‘Our table is through here.’
Dora looked up in time to recognise Griffin Sinclair before her arm was taken in his firm grasp as he led the way through the maze of small dining rooms that seemed to make up most of the lower floor of the hotel, warmly inviting rooms, with only three or four tables in each, log fires burning in the hearths.
‘As you can see, it’s very busy here this evening.’ Griffin stopped beside a table, holding back a chair for Dora to sit down. ‘I assured Fiona we wouldn’t in the least mind sharing a table rather than taking up two!’
Dora frowned at him. He had a damned cheek assuring Fiona of anything where she was concerned!
But there was no doubt that the restaurant was very busy; most of the people that had been in the bar drinking were now starting to drift in to sit at their tables.
‘And sharing the bill, too?’ Dora drawled as she finally sat down.
The room was illuminated by the fire and a dozen or so lit candles. Very romantic! And with a complete stranger, at that. She wouldn’t say he was a ‘perfect’ stranger, because she had the feeling Griffin Sinclair was far from being that!
‘That would be very ungentlemanly of me.’ Griffin sat down opposite her, pouring her a glass of white wine from the bottle he must already have ordered for their table. ‘And although my mother may feel that she failed with me in most things,’ he added hardly, ‘she did bring me up to be a gentleman.’
There was a slight edge to his voice as he spoke of his mother, as there had been earlier when he’d talked of being named after his great-uncle. Dora’s own mother had been dead for eight years, and she still missed her quiet calm, her air of serenity, her sense of fun.
‘In that case, I thank you for dinner.’ She accepted his invitation—albeit a fait accompli!—with a gracious smile.
Griffin sat back in his chair, watching her. ‘You look right in these surroundings, you know, Izzy,’ he finally murmured.
Dora had been aware of his prolonged gaze, and now the hot colour entered her cheeks. She had never been what could be considered a fashionable dresser, preferring to wear what was comfortable or smart, and, in the case of the cream blouse and black skirt, she considered them to be both.
Her hair was freshly washed after her travelling and her business appointment, and fell softly to her shoulders; her make-up was light—a peach lipgloss on her lips, just a brush of mascara to darken her lashes and enhance the grey of her eyes.
In fact, she had been quite satisfied with her appearance before she’d left her bedroom a few minutes ago, but she realised that she probably wasn’t sophisticated or beautiful enough for a man like Griffin Sinclair, that his taste would be for much more glamorous women than she could ever be.
‘I meant that as a compliment, Izzy.’ His husky voice interrupted her wandering thoughts. ‘I’ve fallen in love with the charm of this place.’ He looked about them comfortably. ‘I only meant to stay overnight initially, but instead I’ve been here almost a week now!’
‘Are you here on business, Griffin?’ She deliberately chose to ignore what he considered his compliment—and the fact that he continued to call her Izzy when no one else ever did. The whole of her visit to this hotel was taking on a dream-like quality; he might as well become another part of it. And, actually, it was quite exciting to be someone other than Dora for a few hours in her life!
Not that there was anything particularly wrong with her life. She kept house for her father, and helped him in his bookshop throughout the week. It was just that the very fact of being called Izzy made her feel as if she were somehow different, no longer the shy, cautious little Dora. Or maybe it was as Griffin said: the charm of this country inn just seemed to take over…
He laughed softly. ‘This is my business, Izzy. I write travel reviews,’ he explained at her questioning look.
‘For Sunday supplements, things like that?’ She had never actually thought about the fact that the people who wrote those things had to actually stay in the places they wrote about. But of course they did. And Griffin was obviously one of the people who did that. They had travel books at the shop, of course, but not ones that involved visiting individual hotels and giving a rating on them.
‘Things like that,’ Griffin echoed dryly, with a mocking inclination of his head.
‘How interesting.’ She took a sip of her wine, finding it light and dry. Just the way she liked it…
Griffin burst out laughing, uncaring of the female heads that turned his way as he did so. ‘Take my advice, Izzy, and never take up acting—you’re lousy at it!’
