Chapter Twenty

NATE

Charlie was lying on his bed and messing with his phone, a half-empty bottle of Jack Daniels propped against his thigh.

"What are you, an eighties rockstar?" I greeted him, closing the door behind me.

He grinned. "That would make you my groupie," he said, sliding his hand slowly down his torso to flick open the top button of his jeans. I wasn't sure he was joking.

I sat in the leather armchair beside the window, studiously ignoring some rather dubious stains. "I just wanted to check we're okay."

"Check I'm not sobbing my heart out over you, you mean," he said, with a curl to his lip.

"It would be a shame to lose the years of friendship."

"So, fuck buddies, then?"

"Charlie." He never used to be this obtuse. "Just friends. If you want."

He swigged from the bottle before offering it to me. I took a gulp, then put it by my feet. His face was flushed, his eyes bright, and he'd had more than enough for a weeknight when he had to go to work the next day. "Want to go clubbing later?" he asked. "As friends." Mockery flicked through his voice.

"I'd better not. I need to impress your father before my interview, not stagger in at all hours, absolutely hammered."

His eyes narrowed. "Dad's giving you a job? What the hell? He hasn't said a word to me about it." He reached out a hand, and I passed the bottle back. "I don't want you working there. You need to tell him you don't want it."

"Why don't you want me there?"

"Because Stevie will tell everyone you're better at your job than I am."

That was honesty I hadn't expected. Honesty he hadn't expected, it seemed, from the arrested look on his face.

"You mean Steven? Everyone knows how good you are and that he's jealous of you." How had I fallen back into my supporting-Charlie role so easily?

"Yeah," he said with a smile that didn't reach his eyes. "So why would you want to work for us? I thought the high-and-mighty Mortimers were above the rest of us inferior beings."

His voice was bitter, and he took another long drink. I had no idea of the cause of this sudden resentment, but I spun him the same story I'd given his father about my career progression having reached a dead end.

He didn't say anything until I finished speaking. Then, it was as if I hadn't said any of that. "I'm going out. Come if you want. I don't care."

I didn't go with him. But as I was cleaning my teeth, ready for bed, I was still thinking about Charlie. He hadn't looked like he was going out to have fun. He'd looked like he was trying to escape.

When I went to check my phone, I belatedly remembered I'd left it in the drawing room. On my way to recover it, I almost bumped into Alex, who had his head down and was mashing at his phone as he stalked along the landing.

"What's wrong?" I asked. There was no mistaking the tension in him.

"Hide me if you see Anna Fortescue coming my way," he begged. "She's trying to thrust me into Ella's arms."

I slid my fingers through the loops of his jeans and tugged him close to me. "I'd much rather you thrust into me," I told him, and I kissed him.

It didn't last long because we were both aware of where we were. It was long enough to have me ruing the fact we'd be under the same roof in different beds. It wasn't even about sex. Okay, it wasn't just about sex. It was about sleeping next to him and waking tangled up with him. I wanted to have that every day.

ALEX

I'd expected yet another day of traipsing around Bath with Nate, but I was disappointed. He stopped me on the stairs after breakfast.

"I'm going back to London today," he said, and my heart jolted. "I need to pick up my passport and a suit for the trip with Tom."

Oh, thank God. He wasn't leaving permanently.

"I guess we did kind of ruin your suit," I said.

"True, but I need a suit for business, not a dinner jacket."

There was a difference? "Couldn't you swing past your place on your way to the airport instead?" I asked him. I didn't want to face an entire day without him here.

"The Fortescues' plane is hangared at Bristol."

"I'm sorry, what? Are you telling me they have a private jet?" I'd thought that was just film stars and billionaires. Though, now I stopped to think about it, I realised I had no idea how rich the Fortescues were.

Nate shrugged as if it were perfectly normal. For him, I supposed it was. "I'll see you later," he said, then leaned close and spoke quietly. "Flying this evening?"

That reassured me somewhat, but I was still unsettled. In my concentration on Nate, I'd lost sight of how very different his world was from mine.

*

Margaret swept me up later to go for a walk in the freezing cold. "How rich are the Fortescues?" I asked her.

