The Wealthy Man's Waitress
Maggie Cox
Piers Redfield, billionaire businessman, is the ultimate predator — in the boardroom and the bedroom — and he's way out of Emma's league.But when Emma bravely stands up for a friend, Piers knows he has to have the feisty brunette. He'll sweep her off to Paris and give the young waitress a weekend she'll remember forever. However, Emma is not just a woman for a weekend.And soon Piers finds his desire for her is beyond his control.
The Wealthy Man’s Waitress
Maggie Cox
To Bob and Simone.
I am indebted to you both for love, healing and
the great gift of your friendship.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CHAPTER TWELVE
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
COMING NEXT MONTH
CHAPTER ONE
THERE was just a door between Emma Jane Robards and her current goal. Only it wasn’t just any old common or garden door. No: this one was sleek and forbidding, made out of the finest grained walnut, with a sign in perfectly formed gold lettering that seemed to haughtily announce the name of its occupant like a VIP at a banquet. Piers Redfield. Even the name seemed imbued with importance.
‘Don’t bother trying to arrange an appointment to see him,’ Lawrence had advised. ‘He employs an army of staff to keep out the riff-raff. No offence.’ He’d smiled apologetically and Emma’s stomach had churned a little queasily. What on earth was she letting herself in for, sneaking around trying to get into some corporate wizard’s protected enclave as if she was some kind of amateur spy or something? And why, oh, why had she allowed Lawrence to even persuade her to consider it?
Because he needed her help, Emma reminded herself with renewed determination, and that was why she was willing to risk being thrown out into the street by Security or—worse—being driven off in a police car. Doggedly tilting her chin to shake off her fear, she rapped her knuckles smartly against the imposing walnut, frankly stunned that she had managed to get as far as the great man’s door without being stopped. But today, for once, luck seemed to be on her side.
‘Come!’
Into the lion’s den… Her thoughts racing, Emma twisted the brass doorknob and swept into the inner sanctum so appropriately guarded by that imposing door, then came to a nervous standstill almost as soon as her feet crossed the threshold. She hadn’t expected the room to be quite so huge or awe-inspiring but, with its panoramic windows and endless sea of forest-green carpet, it was. And those beautiful paintings on the walls weren’t prints either. They had to be the real thing—even Emma’s untrained eye could see that. But more than her intimidating surroundings, or the pervading aura of wealth that hung like exclusive perfume on the air, what commanded her attention the most was the immaculately attired glowering male sitting behind a stylish desk so huge it wouldn’t have looked out of place accommodating a small dinner party. Piers Redfield himself.
‘Who the hell are you?’
Emma’s feet wanted to run, but sheer strength of will made them stay right where they were. Now she’d come this far, she wasn’t about to bolt like some frightened rabbit just because he was the head of a hugely successful corporation, a multimillionaire if Lawrence was to be believed, and she a mere waitress in her friend’s bistro. He had a lifestyle about a million miles away from her own and probably wouldn’t give her the time of day if their paths should ever cross in the normal course of events, but even so, Emma told herself, she had to seize the moment and not be scared. Though in the normal course of events their paths would never cross—probably not even in her wildest dreams. Lawrence hadn’t exaggerated. Piers Redfield looked as if he could put the fear of God into just about anyone.
‘Are you going to answer me or do I get Security to come and throw you out?’ His bellow bounced off the walls and Emma gripped the black leather briefcase she’d brought with her to help her look as if she was meant to be in the building and prayed hard that her bravado would hold out.
‘I’m Emma. I’m a friend of Lawrence.’
‘Lawrence?’ Dark blond brows came together over penetrating blue eyes the seductive hue of an azure sky over the French Riviera. Staring into them, even from this distance, Emma almost forgot the reason she’d come. Unlocking her hand from its death grip on the briefcase handle, she wondered if it was normal for a heart to beat so deafeningly loud, or for fear to grip her courage by the throat and strangle it into oblivion.
‘Your son.’
‘I know perfectly well he’s my son, but that still doesn’t explain your presence here. And, while we’re on the subject, how did you get past Reception and my assistant without being seen?’
‘They’re out front watching the Lord Mayor’s Show. And I suppose there aren’t many people here on a Saturday morning.’ When Emma had emerged from the tube station to find herself swept up in the crowd of people thronging the streets, she had prayed with all her might that the occupants of the office buildings lining the route would be distracted by the procession. She’d hardly been able to believe it when she’d found that to be the case. It was a miracle but she had been able to whip past the temporarily empty security desk downstairs as easily as a magician’s assistant. Now you see me, now you don’t.
‘Is that on today?’
Without waiting for Emma’s confirmation, Piers pushed back his chair and strode over to the window. The way he carried himself was compelling, Emma mused silently, and she couldn’t recall ever being fascinated by the way a man moved before. There was a strength and grace about him that put her in mind of an athlete. He probably worked hard to keep himself in prime physical condition. But right then she wished she wouldn’t notice such distracting things. There was a very good reason why she was here, and she wasn’t going to be put off by Piers Redfield’s intimidating good looks, or the fact that wealth and power were obviously second nature to the man. His whole personality radiated those very considerable attributes, and Emma had been amply forewarned by Lawrence that he was a tricky customer not averse to using his extremely potent assets to bend the will of even the most steadfast individual. Well, he wasn’t going to get the chance to bend her will. As far as Lawrence was concerned, Emma was a woman on a mission.
‘You won’t see much from there. You’re too high up.’ Her comment could just as soon have been meant metaphorically. His status certainly put him on a pedestal way above her.
‘So much for security. Now, what’s this all about? Did Lawrence send you? Who are you—one of his girlfriends?’
One of his girlfriends. The insult was a poisoned barb, clearly meant to sting. Beneath the fitted cerise jacket that she’d reluctantly donned for the occasion over a mid-length black skirt, Emma’s shoulders stiffened. ‘I like to think I mean a little bit more to him than that.’ As soon as the words were out she wished she could take them back. Now Piers’s lips—those perfectly moulded, sensuous-looking lips—were quirking, as if he’d got her measure, and that was the last thing she wanted him to have. The man was already weighed down with enough advantages.
‘He didn’t tell me he was seeing anyone special.’ He was leaning back against his desk, his eyes glimmering with suddenly interested speculation.
‘Why should he when you don’t even return his phone calls?’ The accusation was out before she could check it and once again Emma had cause to regret her impulsive nature. Especially when Piers threw back his head and laughed as though it was the best joke he’d heard in ages.
‘Poor hard-done-by Lawrence. Is that the tack you’re going to employ? OK, then, let’s cut to the chase. I take it you’ve come to petition me for some money on his behalf?’
‘No, of course not! I mean—I mean, I just wanted to talk to you about all the sacrifices he’s made lately to finance his new career. To—to demonstrate to you that he’s finally found the thing that inspires him most. He told me you always put him down. Won’t even give him a chance. Everybody deserves a chance, Mr Redfield. Didn’t somebody help you at the start of your famous career?’
Hard work, resilience and the ability to make tough decisions without wavering had taken him to the top, Piers mused passionately. Not a leg up from his father. Now, as he considered the rather arresting brunette in front of him, with her pouty coral lips, honey-brown eyes and the cute little beauty spot just above her left cheek, he could only think it typical that she’d been led to believe that he was the storybook hard-hearted father and Lawrence the poor, misunderstood, rejected son. If he’d been in the mood he could have illuminated her misconceptions with a few unpalatable facts about that poor, misunderstood, rejected son, but Piers didn’t see the point when her mind was so obviously already made up.
Glancing down at the Rolex encircling his tanned wrist, he briefly noted the time, then looked pointedly at the young woman in front of him.
‘You said sacrifices? What ‘‘sacrifices’’ has my son made lately to finance his new career that I should know about? And, by the way, you’ve got precisely three minutes before I have to go and chair a board meeting.’
