Bound To Him
Chapter One
Cassie
I was concentrating so hard on the mosaic pavement that I didn’t notice the pair of shiny black lace-up shoes standing next to me until someone cleared his throat noisily. Oh great, my boss has come to watch me. I never did well when he did that. He’d stand over me and then stare until I started shaking. This job meant so much to me that any mistake was one too many. And I’d worked so hard to get it.
Control yourself, Cassie. Calm down.
I leaned back, prepared to lift my head and smile, but I hit an obstacle that shouldn’t have been there. Caught off balance, I flung out my hand out instinctively to save myself, and the tray of tiny tesserae I was holding went flying. Little bits of mosaic went everywhere, destroying the careful arrangement that had taken me all the previous day.
“Fuck!” My word rang around the walls. People turned their heads, glaring at me, an interloper who didn’t belong here. I closed my eyes in horror.
Strong male hands closed around my shoulders and pulled. I had no option but to straighten. Pushing my glasses up my nose, I turned around to see who had turned my day into such a disaster.
Oookay. So he was gorgeous. There stood a man with perfectly classical features, one that Phidias would have wept to see. A smile curved his sensuous lips. He held my shoulders and stared down at me, while my hair tangled around my face. I had tied it back with a clip when I’d started work, but the clip had broken. Now it was a tousled mess, clogged with bits of plaster.
I didn’t dare touch him. He looked untouchable. He wore a pair of jeans and a sweater, but with such an air the clothes had to be designer. You didn’t get that kind of perfection without spending a fortune to get it. His dark hair was perfectly cut into a style longer on top, with sides short enough for a girl to run her fingers through, if she had a mind to. His scruff of a beard made me long to touch it.
He looked vaguely familiar, but that was probably because I spent my days surrounded by Classical statues. He could join them, except his face was animated and alive. And he was in color. His eyes were such a startling shade of blue that I wondered if someone had carved them from lapis lazuli.
“Hi,” he said. “Can I help pick up the bits?”
“Cassie, my office in half an hour,” my boss snapped.
I nodded, letting my head hang. “Sure thing. I need to pick up the tesserae.”
“That’s why I said half an hour instead of now,” Steve said. He sighed, as if he was suffering yet another of my messes, which in a way he was. But if that man hadn’t been standing there, I wouldn’t have lost my balance and none of this would have happened. Not that I could say that to him. He’d fire me on the spot.
I hated calling him Steve. I would have preferred Mr. Arbalest, because he was as old as my father and twice as terrifying. ‘Steve’ didn’t sound right. I’d been brought up the old-fashioned way, to treat my elders respectfully and at a distance. Steve sometimes came too close.
Not that anybody in their right mind would want me when so many beautiful people came to the museum. I wore my loose jeans and shapeless top, which had been clean when I started my shift, but were now smeared with the dust of centuries. Normally I’d wear my dust with pride, but this man made me super-aware of my appearance. “N-no, thank you,” I stammered. “I’ll do it. I need to count them.”
I wasn’t quite sure how many pieces I’d had in the tray. I’d put myself into a kind of hypnotic trance carefully placing the pattern and ensuring all the tiles were exactly placed.
“I was going to ask you to tell our guest about the reconstruction, but on second thoughts, I’ll do it myself.” Steve heaved another sigh. I wanted to slap him, or shout at him to leave me alone with this man.
I had seen him somewhere before, I knew it. I frowned, trying to place him. He released my shoulders and it felt as if the lifeline between us was broken. I am so stupid sometimes, I make myself cringe.
“I’m sorry,” I mumbled, but I didn’t lift my head.
It was the eyes. I knew those eyes, and once I’d got them, I got the rest of him. Hollywood bad boy Troy Cooper, in the news for all the wrong reasons, had touched me. Everybody knew Troy, from his start as a child star to the total hottie he was now. His current hit was playing in the cinemas, and my roomie was still sighing over it. He played Foxman in the latest superhero movie, but he’d died at the end. The media said they’d killed him off because his private life was getting more headlines than the parts he played. Movie fans were still bewailing the loss all over social media. Nobody really knew if Foxman would come back from the dead, or if he did, that Troy Cooper would be playing him.
