“Admit it. You deliberately set out to get under my skin tonight, didn’t you?”

Kosta trailed one finger down the line of sensitivity at the back of her neck. Annis shivered. “Didn’t you?”

“Yes.”

His arms went around her, hard.

“Why?” he murmured against her lips.

“I—don’t know.” And she didn’t.

“Yes, you do.” His hands were molding her body. “Chemistry. You’re getting the hang of it at last.”

Dear Reader,

When I was twelve I made friends one holiday with a millionaire’s daughter. She wasn’t spoiled. She was lonely. Loneliest, perhaps, at home.

I thought I’d forgotten her. Yet when I started to write this story, I found Annis kept reminding me. Annis, though, was lucky. Her father remarried and suddenly she had a little sister!

Two women could not be less alike. Annis is clever and quiet. Bella is bubbly and beautiful. Still, they laugh together, love each other and protect each other’s back. More than friends, allies.

To such an extent, in fact, that I found Annis would not let me go until I had told Bella’s story, too. It disconcerted all of us, including my editor. (Completely threw her schedule.) The Bridesmaid’s Secret, coming next month, is the result.

I hope you enjoy these books as I much as I enjoyed writing them.

Best wishes,

Sophie Weston

Readers can visit Sophie Weston’s Web site at http://www.sophie-weston.com.

The Millionaire’s Daughter

Sophie Weston

www.millsandboon.co.uk

CONTENTS

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

EPILOGUE

CHAPTER ONE

ANNIS CAREW walked into her father’s house and stopped dead. This was not the small, family supper she had been expecting. This was a full scale dinner party with women in jewels, waiters in black tie and, inevitably, tonight’s candidate to help the millionaire’s plain daughter off the shelf.

And what a candidate! Annis picked him out the moment the door closed behind her. He was talking to her father on the other side of the drawing room but they both glanced up to see who had arrived. At once, Annis forgot her father, her kind matchmaking stepmother Lynda, and everyone else in the room.

The candidate was tall and good looking in a sardonic, hard edged sort of way. But it wasn’t his height or his Byronic profile that stopped her breath in her throat. It was what she privately called The Look—the look of a man who did not have to try.

Annis knew The Look from grim experience. She had been meeting—and failing to make any impression on—men with The Look ever since the first smart cocktail party at which Lynda had tried to introduce her to what she called Nice People.

Oh, no, not that one, thought Annis. Lynda, what are you trying to do to me?

Her father had obviously been waiting for her. Lynda’s instructions, no doubt. Now, as he said something to the tall dark man, he looked relieved.

Probably thought I’d realise what was going on and cut loose, thought Annis. As I should have done. How could I be so stupid?

On the telephone this afternoon Lynda had been casual. Too casual, Annis now realised. ‘Come over for supper, darling. It’s so long since we’ve seen you,’ Lynda had said.

And Annis, speeding through her flat on the way to her next meeting, had flung, ‘OK. What time?’ at the telephone speaker without pausing to think.

So now here she was, high and dry, an ugly duckling in her sober business suit among the swans of London’s elite. Rain-draggled hair dripped down her back. Meanwhile The Look shouldered his way purposefully through the crowd to the rescue of the millionaire’s plain daughter who didn’t want rescuing.

Say a big hello to the perfect Friday night, thought Annis. She felt a strong urge to scream. She repressed it. Just.

Annis watched the tall figure bearing down on her. Like most of the men here this evening he was formally dressed. Unlike most of them he was wearing a high collared Nehru jacket in a muted brocade that glimmered richly in the candlelight. It skimmed his slim hips in a fashion that was as flattering as it was startling. Together with his strange, slanted eyes, it gave him an air of slightly exotic danger.

No doubt at all, thought Annis, that the effect was deliberate—and carefully calculated. A peacock, she thought, among all these high priced swans. Who on earth was he?

He reached her and took her hand.

‘Across a crowded room—I knew it would happen one day.’ He had a voice like black treacle, warm and deep and horribly sensuous. You could, thought Annis indignantly, probably drown in that voice. Slowly and pleasurably.

She gave him a wintry smile and removed her hand.

‘Hi, doll,’ said her father, arriving.

Since Annis had become a businesswoman in her own right her father treated her with a breezy camaraderie that imperfectly disguised his gratitude that she no longer admitted to emotions.

‘Hi, Dad,’ she said, cool as the glass of champagne a waiter was pressing into her hand.

‘This is Konstantin Vitale. He specially wants to meet you.’

I’ll just bet he does, thought Annis dourly. She wondered briefly whether it was the opportunity for business offered by her father’s company or her own status as an heiress that had drawn Konstantin Vitale across the room to her side.

Tony Carew answered the question for her. ‘He’s working on the headquarters project.’

‘Ah. Palazzo Carew,’ said Annis, understanding.

Her father’s plans for the new centre he was going to build for his company were enthusiastically extravagant. They had impressed the media and had stunned his rivals. His family had been teasing him about them for months.

‘So, here’s your mystery woman, Vitale.’ He sounded pleased with himself ‘My daughter, Annis.’

‘Mystery woman?’ echoed Annis. She was growing warier by the minute.

The Byronic hero answered before her father had the chance. ‘So late. So damp. So preoccupied.’

To her annoyance, an instinctive hand flew to the soaked strands at the base of her neck. His eyes followed the gesture. She felt embarrassment heat her skin.

She said more sharply than she intended, ‘Nothing mysterious about being late. I let time get away from me, that’s all.’

‘You two should have a lot in common,’ Tony announced.

He gave Annis a conspiratorial grin before he pushed off. She knew that grin. It meant things were going to plan. In this case, she was almost certain the plan in question had been laid down in advance of the party by his wife. She ground her teeth silently.

‘You don’t look as if you agree with him,’ said the black treacle voice, amused. But not only amused. The damned man sounded as if he was caressing her.

Annis felt her spine arch like an angry cat’s. Over his shoulder she could see her reflection in the oval Venetian mirror. It was eighteenth century, one of Lynda’s finds. Curlicued and garlanded, gleaming with gold, it might have been made for Konstantin Vitale, with his brocade coat and dramatic profile.

It had certainly never been intended to reflect someone like Annis. Her short dark hair had been turned black by the rain and was now plastered to her head like a skullcap. The only good thing about it was that the wet hair was also plastered over the ugly scar that ran from her eyebrow to her hairline. Realising it, she scowled horribly, then saw that he was laughing at her again.

Hurriedly Annis readjusted her expression.

‘I always try to keep an open mind,’ she said lightly.

He hardly pretended to believe her.

‘Sure you do.’

Her reflected brows snapped together in a frown of irritation. Annis saw it in despair. Her frowns were notorious. There never seemed to be anything that she could do about them, either.

She struggled to forget that she was over-tired, underdressed and that her minimal make-up had run in the rain. And that the Lord Byron look-alike in front of her had noticed every detail. She even tried to hide how thoroughly jangled she was to find the promised family supper transformed into one of Lynda’s find-Annis-a-man fests. After all, none of that was Konstantin Vitale’s fault, she reminded herself.

‘Sorry,’ she said. ‘Put it down to end-of-the-week neurosis.’ She squared her shoulders, pinned on a polite smile, and tried to retune her mind to social conversation. ‘So what does my father think we have in common?’

The sardonic expression was very evident. ‘To be honest it was Mrs Carew who said you and I ought to get together.’

‘Surprise me,’ muttered Annis.

‘Excuse me?’

She shook her head, annoyed with herself. ‘Nothing.’

His eyes were speculative. ‘She respects you a lot.’

But not enough to accept that I can live without a man. There was a pregnant pause while Annis closed her lips over that one.

‘No, really. She’s a real fan. She was telling me how smart you are. What a great stepdaughter.’ It was almost a question.

Annis knew she was not reacting like a great stepdaughter. ‘That was kind of her,’ she managed in a stifled voice.

‘And unusual.’

Quite suddenly Annis realised she had run out of the ability to pretend. It was something to do with Friday-night tiredness. But more, much more, to do with that seductive voice and the horrible feeling that she was being sucked into something she could not control.

‘No,’ she said on an explosive little sigh. ‘No, it’s not unusual. Lynda does a terrific marketing campaign.’

‘What?’

