Sweet Surrender With the Millionaire(5)

       
           



       

After several days of battling with the Aga cooker she'd finally got the  knack of persuading it into action just before she'd resumed work, but  she hadn't lit it all week, making do with microwave meals. She could  imagine the kitchen was a warm, cosy place with the range in action, but  each evening she'd lit a fire in the sitting-room grate and sat hunched  over it for the first hour until the chill had been taken off the room.

Putting a match to the fire she had laid that morning before she'd left  for work, she walked through into the kitchen to switch the electric  kettle on, shivering as she went. The last few days had pointed out her  main priority was to get oil-fired central heating installed in the  cottage as quickly as she could; the sitting-room fire would be a nice  feature to keep but was woefully inadequate as the sole means of warmth.

Once she was nursing a hot mug of coffee she returned to the sitting  room and threw a couple more logs and a few extra pieces of coal on the  fledgling flames, fixing the guard round the fire before she went  upstairs to change into jeans and a warm jumper. That done, and in spite  of the fact the room was freezing, she sat for some time on the bed  sipping the coffee as she stared at her reflection in the long thin  mirror on the opposite wall, her mind a million miles away.

It had been a tiring week at work with several minor panics and she was  still getting used to the long drive home, but it wasn't that that  occupied her thoughts, but how her life had changed in the last twelve  months and especially in the two weeks since she had moved into the  cottage. OK, it might be pretty basic right now but it was hers. She had  done this on her own. Why hadn't she had the courage to leave Piers  long before she had done and make a new life without him? Why had she  tried and tried and tried to make the marriage work long after she had  known she'd married a monster? A handsome, charming, honey-tongued  monster who had fooled her as completely as he did everyone else. At  first. Until she'd tied the knot.

Why? a separate part of her mind answered. You know why.

Yes, she did. She nodded her acquiescence. Piers had been the master of  mind games and he had moulded and manipulated her to his will so subtly  she hadn't been aware of his power over her until it was too late. He  had convinced her she was worthless, useless, that she couldn't manage  without him, and she had believed him utterly. Because she'd trusted  him, fool that she was.

Rising abruptly, she walked closer to the mirror and stared into the  slanted green eyes looking back at her. What had attracted Piers to her  that night nearly six years ago? There'd been other, prettier girls in  the nightclub. But he'd chosen her and she'd been thrilled, falling head  over heels in love with him from the first date. Seven months later her  parents had been killed and when he'd asked her to marry him just after  the funeral she'd accepted at once, needing his love and comfort to  combat the pain and grief. A month later they were Mr and Mrs Piers  Gregory. And she had been caught in a trap.

Marry in haste, repent at leisure. An older, wiser friend had murmured  that to her when she had announced her wedding date but at the time  she'd been too much in love and too heartbroken about her parents to  take heed to the warning.

Shaking her head at the naive girl she had been then, Willow made her  way downstairs. On entering the sitting room she was slightly alarmed by  the roaring fire, although it had warmed the room up nicely. Hastily  banking down the flames with some damp slack, she walked through to the  kitchen and made herself another coffee. Give it a few minutes and she'd  toast the crumpets she'd bought for her tea in front of the fire once  it was glowing red; there was nothing nicer than toasted crumpets with  lashings of butter. And this was definitely a comfort night.

She had just picked up the mug of coffee when a sharp pounding on her  front door almost made her drop it. Her nerves jangling, she hurried  into the tiny hall and opened the door, her eyes widening as she took in  the tall dark man in front of her. And he looked just as angry as when  she'd first seen him.

'Are you aware your chimney's on fire?' Morgan said grimly.

'What?' She stared at him. 'What are you talking about?'                       
       
           



       

'Look.' To her amazement she found herself hauled forward by a hard hand  on her arm as he pointed to the roof of the cottage. Massive flames  were lighting the night sky.

