‘No one knows I’m here,’ he said. ‘Not even Leo. I’d like to keep it that way.’
‘Of course,’ she mumbled.
He didn’t realise she had no one to tell and she was far removed from anyone in his world. But she did need to stay here. Not only did she have nowhere else to go, but this was also an important job for her professionally. She had debt to clear and a future to forge.
‘You won’t even know I’m here.’ But as she earnestly attempted to reassure him, she saw the look in his eyes morph once more.
CHAPTER TWO
YOU WON’T EVEN know I’m here.
Well, that was impossible. Ash scowled. How was he going to forget the sight of her gleaming in the moonlight like a welcome beacon? She’d been rising out of that bath like a dryad at a magical spring, complete with champagne fountain and a flushing allure that had transfixed him. Only he’d been so jaded he’d mistaken her for a woman of the night and said so. Even for him it had been inappropriate, an unthinking utterance of the first possibility his tired brain had come up with. Wishful thinking, if he was being completely honest. The fantasy of her waiting nymph-like to give him pleasure had made perfect, albeit impossible, sense. He should’ve held his outrageous, rebellious tongue, but he never yet had.
And now?
He needed to be alone, but he’d never been going to stay a full week. It was going to be a couple of days max. He’d just wanted her well out of the way so he could be clear of any human contact while he absorbed the shock of what had been done to the place. But now he was stuck with her. Yet he wasn’t feeling as irritated about that as he had been only a second ago.
Yesterday’s headline should’ve been easy to ignore. The newspaper article comparing ‘playboy rebel Ash’ to his illegitimate half-brother, Leo, the ‘responsible leader’, had been rubbish. Yet it had forced him into the action he’d been deferring for months. Almost a year ago, Ash had inherited everything. His father, Hugh Castle, had refused to recognise Leo right to the end. He’d also refused to believe Ash’s own refusal to be involved in the family business. No matter that they’d been estranged for a full decade and that Ash hadn’t once set foot inside the company headquarters or any of the family properties in all that time. Or that he’d deliberately set out to make his own fortune—taking risks purely to have the satisfaction of being more successful to spite his father.
None of that had mattered. His father, as always, didn’t listen, didn’t care and only did what he wanted. As Ash was Hugh’s first-born, legitimate male heir, it was onto his unwilling shoulders that the company had been foisted. But Ash had immediately moved to ensure all Hugh Castle’s heirs got their fair share. He’d intended to liquidate all assets and split the wealth. But Leo had asked for a different solution. It wasn’t that Ash had ʻabandoned responsibility’, forcing Leo to take over Hugh’s company, Leo had insisted. He’d been determined to take over. Ash had simply stood aside and let him. How could he say no when Leo had been denied so much by the Castle family already?
Ash had half expected his half-brother to raze Castle Holdings to the ground. He wouldn’t have blamed him, in fact he would’ve enjoyed watching. But Leo hadn’t done that. Leo had obviously inherited integrity from his mother. Maybe growing up away from the malignant force that had been their father had benefited him.
Whereas Ash was utterly his father’s son. Careless. Ruthless. Selfish.
But there was one particular problem Ash had been avoiding. This last personal property—the former family holiday home on Waiheke Island. The press would never think to look for him here. No one would, which was why he should’ve realised the idea of Leo arranging a woman for him was ridiculous. It wasn’t in his ultra-responsible half-brother’s playbook. Truthfully, it wasn’t in his either. And this woman was no courtesan. She couldn’t underline that fact more boldly than with the monstrously oversized clothes she’d hurriedly thrown on. But the swamping swallow-her-whole trousers and sweatshirt were too late. Ash had seen her naked and one part of him had already made meticulously detailed plans for her very luscious body.
‘The place is large enough for us to avoid each other completely,’ Merle Jordan reiterated in that shy, low, sexy-as-sin voice.
Ash stared as the colour in her luminous skin increased and her beautiful brown eyes darkened. His gloom evaporated as his intuition purred. He had to suppress a satisfied smile.
She was bothered. It wasn’t just because of what he’d said or done. The underlying cause was as obvious as it was reciprocated by him. Instant interest—the immediate recognition of physical, pleasurable, possibilities. Admittedly, they were possibilities she seemed determined to reject. Yet she was the one who’d insisted on staying here. Who’d insisted he discover for himself how impossible it was to find other accommodation on the island. Who’d wanted to teach him a lesson. It had actually pleased him to learn that he’d be able to sell even this ultra-expensive property quickly and easily, given the popularity of all pricing levels of accommodation. So her plan hadn’t only backfired, it’d also had a beneficial consequence.
‘Don’t you think?’ she added.
Maybe there could be more than one benefit. But then he saw the anxiety lurking in the backs of those beautiful eyes.
She’s bothered because she’s worried about being homeless, you idiot.
At his silence that blush swamped her face again. She’d almost stammered as she’d pushed past her shyness to fight for her place here. It had cost her to admit to him the truth of her circumstances. The confession hadn’t been an attempt at manipulation, but rather dragged out of her in raw embarrassment. It drew a response from deep within him too. The feeling shimmered again now and reminded him of another woman who’d also been alone and vulnerable and awkwardly shy. One who he’d stepped forward to help. But back then the flare of protectiveness within Ash had ended in a destructive mess.
Back. Away.
He should leave. Yet the temptation to do the absolute opposite almost overwhelmed him. He wanted to reach out and slide his fingertips down her neck, to push aside that baggy sweatshirt and explore her skin, to draw her close and kiss her past comfortable and right on to pleasured. The concentration required to stop himself made him ache. This chemistry at first sight was explosive. For all of his success with women, it wasn’t something he was used to. He played around but never foolishly. Now it was as if a fever had taken hold. He forced his gaze beyond her, focusing on the house to pull himself together.
It was exactly the shock he needed.
The beach house had always stolen his breath—one moonlit glimpse of the inky water was enough to invoke that old sense of freedom. But the house itself had been altered beyond recognition—entire walls were gone, replaced with larger, newer elements. He’d yet to see all the renovations, but what he could see was so changed. That first feeling of freedom was strangled in seconds by anger. Regret. Self-recrimination. The last time he’d been here was the last time he’d seen his mother alive. And he’d disappointed her so badly.