‘Well…’ Clearing her throat, Emma wished she had a glass of water to hand. It wasn’t easy to articulate her concerns about Lawrence when her mouth felt as dry as sun-bleached bones. Only now it started to hit her how stupidly presumptuous she’d been in waltzing into the building and infiltrating this man’s protected enclave as if she had every right. He was Piers Redfield, for goodness’ sake! The role model for aspiring corporate geniuses everywhere, according to his son. Head of one of the premier management consultancies in the country, with a worldwide reputation to match. And not only was his business acumen admired by the great and the good, but he was also awesomely attractive, a fact that Emma hadn’t really been prepared for. The man had so much class it practically oozed from his pores, she reflected a little resentfully, reluctantly admiring the beautiful cut of his tasteful dark grey pinstripe suit.
‘He sold his car and his motorbike to raise some capital, and they were both his pride and joy, but it’s still not enough for him to start up in Cornwall. He’ll also need to pay rent on a place as well as buy food. It’s going to take a while before the business takes off, but you mark my words, Mr Redfield, it will! Have you any idea how talented your son is?’
‘I know exactly what kind of talents my son is endowed with, Miss…?’
‘Robards.’
‘Miss Robards. But somehow I don’t think they’re the same ones that you’re so keen to endorse. And, for what it’s worth, setting up a pottery in an already overcrowded market in the middle of St Ives is not my idea of a viable venture. If you want my opinion, and I’m sure you don’t…’ The piercing blue eyes frosted over as they swept over her flushed features, causing Emma to bite apprehensively down on her lip. ‘…it’s just another excuse for Lawrence to swan around abdicating all responsibility for his own welfare at my expense. I’ve given him money more times than I care to mention to finance any number of madcap schemes, and he squandered his mother’s legacy in less than a year. I’m afraid as far as I’m concerned he’s more than had his quota of help from me. Shame you had a wasted journey, Miss Robards.’ And with that Piers walked around his desk and picked up the phone.
Emma could hardly believe he was dismissing her so easily, so coldly, and without consideration. It was his son she’d come to talk about, not some stranger who wasn’t anything to do with him! She’d never had a man cry in her arms before, but last night Lawrence had. He’d broken down and poured out all his heartbreak—his lonely, unloved childhood, the death of his poor unhappy mother, driven to numerous affairs during her marriage to Piers because of his addiction to work and making money, and his father’s coldness to him whenever he asked for his help. No wonder he hadn’t got into university, he’d told her with wounded eyes. No wonder he’d drifted ever since. He was a lost soul and Emma was only too glad to help him in whatever way she could. She might have started out as just the girl who occupied the flat downstairs, but they’d quickly become friends and she’d often fed him when he’d run out of money for food and his cupboards were bare. The least his cold, imperious father could do was hear her out on his behalf!
‘Mr Redfield.’ Piers glanced up in surprise as Emma crossed the room to the edge of his desk and laid her hand across his where it rested on the receiver. Her skin was exquisitely soft, like the dewy petals of a rose, and he had to curb his surprise at the effect it had on him. A sensual little charge of electricity ran up his arm at her touch and created a nicely warm heat haze in his groin. Time seemed to stand still as all Piers’s senses were drowned in the sheer eroticism of the moment. Then, giving himself a mental shake, he moved his gaze to her face and was gratified to see her blush, amused when she quickly withdrew her hand as if he might have something contagious. Was she for real? That becoming colour flooding her cheeks certainly couldn’t be faked. He might not admire Lawrence for much, but he could certainly admire his taste in this particular woman. She was too young, of course—twenty-three or -four at most—but she had gumption: that much was clear, or else she wouldn’t have risked arriving unannounced in his office to plead her case for his good-for-nothing son. And the way that cerise jacket fitted across that sexy little black stretch top of hers… Well, those delicious curves could keep a man distracted better than the latest Ferrari out of the showroom. Piers withdrew his hand to his trouser pocket, his nostrils flaring slightly as he breathed in deeply to contain his sudden lust.
‘Was there something else, Miss Robards?’
‘Don’t give up on your son. He already feels rejected by you. He needs your help, not your condemnation. He told me to tell you he absolutely promises that this will be the very last time he asks for your help. Can’t you just meet up with him for half an hour and hear him out?’
‘And what’s in it for you, Miss Robards?’
‘What do you mean?’ Her softly defined brows drew together as she frowned, and her perfume seemed to envelop Piers enticingly as she blushed again. He absorbed the sensation for a long moment as he watched her, registering its impact deep in his belly, deciding he liked the effect it had on him far too much.
‘I mean, how does it benefit you if I help Lawrence? Are you looking for an easy life down in the West Country as well?’
He thought… He thought she was pulling some kind of scam to get hold of his money! Emma blanched at the very idea. There wasn’t a dishonest bone in her body, and she’d always gone out of her way to help others less fortunate than herself. And this man…this…this arrogant despot was suggesting that the only reason she was helping Lawrence was to somehow secure herself an easy life in Cornwall! Her hand itched to slap that conceited smirk right off his too handsome face, but she’d already risked enough trouble without being hauled off for assault as well. Instead she curled it into a fist by her side and told herself to take a deep breath before retaliating.
‘I should have known to expect such a low blow from a man such as you,’ she said passionately. ‘For your information, Mr Redfield, I only came here because Lawrence asked me and I happen to believe in what he wants to do. Personally I’m totally unimpressed by your wealth and wouldn’t ask you for a penny if my life depended on it, but Lawrence is a different matter. We’re not all cut out to run multimillion-pound corporations, you know. Some of us are struggling with deeper issues that sometimes make it hard for us to find our feet.’
What deeper issues was she struggling with? Piers mused fleetingly before dismissing the thought as irrelevant.
‘Are you sleeping with him?’
‘What?’ Emma stared at him as if he’d just accused her of embezzling all the corporation’s funds.
‘Let me make it clearer.’ Folding his arms across an impressively wide chest clad in an expensive suit with no doubt impeccable credentials, Piers let his gaze linger for a moment on the fulsome shape of her breasts, lovingly outlined by the black clingy top beneath her jacket. The coming board meeting really wasn’t the most pressing thing on his mind right now. ‘Are you having sex with my son?’
‘How dare you? That’s none of your damn business!’ Emma was hardly going to tell him that Lawrence had tried to lure her into bed several times since they’d met but, although she was attracted to him, she wasn’t ready to make that particular leap of faith just yet. For now she was just happy to think of him as a very good friend.
Besides…he had enough girls parading in and out of his flat, as far as she could see. Like father, like son? According to Lawrence, Piers’s love of beautiful women had earned him a reputation as a bit of a playboy. Very aware of that fact, Emma wished her heart wouldn’t beat so wildly when he narrowed his penetrating gaze at her as if he was imagining what she looked like without her clothes.
‘You must be. Why else would you be championing his cause? Don’t be so gullible, Miss Robards. He’s only using you, you know. And you wouldn’t be the first misguided fool to fall for his dubious charm either.’ Sighing, Piers rubbed at his forehead as if a headache had started and Emma was the cause. Then, before she could retaliate, he smiled a slow, knowing little smile that caused a shocking wave of heat to pulsate throughout Emma’s body as if she’d suddenly been locked inside a steam room. ‘Are you my reward for meeting my son’s demands?’
‘What?’ For a crazy instant, Emma told herself she’d imagined the innuendo in his question. She simply couldn’t believe that a rich, powerful individual like Piers Redfield would deign to make a pass at an ordinary girl like her. But then as reality set in, so did anger. Waves of it. ‘I can’t believe you’re insinuating such a foul thing! Lawrence told me your opinion of him was low, but how low I didn’t begin to guess. How dare you suggest for even a second that your own son would do such a thing? And even worse—that I…that I would comply with it!’
Piers’s glance was unflinchingly direct. ‘Then you clearly do not know Lawrence as well as you think you do, Miss Robards. As I said before, he’s probably only using you. The sooner you realise it, the better.’
‘He’s not using me!’ she insisted. ‘We’re good friends. I’d trust Lawrence with my life!’
