Tessa Radley - Millionaire Under The Mistletoe

This was not going as he’d planned. He could see her thinking, coming to the Lord knew what conclusion.

Ah, hell. “Not you,” he muttered.

“What?” Her full attention zeroed in on him again.

“I wasn’t going to propose to you.”

An indecipherable expression flashed across her face. “Then who?”

He saw the moment she put it together. Her eyes went dark and blank. “Petra.”

He nodded slowly, uneasy at the way Miranda was looking at him.

“You asked Petra to marry you last night.” She dropped the ring back into the box and the lid snapped shut, the sound loud in the early morning silence. Then she stood up and he heard the box skip across the stainless steel bench.

He flinched. Miranda thought-

“Hang on,” he said urgently, leaping to his feet.

But she ignored him. Swinging on her heel, she marched across the kitchen, her heels tap-tapping a furious tattoo on the matte wooden floor.

“Hey, you don’t understand.” He reached out to restrain her as she stomped past.

She turned her head and gave him a contemptuous glare. His hand fell away.

“Oh, I understand too well. You asked the daughter of a new major shareholder to marry you. She had the sense to refuse, so you slept with the hired help-” she spat out the last two words “-in a fit of pique.” She punctuated her conclusion by marching to the door into the house and slamming it behind her.

A click followed.

Callum skidded after her, only to find she’d locked the door from the hall side. By the time he’d rushed out the back door, through the mews, and around to the front of the row of town houses, Miranda was gone.

The beastly two-timing jerk.

Miranda was still fuming when she arrived at The Golden Goose shortly before noon on Sunday. Fortunately Flo had accepted her arrival home in the clothes she’d gone out in last night with no questions, glossing over Miranda’s stuttered excuse about working late.

Her mother’s skirting the issue hadn’t soothed her as much as it should’ve. Nor did it help that Gianni, the longtime chef, was glowering at her over the chopping block while Mick, the manager, danced around muttering that she was late-even though Miranda knew she’d walked in the door at five minutes to midday.

The final straw came when Mick cornered her later to say that her commitment was lacking. She’d left early last week, and now she was late and she was to take this as a warning. In these tough times, he expected more.

Gianni gave her a sly grin as she passed him, confirming where the heart of the problem lay. She wished she could reassure him, tell him that she had no ambitions to take over his job. But she knew that would only make him rush to tell Mick about her lack of commitment.

She was screwed.

By the time she got home late that night, Miranda was ill-prepared for the sight of an ostentatious bunch of long-stemmed pink roses that must’ve cost some joker a fortune.

And she suspected she knew who the joker might be.

“An admirer from last night?” Flo arched a finely penciled eyebrow. “I thought you said it was work.”

“Must be a thank-you,” Miranda bit out, ripping off the still-sealed envelope and pocketing it to get it out of her mother’s line of sight.

“So considerate.” Flo touched the blooms with reverent fingers. “They’re beautiful. I watered them. Why don’t you put them in your bedroom?”

And be stuck looking at a reminder of last night’s calamity? No, thanks! Stalking away, Miranda wished she hadn’t said they were a thank-you; now she couldn’t even throw the wretched flowers away.

“Someone rang for you earlier.”

Miranda froze in the doorway, but didn’t turn around. “Who?”

“A man. He had a rough voice. It was strangely familiar,” said Flo slowly.

Miranda stifled an anxious groan. “Did he leave a name?” She prayed not. Her mother didn’t need to know she’d been fraternizing with the Ironstones.

“No. He said he’d catch you on your cell phone.”

Her cell phone had been off while she worked. “Thanks, Mum.”

After setting down the unopened white envelope on the dressing table in her room, Miranda made for the bathroom the three of them shared. After she’d showered the odors of The Golden Goose away, she changed into a flannel nightie and brushed her teeth.

Climbing into bed, she finally picked up her cell phone and switched it on. The message light flashed. She stared at it for long seconds.

No. She had no intention of giving in to curiosity and checking to see if Callum had left her a message. The man had dominated her thoughts far too much already. And she was not about to let him cause her another sleepless night.

Setting the phone on the bed stand, she turned the lamp off, refusing to let herself dwell on the reason why she’d slept so little last night…

Miranda was wakened the following morning by banging on her bedroom door. She’d barely opened her eyes before Adrian barged in.

“Phone.” He held out the handset. “Callum.”

Her heart sank. She wished fervently she hadn’t been too cowardly to check her cell phone the night before. Now she was at a decided disadvantage. “Thanks.”

Adrian hovered in the doorway, clearly curious. But an older-sister scowl caused him to roll his eyes and depart. When his footfalls finally faded, she lifted the handset to her ear. “Yes?”

“What happened to good morning?” Callum sounded delighted.

She squinted at her bedside clock. “Do you have any idea what time it is?”

“Although now that I think about it, you didn’t greet me yesterday, either. Maybe you’re not a morning person.”

He had that right. But nor did she want any reminder about waking in his bed yesterday morning. “What do you want?”

“Now there’s a leading question.” He’d lowered his voice to a husky drawl and at once a rush of heat filled Miranda. Oh, heavens! She couldn’t let herself respond to Callum with such unfettered sensual delight.

She tamped it down. “Oh, please, it’s too early in the morning for sexual innuendo.”

He laughed. “Definitely not a morning person. I apologize for calling so early.” That must be a first. “I’m flying out to New York this afternoon,” Callum continued more briskly, “and my schedule this morning is hellish.”

Miranda suppressed the urge to cheer at the thought of Callum over three thousand miles away-it would give her time to recover from the turmoil that sleeping with him had caused her.