She fixed the tall dark stranger with a baleful eye. She had been in this situation before. Experience told her there was only one thing she had never tried. Take a firm line straight from the start and hang on to it.

She took a deep breath and did just that. ‘Look, I don’t know what Lynda has told you. But let me set the record straight.’

He looked politely intrigued.

Annis drew a deep breath. ‘I’m twenty-nine years old, I live for my work and I don’t date.’

The man had high cheekbones and strange, slanting green eyes. They did not blink. Not blinking, he said a lot.

Ouch, Annis thought. I don’t think I meant it to sound like that.

She added hastily, ‘Nothing personal.’

It was not, perhaps, brilliantly tactful. The green eyes narrowed almost to slits.

‘That’s a relief,’ he said with a dryness that made her wince.

The deep voice had just a hint of a foreign accent. A very sexy accent. And he was taller than she was. Annis did not usually have to look up to people. It threw her off balance in every way.

‘I don’t want anyone to get the wrong idea. I mean I just like to make things clear. In general.’ She was floundering. Come on, Annis, you can do better than this. ‘Sometimes Lynda can be a bit misleading…’

He did not say anything, maintaining his air of gentle interest. Annis ran out of excusing generalities.

She tried the truth. ‘I—er—I mean I’m a bit of a workaholic.’

She made a despairing gesture. Too big a gesture, as always in this room of objets d’art. Champagne fountained from the glass she’d forgotten she was holding. At the same time a gold-painted plinth swayed at the impact. Konstantin Vitale steadied it. She saw he was looking deeply amused.

Amused! Great!

Of course, she could have said, My stepmother has set me up once too often. She thinks it would be nice for me to meet you. And when she says meet, she means dine with, dance with, holiday with, sleep with and, in the fullness of time, marry. Because my stepmother cannot get her head round the idea that any woman of my age might have other priorities. She thinks I’m scarred and difficult and on the shelf. She wants to help. You’re just the latest in a long, long line of unattached men she thinks might be good for me.

Oh, yes, she could have said that. It was there, every furious word, seething on the tip of her tongue.

Except, Annis was realising uneasily, he did not look like the latest in a long line of anyone. Nor, on consideration, like the sort of man who was likely to be good for the woman of the moment. Challenging, exciting and unpredictable, yes; cynical, certainly. Not, good.

Annis looked into the handsome, world-weary face and was assailed by doubt. Surely even Lynda, who thought she had a moral obligation to throw unmarried people together, wouldn’t imagine she could matchmake for a sophisticate like this?

She said gropingly, ‘Lynda did say she wanted us to meet?’

He was straightening the abstract sculpture on the plinth she had nearly sent flying. He glanced down at her, green eyes glinting.

‘Those common interests of ours, I guess.’

He looked perfectly solemn but Annis knew he was laughing.

Annis’s doubts disappeared. So her first suspicions had been right after all. She was oddly disappointed. She did not want him to be the sort of man to date a millionaire’s daughter, sight unseen.

‘Oh, yes?’ she said freezingly.

He was bland. ‘Meet another workaholic.’

And he held out his hand again.

To her own annoyance, Annis found herself taking it as if he had mesmerised her. It was not the light, social brush of the fingers of that first handshake either. It was a purposeful grasp, as if he were giving her a message.

Startled, she looked down. His hand was tanned and strong. It looked as if he had been working outdoors somewhere in the sun. Her ringless fingers were as pale as water engulfed in his clasp, and looked about as weak, Annis thought in disgust. Was that his message? Indignant she lifted her head and glared right into those strange eyes.

There was a moment’s silence.

Then, ‘Yeah,’ he drawled. As if she had asked him a question. Or as if she were a strange girl he was sizing up across a fairground or the floor of a nightclub. Sizing her up, what was more, with lazy appreciation.

Appreciation? Ridiculous. He had to be mocking her.

Annis tugged her hand away in pure reflex.

She half turned away and spoke at random. ‘If you’re a genuine workaholic, what are you doing at a party? There’s at least another four hours’ working time left tonight.’

It wasn’t a very good joke and Konstantin Vitale didn’t laugh.

‘I could ask you the same thing,’ he said slowly.

Annis was curt. ‘Family.’ She was not going to admit that her stepmother had got her here under false pretences, though. It made her look a fool. So she added lightly, ‘Lynda’s dinner parties are a three-line whip. Besides, I haven’t seen my father since Carew’s half-year results.’

Konstantin Vitale glanced across at his host, currently holding forth by the fireplace. His mouth curled.

‘You work for Carew’s? I thought your stepmother said you were independent.’

Annis bristled. ‘I am. I still take an interest in the family firm.’

The sardonic look deepened. ‘Of course. Why didn’t I think of that?’

He doesn’t like me, she thought. Well, that was mutual.

‘Families do usually take an interest in each other’s affairs.’

‘I’ll take your word for it,’ he said dryly.

Annis narrowed her eyes at him challengingly. ‘No family, Mr Vitale?’

‘None that I’d discuss my financial results with.’

Annis saw the chance for revenge.

‘Could this be why you’re a workaholic?’ she asked sweetly.

He appeared to consider the question. ‘Nothing better to do with my time?’ he interpreted. He shook his head decisively. ‘No, it’s not that. You see, unlike you, I do date.’

The riposte was so unexpected that for a moment Annis could not think of a thing to say. Then she saw the devilish glint of laughter in the green eyes. And was swamped by a blush.

Oh, boy, what a restful Friday evening this was turning out to be!

Annis tried to ignore the heat in her face and the nasty sensation that a master had beaten her at her own game.

‘Each to his own,’ she said crisply, preparing to turn away.

He stopped her by propping himself against the wall and barring her escape route.

‘I so agree. And what is your own, Annis Carew? Are you just playing at business, propped up by family money? Is that what you’re doing here? Checking that the subsidy will keep coming?’

Annis was so indignant she forgot the dying blush.

‘I’m here to network,’ she said furiously and quite untruthfully. ‘In my line of work you seize every opportunity.’

She comforted herself that lots of management consultants did network a great deal. Just because she and her business partner Roy did not choose to, that didn’t undermine the general principle.

‘Plenty of people worth networking with,’ agreed Konstantin Vitale.

How did he manage to sound as if he had found a slug in his salad?

Annis conveniently ignored the fact that when she’d arrived this evening her heart had sunk at the sight of all these dauntingly impressive people. ‘Lucky me,’ she said brightly.

Konstantin Vitale looked bored. ‘And what is this work that you live for?’

‘I’m a management consultant.’

‘Impressive.’ His voice was grave and his face did not change by a muscle.

So why did she think he was mocking her?

Annis set her teeth and decided to fight fire with fire. ‘And what to you do when you’re working on my father’s new building?’

He gave a soft laugh. ‘I keep Carew in line.’

Annis was genuinely startled. ‘What?’

He repeated it obligingly.

Clever, she thought. Her father’s friends called him Tony; his subordinates called him Mr Carew. Konstantin Vitale was making a point. Not an employee, then. And if he was a professional adviser, he was not a very respectful one.

Annis bristled. ‘Forgive me if I say that I find it difficult to imagine.’

‘Too right,’ said Konstantin Vitale blandly. ‘He’s stubborn as hell.’

Most people who worked with Tony Carew were impressed by him. If they weren’t impressed they did not last very long.

‘I take it that your professional relationship with my father is on its last legs?’ said Annis

He was surprised. ‘No. Why? He wants the best. I am the best. He just needs a bit of education to appreciate it, that’s all.’

Annis blinked. She found she had nothing to say in the face of such superb assurance. Out of my depth again.

‘Could be it runs in the family,’ he murmured provocatively.

Annis was instantly suspicious. ‘What does?’

‘A need to be challenged.’

She met his eyes in fulminating silence. He raised one eyebrow. He was amused, confident and—quite temporarily—ready to duel with her. Oh, that Look! Annis could have stamped her foot with frustration.

She stopped pretending that she did not know he was trying to wind her up.

‘No chance,’ she said curtly. ‘Forget it, Mr Vitale. I not only don’t date, I don’t play any other silly games either. Now, I must find my stepmother. Excuse me.’

Annis was still seething when she tracked Lynda down. Her stepmother kissed her on both cheeks, all wide-eyed innocence.

‘So lovely to see you, darling. I saw your father was looking after you. How did you get on with lovely Kosta?’

