepted. ‘You can borrow some of my clothes, even though they’re probably not quite up to your standard, and then I’ll cook us something to eat.’
‘Thank you,’ she muttered, out of good manners—though she was looking forward to putting on dry clothes. Whenever she tried to stand, even slightly, on her hurt foot, she could feel her whole body flinch in discomfort. The bandage had made it feel better, or at least had given her the illusion of thinking that it did, but who cared whether she could hop, skip and jump in the morning? She would still be stuck here in ferocious bad weather with this unbearable man who moved from hostility to contempt with the ease of a magician. Through the little panes of the window she could see the snow whipping around outside and she could hear it as well. The low howl of wind and the soft spitting of the snowdrops. It was a nightmare.
‘Don’t be too proud to ask for help,’ he threw in casually, as she clung to the banister and tried to heave herself up, and Miranda looked at him sourly. Blue eyes, a deeper more piercing shade than her own aquamarine-blue and infinitely more opaque, met hers. His eyebrows were dark, the same raven darkness of his hair. But, close to him like this, she noticed his eyelashes, which were thick and long and unexpectedly attractive.
‘If you wouldn’t mind…’ she said, looking away, and he obligingly swept her off her feet and carried her upstairs as though she weighed less than a feather. A huge wave of exhaustion swept over her and she had to fight to keep her eyes open.
It felt so comfortable being carried like this. She could feel the strength of his body against her, like steel. The hands supporting her were large and powerful, like the rest of him; and, unlike most of the men she socialised with, he smelt not of expensive aftershave but of something more masculine and tangy. Very rough and ready, she thought. He would be if he lived here and spent his life chopping logs and skiing.
‘There’s just the one bathroom,’ he said, pushing open the door with his foot and then settling her on the chair by the bath. ‘So make sure you leave it just as you found it. I don’t intend to have to clean up after you.’
Without bothering to give her a second glance, he began running the bath, testing the water with his hand, squatting by the side of the bath so that his shirt lifted slightly to reveal a slither of hard brown skin.
‘I’d better get you undressed.’ He turned towards her and she was propelled out of her lazy observation of him.
‘No, thank you!’
‘You mean you can do it all yourself? With that ankle of yours?’
‘I’m very grateful to have been rescued by you,’ Miranda said stiffly, ‘but if you lay a finger on me, I swear I’ll scream this place down.’
‘Oh, will you?’ He leaned over her, caging her in with his hands and making sure that there was no place for her to look but at his face. His features were blunt and overpoweringly masculine and she cringed back into the chair like a startled victim of a bird of prey. ‘And who do you think will hear you? But…’ as quickly as he had leaned over her, he stood back, straightening to his massive height, and looked at her with an insolent lack of respect ‘…far be it from me to invade your maidenly privacy. Just make sure you clean up after yourself. I don’t want to find any of this…’ without warning he lifted some strands of her hair between his fingers so that the long fine white-blonde hair trailed over his wrists ‘…clogging up my plug hole.’
It took one full hour for her to complete her bath. Struggling out of her layers of ski gear was a feat along the lines of running five marathons in a row. And then, when she finally decided that her body would shrivel from overexposure to bath water, she got out and was confronted with the further indignity of yelling for him from the top of the stairs with a towel wrapped around her and her hair hanging limply wet down her back.
‘I wonder if I might borrow those clothes you mentioned?’ she told him when he finally surfaced at the bottom of the stairs with a saucepan in his hand.
‘I’m sorry?’
‘I asked whether I might borrow those clothes you mentioned?’ Miranda repeated tersely. The towel barely covered her body. He must have known how awkward she felt standing here like this but either he didn’t give a damn or else he frankly enjoyed her discomfort. Or both.
‘I heard that bit. I’m waiting for you to finish your request.’
‘Please.’
‘That’s much better.’ He deposited the pan on the small wooden table at the bottom of the stairs and then headed up towards her. ‘You can use the spare bedroom,’ he said, pushing open a door to reveal a small, cosy room with its own open fireplace. There was just enough space for the single bed, a dressing table with a mirror and a chest of drawers. Miranda propped herself up against the door frame and looked around it. She was used to sleeping in a double bed. Even when she stayed in hotels, she always insisted on a double bed, however much extra the room might cost. She liked having a lot of space when she went to sleep. Single beds reminded her of hospitals and hospitals reminded her of her mother who had died in one when she had been barely knee-high to a grasshopper.
‘Not good enough for m’lady?’ For a big man, he moved with disconcerting stealth, she thought, swinging around to face him and finding a bundle of clothes shoved into her hands.
‘It’s fine. Thank you.’
‘Good. Because the only king-sized bed is in my room and my excessive hospitality does have its limits. Now, shall I help m’lady inside?’ Without giving her time to answer, he placed his hand squarely around her waist, leaving her no option but to clutch the loosening towel with one hand and place the other around his neck.
‘Now…’ He stood back and looked down at her with his arms folded ‘…you can get changed, and I’ll be up in fifteen minutes with something for you to eat. M’lady.’ He gave a mock salute.
‘Could you please stop calling me that?’
‘M’lady?’ His dangerous blue eyes widened with an expression of ridiculously inept innocence. ‘But why?’
‘Because it’s not my name.’
He didn’t bother to answer that. Instead he moved across to the dead fireplace. ‘Cold in here, isn’t it? But then, I wasn’t expecting company or else I would have lit this fire and had the room warm and ready. You’d better get dressed. You’re trembling. I’ll put your clothes to dry in front of the fire downstairs.’
‘Thank you.’
‘And I’ll bring some logs up later and get this fire going.’
‘I would appreciate that.’ Miranda could feel goose pimples on her arms from the abrupt change in temperature after the warm bathroom. ‘You needn’t worry, Mr Decroix…’
‘Luke, please. Why stand on formality when we’ll be living together?’ He inclined his head to look at her over his shoulder, and she realised, with