The Billionaire's Housekeeper Mistress

Daisy couldn’t help being impressed by this aspect of his character. She was a bit of a neat freak herself, liking to know where everything was so she didn’t get frustrated hunting for mislaid items, wasting time that wouldn’t need to be wasted if a bit more care was taken in the first place. But maybe he was a control freak, which wouldn’t be easy to live with. She had to stop thinking things that added to an attraction that was already too disturbingly strong.

The doorbell was a welcome distraction.

It was the architect.

‘Hi! I’m Charlie Hollier and I presume you’re Daisy Donahue,’ he rattled out with a broad smile. ‘Ethan called me and said you’d be here.’

‘Right!’ She smiled back. He was short and stocky, not much taller than her, with a rather homely face and friendly blue eyes twinkling at her as though he was happy to make her acquaintance. The fact that he was wearing blue jeans and a blue-and-white checked sports shirt also made Daisy feel immediately relaxed with him.

‘He mentioned you suggested a bar in the games room. Good idea! Should have thought of it myself. We won’t have to wait until the end of a game to go and get a drink from the kitchen.’

‘You’re one of his Tuesday group?’

He nodded. ‘Always a great night. Let’s go and have a look where best to put it.’

They walked inside to survey the situation. Daisy could not contain her curiosity. ‘How many of you come to play?’

‘Well, there’s the old solid core from Riverview. Ethan and Mickey started it amongst the boarders in our class when we were at school together. A bit of competitive fun when we weren’t at sport or study. That’s three regulars plus Mickey when he’s in town, and other friends we’ve made since then. Usually we have eight people turn up, sometimes more.’

Riverview…it was one of the big private schools at Hunters Hill, sited just across the Lane Cove River from this house. Being a boarder probably meant each student had allotted spaces for his possessions and he would certainly be disciplined into making his bed. If Ethan Cartwright had spent the six years of secondary school there, that could have become habitual, and it would be fairly natural for him to have a place for everything and everything kept in its place—nothing too odd about it.

Daisy was bursting to ask more questions about Ethan Cartwright’s personal life, but reined in what could be seen as too much interest from a mere employee.

The architect decided on a corner bar next to the wall that backed onto the utility room—easy to run plumbing for a sink through from there. He would amend the plans and give a new set to Daisy so she could keep an eye on everything and stop mistakes from being made. ‘I’m delighted Ethan has found someone to be on the spot all the time,’ he added enthusiastically. ‘You’d be surprised how often things have to be fixed because they weren’t done right in the first place.’

Daisy was relieved to hear this. It made her feel she could be of real value here, earning her salary.

‘In fact, I’d appreciate it—Ethan would, too—if you’d ensure that the men laying the slate around the pool today get the mix right,’ Charlie ran on as they strolled out to the back of the house where the work was going on. ‘Quite a lot of the slate will be charcoal-grey without the blue-green streaks in it. Sometimes they just reach for the next piece of slate in the pile and you end up with a square metre of all grey instead of splashes of colour here and there.’

‘Okay. I’ll keep an eye on that,’ Daisy promised, feeling better and better about the job.

They toured the whole site together with Charlie checking on progress, Daisy listening to how he wanted everything to be. ‘It seems a bit weird to me that all this is just for one person,’ she couldn’t help commenting as they returned to the house.

‘Actually Ethan was planning to get married when he bought the place,’ Charlie tossed off casually. ‘Changed his mind, thank God!’

She shot him a quizzical look. ‘You didn’t like the woman?’

He grimaced. ‘A bit too much into being the lady of the manor for my liking. But I’m glad Ethan decided to keep the manor anyway. It’s going to be fantastic when it’s all finished.’

‘It certainly is,’ she agreed, terribly tempted to pump more out of Charlie about the woman, but that was none of her business and it should remain none of her business.

Nevertheless, the phrase—lady of the manor—conjured up someone stunningly beautiful with all the airs and graces learnt from an exclusive finishing school where manners were polished and deportment and elocution were perfected. No doubt she had been trained to be the wife of a billionaire, knowing how to hostess every social event and look the part with elegant ease. Ethan Cartwright would naturally choose to marry a woman like that. She wondered what had happened to change his mind about the one he had chosen.

The lighting people arrived soon after the architect had left. As she watched the chandelier being carefully lowered onto the canvas laid out on the floor, it was impossible not to feel a pang of regret at its removal even though it wouldn’t suit the lifestyle Ethan planned for himself. Perhaps the lady of the manor had wanted to keep the grandeur of the old house and they’d clashed on that point, realising they’d envisaged different futures together.

Whatever…it was none of her business.

She had a job to do and she would do it to the best of her ability.

Ethan was frustrated. Almost three weeks had passed and he was getting nowhere with Daisy Donahue. What he needed was a good block of time with her—enough time to get past the business of the day and onto more promising ground.

She was gone when he arrived home after work, always leaving him a note on what had been accomplished during the day, informing him of any snags to the flow of progress and how and when they would be corrected. Each morning she arrived all fresh and perky at eight o’clock, provoking an instant rush of sexual excitement, but no matter how long he delayed his departure, she would not be diverted from talk about the job. It was as though she was obsessed with it, not the least bit interested in him as a man, quickly brushing past every attempt he made at a more personal connection.

Nevertheless, the interest was there. He felt it in the tense way she deliberately kept a physical distance between them. He saw it in an occasional flash of her eyes before her gaze quickly slid away from his. He actually sensed her inward battle to suppress it whenever she was in his company.

It was obvious that she needed to feel secure in the position of his on-site project manager, continually affirming that her salary was being earned. Having a regular income was a big issue with her and she was probably determined not to risk losing it by indulging an attraction that could rock her boat.

I don’t gamble.

Somehow that steely will had to be broken.

Or at least bent.

His way.

Daisy always rang the doorbell when she arrived at the Hunters Hill mansion each morning. Although she had a set of house keys and could have let herself in, the solid common sense of keeping everything formal between her and Ethan Cartwright stopped her from taking any kind of familiar freedom on his territory when he was at home.

He’d greeted her at the door one morning wearing only a short black silk wrap-around robe. Even though he had been decently covered, the deep V of bared chest with the sprinkle of black, curly hair and the powerful muscularity of his long legs had messed with her head for the rest of the day. No way did she want to catch him by surprise in any state of undress. The man oozed masculine sexuality. The more she saw of him, the more he rattled all her female hormones.

Even when she’d believed herself in love with Carl, he hadn’t affected her like this—such a strong physical tug that inspired lustful thoughts. Sex with Carl had been more a natural progression of romance, not some primitive form of sheer wantonness that kept pleading for connection, eroding the common sense she had to hang onto.

She knew Ethan Cartwright was too much of a high flyer to ever consider her as a possible wife. She wasn’t beautiful. She had no outstanding talent to lift her above her very ordinary background. Her circumstances were such that she was no match for him on any level, and no match meant no serious relationship.

Playing with her…that was something altogether different. She strongly suspected he enjoyed doing that already and wanted to push it further, but since Daisy couldn’t see herself becoming the main event in his life, pride wouldn’t allow her to fall into the role of a bit on the side, not even for the satisfaction of knowing what it would be like to have an intimate connection with him.

Most likely this was a case of her being on the spot and him not having chosen another sexual partner since breaking up with his fiancée. He probably viewed her as a nice little tonic for his hurt pride—a good dose and he’d feel on top of his world again. Which would make Daisy just another feather stuffed in his winner’s cap. Her self-esteem insisted she was worth more than that. She’d been used once. She wasn’t going to be used again. Despite the fact that Ethan Cartwright left Carl for dead in the attraction stakes.