Annis did not answer that directly. ‘He’s tonight’s people’s choice, is he?’ she said grimly.

Lynda fingered her fabulously simple, fabulously expensive gold collar nervously. She avoided Annis’s eyes.

‘Your father asked him. They’re doing business together, I think.’

‘And no doubt I’m sitting next to him at dinner.’

Her stepmother did not deny it. Another unwelcome thought occurred to Annis, based on previous experience.

‘And my flat just happens to be on his way home, I suppose?’

Lynda did not deny that either. She scanned Annis’s face, clearly concerned.

‘Darling—’

Annis was surprised at the gust of fury that whipped through her. Konstantin Vitale had disturbed her more than any other of Lynda’s offerings, though she could not have said why. She just knew that she hated it.

‘So he offers to drive me home and I’m supposed to say thank you kindly. And go out with him when he calls next week.’ She was shaking with anger. ‘Tell me, Lynda, have you given him my number already?’

In spite of a designer cocktail suit and several thousand pounds’ worth of discreet jewellery, Lynda Carew looked like a guilty four year old caught out in the playground.

‘Not to Kosta. But darling—’

‘Lynda, I love you very much. But will you just stop interfering in my life?’

Lynda looked shaken. Annis had never reacted like this before. All right, she did not usually go out with the men Lynda introduced to her more than once. But at least she greeted them with amused resignation. Lynda had never seen such passion in her level-headed stepdaughter. Or not about men.

She tried to sound airy. ‘But your father had these business types he really wanted to invite. So I thought, Why not?’ Her eyes were huge, blue and limpid. ‘Starting out on her own like that, Annis will probably be glad of a chance to meet some people who could put work her way.’

Annis stared. It was so close to what she had already claimed herself that Lynda might have been eavesdropping. Hoist with my own petard, she thought. In spite of herself, her lips twitched. She flung up her hands in surrender.

‘OK. I’m here to network. Let’s leave it at that.’ But she still looked at Lynda severely. ‘And I get to go home alone, right?’

‘Right,’ said Lynda relieved. She patted Annis’s sober blue shoulder. ‘I suppose you’ve come straight from work?’

Annis sipped the champagne. ‘How did you guess?’

‘You’re always scratchy when you’re tired,’ Lynda said frankly.

That was undoubtedly true. Annis, always fair minded, had to admit it.

Lynda sensed a softening. ‘I wish you wouldn’t make things so difficult for yourself, darling. Why don’t you just try to enjoy yourself for once?’

Annis closed her eyes briefly. ‘You’ve been saying that since I was fourteen.’

‘Then, it’s about time you gave it a try.’

Annis opened her mouth to retort.

‘What you ought to do is go upstairs to my room and freshen up,’ Lynda said coaxingly. ‘That will make you feel better. Borrow an earring or something. And then come downstairs and be nice to people.’

There was a shout of loud laughter from her father’s group at the fireplace. Lynda put a hand on her Annis’s arm. Her expression was suddenly serious.

‘Don’t spoil it, Annis,’ she said in a low voice. ‘It’s so long since he relaxed properly.’

Annis looked down from her five feet eleven into her diminutive stepmother’s exquisite face. Annis had given thanks for Lynda every day since she’d married Tony Carew and had taken his daughter under her wing. They were as different as two women could be but Lynda had given her unstinting affection, making no distinction between Annis and her own daughter Isabella.

What was more, she made Tony Carew laugh again. Under Lynda’s influence he came home from the office at night. He even took some notice of his neglected ugly duckling daughter and found, to his astonishment, that she was interesting. Found that she was not a sullen adolescent, just painfully shy. Found that he liked her.

So now Annis looked at Lynda, who would not remind her that it was she who had given Annis back her father. Annis knew herself beaten. Again.

‘Yes,’ she said capitulating entirely. ‘Yes, all right. I’ll paint my face and sing for my supper. Just no more throwing me together with your spare men.’

Lynda laughed and let go of her arm. ‘Take your drink with you.’

It was only when Annis was sitting in front of her stepmother’s enormous dressing table that she realised that Lynda had made no promises.

‘Outsmarted again,’ she told her reflection with irony, and, as she so often ended up saying after a tussle of wills with her sweetly accommodating stepmother, ‘When will you learn? You’ll walk straight back into the arms of tonight’s Mr Available.’

Only, in spite of all the evidence to the contrary, Konstantin Vitale did not feel like Mr Available. Reflecting on that exchange downstairs, her eyebrows knit in puzzlement.

Of course, it was probably not his fault. It was even possible that he did not know that Lynda was matchmaking. Annis knew her stepmother very well. The most Lynda would have told him was that she needed a spare man to make up numbers and sit next to her clever stepdaughter. That’s what she had told the sculptor, the writer and the aspiring politician.

Lynda’s candidates were normally men with promising futures and a shortage of current cash. That was what made the idea of dating millionaire Tony Carew’s daughter rather attractive, no matter how scarred and difficult she might turn out to be. Annis wondered exactly what Konstantin Vitale did for a living. And if she had done enough to make him think better of the dating-the-unattractive-heiress scenario.

Annis found her reflection was frowning horribly. She leaned forward and smoothed her heavy eyebrows apart. ‘Borrow an earring,’ Lynda had said. Well, she could do better than that with the run of her stepmother’s resources. With the efficiency of long, long practice, Annis set about livening up her neat navy business suit.

She borrowed a silk scarf so fine that it was transparent, with the evening colours of an impressionist painting shimmering as she moved, and some long turquoise earrings that Lynda had brought back from Morocco. No time for elaborate make-up, thought Annis, who was no good at it, even at the best of times. So she just combed her hair forward to hide the scar, flicked damp fronds into place against her long neck and dusted a touch of rose to her full-lipped mouth.

Then she squared her shoulders and went back to face the battle.

Fortunately the first person she saw was not Konstantin Vitale. Not even another glamorous spare man. It was Lynda’s own daughter, Bella.

Isabella, at twenty-three as golden and charming as her mother, regarded Annis as one of her very best friends.

It was Bella who saved her now.

‘Annie,’ she screamed, rushing over.

A number of people looked up and smiled. Across the room, Annis saw, even Konstantin Vitale of The Look glanced up. For a moment the bored shell cracked. He looked almost intrigued. But then, thought Annis wryly, men usually did look intrigued when they first caught sight of Isabella Carew.

Tonight she was on top form, in a slip of a dress that was all shimmery curves and slipping straps, showing yards of perfect leg. She enveloped Annis in a bear hug.

‘Hi, Brain Box.’

Annis kissed her sister more sedately. ‘Hi yourself, Bella Bug. How’s life?’

‘Great. What—’

Lynda frowned her daughter down. ‘We can have a family chat later. There’s someone I want Annis to meet.’

‘Another one?’ said Annis incredulously.

Bella grinned. She was not hampered by any chivalrous feelings of obligation and she knew as well as Annis did what Lynda was up to. Only Bella was a lot better at heading off her mother’s matchmaking tactics.

‘Leave it out, Mother. The girl works. She’s had a hard day. Let her get her breath before Prince Charming parachutes in.’

Annoyance tightened Lynda’s pretty mouth for a moment.

‘I thought you were going to have a word with the cook.’

Bella was impervious. ‘I did. The guys will tell you when she’s ready to serve dinner.’

Lynda gave up. There were more guests arriving and she knew she would not part the girls until they had caught up on each other’s news. ‘We’ll have a good talk later,’ she told Annis. Leaving, she added, belatedly conscientious, ‘You’re looking wonderful, darling.’

Both Isabella and Annis stared after her, speechless.

‘Why does she always sound surprised when she says that?’ said Annis eventually.

Bella giggled. ‘Because she didn’t stand over you and choose every single thing you’ve got on,’ she said. ‘She does it to me too.’

Annis’s eyebrows flew up. She had her father’s eyebrows, heavy and expressive. Like her height and her aquiline nose they were less than feminine, but Annis had learned to use them to good advantage to make her point. As she did now.

Bella snorted with laughter. ‘When Mother saw me tonight, she said didn’t I think I would get cold in this?’

And she gave an illustrative twirl. Across the room Konstantin was arrested. Not, thought Annis, by a tall brunette still wearing her business suit, no matter how much Alessandra van Herzberg silk scarf she had draped across it. It did not augur well for Lynda’s cosy schemes. Good.

