Tycoon's Forbidden Cinderella

He came into the sitting room and Audrey’s heart kept time with the tread of his feet on the creaky floorboards.

Step-creak-boom-step-creak-boom-step-creak-boom.

‘Harlan?’ Lucien’s deep baritone never failed to make her spine tingle. ‘Sibella?’

Audrey knew it was too late to step out from her hiding place. She could only hope he would leave before he discovered her. How long was he going to take? Surely he could see no one had been here for months... Yikes. She forgot she had been laying a fire. Her breathing rate accelerated, her pulse pounding as loud as the thunder booming outside. She’d been about to strike the match when the power had gone off and it was now lying along with the box it came from on the floor in front of the fireplace.

Would he see it?

Another floorboard creaked and Audrey held her breath. But then her nose began to twitch from the dust clinging to the curtain. There was one thing she did not have and that was a ladylike sneeze. Her sneezes registered on the Richter scale. Her sneezes could trigger an earthquake in Ecuador. Her sneezes had been known to cause savage guard dogs to yelp and small babies to scream. She could feel it building, building, building... She pressed a finger under her nose as hard as she possibly could, her whole body trembling with the effort to keep the sinus explosion from happening.

A huge lightning flash suddenly zigzagged across the sky and an ear-splitting boom of thunder followed, making Audrey momentarily forget about controlling her sneeze. She clutched the curtain in shock, wondering if she’d been struck by lightning. Would she be found as a little pile of smoking ashes behind this curtain? But clutching the curtain brought the dusty fabric even closer to her nostrils and the urge to sneeze became unbearable.

‘Ah... Ah... Choo!’

It was like a bomb going off, propelling her forwards, still partially wrapped in the curtain, bringing the rail down with a clatter.

Even from under the dense and mummy-like shroud, Audrey heard Lucien’s short, sharp expletive. Then his hands pulled at the curtain, finally uncovering her dishevelled form. ‘What the hell?’

‘Hi...’ She sat up and gave him a fingertip wave.

He frowned at her. ‘You?’

‘Yep, me.’ Audrey scrambled to her feet with haste not grace, wishing she’d worn jeans instead of a dress. But jeans made her thighs look fat, she thought, so a dress it was. She smoothed down the cotton fabric over her thighs and then finger-combed her tousled hair. Was he comparing her with his glamorous girlfriend? No doubt Viviana could stumble out of a musty old curtain and still look perfect. Viviana probably had a tiny ladylike sneeze too. And Viviana probably looked amazing in jeans.

‘What are you doing here?’ His tone had that edge of disapproval that always annoyed her.

‘Looking for my mum and your dad.’

Lucien’s ink-black brows developed a mocking arch. ‘Behind the curtain?’

Audrey gave him a look that would have withered tumbleweed. ‘Funny, ha-ha. So what brings you here?’

He bundled up the curtain as if he needed something to do with his hands, his expression as brooding as the sky outside. ‘Like you, I’m looking for my father and your mother.’

‘Why did you think they’d come here?’

He put the roughly folded curtain over the back of the wing chair and then picked up the curtain rail, setting it to one side. ‘My father sent me a text, mentioning something about a quiet weekend in the country.’

‘Did his text say anything about daffodils?’

Lucien looked at her as if she’d mentioned fairies instead of flowers. ‘Daffodils?’

Audrey folded her arms across her middle. ‘Didn’t you notice them outside? This place is Wordsworth’s heaven.’

The corner of his mouth twitched into an almost-smile. But then his mouth went back to its firm and flat humourless line. ‘I think we’ve been led on a wild-goose chase—or a wild-daffodil chase.’

This time it was Audrey who was trying not to smile. Who knew he had a sense of humour under that stern schoolmastery thing he had going on? ‘I suppose you got the invitation to their wedding?’

His expression reminded her of someone not quite over a stomach bug. ‘You too?’

‘Me too.’ She let out a sigh. ‘I can’t bear to be a bridesmaid for my mother again. Her taste in bridesmaid dresses is nearly as bad as her taste in men.’

