He was everything she loathed. He was what she had vowed to protect herself from—the sort of man capable of inspiring obsession.
Recovering her poise, she met the sensational silvered gaze. All at once her precarious poise vanished. Swallowing, Anna took an involuntary step backwards as he uncrossed one foot from the other and, his languid actions presenting a stark contrast to the gleam in his deep-set eyes, Cesare levered his broad shoulders from the wall where he had been leaning. As he peeled away the dark curve of lashes lifted off his chiselled cheekbones and she encountered the full force of the maliciously amused contempt in his eyes.
‘Well, you’ll have plenty of opportunity to see me.’ He watched a spasm of wild-eyed panic cross her quite remarkably expressive face. For a woman who presumably had some experience in lying and cheating, she really did not hide her feelings well.
Promise, threat? She didn’t want to know. ‘I...I thought you travelled a great deal.’
He arched a sardonic brow. ‘I am my own boss.’
‘Nice for you. I’d settle for having a permanent job!’ Anna flared back, taking refuge in resentment.
‘Am I meant to feel guilty for your unemployment? If you resigned your post before you secured another you must have been very confident, or possibly,’ he speculated nastily, ‘you jumped before you were pushed?’
‘I am confident that I am good at what I do,’ she retorted with a quiet dignity that brought a frown to his face.
‘But if you had bothered to read my CV you’d know that the inner-city school I was working at was a victim of closures.’ It had been that circumstance and the encouragement of friends and colleagues, not ambition, that had made Anna apply for headships. She had been very happy where she was and being a deputy head had meant she’d still retained the face-to-face teaching contact with the children.
It took him a moment to meet her eyes. He already knew all he needed to about this woman without reading her CV. ‘And the job situation is so bad that you were forced to consider relocating to the other end of the country?’
‘So only rejects need apply, is that what you’re saying?’ she snipped back.
His moulded lips tightened. ‘I’m saying that a woman like you would not last ten minutes here before she got bored, and the children here deserve continuity.’ He stopped, realising that anyone listening might consider he felt the need to defend his position. His jaw tightened. He didn’t.
Her chin went up. ‘Mr Urquart, you know nothing about a woman like me.’
He huffed a cynical laugh. ‘You’d be surprised.’
Anna threw up her hands, unable to control her exasperation. ‘It really doesn’t matter what I say, does it? You’ll never give me a fair hearing because you’ve already made up your mind,’ she accused.
His nostrils flared at the accusation. Ignoring the voice in the back of his head that suggested he might not be applying the objectivity he was famed for to this situation, he retorted coldly, ‘My personal feelings have nothing whatever to do with this.’
Anna gave a disbelieving snort and chimed with bitter mockery, ‘Lucky you.’
Cesare did not deign to respond. ‘My sister is her own woman.’
Wishing her top were thicker, Anna folded her arms across her chest and masked her growing inability to hide her physical reaction to his aura of animal magnetism that lurked behind an expression of amused indifference.
How was it possible to loathe a man and still find yourself a helpless victim of his earthy sexuality? Why deny it? Her time and energy were better spent fighting it...him, herself.
‘You make it sound like that’s a bad thing.’ Taking a breath to slow the agitated flow of words, she managed a condescending sniff. ‘But then, I suppose for you it is.’
It was obvious to Anna that he wasn’t the sort of man who would consider a mind of her own a good thing in a woman. It was easy to imagine the sort of female he liked, the variety who pandered to his vanity and acted as if every syllable he uttered were pure gold, just because he was famous and rich.
She sniffed. All right, there were probably other reasons too. She had to concede that even had Cesare Urquart been destitute and wearing rags there would still be plenty of women willing to overlook his flaws, willing to put up with a lot to be given access to that gorgeous...hard...male body.
Huffing out a tiny shocked gasp, she forced her eyes back to his face as she reminded herself that she was not—definitely not—one of those women. She preferred her men grounded and safe. Men like her ex, Mark.