The Tycoon's Virgin. PENNY JORDAN

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СКАЧАТЬ her stomach muscles tensed, despite the fact that she knew it was impossible that her caller could be Leo Jefferson; after all, he didn’t even know who she was, thank goodness! A small frisson of nervous excitement tingled through her body, quickly followed by a strong surge of something she would not allow herself to acknowledge as disappointment when she recognised her cousin Nigel’s voice.

      It was no wonder, after all she had been through, that her emotions should be so traumatised that they had difficulty in relaying appropriate reactions to her.

      ‘At last,’ she could hear Nigel saying cheerfully to her. ‘This is the third time I’ve rung. How did it go with Leo Jefferson? I’m dying to know.’

      Jodi took a deep breath; she could feel her heart starting to pound as shame and guilt filled her. The hand holding the receiver felt sticky. She had never been a good liar; never been even a vaguely adequate one.

      ‘It didn’t,’ she admitted huskily.

      ‘You chickened out?’ Nigel guessed.

      Jodi let out a sigh of relief; Nigel had just given her the perfect answer to her dilemma.

      ‘I…I was tired and I started to have second thoughts. And—’

      Before she could tell Nigel that she had decided to write to Leo Jefferson rather than speak with him her cousin had cut across her to say tolerantly, ‘I thought you wouldn’t go through with it. Never mind. Uncle Nigel has ridden to the rescue for you. My boss has invited me over to dinner tonight, and I’ve asked him if I can take you along with me. He’ll be speaking to Leo Jefferson himself next week, and if you put your case to him I’m sure he’ll incorporate the plight of the school into his own discussion.’

      ‘Oh, Nigel, that’s very kind of you, but I don’t think…’ Jodi began to demur. She just wasn’t in the mood for a dinner party, and as for the idea of putting the school’s case to Nigel’s boss, who was the chief planning officer for the area, Jodi’s opinion of her own credibility had been so undermined that she just didn’t feel good enough about herself to do so.

      Nigel, though, made it clear that he was not prepared to take no for an answer.

      ‘You’ve got to come,’ he insisted. ‘Graham really does want to meet you. His grandson is one of your pupils, apparently, and he’s a big fan of yours. The grandson, not Graham. Although…’

      ‘Nigel, I can’t go,’ Jodi protested.

      ‘Of course you can. You must. Think of your school,’ he teased her before adding, ‘I’m picking you up at half-past seven, and you’d better be ready.’

      He had rung off before Jodi could protest any further.

      

      Wearily Jodi studied the screen of her computer. She had spent most of the afternoon trying to compose a letter to send to Leo Jefferson. The headache she had woken up with had, thankfully, finally abated, but every time she tried to concentrate on what she was supposed to be doing a totally unwanted mental picture of Leo Jefferson kept forming inside her head. And it wasn’t just his face that her memory was portraying to her in intimate detail, she acknowledged as she felt herself turning as pink as the cascading petunias in her next-door neighbour’s window boxes. Mrs Fields, at eighty, was still a keen gardener, and as she had ruefully explained to Jodi she liked the strong, bright colours because she could see them.

      Jodi’s own lovingly planted boxes were a more subtle combination of soft greens, white and silver, the same silver as Leo Jefferson’s sexy eyes.

      Jodi’s face flamed even hotter as she stared at her screen and realised that she had begun her letter, ‘Dear Sexy Eyes’.

      Quickly she deleted the words and began again, reminding herself of how important it was that she impress on Leo Jefferson the effect the closure of the factory would have not just on her school but also on the whole community.

      All over the country small villages were dying or becoming weekend dormitories for city workers, although everyone here in their local community had worked hard to make theirs a living, working village.

      If she could get Nigel’s boss on her side it was bound to help their case. Frowning slightly, she pushed her chair away from her computer. She ought to be used to fighting to keep the school going now. When she had first been appointed as its head teacher she had been told by the education authority that it would only be for an interim period, as, with the school’s numbers falling, it would ultimately have to be closed.

      Even though she had known she would get better promotion and higher pay by transferring to a bigger school, as soon as Jodi had realised the effect that losing their school would have she had begun to canvass determinedly for new pupils, even to the extent of persuading parents who had previously been considering private education to give their local primary a chance.

      Her efforts had paid off in more ways than one, and Jodi knew she would never forget the pride she had felt when their school had received an excellent report following an inspection visit.

      Her pride wasn’t so much for herself, though, as for the efforts of the pupils and everyone else who had supported the school; to have to stand back and see all the ground they had gained lost, the sense of teamwork and community she had so determinedly fostered amongst the pupils destroyed, was more than she wanted to have to bear.

      She had proved just how well the children thrived and learned in an atmosphere of security and love, in a school where they were known and valued as individuals, and Jodi was convinced that the self-confidence such a start gave them was something that would benefit them through their academic lives. But somehow, trying to explain all of this to Leo Jefferson was far harder than she had expected.

      Perhaps it was because she suspected that he had already made up his mind, that, so far as he was concerned, the small community he would be destroying simply didn’t matter when compared with his profits. Or perhaps it was because all she could think about, all she could see, was last night and the way they had been together…

      With every hour that distanced her from the intimacy they had shared it became harder for her to acknowledge what she had done. It just wasn’t like her to behave in such a way, and the proof of that, had she needed any, was the fact that he, Leo Jefferson, had been her first and only lover!

      Too overwrought to concentrate, Jodi stood up and started to pace the floor of her small sitting room in emotional agitation.

      Shocking though her behaviour had been, she knew and could not deny that she had enjoyed Leo Jefferson’s touch, his lovemaking, his possession.

      But that was because she had been half-drunk and half-asleep, she tried to defend herself, before her strong sense of honesty ruthlessly reminded her of the way she had reacted to him when she had first seen him, when she had quite definitely been both sober and awake!

      It was nearly six o’clock. Her letter wasn’t finished, but she would have to leave it now and go and get ready for the evening.

      Nigel was going to a lot of trouble on her behalf and she ought to feel grateful to him. Instead, all she wanted was to stay at home and hide from the world until she had come to terms with what she had done.

      CHAPTER THREE

      LEO grimaced as he ran a hand over his newly shaven jaw. There was no way he felt like going СКАЧАТЬ