Читать книгу Second-Best Husband - Пенни Джордан, PENNY JORDAN - Страница 7

‘BUT I never faint!’

Sara frowned, recognising her own voice. She opened her eyes and discovered that she was lying in the back of a Land Rover, and moreover that there was something hard and lumpy under her spine. She tried to move, but a pair of large male hands restrained her.

‘Not so fast, otherwise you’ll be off again. Keep still for a moment.’

‘Off again…’ What on earth did he think she was? she wondered indignantly. ‘I never faint,’ she repeated firmly. ‘And if you would just let go of me…’

She tried to sit up, to struggle against him, and gasped in shock at the way her head started to swim the moment she lifted it from the floor.

‘Keep still. You’ll feel better if you do.’

The deep voice, so calm, so authoritative, ought to have annoyed her, but for some reason it had exactly the opposite effect, relaxing her tense muscles, soothing both her body and her mind so that this time she stayed where she was, closing her eyes, conscious of the hard fingers circling her wrist, monitoring her pulse.

‘Now try breathing slowly and deeply. Not too deeply…’

Again, half to her own astonishment, she did as she was instructed, finding it easy somehow to match her breathing to the even cadences of the voice instructing her.

‘Feeling any better?’

This time, when she opened her eyes and nodded, the world didn’t spin round her but stayed stationary.

‘It’s my own fault,’ she announced as she sat up, a little more cautiously and far more successfully this time. She was, she realised, in the back of Stuart Delaney’s Land Rover. It smelled of fresh clean earth, of rain and growing things. ‘I didn’t have anything to eat before I left London.’

No need to tell him that she had not in fact eaten properly for several days, not merely several hours.

She winced a little as she had an unwanted mental vision of Anna’s soft femininity, her curves, the fluid contours of her flesh, so much a contrast to her own more angular slenderness. Thin and dried-up, that was how Anna had dismissively described her, making her feel somehow desiccated, withered, old almost, even though Anna was in actual fact two years her senior.

Men didn’t like thin women; they liked curves, softness, the ripe promise of a female body that was alluringly shaped; and she tensed a little, waiting for Stuart Delaney to make some comment about her thinness, but instead to her relief he merely commented almost absently, ‘Well, we all do it at times, when we’ve more important things on our minds. Done it myself. In fact…’

She was sitting up now, ruefully conscious of the fact that the dirty interior of the Land Rover wouldn’t have done her cream suit much good.

‘Look, I was just on my way home. I haven’t eaten myself yet. Since your parents aren’t here, why don’t you join me? Mrs Gibbons from the village will have been up today to give the place a clean. She normally leaves me something to eat, and in view of the hospitality I’ve received from your parents…’

It would be foolish to refuse his offer. This wasn’t London, where a woman had to be wary of invitations and approaches from any man on such a short acquaintance. And besides, she already knew from her mother’s phone calls how much her parents liked their new neighbour.

The alternative was remaining at home on her own, brooding, remembering…

‘Well, if you’re sure you don’t mind…’

‘If I minded, I wouldn’t have suggested it in the first place.’

There was more than a touch of brusqueness in his comment, but instead of feeling rebuffed by it Sara found that it was refreshing almost. He was so very different from Ian. Ian, whose charm had masked a cruelty, a callousness that had left her feeling as though she had been mauled and left sore and bleeding when a harder, cleaner blow would have been kinder.

‘Fine. I’ll follow you up to the house in my own car, shall I?’ she suggested, but Stuart Delaney shook his head.

‘No, better not… I doubt that you’re likely to faint again, but it’s best not to take the chance.’

‘Oh, but that means you’ll have to bring me back,’ she began to protest, but he had apparently stopped listening to her, and was walking to the rear of the Land Rover, jumping out and heading for the driver’s door.

Sara started to follow him. She was no stranger to travelling in the back of beaten-up old Land Rovers, and had done so on many occasions during her teens, and so she knew from experience just how uncomfortable a ride she was likely to have if she stayed where she was. No, she would be far more comfortable in the passenger seat.