He was still talking rapidly. “I’ve got tickets for Les Misérables on Saturday night. Do you want to go? We can have dinner afterward.”

“You called me to invite me on a date?” she said, blank dismay settling over her.

The silence stretched. Then he said, “I suppose you could call it that.”

What else did one call a show and dinner followed by whatever else he had in mind? Shivers prickled as vivid images of what he might be planning assailed her.

The last thing she needed was an affair with Callum Ironstone. She already despised herself enough for allowing him to seduce her-although to be fair she’d been more than willing. If she hadn’t had those glasses of red wine…if he hadn’t been so damn tempting…if he hadn’t kissed her and turned her legs to jelly.

Oh, God, she couldn’t believe she was letting herself relive it all. Callum had taken her to bed the same night he’d proposed to another woman. Because of him her father was dead. How could she have let him touch her? Seeing him again would be a betrayal of her very soul.

“No, I can’t come.”

“Another evening then?”

“No.” She hung up.

The phone rang again. She glared at it. Then picked it up before Adrian-or Flo-could.

“Did you get the message I left on your cell phone last night?”

“No,” she said guardedly, eyeing the phone that winked a message on the bedside table. “But whatever you said wouldn’t have changed my answer.”

“You believe I only slept with you because Petra rejected me.”

That was only the tip of the iceberg. She was furious with herself for sleeping with him at all. Furious with him for making it so easy. “Yes? So what?”

“I never asked Petra to marry me,” he said.

“You didn’t?”

“That’s the message I left for you yesterday.”

“Oh.” She fell silent. Why had he told her this? She wouldn’t allow it to be important. Yet her pulse quickened. Miranda drew a steadying breath, aware that she had to tread carefully.

“It doesn’t make any difference, Callum.” She couldn’t afford to alienate him. He’d given Adrian a vacation job, which might lead to a permanent placement next year. If she annoyed Callum, he might fire Adrian. “I just don’t think it’s a good idea for me to date you.”

She heard him whisper “Liar” just as she hurriedly severed the connection.

This time he didn’t ring back. But before she could set foot out of bed, Adrian slipped into her room.

“What did Callum want?”

She wasn’t telling him that his boss, her nemesis, had asked her on a date. “Nothing to do with you.”

Adrian looked sick. “Sis, please be nice to him.”

Adrian’s anxiety reinforced her own worry that if she annoyed Callum he’d take it out on her brother. But there was a limit to how far she’d go-and Adrian had to know that.

“Be nice?” She loaded the meaning. “What are you asking me to do here, Adrian?”

“I mean be polite.” His Adam’s apple bobbed. “Nothing more. I don’t want to lose this opportunity to get a good reference.”

She hated the idea that Adrian thought she’d jeopardize his work. Was that how bitter she’d become?

Miranda crossed her fingers under the bedclothes. “I did some catering for Callum. We were talking about that.”

His expression cleared. “That’s great. So you’ll be doing more work for him?”

“I didn’t say that,” she said hastily.

“I told him you were a good chef-that you were wasted at The Golden Goose.”

“The Goose is convenient.” Miranda fixed her brother with a narrow stare. Adrian must have told Callum about her dream to run her own catering business. At least that meant her fear that Callum had been able to read her like an open book had been…relatively baseless. “What else did you tell him?”

Her brother spread his hands. “Nothing. I swear.”

She studied him as she swung her legs out of bed. “Okay, I believe you. Now scoot-I want to get dressed.”

But he lingered. “Uh…when will you give me that money?”

“I’ll go to the bank today.”

“Sis…” He hesitated, then said in a rush, “Can you add another couple hundred quid?”

She paused in front of the wardrobe. “More money? When you still haven’t repaid me the fifty pounds I lent you last week?”

He all but ran out of her room. “We can talk about it when you’re dressed,” he said over his shoulder.

Adrian had made breakfast by the time she got to the kitchen. Miranda drew out one of the pine chairs that Flo had sewed yellow-and-white-checked gingham covers for and stared suspiciously at the spread on the table. Scrambled eggs. Bacon. Mushrooms. Toast. Marmalade. Her favorites. “Is this a bribe?”

“No.” But he looked sufficiently guilty for her to frown at him. “I took Mum her food on a tray.”

“So now it’s just you and me.” Miranda sighed as she sat down. “Okay, explain to me why I should pay another cent to sort out your friend’s problems. Hasn’t he got family of his own?”

Adrian turned a dull red that clashed with his freckles. “It’s not for a friend. It’s for me.”

“A new pair of shoes?” she asked snippily. “You know I’m saving. Can’t this wait?”

“No.” He looked down at his plate for long seconds. When he looked up, Miranda was shocked at the desperation in his expression. “I’m in trouble.”

All her worst fears crowded in. “Tell me.”

“Last Monday night-”

“When you went out with your friends?”

He nodded. “I borrowed a car from work, but I crashed it-hit a concrete pillar in a basement parking lot as we were leaving a club.”

Horror filled her. “Everyone was okay?” The pounding of her heart slowed at his nod, and relief seeped through her, turning her limbs weak. No one had been hurt…or worse. “Were you drunk?”

“No.” He looked shaken. “I never drink and drive.”

She relaxed enough to fork a mouthful of food into her mouth. “So get the car fixed.”

“I’ve already had it repaired-and borrowed money from my friends to pay for it. But the amount was more than the original quote-that’s why I need more money. And they’re pressing me to repay them.”

I don’t have any more money. Not for this. Miranda bit back her wail of despair, as the extent of his deceit struck her. “You lied to me.”