‘Oh, really?’ Piers’s tone was deliberately scathing. ‘Then don’t put such a cheap price on it, is my advice to you.’
Emma’s slender shoulders sagged dejectedly. It had been a complete waste of time coming to see him. He clearly had no intention and, more to the point, no interest whatsoever in helping his only son. She only hoped he wouldn’t have cause to regret it if Lawrence went and did something rash. Was Piers aware that his offspring suffered with chronic depression? Well, now wasn’t the time to illuminate him. He looked eager for her to be gone so he could go and chair his obviously far more important board meeting, and frankly Emma didn’t feel like subjugating herself to any more far too intimate questions about her love life…or lack of it.
‘Whether I’m sleeping with Lawrence or not is neither here nor there,’ she said shakily, brown eyes hurt and disappointed. ‘All I came here for was to ask you to talk to him, to maybe give him some help…not just financial help, either. He gets very low sometimes and I worry about him. He’s not strong like you.’ She flushed when Piers’s glance became even more piercing.
He was well aware that his son had a deeply melancholic side. But part of Piers still wrestled with the fact that even when things were good for Lawrence, he still managed to muck things up big time. He’d been a greedy and demanding boy who’d only ever thought of himself, and had replicated those less than admirable qualities as an adult, acting as if the world—or at least his father—owed him a living. Piers couldn’t even remember how many interviews and meetings he’d set up with friends and clients in business to help Lawrence get his foot in the door. But time and time again he either hadn’t shown up for the interview or, if he’d taken the job, had got bored within a week or two and found some pathetic excuse as to why it wasn’t exactly what he was looking for. Piers didn’t think Lawrence would know what it was he was looking for if it came up behind him and sunk its teeth into his backside. What on earth Emma Robards found remotely appealing about him, apart from his looks, his father could only wonder. Unless, of course, she was hoping that some of Piers’s own wealth might trickle down to him.
‘Lawrence will survive, mark my words. He’s too selfish to do anything that might deprive the world of his presence, so please stop worrying on that score.’
‘And that’s all you’ve got to say on the subject?’ An ache started between Emma’s shoulder blades where anger and disappointment turned her spine into a steel rod instead of cartilage and bone, and she couldn’t help but wish that her interview with Lawrence’s harsh, uncaring father had not concluded with such a discouraging outcome. Poor Lawrence would be devastated. He’d told Emma before she left that Piers was his last and final hope. The banks just didn’t want to know. He had debts outstanding on two big loans already and even his father’s illustrious name had not been enough to persuade them to extend him more largesse.
Abruptly bringing the interview to an end, Piers strode to the door and pointedly held it open. Her cheeks burning with embarrassment, Emma walked towards him, her brown eyes desperately trying to conceal the fact that she was close to tears. She hated letting anybody down…especially a friend. When she’d agreed to do as Lawrence asked, she’d taken on the task with such high hopes, even knowing that his father’s reputation was formidable. But she could get along with most people, she told herself, and at the end of the day Piers Redfield was only human, wasn’t he? And Lawrence was his son…his only son.
‘Don’t take it personally, Miss Robards. It’s certainly no failing on your part. You’re not responsible for fixing Lawrence’s life, and neither am I. He’s an adult. He’s made his choices and I’m afraid he’ll just have to learn to live with them.’
There was not the slightest flicker of regret in those coldly crystalline eyes, Emma noticed indignantly. Not even the smallest notion that another human being might dare question his judgement—his particular choices. Number one being the apparently total abandonment of his only son in his time of need.
‘I don’t suppose there’s anything I can say that would change your mind?’ As she raised her hopeful gaze to his, Piers could do nothing about the flash of heat that suddenly throbbed through him. It was not dissimilar to the drenching, languid heat that assailed his body when he was lying out on his terrace in Marbella, but it didn’t make him think longingly of margaritas by the pool. No, it conjured up longings of a very different kind. She had the most bewitching eyes, Piers realised—beautifully framed by the most lavish dark lashes the colour of warm melted caramel.
‘That kind of question could get you into all kinds of trouble, Miss Robards,’ he drawled softly.
Reacting as though he’d just slapped her face, Emma stood rigid with shock as she stared into his eyes, suddenly consumed by a sea of such blazing sensuality that every inch of flesh on her body felt as if it was bathed in warm, silken honey. Her nipples grew almost painfully tight beneath her shirt and she had to bite back a gasp.
‘I—I…’ She tried to speak but to her humiliation couldn’t get the words past her throat.
‘Take my card.’ His voice lowered to a more sensual cadence, Piers retrieved a business card from his inside jacket pocket. He pressed it into her hand, briefly and devastatingly curling his fingers around hers. ‘Why don’t you give me a ring some time?’
Willing herself to move, Emma tore her gaze away from his, knowing that if she didn’t get out of there soon she was going to end up in all kinds of trouble. This wasn’t how she had planned it at all! How had she ended up with Lawrence’s high-powered father telling her to give him a ring some time instead of agreeing to a meeting with his son?
‘I have a relationship with your son, Mr Redfield—that’s why I’m here. Doesn’t that mean anything to you? Presumably you’re not asking me to ring you to help arrange a meeting with Lawrence?’
Not flinching for a second from her indignant censure, Piers clenched his jaw, completely unperturbed by the shock in her eyes. ‘What do you think, Miss Robards?’
‘What do I think? I think you don’t deserve to be a father, that’s what I think!’ Angrily hefting her briefcase under her arm, Emma tore the little embossed card he’d given her straight down the middle and let the pieces flutter uncaringly to the floor. Disconcertingly, Piers merely smiled enigmatically, his cheekbones deep golden slashes in a face so extraordinarily handsome that once imprinted on a woman’s memory it wouldn’t be forgotten or relinquished easily.
Shrugging off the insult as easily as brushing a piece of lint off his suit, Piers lifted one corner of his disturbingly attractive mouth in a sardonic little smile. ‘Well…if you change your mind, you know where I am.’
Emma turned and fled down the corridor before she said or did something she might definitely have cause to regret.
Returning to his desk, Piers flipped open his diary, glancing down at it unseeingly. There was now no doubt in his mind that Lawrence had deliberately sent the beguiling Emma Robards to do his dirty work for him, and for a moment rage swirled in his gut and clamped his vitals in a vice. Was there no road his feckless son would fail to go down in a bid to get what he wanted? Cursing beneath his breath, Piers dropped down into the black leather chair and deliberately loosened his tie, which just then felt as if it was strangling him. Things between himself and Lawrence just seemed to go from dire to disastrous and right now Piers couldn’t think of one damn thing he could do to improve relations. Been there, tried that, been let down more times than any law-abiding parent deserved, in his opinion.
So Lawrence had thought to sweeten his father’s attitude towards him by presenting him with a bribe? Did he really believe that Piers wouldn’t take him up on it? Maybe he thought his father was too old to be attractive to a pretty young thing like Emma. At the memory of those innocent brown eyes staring back so fetchingly into his, Piers felt inevitable erotic heat settle in his groin. Lawrence should know by now that when it came to a challenge—whether business or personal—Piers was not a man to trifle with.
CHAPTER TWO
‘SO, HOW did it go with the old man?’ His expression wary, blond hair tousled, chest bare and his jeans hung low on his youthful hips, Lawrence strolled into Emma’s living-room and dropped down onto the sofa. As he leant forward, his blue eyes were very intense as they flicked across Emma’s face. For a moment she didn’t know what to say. How was she going to tell him she had failed to get the help he needed when his gaze was so trusting and hopeful? It would be like kicking a dog when he was already down.
‘I take it you did get in to see him?’ His smile a little nervous, Lawrence helped himself to an apple from the cut-glass bowl on the coffee-table and took a bite. Momentarily surprised by his assumption that she’d actually got that far at least, Emma frowned as she looked at him. ‘Don’t you believe in wearing clothes? It’s November, not the middle of July!’