As she reached the rear of the vehicle, she slipped off her high heels and prepared to struggle down to the ground with the handicap of her straight skirt, but to her amazement Stuart, who she thought had left her to make her own way out of the Land Rover, was waiting for her, calmly scooping her up in his arms.

‘Please…there’s no need for you to do this,’ she protested breathlessly, clutching her shoes with one hand and discovering very quickly that it was necessary to cling to the front of his shirt with the other.

It was very difficult to sound cool and businesslike with her head tucked into his shoulder and her fingertips inadvertently brushing the warm bare flesh of his throat.

It disconcerted her to realise how oddly aware of him she was, how very quickly and unexpectedly her breathing had altered to become shallow and quick as her body registered the proximity of his.

A look of startled bewilderment darkened her eyes, causing her to immediately close them as her body tensed against the sensations she was experiencing.

It was just the total unexpectedness of being held like this, she told herself. How long had it been since a man had picked her up and held her in his arms?

How long had it been since she had experienced this kind of male-to-female intimacy in any form at all, no matter how non-sexual?

She tried to remember, to conjure up some corresponding mental image to offset the peculiar and unwanted sensations that were causing her such discomfort and embarrassment, and could not do so.

Oh, there had been occasions in her teens…boys…clumsy, awkward kisses and embraces; but she had always been on the shy side…and then since she had met Ian…

As he felt her tension, Stuart stopped moving, and told her equably, ‘It’s OK, I’m not going to drop you. Don’t forget I’m used to carrying half-grown trees about, and if you’re thinking they don’t need to be treated as fragile and easily damaged, then you’re wrong. There is nothing more vulnerable and open to damage than a young tree removed from its habitat.

‘A moment’s carelessness, and the bruising and root damage which can be caused can prove fatal.’

Sara found she was battling against a half-hysterical desire to start giggling. Here she was, worrying about that startling frisson of physical sensation being in Stuart’s arms had aroused within her, tensing herself against his answering awareness of it, only to discover that in her rescuer’s eyes she was simply a sapling he was carrying from one place to another; that he was neither aware of nor concerned about the physical intimacy of their bodies in any sexual way at all and that he was totally oblivious to that tiny shudder of sensation that had run through her, coiling the muscles of her stomach, making her aware of the disconcerting hardening of her nipples.

It had been a long time since her body had reacted like that, she recognised, as he balanced her against him and eased her into the passenger seat of the Land Rover. Once, all it had needed to set her body on fire with aching need had been for Ian to walk into the same room; simply to hear his voice, to register his presence had been sufficient. But just lately… She frowned, trying to remember just when it had last been that her body had reacted physically to his presence, to his sexuality, and acknowledged that she could not do so. Which was strange, surely, when she loved him…

She was still frowning when Stuart got into the driver’s seat of the vehicle and put it in motion.

‘Sexless’ was how Anna had tauntingly described her, and in her heart of hearts Sara had admitted the accuracy of the taunt. She loved Ian, and of course she desired him, but over the years that desire had become muted, tamed. So much so that she had virtually forgotten what it was like to feel that sharp, biting ache within her body, that overwhelming physical feminine responsiveness to a man’s maleness; that she had honestly believed herself to have passed beyond the excitement of sexuality into more mature waters.

And yet here she was reacting in exactly the way she had thought impossible—and not to Ian…Ian, whom she loved…but to another man, a stranger—a man, moreover, who had given her no encouragement whatsoever to think of him in any sexual terms.

As he drove down the lane, she wondered uneasily what was happening to her, why her body had seen fit to rebel in such an unexpected and disconcerting fashion. She even began to wonder uneasily if she might have been wiser to have refused Stuart’s invitation to share his supper. And then common sense reasserted itself and she reminded herself mockingly that it was hardly likely that she was going to spend the evening locked in Stuart Delaney’s arms, and that, since that odd and totally unwanted sensual frisson of pleasure had only occurred when he had held her, she was perfectly safe from experiencing it again.