Cassie
I was concentrating so hard on the mosaic pavement that I didn’t notice the pair of shiny black lace-up shoes standing next to me until someone cleared his throat noisily. Oh great, my boss has come to watch me. I never did well when he did that. He’d stand over me and then stare until I started shaking. This job meant so much to me that any mistake was one too many. And I’d worked so hard to get it.
Control yourself, Cassie. Calm down.
I leaned back, prepared to lift my head and smile, but I hit an obstacle that shouldn’t have been there. Caught off balance, I flung out my hand out instinctively to save myself, and the tray of tiny tesserae I was holding went flying. Little bits of mosaic went everywhere, destroying the careful arrangement that had taken me all the previous day.
“Fuck!” My word rang around the walls. People turned their heads, glaring at me, an interloper who didn’t belong here. I closed my eyes in horror.
Strong male hands closed around my shoulders and pulled. I had no option but to straighten. Pushing my glasses up my nose, I turned around to see who had turned my day into such a disaster.
Oookay. So he was gorgeous. There stood a man with perfectly classical features, one that Phidias would have wept to see. A smile curved his sensuous lips. He held my shoulders and stared down at me, while my hair tangled around my face. I had tied it back with a clip when I’d started work, but the clip had broken. Now it was a tousled mess, clogged with bits of plaster.
I didn’t dare touch him. He looked untouchable. He wore a pair of jeans and a sweater, but with such an air the clothes had to be designer. You didn’t get that kind of perfection without spending a fortune to get it. His dark hair was perfectly cut into a style longer on top, with sides short enough for a girl to run her fingers through, if she had a mind to. His scruff of a beard made me long to touch it.
He looked vaguely familiar, but that was probably because I spent my days surrounded by Classical statues. He could join them, except his face was animated and alive. And he was in color. His eyes were such a startling shade of blue that I wondered if someone had carved them from lapis lazuli.
“Hi,” he said. “Can I help pick up the bits?”
“Cassie, my office in half an hour,” my boss snapped.
I nodded, letting my head hang. “Sure thing. I need to pick up the tesserae.”
“That’s why I said half an hour instead of now,” Steve said. He sighed, as if he was suffering yet another of my messes, which in a way he was. But if that man hadn’t been standing there, I wouldn’t have lost my balance and none of this would have happened. Not that I could say that to him. He’d fire me on the spot.
I hated calling him Steve. I would have preferred Mr. Arbalest, because he was as old as my father and twice as terrifying. ‘Steve’ didn’t sound right. I’d been brought up the old-fashioned way, to treat my elders respectfully and at a distance. Steve sometimes came too close.
Not that anybody in their right mind would want me when so many beautiful people came to the museum. I wore my loose jeans and shapeless top, which had been clean when I started my shift, but were now smeared with the dust of centuries. Normally I’d wear my dust with pride, but this man made me super-aware of my appearance. “N-no, thank you,” I stammered. “I’ll do it. I need to count them.”
I wasn’t quite sure how many pieces I’d had in the tray. I’d put myself into a kind of hypnotic trance carefully placing the pattern and ensuring all the tiles were exactly placed.
“I was going to ask you to tell our guest about the reconstruction, but on second thoughts, I’ll do it myself.” Steve heaved another sigh. I wanted to slap him, or shout at him to leave me alone with this man.
I had seen him somewhere before, I knew it. I frowned, trying to place him. He released my shoulders and it felt as if the lifeline between us was broken. I am so stupid sometimes, I make myself cringe.
“I’m sorry,” I mumbled, but I didn’t lift my head.
It was the eyes. I knew those eyes, and once I’d got them, I got the rest of him. Hollywood bad boy Troy Cooper, in the news for all the wrong reasons, had touched me. Everybody knew Troy, from his start as a child star to the total hottie he was now. His current hit was playing in the cinemas, and my roomie was still sighing over it. He played Foxman in the latest superhero movie, but he’d died at the end. The media said they’d killed him off because his private life was getting more headlines than the parts he played. Movie fans were still bewailing the loss all over social media. Nobody really knew if Foxman would come back from the dead, or if he did, that Troy Cooper would be playing him.