‘I’m OK.’ He shrugged his wide shoulders uncaringly. ‘I just had a shower. As soon as I heard you come back I just left everything and came downstairs.’
Hearing footsteps walk across the floor above, Emma swallowed down the unexpected hurt that suddenly cramped her throat as she glanced knowingly up at the ceiling. ‘Have you got a girl up there?’
For a moment the brilliant blue eyes clouded over. Throwing the half-eaten apple back into the bowl, Lawrence got to his feet and came to join her. ‘She means nothing, Em. You know how I’ve been lately. I just needed some comfort. Someone to hold.’ The unspoken censure was there in his eyes, Emma realised. He’d had to resort to someone who ‘meant nothing’ because Emma refused to go to bed with him. He slid his hands onto her shoulders, regret and concern competing for her understanding in his gaze.
Emma swallowed down her disappointment and hurt and tried to rally her spirits, despite feeling like an ant that had just been stamped on by an elephant. ‘I have feelings too, Lawrence. I tried to explain to you that I needed more time. You tell me you want us to be closer, yet you go to bed with someone else at the first opportunity? I really don’t understand.’
‘I’m sorry I hurt you, angel. Please, don’t be angry with me. I know it’s hard for you to understand but a man has needs. You must realise I wouldn’t be interested in any other girl at all if you would just allow yourself to be a little more intimate with me.’
Telling herself she was too damn forgiving for her own good, Emma wished she didn’t suddenly feel like crying…and she still hadn’t managed to give Lawrence the bad news yet. ‘Anyway, I did manage to see your father.’
‘I knew you would.’ His hand moved up from her shoulder to settle briefly at the side of her cheek. ‘So…how did it go?’
‘Not good, I’m afraid.’
‘Oh?’ Moving away from Emma, Lawrence strode back across the room to the sofa and stood in front of it with his arms folded across his bare chest.
‘I’m afraid he won’t help.’ Hating the fact she was forced to state things so baldly, Emma chewed down anxiously on her lip, fielding the hurt she already saw reflected in the dazzling blue irises and wishing there was some way she could eradicate it forever.
‘You explained everything to him? That I wanted to make a new start down in Cornwall? That I wouldn’t bother him again if he helps me out just this one last time?’
‘Lawrence, I did my best, I really did, but he was resolute. Nothing I said seemed to reach him.’
‘Then you clearly didn’t try hard enough!’ His lips twisting in a scowl, Lawrence glared at Emma as if she were solely responsible for the predicament he found himself in. As his words scorched into her brain, Emma stared back at him, feeling as if she’d just received a sudden, unexpected blow to the head.
‘What did you say?’ Nervously, she wove her hand through her shoulder-length hair then pulled it free again.
‘You know how desperate I am!’
That was it, Emma told herself soothingly. He was only angry with her because he felt so desperate. When he calmed down, everything would be right again between them. But beneath her own assurance another feeling was rising, one that resembled something very close to resentment. Many of her friends—and she herself—had come from far more difficult situations and not everyone had had the cushion of comfort to fall back on that Lawrence had had. Was he right to always expect his father to bail him out of trouble? When did the boy become an adult and start to look after himself?
Glancing at the tall, blond, handsome youth who graced her living-room, Emma experienced a sudden surge of shame that she was silently giving vent to some not so nice feelings about him. It was the ordeal she’d been through, she told herself. It was having Piers Redfield look at her as if he wanted to manoeuvre her up against a wall and take her there and then in his office, with the Lord Mayor’s procession weaving through the streets and his staff hanging out of the windows to watch it. Her body throbbed with shameful heat at the thought.
‘I’m really sorry that your father won’t help but maybe there’s another way? Between us we must be able to come up with something.’ Forever hopeful, Emma tried to smile consolingly but she could hardly bring herself to look Lawrence in the eye with the thoughts that were currently scorching her brain. Some friend she was.
‘Bastard!’ Without a thought for Emma’s furniture, Lawrence kicked the leg of the coffee-table and sent the glass bowl containing the fruit skidding along its polished surface.
‘Lawrence!’
‘I suppose he gave you a lecture on how irresponsible and selfish I was? How I don’t deserve help because I’m such a dismal failure? Then I suppose he told you how many jobs he’d got me interviews for, how many I didn’t turn up to or left after a few days? How I’m always coming up with crazy schemes that go nowhere instead of knuckling down to some ‘‘honest hard work’’?’
‘He didn’t run you down to me.’ Distressed by his anger, Emma crossed the room to go to him but he shrugged her off when she reached out to comfort him and glared at her instead.
‘What’s the matter with you?’ His eyes wild, he shook his head. ‘You’re supposed to be my friend. You know how desperate I’ve been. You may not mind living in this dump but I do mind! I’d do anything to get out of it…anything! Why couldn’t you have persuaded him to help me?’
‘Persuaded him?’ Her dark eyes huge, Emma stared back at Lawrence in stunned disbelief. ‘What do you mean, persuaded him?’
‘You’re a pretty girl, nice breasts, long legs, soft voice… It can’t have been beyond you to try and convince him, can it?’
She felt sick. The room seemed to lurch crazily as all her blood rushed to her head, and she remembered Piers asking her, ‘Are you my reward?’ Had he guessed right? Had Lawrence expected her to get intimate with his father so that he would help him out? Could her so-called friend really be that ruthless? The thought was so stunningly outrageous that Emma could hardly find words to express her disgust. ‘Get out,’ she said, her teeth gritted.
‘Yeah, well.’ Pushing his fingers defiantly through his dishevelled blond hair, Lawrence appeared unaffected by her distress. ‘I worry about you, you know, Emma? It’s unnatural not to be interested in sex. The only reason Vicky or Nicky, or whatever her name is, is upstairs in my bed is because you’re so damned frigid! Either that or you’re a lesbian and you haven’t told me.’
‘I think you’ve said quite enough for one day.’ Her back stiff, Emma walked to the already opened door and held it wide. Biting her lip to stop it from quivering, she watched, chilled, as Lawrence swept past her without another word then pounded up the linoleum-covered stairs to his flat. When he’d gone, she quietly closed her door and leaned back against it with her eyes shut tight.
‘You wouldn’t be the first misguided fool to fall for his dubious charm,’ his father had said, and at the time Emma had believed him to be judging his son completely unfairly. But this was the first time she’d really let him down, she realised. Usually when Lawrence asked a favour of her, she endeavoured to deliver it. Disappointment in her failure to come up with the goods this time must have soured his supposed affection for her—so much so that he couldn’t even pretend to be civil. Now she was left with the knowledge that at least his equally ruthless father had been expressing an honest belief when he’d suggested that Lawrence had sent Emma to use her charms to persuade him to cough up financially.
Her stomach churning, Emma pushed away from the door and glanced disconsolately at the clock on the mantel. She had just a couple of hours before she had to be at work and right now she needed a shower to scrub away the taint of the day, though she seriously doubted if she’d ever be able to forget the humiliating events of today. The way she was feeling it would be very easy to blame herself for being such a disappointment to both Redfields. She wasn’t sophisticated or clever enough to command genuine regard the way some more worldly women could and consequently she’d allowed both men to treat her with disrespect. Though she wasn’t entirely sure that gazing at someone as if they urgently needed to be alone with you in the most intimate way could really be construed as demonstrating disrespect… Remembering the almost overwhelming pull of attraction she had shockingly experienced when she’d looked back into Piers Redfield’s disturbingly blue gaze, Emma felt herself grow hot with shame. She had no business lusting after Lawrence’s father—however attractive or compelling he might be—and the sooner she put him out of her mind and got back to reality, the better.
Piers had dinner at his club, enjoyed a glass of his favourite French cognac with an old business associate, then got Miles, his driver, to take him home. But once home in the large five-bedroomed Victorian house on the outskirts of Hampstead Heath, he prowled the huge drawing-room then the impressively stocked library with little enthusiasm or interest, a restlessness in his blood that he could neither restrain nor deny. His mind all but drove him crazy with the memory of Emma Robards telling him that he didn’t deserve to be a father because he wouldn’t help Lawrence and had made a pass at her instead.