In fact, she told herself firmly, she would be better advised to put the whole incident right out of her mind. After all, her emotions had been through so many traumas recently that it was hardly surprising if she experienced the odd unexpected reaction.

As she saw the shadowy bulk of the manor house taking shape in the darkness ahead of them, she tried not to listen to the small, sharp voice that told her that her reaction to Stuart had been physical and not emotional.

After all, she knew herself well enough to feel completely secure and confident that she was not the type of woman who would ever need to seek reassurance and comfort, or even a confirmation of her desirability and femininity, in any compulsion to experience an intimacy with a man which was purely physical. After all, she reminded herself bitterly, hadn’t Anna and Ian already made it devastatingly plain to her that she was not the kind of woman whom men desired or found physically attractive? She would be a fool even to think of putting that denunciation to the test…of trying to prove them wrong by…

The direction of her thoughts brought her to an abrupt and shocked halt. A physical relationship with a man who wasn’t Ian? A man she did not love? Was she out of her mind? Had the shock of recent events virtually unbalanced her mentally as well as emotionally?

Stop it, she warned herself angrily. You’ve got enough problems to deal with without looking for more.

It had been several years since Sara had last visited the manor house—a duty visit with her mother one Christmas to the old man who used to live there—but as a child she had always found the place fascinating, and now, as Stuart brought the Land Rover to a halt at the rear of the building in what had originally been the stable yard, she turned to him and asked him impulsively, ‘What made you decide to buy this place?’

He gave her a brief smile. He had a nice smile, she noticed, and an unexpected dimple on the left-hand side of his mouth. She had to subdue an odd urge to reach out and touch it. It gave him a vulnerability totally opposed to her initial impression of him as a man as tough as granite.

He might not have Ian’s golden good looks, but he was a very attractive man none the less, she recognised, on a small spurt of surprise, a man a woman would feel she could depend on, trust…a man who would make a good father.

She was startled by the waywardness of her own thoughts. Where on earth were they coming from? A good father… What a ridiculous thought to have about a man she barely knew.

‘It was the woodland,’ she heard him saying to her, and frowned until she realised he was answering her own question. ‘Not because of the quality of the trees in it. In all honesty they’re pretty poor. Most of the oaks have had to come down, although I’ve been hoping to be able to use the wood once it’s matured. No, it was because the soil here…the land, is perfect, or as near perfect as I’m likely to get for my purposes. The acreage that goes with the house is sufficient for my needs, and the land is sheltered by the Welsh hills. It’s well watered but not marshy. I must admit I was worried at first about the risk of transplanting our stock up here, but so far our losses have been minimal and the new trees we’ve planted are doing very well. It’s always risky transplanting mature trees; that’s why, before we sell one, I like to check on where it’s going and to make sure the buyer is aware of the maintenance programme that’s necessary until it’s securely rooted. Of course, with all the recent storm damage, we’ve done very well on the sales side, but that also puts pressure on us to produce more stock, which takes time.’

Sara was both fascinated and confused.

‘I didn’t think it was possible to transplant mature trees.’

‘It isn’t unless they’ve been specially grown for that purpose. My uncle started the business, seeing a gap in the market, and in the main supplying councils. When he died I inherited it from him. I was already working for the Forestry Commission. In fact I was on secondment in Canada at the time. At first I intended to sell the business, but then we had the storms of ‘87 which put pressure on all suppliers of mature trees—and there aren’t many of us—and somehow or other I found I was hooked and that the business had grown on me, so to speak, but we needed to expand, and so I started looking for somewhere to relocate.’

‘It sounds fascinating,’ Sara commented, and genuinely meant it, but she could see from the sudden tightening of his mouth that he thought she was being sarcastic.

Impulsively she touched him, and said quickly, ‘No, I meant it. It does sound fascinating. I had no idea that it was possible to transplant large trees.’

