‘Yes, Mr Jacobs.’
‘And you’d better take that stupid smirk off your face right now before I take it off for you!’
‘Is that a threat?’
‘If you want to keep your job you’d better not even think about getting cute with me. Do I make myself clear, Mr Ferrers?’
Clearly struggling to keep a lid on his temper, Steven nodded his head derisively before stalking from the room looking as if he was going to kick the nearest thing that came into contact with his boot.
Letting go of the breath she’d been holding, Liadan pressed her hand to her chest, her fingers closing over a tiny pearl button on the roll-neck collar of her soft wool sweater.
‘You should know better than to encourage him.’ Arms akimbo, Adrian studied her as if she was a great disappointment to him. Indignation and hurt welled in Liadan’s chest at his careless assumption about her association with the younger man. Did he really think she’d be interested in a low-life like Steven Ferrers?
‘I didn’t! I mean I don’t! He just wanted to—’
‘I’m not interested in what he wanted from you, Liadan. Things would run a lot more smoothly round here if the people I employed just got on with their jobs and kept the organisation of their social lives for their days off!’
As he strode out of the room Liadan took a moment to absorb the outrageous admonition before haring off after him and catching up to him in the corridor. Unable to think past the fury that was threatening to burst out of her like a hot spring, she caught his arm to make him stop and face her.
Adrian stared down at the pale, slender fingers curved round his bicep, and couldn’t deny the fierce stab of heat that went straight from his arm to his groin. For a moment it made him almost dizzy—weak with longing. With her blue eyes flashing and her chest heaving, right now Liadan Willow was the woman of his dreams, the epitome of all his fantasies rolled into one gorgeous, sexy package…
‘Just a minute! You can’t just walk in, say something as insulting as that and then walk out again!’
‘You don’t think I have a right to admonish you if you waste your time making social arrangements with Steven Ferrers when I’m paying you both to work for me?’
Suddenly aware of exactly where her hand was resting, Liadan snatched it back, her pale face awash with burning heat. All she could think of was one thing now she had felt the throb of that steely bicep beneath her fingers…sex. Adrian Jacobs was sex on legs and just lately it had been slow, sweet torture to even be in the same room as him. Never in all her twenty-seven years had Liadan experienced such wanton longing for a man.
‘I don’t even like the man! Why do you think I would even dream of seeing him after work?’
‘It’s not such a stretch of the imagination, is it? He’s not bad-looking, I suppose, and he certainly has a reputation for being a bit of a magnet for some of the local girls, so I’m told.’ Adrian shrugged and glanced away. When he next rested his dark brown eyes on Liadan, one corner of his usually stern mouth had disconcertingly lifted in a little half-smile. ‘Maybe you’re lonely? You’re a young, healthy woman, Liadan—barring head wounds caused by an aversion to running over rabbits. I’m sure you have the normal desires of any young female. You don’t have to be ashamed of them.’
Barely able to speak over the dryness in her mouth, Liadan frowned. ‘I’m not ashamed. I’m just not interested in Steven Ferrers and I don’t want you believing that I am.’
‘Good.’ His voice arrestingly low, Adrian brushed back a curl from her forehead and seemed to be examining the gauze pad that was still taped there. His touch immediately sent tiny electrical currents of shock pulsing throughout Liadan’s body. She felt shivery with heat, weak with fervent, helpless longing, as if her insides were slowly but inexorably melting.
‘I like this sweater,’ he said beguilingly, his hand moving away from her forehead and resting instead on the front of her mulberry-coloured jumper.
‘Do you?’ Mesmerised by his hot glance, Liadan hardly dared breathe.
‘It shows off your shape to perfection.’
She sensed his fingers move inevitably downwards until they stroked across the burgeoning nub of her nipple, peaked inside her pretty lace bra. Her womb contracted deeply in shock, and a violent wave of scalding desire throbbed through her body leaving her momentarily dazed.
‘Adrian, I—’
He withdrew his hand, but his glance still burned. Liadan could feel the prickling sensation on her breast where he had touched her, the primitive aching need between her legs…
‘Keep away from Steven Ferrers. Take it from me, he’s trouble. If he bothers you in any way I want you to tell me right away. Understand?’
All she could do was nod. Right now she was hardly capable of speech.
‘Oh, and Liadan?’
‘What?’
‘If you could take pity on me and not wear that tight sweater again, I’d be very much obliged.’
With her face flaming a vibrant scarlet, Liadan turned without a word and hurried back to the kitchen.
CHAPTER SEVEN
‘LEAVE that. I think you’ve done enough for one day, don’t you?’
‘I’m only setting the table for your dinner. It won’t take a minute. I haven’t made anything fancy tonight—just a lasagne with a salad.’
Flushing a little, because seeing him again had reminded her that he had all but reduced her to a puddle on the floor with that electrifying brush of his fingers across her breast, as well as his comment about her sweater, Liadan continued to lay the table. At lunchtime she had taken him soup and sandwiches, leaving the tray as usual on top of the beautiful grand piano that she itched to play. Apart from a polite inquiry about her head, he’d let her appearance pass without comment, his work commanding his attention again almost immediately. Liadan had been glad to leave him to eat his lunch in peace and return to the kitchen to eat hers.
But now Adrian wasn’t absorbed by work. Dressed in casual black jeans and a chocolate-brown sweater that highlighted his exceptional physique in a way that made Liadan a little more than hot under the collar, he smiled at her as he came into the room, his face looking less careworn than it had in days. That smile had her spirits soaring as high as a bird and she was fiercely glad that she had prevented him from seeing that despicable rag masquerading as a newspaper that Steven had shoved under her nose earlier.
‘Why don’t you join me?’
‘You mean, eat in here with you?’
‘Would it be such a hardship, Liadan?’
‘No.’ Liadan frowned as she straightened up from the table. ‘It wouldn’t be a hardship at all. That wasn’t what I meant. It’s just that—’
Looking amused, Adrian casually rubbed his hand round the back of his neck. ‘It’s just that what?’
Did he really have to ask? Liadan wondered in exasperation. He’d already emphasised more than once that he was paying her to do a job for him, nothing more. Sitting down in his grand dining room to eat dinner with him would be too awkward for words. It would make it hard for her to remember that she was just his housekeeper and not something far more intimate, and to Liadan’s mind it was best if she kept the distinction between their roles clear. At the end of the day, Adrian was her employer and she his employee. She needed to hold onto this job if she was going to keep her little house and that had to be her priority. Not some pie-in-the-sky hope that her relationship with her employer might become more personal.
‘It would be better if I just ate in the kitchen as normal. You should relax and unwind after your day’s work. Dinner won’t