If he was annoyed by her veiled slight against his father he didn’t show it. ‘We need to stop them from making another stupid mistake before it’s too late.’

‘We?’

His dark blue gaze collided with hers. Was it even possible to have eyes that shade of sapphire? And why did he have to have such thick, long eyelashes when she had to resort to lashings of mascara? ‘Between us we must be able to narrow down the search. Where does your mother go when she wants to get away from the spotlight?’

Audrey rolled her eyes. ‘She never wants to get away from the spotlight. Not now. In the early days she did. But it looks like she hasn’t been here in months, possibly a year or more. Maybe even longer.’

Lucien ran a finger over the dusty surface of the nearest bookshelf, inspecting his fingertip like a forensics detective. He looked at her again. ‘Can you think of anywhere else they might go?’

‘Erm... Vegas?’

‘I don’t think so, not after the last time, remember?’

Audrey dearly wished she could forget. After her clumsy air kiss to Lucien—as if that hadn’t been bad enough—her mother and his father had been ridiculously drunk at the reception of their second wedding and had got into a playful food fight. Some of the guests joined in and before long the room was trashed and three people were taken to hospital and four others arrested over a scuffle that involved a bowl of margarita punch and an ice bucket.

The gossip magazines ran with it for days and the hotel venue banned Harlan and Sibella from ever going there again. The fact that Audrey’s mother had been the first to throw a profiterole meant that Lucien had always blamed Sibella and not his father. ‘You’re right. Not Vegas. Besides, they want us at the wedding to witness the ceremony. Not that the invitation mentioned where it was being held, just a date and venue to be advised.’

Lucien paced the floor, reminding her of a cougar in a cat carrier. ‘Think. Think. Think.’

Audrey wasn’t sure if he was speaking to her or to himself. The thing was, she found it difficult to think when he was around. His presence disturbed her too much. She couldn’t stop herself studying his brooding features. He was one of the most attractive men she’d ever seen—possibly the most.

Tall and broad-shouldered and with a jaw you could land a fighter jet on. His mouth always made her think of long, sense-drugging kisses. Not that she’d had many of those, and certainly none from him, but it didn’t stop her fantasising. He had thick, black, wavy hair that was neither long nor short but casually styled with the ends curling against his collar. He was clean-shaven but there was enough regrowth to make her wonder how it would feel to have that sexy stubble rub up against her softer skin.

Lucien stopped pacing and met her gaze and frowned. ‘What?’

Audrey blinked. ‘What?’

‘I asked first.’

She licked her lips, which felt as dry as the dust on the bookshelves. ‘I was just thinking. I always stare when I think.’

‘What are you thinking?’

How hot you look in those jeans and that close-fitting cashmere sweater.

Audrey knew she was blushing, for she could feel her cheeks roaring enough to make lighting a fire pointless. She could have warmed the whole of England with the radiant heat coming off her face. Possibly half of Europe. ‘I think the storm is getting worse.’

It was true. The lightning and thunder were much more intense and the rain had now turned into hail, landing like stones on the slate-tiled roof.

Lucien glanced out of the window and swore. ‘We’ll have to wait it out before we leave. It’s too dangerous to drive down that lane in this weather.’

Audrey folded her arms across her middle again and raised her chin. ‘I’m not leaving with you, so you can get that thought out of your head right now.’

His eyes took in her indomitable stance as if he were staring down at a small, recalcitrant child. ‘I want you with me when we finally track them down. We need to show them we are both vehemently against this marriage.’

No way was she going on a tandem search with him. ‘Were you listening?’ She planted her feet as if she were conducting a body language workshop for mules. ‘I said I’m not leaving. I’m going to stay the night and tidy this place up.’

‘With no power on?’

Audrey had forgotten about the power cut. But even if she had to rub two sticks together to make a fire she would do it rather than go anywhere with him. ‘I’ll be fine. The fire will be enough. I’m only staying the one night.’

He continued to look at her as if he thought a white van and a straitjacket might be useful right about now. ‘What about your thing with spiders?’

