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Titus gripped the steering wheel as he stared at the splendour of his ancestral home. At times she could be so vulgar! His attention was momentarily distracted by her crossing one slim, denim-clad leg over the other and once again he felt the potent kick of lust. Was it unconscious or deliberate—that powerful sexual allure she seemed to exude? For the first time he began to wonder how she might fit in with the rest of the staff—and whether this worldly urban singer would adapt to the isolation of his vast Norfolk estate.
Yet, inevitably, he felt some of the tension escape from his body as he drove towards the glowing golden brickwork of Valeo Hall. He might simply be the ancient building’s temporary custodian and it might bring back bitter memories of his fractured childhood—but it was still home. Still the place where he felt most free. Where he could walk through the vast grounds of the estate and lose himself in the beauty of nature.
‘I’ll take you straight up to the great house,’ he said. ‘And you can get to know your way around.’
Roxy nodded, trying to get her head around the fact that this was going to be her new place of employment. ‘How many people work here?’ she said.
He sighed. ‘These days there’s only a skeleton staff, I’m afraid.’
‘You mean they’re all dead?’
‘That’s not even funny, Roxanne.’
‘Then why are you laughing?’
Titus subdued the hint of a smile. ‘What I mean is that the aristocracy have had to make cuts, just like everyone else.’
‘Oh, dear.’ She mimed playing a violin. ‘My heart bleeds. Couldn’t you just sell off a few thousand acres if you’re broke? By my calculation, that would still leave you with a few thousand more.’
‘I think you’ve made your point,’ he said coolly. ‘I thought you wanted to find out about my staff—as opposed to the minutiae of my property portfolio. You’ll answer to Vanessa—she’s the housekeeper. There’s a cook and various kitchen staff. There are also ground staff and secretarial staff and several cleaners—I have no idea of exact numbers. But I’m sure you’ll soon get to know them all.’
‘Right,’ said Roxy, resisting the temptation she’d been fighting ever since she’d woken up and turning in her seat to look at him properly. Her initial assessment of him had been an accurate one. He really was the most charismatic man she’d ever met and she wondered if he’d always been that way. She tried to imagine what he must have been like as a little boy—but it wasn’t easy to imagine Titus as being in any way little. Had he always had that wayward lock of thick, tawny hair brushing against his neck? And did women always feel an urge to brush it away and to place their lips there instead? She bet they did.
Rather self-consciously, she cleared her throat in an effort to distract herself. ‘So what’s it like, growing up surrounded by staff?’ she asked.
Titus slowed the Bentley down. ‘You must have had people working for you during your heady days as a star.’
She tried not to notice the way the muscles of his thigh tensed when he pressed on the clutch or the sarcasm which had hardened his voice when he said ‘star’ like that. ‘Yes, I did—but they were employed by the record company, or by whichever hotel we happened to be staying in. I didn’t have any staff of my own.’
‘But you must have had a manager.’
‘My father acted as my manager,’ she said tonelessly.
He heard the chill which had crept into her voice. ‘But he’s no longer around?’
‘He’s not dead, if that’s what you mean.’
‘It wasn’t.’
Roxy stared down at her unpainted fingernails, aware that two of them were broken. His unspoken question hung on the air but she guessed he was too well brought up to say it. Why couldn’t you go to your father for help? Why did you tell me you didn’t have any relatives?
‘He’s around,’ she elaborated reluctantly. ‘But he’s no longer my manager and he wouldn’t be, even if I had need of one—which I don’t. I don’t really see him very much at all these days.’
‘And why’s that?’
His unexpected question surprised her so much that she found herself answering it. Because for a moment then, he sounded as if he was actually interested. As if she was more than just an unnecessary burden he’d been forced to carry.
‘His succession of increasingly young girlfriends doesn’t exactly help smooth the father-daughter relationship,’
she said. ‘But things have never been quite the same between us since he lost my entire fortune due to some pretty dire investments.’
‘Ouch,’ he said softly.
Roxy shrugged. ‘Yes, it was pretty painful at the time—but you get used to it. Easy come, easy go,’ she recited, with a carelessness which she had deliberately cultivated over the years. Because what was the point in lamenting something you couldn’t change? ‘But anyway, that’s enough about me. What family do you have?’
Titus let the Bentley crawl along at a snail’s pace. If it had been anyone else, he probably would have changed the subject. And if it had been anyone else, they would probably have let him. But Roxanne Carmichael was different, he recognised—and not just because she had the rather cocky confidence which came from having once received mass acclaim. She was different because of the circumstances surrounding her arrival at his house.
She wasn’t just someone who had applied through the usual channel of an advertisement placed in the back of a genteel magazine. He had brought her here—and thus a rather unusual bond had formed between them. Which meant that he couldn’t be as dismissive to her as he would with any other junior member of staff—none of whom would have dreamed of asking him such a personal question. And she was going to be living here, he reminded himself. Inevitably she was going to find out more about him. So why not cut out the middleman and let her hear it from him for a change?
