Sophie’s heart went out to Julie and she looked at her friend sympathetically. Sympathy was about all she could offer. She had signed up to a deal with the devil and it was a better deal than she might have hoped for. Even though she hated it.

She had been over all the pros and cons of the situation, and had apologised profusely to her friend, who was not as confident in the kitchen as she was.

‘But on the bright side,’ she said in an upbeat voice, ‘think of all the possible connections we could make! And,’ she felt compelled to repeat because fair was fair, ‘he could have just taken everything from us to sort out the damage to his car. I honestly had no idea that a car could cost that much to repair! It’s mad.’

He was sending a car for her and Sophie looked at her watch with a sense of impending doom. A fortnight ago, his secretary had emailed her with an extensive list of things she ‘should bring, should know and should be prepared to undertake’.

There was to be no veering off from the menu and she would have to ensure that every single dish for every single day was prepared to the highest possible specification.

She was told how many helpers she would have and how they should behave. Reading between the lines, that meant no fraternising with the guests.

She was informed of the dress code for all members of staff, including herself. The dress code did not include jeans or anything that might be interpreted as casual.

She gathered that she was being thrown in at the deep end and this detailed information was his way of being kind to her. She assumed that he had diverted his original catering firm to some other do specifically so that he could put her through her paces and she had spent the past two nights worrying about what would happen if she failed. Matias Rivero wasn’t, she thought, callous enough to take the shirt off her back, but he intended to get his money’s worth by hook or by crook. He might be unwilling to throw her to the sharks, but he wasn’t going to let her get off lightly by agreeing to monthly payments that would take her decades to deliver what was owed.

This was the biggest and most high-profile job she had ever got close to doing and the fact that he would be looking at her efforts with a view to criticism filled her with terror. She wondered whether he hadn’t set her an impossible task just so he could do his worst with a clear conscience when she failed. He struck her as the sort of man who saw ruthlessness as a virtue.

His car arrived just as she was giving some final tips to Julie about the catering job she would be handling on her own, and Sophie took a deep breath and reached for her pull-along case.

There would be a uniform waiting for her at his country house, which was in the Lake District. However, his instructions had been so detailed that she had decided against wearing her usual garb of jeans and a tee shirt to travel there and, instead, was in an uncomfortable grey skirt and a white blouse with a short linen jacket. At a little after ten in the morning, with the sun climbing in the sky, the outfit was already making her perspire.

She hung onto the hopeful thought that she would probably find herself stuck in the kitchen for the entire time. With any luck, she wouldn’t glimpse Matias or any of his guests and she knew that, if that were the case, then she would be all right because she was an excellent chef and more than capable of producing the menu that had been emailed to her.

She wouldn’t even have to bother about sourcing the ingredients, because all of that would already have been taken care of.

Her high hopes lasted for as long as the very smooth car journey took. Then nerves kicked in with a vengeance as the car turned between imposing wrought-iron gates to glide soundlessly up a tree-lined avenue on either side of which perfectly manicured lawns stretched towards distant horizons of open fields, shaded with copses. It was a lush landscape and very secluded.

The house that eventually climbed into view was perched atop a hill. She had expected something traditional, perhaps a Victorian manor house with faded red brick and chimneys.

She gasped at the modern marvel that greeted her. The architect had designed the house to be an organic extension of the hill and it appeared to be embedded into the side so that glass and lead projected as naturally from rock and foliage as a tree might grow upwards from the ground.

The drive curved around the back, skirting a small lake, and then they were approaching the house from the side where a sprawling courtyard was large enough to house all those important guests she had been expecting to find. Except the courtyard was empty aside from three high-performance cars parked haphazardly.

All at once, a quiver of nervous tension rippled through her. She could have become lost in a crowd of people. In an empty mansion, and it certainly looked empty, getting lost wasn’t going to be that easy.

And for reasons she couldn’t quite understand, reasons that extended well beyond the uncomfortable circumstances that surrounded her presence here, Matias made her feel...awkward. Too aware of herself, uncomfortable in her own skin and on edge in a way she had never felt before.

Her bag was whipped away from her before she had time to offer to take it herself and then she was being led through a most marvellous building towards the kitchen by a soft-spoken middle-aged woman who introduced herself as Debbie.

It was a cavernous space of pale marble and pale walls on which were hung vast abstract canvasses. She could have been walking through the centre of a fabulous ice castle and she actually shivered because never had she felt so removed from her comfort zone.

It had been hot outside but in here it was cool and quite silent. When she finally turned her attention away from her impressive surroundings, it was to find that Debbie had disappeared and instead Matias was lounging in the doorway of the kitchen.

‘You’re here,’ he commented, taking in the prissy outfit and the flat black pumps and the neat handbag, which had apparently replaced the Santa’s sack she had been carrying the last time he had seen her. He straightened and headed straight back in the direction of the kitchen, expecting her to follow him, which she did.

Sophie was tempted to retort where else would she be when she’d had no choice, but instead, she said politely to his back, ‘I expected it to have been a bit busier.’

‘The first of the guests don’t arrive until tomorrow.’ Matias didn’t bother to turn around. ‘I thought you might find it helpful to acquaint yourself with the kitchen, get to know where everything is.’

They had ended up in a kitchen that was the size of a football field and equipped to the highest possible standard. Sophie felt her fingers itch as she stared around her, dumbstruck.

‘Wow.’ She turned a full circle, eyes as wide as saucers, then when she was once again looking at him, she asked, ‘So are you going to show me where everything is?’

Matias looked blankly around him and Sophie’s eyebrows shot up.

‘You don’t know your way around this kitchen at all, do you?’

‘I’m not a cook so it’s true to say that I’ve never had much time for kitchens. I’m seldom in one place for very long and I tend to eat out a great deal. I’m a great believer in the theory that if someone else can do something better than you, then it would be cruel to deny them the opportunity.’

Sophie laughed and was surprised that he had managed to make her laugh at all. Her cheeks warmed and she looked away from those piercing dark eyes. Her heart was beating fast and she was confused because once again she could feel the pull of an attraction that went totally against the grain.

For starters, he had proven himself to have all the characteristics she despised in a man. He was arrogant, he was ruthless and he had the sort of self-assurance that came from knowing that he could do what he wanted and no one would object. He had power, he had money and he had looks and those added up to a killer combination that might have been a turn-on for other women but was a complete turn-off for her.