How like him to remind her of her embarrassing childhood phobia. But she had no reason to be ashamed these days. She’d taken control. Ridiculously expensive control. Twenty-eight sessions with a therapist that had cost more than her car. She would have done thirty sessions but she’d run out of money. Her income as a library archivist only went so far. ‘I’ve had therapy. I’m cool with spiders now. Spiders and me, we’re like that.’ She linked two of her fingers in a tight hug.

His expression looked as though he belonged as keynote speaker at a sceptics’ conference. ‘Really?’

‘Yes. Really. I’ve had hypnotherapy so I don’t get triggered when I see a spider. I can even say the word without breaking out in a sweat. I can look at pictures of them too. I even draw doodles of them.’

‘So if you turned and saw that big spider hanging from the picture rail you wouldn’t scream and throw yourself into my arms?’

Audrey tried to control the urge to turn around. She used every technique she’d been taught. She could cope with cobwebs. Sure, she could. They were pretty in a weird sort of way. Like lace...or something.

She was not going to have a totally embarrassing panic attack.

Not after all that therapy. She was going to smile at Incy-Wincy because that was what sensible people who weren’t scared spitless of spiders did, right?

Her heart rate skyrocketed. Breathe. Breathe. Breathe. Beads of sweat dripped between her shoulder blades as if she were leaking oil. Don’t panic. Don’t panic. Don’t panic. Her breathing stop-started as though a tormenting hand were gripping, then releasing her throat. Grip. Release. Grip. Release. Grip. Release.

What if the spider moved? What if this very second it was climbing down from the picture rail and was about to land on her head? Or scuttle down the back of her dress? Audrey shivered and took a step closer to Lucien, figuring it was a step further away from the spider even if it brought her closer to her arch-enemy Number One. ‘Y-you’re joking, right?’

‘Why don’t you turn around and see?’

Audrey didn’t want to turn around. Didn’t want to see the spider. She was quite happy looking at Lucien instead. Maybe her therapist should include ‘Looking at Lucien’ in her treatment plan. Diversionary therapy...or something.

This close she could smell his aftershave—a lemony and lime combo with an understory of something fresh and woodsy. It flirted with her senses, drugging them into a stupor like a bee exposed to exotic pollen. She could see the way his stubble was dotted around his mouth in little dark pinpricks. Her fingers itched to glide across the sexy rasp of his male flesh. She drew in a calming breath.

You’ve got this. You’ve spent a veritable fortune to get this.

She slowly turned around, and saw a spider dangling inches from her face.

A big one.

A ginormous one.

A genetically engineered one.

A throwback from the dinosaur age.

She gave a high-pitched yelp and turned into the rock-hard wall of Lucien’s chest, wrapping her arms around his waist and burying her face in the cashmere of his sweater. She danced up and down on her toes to shake off the sensation of sticky spider feet climbing up her legs. ‘Get rid of it!’

Lucien’s hands settled on her upper arms, his fingers almost overlapping. ‘It won’t hurt you. It’s probably more frightened of you.’

She huddled closer, squeezing her eyes shut, shuddering all over. ‘I don’t care if it’s frightened of me. Tell it to get some therapy.’

She felt the rumble of his laughter against her cheek and glanced up to see a smile stretching his mouth. ‘Oh. My. God,’ she said as if witnessing a life-changing phenomenon. ‘You smiled. You actually smiled.’

His smile became lopsided, making his eyes gleam in a way she had never witnessed before. Then his gaze went to her mouth as if pulled there by a force he had no control over. She could feel the weight of his eyes on her mouth. She was as close to him as she had been to any man. Closer. Closer than she had been to him at the last wedding reception. Her entire body tingled as if tuning in to a new radar signal. Her flesh contracting, all her nerves on high alert. She could feel the gentle pressure from each of his fingers against her arms, warm and sensual.

His fingers tensed for a moment, but then he dragged his gaze away from her mouth and unwrapped her arms from his waist as if she had scorched him. ‘I’ll take care of the spider. Wait in the kitchen.’

