Lessons in Rule-Breaking

Jess swallowed, trying to loosen up her throat, which was tight with tension. Shaking her nerves off before they took too firm a hold, she reminded herself that she was here to work, and that was what she was damn well going to do.

‘H-hello. This place is beautiful,’ she managed to stutter out, cursing the shake in her voice. She was having immense trouble keeping her gaze on his face and not allowing it to drop to the incredible physique of his chest.

‘It’s a friend’s holiday home. Pretty impressive, huh?’

‘Yup. Impressive.’ It seemed she was totally out of intelligent conversation. Not a great start for someone who was supposed to be a wordsmith for a living.

‘I’m heading back up to the villa for tea and cake. Rosa makes the best summer panettone. Come and join me.’ It wasn’t a question and she bristled a little at his bossy tone.

‘I’m not hungry. I had a late lunch.’

He gave her a slow, sexually laden smile that made her stomach swoop alarmingly. ‘Well, I’m hungry.’

The gentle breeze caught her hair and blew it across her suddenly incredibly hot face. Before she could react, he took a step towards her, lifted his hand and slid his long fingers against her cheek, then tucked the rogue curl of hair behind her ear. It was such an intimate thing to do she was utterly lost for words, and, instead of speaking, she found herself staring at his mouth, totally transfixed by the fullness of his lips as they parted slightly, revealing his perfect white teeth. The heat of his almost naked body bled into her skin and she took a deep, calming breath in, only to draw the musky fragrance of his skin into her nostrils, sending her senses spinning out of control.

Every bit of her body felt energised and tingly—the anticipation of what could happen if he just leant forward a couple of inches burning like wildfire in her chest. Was he going to...?

Kiss me.

She wasn’t sure for a second whether she’d said it out loud and she skimmed her gaze up to look into his eyes, hoping desperately it had only been an errant voice in her head.

His gaze flicked between her eyes, the bright aqua of his irises captivating her with their other-worldliness.

What the hell was going on here? A nervy panic rose inside her, causing a wave of jittery heat to rush up her neck. She couldn’t handle this. Not here, in broad daylight, totally unprepared for what might happen if he kept on looking at her like that.

Xander must have sensed her panic because he took a step away from her, giving her the space and air she suddenly craved.

‘You okay, Jess?’ he said, bemused concern clear in his voice.

‘Fine. I’m fine,’ she managed to gasp, forcing a smile onto her face. ‘Just a bit hot in the sun.’ She flapped a hand in front of her face in a pathetic attempt to cool herself down. ‘I have to go and check in to my hotel but I wanted to let you know I’d arrived. I’d like to make a plan for starting the interview so we can get started as soon as possible.’ She kept her voice clipped and businesslike, trying like mad to pull back the professional persona she’d been so keen to promote.

‘How very diligent of you. Well, to be honest, I’m not in the mood for spilling my deepest, darkest secrets right now.’ He took a step closer to her and dipped his head, his gaze capturing hers as something dangerous flashed in his eyes. ‘I’d like to get to know you a bit more intimately first.’

‘I’m not going to sleep with you,’ she blurted out before she could stop herself, her nerves riding roughshod over her common sense.

He laughed out loud, shaking his head in mirth.

Jess just stood there dumbly, flushing hot with embarrassment.

What an idiot she was. Of course he wasn’t talking about sleeping with her. She very clearly wasn’t his type if the media reports of his affairs were anything to go by. From what she’d seen in the press—and at his studio—he was more of a leggy-blonde type of guy.

And that suited her just fine. Absolutely fine. Couldn’t be finer.

‘Don’t worry, I’m taking a break from seducing innocent young journalists, so your virtue is safe with me,’ he joked, his mouth quirked in a playful smile. ‘I am interested in your body, Jess, but only on an artistic level.’

Jess pulled her arms across her chest. ‘You can’t blame me for being wary when you make provocative-sounding statements like that. You do have a reputation for being a bit...’

‘A bit what?’

She paused, searching for the right word. ‘Wild.’

He gave her a bemused grin. ‘I promise to be on my best behaviour,’ he said, making a crossing motion over his heart. ‘And if I slip up you have my permission to lick me into shape.’

