Stranded With the Tycoon Page 11

  Not that she was in love with Ben Hampton. Not even she was that idiotic.

  She’d brought this on herself. Take responsibility. Take control. Well, she’d take the responsibility, anyway. Control seemed to be entirely out of her hands.

  This was her punishment for taking what she wanted for a change—for forgetting about her obligations, about her family. Would the snow clear for them to get through? The thought of spending another night in the cottage, even in her own room, made her shiver. And what if she didn’t make it home for Christmas Eve and Tom’s dinner? Or, worse, Christmas Day itself?

  If giving in to her foolish desire to sleep with Ben Hampton ruined Christmas for her family they’d never forgive her. Hell, she’d never forgive herself.

  In a flurry of movement Luce crossed the room and settled into the chair, flipping open her laptop and tapping her fingers against the wood of the desk as she waited for it to bring up her manuscript. Work. That was what she needed. Something to distract her and give her purpose. Except...

  How am I supposed to concentrate on ancient history when my own past and present is naked in the next room?

  No, she needed to focus. Nest. What happened after Owain took her from Cilgerran? Henry I intervened. So, how to frame it? Consider how one woman, a Welsh princess, caused uproar in the English court? Or tell the more personal story of her ex-lover coming to the rescue of her reputation?

  Her lips tightened. God only knew what her grandfather would make of her reputation right now if he were still alive.

  Nest had it easy. One quick kidnapping and she was set.

  With a sigh, Luce turned her attention to the document in front of her and pushed all thoughts of Ben, the night before and what the hell happened next out of her head. The only thing she could fix right now was her book.

  * * *

  Ben was still cursing himself for an idiot two hours later when, as he waited for the kettle to boil for an apologetic cup of peppermint tea, the lights went out. Cursing, he flipped a few switches on and off, then stalked off towards the fuse box. Chances were it was a power cut, given the snow, but his luck had to turn some time. Maybe it was a tripped switch.

  It wasn’t. And by the time he returned to the kitchen Luce stood in front of the fire, arms crossed over her chest, glaring at him. ‘What the hell’s happened now?’

  ‘Power cut,’ Ben said. ‘At least best I can tell. Might be a line down somewhere.’

  ‘So what do we do?’ Luce asked, a snap in her voice. ‘Don’t you have an emergency generator or something?’

  At least she was talking to him. He supposed he should be grateful for that. ‘No generator. Now we build up the fire, keep warm and survive on whatever in the fridge doesn’t need cooking.’ Maybe he had some marshmallows they could toast somewhere at the back of a cupboard.

  Luce glared out of the window and he followed her gaze to where the snow was still fluttering to the ground. ‘I’m thinking very fondly of the Eight Bells right now.’

  ‘We’d never get down the path,’ Ben said.

  ‘Just as long as it clears enough for us to get to Cardiff. I’m not staying another day here with you.’ Luce’s tone was firm, as if daring the weather to disagree with her again. But, given the way the snow had started to drift, driving anywhere in the next few days would be a really stupid idea.

  Of course getting snowed in at his cottage, during a power cut, with a furious Lucinda Myles was also kind of idiotic. Apparently there was something about her that made him lose his mind.

  ‘Are you hungry?’ he asked, checking his watch in the firelight. He wasn’t sure what meal they were on, but it had been a while since either of them had eaten.

  ‘That depends on what’s in your fridge.’ Luce eyed him with suspicion, as if he might be about to add poisoning to his list of crimes.

  ‘I picked up some bits from the village shop yesterday. There should be enough to tide us over.’ Just about. He’d only planned on having to feed himself, after all.

  ‘Fine. But the power had better come back on before my laptop battery runs out.’ Turning on her heel, Luce stalked back towards her room. ‘Call me when the food’s ready.’

  Ben sighed and watched her go. Apparently any sort of reconciliation was still a way off.

  There wasn’t much to prepare. Ben arranged cheeses and bread on plates, adding some cold meats he’d picked up, then carried them over to the low table in front of the fire. Then, as an afterthought, he grabbed a bottle of red wine and two glasses. Wine always made things more of a feast.

