The Tycoon's Mistress: His Cinderella Mistress. Carole Mortimer

of their father the previous year she now took that role doubly seriously.

      ‘Don’t worry, I won’t.’ March grinned dismissively, always the more reckless sister of the trio.

      ‘I’ll see you both in the morning,’ January told them laughingly, well accustomed to the battle of wills that often ensued between her cautious and more impetuous sisters.

      She hurried up the stairs to get herself ready for this evening, choosing another black dress this time, knee-length, with a low neckline and long black sleeves ending in a dramatic vee at her slender wrists. Her hair she pulled back with jewelled combs, leaving wispy tendrils against her creamy cheeks.

      It was slightly strange to lead these double lives, dressing glamorously for her role as a singer compared to the usual thick baggy jumpers, old denims and wellington boots when she was on the farm. Somehow the two didn’t seem compatible…

      It was troubling about the farm, though, she considered on her drive to the hotel. As March was only too keen to point out, no one could force them to sell if they didn’t want to—which they certainly didn’t. But what May had said was also true: life could be made very difficult for them if some sort of development completely surrounded their land and the farm.

      There were such things as right of way, and water rights, for one thing; James Hanworth had never troubled about such things, had accepted that the Calendar farm was adjacent to his, and that access and water were a necessary part of its success. Somehow January doubted the new owner—a corporation, no less—would be quite as magnanimous.

      It was testament to how troubling she found the situation that she hadn’t even given the man Max a second thought until she went into the almost deserted piano-bar and found him sitting there chatting to John, the barman!

      For some reason she had assumed Max would only be staying at the hotel the previous night. Erroneously, as it turned out.

      ‘Ah, January.’ Max turned to look at her with mocking blue eyes as she went straight over to the piano to arrange her music for the evening. He strolled over to stand only feet away from her. ‘I believe there was some sort of confusion last night as to where we were to meet each other at the end of the evening?’

      He believed no such thing, knew very well that she had deliberately slipped away through another door in order to avoid meeting him.

      ‘Was there?’ January raised her head to look at him, her gaze steady—despite the fact that she felt an inner quiver of awareness at the physical impact of his attractiveness in the lounge suit and blue shirt.

      He really was a very attractive man, and January would be deceiving herself if she denied responding to that attraction. It was his sheer intensity of personality that she found a little overwhelming.

      ‘I like to think so.’ He smiled, a pulse-jumping, heart-stopping smile.

      As if to give lie to her wariness of his previous intensity… ‘Maybe we can do better this evening?’ he suggested mildly.

      He really was trying to lighten up, wasn’t he? January accepted with an inner amusement. But not hard enough to conceal the fact that he was still determined to spend time alone with her…

      ‘Perhaps,’ she returned noncommittally. ‘If you’ll excuse me? I have to start my first session,’ she added to take the bluntness out of her previous statement.

      ‘Of course,’ he accepted lightly, moving back slightly to allow her to seat herself at the piano, before bending forward, his mouth only inches from her ear. ‘You’re looking even more beautiful this evening than you did last night,’ he murmured huskily, the warmth of his breath stirring the tendrils of hair against her cheeks.

      January swallowed hard, tilting her head back slightly to look up into his face. A face still only mere inches away from hers… ‘Thank you,’ she accepted softly.

      Max straightened, that smile back on his lips as he looked down at her admiringly. ‘Very graciously said,’ he told her appreciatively.

      January gave a mocking inclination of her head, determined not to let him see that his proximity was unnerving her. Even if it was! ‘I like to think so,’ she dryly returned his own comment of a few minutes ago.

      He chuckled appreciatively. ‘I’ll have a drink waiting for you at the bar when you have your break. John tells me that you usually prefer a sparkling water.’

      She gave an irritated frown at the thought of this man discussing her likes and dislikes with a third person, even someone as innocuous as John. ‘The whole point of my having a break is to give me a few minutes to relax.’ Something she certainly couldn’t do around him!

      ‘Then we won’t talk,’ he promised lightly.

      No one could have accused him of being a chatterbox the previous evening! But this man didn’t need to say anything to totally disrupt her equilibrium; just having him sitting there staring at her was enough to make her nervous.

      ‘Fine,’ she accepted tautly.

      Max looked at her consideringly for several long seconds. ‘The last time you agreed with me so readily you made an escape out the back door,’ he said slowly.

      January felt the guilty colour warm her cheeks; she had said and done exactly that, hadn’t she…?

      ‘Well, this time I won’t,’ she assured him impatiently. ‘Okay?’

      ‘Okay,’ he acknowledged with a slight inclination of his head. ‘By the way…’ he paused before leaving ‘…you have the most incredibly sexy voice, speaking or singing, that I have ever heard,’ he told her softly before walking away.

      Oh, very conducive to calming her already frayed nerves—she didn’t think!

      Better, Max, he congratulated himself as he resumed his seat on a stool at the bar. Much better. Just the right balance of humour and determination. All he had to do now was keep it up for the next few hours!

      All! When January had walked into the room a short time ago wearing that figure-hugging black dress, showing a long expanse of shapely legs beneath its knee-length, he had literally stopped breathing for several seconds, the blood singing heatedly in his veins, and as for the rest of his body—! That sort of response just at the sight of a woman hadn’t happened to him since he was a raw teenager!

      But he had regrouped, he assured himself, had spoken to her confidently and yet not too forcefully, infusing humour into the banter they had exchanged.

      And then he had told her how sexy he found the sound of her voice!

      Okay, okay, so he had slipped back a little there. But it had been worth it—if only to see the warm colour that had suffused her cheeks, the sparkle in those incredibly beautiful grey eyes!

      At thirty-seven, Max had known many beautiful and accomplished women, been involved with several of them, but those women had been far too worldly-wise themselves to blush at something that was said to them; it was refreshing to know that January wasn’t such a sophisticate.

      How old was she? he wondered. Mid-twenties, probably, he decided. Not too young that he felt guilty over this single-minded interest he had found in her, but not too old that she had forgotten how to blush at a compliment.

      ‘Great girl, isn’t she?’ The barman spoke admiringly as he stood polishing glasses in preparation for the busy evening ahead, obviously having followed Max’s line of vision. ‘Not in the least stand-offish like some of the singers we’ve had in here in the past,’ John added with a pointed grimace.

      Max sensed that John could be a great source of information about January. If Max chose to pursue it. Which he didn’t…

      For some reason he felt a great need to get to know January for himself, to unpeal each protective layer, until he knew her totally. Like that parcel in the children’s game where you took one wrapper off at a time as the music stopped, until at last you arrived at the treasure within.

      Once