Wrenching herself free, Willow stared aghast at the chimney. Never  having lived in a house that accommodated coal fires, she'd had no idea a  chimney could catch fire.

'I've called the fire brigade and they should be here shortly.' Even as  he spoke the sound of a siren in the distance could be heard coming  rapidly nearer.

'You called the fire brigade?' Willow echoed in horror. 'Can't it just go out? I won't put any more coal on.'

'Are you serious?' Morgan stared at her through the rain, which had  settled down to a fine drizzle. 'You could lose the whole cottage. The  chimney is on fire, for pity's sake.'

'But a chimney is supposed to have smoke and flames go up it,' she answered sharply. 'That's what they do.'

'Up it, yes. If it catches fire that's a whole different ball game. Did you have it swept before you lit the first fire?'

'Swept?' He could have been talking double Dutch.

'Give me strength.'

He shut his eyes for a moment in a manner that made Willow want to kick  him, but then the fire engine had screeched to a halt and in the ensuing  pandemonium she forgot about Morgan.

Half an hour later the fire engine and the very nice firemen left and  Willow stood staring at the devastation in her sitting room. She was  barely aware of Morgan at the side of her until he murmured, 'What is it  with you and fire anyway?'

She wanted to come back at him with a cutting retort, but she knew if  she tried to speak she would cry. Swallowing hard, she picked her way  across the wet, sooty floor and reached for the photograph of her  parents on the mantelpiece. Wiping the black spots off the glass, she  held the photograph to her when she turned to face him. 'Thank-thank you  for calling the fire brigade.' The fireman had said she'd been minutes  away from having a major catastrophe on her hands. 'I want to start  cleaning up now, so if you don't mind … '

He didn't take the hint. 'I'll help you mop up the worst and then I  suggest you leave the main clearing up till tomorrow. Nothing will seem  so bad after a good night's sleep and a hearty breakfast.'

Willow stared round the room and her expression must have spoken volumes  because Morgan smiled the lopsided grin that she'd registered the first  time she had met him before saying wryly, 'OK, it might, but this'll  take hours and it'll be better in daylight.' He shivered, adding,  'Haven't you any heating in this place? It's as cold in here as it is  outside.'

Willow's eyes went involuntarily to the blackened fireplace.

'No central heating? No storage heaters or fan heaters?'

She shook her head. 'Not yet, but I will do something soon.'

'OK, this is what we do,' he said after a moment's silence. 'We mop up  like I said and then you're coming home with me for a hot meal and a  bath before you spend the night at my place. I'll bring you back in the  morning and we'll tackle the cleaning then. At least you'll be in a  better frame of mind to cope.'

Was he mad? Adrenalin surged in a welcome flood, enabling her to  straighten and say steadily, 'Thank you, Mr Wright, but that's really  not necessary. I can manage perfectly well.'

'I've seen the results of you managing … twice.'

Willow's chin raised a notch. 'Thank you,' she said for the third time,  her voice thin, 'but I'd like to be on my own now. I'm not a child so  please don't treat me like one.'

She saw the amazingly blue eyes narrow in irritation. 'Are you always this stubborn?'

The smell of soot was thick in her nostrils and she was so cold her  fingers were numb. All she wanted was for him to leave so she could sit  down and howl. 'Please go,' she said weakly.

It was like talking to a brick wall. Somehow in the next few minutes she  found herself covering the floorboards with a thick layer of  newspapers-Morgan had fetched these from the potting shed and to his  credit he didn't make any comment whatsoever-before fetching her handbag  and coat and locking the front door of the cottage. She felt shivery  and shaky and it was just easier to comply rather than argue, besides  which she was cold and hungry and the thought of tackling the  cleaning-up process tonight was unbearable.                       
       
           



       

It wasn't until Willow reached the rickety garden gate that she noticed  the Harley-Davidson parked down the lane on the grass verge. As Morgan  walked over to the powerful machine she stopped dead. 'That's yours? You  came on that?'