There was a small pause and then he replied, ‘If you really are interested, while you’re up here, I could show you round…show you what we’re doing.’

‘I’d like that.’

She was surprised to discover that she genuinely meant it, and not just because it would be a means of keeping Ian out of her thoughts if only for a short space of time.

‘Are you feeling OK now?’ he was asking her. ‘Or—’

‘No. No, I’m fine,’ she assured him quickly. It was one thing to tell herself that that momentary and discomfiting sexual response to him meant nothing and was hardly likely to happen again. It was quite another to put that belief to the test, especially so soon after that first uncomfortably enlightening occurrence.

‘So far I haven’t been able to do much to the house,’ he warned her as they crossed the yard, and security lights came on, illuminating the cobbles and the empty stables as well as the jumble of windows and doors that studded the weathered stone of the building.

‘As I said, Mrs Gibbons comes up from the village a couple of times a week. I’ve managed to make the kitchen habitable, plus one of the bedrooms, but as for the rest…’

‘It’s a very large house for one man,’ Sara ventured.

They had almost reached the back door and he paused now, turning to look at her.

‘Yes,’ he agreed bleakly. ‘When I bought it, I hadn’t actually visualised living here alone.’

Immediately Sara guessed what must have happened. Like her, he had obviously been rejected by the person he loved. Perhaps she had not wanted to live in such an isolated spot. Perhaps she had been someone he had met in Canada who had not wanted to come and live in England, who had not loved him enough. No one knew better than she how much that kind of rejection hurt…how it scarred and wounded. She wanted to reach out to him, to touch him, to offer him her sympathy, her understanding, but he was already turning away from her, extracting some keys from his pocket and unlocking the kitchen door.

As he held it open for her, he reached inside and flicked on the lights.

Sara stepped past him and into the generous-sized room, catching her breath in admiration as she saw how it had been transformed from the dreary place she remembered.

Walls had been moved to make the room larger; the kitchen range, which she vaguely remembered as a crouching evil monster that belched smoke and was covered in rust, had been transformed somehow or other into a model of polished perfection, whose presence warmed the entire room, offering the two cats curled up on top of it a comfortable place to sleep.

Where she remembered a haphazard collection of tatty utilitarian cupboards, and a chipped stone sink, there were now beautifully made units in what she suspected was reclaimed oak, from the quality and sheen of their finish. The original stone floor had been cleaned and polished and was now partially covered with earth-toned Indian rugs; the walls had been painted a soft, warm, peachy terracotta colour; on the dresser, which like the units was oak and softly polished, stood a collection of pewter jugs and a service of traditional willow-pattern china.

A deep, comfortably solid-looking settee was pulled up close to the range, and the table in the centre of the room looked large enough and solid enough to accommodate a good-sized family.

In fact all that the room lacked to make it perfect was perhaps some flowers in the heavy pewter jugs, and of course the delicious warm smell of food cooking which she always associated with her mother’s kitchen and her mother’s love.

‘This is wonderful,’ she commented admiringly, swinging round to face Stuart and to say wryly, ‘I don’t know who installed these units for you, but I do know that they must have cost the earth—the quality of the wood alone…’

‘Reclaimed oak,’ he told her offhandedly. ‘I picked it up quite cheaply, and as for the units…’ He shrugged, and turned away from her.

‘I made them myself. Not a particularly difficult task.’

He sounded so offhand that for a moment Sara felt embarrassed that she had enthused about them so much, and then she recognised that her praise had probably embarrassed him, that he perhaps wasn’t actually used to his talents being admired.

While she assimilated these thoughts, she chalked up another black mark against the woman who had rejected him. Had he built this kitchen for her, working on it with love and hope, only to find…?

Tears stung her eyes. She blinked them away hurriedly, and heard herself saying in an oddly choked voice, ‘Well, no matter what you say, I think they look wonderful. The wood—there’s something about it that makes you want to touch it…to stroke it almost…’ She broke off, feeling thoroughly embarrassed as she realised that he had turned round and was scrutinising her.

