She hoped she sounded convincing.
The car slid into the supermarket car park. Kane Talbot got out and so did she, walking quickly inside to pick up her parcels. Again he caught her up before she’d taken more than a few steps.
It was, she thought a few moments later, rather like being with royalty. He knew everybody; they knew him. He greeted people as they walked through the shop, meeting smiles and interested glances. But he didn’t stop to introduce anyone. And he scooped up her three plastic bags without asking whether she needed any help.
The sort of man who simply took over, Emma thought, replacing a quirk of resentment with resignation. Good in emergencies, but unbearable in everyday life. That poor woman in Australia—after a year of marriage she wouldn’t have a thought to call her own.
Back in the car, groceries safely stowed, he switched on the engine and asked casually, ‘Do you ride?’
After a moment’s pause she said, ‘Yes.’
‘I have a mare that badly needs exercise. I’m too big for her and no one’s been on her for a couple of months.’
‘You don’t know whether I’m any good,’ she said.
When his tawny glance flicked across her hands, the fingers curled. She felt as though she’d been branded.
‘I think you’ll be all right,’ he said with cool, abrasive confidence, ‘but if you sit like a sack of spuds and saw at her mouth I’ll rescind the offer.’
Surprised into a short laugh, she said, ‘All right, I’d like to try her out.’
‘She’s not placid.’
‘Neither am I,’ Emma said dulcetly.
Something glittered beneath the long black lashes. ‘No? You look as sweet and demure as a good child.’
Slowly, with great effort, Emma relaxed her hands until they rested sedately in her lap. She’d like to hit him fair and square in the middle of that flat stomach, right on the solar plexus so that she winded him, so that he doubled up and gasped and had to wipe tears from those brilliant eyes.
Restraining the sudden and most unusual surge of anger, she looked down unseeingly. She’d probably break every knuckle if she tried to punch him, and besides, he didn’t look as though he’d accept an attack with equanimity. She stifled the quick, sly query from some hidden part of her brain about how he’d deal with a woman’s aggression, carefully smoothed her brow and leashed her imagination with a strong will.
He probably didn’t mean to sound patronising—and then she looked up and caught the narrow gleam of gold in his eyes and knew that he damned well did.
She produced a smile. ‘I know,’ she said with a sigh. ‘I look like Snow White. That wretched film’s blighted my life.’
‘You wouldn’t have let the wicked stepmama drive you out into the snow?’
How did—? No, he couldn’t know! Colour seeped back into her suddenly clammy skin. When she’d been sixteen she’d fought her prospective stepmother with the only weapon she’d had, her father’s love, and she’d won. Now, seven years too late, she regretted it bitterly.
Fighting to keep her voice even, she said, ‘No. As for housekeeping for seven miners—never.’
‘And I don’t suppose you’re just hanging about waiting for the prince to ride by on his white horse?’
‘Give her credit,’ she retorted, ‘she was in a coma—she couldn’t actually go out looking for him.’
‘True,’ he said, and ruthlessly dragged the conversation back to the subject. ‘So you don’t intend to be any man’s reward?’
‘If we’re still talking about Snow White,’ she returned, ‘don’t you think that the prince was her reward? She’d put up with a lot, worked hard for years and fought off a couple of murderous attacks before succumbing to treachery, and then along came this nice young man who apparently believed in love at first sight. She deserved a treat, and he was it.’
He laughed. ‘Perhaps you’re right. Interesting—fairy stories read as feminist fables.’
‘Nothing as intellectual and rigorous,’ Emma said firmly. ‘It’s just that I got called Snow White so often that I had to develop some sort of attitude to the wretched thing.’
‘I’ll bet you were a tomboy.’
The arrogant, angular profile showed no emotion at all, but the corner of his mouth tucked up. It irritated her that he could read her so easily, and behind that chagrin flickered fear.
Men, Emma had discovered, didn’t really understand women. Seven years ago her father had refused to believe that his daughter was lying and cheating with one aim only: to smash his relationship with the woman he’d been having an affair with, the woman he planned to marry. Because Emma had never been rude, never thrown down any gauntlet, always been polite, he’d believed her and allowed himself to be manipulated by her feigned bulimia.
Looking back down the years, she shivered with dismay as she recalled how grimly she’d battled with the woman she’d believed to be a greedy, unprincipled interloper. Rage and grief had fuelled her determination. She hadn’t cared that her father had truly loved his mistress; she’d been determined to punish them for being lovers while her mother, made wretched by their affair, had suffered and died.
Punish them Emma had. Her father had sent his lover away, and—completely taken in by her pretence—devoted himself to getting Emma through her illness.
A year later he’d died of a heart attack. Sometimes, when she lay awake in the voiceless night, she wondered whether he’d have lived if she hadn’t taken it on herself to avenge his betrayal of her mother, if she hadn’t in turn betrayed her father by lying and cheating. The irony of her own behaviour was now very clear to her.
Kane Talbot seemed a lot more perceptive than most men. Those amber eyes, lit by a clear ring of gold around the dark centres, saw more than she liked.
More acidly than she’d intended, she replied, ‘Turning into a tomboy is the classic response to looking like Snow White. I climbed the highest trees, rode the toughest horses, broke arms and skinned knees galore, and had to prove myself over and over again.’
‘The onset of adolescence must have been a shock,’ he observed.
‘Isn’t it to everyone?’ Emma asked with offhand insouciance. ‘A friend of mine, a thin, shy redhead, was always the tallest in the class—everyone called her Legs. She got unmercifully teased all through primary school. At fifteen she shot up to almost six feet, developed a face to stun the angels, and is now one of the world’s top models.’
And Emma would bet a considerable sum of money that Kane had never had any problems with growing up—or with anything, unless it was swatting away women. That indefinable thing called star quality had probably been obvious from the moment he’d first smiled in his cradle.
Except that ‘star’ was a lightweight description, and there was nothing lightweight about Kane Talbot. The quality that made him immediately noticeable was based on calm mastery of his strength and dynamic power.
Of course, growing up heir to large amounts of money helped. People respected power and influence.
And even as that last snide comment popped into her brain she discarded it. Whatever situation Kane Talbot had been born into he’d still possess that air of authority and courage. It was innate.
Kane broke into her thoughts with, ‘And do you envy this top model?’
‘Good