The Billionaire's Housekeeper Mistress

And no way would they get the full value of the house in a forced sale, given the current slump in the property market. It wouldn’t get her parents out of trouble. Besides, it wasn’t fair for them to lose their home at this stage of their lives. They deserved a carefree retirement.

Their investment advisor had got it hopelessly wrong. Last year’s share market slide had sliced over thirty percent off their superannuation savings. The resulting loss of income was never going to be recovered. Neither was there any hope of the situation improving during this recession.

The rest of the family wasn’t in a position to help. Her three older brothers and one sister were all married with young families, struggling to make ends meet. Two of her brothers, Ken and Kevin, had been laid off by their employers in the workforce squeeze. Keith had gone into business for himself and was feeling the pinch. Violet, her sister, had an autistic son who needed so much care, her marriage was very rocky because of it. They simply couldn’t cope with more pressure on their shoulders.

Which meant she was the only one who could carry the load. By far the youngest—the late accidental pregnancy—she had moved back to her parents’ suburban home in Ryde to give them the rent money she’d been paying for her share-apartment in the inner city, as well as covering most of the food bills to ensure her parents didn’t stint on their diet in their anxiety over the debt. Her contribution meant the monthly interest bill could be paid, but it was an endless cycle. She didn’t make enough money to pay off the loan.

What really irked her was if her parents had sought out Ethan Cartwright to manage their nest-egg…But how were ordinary people supposed to know he was the man to go to? There’d been no publicity about him until after the economic crash. Besides, he probably only dealt with multi-millionaires. The big spenders in this marquee only mixed with each other.

The commentator’s voice rose several decibels as the race began, calling out a string of names. A hubbub of excitement broke out from the spectators gathered in front of the television screens. Daisy rigidly refused to look, resenting how much money these people were prepared to risk on stupid bets. It was a well-known fact that race-fixing went on all the time. If you weren’t in the know…although perhaps the Magic Millions was different with all the owners wanting their new purchases to perform well in such a prestige event.

‘Midas Magic hits the front at the turn and is starting to leave the field behind. He’s two lengths ahead…three…four…no one’s going to catch him!’

The screaming from the commentator assaulted her ears. And her heart. The man who had everything was about to get a lot more with his horse winning this race. It wasn’t fair. It vexed her even further that he’d put her in the know and she had ignored his advice, sticking to her principles of not taking any gambles. Besides, who could believe that any horse was a sure thing?

Lynda Twiggley for one!

Daisy scrambled guiltily to her feet as her employer came bursting out of a group of people, gleefully brandishing a betting ticket and catching her PA sitting down on the job. ‘I won! I won!’ she cried. ‘Isn’t it marvellous? Ten thousand lovely dollars!’

‘Ten thousand?’ Daisy repeated, totally stunned by the amount.

‘Yes. I wouldn’t have taken such a plunge on a horse if Ethan Cartwright hadn’t recommended it,’ Lynda archly confided. ‘Such a gorgeous, clever man! He’s made my day!’

‘I’m very pleased for you, Miss Twiggley,’ Daisy managed to force out. At least it had put her employer in a good mood, unlikely to snipe at any shortcomings she perceived in her PA.

The glittery blue eyes narrowed in determined calculation. ‘Now I must get him to look at my shares portfolio. If I can net him into another tête-á-tête, don’t interrupt us for anything, Dee-Dee. Should any problem arise, use your own initiative to solve it. That’s what I’ve trained you for.’

‘I won’t go near him,’ Daisy firmly promised.

She couldn’t stand seeing him shine with triumph anyway. It would be sickening. Privately she thought her employer had little chance of netting him again. Ethan Cartwright had tried to hang onto the diversion of Daisy’s gaffe in interrupting their last encounter, insisting on being properly introduced, continuing to speak to her despite Lynda’s obvious impatience for her to be gone.

He wouldn’t have bothered trying to connect with her under ordinary circumstances. She was way beneath his notice. He’d simply been using her for his own purpose—breaking up a meeting he didn’t like. She wished she could dismiss him from her mind. Everything he stood for stirred her up. Worst of all was the fact that she’d felt an undeniable physical attraction to the man. Which was understandable, given that he was a standout male, but she hated him all the more for it, making her want what she knew could never be available to her.

