She needed to sit down. Needed coffee. Ice cream...
For heaven’s sake, she was a grown-up and smart enough to know that leaping on a man you barely knew was never going to end well, especially when it was supposed to be strictly business. Especially when her entire life plan depended on it being strictly business.
What on earth had she been thinking?
Scratch that. No one had been thinking, least of all her. Apparently she still wasn’t because she couldn’t wait for the return match and next time she’d have more than cake in her bag...
She was grinning, helplessly, at the thought when her phone began to ring. She checked the number, ultra cautious since her name had been plastered all over the evening papers. Journalists might believe that she was safely tucked up out of harm’s way in the Fairview where they couldn’t get at her, but it hadn’t stopped them trying her number, leaving sympathetic messages, wanting her side of the story. As if she was going to fall for that.
It wasn’t a journalist. It was Darius.
‘Text me your address,’ he said, before her brain could unscramble itself and deliver a simple hello.
‘Excuse me?’
‘The caretaker is in hospital and the legal lot insist that you’re accompanied by a responsible adult.’
‘That’s very, um, responsible of them.’ She’d bet the house that wasn’t all they’d said. They would have had a dozen good reasons why he should pull out of their deal. Given a minute, she could probably come up with at least that many herself. But he hadn’t... ‘What’s the matter with Mr Grumpy?’
‘He fell off a ladder. Broken leg, broken wrist, bruises.’
‘Oh...’ How to go from feeling great to feeling about two inches high in ten seconds. ‘I’m so sorry.’ And she was. He’d been a grouch but he didn’t deserve that. ‘Is he going to be okay?’ Then, as an awful thought struck her, she said, ‘He wasn’t trying to fix that window, was he?’
‘Is that a guilty conscience I can hear, Miss Gordon?’ Darius asked. ‘Maybe you should take him some of your cake.’
‘Darius!’
He laughed. ‘Relax, Sugarlips. This is not your fault—he was clearing a blocked gutter at the village hall, but you’re right, it needs fixing. I’ll get it sorted.’
Sugarlips? Oh, cripes...
‘I could arrange that for you,’ she offered, doing her best not to think about what had made him pick on that particular endearment. She should definitely not think about him sucking the tip of his thumb. She could still taste him, smell him on her... ‘I have a first-class honours degree in estate management.’
‘Well, bully for you. Call the National Trust; maybe they’ll give you a job.’
‘They did,’ she said. ‘I turned it down.’
There was a brief silence which told her that she’d finally managed to surprise him, then he said, ‘I’ll pick you up at eight tomorrow morning.’
‘You?’
‘I’m the only responsible adult available at short notice.’