Audrey sucked in her lower lip. ‘You’re not going to kill it...are you?’

‘That was the general idea,’ he said. ‘What else do you want me to do? Take it home with me and handfeed it flies?’

She stole a glance at the spider and fought back a shudder. ‘It’s probably got babies. It seems cruel to kill it.’

He shook his head as if he was having a bad dream. ‘Okay. So I humanely remove the spider.’ He picked up an old greetings card off the bookshelf and a glass tumbler from the drinks cabinet. He glanced at her. ‘You sure you want to watch?’

Audrey rubbed at the creepy-crawly sensation running along her arms. ‘It’ll be good for me. Exposure therapy.’

‘Ri-i-ight.’ Lucien shrugged and approached the spider with the glass and the card.

Audrey covered her face with her hands but then peeped through the gaps in her splayed fingers. There was only so much exposure she would deal with at any one time.

Lucien slipped the card beneath the spider and then placed the glass over it. ‘Voila. One captured spider. Alive.’ He walked to the front door of the cottage and then, dashing through the pelting rain, placed the spider under the shelter of the garden shed a small distance away.

He came back, sidestepping puddles and keeping his head down against the driving rain. Audrey grabbed a towel from the downstairs bathroom and handed it to him. He rubbed it roughly over his hair.

She was insanely jealous of the towel. She had towel envy. Who knew such a thing existed? She wanted to run her fingers through that thick, dark, damp hair. She wanted to run her hands across his scalp and pull his head down so his mouth could cover hers. She wanted to see if his firm mouth would soften against hers or grow hard and insistent with passion.

She wanted. Wanted. Wanted the one thing she wasn’t supposed to want.

Lucien scrunched up the towel in one hand and pushed back his hair with the other. ‘This storm looks like it’s not going to end anytime soon.’

Just like the storm of need in her body.

What was it about Lucien that made her feel so turned on? No other man triggered this crazy out-of-character reaction in her. She didn’t fantasise about other men. She didn’t stare at them and wonder what it would be like to kiss them. She didn’t ache to feel their hands on her body. But Lucien Fox had always made her feel this way. It was the bane of her life that he was the only man she was attracted to. She couldn’t walk past him without wanting to touch him. She couldn’t be in the same room—the same country—without wanting him.

What was wrong with her?

She didn’t even like him as a person. He was too formal and stiff. He rarely smiled. He thought she was silly and irresponsible like her mother. Not that her two tipsy episodes had helped in that regard, but still. She had always hated her mother’s weddings ever since she’d gone to the first one as a four-year-old.

By the time Sibella married Lucien’s father for the first time, Audrey was eighteen. A couple of glasses of champagne—well, it might have been three or four, but she couldn’t remember—had helped her cope reasonably well with the torture of watching her mother marry yet another unsuitable man. Audrey would be the one to pick up the pieces when it all came to a messy and excruciatingly public end.

Why couldn’t she get through a simple wedding reception or two or three without lusting over Lucien?

Another boom of thunder sounded so close by it made the whole cottage shudder. Audrey winced. ‘Gosh. That was close.’

Lucien looked down at her. ‘You’re not scared of storms?’

‘No. I love them. I particularly love watching them down here, coming across the fields.’

He twitched one of the curtains aside. ‘Where did you park your car? I didn’t see it when I drove in.’

‘Under the biggest oak tree,’ Audrey said. ‘I didn’t want it to be easy to see in case the press followed me.’

‘Did you see anyone following you?’

‘No, but there were recent tyre tracks on the driveway—I thought they were Mum and Harlan’s.’

‘The caretaker’s, perhaps?’

Audrey lifted her eyebrows. ‘Does this place look like it’s been taken care of recently?’

‘Good point.’

Another flash of lightning split the sky, closely followed by a boom of thunder and then the unmistakable sound of a tree crashing down and limbs and branches splintering on metal.

‘Which tree did you say you parked under?’ Lucien asked.

Audrey’s stomach lurched like a limousine on loose gravel. ‘No. No. No. Noooooo!’

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