‘I’d kill for a cup of coffee right now. I wish they’d get on with serving it.’

The whining complaint from one of the models—very much a VIP, having been chosen to star on the runway for Victoria’s Secret—sent Daisy straight to the catering tent to investigate the delay. Lynda Twiggley would have a fit if she heard one of her prized guests being put out by any failure in the arrangements made for their pleasure and comfort. Bad PR. It was up to Daisy to prevent or fix anything bad.

Two of the chefs were having a raging argument and their assistants all looked rigid with tension, doing nothing but watching from the sidelines. This catering outfit was being very highly paid to do a top-class job and they weren’t delivering. Daisy steeled herself to walk right into the line of fire between the fighting chefs and remind them of their prime responsibility.

‘People are asking for coffee,’she stated briskly, giving both of them a stern look. ‘It should be out there being served. VIP guests don’t like to be left wanting anything.’

It startled them into turning their attention to her.

‘It’s also supposed to be accompanied by chocolates and petits-fours. Are they ready to go?’ she ran on, reminding them of what was expected, then adding a sensible warning. ‘You don’t want to lose your good reputation with these people. They always remember delays like this.’

One of the temperamental chefs threw up his hands and glared around at the motionless staff. ‘Move! Move! Get on with it!’

Satisfied she had made her point, Daisy returned to the VIP marquee, intending to assure the model that coffee was on its way. She stopped in her tracks when she saw Ethan Cartwright chatting to her. Venomous thoughts exploded in her head. Nothing but the best for a man like him! She’d known—of course, she’d known—he wasn’t really interested in a little brown cow. This was reality—birds of a feather flocked together.

No doubt the magnificent model had taken his advice to bet on Midas Magic, too. The two high-flyers were both beaming with the pleasure of victory, making Daisy’s stomach churn from the terrible injustice of it all.

Ethan felt it again, his whole body tingling from a blast of electric energy. He turned his head, his gaze instinctively homing in on the source—Daisy Donahue, her eyes blazing at him with feral animosity, stirring the urge to do battle with her, catch her, cage her until she was tamed to his satisfaction. The weird, exciting thoughts raced through his mind, swiftly followed by Mickey’s catch-cry—seize the day.

He’d looked for her without success when he’d reentered the marquee after the race. Now here she was a few metres away, within easy reach, the challenge she threw out drawing him like a magnet. He automatically started to move towards her, their eyes locked in a duel of sizzling passion.

‘Ethan?’

The full-of-herself model he’d been talking to was calling him back. He’d forgotten his manners. ‘Please excuse me, Talia,’ he swiftly tossed back at her. ‘Someone I have to see.’

In that brief moment of disengagement with Daisy she’d taken flight, dodging behind groups of people, apparently intent on hiding from him. It spurred Ethan on to catch up with her, force a face-to-face confrontation. He sliced through the throng, his interest aroused to an intensity that surprised him, his heart beating like a battle drum as he intercepted her attempted escape, making it impossible for her not to acknowledge him.

‘Hello, again,’ he said, revelling in the flush of angry frustration that flooded into her cheeks, giving her pale, flawless skin a peaches-and-cream vivacity, making the eyes that warred with his in flaming fury even brighter.

His abrupt appearance in front of her had shocked her into stillness, but it was the stillness of a tightly coiled spring, nerves twanging at the suppression of movement away from him. Her chin jerked up belligerently. The brown pill-box hat slid slightly from its perch on top of her head. He barely restrained himself from reaching up and straightening it for her. He wanted contact—intimate contact—with this woman.

‘Mr Cartwright…’ she bit out, obviously hating being trapped into this encounter.

He smiled, intent on pouring soothing balm over whatever was making her bristle in his presence. ‘Let’s make that Ethan.’

She sucked in a quick breath, her eyes flaring a denial of any familiarity between them. ‘Congratulations on your win,’ she said tersely. ‘I didn’t place a bet on your horse. As I told you before, I don’t gamble, so there’s nothing more to say, is there? We have nothing in common.’

Ethan was not about to let his feet be cut out from under him before he’d even started to make inroads on getting to know her. He turned his smile into an ironic grimace. ‘I need some assistance.’

