He carried the glass of liquid carefully upstairs and knocked on the bathroom door. He didn’t wait for her response and walked straight in, keeping his eyes down to protect her modesty as well as his state of mind.
‘Don’t worry, I’m not staying.’
‘I’m not worried,’ she said, her voice strained.
He felt her take the glass from his outstretched hand and turned back towards the door. He was twitchy, and desperate to get out of there, but he wanted to check she was over the worst.
‘So how are you feeling now? Any dizziness? Irregular breathing?’ He heard the swish and splash of water as she stood and stepped out of the bath.
‘No,’ she said.
Her voice was softer than before. Was that shame he could sense in her tone? He felt suddenly protective of her. She must have been terrified out there on her own. People misjudged the danger of being out in the heat all the time, thinking they were okay right up until it was too late.
‘Good. It sounds like you’re recovering okay. You’ll need to rest up and sleep it off. You’ve put your body through quite an ordeal.’
There was a pause.
‘Connor?’
‘Yeah?’ He turned round to face her. She’d wrapped a thick towelling robe around herself and it swamped her slender frame. She looked younger and oddly vulnerable. An uncomfortable pressure squeezed his abdomen and there was a strange buzzing in his head.
‘Thank you.’
He shook his head, trying to clear it. ‘It’s okay, really. It could have happened to anyone.’ He smiled, hoping to lighten the atmosphere.
‘I’m not thinking straight at the moment.’
‘Because of the thing at work?’
He didn’t know what had made him ask that right then, but he found he really wanted to hear the answer. All this over-reactive behaviour had to be linked to something. She was clearly a clever woman who was having a hard time dealing with whatever had brought her here to the farmhouse.
She laughed quietly. ‘You’re determined to get a straight answer out of me, aren’t you?’
He shrugged. ‘I’m a nosy bastard.’
She sat carefully on the edge of the bath and stared down at the floor, her hair falling across her face. ‘It’s a tough marketplace and we’re fighting every day to keep and win new business.’ Her voice was steady, but emotionless. ‘There aren’t a lot of contracts up for grabs in this climate. It’s harsh out there. Eat or be eaten.’
An image of his sister as a young, determined girl flashed into his mind. He could see why she’d chosen Josie as a business partner. He crossed his arms and looked out of the window, trying to eradicate the feeling of unease this train of thought triggered.
‘You don’t really want to hear all this crap,’ Josie said, breaking into his thoughts.
‘It’s okay.’ He shrugged. ‘I’ve been told I’m a good listener.’ He refused to give any more brain space to his sister. That particular direction in the maze of his life was a dead end now.
‘You are.’
She was smiling at him when he looked back.
‘But I need to sleep and I should let you have a shower.’
‘I smell that bad, huh?’ He raised an eyebrow, hoping humour would drag him out of his funk.
‘Of course not...that’s not what I meant.’ Her cheeks were adorably flushed.
He flapped a hand at her to show he was only joking. ‘Okay, get some rest.’ He backed towards the door. ‘Bang on the floor if you want anything, okay?’
‘Okay,’ she said as he turned and walked out into the safety of the hallway. ‘Thanks for looking after me, Connor.’
The words rang out in the air behind him.
* * *
It was six o’clock in the evening before Josie woke up. Rolling onto her side, she sat up tentatively and waited for her headache to catch up with the movement. It appeared to be much reduced.
Thank God for that.
She could hear Connor banging about in the kitchen below and a delicious smell wafted up the stairs, making her stomach rumble with hunger.
Dressing quickly, she pulled a brush through her hair and checked her appearance in the mirror. She looked tired and beaten. So much for this holiday doing her some good.
The room was much more of a mess than she remembered leaving it. All the drawers of the vanity were open and clothes spilled out of them. How embarrassing. Connor must think she was a real slovenly slut. She pushed the clothes back in and tidied up a bit. Looking around, she realised her laptop was no longer sitting on the window ledge. Strange. Perhaps Connor had moved it for some reason? Worry pinched at her chest and she rubbed her hand across her ribs to try and relieve it.
After taking three slow breaths, in and out, she straightened her spine and tipped up her chin. Better.
Okay, time to face the music.
She went downstairs and found him washing up at the sink.
‘That’s what I like to see—a man hard at work,’ she joked, hoping to start things off on a light note after the edginess of their last interaction.
He turned and gave her a comical reproving look.
Good, at least she wasn’t in the doghouse. ‘Can I do anything to help?’ she asked, trying hard not to stare at the fluid way he moved his muscular body around the kitchen. How could someone so big be that graceful?
‘No. Thanks. The omelettes are ready. I’ll serve them up now you’re here.’
She sat at the table, her body humming with a confusing mixture of anxiety and something akin to excitement, and watched him load the plates with food, nodding her thanks as he slid one in front of her.
‘Did you move my laptop?’ she asked as they tucked into the food.
