The Prospective Wife

‘Do you really think you’re such a great catch?’ she grouched.

So it wasn’t tactful, but a girl had her breaking point! And it was something that Kat felt needed saying; this man had an entirely too great an opinion of himself! So what if he had a smile that could melt a girl’s bones?

Matt wasn’t a vain man, but he did take some things for granted and one of them was, to put it crudely—as Joe had, on more than one occasion—his pulling power! Without realising it, over the years he had come to expect a certain degree of appreciation from females.

It wasn’t as if he had any illusions about what attracted many women, and in Matt’s view it wasn’t the fascination of his blue eyes! He had money and power, and a particular sort of woman liked men who could provide them with those things. How else did you explain hordes of drop-dead gorgeous lovelies on the arms of men old enough to be their grandfathers?

Despite normally evincing a healthy cynicism for that sort of adulation, now, reading the scorn in Kat’s wide eyes, he decided that uncritical worship might not be so bad after all! Just how hard, he speculated, his lips settling into a brooding line of dissatisfaction, would it be to replace that superior disdain with indiscriminate drooling desire…? Now that might be the sort of therapy he needed!

‘You were going, I think, Joseph,’ Matt said without taking his eyes off Kat.

‘I was…?’ It occurred to Joe that, as far as the woman of his dreams was concerned, he had never really been there at all—he tried to take the fact he wasn’t making any contribution towards the electric atmosphere in the room philosophically.

‘Don’t worry, I think I’ll be quite safe in Miss Wray’s capable hands.’

Matt couldn’t ignore the stimulating effect this the image had on his jaded imagination… It was the undies question rearing its ugly head again. Were lingerie fetishes a normal result of several months of enforced celibacy…? There could be a paper in this for good old Dr Metcalf…

Kat could hardly believe the startling alteration in his manner. He sounded suspiciously like a normal, rational human being; there was even a hint of beguiling warmth in his voice!

‘You don’t mind me being here?’ Kat discovered she felt rather ambivalent about this breakthrough. She did have the offer of several temporary beds… Would you really prefer to be a burden on your friends? she asked herself sternly.

‘I want to throw those—’ his electric blue gaze lit momentarily on the discarded crutches ‘—out for good. If you can speed up the process I’d be a fool to object, wouldn’t I.’

It sounded reasonable…

‘Yes, you would.’ It seemed that he was no longer fearful that she would seduce him… How did you go about seducing someone…? With her rudimentary grasp of the subject, she’d probably produce a seduction routine that would have him laughing some more. She still felt like wincing when she thought about the sound of his deep, uninhibited amusement at her expense.

‘Then that’s settled.’

‘Your mother said that you—’

Matt didn’t much want to know what his mother said. ‘I thought you two were on first-name terms…?’ Matt interrupted her flow.

‘Is that a problem, Mr Devlin?’

‘Nobody calls me Mr Devlin.’

Kat’s mobile features screwed up in an uneasy frown. ‘I’m not sure I’m comfortable using your first name…’ She wasn’t sure why she felt so strongly about this… It wasn’t as if she was renowned for her formality.

‘I’m sure we all want you to be comfortable…’ he responded smoothly.

Then why, she wondered, does everything you do appear to be specifically designed to make me feel uneasy…? ‘No, I’m sure it will be fine…Matthew…’

‘Matt. And you’re…?’

‘Kat.’

‘Which is short for what…? Katherine…?’

‘Kathleen,’ she supplied, feeling a strange reluctance to divulge any personal information, no matter how innocuous, to this man.

‘Kathleen… Irish…?’

When he wasn’t barking orders or sounding paranoid, Matthew Devlin had a sinfully attractive voice, the sort of voice that had a colour and texture—in this case, midnight-blue and velvet—when you closed your eyes to appreciate the husky resonance. Kat didn’t close her eyes, but it was a close call!

‘On my mother’s side,’ she confirmed.

‘Me, too.’

‘I know. They went to school together, but they hadn’t seen each other for years and years,’ she added swiftly, in case it got him started on the conspiracy theory again. ‘Not until…recently.’

Matt didn’t need to be hit on the head with evasion to recognise it. He’d always been good at picking up on things people didn’t say; it was a trait that had done him no harm in his business dealings. He felt his curiosity stir as he wondered about what Kat was leaving unsaid.

Kat was sorry to see Joe go. She’d felt he might be a useful ally in hostile territory. Kat was realistic; she had her foot in the door, but she was pretty sure that this was only the first hurdle—she soon discovered her instincts were right.

‘I’ll use the room I always do, thank you, Elizabeth. If you could have my bags moved upstairs at some point I’d be grateful.’ Despite the pleasant smile he had for the housekeeper, there was no doubt Matt hadn’t liked discovering he’d been put in the ground-floor guest suite.

The housekeeper, whom Kat had had down as the unemotional type, had all but wept with joy at seeing Matt. There was no accounting for taste! She now cast a look of urgent appeal in Kat’s direction as she left the room.

The door closed and Kat could no longer keep a hold on her tongue. She was too exasperated by this point to wrap up her criticism in sugar-coated terms. So far, during their cosy getting to know one another chat, he had vetoed every tentative suggestion she’d made, for no reason as far as she could see other than pig-headed awkwardness, plain and simple.

‘I suppose that’s one way to prove you’re in control. Lay down the law, watch them jump and don’t worry,’ she soothed nastily. ‘Even if they think what you’re saying is stupid they’re not likely to say so!’

Kat had never met a more obstinate individual! For the life of her she couldn’t understand why the staff here seemed so delighted to have him staying—it was bizarre. The housekeeper in particular seemed a very sensible woman, which made her reaction to Matt all the more incomprehensible.

Perhaps the man had hidden depths…? No, Kat decided, with an angry sniff, if he did have depths they were probably murky. Either it was case of mass hypnotism or the whole place must be particularly susceptible to blue eyes; there was no other explanation.

The thought drew her own angry eyes back to his. There was no escaping the fact that his eyes were very blue. Kat herself had found her own gaze repeatedly drawn towards his thickly lashed deep-set eyes as their conversation had become increasingly one-sided. Right now, the main expression she could see in those azure depths was shock… Perhaps he didn’t expect the paid help to answer back?

Matt settled back in his seat and reached for a slice of carrot cake, looked at it with a look as jaded as his palate, and then put it back on the plate untouched.

‘I take it I shouldn’t expect you to feel equally stifled when it comes to the subject of my stupidity.’

‘Are you going to eat that?’

‘Why, do you want it?’ He held out the plate towards her. So far she’d gone through two slices and several of the wafer-thin smoked salmon sandwiches.

‘Very funny.’ Her lips twisted with impatience. ‘You never think about other people, do you?’

‘Not feeling hungry puts me in the selfish and heartless category…?’ Why was he surprised? She seemed able to imbue his most innocent action with sinister intent. ‘Your logic is interesting—bizarre, but interesting.’ Interlacing his fingers, he rested his square chin thoughtfully on them. ‘I feel sure you’re about to fill in the gaps for me.’

‘The afternoon tea.’ She waved her hand over the rather grand spread. ‘I bet everything here is your favourite,’ she accused.

Kat watched as his blue eyes swept over the food on the delicate china plates. Now that she’d pointed it out, he recognised favoured titbits from his schooldays. His shoulders lifted in a negligent concessionary shrug.

‘Hah! I’m right!’ she crowed.

‘If you’ve got a point to make, I think now is the time to make it.’