‘And will you?’

‘In here? Darling.’ Bella rolled her eyes naughtily. ‘Quite apart from the central heating and the fire, can’t you feel all that hot breath in the air?’

Konstantin had stopped even pretending to listen to the florid man.

‘Oh I can,’ Annis agreed dryly.

‘Anyway, I’m not sure but I think I may—I just may—be getting my love to keep me warm.’

He was measuring the distance between them. He was, Annis thought, going to come over. She was aware of a little flutter under the breastbone. She knew exactly what it was: the plain girl bracing herself for yet another encounter with a man who was going to look straight through her.

Well, that was all right, wasn’t it? She hadn’t liked it when he did not look straight through her, propping himself against the wall and laughing at her. No, of course she hadn’t liked it, Annis answered herself. That didn’t mean that she wanted to be reminded that no man would see her beside beautiful Bella.

With an effort she brought her attention back to her stepsister.

‘Lucky you,’ she said sincerely.

‘Well, it’s early days, but—’ And Bella crossed her fingers for luck.

‘You’ll be fine.’

And she would. Bella skipped from love affair to love affair, delightful, delighted and ultimately uninvolved. Annis, who took a long time to get into a love affair and even longer to get out, could only admire her. Bella launched into each one with total passion. Then, when the passion ran out, she detached herself with skill and kindness and, as far as Annis could see, no injuries at all, not even to the male ego.

But for once Bella was less than confident. ‘I hope so.’ She sucked her teeth, unusually grave. ‘This one makes me jumpy.’

Annis stared. ‘That doesn’t sound like you.’

‘I know. Oh, well, life is full of new experiences.’ Bella dismissed her uneasiness with a shrug. ‘Tell about you. Who is the man of the moment?’

‘Would I be here without protection if there was a man of the moment?’ Annis said dryly.

Against her will her eyes drifted towards Konstantin Vitale. The Look very much in evidence, he was assessing Bella with appreciation, as if she were a new car or some other toy for boys. It made Annis want to hit him.

Unaware, Bella said, ‘You know if you got a feller for yourself Mother would lay off.’

Annis flung up a hand.

‘OK. OK. You haven’t got time for anything but the business. I believe you even if Mother doesn’t.’ Bella looked round. ‘Who is her candidate for tonight, anyway?’

‘I’m not certain,’ said Annis evasively. She had no idea why she did not tell Bella the truth. Except that Konstantin Vitale was now staring unashamedly and Annis somehow did not want Bella to notice. ‘Whoever I’m sitting next to at dinner, I suppose.’

Suddenly very like her mother, Bella looked naughty. ‘Do you want me to distract him?’

Not the way he is looking at you now.

‘I think I can handle it, thanks.’

‘Well, you’ve had plenty of practice.’

Annis managed not to wince. Bella would not have understood. She knew that her mother’s matchmaking annoyed Annis. She had no idea that it was really hurtful.

Annis was saved from her unhappy reflections by the announcement that dinner was served.

‘Here we go,’ said Bella under her breath. ‘Don’t bite his head off, whoever he is.’

The dining room was a picture. The table had been extended to its entire length and covered with a starched and snowy cloth. Around the walls Lynda had filled every alcove and corner table with golden autumn flowers. Polished wood, crystal goblets, gold leaf and silver gleamed in the candlelight.

There were place cards but Lynda stood at the head of the table, skillfully breaking up conversations and directing people to their seats anyway. She waved Bella down the table to sit between two grey-haired men currently deep in debate. It underlined the point that Lynda did not need to do any matchmaking for Bella.

Annis looked down the table. Her heart sank. Yes, there he was. One or two of the men at this evening’s party were positively devastating but there was only one lion in the jungle tonight and she had already met him.

He was standing behind a chair next to an empty place. The confidence blazed out of him. Oh, yes, he was much more than a peacock. The sheer physical vitality of the man was almost shocking. Annis felt her mouth dry, unexpectedly.

As if he felt her looking at him, he glanced up. Their eyes met. His were coldly amused. While she—

Annis drew a sharp breath.

From a distance he looked even tougher than he had close up. Tough and sexy by anyone’s standards, let alone those of a quiet twenty-nine-year-old with more expertise in business than men. And, of course, that was the place that Lynda waved her into.

‘We meet again.’

‘Yes,’ said Annis gloomily. Her heart was pattering irregularly and she had the unpleasant feeling that her head was about to detach from her body.

She turned to look at her other neighbour. He was a tall blond hunk she had seen holding three wide-eyed women enthralled by his conversation before dinner. His hair gleamed as gold as the border on Lynda’s best porcelain.

‘Hello,’ he said, smiling broadly as if she should know him already.

‘I’m Annis—’

‘Hi, Annis, great to meet you,’ he said before his attention was claimed jealously by one of the admiring ladies who still gathered about him. In fact they stubbornly resisted Lynda’s increasingly imperious hand signals to take their own seats.

‘Great,’ muttered Annis.

She squinted at his name card but it was turned at just the wrong angle. Had she met him before? He did seem faintly familiar, now she came to think about it.

Her mind scampered. Son of one of her father’s friends? Employee of Carew’s? Former acquaintance from children’s parties? Sailing club?

In her ear, a dry voice said, ‘Alexander de Witt. He was on the radio on Wednesday, television yesterday and will be all over the Sunday newspapers this weekend. You must be the only person in the room who doesn’t recognise him.’

Annis jumped and turned. She met The Look full on. It had an intensity that made her blink. For a moment, everything went out of her head except how extraordinarily close the man was. How easy it would be to touch his face…to lean forward and bury her face in that brocade jacket…even kiss. Or be kissed.

That shook her. She said, more sharply than she intended, ‘I haven’t got time to listen to chat programmes.’

Konstantin Vitale surveyed her. For a moment Annis had a horrible feeling that he could read her mind. She set her teeth and tried to wipe out all treacherous thoughts of warm bodies and mouths too close. She braced herself.

But then he nodded, as if she had said exactly what he had expected her to say. Not a mind reader, then. Well, not this time. Her breath came out in a whoosh of relief.

‘How long have you been a workaholic, Annis Carew?’

She glanced briefly at her father, at the head of the table. He was looking restless. Wives sitting next to him, rather than businesswomen, deduced Annis fondly.

‘It’s in the genes,’ she said.

Konstantin Vitale followed her eyes.

‘Ah, yes, of course. The phenomenal Tony Carew.’

There was something in his voice that made Annis uneasy. According to Lynda, it was her father who had insisted on inviting him, after all.

‘Don’t you like him?’ she demanded.

‘We have our disagreements.’

Not many people disagreed with her father and stayed on his payroll.

‘What about?’ asked Annis, intrigued enough to forget her uneasiness.

‘Lots of things. Buildings. My timekeeping. Rights and obligations of ownership.’

‘Good grief.’ She looked at him with genuine respect. ‘You’ve been lecturing my father on his obligations?’

He shrugged. ‘I don’t believe in ownership.’

‘Don’t believe—’ Annis choked. Tony Carew was a master capitalist with very pronounced views on what was his.

‘The moment you own something you want to put it in a box and stop anyone else enjoying it. That’s a miserable way of living.’

Annis swallowed. ‘And you’ve told my father as much?’

He laughed suddenly. ‘Sure. He wasn’t very receptive. But I said to him, “Look, there are some things you may be able to lock up and keep for yourself but major buildings aren’t among them. Too many people use them. Too many people see them, for God’s sake.’”

Annis gave a choke of startled amusement. ‘He must have had apoplexy.’

That gave him pause. ‘You are very—frank,’ he said slowly.

‘I’m my father’s daughter.’

Their eyes met. For a moment his were not unreadable. She had disconcerted him, thought Annis. And he did not like it.

Yes, she thought exultantly.

And then the mask was in place again and he was laughing gently.

‘You are indeed. Well, you’ll have to forgive me if I don’t have the Carew—er—frankness.’

‘You mean rudeness,’ said Annis, interpreting without difficulty.

‘You both certainly make yourselves understood.’

‘Do we?’

‘Clear as crystal,’ he said dryly, as if he could read her like a book.