Her comment had touched him in a very raw place—an old wound made up of guilt and regret. He’d carefully erected layers of skin as tough as steel around it to stop it from hurting him. But as he recalled it now, it did hurt him. Lawrence might have made a hash of his life so far in terms of getting his act together, but was that really so deserving of Piers’s contempt? Was it the boy’s fault that his mother had tried to make up for the lack of his father’s input by spoiling him rotten and endeavouring to meet every whim and want with meticulous regularity to make up for Piers’s absence? Thereby creating an individual just about as selfish as he could be.
‘And was it my fault that I was away from home too much because I was trying to build a firm foundation for my family’s future? Did Naomi really believe I just did it all for myself?’ Piers stalked the floor of the library, his hands alternately deep in his pockets and raking frustratedly through his hair. Emma Robards had opened a can of worms, that was what she’d done. Who the hell did she think she was, stealing into his office uninvited, practically demanding that he finance Lawrence’s latest crazy business venture just because they were related by blood?
Recalling those bewitching honey-brown eyes of hers with no difficulty at all, along with the unexpectedly sensual touch of her skin when she had laid her hand across his, Piers silently conceded that he was both intrigued and more than a little attracted to his son’s girlfriend. Emma Robards had the kind of chutzpah he admired but she was surely on a lost cause if she was hoping to win Lawrence’s undying gratitude for what she’d dared. Piers knew his own son and it didn’t take much imagination to work out that when Emma had returned home empty-handed—with no promise of his help, either financial or otherwise—gratitude would be the last thing on Lawrence’s mind. He was like a child who’d received every Christmas present he’d ever dreamed of, but still expected there to be one more. No, if Piers wasn’t mistaken, the daring Miss Robards would have received nothing more than the raw edge of his son’s tongue for her troubles. He almost felt sorry for her. What was she doing with a loser like Lawrence anyway?
Piers swore harshly beneath his breath. It had become all too easy to berate his own flesh and blood. Still, he probably deserved it. Especially after this last little stunt, sending his girlfriend to do his dirty work. Well, this time Piers would pay him back and make him think twice about resorting to such a stunt again. He would help him one last time, he concluded, but in return he wouldn’t hesitate to seduce Emma Robards. He’d show his irresponsible son that when it came to matters of strategy, he’d better sharpen his game if he wanted to play with the big boys. As he warmed to the idea, he drove his hand impatiently through his hair one last time then stalked determinedly from the room. In the stunning entrance hall with its black and white tiles and crystal chandelier suspended from the high ceiling, Piers grabbed up his coat from the hall-stand and went out into the cold, rainy night to hail a cab.
‘Sorry, Liz. I don’t know what’s the matter with me this evening.’ As Emma stooped to pick up the pieces of broken glass from the kitchen floor, Liz Morrison—friend and co-owner with her husband, Adam, of the bistro known as The Avenue—dropped down to help her. Her smooth forehead wrinkled with concern when she noticed that the younger woman’s hands were trembling.
‘What’s wrong, my love? Has someone upset you? Those lads are a bit rowdy out there tonight but they’re celebrating a friend’s promotion. Did one of them say something to you?’
‘No, it wasn’t them. I’m just feeling a little on edge, that’s all. Don’t worry.’ Getting to her feet, Emma briskly deposited the broken glass into a nearby bin. ‘It’ll pass.’
‘Want to go home early? I can get Louise to stay a bit later to help out.’
‘Thanks, but I’ll be fine. Really.’
But even as she automatically recited the words, Emma knew she was nowhere near fine. Not after that horrible incident with Lawrence this evening, and the earlier more embarrassing one with his father. It hurt when illusions were destroyed and tonight she’d discovered that Lawrence Redfield wasn’t the friend that she’d thought him to be. He’d clearly only used her friendship to advance his own ends, and now all Emma wanted to do was curl up into a tight little ball and make the world go away for a very long time until she felt right again. Only she couldn’t do that. She had a life and a job to do, and Liz Morrison had been too good to her for Emma to let her down just because her feelings had been hurt. Smoothing down her neat black skirt then adjusting the matching velvet ribbon on her pony-tail, Emma forced a smile, picked up a tray of glasses to take out to the bar, and headed for the double doors that led into the restaurant.
Liz’s hand on her wrist took her by surprise.
‘You need a break. Everyone else has taken holidays except you. You haven’t even marked out dates on the calendar. I don’t flatter myself that work here is so compelling you can’t tear yourself away, so what’s up, Emma? You can talk to me, can’t you?’
Liz Morrison was like a surrogate mother as well as a friend. Her daughter, Fleur, had gone to school with Emma, and when Fleur departed to Paris to start her career as a very junior dress designer in one of the big fashion houses, Emma had become even more like a second daughter to Liz and Adam. Looking into her concerned, attractive face now, Emma lifted her shoulders and dropped them again.
‘I made a fool of myself, Liz, that’s all. I’ll get over it. And as far as holidays go—well, I just haven’t sorted anything out yet.’ Only that wasn’t strictly true either, Emma thought disconsolately. The plain fact of the matter was that she wasn’t in a financial position to take a break. Although she got paid holidays, Emma relied heavily on tips to boost her income, and with her grandmother’s operation coming up and all the improvements that needed to be made to her house if she was to return home there afterwards, she needed as much money as she could get. The local authority would only give her a grant for some very basic improvements—the rest, family were supposed to supply. And, as Emma was the only family Helen Robards now had contact with, the responsibility fell to her. Not that Emma minded—far from it. Her grandmother was the one person in all the world who loved her unconditionally and Emma would do anything in her power to bring a little more ease to her life.
‘Well, you need to make taking a holiday a priority. Even if all you do is stay at home and potter. You’re looking tired. You spend most of your time out of work caring for your gran. I know she’s been seriously ill but it isn’t right that you should be totally responsible for her care. I’m not a fool, Emma. I know she needs a lot of care and that it’s draining you, both physically and financially.’
It was impossible to prevent the wave of self-conscious heat that flooded her cheeks at Liz’s perceptive comment. She did feel drained. But what could she do about it when there was no one else to share the burden of her grandmother’s care?
‘I won’t pretend it’s not tough sometimes but she’s my only family, Liz. Yes, I’d love a holiday but right now it’s not an option. Not even remotely.’
Liz smiled in understanding. ‘I’m not getting on to you, Emma, love. I’m just concerned. Still worried about Gran’s operation?’
Emma nodded, yet couldn’t help smiling at the thought of her grandmother’s determination to get better. ‘She’s tough though, you know? She’ll be OK. And if it makes you feel any better I’ll book some time off in a fortnight. That’s a week before the op, and I can be with Gran and keep an eye on her before she goes into hospital.’
‘Well, if either of you needs anything—anything at all—you must let me know. Promise?’
‘Promise. But you’re too good to me, you know that?’
‘Someone’s got to look out for you, love. Now, you’d better go and help Lorenzo in the bar or he’ll be in here screaming for those glasses any second now!’
An hour later, Emma glanced up from stacking glasses behind the bar and froze. Staring back at her from the doorway where he had just come in from the cold, Piers Redfield’s burning blue gaze closed the distance between them as though they stood head to head. She almost dropped another glass in her bid to extricate herself from the intensity of his examination, glancing helplessly at the handsome Lorenzo as he stood by her side humming along to the music that was playing softly, but unable to find words to elucidate her distress. What on earth was he doing here? Had Lawrence sent him? Had Piers decided to press charges or something equally horrendous because Emma had had the audacity to inveigle her way into his private office?