He took his time looking at her and she wondered why he suddenly seemed so uncomfortable. A slow sinking feeling heated her stomach.
‘What is it?’
He put his cutlery down. ‘We had a break-in while we were out. They took your laptop.’
She gawped at him, her befuddled brain taking a few seconds to catch up with his words. ‘What?’
‘Someone jimmied the lock on the front door and got in. There wasn’t a lot to steal, but your laptop was one of the things that went. I’ve already spoken to the police and they’ve given me an incident number for an insurance claim. You should check nothing else of yours has gone.’
She put her own cutlery down and dropped her head into her hands. This day just got better and better.
‘But we’re so remote out here. Why would they target this place?’ she said, looking back up at him.
‘It happens quite a bit. There are lots of holiday homes in this region. They’re easy pickings.’
‘Maybe someone’s trying to tell me something,’ she said, sighing. That was it, then. All her work on the tender document was gone.
‘Maybe someone wants you to have a real holiday?’ he said, picking up his fork again and shovelling omelette into his mouth.
‘Yeah...’ She felt defeated.
‘You’ve got insurance for it, right?’
She nodded and picked at her food, suddenly not hungry any more.
He frowned at her. ‘At least you weren’t here when they broke in.’
‘True.’
They sat in silence while Connor cleared his plate.
‘Not hungry?’ he asked, nodding at her food.
‘No. Sorry.’
He shrugged. ‘No problem. How are you feeling generally?’
‘My head’s still a bit painful, but nothing like it was.’ She wanted to go back to bed, so the day would be over, but she didn’t want to be rude to Connor. Especially after what he’d done for her. ‘It’s a good job you’re so well trained in first aid.’
H
e smiled and pushed his empty plate away from him, looking out of the window. He was closing down the conversation again, but in this case she really didn’t mind. She guessed it was his way of telling her to move on without dragging her through the humiliation of directly saying it. It was a kind and decent thing to do and she felt new warmth towards him.
‘So what is it you’ll be doing in India?’ she asked, taking his hint and opening up a new conversation.
‘I help set up clean water projects in the developing world. This next trip is about making contact and scoping out where the water refineries are needed most,’ he said.
She looked up sharply. ‘Abi never mentioned you were doing that.’
‘She probably doesn’t know. I’ve never talked to her about it.’
An unnerving heat made its way up from deep in her pelvis. He was a world champion at dropping conversational bombshells. ‘She’s under the impression you’re swanning around the world on one long, extended holiday.’
He shrugged, but didn’t say anything.
‘Why didn’t you tell me before? There have been plenty of opportunities. You let me think you were some kind of entitled layabout.’
He leant in conspiratorially. ‘I thought you might be here spying on me and reporting back to my sister.’
Even though she knew he meant it as a joke, she was sure there was an underlying truth there.
‘She misses you, you know.’
His shoulders stiffened and he broke eye contact. ‘I wouldn’t know. We communicate through lawyers.’
A heavy weight of sadness settled in her belly. How incredibly sad for them both. And she thought she had a difficult relationship with her family. At least they all spoke to each other, even if she kept her contact with them to a minimum.
‘I can’t imagine being that far removed from my family,’ she said, leaning in to him and putting a hand on the table between them in an awkward attempt at empathy.
‘We have nothing to say to one another,’ he said, scowling at his empty plate.
‘I think Abi would disagree.’ The memory of the pain in Abi’s eyes when she’d talked about him resurfaced, and something clicked together in her head.
‘Let’s change the subject.’
There was a finality to his tone she didn’t dare challenge. Another subject it was, then. For now. She’d find a way to get through to him eventually. It was the least she could do for Abi after the trouble she’d caused.
She leant back in her chair, feigning nonchalance in an attempt to take the atmosphere down a notch or two. ‘So, tell me more about your involvement in the projects. You find locations and fund them? Run them all single-handedly?’
He snorted and looked up at her with humour in his eyes, the deep scowl gone from his face. ‘I have a lot of help with the day-to-day running. I research the areas that most need support, raise the capital and get the projects underway.’
‘Very worthy.’
He raised a disdainful eyebrow. ‘I do it because it needs doing.’
‘Yes, of course, but you must get some sense of personal satisfaction out of it?’
He shrugged. ‘More than I would working for a corporation obsessed with profits.’
Pushing down a niggle of annoyance, Josie said nothing to that. She wasn’t sure whether he was having a dig at her job again, but he was starting to open up about himself and she didn’t want to stop the flow of information by making a scene.
‘I need to feel useful,’ he said, turning his head to look out of the window again, so she could no longer see the expression on his face.
She paused, pondering the subtext of his words. ‘Sounds like we have more in common than we realised.’ She looked down at her hands, which were twisted together in her lap, the veins raised against the tight skin. She unwound them, flexing her stiff fingers.
He turned back to her and smiled. ‘Yeah?’
