Page 2 of Hidden Heir With His Housekeeper

For several heartbeats he stood like a dummy, staring at the place where she’d been, trying to figure out if she had been real—or a figment of his sex-starved imagination. He hadn’t dated for over a month, after all. Not since Della had started making noises about moving in with him.

‘Wow,’ the barman whispered. ‘Why do they call her the Ice Queen when she’s so hot?’

‘Who is she?’ Mason demanded, wishing for once he took an interest in celebrity gossip.

‘Th... That’s Beatrice Medford,’ the guy stuttered. ‘Lord Henry Medford’s daughter.’

Medford’s daughter? Seriously? He knew Medford, in passing. He’d met the guy a couple of times at the exclusive Mayfair club Mason had joined a few years back, mostly just to piss off the posh nobs who hung out there. The man was a pompous ass who had inherited a fortune and then lost most of it... Because he wouldn’t know a good investment if it sucker-punched him in the gut.

How could a woman that stunning have come from Medford’s inbred gene pool?

‘She’s also Jack Wolfe’s sister-in-law,’ the barman supplied. ‘They were engaged a few years ago, but he ended up marrying her older sister, Katherine, of Cariad Cakes. It was all over the tabloids,’ the barman finished, falling over himself to answer Mason’s question.

Mason stared some more at the empty spot across the bar.

Wolfe. He knew Jack Wolfe a lot better than Medford. They came from similar working class backgrounds. And, like Mason, Wolfe was smart and ambitious and a ruthless businessman. Or at least he had been, until he’d got married and had a kid, and softened right up.

He’d met Wolfe’s wife too. And while the woman had an earthy, voluptuous, force of nature kind of beauty, which had obviously enslaved Wolfe, Mason would not have put Katherine Wolfe in the same gene pool as the goddess he’d just stripped naked with his thoughts either.

‘Is that right?’ he said to the barman, with an insouciance he didn’t feel. Desire was still pumping through him in a way he hadn’t felt in far too long. Maybe right back to when he’d been a teenager and had craved the kind of human contact he’d only ever found in sex.

The thought made him uneasy.

So, the goddess was a daughter of the aristocracy. If she were priceless antique porcelain, that would make him the knock-off kitchenware you could buy in bulk at any South London street market.

It figured. That had to be where the regal grace came from—wealth, privilege and a sense of superiority he had always found a pain in the arse.

Then again, it had been a long time since he’d enjoyed the thrill of the chase and maybe knocking a princess off her pedestal would salvage this evening’s entertainment.

Strolling over to the balcony, he searched the crowd. He spotted her instantly, her blonde hair like a beacon.

The warehouse lights dimmed and a world-famous DJ opened his set from a stage at the far end of the cavernous space.

Mason headed down the winding metal staircase leading to the dancefloor, already full of people moving to the beat. The music pulsed, while multi-coloured lasers slashed through plumes of artificial smoke, ramping up the throb of anticipation in his gut.

Of course, it was doubtful he’d still want Medford’s untouchable daughter after having a conversation with her—given his low tolerance for snooty society princesses—but there was only one way to find out.

He spotted the blonde chignon taking the stairs opposite him. Was she heading for the exit? So soon?

Not so fast, love...

Who was that guy? Looking at me as if he wanted to gobble me up in a few greedy bites...

Beatrice Medford lifted the hem of her designer gown and shot up the stairs towards the first-floor balcony.

She really ought to be outraged. Bar Guy’s gaze had roamed over her body with an insolent entitlement she’d never encountered before. Men usually gazed at her with awe, or adoration. Because all they ever saw was the sheen of class, the shield of respectability, the sexless and untouchable grace which was all part of the façade her father had created.

But she hadn’t been outraged at all—if she were being entirely honest with herself, what she’d actually been was...well, turned on.

Which was seriously weird for two reasons: she didn’t get turned on by male attention. Because she got enough of it to know it had no real connection to who she was inside. And also because she had no desire to even be here, wearing this far too revealing dress and uncomfortable five-inch heels, simply because her father had demanded it of her.

She shouldn’t have let him bully her into ‘being seen’ at tonight’s event. Because she knew exactly what his decision to hire her a stylist and a designer gown at vast expense and demand she come to the Cascade Scent launch was really all about. It was just another of Henry Medford’s increasingly desperate attempts to shore up his flagging finances by hooking his daughter up with the nearest eligible billionaire.

This afternoon, in his study, he’d even given her a shortlist of men he thought it would be suitable for her to ‘engage with’ tonight—his cold, assessing glare raking over her with a chilling mix of calculation and contempt. If that hadn’t been enough of a wake-up call to his demeaning intentions, his preposterous list had included a three times divorced investment banker who was older than he was, and a boutique hotel magnate who’d dragged himself out of a notorious South London council estate and was well known for dating and dumping beautiful women with the same ruthless efficiency he’d acquired his property portfolio,

Gee, thanks, Daddy, why not tell me you’re pimping me out without telling me you’re pimping me out?

She sighed as she reached one of the venue’s many secret bars and gazed at the throng of gyrating bodies blocking her route to the exit.

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