A Pawn in the Playboy's Game

She was doing her best to avoid eye contact. Even when she took the glass of wine from him, those apple-green eyes skittered away hurriedly.

For a few seconds she remained hovering before subsiding into one of the kitchen chairs and taking a long gulp from the long-stemmed glass.

‘It would have broken my grandmother’s heart if your dad left to live in London. I mean, I know Roberto is probably fond of this place, I know he’s lived in it for...well, for as long as any of us can remember, but I think he knows deep down that it’s far too big for him. Would you like me to find out whether the cottage at the end of the village will be coming up for sale?’ She risked a nervous glance at Alessandro, who was perched against the kitchen counter, staring at her with just the sort of concentration that could send her pulse flying to the four winds.

‘No need.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘If you give me the names of whoever owns the place, I’ll take it from there.’

‘But you won’t know who they are and they don’t actually live in the cottage. I believe it’s a brother and sister. I remember chatting to them when they came to Jim’s funeral.’ She grimaced. ‘They couldn’t wait to leave. Since then they’ve been down a couple of times to make sure the cottage is still standing but they haven’t done anything with it and I’m sure they won’t be interested in moving in.’

‘I just need the names. What’s the boy called?’ He reached for his mobile and tapped in the name given to him.

‘What good is that going to do?’

‘I’ll get in touch with him.’

‘But what if he doesn’t want to sell? I know you think that this is just a backwater, but it’s possible that they might want it as a holiday home. It’s absolutely stunning in the summer months and the salmon fishing is very good...’

‘He’ll sell because I’ll make him an offer he can’t refuse. If he wants a holiday home in this part of the world, he can buy one somewhere else. I intend striking while the iron’s hot. Give my father a little time to start working on another argument for staying put and I could find myself in the same position as I’m in now this time next year.’

‘And that would never do, would it?’ Laura said tartly. ‘Having to drag yourself away from hectic city life to go through the horror of repeat trips to the backwater?’

Alessandro smiled slowly at her. He sipped some of the wine and carried on looking over the rim of the glass, liking what he saw. Jeans, a checked shirt peeping out from behind a dull red jumper. The same fur-lined boots she had been wearing in the classroom. High fashion wasn’t going to be staging a takeover any time soon with her and he really liked that. He also liked the way her skin was tinged pink, the way she was mutinously doing her best to meet his eyes and hold them, the way she didn’t wear any make-up so that the sprinkling of freckles across the bridge of her nose stood out against her pale, smooth skin. Her hair wasn’t in a ponytail but she had still pulled it back into a single long braid, which she had pulled over her shoulder, and it was tied at the end with a red piece of stretchy elastic.

What was a man to do? he wondered.

She wasn’t one of his catwalk models, who were as hard as nails and knew the score before they jumped into bed with him.

She was also nursing a broken heart, although, as far as he was concerned, after a year and a half the heart should not only be mended but would benefit from some energetic exercise. The sort of exercise he was an expert at providing.

And how complicated could it get? They lived in opposite ends of the country and he knew, unerringly, that although she fancied him, she would never look for anything lasting with someone of whom she fundamentally disapproved.

And vice versa. She might make a great change from his predictable diet, but she was as poles apart from him as he was from her. They could have come from different planets and he couldn’t wait to explore their differences.

A big plus was that it would make visiting his father a thing of anticipation, at least for a while. Of course, denial would be a safer option because she didn’t obey the rules of the game he played when it came to women, but denial was something with which he had little experience. What was the point? When it came to sex, all was fair in love and war between consenting adults. And her consent was simmering just below the surface. He could sense it.