LITMIR.BIZ

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occasionally, bills.

      She hadn’t thought about that polish for years. Perhaps she should make some up when she got back to the house to protect the furniture against the ravages of a new tenant?

      The door buzzed behind her, demanding to be closed, breaking the spell.

      Then she stood, frozen and blinking, trying to take in what she was looking at.

      It was like stepping back in time. Light streamed into the space from long, narrow stained glass window panels at the other side of the room that seemed to lead into a corridor. But in front of her, on either side, the walls were covered in rows of square wooden panels probably not wider than her arm above a tough-looking, very weathered wooden floor.

      No carpet or textiles. Just hardwood panelling.

      Cupboards and cabinets were lined up to her left and at head height along each wall were sea charts and maps in heavy gilt frames.

      Well, that explained the security door!

      The last time she had seen anything like this was at a stately home which had not been touched for hundreds of years. The financial demands of keeping the place going had finally caught up with the family and they had very reluctantly opened their home as a film set for historical dramas. The media company she worked for had been there for months, filming what they needed.

      But this room? This was more like a museum.

      Toni strolled over to a stunning wide table decorated in marquetry which stretched the full length of one wall. It was covered with scrolls, brightly coloured documents inside plastic sheets and an assortment of what looked, to her uneducated eyes, like antique survey equipment and sextants.

      She was so engrossed in admiring the stunning elaborate engraving on the handle of a brass magnifying glass that it took a blast of cold air on her neck to snap her back into the real world. Toni whirled around in surprise and inhaled sharply.

      Little wonder. A towering dark blond-haired man filled the entrance to the corridor, blocking out the light. He was wearing a navy blue round-necked light sweater with the sleeves rolled up, oblivious to the cold and wet outside.

      His deeply tanned face was glowing from the rain and wind and he ran the fingers of his right hand back through his long damp hair from forehead to neck in a single natural motion. That simple movement only made his paler heavy eyebrows and pepper-and-salt moustache and beard even more pronounced.

      Last night at the town house, his eyes had seemed dark and cloudy. But here Toni realised just how wrong she had been.

      Despite the lack of a comfortable bed, the exhaustion had faded to a slight crease between those eyebrows, drawing her gaze to eyes the colour of a Mediterranean sea.

      His square jaw was so taut it might have been sculpted. But it was his mouth that knocked the air out of her lungs, and had her clinging on to the edge of the table for support.

      Plump lips smiled wide above his light beard, so that the bow was sharp between the smile lines.

      His button-fly denims sat low on his slim hips but there was no mistaking that he was pure muscle beneath those tight trousers. Because, as he stood there for a second, his hands thrust deep into his trouser pockets, looking from table to table, scanning the horizon that was the confines of the shop, every movement he made seemed magnified.

      The entire room seemed to shrink around him.

      How did he do that? How did he just waltz in and master the room as though he was in command of the space and everyone in it?

      This man was outdoors taken to the next level. No wonder he worked in Alaska. She could certainly imagine him standing at the helm of some ice-breaker, head high, legs braced. The master of his universe.

      The hair on the back of her neck prickled with recognition.

      Instead of giving her the up and down once-over, his gaze locked on to her face and stayed there, unmoving for a few seconds, before the corner of his mouth slid into a lazy smile.

      The corners of those amazing eyes crinkled slightly and the warmth of that smile seemed to heat the air between them. And, at that moment, this smile was for her. And her heart leapt. More than a little. But just enough to recognize that the blush of heat racing through her neck and face were not due to the extra-warm coat and scarf that she was wearing.

      In that instant Toni knew what it felt like to be the most important and most beautiful person in the room. Heart thumping. Brain spinning. An odd and unfamiliar tension hummed down her veins. Every cell of her suddenly alive and tuned into the vibrations emanating from his body.

      Suddenly she wanted to preen and flick her hair and roll her shoulders back so that she could stick her chest out.

      It was as if she had been dusted with instant lust powder.

      Standing a little straighter, Toni quickly focused her gaze on the engraving on the glass that she was still holding, trying to find something to do with her hands, only too aware that he was still watching her.

      She could practically feel the heat of that laser beam gaze burning a hole through her forehead and was surprised that there was no smell of smoke or a scorch mark on the wall behind her.

      ‘Miss Baldoni. I’m surprised to see you here at this time on a Sunday morning. I thought that you might be enjoying a lie-in. I do hope that I didn’t wake you up on my way out this morning. It was very early.’

      ‘I didn’t hear a thing, Mr Elstrom. As for my being here?’ Toni very carefully put down the glass and lifted her chin. ‘As I explained last night, I have a contract to paint the head of Elstrom Mapping. No matter whom that may be.’ She braved a small smile. ‘I am so looking forward to painting your portrait. Perhaps we can get started with some photographs? Show me your best pose. I dare you!’

       FOUR

      Scott’s reply was to rest his hands, splayed out, on the table, his left hand loose and relaxed, the right bandaged around the fingers. He leaned the top half of his long wide frame towards her from the hips so that she had to fight the urge to lean back against the display table and protect her space.

      She liked hands, always had. It was usually one of the first things she noticed about a person. She could tell from the way he protected his bandaged fingers that he must be in pain. His left hand had long slender fingers with clean short nails. The knuckles were scarred and bruised as though they had been bashed at regular intervals and the veins on the back of his hand stood out in prominent raised rivers. Sinewy. Powerful.

      They were clever, fast, working hands.

      No manicures for Scott Elstrom.

      The neck of his top stretched open and revealed a hint of deeply tanned skin around the neckline and more than a few dark blond chest hairs.

      At this distance, she could have reached out and touched the curved flicks of thick blond slicked-back hair that had fallen over one side of his temple, but she had the idea that he would like that far too much so she simply lifted her chin and inhaled a long calming breath through her nose.

      Big mistake.

      Instead of a background aroma of leather and lavender and old books, she was overwhelmed with the scent of gentle rain on freshly cut grass blended with lime zest which was tangy and fresh against the sweetness of the air.

      He had certainly made good use of the bath at Freya’s!

      He smelt wonderful. Expensive, distinctive and on a scale of one to ten on the testosterone level she would give him a twelve. From the sun-bleached hair on his arms and the way the muscles in his neck flexed when he moved, to the know-it-all confidence in the smile he was giving her at that moment, he was off the scale.

      He was about as different from Peter as it was possible to be—on the surface.

      He was a fashion photographer’s dream.

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