One Night On The Virgin's Terms - Melanie Milburne Page 0,25

to go before. They would be spending the night doing all the things he’d told himself they weren’t going to do...

Louis pulled himself out of his reverie and wandered over to the sideboard in the sitting room where a group of photos was displayed. There was one of Ivy and Ronan at his graduation, another of Ivy with two attractive young women he presumed were her current flatmates. His gaze landed on another one of Ivy as a child at an Irish dancing contest. He picked up the photo frame and couldn’t hold back a smile. The red-gold-haired cherub in that photo was enough to make anyone’s heart melt.

He put the photo down and his gaze went to the one of her rescue dog, Fergus, who had died a couple of years ago. Ronan had told him Ivy had been inconsolable and on an impulse Louis had sent her flowers and a card. She’d sent him a neatly written thank-you note that he still had in his filing cabinet. He couldn’t quite explain why he’d kept it.

Ivy came back into the sitting room lugging two overnight bags. ‘I’m ready.’

‘Here, let me take those for you,’ Louis said, reaching for them. ‘What have you got in them? A full set of encyclopaedias?’

Her cheeks pooled with twin circles of pink. ‘I hate people who can go away for a weekend and fit everything in one bag. My make-up and toiletries fill one bag on their own.’

Louis gave a soft laugh. ‘Come on. Let’s get going before we get stuck in traffic.’

He wanted no time wasted until he could kiss her again.

About two hours after leaving London, and after driving down a long, winding hawthorn-fringed lane and over a narrow bridge across a small river, they arrived at a traditional Cotswold-stone manor house. Ivy leaned forward in her seat in excitement, struck by the beauty of the gardens surrounding the house that had been recently renovated, with an extension that perfectly suited the old bones of the house. ‘You said it was a little place in the Cotswolds. This is huge!’

‘Only ten bedrooms,’ Louis said. ‘I could have bought one with fifteen but thought that was a little over the top for one person.’

She glanced at him as he brought the car to a halt in front of the house. ‘But don’t you want to have a family one day to share this with? I mean, this would be ideal for—’

‘No.’ His tone was blunt. Emphatic. Decision made and will not be changed. ‘I don’t.’

Ivy unclipped her seatbelt, more than a little intrigued as to why he was so adamant against settling down one day. ‘How often do you come down here?’

‘Not often enough.’ He got out of the car and came around to her side to help her out. ‘I have a caretaker and housekeeper and a couple of gardeners who keep things in check. I try to spend a couple of weeks here in the summer and the occasional weekend throughout the year.’

‘Is that all?’ She looked at him in surprise. ‘If this was my place, I would never want to leave. It’s so private and peaceful.’

‘Speaking of private—we’re keeping our time together a secret, right? I don’t want anyone speculating that we’re an item. The press would have a field day.’

‘Sure...’ Ivy avoided his gaze, pretending an avid interest in a garden sculpture near the front of the house.

‘Ivy.’ His tone was commanding. ‘Look at me.’

She sucked her lower lip inside her mouth and turned to glance at him. His gaze was probing, the line of his mouth firm. ‘I’m sorry, I wasn’t going to tell Millie, but then...but it kind of slipped out the other week when we first went out for dinner, and then she told Zoey.’

‘Oh, God.’ His despairing groan was a shattering blow to her self-esteem. Was it so embarrassing for him to be associated with her, even for a weekend? ‘And who else will they tell? Will it be all over social media by now?’

‘Don’t be ridiculous, they would never do something like that.’

‘Who else have you told? Your mother? Or Ronan?’ His frown was savage, his eyes as piercing as a detective honing in on a suspect.

‘No, of course not.’ Ivy sent him a glowering look. ‘Do you really think I’d crow to all and sundry that you’re helping me with my intimacy issues? It’s embarrassing enough for me without broadcasting it to the world.’

He released a rough sigh that had a note of