was out this morning. I don"t know if you like fresh salmon."
" I love it," Sara a.s.sured him.
" And I"d also love to see over the house. If you don"t think it"s too
intrusive of me to ask."
" Not at all," Stuart a.s.sured her.
" Although I warn you it isn"t exactly Homes and Gardens."
Sara laughed.
" Good," she told him with a smile.
" Other people"s perfection always makes me feel dreadfully inferior."
" Yes, I know what you mean," Stuart agreed, as he opened his door. She
made to do the same, but he stopped her.
" Hang on," he said.
" It"s quite a long way down out of this thing.
I"ll come round and give you a hand."
Sara could have told him that she"d been scrambling out of Land Rovers
since she was no higher than her father"s knee, but for some reason she
refrained. There was something undeniably pleasant, after Anna"s scathing and cruelremarks about her lack of s.e.xuality, her lack of femininity, in having aman perform the small courtesy of helping her out of his vehicle eventhough it might be unnecessary.
It made her feel fragile, and delicate, all the things she knew quitewell she wasn"t and never had been. It made her feel that she was a woman, she recognised in startled comprehension, something that Ianhadn"t done in a long time, and something she hadn"t allowed any otherman to do, because of Ian.
And so she waited, with her door closed, smiling at Stuart as he openedit for her, releasing her seatbelt, so that she could start to climb outof the Land Rover.
She had a.s.sumed that Stuart would simply give her a guiding hand, an armto lean on if necessary as she stepped down on to the ground, and wastherefore startled when instead he reached into the Land Rover and placed his hands firmly on her waist.
As he leaned towards her, their eyes were virtually on the same level.
His were a dark warm gold, flecked with tawny highlights. They were verymasculine eyes, she acknowledged, despite the length and thickness ofthose dark lashes. They were also very perceptive eyes; eyes that seemed to recognise her momentary shock at the sensation ofhis hands against her body, warming her flesh through her jeans andshirt, making her suddenly almost painfully aware of the fact thatvirtually the only physical contact her body had had with that of a manhad been limited to the clumsy caresses of her teenage years; that therehad never been a time when a man had held her like this as"a preamble toa more intimate em brace; that she had never in fact experienced thesensual tension that came from knowing that the male hands resting onher waist would soon be sliding upwards over her ribcage to caress herb.r.e.a.s.t.s, that the dark male head so close to her own would soon beobliterating the light as they shared the intimacy of a lovers" kiss.
A lovers" kiss. Unable to stop herself, she looked at Stuart"s mouth.
Her heart was thudding frantically, her breathing jerky and unsteady.
An embarra.s.sing sensual awareness of him as a man seemed to rocketthrough her, totally throwing her off guard. She started to tremble, toshiver as her body was gripped with an unfamiliar tension, a sharpaching need that seemed to burst into life inside her, taking over herentire nervous system so quickly that she was given no chance to controlit. She closed her eyes, feeling sick with shock and self-disgust.
" Sara... Are you all right?"
Her eyes opened automatically, focusing on Stuart.
" I ... I...".
" You"re trembling."
He said it almost accusingly, his grip on her waist tightening.
What on earth could she say? How on earth could she explain? Shecouldn"t.
Impossible to tell a man, any man, however nice he was, that you weretrembling because your body for some to tally unknown and embarra.s.singreason had suddenly decided that it found him so s.e.xually desirable thatyour brain couldn"t control its response to him.
Even now, her body was still reacting to him, her nipples taut andstiff, her stomach tight with a sensation she couldn"t rememberexperiencing in years.
How could she tell him any of that? How could she tell him that she hadlooked at his mouth and for one insane awful moment had not onlywondered what it would feel like against her own, but had actually beenin danger of leaning towards him; of physically betraying her yearning, aching need to experience his kiss?
She did not want him really, she a.s.sured herself. It was all because ofAnna, because of Ian. Anna"s cruel gibes about her lack of s.e.xuality hadgone deep and left a festering poison, which had somehow erupted in thatappallingly embarra.s.sing wave of heat and need, so that for a moment shehad actively wanted to prove Anna wrong by. By what. Wanting Stuart tomake love to her?
She was still trembling, shocked both by what she had experienced andher own ability to understand it.
" Sara."
She heard the urgency, the concern in Stuart"s voice.
" I... I" mfine..." she lied shakily.
She could tell from the way he was looking at her that he didn"t believeher, but she was grateful to him when he didn"t press her, simplylifting her down out of the Land Rover. And she needed his help now, sherecognised weakly.
She felt so disorientated, so feeble. so. shocked and shaken by what shehad just experienced.
As he swung her down to the ground, her hair brushed his face. She feltthe sudden brief tension in his hands, before he set her down andreleased her.
" Nice perfume," he commented, his voice almost rough, his face avertedfrom her.
Perfume? She was puzzled.
" But I don"t wear perfume. At least..." She had washed her hair thismorning and she could only presume that it was her shampoo he couldsmell.
It gave her an odd feeling in the pit of her stomach to know that he hadbeen close enough to her to inhale the scent of her hair.
What if she had inadvertently moved just that little bit closer to him.
Would she then have felt the warmth of his breath against her skin?
Would he.
" Look, if you want to change your mind... If you"re not feeling up tothis..."
She heard what he was saying and tried to focus on it, shaking her headin quick negation of his suggestion, telling him quickly," No, no. I"mfine."
As he closed the Land Rover door she watched him, her glance slidingalmost compulsively to his mouth. What if he had kissed her then when hewas lifting her out of the Land Rover? What if he had actually read hermind and.
She swallowed hard. She ought to be heartily glad that he had done nosuch thing. It was embarra.s.sing enough as it was that she should ac Dtually have experienced those sensations, never mind having himrecognise her vulnerability.