‘But surely it is interesting?’ She hurriedly tried to rectify what he had obviously taken as an insult. This place, or being called Izzy, must be having a strange effect on her; she wasn’t usually so outspoken! ‘I’ve always wanted to travel,’ she added wistfully, knowing that while she worked for her father she probably never would, other than on business trips like this one. And she only made those because her father now felt he was too old for making such long drives himself.
When she was younger Dora had imagined she would perhaps take a year out after finishing school and before taking up a course at university, but her mother’s death, and the need for her at home, meant that that had never happened. And now, with her father and herself both working in the shop, they had necessarily to take separate holidays. Most of Dora’s friends were now either married or had moved away from the area, and it didn’t feel right, nor would it be as much fun, for her to travel on her own. And so her holidays were usually spent at home.
Although travelling for a living, while it might be fun to start with, must surely become boring after a while…
‘It can be interesting.’ Griffin shrugged. ‘Although my family keep asking me when I’m going to get a ‘‘proper’’ job!’
From what Griffin had said about his family, his mother in particular, Dora had the feeling he was quite happy to continue as he was—if it managed to annoy his family at the same time as providing him with a living!
Dora couldn’t imagine living with such tension between herself and the only living member of the family she had left: namely her father. She preferred life to run smoothly and comfortably, not to be in constant conflict with those around her. Griffin gave every impression of not giving a damn about who he upset!
Her mouth twisted wryly. ‘I’m sure they must be proud of you.’ After all, he must be quite good at what he did, otherwise he wouldn’t still be in employment.
‘And I’m damned sure they’re no such thing!’ he returned unconcernedly.
Dora took another sip of her wine. In fact, she seemed to sip rather a lot of wine during the next couple of hours as they enjoyed their meal, and Griffin ordered another bottle halfway through their main course.
Dora wasn’t sure it was exactly prudent to drink any more wine, but she wasn’t driving, and she really was quite enjoying herself. Griffin was genuinely interesting as he told her some of the funnier stories of his travels, and she didn’t want to refuse the wine and so put a dampener on their evening. Even Derry, as he wandered about the place, didn’t seem quite as big and frightening as he had earlier. In fact, he seemed to have decided he quite liked her, coming to lie on the carpeted floor at her feet.
‘Five feet nothing, and yet you seem to have some sort of power over rogue males,’ Griffin murmured thoughtfully.
Dora gave him a sharp look, searching for some sort of hidden meaning in his comment—or one that wasn’t so hidden! There was no doubting that Griffin was male, a fact that her racing pulse had been telling her all evening, and as for rogue—he was the most unorthodox man she had ever met! He had made no effort to dress for dinner, and was still wearing his denims. He’d swapped his black tee shirt for a green one, which seemed to darken the colour of his eyes, adding to their enigmatic depth. Those eyes combined with that over-long blond hair made him very much a ‘rogue male’ himself. But perhaps that wasn’t what he had meant…?
‘It was exactly what I meant, Izzy.’ He sat forward, his expression suddenly intense as he reached out and clasped one of her hands in his own. ‘Where the hell did you come from?’ he muttered grimly.
She swallowed hard. He was playing with her; he had to be. In fact, she had been wondering all evening why a man like him should choose to have dinner with someone as ordinary as herself. In the end she had decided he was having dinner with her because there was simply no one else here for him to have dinner with!
‘Hampshire, actually.’ She deliberately misunderstood him.
Oh, she was tempted, so very tempted—what woman wouldn’t be?—to go along with his flirtation, just once in her life to forget—
But, no! She was Isadora Baxter—Dora, who had never been involved in a serious relationship in her life—and she was not about to jump into a flirtatious fling now with a man she had only met for the first time this morning. A man who was the complete opposite of everything she had ever looked for in a man. She wanted someone sober, hardworking—a son-in-law that would at last make her father proud of her.
