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He continued to read. “I’ve just been for a run.”
Isabella looked towards the windows, frowning. “Outside? How, in all that snow? And without a shirt?”
He fixed her with a mocking gaze. “On a treadmill. Inside. And si, without a shirt.”
Her mouth was inexplicably dry, and for some reason she found it almost impossible not to let her eyes drop to his broad chest. There were tattoos there too, the ink that covered his biceps stretching across taut pectoral muscles, so that curiosity inspired her temptation. That was all – she was a reader, and always had been. If there were words printed on a surface, Isabella liked to understand them. His body was a tapestry of information she wanted to decode, but it would be highly weird – and inappropriate – to start gawking at his chest.
She kept her gaze trained on his face, though it required a gargantuan effort.
“I don’t have any mobile reception here,” she said quietly, lifting her phone from her pocket. “But if you log me into the wifi, I’ll email my accommodation and let them know what happened.”
His eyes scanned her face, his expression analytical.
“So that I can tell them to expect me later today,” she tacked on, in case he didn’t understand her meaning.
He continued to stare for another second or two then returned his attention to the iPad. “You won’t be leaving today.”
“I thought you said you’d fly me out this morning?”
“This is not safe flying weather,” he gestured towards the windows.
Isabella’s lips parted on an exhalation. She hadn’t even thought of that. “But surely – we can fly above it?”
“In a jet, yes, but not a helicopter. It’s too dangerous; I won’t risk it.” He looked back at the iPad, as though that were the end of it.
Impatience zipped through Isabella. “Hold on a second.” She moved to the other side of the bench in an attempt to draw his attention. “I can’t stay here.”
His nostrils flared as he sighed, making a pointed display of putting the iPad aside and looking at her with the full force of his attention. It was what she’d thought, a moment ago, that she wanted, but now that he was probing her eyes with his own silvery grey pair, she felt like a bug under a microscope.
“Then what will you do?”
She gaped, floundering as she sought for an alternative. “I – guess I’ll go – somewhere else.”
“There is nowhere else, for many miles. The nearest town is an hour’s drive away – in good weather. The roads are – as you’ve discovered, quite unpassable at present.”
&nbs
p; “So you’re saying I’m stuck here?”
He nodded slowly. “Believe me, if there was any alternative, I would take it.”
She quelled the familiar feeling of being unwanted. It wasn’t like she wanted to be here either. “There must be somewhere…”
“There isn’t. But don’t worry. It’s a big house. We don’t need to have anything to do with one another. In fact, it would be for the best if you keep out of my way.”
“Charming,” she muttered under her breath. Even though she knew she should be grateful he was allowing her to shelter here at all, she still bristled at his tone and manner. It wasn’t as though she’d intentionally got herself stranded in the shadow of his castle, for goodness sake.
“I am not charming,” he responded with a gruff tone to his voice. “I am not nice. I am not kind. And I have no interest in playing the genial host just because you were careless enough to go for a leisurely drive during a once-in-a-century blizzard. Eat, drink, sleep, but stay the hell away from me.”
3
IT DIDN’T MATTER THAT the woman was doing precisely as he’d suggested. He still knew she was around, in his house, invading his privacy, an intruder he didn’t want and didn’t welcome. He came to Il Nido to be alone. Completely alone. Not left alone, but actually, truly, absolutely on his own, right here at the edge of the earth.
He ground his teeth, focussing on the spreadsheet in front of him, running the back tip of the pen over the screen to help him keep track of the numbers. He’d been reading the same spreadsheet for an hour. It was useless. He stood up, restless and annoyed, and prowled to the windows. There was no sign of the storm clearing. Ordinarily, he would have welcomed this. Being snowed in at Il Nido would have been all his dreams come true, but with another occupant of the house, he was impatient for the weather to clear so he could get rid of her.
That wasn’t likely to be for some time, though. Likely several days, if the forecasts were to be believed. Which meant he had to find out how the hell to tolerate her existence in the house.
Eyeing his empty coffee cup, he snatched it off his desk and strode out of his office, down the deserted hallway into the blessedly silent stairwell, thankful that at least she was capable of following directions.
