I hold my arms out for Brutus. “Come here, baby. Did you get a scare?”

Samuel narrows his eyes at me but says nothing.

“If those guard dogs bark every time some wildlife comes onto the lawn, we’re going to be in for a tiring time of it. We get tons of badgers and foxes around here.”

“It’s the middle of the capital city,” he says.

“Yes, urban wildlife is a big thing in London. Are they going to go mad every time some fox, rat, or badger wanders onto the lawn? The neighbors won’t like it.”

His right brow arches in a manner that tells me he’s not impressed with what I’m saying. “Your lawn is the size of a field. I don’t think your neighbors will hear either, as far away as the next millionaire’s mansion is.”

“It’s actually very close. Also, this isn’t a millionaire’s mansion.” I bristle at his words.

“Oh, come on. I’ve seen the property prices around here.”

“I paid for this with my own hard work. Not a penny of Daddy’s money went into it.”

He holds his hand up and chuckles as I lower my face into Brutus’ fur and take a deep inhale of his familiar scent, soothing myself.

“I never said a word about your father. I’m simply observing that the houses in this area are large and have a lot of space around them.”

I narrow my eyes. “And I bet you aren’t exactly poverty stricken. I expect my daddy is paying you a hell of a lot of money to guard me. I do believe many of your kind take contract work after leaving the Special Forces, so don’t lecture me.”

I turn smartly on my heel and stomp into the bedroom.

He is right behind me. I can feel his heat, but I don’t pause or turn around. Instead, I gently place Brutus on the bed and studiously ignore the six-foot-three wall of seething anger at my back.

Why does he rub me up the wrong way so easily?

He reminds me in some ways of a boy I met when I was sixteen. He was eighteen and most definitely from the wrong side of the tracks. He joined the private school I went to for the last two months of his final upper year before he went to university. His uncle paid for the place in a desperate bid to force the boy, Rob, to knuckle down and get through his exams. It worked, but Rob was like a cluster bomb going off in our staid school.