It was an unsettling thought. And she was even more unsettled when he said in quite a different voice, ‘Though you’re more of chameleon than your dad.’

‘What?’

‘I like the transformation. Turquoise suits you.’

He did not actually touch her breast where the evening-sky silk was draped. But Annis recoiled as if he had put his hands on her. The green eyes lifted, intrigued. She saw the sudden speculation there and could have kicked herself.

To hide it, she said, ‘Don’t be deceived. The plumes are borrowed.’

‘I wasn’t deceived,’ he said softly.

Damn!

She said hastily, ‘What exactly do you do for my father? I know you work for him but are you on the payroll of Carew Electronics?’

‘In a way.’

‘That means you don’t want to tell me,’ Annis said wisely. ‘Why not?’

He shrugged. ‘Business confidentiality,’ he said vaguely.

Annis smiled. ‘My father is in the process of poaching you,’ she deduced.

‘No. I’m my own boss. And going to stay that way. Though I guess Carew does a lot of poaching where he can.’

‘Doesn’t every businessman?’

He looked at her curiously. ‘You tell me. Isn’t that the sort of thing you advise on? Where to poach key staff?’

Annis laughed. ‘If you don’t already know that, then your business is way beyond the help of a management consultant.’

She thought he would laugh. But he did not. Instead there was an unnerving silence while he watched her.

At last he said slowly, ‘You really are your father’s daughter, aren’t you?’

Annis tensed. She could feel the frown coming and fought it. ‘Am I supposed to apologise for that?’

‘No. No of course not. It’s just—’

But Lynda had got everyone seated at last and the waiter was beginning to take the first course round the table. Annis helped herself to cheese soufflé and Konstantin Vitale’s attention was claimed by the woman on his other side. Annis felt reprieved. By contrast, the massive but uncomplicated ego of Alex de Witt was a piece of cake.

‘So who’s here, then?’ he said, smiling across the table at one of his admirers.

Annis hid her amusement. ‘The usual mix. Carew Electronics. My stepmother’s charity committees. A couple of neighbours.’

Alex de Witt was not very interested in neighbours.

‘Have you seen Totality yet?’

And then she slotted him into place. He was starring in a new play which had hit the headlines. She almost snapped her fingers as she realised.

‘No, I haven’t managed to get there yet but it’s on my list.’ A thought occurred to her. ‘Come to think of it, why aren’t you on stage tonight?’

He beamed. ‘We’re transferring to the West End. Opening next Thursday. Provided the director can get his act together, of course.’

Annis recognised a cue when she heard it. She took it effortlessly.

‘Do you have to rehearse all over again when you transfer from one theatre to another?’

The actor’s monologue carried them through the first course, second helpings, the removal of plates, a change of wine and the appearance of new china for the second course. Waiters arrived with large serving dishes of boeuf en croûte and Annis sighed. She had been well brought up. She knew you talked to the neighbour on your right for the first course, left for the second. Her respite was over.

Mentally girding herself, she turned back to Konstantin Vitale and pinned on a social smile.

‘Have you been in London long?’

He did not answer that directly. ‘Very smooth.’

Annis could feel her social smile stiffening. ‘What?’

‘Only it won’t work, you know.’

Annis’s smile felt like a rictus on her stiff mouth. ‘What do you mean?’ she said in a voice that was not social at all.

‘If we’re going to talk at all, tell me something I don’t know. Like what your sort of management consultant does. And what turned you into a workaholic. Don’t bother asking me pretty questions about myself because I don’t play that game. It bores me.’

Her skeleton smile disintegrated abruptly.

‘Well, we mustn’t have that, must we?’ said Annis furiously.

‘I’ll trade. One secret—that’s all, just one—for everything you want to know about me.’

‘I don’t want to know a thing—’ Annis began with heat, until she saw the mocking glint in his eyes. Oh, how quickly she had risen to his baiting! She drew a long, careful breath and said, ‘Anyway, I don’t have secrets.’

She did not sound encouraging. She did not mean to. Konstantin Vitale’s eyes narrowed appreciatively.

‘Yes, you do.’

‘What?’

‘Mystery lady,’ he said, so softly that only she could hear.

‘I am not a mystery,’ she said between her teeth. ‘And if you are trying to flirt with me, you can just stop right now.’

He did not say anything, waiting.

‘I don’t play that game,’ she quoted back at him, goaded.

He raised his eyebrows, acknowledging a hit. Annis nodded coolly, half in triumph, half in simple relief.

Kosta Vitale looked at his companion thoughtfully. He really had been drawn to her the moment he saw her across the room. More than that, he had felt a shock. It was as if he had been waiting for her, or as if she was someone he’d recognised from a long distant, idyllic past. In fact, he had looked twice to make sure that he did not know her. But he knew he had never met Tony Carew’s daughter.

And then, as soon as Tony had introduced them, Kosta had known this was going to be a whole new experience.

Annis Carew was not the sort of woman who usually attracted him. For one thing, from that first handshake, she had turned him into an opponent. For another, though she duelled well, she seemed to wince away from ripostes that she had asked for. He did not like women like that. They handed it out, but any man they went to war with was expected to pull his punches. Maybe it came from being a millionaire’s daughter.

And yet…And yet…Her eyes were full of mysteries. Kosta was shocked to find how much he wanted to explore those mysteries. But he did. Through and through. From the height to their depths.

I’ll have to be careful with this, thought Kosta, shaken.

‘All right,’ he said after a moment. ‘No secrets,’ adding silently, Yet. ‘Tell me about your career. Unless that’s on the classified list too.’

She bit back a nasty remark and said with icy civility, ‘I trained as a management consultant with Baker Consulting. I set up a partnership with a colleague six months ago.’

‘That’s why you’re a workaholic?’

Suddenly she smiled with real amusement. It turned her eyes gold, like the lamplight. Kosta watched, fascinated.

‘No, I’ve always been a workaholic.’ She drew a deep breath and the gold died out of her eyes. ‘Now can we talk about something that interests me?’

Raise your foil, Kosta, off we go in the next bout, he thought dryly.

But there was something he wanted to know first. No, not wanted. Needed to know.

‘So who is this partner? The reason you don’t date?’

Annis put a lid on her annoyance and registered a private resolution to rock the damned man off his complacent axis if it was the last thing she did.

In pursuit of this end, she sat back in her chair and sighed elaborately.

‘I don’t date because I don’t want to,’ she drawled. ‘To use your own words, it bores me.’

It was not true. But Annis was in too much of a temper to remember that. Especially as she seemed to score a hit. Not the bull’s-eye maybe. But a definite hit. The steady green eyes even blinked for a second.

‘Dating bores you?’

He sounded outraged, thought Annis, pleased.

‘I’m not keen on competitive games,’ she explained sweetly.

‘Competitive?’ He sounded disbelieving. ‘You must have dated some real oddballs.’

She flinched. He’s telling me I’m so weird no normal man would take me out. It hurt. Of course, she knew it wouldn’t have hurt if it had not been exactly what she was already afraid of. Annis felt her temper fly straight through the top of her head.

But she was too used to controlling her feelings to allow it to show. ‘No, no. Standard issue,’ she assured him affably.

His eyes flickered. ‘They have my sympathy.’

Annis flinched inwardly. That’s what comes of mixing it with the sexiest man in the room, she told herself, rejecting the hurt. You started it. So have your fun. Just expect to pay for it.

The woman on his other side said something. He inclined his head courteously for a moment, not taking his eyes off Annis. A smile began to lift one corner of his mouth. Not a nice smile.

‘I don’t think Ms Carew would agree with you. She’s just told me she doesn’t date. I don’t imagine she flirts, either.’ He leaned back so the two women could talk to each other.

That, thought Annis, was not playing fair. Theirs was supposed to be a private battle. He knew it as well as she did. But she set her teeth and prepared to meet him on this new ground. ‘Flirt?’ she echoed, smiling. ‘Me? Why not?’

‘You were the one who just told me to stop,’ he reminded her, enjoying himself.

Her eyes glittered.

Before she could retaliate, however, Kosta was addressing the subject to the table at large. ‘And I’m sure you’re right. Flirting,’ he announced ‘takes Mediterranean flair. The English don’t trust flirting any more than they trust garlic. Quite apart from the individual temperament.’

He glanced down at Annis quizzically.