Oh, my God, the images he’d just conjured in her mind.

She really needed to get out of here before she totally lost her cool.

‘Come over for dinner tonight at eight,’ he continued, going over to a rock where he’d left his towel and swiping it along his long, lean arms, ‘and we can get better acquainted.’

He flashed her one last beguiling smile before turning and walking away up the path, the bright drops of lake water that still clung to his broad back shimmering in the sunlight.

An overwhelming urge to pack up and go home, where she didn’t have to deal with these weird and disturbing feelings he provoked in her, besieged her. But she wasn’t going to leave. She was determined to keep her job at the magazine, no matter what it took. She was going to brazen it out here and ignore the blatant innuendos he seemed so keen to tease her into a jittery mess with.

He was a player all right, but she wasn’t about to let him play her.

* * *

In total contrast to the villa where Xander was staying, her hotel was the most run-down, sleazy-looking pit Jess had ever had the misfortune to set eyes on. She could have sworn she saw a rat run around the corner of the building as she parked her hire car in the tiny, litter-strewn parking lot. The thought of it made her shudder. She wasn’t good with rodents. Or spiders. Or any type of insect if she was totally honest.

It looked as if they were doing building works on the place, too, judging by the mess of rubble and steel piled haphazardly against the peeling walls of the hotel, but there didn’t seem to be anyone doing any actual work out there. Jess prayed she wasn’t going to be woken up in the early hours by workmen banging the hell out of the wall next to her head.

A disgruntled receptionist with long, lank hair and a sweat-stained blouse checked her in and handed over her key, motioning her to walk through the rather run-down reception to a door on the ground floor, next to what appeared to be a kitchen.

The Ritz it was not.

Her room wasn’t in a much better state than the reception, but at least it had a decent-sized bed and its own en-suite bathroom—even if she did have to turn sideways when in it to get the door closed.

Okay, well, it was all she needed. She was only going to put up with it for two nights. Surely it wouldn’t take longer than that to get enough info to write a decent piece on Xander?

Kicking off her shoes, she flopped down onto the bed, ignoring the unnerving sway of the bed frame, and pulled her mobile out of her back pocket. Time to do some more research on the man himself.

She’d already had a cursory look through the search engines for his name, but not much of any use had come up, mostly gossip pieces about the women he’d dated and the parties he’d made a scene at. In fact he seemed to have been in a constant state of drunken debauchery for an entire year. There were a handful of articles about his last couple of exhibitions as she trawled lower, though, the last of which had been a bit of a critical flop, as Pam had mentioned.

She wondered how his colossal ego had dealt with that. Judging by the press reports on him between now and then, not very well. He’d become belligerent and withdrawn with the press and, instead of producing more work to shut his critics up, he’d thrown himself into partying and womanising instead. In fact he didn’t seem to have produced a single thing since that exhibition.

Interesting.

It was a soothing distraction focusing on work after the nerve-jangling meeting with Xander and her eyelids grew heavy as she relaxed into the soft mattress. Perhaps she could get forty winks in now to power herself up before having dinner with Xander tonight? She wanted to be at her sharpest when she faced him again. She had a sneaking suspicion he was deliberately trying to unsettle her so he could avoid having to answer any of her probing questions.

If he thought it was going to be that easy to get around her he had another think coming.

A loud scuttling sound—which seemed to be emanating from under the bed—made her sit bolt upright in alarm.

What the hell was that?

Out of the corner of her eye she thought she saw something dart from under the bed and disappear behind the vanity unit on the other side of the room.

Goosebumps pricked her skin as all the hairs on her body stood up as one in disgust. Ugh! Bugs! Quite possibly cockroaches.

Her spirits sank to the floor. How was she supposed to sleep with large indeterminate creatures running around under her bed?

Taking care not to step on any of the little blighters, she dashed out of the room and back over to the reception and tried to persuade the woman to move her into a different room.

Denied.

It appeared—incredibly—that the hotel was fully booked.

Jess sighed and went back to her room, feeling frustrated and discombobulated. She couldn’t afford to move out of this hovel—her savings wouldn’t stand it—and she wasn’t about to leave, not when the fate of her career was in the balance.

She was just going to have to grit her teeth and suck it up.

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