  ‘Grub’s up,’ he called, and moments later Luce appeared. She’d added another jumper on top of her outfit from earlier. With the electric under-floor heating out of commission the cottage was becoming very chilly, very quickly. ‘Sorry it’s not much.’

  Luce took the glass of wine he’d poured for her and sat at the end of the sofa nearest the fire. ‘Better than nothing. At least it’s warm in here.’ Her words were short, terse. And she still wasn’t looking at him.

  With a deep breath, Ben sat down beside her, reaching for his own wine. ‘That’s not all I’m sorry for.’

  Slowly she turned to look at him, without speaking. It wasn’t much, but Ben took it as a sign she was at least willing to listen. ‘I’m sorry about what I said. About...’

  ‘Your one-night rule?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘Fine.’

  She’d turned her attention back to her plate again, picking at the bread. Ben watched her, waiting for something more, but it wasn’t forthcoming.

  ‘Not feeling inclined to apologise for accusing me of trapping you in this cottage purely to seduce you?’

  ‘Not really.’ She reached for her wine glass. ‘Apart from anything else, you did seduce me.’

  She had a point there. And somehow Ben knew that saying, You asked me to wasn’t going to make anything any better.

  ‘How does it even work, anyway?’ she asked, after a long moment’s silence in the flickering firelight. ‘Your stupid rule? What? You just live your life going from one-night stand to one-night stand?’

  ‘No.’ Ben rubbed a hand across his forehead. Now she wanted to talk about this? There was a reason he usually had this talk before he hit the sheets. ‘Of course not.’

  ‘Then what?’ Putting down her plate, Luce turned her body to face his, all attention on him. ‘Come on. I want to know.’

  * * *

  For a moment she thought he wasn’t going to answer. But, Luce rationalised, as a victim of his stupid rule, at the very least she deserved to understand it.

  Finally Ben spoke. ‘I date women. Same as anyone. I just make a point not to spend more than one night with them at a time.’

  ‘Because twenty-four hours is too much like commitment?’ Luce said, rolling her eyes. Men. What were they so damn scared of?

  Ben sighed. ‘Because if one night becomes two nights then it’s all too easy for it to be three nights. A week. A month. More. And suddenly she’s expecting a ring and a life. Something I can’t give her.’

  ‘You’ve tried, then?’ Luce folded her legs up under her, twisting so her feet were closer to the hearth. With just the flickering fire to light the room it felt smaller, cosier. As if the world were only just big enough to encircle the two of them and their shadows.

  ‘I don’t have to. I’ve seen it before.’ The way he said it, Luce knew that whatever he’d witnessed it had been up close and far too personal.

  Frowning, she made an educated guess. ‘Your parents?’

  ‘Yeah.’ Ben topped up their wine glasses, even though neither of them had drunk very much. ‘Dad...his life was the business. Everything came second to Hampton & Sons. Even the sons.’

  How must that have felt? Knowing he was less important than a building? Luce couldn’t imagine. Her family might expect a lot from her, but at least she always knew they needed her.

  ‘And your mum?’ she asked.

  Ben blew out a long breath. �
�Mum would follow him around from business opportunity to networking dinner, smiling when he wanted her to smile, wearing what he wanted her to wear. She gave up her whole life to satisfy him, until finally she realised she’d given up herself.’

  ‘She left?’

  ‘When I was eight.’ Ben stared into the fire. ‘She just...she couldn’t do it any more. We didn’t see her much after that. And then she died two years later.’

  Luce swallowed, her heart heavy in her chest. ‘I’m sorry. I never knew.’ She could almost imagine him, ten years old, perfectly turned out in a suit at his mother’s graveside. His heart must have broken. Was that when he’d given up on family?

  Ben shrugged. ‘No reason you should. Anyway, that’s why. My life—it’s all about fixing things and moving on. Just like Dad. And I won’t subject a wife or a child to that.’

  ‘So you just don’t let anyone get close enough to want it?’ Couldn’t he see how bleak that existence was?