Her father loved her, she knew that he did, it was just that he’d always wanted a son, and having another child had been an impossibility after Dora was born. So it had always been Dora’s wish to give him the next best thing; a son-in-law he could be proud of. She knew he would be horrified at her attraction towards a man like Griffin Sinclair!
‘Would you like coffee now, or shall we wait until after our walk?’
Walk? What walk? She didn’t remember him mentioning the two of them going for a walk, let alone her own agreement to the idea. ‘I—’
‘It’s a beautiful evening, Dora,’ Griffin added encouragingly, standing up to pull back her chair for her.
Dora stood up. She was feeling too mellow—from drinking too much good wine, she freely admitted—to be bothered to argue the point. Besides, the night air might clear her head.
She shivered slightly as they got outside. ‘I thought you said it was a beautiful evening,’ she said ruefully.
‘Beautiful doesn’t necessarily mean warm!’ he chuckled. ‘Here.’ He took off his jacket and draped it about her shoulders, lightly grasping her arm as they walked across the forecourt and into the gardens beyond.
Dora tried desperately not to react to the lightness of his touch, which wasn’t very easy when wrapped in the warmth of his jacket; the material smelled of him, a mixture of maleness and his aftershave. It wasn’t doing anything to clear her head, either!
She sat down at one of the picnic tables placed around the garden, lit by the lamps placed strategically to emphasise the flowers and topiary. Unfortunately for her already shaky senses, Griffin chose to sit down next to her, so close that the warmth of his breath stirred the hair at Dora’s temple.
And yet she couldn’t seem to move away. She seemed to be held there mesmerised by the dark intensity of his gaze. And so she used the only line of defence open to her—words!
‘I suppose you’re going to give the hotel a good write-up?’ She hadn’t meant to sound sarcastic, but even as she said the words she knew that she did.
Griffin tilted his head to one side. ‘And just what do you mean by that?’ he said mildly.
He knew exactly what she meant; he was just playing with her!
She could feel the hot colour of embarrassment in her cheeks. ‘I just thought, being such a close friend of Fiona’s…’ she mumbled awkwardly.
‘I knew what you meant, Izzy,’ he drawled with amusement. ‘I just wondered if you had nerve enough to say it!’
Her eyes flashed angrily now. ‘Don’t play games with me, Griffin—’
‘Then don’t jump to erroneous conclusions—Izzy,’ he returned hardly. ‘Fiona is a nice woman; I may deserve your derision, but I’m not sure she does!’
Wonderful. Now she felt really awful! But he was right. Her sarcasm hadn’t been directed at the other woman but at this man at her side. Unfortunately, it had backfired on her…
‘They are erroneous conclusions, Izzy,’ Griffin murmured softly as he saw her dismay. ‘Fiona was very much in love with her husband.’
But her husband was dead…
Besides, that explanation didn’t rule out Griffin being attracted to the beautiful widow. And Griffin was a very attractive man—even if he did give the impression he didn’t give a damn about anything or anyone!
She swallowed hard. ‘Griffin—’
‘Izzy…!’ he murmured throatily, before kissing her!
And with a passion Dora had never known before!
One minute they were sitting side by side on the bench-seat, the next he had pulled her to her feet, his jacket falling unheeded to the ground by both of them as he moulded her body to his, his mouth laying claim to hers.
For there was no other way to describe the passionate demand of Griffin’s mouth against hers. No gentle caress, no searching for a response, simply taking. As if he had been aware of her compliance all along!
Had she been so obvious in her attraction towards this man? Had she shown from the first how bowled over she was by his rakish good-looks?
Worse, had Griffin taken one look at her, a single woman of twenty-four, not beautiful, but not plain either, and realised she would be an easy conquest for his undoubted charm?
Was that the reason he had so arrogantly arranged for the two of them to have dinner together this evening?
Dora wrenched away from him. ‘That’s enough, Griffin!’ she told him coldly.
He kept his arms firmly about her waist. ‘We’ve barely begun, Izzy,’ he assured her huskily.