She raised a disbelieving eyebrow, offering him no encouragement to spell it out.

‘That is your job, isn’t it? Assisting any of the guests here who have a problem?’ he pushed.

‘What is your problem, Mr Cartwright?’ she demanded, her eyes glinting open scepticism.

‘You are, Daisy Donahue.’

She frowned, her certainty that he had no problem shifting into a flicker of fear. ‘What do you mean?’

‘I have the curious sensation that you’re shooting mental bullets at me all the time. I’d like you to tell me why.’

For a moment her face went totally blank, as though a switch had been thrown and defensive shutters had instantly clicked into place. He watched her labouring to construct an apologetic expression—a sheer act of will, against her natural grain. Her eyes took on a pleading look, begging his forgiveness. Her mouth softened into an appealing little smile. She spoke in a tone that mocked herself.

‘I’ve just had to deal with some trouble in the catering tent and it may cause more trouble. I’m sorry if I’ve channelled my own angst onto you, Mr Cartwright. I didn’t mean to attract your attention. In fact, you’ll be doing me a great favour if you’ll walk away from me right now. My boss won’t like it if she sees you talking to me.’

‘Surely as a guest I’m entitled to speak to whomever I like,’ he argued.

‘I’m not a guest and I’m taking up your time—time Miss Twiggley would prefer you to spend with her,’ she said pointedly.

‘I’ve said all I intend to say to Lynda Twiggley.’

‘That’s not my business. If I don’t stay clear of you, my job might very well be at risk. So please excuse me, Mr Cartwright.’

‘Be damned if I will!’ Frustration fumed through him. His hand snaked out and grabbed her arm as she turned away to escape him again. ‘This isn’t the Dark Ages!’ he shot out before she could voice a protest.

‘Oh, yes, it is!’ she retorted with blistering scorn, the defence system cracking wide open at being forcibly held. Wild hostility poured into wild accusation. ‘You’re acting like a feudal lord manhandling a servant girl who can’t fight back.’

The image was wrong. She could fight back. She was doing it with all her mental might. But for once in his life Ethan wanted to be a feudal lord, having his way with this woman. He knew he should release her yet his mind had lost all sense of civilised behaviour. Imposing this physical link with her was arousing a host of primitive feelings that demanded satisfaction.

‘You’re denying me the assistance I asked for,’ he argued.

‘With good reason,’ she hotly returned.

‘Nonsense! It’s totally unreasonable!’

‘What is the matter with you?’ she cried in exasperation. ‘Why bother with me when—?’

‘Because you bother me more than anyone here.’

‘What? Because I’m not seeking your attention? Are you so used to women hanging on your every word, your high and mighty ego is pricked by one who doesn’t?’

‘You did want my attention, Daisy Donahue,’ he slung back at her in burning certainty. ‘You were looking at me.’

She tried to explain it away, biting out the words with icy precision. ‘The model you were talking to had complained about coffee not having been served. I had intended to inform her it was on its way when I saw you with her.’ Her teeth were bared in a savagely mocking smile. ‘Mindful of my boss’s instructions and contrary to your arrogant assumption, I didn’t want to draw any more attention from you, Mr Cartwright.’

Ethan was not convinced. It wasn’t dismissal he’d felt coming from her. It had been a powerful bolt of passion aimed directly at him. It was still hitting him. His whole body was energised by it. His eyes derided her evasion of the truth as he attacked her reading of his character.

‘You can stick me with ego and arrogance as much as you like, but there’s more going on in your head than you’re telling me, and it has nothing to do with Lynda Twiggley’s instructions.’

‘What I think is my business,’ she whipped back.

‘Not when it involves me.’

Impasse.

She glared at him, the wheels of her mind going round and round in a fierce search for an exit line he might accept.

He wanted to drag her into his embrace and kiss her until all her resistance melted. Never had he been so aroused by a woman. For the first time in his life he was in total tune with the cavemen of old who simply hauled off the object of their desire and took their pleasure at will. Was it her hostility that excited him? Had he grown too bored with women who were only too eager in their compliance?