Finally realising they had another customer and before Emma could find her voice, Lorenzo dashed out from behind the bar to greet the imposing-looking man in the damp trenchcoat, speaking to him enthusiastically in his drawling Italian accent as Emma looked on, aghast. Then, shaking Piers’s hand and taking his coat, he led him to a secluded table for two in one of the dimly lit recesses with their dark oak seating. He laughed at something Piers said as he bent his head briefly to light the lone white candle in the centre of the table. Emma’s stomach knotted with deep foreboding. She noted a couple of women at one of the nearby tables glance across the almost full restaurant at Piers. Bending their heads, they whispered something and giggled. It didn’t take a genius to guess what had just passed between them. Piers was easily the most attractive and dynamic-looking man in the room, and Emma didn’t suppose there were too many crowded restaurants where that wouldn’t be the case.
Taking a deep lungful of air, she busied herself with drying glasses until Lorenzo hung up Piers’s coat then returned to the bar.
‘Emma, can you take the man in the corner a menu, please?’
It wasn’t like her to be so slow on the uptake but then it wasn’t every night she had a good reason to hang back. Her nervous brown eyes glanced helplessly into Lorenzo’s deep black. ‘Can’t you do it? I’m—I’m busy with these glasses.’
The young Italian restaurant manager shook his head in clear disapproval. ‘First you break all my glasses then you refuse to serve a customer. What is wrong with you this evening, Emma?’
A fierce blush coloured her otherwise pale cheeks. ‘I’m not refusing to serve anybody, I’m just busy doing something else.’
Without a word, Lorenzo reached for something on the corner of the bar and dropped a leather-bound menu into her hands. ‘Enough of this nonsense! Take the man a menu and for the love of God look happy about it!’
Now she knew how those French aristocrats must have felt on their way to the guillotine. Her legs almost buckling beneath her, Emma took her time negotiating her way past tables, a smile fixed on her face that felt more like a mask. When she reached Piers’s table, she held out the menu and lost the smile altogether.
‘What are you doing here?’ she asked, her voice barely above a strangled whisper. Completely unfazed, Piers took the menu without a word and opened it. Pretending interest, he idly flipped through the beautifully bound pages and smiled. It was the smile of a big cat that had just cornered his prey and was now toying with it before the inevitable took place.
‘I heard this was a good place to eat. What would you recommend this evening?’
‘You haven’t really come here to eat at all, have you?’ Her anxious glance suddenly trapped by his remarkable blue eyes, Emma’s stomach clenched painfully. Soundlessly closing the menu then placing it carefully down on the table, Piers linked his hands together and considered her with all the serious deliberation of a judge about to pronounce sentence.
‘Astute as well as daring. You’re a constant surprise, Miss Robards.’
‘What’s this all about? Why have you come here? Did Lawrence send you?’
‘Now, why would he do that?’
To punish me…to make me suffer because I didn’t get him what he wanted… Emma put her hand to her mouth to stop herself from pleading with him to go away and leave her alone. Already Lorenzo was looking over at her from the bar, a suspicious frown between his smooth black brows. ‘I don’t know. Why would a Redfield do anything?’
‘Is that an insult I hear in your voice, Emma? You don’t mind if I call you Emma?’
‘Please.’ Nervously running her hand across her hair, she leant closer, her words intended for his ears only. ‘If you’re angry with me for coming to see you on Lawrence’s behalf, I’m very sorry. If you want to know the truth, I regret every second and I swear to you it will never happen again. Now, will you please go before my manager gets even more suspicious?’
‘You’re right. I didn’t come here to eat.’ Before she realised his intention, Piers had snagged her hand and held it, a glimmer in the seductive depths of those deeply crystalline blue eyes that sent Emma’s heart racing in a futile search for somewhere to hide. His touch made her hot all over and the faint musky tang of his aftershave enveloped her in a sudden paroxysm of fear and anticipation. ‘I went to see Lawrence. He told me you worked here. You and I have to talk.’
‘Why did he tell you where I work? What do you want from me, Mr Redfield? Please tell me quickly so that I can get back to work.’ She snatched her hand away and rubbed it as if to erase his touch.
Piers frowned. He wasn’t used to women responding to him in such a negative way and, frankly, it irked him. Did she still nurse hopes for herself and Lawrence? Was that the way of it? If so, she was on a hiding to nothing because when Lawrence had answered the door to him earlier, his errant son had clearly had company. Company of the bedroom kind—a cute little blonde with an impish smile and breasts to write eulogies to if that tight red dress she’d been wearing was any true indication of the facts. After he’d agreed to furnish Lawrence with twice the amount he needed to set up in Cornwall, his son would have told Piers anything he cared to know. It had been easy to get him to reveal the name and location of the bistro where his pretty neighbour worked. Lawrence himself had mentioned it during the course of their conversation—no doubt to lessen Emma’s appeal by revealing that she was a waitress and not in a league his father would be interested in. ‘Why would a Redfield do anything?’ Emma had suspiciously asked… Why indeed? Perhaps ruthlessness ran in the blood after all?
Now, as he sat staring up at the beautiful girl his son had thought to use to further his own ends, Piers felt that same blood in his veins heat and slow with all the excitement and anticipation of fierce desire. All the aces were on his side if he played his cards right, and if she was sweet to him Piers would reward her with anything her little heart desired…
‘What time do you finish?’
Emma reluctantly told him.
‘I’ll wait and take you home. It’ll have to be a cab; my driver’s gone home for the night.’
‘Your driver?’
‘Chauffeur, then. Anyway, as I said, I’ll wait and take you home, then we can talk.’
‘No!’
‘No?’
‘I mean, I don’t want you to wait and take me home and I definitely don’t want to talk to you, Mr Redfield! What can you possibly have to say to me that would be of interest? I’ve already apologised for sneaking into your office; what more do you want?’
His blue eyes went so dark that Emma stepped back from the table as though a hot lick of flame had suddenly scorched her tender skin. Her blush was so deep she felt sure everyone in the room must notice it. In fact Lorenzo was headed her way right this second—no doubt angry that she seemed to be antagonising his customer—because it was plain to see that Piers wasn’t smiling.
‘Is everything all right?’ He specifically addressed Piers, but his suspicious gaze broke away for all of a couple of seconds to silently rebuke Emma.
‘Everything is fine. Grazie.’ To her amazement, Piers started to converse with Lorenzo in what sounded like flawless Italian and the younger man, obviously delighted and surprised, responded enthusiastically in his native tongue as though they were long-lost buddies. Relieved that Lorenzo wasn’t about to berate her in front of Piers, Emma moved to make herself scarce, and was shocked when Lorenzo waved her commandingly into the seat opposite Piers and all but pushed her down into it.
‘I am cross with you, Emma, that you didn’t tell me that this man was your fiancé! Even if you had a fight you must not keep such secrets from me, huh? I am your friend as well as your manager.’
‘But he’s not my—’
Beneath the table Piers gave her ankle a sharp kick. Glaring at him with pointed little daggers of pure dislike, Emma wondered what the hell he thought he was playing at. Of all the things he could have said, what on earth had possessed him to tell Lorenzo that they were engaged to be married?
CHAPTER THREE
‘I WILL bring that bottle of wine pronto! Emma, you must take the rest of the evening off. Scusi, Mr Redfield, I will be back in a moment.’
When they were alone, Emma struggled for all of two seconds to contain the anger that was threatening to burst like a dam.
‘How dare you lie to him? How will I explain to him later that it was just some kind of sick joke? I don’t know what you’re playing at, Mr Redfield, but whatever it is I don’t want any part of it!’
‘For your information, Miss Robards, I’m not playing. When I see something I want I cut right to the chase—whatever it takes. Do I make myself clear?’ His penetrating gaze signalled his seriousness and Emma felt her stomach flip over in fright. Was he saying that he wanted her? What had she done to warrant such unasked-for attention? This man was rich beyond imagining and could clearly have any woman he set his sights on—so why had he set his sights on her? An insignificant little waitress who’d championed his son’s cause because he was in need and she’d mistakenly believed he was a true friend.
