Page 5 of Contracted as His Cinderella Bride

‘And we can deal with your leg,’ he added.

‘What?’ she mumbled.

‘Your leg.’ The chocolate gaze dipped. ‘It’s bleeding.’

She glanced down to see blood seeping out of a gash on her calf, exposed by a rip in her leggings. It must have been caused by her altercation with his fiancée—or rather his ex-fiancée—and she’d been too cold to feel it.

‘It’s nothing,’ she said. ‘I have to go.’

But as she turned to leave, he spoke again.

‘Arrêtes. It’s not nothing. It’s bleeding. It could get infected. You’re not going out there until it has been cleaned.’

The emotion started to choke her. She couldn’t stay, couldn’t accept his kindness—however brusque and domineering.

‘I’ve got work, another job,’ she added, frantically. ‘I can’t stay.’

‘I’ll pay for your time, damn it, if the problem is money. I don’t want an injured cycle messenger on my conscience as well as an eighty-grand ring.’

He was too close, surrounding her in a cloud of spicy cologne and the sweet subtle whiff of whisky. Her pulse points buzzed and throbbed in an erratic rhythm.

But then he hooked a knuckle under her chin, and nudged her chin up.

‘Wait a minute. I do know you.’ His eyes narrowed as he studied her face. For the first time, he was actually seeing her. The intensity of his gaze set off bonfires of sensation all over her chilled skin. She fumbled with the helmet she had hooked over her other arm, desperate to put it on, to stop him recognising her.

But it was too late as the swift spike of memory crossed his face.

‘Monique?’ he murmured.

Tears stung her eyes. ‘I’m not Monica. Monica’s dead. I’m her daughter.’

‘Allycat?’ he said, looking as stunned as she felt.

Allycat.

The nickname reverberated in her head, the one he’d given her all those years ago. The name she had been so proud of. Once.

As if he’d flipped a switch, the adrenaline she’d been running on ever since she’d got the commission drained away, until all that was left was the shame, and anxiety. And the inappropriate heat.

She dragged in tortured breaths, struggling to contain the choking sob rising up her torso. She didn’t have the strength to resist him any more. And what would be the point, anyway?

‘Breathe, Allycat,’ he murmured.

She gulped in air, trying to steady herself, and got a lungful of his scent—spiced with pine and soap.

‘Bad night?’

‘The worst.’ She bit back the harsh laugh at his sanguine tone. And shuddered, the pain in her ribs excruciating

as she struggled to hold the sobs at bay.

What exactly are you so upset about? Having Dominic LeGrand pity you isn’t the worst thing that’s ever happened to you.

‘I know the feeling,’ he said, the wry smile only making him look more handsome—and more utterly unattainable.

She forced a smile to her lips as she shifted away from him, and scooped up the helmet that had clattered to the floor.

‘It was nice seeing you again, Dominic,’ she said, although nothing could have been further from the truth. Nice had never been a word to describe Dominic LeGrand. ‘I really do have to go now, though.’

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