CHAPTER SEVEN

      RAFE PICKED HIS jaw up from the table where he felt it had dropped. ‘Are you serious?’

      ‘I told you before...’

      ‘You told me you hadn’t slept with your ex. You didn’t tell me you hadn’t slept with anyone.’

      Her expression was defensive. ‘Go on—call me a dinosaur. Call me a pariah.’

      Rafe couldn’t get his head around it. He had slept with dozens of women and not one of them had ever been without experience. Some had had much more than him, particularly those he had slept with in his teens.

      He liked to think he didn’t operate a double-standard; he liked to think he was as twenty-first-century, open and progressive about sex as everyone else. But something about Poppy’s inexperience struck a chord of something terribly old-fashioned deep inside him that he hadn’t even been aware of possessing until now.

      A virgin.

      In this day and age!

      Rafe looked at her taking careful sips of her champagne, her toffee-brown gaze meeting his every now and again, as if she was trying to act normal in a totally abnormal situation. Or at least, it was abnormal for him.

      He had the routine down pat: dinner and sex. It was a combo that always worked. He couldn’t remember a time when it hadn’t.

      He always got the girl.

      But Poppy Silverton was another story. From the moment he had walked into that tearoom of hers he had seen her as the enemy that he would eventually conquer, but somehow she had the edge on him now. It was laughably ironic. He was known for his steely determination, for his merciless intent, yet in this case he felt totally ambushed.

      He had not seen this coming. He had been totally unprepared for it. She was the most fascinating and intriguing woman he had ever encountered.

      And she hated him.

      OK, so that was a minor problem, but he could work on that—get to know her, charm her a little and get her to feel a little more comfortable around him.

      Get her to sell him her house.

      That was still his goal. Nothing was going to sway him from it. He didn’t back down from his goals, not for anyone. He wanted that house because without it the Dalrymple Estate would not be complete. He didn’t do things in half-measures. When he set his sights on something he got it. It didn’t matter what or who was standing in the way of it. The fact that a mere slip of a red-haired girl was standing in his way was immaterial. There had to be a way around this so he could win.

      He always won.

      Losing would be playing into his grandfather’s belief about him—that he was not good enough, not strong enough to withstand the opposition. Vittorio had instilled in him and his brothers the sense that, like their late father, they were just paltry imitations of him. That he was the patriarch that no one could or would dare to outshine.

      His grandfather’s arrogance had fuelled Rafe’s determination since childhood. It was like a river of steel in his blood. He abhorred failure. It was a word that didn’t exist in his mind, let alone his vocabulary.

      Rafe wasn’t supposed to like his enemy. He wasn’t supposed to respect her, or be intrigued by her, or want her like he had wanted no other woman. Desire was a pulsating force inside him even now. Just watching the way her lips cupped around the rim of her glass as she sipped from her champagne flute made him hard. He watched the rise and fall of her slim throat as she swallowed and wondered what it would feel like to have those rosy-red lips suck on him, to bring him to the brink of primal pleasure...

      ‘So how did you get to the age of...?’

      ‘Twenty-five.’

      Twenty-five! He’d lost count of the number of lovers he’d had by the age of twenty, let alone twenty-five. ‘How did you get to that age without having sex?’

      ‘I didn’t want to end up like my mother, falling for the first guy who paid her a compliment,’ she said. ‘I guess it made me overly cautious. I just wanted to be sure my first time was with the right person. It’s not that I’m hankering after a wedding ring or anything. And it’s not because of religious beliefs, although I have a lot of respect for those who have them.’

      Rafe wished he could say the same. But the God of his childhood hadn’t answered his prayers the day his parents had been killed. He had felt alone in the universe that day and the feeling had never quite left him. ‘I don’t think you’re a pariah at all,’ he said. ‘I also think there’s nothing wrong in being selective about who you sleep with. To tell you the truth, I wish I’d been a bit more selective at times.’

      She gave him a tiny ‘let’s change the subject’ smile. ‘What do your brothers do?’

      Making neutral conversation was good. He could do that. ‘Raoul’s involved in the family business on the investment side of things but he also runs a thoroughbred stud in Normandy. He’s a bit of an extreme sportsman; not only does he ride horses at breakneck speeds, he’s a daredevil skier on both snow and water. And Remy is a business broker. He buys ailing businesses, builds them up and sells them for a profit. He loves his risks too. I guess it’s the gambler in him.’

      ‘You must be constantly worrying about both of them. I’m almost glad I’m an only child.’

      Rafe had survived the loss of his parents but the thought of losing either of his brothers was something that haunted him. They were both so precious to him. He didn’t tell them—he rarely showed his affection for them, or they for him—but he would be truly devastated if anything happened to either of them. Ever since he was ten it had been his responsibility to keep watch over them. ‘We each have our own lives. We try and catch up when