"I honestly don't know. I doubt the taxman does, either."

"Did you know they have a private jet?"

Her eyebrows rose. "Yet you still don't want to marry into the family?"

"Private jets are bad for the environment," I said virtuously.

"There's that," she agreed, before getting into the reason she'd wanted my company. "I asked James about what Steven said. He was furious, though he tried to hide it. The story he spun is that they want to enter a partnership with us because of our distinguished lineage." She mimicked James's pompous accent to perfection. "An alliance of their money and influence and our history will result in other dragons treating both of us with suitable deference and following our lead in everything."

"He said it that openly?" I was surprised.

"Alex, you're getting the short version because it's bloody freezing out here. Now, shush, and let me finish. He explained how badly Steven had misunderstood about the two million—that would go into a trust fund for any children, just as he'll do for all his grandchildren. He would, however, make generous compensation to both you and our family for requiring you to live in Bath once you were married."

"He expects me to leave Cornwall?" I couldn't believe what I was hearing.

"I spoke to your father earlier. Once he stopped laughing at the idea of you creating babies with a Fortescue, he agreed with me not to knock this on the head too quickly. James is evidently manoeuvring for a big shake-up of the dragon world, and we're safer knowing what he's planning. I wish we could go back three months to when no one was even thinking about us, but we can't—we have his attention now."

"What does this mean for me?" I was cold, I didn't like the sound of where this was going, and right now, that was all I cared about. "You don't expect me to—"

"Alex." It was her leader"s voice, not her aunt"s voice, and I shut up. "I told James that, before I make any decisions, I need to get to know his daughter and determine if she's worthy of marrying into my family."

"How did he take that?"

She grinned, her eyes dancing with enjoyment. "It annoyed him, though I think he quite liked the reminder there's a reason he wants a partnership with us. We're not just common or garden dragons. Anyway, what that means is that you're off the hook for the moment. Refer Anna to me if she tries to push you together again." She raised a finger as I opened my mouth to speak. "And yes, I know you're perfectly capable of telling Anna Fortescue where to get off. I'd prefer to avoid a diplomatic incident, however."

My wounded expression went sadly unappreciated.

"I think Ella may be the best of that family. She's young for her age and is flailing a bit, trying to prove herself. If she can get away from her family, she could become a decent person and dragon."

The problem was, we both knew how unlikely it was that the Fortescues would let her go. Look at the way Charlie's mother was trying to hold onto him. I wished Anna hadn't pulled Nate into her machinations. The further Nate kept from Charlie, the better pleased I'd be.

And not only because of my dragon's possessive instincts. I remembered the look Charlie had put on Nate's face. I didn't want to see him hurt again.

Once Margaret left me in order to take advantage of Bath's shops, I was at a loose end. Bath wasn't much fun without Nate, but I had to do something, so I decided to visit the places on the tourist trail that Nate and I hadn't yet seen.

The more I saw of the beautiful Georgian houses, the more it seemed like Bath was a rich person's place. Where did the locals live, the ones with normal jobs? It reminded me of Cornwall, where all the rich Londoners had bought second homes and priced locals out of the property market. Rich Londoners who were probably bankers.

It appeared I still hadn't recovered from the shock of the Fortescues' jet. Or the realisation of how very different Nate's world was from mine. He probably had multiple suits hanging in his wardrobe, one for any type of occasion he might possibly encounter. More intimidating was the fact he doubtless knew the difference between them.

I'd worked myself into a mood full of gloom and uncertainty as I looked at the magnificent houses that formed the curve of the Royal Crescent and wondered how many millions each one cost. Why would someone like Nate see me as anything more than a brief diversion? A bit of rough trade (thank you, Steven Fortescue). Then my phone vibrated with a message, and I forgot everything in my excitement at seeing it was from Nate.

Where are you? Traffic was better than I thought.

I started down the grassy slope below the Royal Crescent and met Nate halfway up the hill. His stride lengthened when he saw me, until we stood in front of one another, grinning like idiots. God, it was so good to see him.

"May I kiss you?" he asked.