What was happening to her? she wondered in self-revulsion. All throughthe years when she had loved Ian, had wanted him, she had never beenremotely interested in any other man, had never experienced the leastdesire for anyone else. And yet here she was. It was just reaction, thatwas all--reaction to Anna"s cruelty, reaction to reality. reaction tothe discovery that she had wasted so many years in idiotic daydreams andfantasy.
Her reaction to Stuart was undoubtedly only her body"s way ofdesperately trying to prove that Anna had been wrong in telling her shewas s.e.xless and undesirable. Now that she was aware of her vulnerabilityshe would be able to control and monitor it. There was no real reason for her to feel alarmed and apprehensive. Once she had thoroughlya.n.a.lysed and understood her uncharacteristic behaviour it wouldn"thappen again.
Feeling a lot happier now that she had explained to her own satisfactionjust why she had reacted in such an unexpected and potentiallyembarra.s.sing fashion, she fell into step beside Stuart.
CHAPTER FOUR.
" How about a quick tour of the house followed by lunch?" Stuartsuggested once they were inside.
" Wouldn"t you prefer me to look over your paperwork first?" Saraoffered.
He smiled ruefully at her.
" I"m afraid to risk letting you see the chaos it"s in on an emptystomach."
" As bad as that?" Sara sympathised.
" Worse," he a.s.sured her.
Sara laughed. She was getting to like him more and more. In fact shecouldn"t remember ever feeling so instantly at ease with anyone. If onlyshe hadn"t had that idiotic reaction to him while he was helping her outof the Land Rover. Thank goodness he at least hadn"t realised the effecthe was having on her.
" If you can just hang on for a sec while I get the lunch on, I"ll do mybest to act as an adequate tour guide. I expect you know more than I doabout the house"s history. One day when I"ve got rather more time tospare than I"m likely to have for quite some time to come I"d like toresearch the house"s past more thoroughly, sort out the reality from themyths. It"s changed hands so often."
" Yes, I know," Sara agreed, telling herself that it was ridiculous ofher to feel an unmistakable if slight tinge of feminine chagrin at theefficient way he moved around the kitchen, deftly preparing the salmonfor their lunch.
She was all for men and women sharing their household tasks in theory,but in reality, much to her own astonishment she was discovering thatshe felt a small fris son of resentment when confronted with the evidence that such a very male man was obviously completelyself-sufficient.
Inwardly chiding herself, she asked herself sternly if she would reallyhave preferred it if Stuart had sat back and expected her to take overthe ch.o.r.e of making their lunch. Why should she want to? So that shecould impress him with her domestic skills? How ridiculous.
How." My cooking is pretty basic, I"m afraid," Stuart told her,interrupting her thought-flow.
" It will just be salmon, new potatoes and green beans. Unfortunately mytalents do not stretch as far as Hollandaise sauce."
Sara"s did. Her mother was a first-rate and very inspired cook, and shehad pa.s.sed on to both her daughters her pleasure in the preparation offood, even if Sara had discovered once she was living alone in Londonthat, for her, most of the pleasure in cooking came from watching otherseat what she had prepared for them.
Ian, even if they had been close enough for her to have asked him roundfor dinner, preferred to eat out, somewhere expensive and fashionablewhere the food he was eating was generally of little importance to him.
" Ready for the grand tour?" Stuart asked her, deftly placing the salmonin the oven and closing the door.
Nodding her head, Sara stood up.
" I thought we"d start at the top and work our way down," Stuartsuggested.
" We"ll leave out the attics. They"re filthy, for one thing."
" How many bedrooms does the house have?" Sara asked him, as he stoodback to allow her to precede him up what were obviously the back stairs.
" Twelve," Stuart told her, but ultimately I"d like to reduce that toeight, and to use the smaller rooms as bathrooms. I"m not using it atthe moment, because there was a problem with one of the windows, whichover the years has led to quite considerable damp and deterioration inthe plaster work inside it, but the master bedroom has its own adjoiningsitting-room, which I"d like to retain. I rather like the idea of havingsomewhere comfortable and private to relax in."
" You could perhaps turn it into a sitting-room c.u.m-study," Sarasuggested, as they reached the landing.
" These days with computer terminals, and " " A computer terminal? No,thanks," Stuart interrupted her firmly.
" Computers and I do not exactly see eye to eye."
Sara laughed.
" Perhaps you"re not using the right software. Now there are so manyuser-friendly " " It might be user-friendly, but I am most definitely not computer-friendly," Stuart told her wryly.
" I know that isn"t the sort of thing one ought to admit to these days,rather as in the past no male worthy of the name dared to admit that hecouldn"t drive a car.
The animal I have now is supposed to be virtually able to do everythingbar licking the stamps to put on the envelopes, but every time I attemptto use it." He shrugged as he pushed open the first of the doors alongthe corridor.
It was a good-sized room, with three small windows all of them barred.
" No doubt this must once have been used as a schoolroom or nursery," hecommented, as Sara walked over to the windows.
They overlooked the rear of the house, and be yond the wall encirclingthe stables and the yard she could see what must once have been thekitchen garden. This was totally enclosed by a high brick wall, withgates set into it. The area inside the wall was a tangle of weeds,nettles and overgrown briars.
" That"s another of my future goals," Stuart told her, coming to standbeside her.
" To restore the kitchen garden, if not to what it once was then atleast to something a lot more productive than it is now. There must oncehave been a gla.s.shouse along one of the walls, and espaliered fruittrees on the others."
" Wouldn"t itbe very labour-intensive?" Sara asked him.
" Mmm. But if I expand as I hope to do there are bound to be quietperiods when men can be spared from working with the trees, to spendsome time on the rest of the grounds. If not, I"ll just have to makesure that if and when I marry my wife is a keen gardener.