  ‘Seems easiest.’ He drained his wine and poured himself another glass. ‘So, what about you? What is it that makes you believe that bricks and mortar are important? I mean, I’m all for lucrative property opportunities. But your house is more than that to you, isn’t it?’

  ‘It’s home,’ Luce agreed. ‘It always will be.’

  ‘So tell me. What makes it home?’

  Luce glanced over and saw that Ben’s eyes were closed, as if by not being able to see her he was distancing himself from the question he was asking. But if he wanted to understand what made a house a home, she wasn’t going to deny him.

  ‘It was my grandfather’s house, originally. I told you that, right?’ She trailed her finger around the stem of her glass, trying to find the words to explain what the house meant to her. ‘He bought it after he moved to Cardiff with Grandma and made a little money, back in the fifties. It’s not in a great area, but it’s still more than I could afford to buy today. And it’s close to the university.’

  ‘He left it to you?’

  Luce nodded. ‘When he died, yeah. We grew up there, you see. My father left when Dolly was a baby, and my Mum...that’s when she retreated to her own bubble. Grandad moved us in, helped bring us up. Grandma had been dead for years, and the house was too big for just him, he always said.’

  ‘You were his favourite, though,’ Ben said. ‘If he left you the house instead of your mum or your brother and sister.’

  The unfairness of that act caught in Luce’s chest every time she thought about it. ‘It wasn’t that, exactly. He relied on me to take care of them. The house needs a lot of work, and I don’t think he thought they’d manage it. They all know it’s still their home, too.’

  ‘So you even give them your house?’ Ben’s eyes opened wide to stare at her. ‘You really do give up everything for them, don’t you?’

  The cosy warmth of the fire started to cool and Luce pulled away a little. ‘I don’t expect you to understand,’ she said, leaning back against the arm of the sofa.

  Ben shrugged. ‘Like I told you, home for me was hotels, after Mum left and Dad gave up the house. I used to think maybe I’d missed out, when I was a kid away at boarding school. But I like moving on—finding new things, new places.’

  ‘But you bought this cottage,’ Luce pointed out. ‘You did it up, made it a home. You brought me here.’

  She regretted the words as soon as they were spoken. She knew she shouldn’t read more into that than a whim, an emergency pit stop in the snow. But it was so hard not to.

  When she looked up his face was closed, his eyes staring over her head. ‘The cottage is an investment. I’ll probably sell it soon.’

  The thought of Ben giving up his escape, the closest thing he’d had to a home in years, without even realising what it meant, was too depressing to contemplate.

  Looking away into the fire, she said, ‘Doesn’t look like the power’s going to come back on tonight.’

  ‘Yeah, I doubt it.’ Ben gave her a look she couldn’t quite read, then added, ‘We’ll have to see how the roads look in the morning.’

  No. No way. Maybe she understood him a little better now, but that didn’t mean she could stay here any longer and not go crazy. ‘I’m sure they’ll be fine.’ Getting to her feet, she added, ‘And a good night’s sleep will do us both some good before the drive. I’ll see you in the morning.’

  She didn’t look back, didn’t check his expression, didn’t wait for him to wish her goodnight. Even so, she barely made it to the door before the sound of his voice stopped her in her tracks.

  ‘What if I said you were worth breaking my rule for?’ he asked, so low she almost thought she must have misheard.

  She turned back to face him, her heart thumping against her ribcage. ‘But I’m not. I’m just the same Lucinda Myles you made fun of at university.’

  Ben shook his head. ‘You’re so much more than I ever saw.’

  Luce gave him a half-smile. ‘So are you.’

  And then, before she could change her mind, she shut the bedroom door behind her and climbed, fully clothed, into the freezing bed.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  BEN HAD PASSED a fitful night on the sofa, his dreams filled with dark hair and brick walls. But at least he’d been warm, he reasoned. Luce must have been half frozen in her lonely bed, if the way she’d appeared in front of the freshly banked fire before the sun had risen was any indication.

  ‘Happy Christmas Eve,’ she murmured as she held her hands out to the flames. Her suitcase leant beside the front door, just as it had in Chester, waiting to leave.