I glanced around. Everyone close to us looked to be the typical Bath tourist type—middle-class and middle-aged. The worst reaction we'd likely elicit would be a disapproving tut.

So, by way of answer, I kissed him. It was already so familiar, the ease with which he opened under my mouth, the way he pulled me against him as if he never wanted to let me go. And I never wanted to stop kissing him.

Of course, we had to, eventually. If nothing else, the day was freezing. We headed to Sheila's for fresh flapjacks and hot coffee to warm up.

"Thank God we don't need to do any more Jane Austen research," Nate said, passing me his flapjack. They were smaller than I'd expected, or I'd have asked for two. "I think leaving my phone unattended again would be too obvious."

"D'you know if anyone looked through it?" My question was muffled by oats and golden syrup, but Nate got the gist.

"I don't. They had a few hours when it was lying in plain sight. I can't do much more than that."

"I've been thinking about Steven," I told him. "There's nothing more to find in James's study, and it's not as if we can get into his office at the bank. D'you think Steven might have some papers or something in his room? He obviously knows everything James is planning."

Nate was silent for a moment. "I suppose it's possible," he allowed. "Is the probability worth the risk we'd be running?"

"What risk? We know the staff's movements, and Steven's car can be heard from almost anywhere in the house. My room's on the same floor as his, so we could pretend that's where we were heading if we didn't have time to get downstairs." That wouldn't be a great idea as we weren't supposed to be together, but it would be better than getting caught searching Steven's room.

"I suppose we should," Nate said reluctantly.

That settled, I drank my coffee and watched him. This morning's conversation had reminded me of the gulf between us. It had been like waking from a dream—like the end of a holiday, something whispered deep inside me. But it was difficult to remember that when I was with him.

"If you weren't in Bath, what would you be doing back in Cornwall?" he asked.

I told him about the village where I lived, how the cliffs were only a few minutes' walk from my house and how the storms buffeted the old cottage every winter. He asked about our family, and I explained how geographically spread out we'd become over the years, yet how the ties between us never weakened.

In return, I asked about his life. He had little to say about what he did in London, but he talked about his brother Rufus with a gentleness in his voice that made me want to meet the man who could cause that. "He's scarily bright and reads Latin for fun," he said proudly. "He's also good at catching spiders."

He'd said something about spiders when we'd been by the river. "You don't like them?" It didn't seem possible that a dragon could bescared of such an itty-bitty creature.

"I pay my neighbours' son twenty quid a time to get rid of them if one comes into my flat," he said.

"Uh, Nate."

His eyebrows raised.

"Aren't you worried he'll start shoving handfuls of them through your letterbox so he can make more money from you?"

There was a flash of real distress in his eyes.

"Shit, I'm sorry. Of course, he'd never do that." I said quickly, furious at myself. "I'm sorry—I'm a jerk."

"I don't have a letterbox," he said, as if to reassure himself that couldn't happen. "The concierge holds the mail for me."

He evidently lived in an upmarket type of flat. I tried to imagine him in my cottage, and despite the fact it must be different from everything he'd ever known, I could see him there. He'd learn to live with how the gales sometimes blew the smoke back down the chimney and the roof rattled in the storms. I firmly turned my mind away from that. Neither of us had mentioned what might happen once we left Bath, and it was better to ignore the subject than find out the answer wasn't the one I wanted.

The afternoon passed swiftly as we learned more about one another's lives. I realised, from what he didn't say as much as what he did, that I wouldn't trade mine for his. This, despite the fact I couldn't get regular work and my ancient Land Rover was held together by bits of string and hope. All the money in the world couldn't buy a loving family, and I determined to visit my parents as soon as I got home and tell them how much I loved them. They'd doubtless think I'd been drinking, but I'd say it anyway.

Sheila finally threw us out when she shut up shop for the night, and we headed back to the Fortescues'. For a brief stop, only. Tonight, there'd be swimming. There'd also be other things, and I couldn't wait to strip him of those hideously expensive clothes until he was just Nate. Not a Mortimer, not a rich, banking dragon, but Nate.

The memory of being with him tonight would keep me company while he was away in Zurich. The prospect of two days without Nate seemed to stretch before me like a desert.