The Virgin's Wedding Night

Her heels rang on the metal steps as she climbed. Like the clash of armour before battle, she thought, and found she was unexpectedly fighting a very real temptation to forget the whole thing, return to the waiting cab, and go home.

But that was the coward’s way out, she told herself. And that arrogant bastard wasn’t getting away with what he’d tried to do to her.

As she reached the narrow platform at the top, the door opened suddenly, and Harriet took an involuntary step backwards, pressing herself against the guard rail.

A girl’s voice with a smile in it said, ‘See you later,’ and she found herself confronting a pretty girl, immaculate in pastel cut-offs and a white tee shirt, her blonde hair in a long braid, carrying a large canvas bag slung over one shoulder. She checked, with a gasp, when she spotted Harriet.

‘Heavens, you startled me.’ Blue eyes looked her over enquiringly. ‘Was there something you wanted?’

Harriet saw that the hand holding the strap of the canvas bag wore a wedding ring. The possibility that this Roan might be married had not, frankly, occurred to her.

But, even if he was, there was no way someone so irredeemably scruffy could possibly be paired with a such a clearly high-maintenance woman.

Unless the attraction of opposites had come into play, and he was her bit of rough, she thought with distaste.

The girl said more insistently, ‘Can I help you?’

Discovering that she seemed to have momentarily lost the power of speech, Harriet mutely held out the business card that she was still clutching.

‘Oh.’ The girl sounded surprised. ‘Oh—right.’ She turned and called over her shoulder, ‘Darling, you have a visitor.’ She gave Harriet a smile that was friendly and puzzled in equal measures, then clattered her way down the staircase.

Darling…

My God, Harriet thought, wincing. Lady, you have all my sympathy.

At the same time, she was glad the other girl had departed, because what she wanted to say, possibly at the top of her voice, didn’t need an audience. Especially when the evidence suggested she could not count on its support.

She drew a deep, steadying breath, took the screwed-up drawing from her pocket, and walked through the doorway.

Because of its immediate environment, she’d expected the place to be dark inside, and probably dingy. Instead she found herself in a large loft room, brimming with the sunlight that poured through the vast window occupying the greater part of an entire wall, and down from the additional skylights in the roof.

The smell of oil paint was thick and heavy in the air, and on the edge of her half-dazzled vision, stacked round the walls, were canvases—great splashes of vibrant, singing colour.

But she couldn’t allow them to distract her, even for a moment, because he was there—a tall, dark figure, standing motionless, hands on hips, in the middle of all this brilliance.

As if he was waiting for her, hard and unbending as a granite pillar, the black brows drawn together in a frown, his mouth harsh and unsmiling.

He said, ‘What are you doing here? What do you want?’

His voice was low-pitched and cool. Educated too, she recognised with faint surprise, but slightly accented. Spanish—Italian? She couldn’t be sure.

Of course that deep tan should have given away his Mediterranean origins, as she now had every opportunity to notice, because the tee shirt he’d been wearing earlier had been discarded. His feet were bare too, and the waistband of his jeans, worn low on his hips, was unfastened.

As it would be, she thought, if he’d simply dragged them on for decency’s sake as he said goodbye to his lover.

And, while there wasn’t an ounce of spare flesh on him, effete he certainly wasn’t, she realised, swallowing. His naked shoulders and arms were powerfully sculpted, and his bronzed chest was darkly shadowed by the hair that arrowed down over his stomach until hidden by the barrier of faded denim that covered his long legs.

Penniless artist he might be, but at the same time he looked tough and uncompromising, and it occurred to her suddenly that perhaps it might have been better if the blonde had remained after all.

Or if I’d stayed away…

The thoughts seemed to be chasing each other through her skull.

‘I asked why you were here,’ he said. ‘And I am waiting for your answer.’

That jolted her back to the here and now. Needled her into response too.

She lifted her chin. ‘Can’t you guess the reason?’ She took the crumpled ball of paper from her pocket, and threw it at him. It didn’t reach its target, dropping harmlessly to the floor between them, and he didn’t waste a glance on it.

‘You were so impressed with the likeness that you came to commission a portrait, perhaps?’ His tone was silky. ‘If so, I must refuse. I doubt if I could summon up sufficient inspiration a second time.’

‘Don’t worry.’ Her own voice grated. ‘I have no plans to feature as a subject for you ever again. I came for an apology.’

His brows lifted. ‘An apology for what?’

‘For that.’ She pointed at the ball of paper. ‘That—thing you left for me.’ She drew a swift, sharp breath. ‘Do you know how many people work in that building—and use that entrance? And you had the damned nerve to put that—insulting, libellous daub where everyone would see it. Make me into a laughing stock. And you did it quite deliberately. Don’t try to deny it.’

He shrugged. ‘Why should I?’

‘And don’t pretend it was only a joke, either. Because, if so, it was in bloody poor taste.’

‘It was no joke,’ he said, and there was a note in his voice that gave her the odd sensation that her skin had been laid open by a whip. ‘And nor was your attempt to have me moved on by your security guard, as if I was guilty of some crime. And in front of a crowd of people, too.

‘Humiliation does not appeal to me either,’ he added grimly. ‘Although I must tell you that your plan misfired, because no one laughed. They were all embarrassed for me, including your guard. And several of them sprang to my defence.’

He paused. ‘It is interesting that you did not expect your colleagues to be equally supportive,’ he went on bitingly. ‘But, at the same time, it is hardly surprising if this is a sample of the tactics you use in your workplace. Perhaps they would have recognised my portrait of you only too well.’

She felt as if she’d been punched in the guts, and, for a moment, she could only stare at him in silence. Then, she forced herself to rally. To fight back. ‘You had no right to be there, opposite our offices.’

‘I have been sketching there all week,’ he said. ‘No one from your company or any other has complained before.’

‘That,’ she said, ‘is because I never saw you there before.’

‘Then I can be thankful for that, at least.’

She bit her lip. ‘Anyway, beggars deserve to be moved on. You were causing an obstruction.’

‘I was not begging,’ he said stonily. ‘I was earning honest money, giving pleasure by my sketching. But I guess that pleasure is not something you would readily understand, Miss Harriet Flint.’

She gasped. ‘How do you know my name?’

He shrugged. ‘In the same way that you learned where I live. I was told by Luigi Carossa. He telephoned to say you were planning to pay me a visit.’ His mouth curled. ‘He even thought it might be to my advantage. I did not disillusion him.’

He paused. ‘Now, if there is nothing further, perhaps you would leave.’

It was difficult to breathe. ‘Is that—is that all you have to say?’

‘Why, no.’ The dark eyes swept over her contemptuously. ‘There is also this. Go back to your fortress, Miss Flint, and practise giving more ridiculous and high-handed orders. If you cannot make yourself liked, you can at least attempt to feel important. I hope it is some consolation.’