He’s mocking me. He wants everyone else to join in, she thought. Her heart twisted. She concentrated on her anger.

The other woman frowned him down. Annis had met her before. She was on one of Lynda’s charity committees, a media personality. Now she was looking apologetic.

‘I was just saying to Kosta that flirting is one of the great lost skills.’

Konstantin Vitale smiled straight into Annis’s indignant eyes. ‘And I told Sally that you wouldn’t agree.’

Annis widened her eyes at him. ‘Oh? Why? It seems pretty lost to me. No sign this evening that either you or I know how to flirt, is there?’

Sally drew in a startled breath. Konstantin Vitale ignored her. He sat bolt upright and stopped smiling.

‘And no sign that you regret it for a moment,’ he told Annis crisply. ‘Like I said, no temperament for it.’

Sally murmured. ‘Fifteen-all.’

Annis was hotly indignant. It felt great. ‘You can’t expect someone to flirt with you if you make her account for herself as if you’re interviewing her for a job.’

Sally gave a soft laugh. ‘Ta-da. She’s got you there, Kosta.’

‘What else is a man to ask her about when the first thing she tells him is that she lives for her work?’

‘Thirty-all.’ Sally was enjoying herself hugely.

‘And when she tells him she’s at the party to network.’

‘Thirty-forty.’

Annis stared up at him. His eyes were curiously intent. She found she could not think of one thing to say.

‘And that dating bores her.’

‘Game, set and match,’ crowed Sally.

He did not take his eyes off Annis. ‘No,’ he said softly. ‘Not yet.’

And smiled.

Annis felt as if all her clothes had fallen off.

She did something she had not done since she was a child. She pushed her chair back with a harsh scraping noise and scrambled to her feet. ‘Excuse me.’

She fled.

CHAPTER TWO

ANNIS took refuge in her old room.

There was an old sycamore whose leaves brushed her window, sending strange patterns across the moonlight. She would watch the shadow pictures from her bed. Now the late autumn branches were nearly bare. Annis shivered. They looked as exposed as she felt.

Why had she let Konstantin Vitale get to her like that?

She went to the window and leaned her hot forehead against the glass.

She could not remember ever feeling like this, so angry and muddled and helpless. Even when Jamie had decided that she did not add anything to his street cred she had not felt like this. She had just cleared all his belongings out of the flat and set about turning it back into her own exclusive island. Since then she had defended her home against the world and her heart against sexy, confident men. Defended them successfully, what was more.

So how had Konstantin Vitale managed to turn her defences upside down with a drawling quip that he probably hadn’t even meant?

You’re not a clumsy adolescent any more. You can handle any amount of drawling sophistication. So why have you let him throw you into a spin?

Annis put her fingers to her throbbing temples. The scar was rough under her left forefinger. She dropped her hands as if she had burned them. It was not often that she forgot the scar. Yet she had not given it one thought since she sat down next to him at the dinner table.

Well, at least her unaccustomed temper had done that for her, she thought wryly.

Come on, get a grip.

There was a small vanity unit in the corner. Annis splashed cold water on her face. She blinked at the shock of it but at least when she straightened she felt more normal.

‘No more anger,’ she said aloud.

She peered at herself in the well-lit mirror. Too well-lit. It showed the puckered skin from eyebrow to hairline as if a special effects’ artist had just drawn it on. It looked as it had done when her mother had picked her up and had recoiled, her face a mask of revulsion. So long ago and yet Annis could still see it as clearly as if it was happening right in front of her eyes now.

Deliberately she put the thought away from her.

‘Come on, Scarface,’ she told herself wryly. ‘You can hold it together. You’ve done it before. You’ll never see Konstantin Vitale again after tonight. He’s not worth wasting anger on. Just treat him as a short-term project.’

She patted her face dry and pulled the softly curling hair forward to hide the scar. Then, straightening her shoulders, she went back to face the music.

It was not as bad as she’d feared. At the end of the second course Lynda decided that she wanted to mix her guests around. So all the men were told to move six chairs to their left.

‘I’ll see you after the musical chairs,’ Konstantin told Annis graciously.

‘I’ll look out for you.’

He looked at her sharply and she realised that the ambiguity was not lost on him. Sexy, arrogant and shrewd. Oh, Lynda had really excelled herself this evening.

But somehow the perfectly nice men who sat next to her during the cheese and dessert courses were insipid by contrast.

Crazy, thought Annis, applying herself hard to the finer points of widget design as described by her father’s newest head of research. She greeted Lynda’s discreet sign to the ladies to leave the table with relief.

They all congregated in Lynda’s bedroom, fluffing up shining hair that did not need it and reapplying colour to make-up that already looked perfect.

And talking about the men left behind at the table. Of course.

‘He’s so gorgeous,’ said Gillie Larsen.

‘And tonight he’s got Annis’s name on him,’ murmured Bella naughtily as she swished past with a box of tissues.

Annis frowned at her. ‘Behave.’

Bella’s eyes danced. ‘You sat next to him and your heart didn’t just melt?’

Annis thought of Konstantin Vitale: the Byronic looks; the intensity.

‘Not my type,’ she said with feeling.

Bella chuckled. ‘Mother will cut her throat.’

‘Tough,’ said Annis hardily.

Bella delivered her burden and came back to sit beside Annis on the ottoman at the end of Lynda’s impressive gilded bed.

‘Seriously, Mother’s going to despair. He was her prize. You have no idea how hard she had to work to get him here tonight.’

‘But I thought Dad asked him?’

Bella pulled a face. ‘You know Mother. Maybe she thought it sounded better coming from Dad. All I know is that she’s been planning this for weeks. He’s dropped out several times. That’s why she wasn’t going to ask you until the last moment.’

‘Ah,’ said Annis. So that explained the hurried invitation.

‘And your heart didn’t miss a beat? Not for a microsecond?’

She was not going to tell Bella that he had made her feel naked. Nor that her heart had been going like a steam hammer for longer than she could admit, even to herself.

So Annis put on her haughtiest business lady expression. ‘What heart?’

Bella snorted. ‘Don’t give me that. You’re as soft as Mother and me.’

‘Not,’ said Annis patiently, ‘about alleged heart throbs.’

Bella shook her head. ‘Don’t believe you.’

‘Look.’

Annis put her arm round her sister’s waist and walked them both over to Lynda’s full-length curlicued mirror. In spite of the scarf, her navy suit looked even more severe next to Bella’s gleaming bare shoulders. Bella barely came up to her chin, fragile and restless and heartbreakingly pretty. Whereas I, thought Annis, look like a troll. A tall troll.

Bella put her head on one side.

‘You look a bit pale,’ she allowed, ignoring all the other differences between them.

Annis gave a crack of laughter. ‘I did borrow some of Lynda’s lip gloss, honest. But then I splashed some water on my face and it must have washed off.’

‘When you ran away from the table, right?’ Bella nodded. ‘I noticed.’ She swung round and narrowed her eyes at Annis. ‘It didn’t look as if it was anything to do with Alex. It looked as if Kosta had upset you.’

Annis said nothing.

‘You shouldn’t take any notice,’ Bella said kindly. ‘He gets so involved in an argument he can’t let go. He doesn’t mean to be unkind.’

Annis looked at her incredulously.

‘Well, he means it at the time,’ Bella admitted. ‘But he forgets as soon as the argument is over.’

It sounded as if Konstantin Vitale was a more frequent visitor to the Carew household than Annis had realised. In which case, why had it taken Lynda the weeks that Bella had spoken about to get him to come to her dinner party?

Before Annis could demand an explanation, Bella went on buoyantly, ‘And anyway, you made Alex laugh.’

‘Bella,’ said Annis goaded. ‘I am a successful businesswoman and I like living alone.’

Why didn’t it sound convincing? It was true. Only, in her stepmother’s pretty bedroom, surrounded by designer cocktail gear and a heavy cloud of French perfume, it somehow lost that ring of truth.

And Bella, all smiling tolerance, made it ten times worse. She plainly did not believe a word. Annis could have screamed.

‘I—am—not—looking—for—a—man,’ she said loudly.

Gillie Larsen twinkled at her in the mirror.

‘Go for it, girl.’

Gillie was a new neighbour and had become a friend in the last few months. Annis twinkled back gratefully. It also gave her an idea. She registered a resolve to get Gillie on her own when the boudoir crowd thinned out.