‘Not many people recognise that quality in wood, that appeal; to most of them it’s simply…wood. They don’t recognise its tactile appeal…’ He stopped. ‘Sorry, I’m starting to lecture you. If you haven’t eaten all day you must be starving. I’ll see what Mrs G. has left.’

He opened the door and disappeared in the direction of what Sara remembered as being one of the house’s cold pantries, returning within seconds with a covered dish.

‘It looks like shepherd’s pie,’ he told her.

‘Wonderful.’ She could feel her empty stomach starting to grumble hungrily at the thought of food.

This was the first time she had actually felt hungry since Ian had dropped the bombshell announcement of his engagement. The first time she had found herself able to forget her own problems and become interested in something and someone else, she recognised as Stuart switched on the oven and opened it, placing the pie dish on one of its runners.

‘Mrs G. tells me that it is possible to cook things in the range,’ he told Sara ruefully. ‘But as yet I haven’t quite mastered the knack.’

‘I’m not surprised.’

Sara told him about her visits to the house as a child, admiring the way he had managed to restore the range.

‘I enjoyed it. In the winter, when the daylight hours are so short, having the house to work on is an ideal means of finding something to do.’

He paused, his face slightly shadowed, and Sara wondered sympathetically if he was thinking about her, the woman he loved…thinking about how different things might have been were she here to share his life with him. He looked so sombre that she half turned away from him, instinctively wanting to give him privacy for his feelings, and she was surprised to hear him saying, ‘The problem is that, instead of renovating the house, what I ought to be doing is tackling the mountain of paperwork that’s amassing in the study.

‘That’s proving to be my biggest headache since I inherited the business. It seems that an inability to deal accurately and efficiently with paperwork is a family trait. My uncle’s affairs were in such a mess that I had to hire a firm of accountants to get them straightened out. They recommended a computer and a software program, both for the financial aspects of the business and for keeping a record of the replanting schemes I intend to set up, but the first time I tried to use the damn thing…’ He sounded so exasperated that Sara turned to look at him. He had pushed his fingers into his hair as he spoke to her in a gesture of impatient irritation which confirmed her earlier opinion that it needed cutting.

His hair was thick and glossy, almost black, so very different from Ian’s expertly styled blond hair.

‘I don’t know why it is, but I seem to have a blind spot where paperwork is concerned.’ He was scowling slightly, suddenly looking very much younger…almost like a little boy. The thought of anyone considering such a large and tough-looking man as a little boy amused Sara enough to make a small smile curve her mouth. She saw Stuart looking at her, and realised that he was focusing on her face…on her mouth itself.

The instant reaction that ricocheted through her body stunned her into immobility, followed by an astonishing urge to touch her tongue-tip to her lips to relieve their unfamiliar dryness. It was so long since she had been aware of how very erotic it could be to have a man’s attention focused on her mouth in that particular way that it was several seconds before she recognised her reaction for what it was.

Immediately her face became suffused with a wave of hot colour, which intensified as she realised abruptly that Stuart probably hadn’t been focusing on her mouth in any remotely sensual way at all, but had far more likely mistaken her smile for contempt at his inability to cope with his paperwork.

Embarrassment and a desire to rectify matters rushed her into ill-considered speech, so that before she knew it she was saying quickly, ‘Well, if there’s anything I can do to help… I’m going to be here for…for some time. I might not be familiar with your software, but I could perhaps make some headway with the ordinary paperwork.’

He was watching her with so much surprise that she stopped speaking, her face burning again.

‘I’m sorry,’ she started to apologise. ‘You’ve probably made arrangements of your own. You—’

‘No. No, I haven’t,’ he assured her. ‘And if you really mean it… I can’t tell you what a headache it’s been. I just don’t seem to be able to get to grips with it at all. You’re intending to be around for some time, then?’