Connor sensed that Josie wanted to say more, but was having trouble getting the words out. He knew she hadn’t told him the whole story when he’d asked her about the thing at work; he felt it in his bones. He was going to have to force it out of her.
‘What are you hiding from me, Josie?’
She sighed and there was a beat of silence as she stared at the floor, apparently trying to make a decision—perhaps about whether to finally start trusting him. He couldn’t blame her; he hadn’t exactly made it easy for her up till this point.
‘Some of our employees have made a formal complaint against me. Apparently I made one of them so miserable she’s taken long-term sick leave, citing depression.’
She looked up at him with agony in her eyes and his stomach lurched uncomfortably. That was the last thing he’d expected her to say, and for the first time in his life he was at a loss for how to respond.
‘Ah...’
‘Yeah. Not my proudest moment.’
‘So you’re the Boss from Hell?’ He tried keeping his tone light, to show he was joking, but her face dropped even more.
‘I know I ask a lot of them, and I’m not the type of boss to be all chummy with my team, but we can’t afford to make mistakes. Not ones that cost the business money or spoil our reputation. I guess I’m not good at communicating that without sounding like I’m having a go. People skills are not my strong point, as I’m sure you’ve observed.’
He couldn’t help but notice the way her hands shook as she beat her familiar rhythm on the tabletop.
He leant in, trying to relax his posture to make it clear he wasn’t judging her in any way. ‘It can’t all be down to you. There’ll be other factors too.’
He had no idea what they could be, but he needed to say something to take the look of abject misery off her face. He could imagine she’d be a challenging character to work for, but she wasn’t cruel. At least not based on what he’d seen of her. Getting a team to work well together was a tough business, and it sounded as if she was having more than her fair share of trials at work. No wonder she was so exhausted. He shouldn’t have made that crack about a nervous breakdown; it sounded as if he hadn’t been far off hitting on the truth.
‘I have a real talent for making people uncomfortable.’
She didn’t seem to be able to make eye contact with him any more.
‘I take out my temper on them. I should be nicer and more forgiving of mistakes, according to your sister. My PA usually takes the brunt of my anger.’ She paused and spread her hands out on the table, staring down at her fingers before correcting herself. ‘Took the brunt.’
‘And my sister asked you to take some time away?’ He allowed himself to recognise a begrudging respect for Abi. Kudos to her for dealing with this problem head-on.
‘Yeah, before I scare the rest of the team into quitting. I agreed to it because I needed to convince your sister I’m not losing my mind.’
‘Are you?’
She huffed out a frustrated laugh. ‘It feels like it some days. But work is all I have. It’s important to me to be successful. I’ve worked so hard for it.’ She gave a weak smile, but her lip wobbled and her eyes flicked down away from his gaze.
There was a tight feeling across his chest and he had to take a deep breath to release the tension. It was hard seeing her come undone, even though she clearly needed to say all this out loud, but he also felt a ridiculous surge of pleasure that he’d finally been able to get it out of her.
‘So Abi’s running the business by herself while you’re here?’
‘Yeah. Crazy woman. It’s not like she’s not stressed to her eyeballs too. She’s the one who should be taking a holiday.’ She closed her eyes and let out a low breath. ‘I guess I just made things worse.’
A sudden sinking feeling in his gut at the thought of his sister dealing with the same anxiety distracted him. He needed to turn this co
nversation upside down before he got sucked into the melancholy that was nibbling at the edges of his consciousness. A game-changer was in order.
‘Well, you know what’s good for stress?’
‘Enlighten me.’
‘Orgasms.’
The word hung in the air between them, throbbing with potential life.
Her face was a picture. ‘Did you just suggest that we...?’ Josie waved a shaky finger between them both.
‘That we waggle our fingers at each other?’ he said, barely managing to keep the grin off his face at her stupefied reaction.
She tried to laugh but it came out as a cross between a hiccup and a snort. ‘That you and I...?’
He leant in to her again, totally unable to control his urge to tease her. She was such an easy target, and the change in the atmosphere was a relief after the angst of their last conversation. ‘You seem a little lost for words there, Josie. Are you asking me to have sex with you?’
She blushed fiercely and the sight of it made him smile. ‘No! I thought you were asking me.’
He paused, gathering his thoughts. What the hell was he doing? Whatever it was, he didn’t feel like pulling back. ‘What if I was?’
She shuffled in her chair. ‘Well...that would be...a strange request.’
‘Strange, unnatural? Or strange, I’ve-never-been-propositioned-so-directly-before?’
‘The second one.’
He could imagine. She’d be an intimidating prospect. ‘You haven’t lived.’
‘So you keep telling me.’
‘I call it like I see it.’
‘I’ve noticed.’ She let out a loud sigh, as if she’d run out of steam, her shoulders slumping.
He frowned, feeling her change in mood. Her fire had gone out. ‘You sure you’re okay?’
She gave him a pained smile. ‘I suspect I’ve not been entirely impressive since we met.’
Holiday with a Stranger Page 7