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‘Where are we going?’ she asked with interest as he took control of the high-powered machine.
‘I haven’t decided yet. What kind of food do you like?’
‘Anything, pretty much.’ She was curious to see if Antonio’s was open. The restaurant was situated in this direction and was one she knew. Antonio’s was famous for injecting the serious up-market restaurant quarter in London with Italian sunshine and some much-needed joie de vivre. It had been in the same family since the late fifties, being one of the first to bring spectacular ice cream and the art of curling spaghetti around a fork to London. So it should be a bustling concern in the sixties, Magenta reasoned, peering expectantly out of the window. ‘But this isn’t the way to Antonio’s,’ she said with concern as Quinn took a turning that led to a leafy and exclusive London suburb. ‘Antonio’s?’
‘Sorry, I was just thinking about an Italian restaurant I used to go to round here. So…’ She tried for light, and predictably ended up with an anxious wobble in her voice. ‘Have you decided where you’re taking me yet?’
‘I thought I’d show you my etchings. Joke,’ Quinn said dryly when he heard Magenta’s sharp intake of breath. ‘I thought we’d go to my house.’
‘Your house?’ Her mouth dried. ‘Should I be worried?’
‘Do you want to be?’ Quinn threw her a glance.
‘Of course not,’ she said, crossing her legs.
‘Good—but reserve judgement. Remember, you haven’t tasted my food yet.’
‘You’re going to cook for me?’
‘Is that a problem?’
‘No.’ Just a surprise. Genghis Khan in a pinny was quite a thought.
What was she getting into? Magenta wondered as Quinn swung into the drive of a grand, porticoed house. Was this where he usually brought his business associates for a chat? She’d had him down as a very private man who would never mix business with his private life.
She tried not to act like Quinn’s country cousin as he showed her round his house. Magenta’s father lived in some style, but nothing close to this. The music room on the first floor, with its full-sized harp and selection of valuable period instruments, was like something out of a palace. Quinn was a connoisseur as well as a warrior in business. The thought of how that combination might translate in the bedroom made her senses roar. When Quinn slipped her coat from her shoulders and his fingers brushed her neck, she betrayed herself by shivering.
‘Are you cold?’
She stared into Quinn’s amused gaze. They both knew the opposite was the case. Why was she feeling so embarrassed and unsure of herself? Sexual attraction between a man and a woman wasn’t unheard of, was it? Whatever their respective positions in life and whatever the era.
To the sex-starved it was. She moved a sensible distance away from him.
Shrugging off his overcoat, Quinn left her for a moment and when he returned it was with two glasses of amber liquid that glowed seductively in the cleverly designed lighting.
‘What is it?’ Magenta said as Quinn handed her the glass.
‘Single malt.’
She laughed and lightened up. ‘You remembered. Do you know many women who drink whisky, Quinn?’
‘Does it matter?’
‘Not at all—I just wondered if you liked non-conformists.’
‘You’re not a non-conformist, Magenta.’
‘How can you tell?’
‘Because non-conformists all look the same.’
‘Like hippies?’
‘Exactly.’
Now they were laughing together, and against the odds she was beginning to relax in Quinn’s company. She really liked him—too much. She couldn’t afford to let her guard down and expect to survive the experience unscathed.
‘Shall we get down to business?’ she suggested, putting her glass on the table.
Quinn’s lips pressed down with amusement as he put his glass next to hers. ‘I’m ready if you are.’
This was business?
Quinn dragged her into his arms and his kisses were a brushing, teasing, honeyed reminder. ‘I shouldn’t…’
‘You should. You must.’
Quinn’s dark eyes glinted with humour and then he deepened the kiss. The chance to experience everything she had ever dreamed about with Quinn—a man who exuded power, raw and unrepentant—was now a very real possibility. She had always been awkward with men before, concerned she’d get it wrong, but the way Quinn was kissing her, binding every part of her to him, left very little to chance.
Best of all, Magenta reasoned, nothing could go wrong in a dream—there were no consequences. She was free of inhibition and embarrassment. Her twenty-first-century world of metro-males and smooth-cheeked mummy’s boys had never seemed further away as Quinn persuaded her this was one sixties experience she shouldn’t miss out on.