Intensity…the word leapt into his mind. That was what had been lacking in all his other connections with women. Daisy Donahue was transmitting it, hitting the same chord in him. Normally he channelled it into his work. It wasn’t a social asset. Intensity disturbed people. Too dark, Mickey said. But there was a dark side to Daisy Donahue, too, setting off a weird wave of exhilaration through his bloodstream. And a compulsion to explore it.

She dragged in a deep breath and tore her gaze from his, dropping it pointedly to the hand still grasping her arm. He softened his grip, rubbing his thumb along the underside of her wrist, finding the beat of her pulse, exulting in its rapid drumming.

She was excited, too.

Or was it fear?

‘I’m sorry I bothered you, Mr Cartwright,’ she said in a stilted little voice. Her beautifully feminine breasts lifted as she filled her lungs again. Her eyes met his in a plea that held a vulnerability he hadn’t seen before in her. ‘Please let me go.’

It made him feel like a cad for holding her against her will, yet he couldn’t bring himself to let her go. ‘You said we have nothing in common. I think we do, Daisy Donahue.’

She shook her head, agitation flickering into definite fear as she was distracted by something behind him.

‘Ah, Dee-Dee,’ came the smarmy voice of Lynda Twiggley who was obviously about to insinuate herself into the situation.

‘Miss Twiggley,’ she said in a shaky subservient tone as the woman stepped forward to part them.

It enfuriated Ethan that Daisy should feel it necessary to kowtow to her snaky employer. She was a natural-born fighter. It was wrong for her to be in this position.

‘Catering needs a prompt to get the coffee moving.’

It was a dismissive command.

Daisy tried to pull her arm free, anxious to avoid any more displeasure being heaped on her head.

Ethan tightened his grip, determined on keeping her with him.

‘Daisy has already done that,’ he coldly told the Twiggley who turned an ingratiating smile to him.

‘Then she can do it again,’ was the unbending reply.

Unreasonable, demanding bitch!

Ethan lost his cool. ‘Miss Twiggley…’ grated out from between gnashing teeth.

She fluttered her exquisitely painted fingernails and her false eyelashes at him. ‘Oh, do make it Lynda, please…’

It revolted him. Words shot out of his mouth in a stream of searing contempt without any thought to their consequences.

‘I think it’s time you stopped treating your PA like a slave who doesn’t warrant any consideration or courtesy.’

Her mouth gaped open in shock.

He felt a shudder run up Daisy’s arm.

The ensuing silence was impregnated with the hairprickling sense that a bomb had just gone off. Ethan revelled in its intensity. He was so off his coolly analytical brain—no number-crunching going on at all—he was actually looking forward to the fall-out.

CHAPTER THREE

DAISY’S mind was reeling. Her heart was galloping faster than any racehorse. Any second now her boss was going to throw a major tantrum and she’d bear the brunt of it. Ethan Cartwright was too important a person to cop the whiplash from his strike on her behalf.

Why had he done it?

Why, why, why…?

Even if he’d meant well, he should have known it would rebound on her. He just hadn’t cared. It wasn’t going to affect his life. He was an untouchable. Anger at not getting his own way with her had spilled over onto Lynda Twiggley. Never mind that Daisy was the one who would pay for it—the selfish, arrogant pig! She’d explained the situation to him, begged him to let her go, and what he’d done was put her job at risk—the job she had to keep or see her parents’ home go down the bankruptcy drain.

Panic ripped through her stomach as her boss started puffing herself up to let fly her ferocious temper. Mean blue eyes cut her to ribbons. The attack had the cyclonic force of a fireball.

‘How dare you complain about how I treat you, you ungrateful little cow!’

‘I didn’t! I swear I didn’t!’ Daisy babbled.

‘I speak from my own observation,’ Ethan Cartwright sliced in.

It didn’t improve the situation. It made it a thousand times worse. Being subjected to such personal criticism from him was so offensive, Lynda turned to him in a towering rage, probably thinking her bid to have him fix her financial affairs had been sabotaged and Daisy knew she was going to be blamed for it, regardless of anything Ethan Cartwright said.

‘I pay her very well to do what I tell her. There’s nothing slavish about that, I assure you,’ she hissed at him, steam pouring from her.