She swallowed hard, looking up at him in the glow of the garden lights. Lovemaking with this man, she knew, would be wild and beautiful—everything she had ever dreamed it to be. But he was a stranger, a man on the make—and not for love either!
‘You’re wrong, Griffin—we’ve finished!’ she told him scornfully, pulling completely out of his arms, resisting the impulse to smooth down her hair where seconds ago his fingers had run through it. ‘It’s been a charming interlude—’
His expression hardened, his eyes glacial. ‘Don’t dismiss me like someone you just picked up for the evening.’
‘Then don’t treat me like someone you picked up for the evening, either!’ she came back heatedly, her cheeks burning with humiliated colour. ‘Dinner was enjoyable, the conversation fun—up to a point. But in the morning I go back to my own life, and you’ll return to yours. Don’t delude yourself into thinking this place is reality, Griffin!’ She looked about them pointedly. Even the gardens seemed to have a magic quality to them now: the profusion of spring flowers, the shadowy corners a perfect foil for the house itself.
Griffin still looked down at her with narrowed eyes. ‘And just what is your reality, Izzy?’ he rasped. ‘Is there a man already in your life? Someone you go back to tomorrow?’
Only her father. There didn’t seem to be much time or space for other men in her life at the moment. Her last date had been over a year ago, and, as she recalled, that hadn’t been too successful.
But that didn’t mean she had ruled out the possibility of falling in love, of marrying, of having children. She was only twenty-four, and she had all those natural yearnings; she just hadn’t found the right man to share them with yet.
But that didn’t mean she would settle for indulging in meaningless affairs until she met the right man for her. And there was certainly no room in her life, even briefly, for a man like Griffin Sinclair!
She raised her head, meeting the angry challenge in his expression. ‘Yes, there’s a man in my life,’ she told him curtly, forgiving herself for not being exactly truthful about the role that man had in her life. ‘As I’m sure there are dozens of women in yours’!’ she added insultingly.
‘We weren’t talking about me,’ Griffin grated harshly.
‘Of course not,’ she scorned. ‘I’m sure you never answer those sort of questions about yourself!’ Her anger was bordering on tears
now. Tears of dismay. At herself. For allowing Griffin to get even this close to her.
No doubt he would return to his own life eventually, and he wouldn’t even remember meeting someone called Isadora Baxter.
She wasn’t sure she would have the same success in forgetting him. ‘I should go back inside now,’ she said haltingly.
‘Should you?’ He was angry himself now. ‘Why?’ Because this man was disturbing her, was upsetting the even tenor of her life. She should never have agreed to have dinner with him.
‘Because I have an early start in the morning!’ she snapped, turning away.
And with each step she took she expected to find her arm grasped as Griffin turned her angrily back to face him.
It didn’t happen…
By the time Dora reached the sanctuary of her bedroom she was shaking so badly she had to sit down on the side of the four-poster bed. What a fool she’d been. An absolute fool! Griffin Sinclair had just been teasing her after all.
Just how far had he been willing to take it…?
As far as she allowed it to go, Dora realised with a self-disgusted groan.
The sooner she left this hotel, and forgot she had ever met someone called Griffin Sinclair, the better it would be. Most definitely for her, at least.
How could she possibly have known at that time that within six months of her visit to Dungelly Court she would find the ‘right man’ for her; the man she was to marry, to have children with? And that he would turn out to be Griffin Sinclair’s older brother, Charles!
CHAPTER THREE
‘RELAX, for goodness’ sake,’ Griffin chided impatiently. ‘We’re going to a wedding—not an execution!’
Dora sat tensely beside him in the Jaguar sports car. He was right, they weren’t going to an execution, but apart from the occasional coffee with Charlotte, and Griffin’s unexpected visit to the shop four weeks ago, she hadn’t seen any of the Sinclair family since Charles’s funeral. And she had no idea how Margaret Sinclair was going to feel about her presence today. Dora had sent a formal acceptance of her invitation to the wedding, but there had been no response to that, either negatively or positively.
Their Engagement is Announced Page 4