Meanwhile, Bella said. ‘Look, you won’t get near mother’s dressing table for ages. Come to my room and I’ll lend you some blusher, at least.’

Annis went. Bella cleared a space on her dressing table and provided her with a hand mirror and a palette of colours. For a few moments, she watched Annis critically, then took the little brushes out of her hands and began to dust in colour with swift skill.

Lynda put her head round the door. ‘All right? Bella, the Larsens were asking about that guide to Ecuador.’

‘It’s in the study.’ Bella put down the brushes. ‘I’ll get it.’

‘Give it to Gillie, darling. She’s gone down to the drawing room.’

Bella went. Annis picked up one of the discarded brushes and flicked shadow across her eyelid in experiment. She leaned forward to peer at her reflection. It was not impressive.

‘Why does this stuff make Bella look like a million dollars and turn me into a clown?’

‘Practice,’ said Lynda, taking the palette away from her.

She handed her a small impregnated pad and Annis wiped the colour off her eyelid carefully.

‘I could give you a session at Cosmic Works,’ Lynda said tentatively. ‘They teach you how to highlight your best features, what colours suit you best in various lights, that sort of thing.’

Annis dabbed away the last of the eye shadow. ‘No time.’

Lynda sighed but did not demur. For all her apparent fluffiness, she seldom lost focus. ‘So how did you like your dinner companion?’

Annis met her eyes in the mirror. There was a speaking silence.

‘In another age you would be tried as witch you know,’ she said at last.

Lynda smiled. ‘A white witch, darling. You know I only want the best for you.’

And the trouble was she did. As a stepmother she had only one failing. While Jamie had been around it had been easy to keep her at bay, but since they’d broken up Lynda had been more determined than ever to find her stepdaughter a suitable partner for life. Annis was torn between affection and despair.

‘If only your idea of what is best for a woman wasn’t someone tall, dark and handsome to take all the decisions and keep her warm at night!’

Lynda laughed. ‘Darling, you’re so serious. I just want you to have some fun.’

‘Well, I didn’t have a lot of fun with this evening’s candidate,’ said Annis. ‘He tried to grill me.’ She swung round on the dressing stool. ‘Why does he dislike Dad so much?’

‘Does he?’ Lynda sounded surprised.

‘Not much doubt. And another thing,’ said Annis, cheering up at the thought, ‘he doesn’t like me for the same reasons. Whatever they are.’

‘Don’t be silly, darling. You’re always thinking people don’t like you and it’s not true.’

‘No, I’m not. I just—’

‘The trouble is that you work so hard you forget how to talk to people. Your father,’ said Lynda in the tone of someone quoting the oracle, ‘is very worried about it.’

Annis gave a choke of laughter.

Lynda glared. ‘He is.’

Annis stood up. ‘If he is, it’s because you told him he had to be,’ she said fondly. ‘You know perfectly well the only thing Dad and I ever talk about is work.’

Lynda sighed and muttered. But she could not deny it.

Tony Carew might not have noticed when his only daughter stopped talking about James Gould and dropped ten pounds in a couple of weeks. But he knew the business plan of her new venture inside out and had a pretty good grasp of the partnership’s current client list.

‘No talking business tonight?’ It was somewhere between a plea and an order.

‘I’ve resisted so far,’ Annis said kindly. ‘But I thought you wanted me to network.’

‘Not with your father.’

Annis laughed. ‘OK. If Dad corners me I’ll talk about Alex de Witt’s new play. All right?’

Lynda beamed. ‘Sometimes,’ she said, ‘you can be a lot less difficult than you like to pretend. I must go and pour coffee. Come down when you’re ready.’

But Annis had a plan to carry through first. She cornered Gillie Larsen.

‘I need a favour,’ she muttered under her breath.

Gillie was perceptive. She detached herself from her conversation and moved into the hallway where they would not be overheard.

‘What is it?’

‘A lift home. I came by taxi and I don’t want Lynda to organise someone into doing chauffeur duty.’

Gillie was not deceived, though she identified the wrong potential chauffeur. She grinned. ‘Don’t trust Alex de Witt’s driving? OK, you can catch a ride with us. But we’ll have to go soon. We’ve got a sitter.’

‘The sooner the better,’ said Annis with feeling.

‘Poor Annis. Who’d have fairy stepmothers?’ teased Gillie. ‘Grab yourself a quick coffee and we’ll go.’

Everyone had congregated in the drawing room. Lynda waved a hand towards the bookcase but Annis would have found the chair Lynda had designated for her with the ease of long experience. Far enough away from her father not to talk business. Not close enough to any of the artwork to break it, thought Annis, slipping into the low chair in the corner.

Someone gave her a tiny cup of coffee, fragile as glass.

‘Thank you,’ she said, concentrating.

Lynda had brought the cups from Japan and they were beautiful and unique.

‘I said I’d find you,’ purred a voice in her ear. It was a voice that she was coming to know.

Annis jumped so violently that the little cup hopped on its saucer. There was an ominous tinkling sound.

‘Aagh,’ she said, pardonably.

He caught an apostle spoon mid-air, one-handed. Then he took the rocking cup away from her.

‘You’re death to crockery, aren’t you?’ he said, amused.

‘Not just crockery,’ said Annis, betrayed into shameful truth by shock. ‘I’ve been known to push my chair back into an Arabian urn in my time. The insurance paid up but it was touch and go. That’s why Lynda sent me over here. Maximum shadows, minimum hazards.’

He laughed. ‘Well, I appreciate the removal of hazards but I think the shadows are a shame.’

It was his caressing voice. In spite of herself Annis felt a faint heat rising in her cheeks. She swallowed, avoiding his eyes.

The delicate saucer was awash with coffee but he did not, Annis saw with irritation, spill a drop as he put it down on the bookshelf behind her head. He passed her a handkerchief.

‘What’s this for?’

She had to look up a long way. The little dress seat was very small and Konstantin Vitale was taller than she had allowed for. It hurt her neck and her pride about equally.

He smiled. ‘You may want to blot your front. Or I’ll do it if you like.’

Annis snatched the handkerchief and dabbed at the dark patch on the breast of her jacket. He laughed.

‘Thank you,’ she said glacially.

‘My pleasure.’ It sounded as if he meant it.

‘Grr.’

A tall man whipped round at her growl. ‘Oh, sorry, Annis, did you want a chocolate?’ It was Laszlo Larsen, Gillie’s husband. He looked startled. He had probably never heard a woman growl before.

‘No,’ snapped Annis, still glaring at her tormentor.

Laszlo blinked. Konstantin took the gold box of dark chocolate truffles away from him and passed them on.

‘Don’t worry. She just likes things to be clear,’ he told Laszlo reassuringly.

Annis froze. There was a horrible assumption of intimacy in the throw away remark. It was as if Konstantin Vitale knew her well enough to explain her feelings to third parties.

He sent her a quick look. ‘Or so she tells me,’ he added with an understanding smile.

That was worse. He really can read my mind, thought Annis, shaken. She was silenced, appalled at the implications of that.

Laszlo did not notice. He smiled. ‘Vitale, isn’t it?’ He held out his hand. ‘Larsen. I read your article on smart buildings. Impressive stuff.’

Suddenly she realised what he must be doing for her father. Tony Carew had a thing about smart buildings.

‘You’re an engineer?’ she said abruptly.

‘Architect.’

Larsen glanced down at her, surprised. ‘The architect. He’s designed Tony’s imperial palace on the river. Didn’t you know?’

‘Sorry,’ Annis said, not sounding it. ‘Lost the plot on that one. Too busy. I’ve been setting up my own business, you know.’

Laszlo, a banker, did know. All too soon he was telling Konstantin how brilliant she was, how her clients sang her praises. He went on until his hostess claimed his attention.

Annis drew a relieved breath and debated whether she dared risk picking up her coffee again. She looked at the high tide in the saucer and decided against it.

‘Why am I so clumsy?’ she asked the air.

‘Why worry? It clearly doesn’t affect your success.’

Annis turned her head. She wasn’t flattered. Their private battle wasn’t over yet. They both knew it. So she was deeply suspicious when he paid her a compliment.

‘Success?’

‘If you’ve got de la Court on the books, you’re a success,’ he said positively.

