French Leave

‘You’re the one who has no right to be here,’ she interrupted him furiously. ‘Not me. This house belongs to my cousin and her husband and it was Gale who invited me to spend the summer here, and…’

‘You’re Gale’s cousin?’

Against her will, Livvy found herself responding to the sharp authority of his tone, inclining her head in curt agreement as he cut across her angry speech. A persistent and unignorable warning bell was beginning to ring in her brain. ‘You know Gale and George?’ she demanded warily, trusting its authenticity.

‘Yes,’ came the terse response. ‘What do you mean, Gale invited you to spend the summer here? George told me the house would be empty.’

Livvy swallowed.

‘You will tell George that I’m going to be there, won’t you?’ she had asked her cousin.

‘Of course I will,’ Gale had reassured her. ‘Once he can bring himself to spare us some of his precious time.’

As she looked into the face of the man watching her, the stark, cold realisation of why he was here suddenly struck her.

‘George wanted to sell the farmhouse,’ Gale had told her. Then Livvy had taken Gale’s complaints about her husband with a pinch of salt, genuinely believing that George would never behave in such an underhand manner, but this man’s presence here confirmed everything Gale had told her.

He looked the type who would take advantage of someone else’s problems for his own pecuniary gain, she decided cynically.

Tilting her chin, she told him sweetly, ‘Well, now you can see that it isn’t, can’t you? If you want to look round I can’t stop you, but obviously I’d like you to leave as soon as possible…’

‘Me, leave…? My arrangement with George was that I would stay here for a while…’

‘Surely it doesn’t take long for you to decide whether or not you want to buy the place?’ she asked derisively. He certainly didn’t look the indecisive type, far from it.

‘To buy it?’ He was frowning at her now, but Livvy wasn’t deceived.

‘Yes, and no doubt you’re hoping to get it at less than the market value,’ she added scathingly, her lip curling. ‘I’ve met men like you before, men who are always looking to take advantage of other’s misfortunes, men who put money and materialism above everything else. You should get on well with George’s boss. He’s another man who thinks that money and power are everything, who doesn’t care about the effects his demands on the people who work for him could be having on their family lives.

‘Yes…You and Robert Forrest both obviously share the same lack of any real moral values.’

Livvy saw with some satisfaction that she had succeeded in silencing him. But not for long.

‘Moral values? My God, that’s rich, coming from someone like you,’ he told her bitterly.

‘What do you mean?’ The moment she made the heated demand, Livvy knew she had done the wrong thing. She watched as the hostility in his eyes was overlaid with cynical contempt.

‘Oh, come on. I saw you last night, remember? With your…friend. Tell me something, did you ever bother to wait long enough to find out his name before falling into bed with him? Good, was he? But hardly the type you’d want to take home with you? No, I expect that, like your cousin, when you find a fool besotted enough to marry you you’ll make sure he’s rich enough to support you.’

Livvy couldn’t believe what she was hearing. How dared he make such allegations against her, misjudge her so unfairly, condemn her on such implausible evidence? His insults to her were too pathetic to warrant rejection, she decided shakily, but his remark about Gale…

‘Gale did not marry George for his money,’ she told him coldly.

‘No? From what I’ve seen of your cousin, she’s very good at spending her husband’s money. Nor is she above blackmailing him if necessary by using their children.’

‘Gale just wants the best for her sons. Any mother would,’ Livvy protested, defending her cousin.

‘The best for her sons and the best for herself, but where does George fit in? I doubt very much that she ever gives any thought to what he might want…to what might be best for him. It’s no wonder…’

He stopped abruptly, frowning, absorbed in his own thoughts, Livvy recognised as she wondered uneasily exactly what they were. He seemed to know an awful lot about George and Gale. He also seemed to have a definite bias against her sex, Livvy reflected, and then wondered if it was women in general he felt contempt for, or merely Gale and herself in particular.

If so…

If so, what did it matter? She didn’t know him, after all, and after the way he had just behaved and spoken she was heartily glad she wasn’t likely to get to know him either.

