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Maybe it wasn’t impossible, though, and maybe remaining celibate for the next five years was harder than he thought it would be.

‘So?’ he demanded. ‘Think about it. You can give me your answer in the morning.’

Liberty stared at him for one long moment, her posture tense, her chin jutting belligerently. Then without another word, she turned on her heel and went out.

Chapter Four

LIBERTY WOKE THE next morning in an unfamiliar bedroom and experienced a brief moment of disorientation, where she couldn’t remember where she was or how she’d got here.

It was a beautiful bedroom, with a low bed made up with thick duvets and lots of pillows. Cold, pale light shone through a gap in the curtains, a beam of silver on the floor.

She stared up at the ceiling, frowning since she couldn’t hear the sound of traffic, which meant she definitely wasn’t in London. Then abruptly it all came rushing back. Slogging through the snow. Knocking on the window and having Kai pick her up and carry her inside. A horribly awkward dinner. Then his bizarre marriage proposal…

God. That had been the last thing she’d been expecting, especially when all she’d been after was a bloody phone charger. He’d said some strange things about a will and an inheritance, and then that he’d put a stop on the cheque he’d already given her if she refused to marry him.

It all seemed very…odd. Especially when he’d mentioned that they wouldn’t share a bed, and she’d blushed like an idiot. She’d looked away, unable to hold his gaze, yet when she’d looked back, there had been that bright silver glitter in his eyes. An intensity that had made her breath catch.

He’d told her to think about it, but she’d been angry and then was angry for being angry. But he was basically holding Worthington to ransom by blackmailing her into agreeing to marry him.

She could say no. He wasn’t forcing her into anything. Then again, he’d said that he would give her the money to keep the home running indefinitely if she married him, and that was the thing that stuck in her mind and she couldn’t get it out.

There were many children who lived at the home and they depended on it. She’d created what she’d hoped was a supportive, loving environment, and the thought of having to close Worthington was anathema to her. Perhaps she could go elsewhere to find a donor, but she was running out of time, and the kids needed certainty and stability.

If you agreed to this marriage proposal, maybe you could even get more money out of him.

Libby sat up as the idea occurred to her. Yes, maybe she could. Money for things like health care and books and technology. For better food and clothing. Perhaps she could even set up her own charity, open more homes for disadvantaged kids, because finding beds for them all was a very difficult process. She could do a lot of good if she accepted his proposal.

Still, though, it was marriage. A legal marriage. And she’d have to live with him.

She’d never thought marriage would be for her. She had all the family she wanted at the home, and she didn’t need a partner or anything else. In fact, the thought of having to manage a husband as well as a house full of kids didn’t seem like much fun to her. Also, it wasn’t as if she was alone. If anything, it was finding alone time that was the problem.

Then again, a marriage wasn’t something she could enter into lightly, and especially not with a man like him. He was so very different to her, so very different to the boy she’d once known, that he may as well have been a stranger. A cold, icy stranger.

The thought of being married to a man like that didn’t thrill her.

You won’t have to share his bed, remember?

Heat prickled over her skin and she sat up, pushing the thought away firmly. She didn’t want to share his bed, God, no. She wouldn’t even have considered it if that was part of the deal, no, definitely not.

Pushing back the duvet, she slid out of bed and found the clothes she’d worn the night before, still on the floor where she’d left them. After she’d walked out of his office, she hadn’t known quite what to do, except go back to the living room and leaf through some magazines on the coffee table.

He’d come out of his office eventually and found her, then showed her to the bedroom where she was now, before leaving her to her own devices again. She’d managed to get a phone charger and the wi-fi password off him before he’d disappeared, so she’d spent a great portion of the evening on her phone at last, sending emails to Rachel, who was managing Worthington in her absence, and then trying to find out as much about him as she could. Which wasn’t much.

She did, however, find a great deal of information about Neve Aarsland. She’d been a Norwegian businesswoman with interests in the energy sector, who’d owned several large oil and gas companies, and was famous for her cold, regal beauty and her financial acumen. She was also famous for the man who accompanied her everywhere: Kaius Frost. Some news sources said he was her protégé, some said he was her son, while others were more prurient, with rumours that he was her lover. Everyone agreed, though, that he was her heir.

A year ago, the business world had been rocked by her death, sending stocks into a tailspin, while her supposed right-hand man had dropped out of sight, spending most of his time in his remote Norwegian lodge.

Liberty had found all the stories strangely discomforting. There was no information at all about Kai’s background, only that one day he’d appeared at Neve Aarsland’s side as if he’d always been there. Her cold-eyed bodyguard, many people had called him.

Whatever Neve had once been to him, though, it was clear that their relationship was a complex one. In fact, as she’d read through all the stories, Liberty hadn’t been able to stop thinking about the expression on Kai’s face at the dinner table, how cold and hard and distant it had been. How…bleak. So bleak.

He was grieving her, that was clear.

Now Liberty stared at the clothes she’d discarded the night before. Clothes made for a tall, slender woman, who only ever wore pale greys and whites, apparently. Neve’s clothes.

It hadn’t bothered her the night before to wear them, but now she knew who Neve had once been to Kai, she felt uncomfortable about putting them on. Perhaps she could find a robe or something and go down to the laundry and find her own clothes.

She crept into the little ensuite bathroom, found a fluffy white robe hanging from the door and shrugged into it. Then she went back into the bedroom and over to the door, opening it a crack.