‘You know him?’

‘We have a lot in common. Small operation. High technology. Unique personal vision. Probably both geniuses, if he’s on your books, maybe I could use you.’

‘You could use a modesty transplant,’ said Annis, outraged.

He was still pursuing his own line of thought. ‘There seems to be a problem in the London office and I don’t know what it is. Do you think you could handle it?’

Annis was tempted to say a number of things she would probably regret later. But Roy was teaching her caution.

‘Depends,’ she said not very graciously.

Konstantin looked amused. ‘A good consultant’s answer. No promises, no commitment.’

Annis curbed her irritation. ‘I mean it depends on the problem.’

He raised a sceptical eyebrow.

‘Look,’ she said with heat, ‘I’ve seen everything from geriatric product to a homicidal manager. I can make suggestions about new product lines. I’ve no cure for mania.’

‘Oh, that wouldn’t be a problem for us,’ he said airily. ‘There’s no manager in the London office.’

Annis stared. ‘You’re joking, right?’

He looked faintly annoyed. ‘Why should I be? Cut into the twenty-first century, Ms Carew. This is the digital age. We talk all round the world by tickling a mouse. Managers are an anachronism. Now, want to take us on?’

Well, that was probably the answer to his problem, Annis thought. Whether he would accept it, of course, was another matter. She had met self-willed geniuses before and they did not make rewarding clients. She pursed her lips.

‘We’ve got a lot on at the moment…’

He did not moderate his triumph. ‘I thought not.’

She narrowed her eyes and fixed him like a gimlet. ‘But I can see that this one could be a challenge. I’ll take a look and give you a quote.’ She fished under the chair for her bag and pulled out her personal organiser. ‘When would suit you?’

It was bravado, of course. She never thought for a moment he would take her up on it. Did she? Three days later Annis was still asking herself that.

Vitale and Partners had a small, crowded office in a late-eighteenth-century house in Mayfair. There were papers and magazines on every chair so there was nowhere for a visitor to sit. The phones rang all the time. The water dispenser was leaking and the coffee machine looked about to explode. People ran past her at the trot, shouting incomprehensible instructions to each other. The girl in charge of this chaos was standing in a half-open doorway being shouted at.

‘Great,’ muttered Annis.

She scooped a pile of glossy style magazines off the sofa and plonked them on the floor. That gave her somewhere to sit down. She did.

And rose swiftly. She had sat on an umbrella. It was nearly but not quite closed and a couple of its spikes had attached themselves like a hungry sea anemone to her smart grey skirt. It was also, she found as she tried to detach it, still wet.

‘Excuse me,’ she said to the girl who was still being rebuked.

The girl sent her a harassed look, turned back to the room from which the invective was pouring, hesitated…

Annis lowered her voice and, as she had been taught, projected.

‘Excuse me.’

Everyone in the vestibule froze. Even the ringing telephones seemed to falter briefly.

Then another door banged back on its hinges.

‘Workaholic Carew,’ said Konstantin Vitale. He looked delighted. ‘I wondered when you’d get here. You’re late.’

‘I’ve been here fourteen minutes,’ Annis said precisely. ‘And I’ve been bitten by an umbrella.’ She gestured to her unwanted appendage. ‘Can you unhook me, please?’

‘Ah. I’ve heard about that habit of yours,’ he said, weaving his way through the debris.

‘Of mine?’ Annis was nearly speechless.

‘And seen it at work,’ he went on. ‘Death to household appliances and crockery, aren’t you, Carew?’

He detached the thing and cast it back onto the sofa.

Annis retrieved it.

‘You want an old umbrella?’ he said, eyebrows raised.

‘I think,’ she said with restraint, ‘that it might be a good idea to remove it before someone else sits on it.’

He pulled a face. Clearly the sort of detail that was way beyond his lofty consideration, thought Annis. She found she was shaking with temper.

He crooked a finger at the girl in the doorway. ‘Lose this man-eating umbrella, will you, Tracy?’

Summoned by the big cheese, the girl did not hesitate any longer, Annis noticed. She also noticed that the girl looked at him almost with worship as she removed the umbrella from his disdainful fingers.

Annis took her first step as Konstantin Vitale’s management consultant. It was pretty low-grade but at least she was asserting herself. ‘No. Don’t lose it. Give it back to whoever brought it in. Make them put it somewhere safe or bin it.’

‘Er—’ said Tracy.

‘Well, go on,’ said Konstantin. ‘It seems a bit micro but this is what the lady is being paid for. Give it to the owner.’

‘It’s yours,’ blurted Tracy.

‘Oh.’ He stared for a moment, nonplussed. ‘Oh yes, that’s right.’

Annis repossessed it and handed it back to him. ‘Somewhere safe. Or bin it,’ she said again firmly.

He lost his smile. ‘But I don’t want it cluttering up my office.’

‘Then bin,’ commanded Annis, looking round.

Tracy gave a small giggle, hastily smothered.

‘Oh, all right.’ Konstantin snatched it from her and ushered her into his office. ‘Great contribution,’ he said ironically. ‘Thanks a million.’

Today there was no sign of the peacock. He was wearing weathered jeans that looked as if he had climbed over a building site in them, which he probably had. His shirt was navy, a heavy-duty cotton and open at the neck. No concessions to the October weather, no concessions to the fact that he had a business meeting, Annis thought. Or maybe seeing her didn’t count as a business meeting.

Annis worked hard at feeling affronted. It was better than noticing that his outdoor tan went as far down his chest as she could see. Or that the work clothes revealed muscles that she had only guessed at in the soft lights of her stepmother’s drawing room.

Konstantin shut the door behind them. The noises of the outer office were muted but not extinguished.

Annis dragged her mind back to the issue in hand and sat down without waiting to be invited.

‘I don’t do time and motion,’ she said calmly. ‘That’s just common sense. This place is appalling.’

‘What?’

It was nice to disconcert him.

‘Appalling,’ she said firmly. ‘There’s no room, no method, no sound insulation. The filing is all over the floor and nobody seems to realise that for telephones to work you have to answer them.’

He stared. Too shocked to reply, she thought.

‘I cannot believe that you run a serious business here.’

His mouth twitched suddenly. ‘Haven’t you heard of creative chaos?’

‘No,’ said Annis baldly. She looked at her watch. ‘I’m wasting my time here. You don’t need me. You need someone with a clipboard and a floor plan. And a lot of dustbin bags, probably.’ She got up. ‘Good day.’

He threw the umbrella away.

‘Don’t go. I do need you. Really.’

She narrowed her eyes at him. ‘Why?’

He gave her a charming smile. It crinkled up the green eyes, making him look guileless. Annis did not trust him an inch.

‘The business has grown without me really planning it. It needs some—refocusing.’

She looked at him in deep suspicion. ‘Oh?’

He propped himself on the edge of a table littered with plans and drawings. He had not fastened his cuffs and they fell back to reveal muscular forearms. Her mouth dried. Annis whipped her gaze away fast.

Kosta caught the momentary flicker in her eyes. It surprised him. He had been beginning to think he was wrong, that there was nothing to this woman but her needle-sharp brain and a temper like an ice pick. That tell-tale shiver encouraged him.

But he was much too experienced to let it show.

‘I never meant to be international,’ he said ruefully. ‘Even with e-mail and scanners, I sometimes think it’s more nuisance than it’s worth.’

He could see she was intrigued.

‘Where is the main office?’

‘Milan. That’s where I started.’

‘You’re Italian?’

He liked her surprise. It meant that she had been thinking about him, in spite of all appearances to the contrary.

‘I’m a mongrel.’ Something prompted him to add, ‘I set my own rules.’

Her eyes gave that little flicker again. He liked it. No, she was not as cool as she wanted him to think, businesslike Annis Carew.

‘What sort of mongrel?’

‘A wandering one.’ To his surprise, he found himself giving her the full story. ‘My mother came from a village on the coast in what is now Croatia. My father was on holiday from Italy when they met. She went to Australia when I was three.’

Annis looked puzzled. ‘Australia? You don’t sound Australian.’

‘I took off round the world when I was fourteen,’ he said, watching her. ‘I’ve lived all over. I trained in Boston. But my first big job was in northern Italy. Milan is a great city and the Italians really care about their buildings. So I thought, why not stay?’

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