She ought to feel sorry for him really, not angry with him. He really was the most abysmal judge of character, his judgement so flawed that in other circumstances his condemnation of her would almost have been laughable.

‘I think you should leave,’ she told him firmly. ‘George ought to have checked with Gale before allowing you to come down here to inspect the property. Gale doesn’t…’

‘Gale doesn’t what?’ he challenged. ‘Gale doesn’t want him to sell it? Is that why she sent you here? To use your charm to persuade would-be buyers to change their minds.’

His mouth twisted in a way that made Livvy want to hit him as he said the word ‘charm’. That he should have such a low opinion of her sex was his problem and not hers, she reminded herself, and there was at least one point she could correct him on.

‘Gale did not send me here—for any purpose. I came of my own free will, because I wanted a quiet, peaceful, uninterrupted holiday on my own.’

He was not impressed. The look he gave her sent shivers icing down her back. It was so unkind, so feral almost.

He didn’t like her defiant attitude, she could see it in his eyes, and with it an awareness of his sexual power and her potential weakness. It was totally unlike her to be so keenly aware of a man’s sexuality, and totally inappropriate in these circumstances. It irked her, baffled her, angered her, and yet made her feel anxious as well that she should have this sharp, unwanted insight into the maleness he exuded.

Her heart was beating much faster than usual, and not just because she was so angry with him, she acknowledged. She had heard that anger could be a powerful aphrodisiac, but surely not when that anger was directed at a total stranger, and a man, moreover, who on the face of it had nothing about him other than the extraordinary strength of his sexuality to attract her?

And since when, anyway, had she been attracted by a man’s sexuality? All her previous relationships had been based on mutual interests, mutual liking, mutual respect.

‘A peaceful, solitary holiday…a woman like you?’ he scoffed tauntingly now. ‘Don’t forget I saw you at the auberge.’

‘You don’t understand,’ Livvy protested, and then stopped. Why should she bother to explain herself to him? If he hadn’t been able to see with his own eyes what was actually happening, what chance was there of his listening while she tried to explain, and why should she anyway?

‘No, I don’t,’ he agreed curtly and then, almost as though it was against his will, he added harshly, ‘For God’s sake, has it never occurred to you what risks you’re running? Or is that all part of the excitement…the danger of not knowing…of living dangerously, taking risks?’

Too shocked to defend herself, Livvy stared at him. His teeth were white and strong. She gave a small, uncontrollable shudder, imagining their sharp bite against her skin…imagining…

‘Gale can’t stop George from selling this place, you know,’ he warned her. ‘He’s under a great deal of stress at the moment, and—’

‘Yes, because Robert Forrest is virtually making him work twenty-four hours a day,’ Livvy interrupted him bitterly. ‘All Gale wants is a chance to talk things over with him, but she barely sees him, he’s so busy, never mind gets time to discuss anything with him.’

‘The impression I have of your cousin isn’t that of a woman who goes in much for discussion or compromise. If George is avoiding her, perhaps it’s because he feels he has a good reason to do so.’

Livvy tensed. This man, whoever he was, seemed to know a good deal about her cousin’s marriage, his words revealing vulnerabilities in it that Livvy hadn’t known existed. Her stomach tensed uneasily; George and Gale had always seemed to have such a secure, sturdy marriage. Both of them were devoted to their sons. Livvy had seen far too often in her work as a teacher the effects of a parental break-up on children to want to see the same thing happen to her nephews.

‘Gale loves George.’ She could hear the anxiety and distress in her own voice.

‘Does she? Or does she simply love the lifestyle he provides?’

‘No,’ Livvy denied vehemently. ‘Gale had a good job of her own when she met George; she was financially independent. She gave that up to marry him, to be with him and the boys.’

‘So if material things don’t matter to her, why all the fuss about his wanting to sell this place?’

‘Perhaps it’s the fact that he’s trying to sell it without consulting her,’ Livvy told him, rallying. ‘Going behind her back…deceiving her…not telling her that he had arranged for you—’