‘I take exception to you telling her to stay away from me,’ he shot back. ‘That’s not work. It’s—’

Lynda exploded into a tirade at Daisy, cutting Ethan Cartwright off in mid-speech. ‘You stupid, stupid girl! Have you no sense of discretion, no brain in your head? Might I remind you that you signed a confidentiality clause in your contract with me. Which you’ve just broken in the worst possible way with your stupid, wagging tongue.’

She had committed the indiscretion.

It was impossible to defend herself.

What could she say…that Ethan Cartwright’s persistence had goaded her into it? No way would that be an acceptable excuse. She had not put her boss’s interests first. The chaotic effect he had on her had overwhelmed her usual grasp of what was permissible.

Daisy stood in appalled silence, quaking inside as the storm broke over her, her heart sinking as she realised there was no hope of this being forgiven or forgotten.

The inevitable lightning struck.

‘You’re fired! As of now!’

She felt the blood draining from her face.

The thunder rolled on. ‘And don’t come back to the office. I’ll have your personal things parcelled up and sent home. Untrustworthy blabbermouth!’

Lynda Twiggley’s last look of furious disgust barely penetrated the dizziness flooding through Daisy’s head. Like some fade-out on a television screen, the back of her ex-employer disintegrated into dots.

Ethan caught her as she started to fall, scooping her into a tight embrace. It was where he’d wanted Daisy Donahue but not limp and unconscious. He had to get her firing on all cylinders again. With a quick stoop to hook an arm under her knees, he lifted her off her feet, cradling her across his chest.

A chair was needed—set her down, lower her head to get some blood back in it, a glass of water…that was what common sense said, yet as he started carrying her towards one, he was riven by the strong temptation to keep right on going, out of the marquee, into a limousine and off to his cave. He’d caught his woman. She felt good in his arms. He wanted her out of this jungle of people and completely to himself.

Problem was she’d probably come to before he got her to the limousine. How long did a faint last? And she’d undoubtedly throw a scene at the hotel before he could take her to his suite.

No, it was a mad idea.

A sheikh might get away with it.

Or a buccaneer of old who was captain of his own ship.

Not Ethan Cartwright in this modern world of political correctness. He would have to answer for his actions.

Nevertheless, he was almost at the exit to the marquee when Mickey caught up with him. ‘Hey, Ethan. You doing a runner with the girl?’

It stopped him. He turned to his friend whose face was alight with fascinated curiosity. ‘She fainted. I have to get her to a chair.’

‘You’ve passed a whole bunch of them.’

‘Distracted,’ Ethan muttered. He hadn’t been aware of anything except the woman in his arms—the feelings she generated in him.

‘Over here,’ Mickey directed, steering him towards one as Daisy stirred in his arms, her lovely full breasts swelling against the wall of his chest as she gulped in air.

Ethan told himself his brain needed a blast of oxygen, too. As much as he wanted to hang onto Daisy Donahue she was going to rip into him the moment she had regained her wits. He’d be enemy number one for causing her to lose her job, regardless of whether or not it had been a good position for a person like her to have. And freeing her from it so she could be with him was not an argument she was about to appreciate. Somehow he would have to make her see him as her saviour instead of the black dog of disaster.

Daisy struggled to regain her strength and her wits. Never in her whole life had she fainted and to have Ethan Cartwright take advantage of this momentary weakness, manhandling her even more than before, was the absolute pits. At least she wasn’t being carried by him any more. He’d put her on a chair and was sitting beside her. Despite the fact that he’d shoved her head down to her knees, it was still swimming, and he had his arm around her in support, which she probably needed, though she hated needing anything from him. He’d just destroyed the lifeline to keeping her parents in their home.

‘Fetch her a glass of water, will you, Mickey?’

His voice upset her even further, loaded with concern. After the event. No concern when it really mattered.

‘Sure. And here’s her hat. It dropped off on the way.’

Total indignity on top of everything else!

By the time the glass of water came, she was steady enough to lift her head and sip it. ‘Thanks,’ she muttered to the man who’d brought it—Mickey Bourke, another A-list bachelor with no worries about where his next dollar was coming from.

‘I’ll look after her now,’ Ethan Cartwright said, dismissing his friend.

‘Right!’ Mickey Bourke grinned at him. ‘Nothing like seizing the day! Go for it, man!’