  He sat up, blankets falling to his waist, and motioned at the case. ‘You’re still hoping to make it back to Cardiff today, then?’

  ‘I have to.’

  ‘To cook dinner for your family,’ he said, a little disbelievingly.

  ‘To spend Christmas with them,’ she corrected. ‘Don’t you want to get back to London to spend it with your brother?’

  ‘I think Seb wants me there for a business meeting rather than to sing carols round the piano.’ Come to think of it, what did Seb want him there for? He’d been so preoccupied with Luce he’d barely given the strange conversation with his brother another thought.

  ‘Fine. Maybe you don’t care about family, or home, or Christmas. But I need to get back. Will you drive me?’

  She looked down at him, eyes wide and dark, her hair curling around her face, and Ben knew he couldn’t say no to her.

  ‘If the roads are clear.’ It wasn’t a promise, but it felt like one all the same.

  Luce nodded. ‘I’ll pack up the car.’

  The roads weren’t clear, not by anyone’s definition. But the snow had stopped, and by lunchtime the tractors were out clearing some of the local thoroughfares. Once Ben had spent another hour digging his four-by-four out of the snow that had built up around it, and reversed onto the track, the journey looked manageable.

  Still, it wasn’t until they got out of the Brecon Beacons National Park and onto larger roads that Ben finally felt his shoulders start to relax as he settled into the drive. He’d driven through worse weather, especially up in the hills in France, by the château, but that didn’t mean it was his preferred time to travel. Didn’t mean he wasn’t still annoyed with Luce for making him.

  That’s why. That’s the only reason. Nothing to do with her leaving me.

  Something he wasn’t going to think about until this drive was over.

  As they entered Cardiff Luce gave quiet, monotone directions to her house and Ben could feel his time with her slipping away. Being wasted. But what was the point? Her family would always be more important than him. And he would never be able to give her enough to make her stay. Neither one of them was going to change now, if they hadn’t already. Why put himself through that?

  Eventually he pulled up outside a row of townhouses, most of them converted into flats. Luce had the car door open almost before he’d switched the engine off, so he got out and went to open the boot for her.


  ‘Want me to carry this in for you?’ He hefted her suitcase out of the car and rested it on the pavement, his fingers still on the handle.

  Luce shook her head. ‘I can manage.’

  And wasn’t that her all over? ‘Fine,’ he said, relinquishing his hold.

  She paused, biting down on her lip again, and Ben tried to ignore the heat that flooded through him at the sight.

  ‘Thank you,’ she said, finally. ‘For this week.’

  ‘I know it wasn’t what you planned. But I hope you found the time away...useful.’

  ‘I did, actually.’ She sounded surprised.

  ‘Good.’

  What else was there left to say?

  Awkward silence stretched between them until Luce motioned towards her front door and said, ‘I’d better go and get ready.’

  ‘The dinner party.’ Ben nodded, his neck feeling stiff. ‘Of course.’

  ‘I know it doesn’t seem like—’

  ‘It’s your life,’ he interrupted, too tired to have the argument again. ‘Do whatever you want, Luce.’

  As he got back into the car he could have sworn he heard her say, ‘That’s the problem.’ But by the time he turned round she’d already gone inside.

  He thought about going straight back to the cottage, but he knew the memory of her would linger there. He’d call his usual cleaning lady, get her to clear the place out so that all reminders would be gone by his next visit.

  He could check into a hotel, he supposed, if any had a spare room on Christmas Eve. But suddenly he wanted to see his brother. He wanted to know what Seb had planned next for the business. Something about this time with Luce had left him unsettled, unsure. And he needed something to throw himself into.

  Decision made, he climbed back into the car and headed east, watching the snow that had disrupted his life thin and finally disappear as he sped along the M4.

  He drove straight to Seb’s office, figuring—correctly—that even late on Christmas Eve his brother would still be hard at work.

  ‘You look terrible,’ Seb said, as Ben sprawled in the visitor’s chair on the opposite side of their dad’s antique desk.