‘It’s not clear at all.’ Her face burning, Emma fiddled with the little silver napkin ring in front of her. ‘I don’t know what you want from me.’ Finally risking a direct glance, she saw a corner of his mouth hitch up slightly into what could be the beginnings of a smile—only she wasn’t entirely sure. Everything about him inspired awe, from the width of those amazing shoulders in his exquisitely tailored suit, to the clean-cut edge of his hard, chiselled jaw and those scintillating eyes that clearly didn’t miss a trick. Imagining him as chairman of the board at meetings with the country’s most prominent and influential businessmen and entrepreneurs, Emma knew there’d be a respectful hush when he entered the room.
‘Your attention is what I want, Emma.’
‘And you had to tell Lorenzo you were my fiancé to get it?’
‘Whatever it takes, remember? How old are you?’ he asked, amused.
‘Twenty-five.’ Her guard down, Emma widened her dark eyes in puzzlement. ‘Why do you ask?’
‘Because you look more like nineteen. Tell me. Are you serious about Lawrence?’
The steely muscles that made up the hard wall of his stomach actually clenched as Piers waited for her to answer. Her features were compellingly beautiful, with skin as fine and pale as alabaster and eyes and lips a man could happily gaze at until he grew old—yet she was also possessed of an extraordinary innocence that intrigued Piers even more. He could hardly believe she didn’t know what kind of effect she could have on a man, but that was the impression he was getting. Look at him, he thought wryly. Just one encounter with her and he’d gone against all his principles and signed Lawrence a cheque for a ridiculous amount to set up some pie-in-the-sky little venture that was surely doomed to failure before it even started. He’d have been better off just throwing his money into an incinerator.
‘I don’t know what you mean.’ Flushing, Emma glanced up almost with relief as Lorenzo descended upon them, flourishing a bottle of the best red wine in the house. Addressing Piers, the young Italian poured the wine, all the while chattering away in his native tongue, then left them to, ‘Enjoy, enjoy!’ with a final departing wink in Emma’s direction and a too knowing smile as he slid behind the bar again.
His fingers sliding around the stem of his wineglass, Piers continued to survey her with an unnerving intensity that made it difficult to corral her thoughts. ‘Would you be heartbroken if you didn’t see him again?’
‘Why? Is he going somewhere?’
‘Cornwall, if everything goes to plan.’ Piers shrugged as if he had his doubts.
‘Then you agreed to help him?’ Her mouth dropping open, Emma couldn’t disguise her astonishment.
‘Let’s just say I had second thoughts after you left.’
‘He must have been over the moon.’
‘I left him getting ready to go out and celebrate with his lady friend.’
‘Oh.’
‘You don’t mind?’ Watching closely for signs of hurt or distress, Piers was gratified when he found none. Instead she looked resigned.
‘Our relationship isn’t like that.’
‘Sexual, you mean?’
Emma felt the heat in her face deepen. ‘Lawrence has lots of girlfriends but our association is purely platonic.’
One fair brow jutted towards his hairline. ‘You’re telling me you didn’t sleep with him?’
Emma sighed and took a careful sip of the dark red wine that Lorenzo had poured out for her. Her tastebuds barely registered the smouldering burst of grape on her tongue. ‘Look, where is this leading? I hardly know you and yet you sit there expecting me to discuss my private life with you as though it was the most natural thing in the world. I’m glad you decided to help your son, Mr Redfield, but as far as he and I are concerned, I don’t actually care if I never set eyes on him again!’
‘So he gave you a hard time when you told him I wasn’t going to help?’ Raking his fingers through his dark blond hair, Piers sat back in his seat and shook his head. ‘That figures.’
‘Look, I really should get back to work.’
‘Stay right where you are.’ Emma suddenly found she had his undivided attention again. Heat ignited in his eyes with all the impact of a dazzling white flare against a coal-black sky, and an answering shiver zigzagged down her spine. ‘We’re supposed to be engaged, remember? You don’t want Lorenzo over there to think we’ve had another fight, do you?’
‘I don’t care what he thinks, considering this whole thing is a complete farce!’
‘I want to see you again.’
‘Why… For what reason?’
‘Because you intrigue me. Isn’t that reason enough?’
She’d never had a man tell her that she intrigued him before and the fact that Piers Redfield—who was generally regarded as a phenomenon himself—said so was more than a little difficult to take in. Try impossible. Emma could only draw the conclusion that he must be up to something…but what?
‘So, you’re intrigued by waitresses? With some men it’s lap dancers or nurses but obviously you—’
‘Emma.’
The soft yet steely command in his voice stopped her dead. Her heart started to race again and she wished her face wouldn’t burn so. ‘What?’
‘I don’t have a fetish for waitresses. Though I’d be lying if I said you didn’t look extremely sexy in that tight black skirt.’
In fact Piers had never seen another woman look half so good in a tight black skirt. Emma was slender but her figure was definitely hourglass-shaped and her fitted clothes showed just how delectable that shape was. Now she was blushing again and Piers sensed his attraction deepening. Surely she was used to men paying her compliments all the time? But there was nothing coy about her response. She merely looked flustered and uncertain, like a young girl out on her first proper date.
She’s too young for you, urged the voice of reason. But Piers was in too deep to pay much attention to it. He was only forty-two, for God’s sake! Nowhere near a mid-life crisis or anything as dull as that, and he didn’t particularly lust after younger women. He’d dated plenty of women his own age and older. He simply enjoyed the company of beautiful women. In his career he’d met many, but he’d never yet met one who intrigued him enough to make that relationship permanent. As far as he was concerned, marriage was out. Been there, tried that and, apart from a few short months when Lawrence was a baby and he and Naomi had felt like a real family instead of two angry people who merely tolerated each other, Piers had hated it. Freedom was far preferable in his opinion.
‘It’s not tight, it’s fitted, and I’m not pursuing this pointless conversation with you any longer. I’ve got to get back to work. We’re already a girl short tonight and you can see that we’re busy.’ Getting to her feet, Emma threw Piers a last flustered look and walked away.
‘Damn.’ Piers’s male friends envied the ease at which women seemed to fall over themselves to get to know him, but somehow tonight it seemed his famed ability had vanished. He was left in no doubt that he’d failed to impress or attract Emma Robards. Signalling a passing young waiter, Piers paid his bill, collected his coat and walked back out into the cold, wintry night, not caring that the rain showed no mercy as it pelted him hell for leather as he walked.
‘Why did that man tell Lorenzo you and he were engaged if you’re not?’ Cradling her much-needed cup of coffee, Liz Morrison sat across the cleared table from Emma in the now empty restaurant, endeavouring to get to the bottom of the most surprising thing that had happened all evening.
‘Oh, he was just playing stupid games.’ Emma shrugged, momentarily shielding her expression behind her own coffee-cup. I’m not playing, he’d said, but clearly he’d lied. She really had no idea why he’d taken the trouble to come to the bistro and find her and nor did she buy the reason he had given—that he was somehow ‘intrigued’ by her. So ‘playing stupid games’ was all her befuddled brain could come up with.
‘He was rather gorgeous all the same. When Lorenzo came into the kitchen and told me I sneaked a look while you weren’t looking. Where did you meet him?’ Liz asked conversationally. But behind her employer’s deceptively casual tone, Emma knew there was a wealth of curiosity just bursting to get out. Liz was always trying to fix Emma up with some suitable male or other but was continually frustrated by the younger woman’s inexplicable lack of interest.
‘Oh, he’s a friend of a friend.’ Hoping to brush him off as just that, Emma prayed they could now change the subject. Piers Redfield’s name and presence had simply dominated her day too much. It was time to get back to reality. Not always easy, but at least it was a devil she knew.
‘Well, I certainly wouldn’t kick him out of bed.’
‘Liz!’ Aghast, Emma stared at the other woman as if she had just confessed to some heinous crime.
‘You know very well I love Adam, but it doesn’t mean I can’t appreciate another man’s good looks, does it? And your friend of a friend was certainly worth taking a second look at. Loved the suit too. Bet that cost a pretty penny.’
‘I wouldn’t know.’
