A Second Chance For The Millionaire. Nicola Marsh

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      I should like to dedicate this book to the Royal National Lifeboat Institution, without whose help my heroine could never have been as spunky as she is.

CHAPTER ONE

      IT WAS the burst of beauty that caught Darius unaware. He didn’t regard himself as a man vulnerable to beauty. Efficiency, ruthlessness, financial acumen, these things could be counted on.

      He’d been driven to hire a helicopter on the English mainland and fly five miles across the sea to the little island of Herringdean. Since it was now his property, it made good sense to inspect it briefly on his way to an even more important meeting.

      Good sense. Cling to that, since everything else had failed him.

      But the sudden vision of sunlit sea, the waves glittering as they broke against the sand, stunned him and made him press closer to the window.

      ‘Go lower,’ he commanded, and watched as the helicopter descended, sweeping along the coast of Herringdean Island. From here he could study the place with a critical eye.

      Or so he believed. But there was no criticism in the glance he turned on the lush green cliffs, the golden beaches; only astonished pleasure.

      The cliffs were sinking until they were only a few feet higher than the beach. He could see a large house that must once have been elegant, but was now fast falling into disrepair. In front of it stretched a garden leading to a plain lawn, close to the sand.

      In the far distance were buildings that must be Ellarick, the largest town on the island: population twenty thousand.

      ‘Land here,’ he said, ‘on that lawn.’

      ‘I thought you wanted to fly over the town,’ the pilot protested.

      But suddenly he yearned to avoid towns, cars, crowds. The beach seemed to call to him. It was an unfamiliar sensation for a man who wasn’t normally impulsive. In the financial world impulsiveness could be dangerous, yet now he yielded with pleasure to the need to explore below.

      ‘Go lower,’ he repeated urgently.

      Slowly the machine sank onto the lawn. Darius leapt out, a lithe figure whose fitness and agility belied the desk-bound businessman he usually was, and hurried down to the beach. The sand was slightly damp, but smooth and hard, presenting little threat to his expensive appearance.

      That appearance had been carefully calculated to inform the world that here was a successful man who could afford to pay top prices for his clothes. A few grains of sand might linger on his handmade shoes but they could be easily brushed off, and it was a small price to pay for what the beach offered him.

      Peace.

      After the devastating events that had buffeted him recently there was nothing more blessed than to stand here in the sunlight, throw his head back, close his eyes, feel the soft breeze on his face, and relish the silence.

      So many years spent fighting, conspiring, manoeuvring, while all the time this simple perfection had been waiting, and he hadn’t realised.

      Outwardly, Darius seemed too young for such thoughts; in his mid-thirties, tall, strong, attractive, ready to take on the world. Inwardly, he knew otherwise. He had already taken on the world, won some battles, lost others, and was weary to his depths.

      But here there could be a chance to regain strength for the struggles that lay ahead. He breathed in slowly, yielding himself to the quiet, longing for it to last.

      Then it ended.

      A shriek of laughter tore the silence, destroying the peace. With a groan he opened his eyes and saw two figures in the sea, heading for the shore. As they emerged from the water he realised that one of them was a large dog. The other was a young woman in her late twenties with a lean, athletic build, not voluptuous but dashingly slender, with long elegant legs. Her costume was a modest black one-piece, functional rather than enticing, and her brown hair was pinned severely back out of the way.

      As a man much pursued by women, Darius knew they commonly used swimming as a chance to parade their beauty. But if this girl was sending out any message to men it was, I wear what’s useful, so don’t kid yourself that I’m flaunting my body to attract you.

      ‘Can I help you?’ she cried merrily as she bounced up the beach.

      ‘I’m just looking round, getting the feel СКАЧАТЬ