He smiled, his blue eyes twinkling. “Why should I? I love the view.”
She studied him for a moment. He saw more than wariness in her green eyes.
There was recognition.
“If you’re going to stare, you might as well tell me your name,” she said.
He grinned. “Rafael Collins. And you?”
“Cassandra Croyton.” She stood there, only her flesh from the chin up visible. “Are you going to stare at me all day, or will you let me get out and get my clothes?”
“Oh, don’t let me stop you from coming out.”
“You’d like that, wouldn’t you?”
He felt more than a familiar throbbing start between his legs. He felt something blossom within his soul. “I’d love it, my sweet lady.”
She cautiously watched him. “I’ve never seen you around here before.”
“I don’t usually travel this far north. I needed to check on a landholding for my cousin. Perhaps you know him? Matthias Hawthorne.”
Her face changed. Something flashed through her eyes, and she stepped farther back in the water. “You’re one, too, aren’t you?”
What warmth he’d sensed from her was gone in a flash. As hot as the June day was, he felt a decided chill settle around her. “One what?”
She shook her head. “I’m not one to speak it.”
He stood. “Sorry I disturbed your bathing, m’lady.” He turned to go.
“Wait.”
Something in her voice stopped him. He turned.
“But…you’re here, and it’s the middle of the day. The sun’s out,” she said.
He nodded. “So I see. Do you have a specific reason for that observation?”
She studied him. As her green eyes traveled his body, he felt himself harden. He wanted her. He wouldn’t force her, and he wouldn’t overtake her.
But he wanted her. In a way he’d never wanted a woman in his entire life.
He wanted her for life.
Cassandra finally spoke again. “Do you have a place to stay for the night? There are highway men between here and your destination. It’s not safe.”
From the tone of her voice, he knew it was a lie. “You aren’t worried about me. And if anyone should worry, it would be them, believe me.”
She’d moved a little closer to the bank, but she still crouched deep within the water, concealing the most beautiful parts of her body from his appraising gaze. Finally, “No,” she whispered.
He stepped down to the water’s edge and watched her. “What do you think I am?” he quietly asked.
“What do you think I am?” she whispered in reply.
He smiled, sending out a probe. He watched her eyes, noticed she jumped as she felt his careful mental caress. “I think you’re a very talented, beautiful woman,” he said. “Very powerful. And with a beautiful heart.”
“You probably have women all over.”
He shook his head. “No. I have not married yet, not for lack of some wenches trying their best.”
That coaxed a smile from her lovely, full lips. “Are you calling me a wench, sir?”
“That would be the last thing I’d call someone as beautiful as you.”
They stared at each other for another long moment before she stood and stepped from the water. He fought the urge to take her into his arms and lick the drops of water from every inch of her flesh.
“We all have secrets, don’t we, Rafael?”
He nodded. “We do.”
She put her arms around him, kissing him. He carefully folded her against him, his hands skimming down her smooth, damp back to gently cup her cheeks.
“I’m willing to hold your secrets,” she said, “if you’re willing to hold mine—and me.”
Chapter Two
Two pairs of pantyhose sprouting runs, dropping her lipstick business end first on the bathroom floor, and now having to change from her skirt into a pair of slacks because of a coffee spill had to be bad omens for the day.
And she hadn’t even made it out of the driveway.
Anastazia Proctor stormed through the condo door into the kitchen. Robertson looked up from his newspaper, surprised at her return. “I thought you’d left, dear.”
“I did,” she snarled, stomping through the condo to her bedroom. She didn’t bother closing the door behind her. She heard him follow her down the hall to her doorway.
“What’s going on?” he asked.
She ripped off the skirt and threw it at him, grabbing a pair of slacks that would match her shirt and blazer off of a hanger in the closet. “It’s not a good day, and I’m not even out the door yet.”
He examined the coffee stain. “I’ll run it to the cleaners for you. Would you like me to make you another cup?”
“Please.”
He disappeared to the kitchen. She tried to calm herself while changing. Thank God she didn’t have to be in court today. And thank God for Tim Robertson. He was her rock, her sole comfort in this crazy world that, for today, seemed to especially conspire against her.
Around her height but stocky and robust, his British accent and infectious smile, punctuated by crisp blue eyes, always managed to soothe her. His warm, rounded British accent matched his sturdy frame. He seemed unchanged in the nearly thirty-five years since he came to work for her parents when she was a baby. He had to be somewhere between fifty and sixty.
She didn’t question it. Especially now that he was the only family she had.
“Do you need a towel for your seat, dear?” he called from the kitchen.
Crap. “I don’t think so, but let me take one anyway.” Hopefully the day would turn around for her. She woke up in an irritated state, too early for PMS, but with an unsettled, distracted notion that her world had shifted on its axis. So far, the morning’s events seemed to prove her infallible intuition correct yet again.
Taz made it back to the kitchen. “Is this okay?” She spun for Robertson. She would never be a runway model, but her confident, long-legged curves easily turned men’s heads.
He nodded. “You look beautiful, sweetheart.” He handed her a towel, a travel mug of coffee, and leaned in to kiss her cheek. “Try to settle down and have a good day.”
“That doesn’t seem to be in the stars today.”
He smiled. She tried to ignore her feeling that there was more behind it than he let on. He put his hands on her shoulders.
“Anastazia Proctor, I can almost guarantee you that today will be a stellar day.”
She made it to work without getting in a wreck or spilling her second cup of coffee all over herself. Around ten o’clock, the intercom buzzer startled her. “Ms. Proctor, you have a visitor.”
Anastazia sighed. “Karen, did I have any appointments scheduled this morning?”
“No. Bob Stanley sent him down.”
Damn. The most senior of senior partners. What else could happen today? She patted her unruly auburn hair, pulled back in a neat but not-too-severe bun. “Okay. Send him in.”
She stood as an older man, maybe Robertson’s age, walked in.