‘Oh, for God’s sake, Emma! You’re a beautiful young woman and you’ve got about as much interest in the opposite sex as somebody who’s gay!’ Her hazel eyes suddenly narrowing, Liz lowered her voice conspiratorially. ‘You’re not gay, are you, darling?’
‘No!’ Not knowing whether to laugh or cry, Emma put down her coffee-cup and licked the cream from her top lip. ‘I can assure you I’m not gay.’ It was the second reference to her sexual proclivities that day—first Lawrence’s hurtful jibe, now her friend’s concerned probe. So what if she didn’t have a relationship? Why did everyone seem to believe that coupledom was the only important choice in life? Couldn’t they see that most people’s relationships fell apart on a regular basis? Who needed the grief? All she had to do was remember how heartbroken her mother had been when Emma’s father had walked out on them when Emma was only nine. She’d never really recovered and they’d never set eyes on him again. They’d heard from a friend of his who’d come around to the house once that he’d emigrated to Australia soon after the divorce he’d insisted on, but after that…nothing. He never even kept in touch with his own mother—Emma’s beloved Gran. He’d obviously wiped out the memory of his previous life with heartless precision and had disowned them both. So who needed a man? Certainly not Emma—not right now, and probably not ever.
But just as she reaffirmed her decision to remain single to herself, an uncalled-for recollection of Piers Redfield’s crystalline blue eyes sliding hotly down her body brought a flush of warmth to parts of her anatomy that hadn’t experienced that sensation in a very long time…
‘Men are a hassle. I have enough to deal with without getting screwed up by some relationship. Stop worrying about me, Liz. I’m really quite happy in my single state.’
‘So tell me a bit more about the guy who came in earlier.’
Smiling in spite of her exasperation at Liz’s tenacity where Piers Redfield was concerned, Emma got up, pushed her chair into the table, and went to collect her coat from the nearby coat tree. ‘Trust me. You won’t be seeing him again.’ If Liz even had an inkling of who he was, she wouldn’t let Emma leave the restaurant until she’d told her everything and Emma had had enough embarrassment for one day, thank you very much.
‘You and your fiancé had another fight?’ Lorenzo shook his head in deep disapproval as he came through the swing doors with his leather jacket on. He being true to his Italian blood, the one thing he held in high esteem was amore. ‘Emma, Emma! What did you say to make him leave? He didn’t even stay to eat!’
‘Once and for all, Piers Redfield isn’t my fiancé!’
As Liz Morrison got to her feet, her surprised glance sprang to the younger woman with all the speed of an arrow hitting the bull’s-eye. Her husband read the financial pages of his chosen broadsheet every day and she knew only too well where she’d heard that illustrious name.
‘That was Piers Redfield?’ she yelped. ‘The Piers Redfield?’
Emma’s body turned hot then cold. Nonplussed, Lorenzo glanced from one woman to the other and back again. ‘Is he famous?’
‘Not in the sense that Brad Pitt or Hugh Grant is famous but the guy’s on the UK Rich List, that’s for sure. Emma, you dark horse! What on earth is going on?’
‘Hey, Piers! You were fierce out there today. What’s going on?’ As his friend and colleague hurried to catch up to him in the locker-room of the exclusive sports club of which they were both members, Piers unzipped his bag, pulled out his towel and draped it around his neck. The sweat he’d expended on the squash court dampened his hair and stood out in beads on his brow but still he hadn’t been entirely able to get rid of some of that huge reservoir of energy that had been flowing through him all day. God only knew how he was going to sleep tonight but if the previous five nights were anything to go by, he’d be watching the dawn come up again tomorrow having hardly slept a wink.
‘Nothing’s going on.’ Peeling off his clothes, Piers wrapped a second towel around his lean, hard middle, collected his washbag then disappeared in the direction of the showers across the cool tiled floor.
‘Not getting any lately? Is that the trouble, hotshot?’ Jim Delaney, an affable American and Piers’s regular squash and racketball partner, laughed out loud before disappearing into an adjoining cubicle. As the water built up a head of steam and sluiced down his hot, aching body, Piers couldn’t suppress the colourful language that escaped with his next few breaths. Leave it to Jim to stumble across the truth without even knowing it. But it wasn’t just the fact he wasn’t getting any, as his friend had so crudely put it—it was the fact that he was lusting after a twenty-five-year-old waitress who’d rather work than take the night off and spend it with him. In terms of experiences with women, this had to be a first. Usually it was the women who did all the chasing and, although he was partly ashamed to admit it, Piers had got used to cherry-picking the best. Now, as he glanced down at the manifestation of his sexual frustration, Piers knew that as far as Emma Robards was concerned he would have to come up with something quite unique to get her attention…but get it he would.
Emma couldn’t sleep. A mole hibernating for the winter couldn’t sleep with that racket going on upstairs. What on earth was Lawrence doing? She’d heard the feminine laughter that accompanied the general noise and mayhem and blushed to think what he might be up to. For a moment the thought had the power to wound but then irritation finally got the better of her and she threw back the bedcovers, shoved her feet into slippers and went through to the kitchen to make a cup of tea. Yawning as she filled the kettle, she glanced around the tiny, cramped kitchen with little pleasure. The pink paint she’d applied to the walls only six months ago in a bid to cheer the place up had already started to crack and peel. Her dark eyes seeking out the culprit, she noted the increasingly large patches of damp on the ceiling and on the walls. She’d been on to the landlord several times already about getting something done about it, but if past experience was anything to go by she’d be waiting for a response until she drew her old-age pension. The flat needed lots of work. More than Emma could afford. She was already fretting about how she was going to find the money to help her grandmother make necessary home improvements, so she hadn’t a cat’s chance in hell of finding enough cash to do up her own place.
Sighing, she reached up to the hooks on the wall for a cheerful mug with a bright yellow daffodil on it, then threw in a teabag. Lucky old Lawrence, escaping to Cornwall. Right now she’d jump at the chance. Though of course not with him. They’d hardly exchanged two words since the afternoon he’d accused her of being frigid and possibly a lesbian and, quite frankly, Emma didn’t care. At first she thought she’d miss his regular visits and ‘putting the world to rights’ conversations, but how could she miss someone who wasn’t really the person she’d thought him to be in the first place? Lawrence hadn’t been a true friend. If he had, he wouldn’t have been so nasty to her when she’d told him his father wasn’t going to help get him out of the fix he was in. And he most definitely wouldn’t have expected her to use her feminine assets to get the result he’d wanted. He would have been grateful that she’d at least tried—at great personal risk too.
But it was all academic now because Piers had decided to help his son after all and so Lawrence was packing up lock, stock and barrel to go down to Cornwall and a new start. Piers… When had she begun to address him with such startling familiarity? She’d only met the man twice, for goodness’ sake, and neither encounter had been exactly pleasant. Pouring hot water into the waiting mug, Emma bit down guiltily on her lip. That wasn’t exactly true, she recalled, remembering the way he had complimented her figure in her ‘tight’ black skirt. But the man was altogether too sure of himself, too arrogant and too…too rich! What else had he been doing but playing games, seeking her out at the restaurant where she worked? Perhaps he’d had a slow day at the stock exchange and was looking for some kind of diversion? Yeah…as if a man like Piers Redfield had to resort to chasing two-a-penny waitresses to get his kicks these days!
But all the same, the man had got to her. That fact alone scared Emma witless. After an abortive attempt at a relationship shortly after her nineteenth birthday, Emma had more or less decided on the single life. The man she’d been involved with had been an economics lecturer at her secretarial college who’d told her at the time that he was divorced and living alone. Three months into the relationship Emma had found out that he was still married, living quite amicably with his wife and was the father of two young children. His deceit had made her feel used and dirty, and merely confirmed what she’d known all along—that she was better off on her own. She hadn’t even wanted to stay and get her diploma. Instead she’d decided on a complete change of pace and, at her friend Fleur’s instigation, had gone to work for Liz and Adam Morrison at The Avenue, a popular and trendy bistro not far from where Emma lived.
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