by Penny Jordan
The reality of the financial ruin she could be facing if she allowed her pride its head finally got through to her, like a blast of cold air in an overheated room, making her shudder as she recognised her own danger.
She could sense the tension in the room, the sense of appalled fascination their duel was creating amongst the onlookers. Her pride urged her not to give in, but reality forced her to acknowledge that she could not continue. Her awareness of her own vulnerability tasted bitter, made her eyes sting with angry emotions she furiously refused to acknowledge. Holding her head high, she looked across at Finn properly, for the first time since the bidding had begun. Silently he looked back at her. His eyes were inimical and cold, his mouth a hard tight line of angry rejection
The auctioneer was waiting for her response to Finn’s last bid. Reluctantly she shook her head, appalled by the unexpected and unwanted rush of hot tears choking her. Unable to face any more, she turned on her heel, heading for the exit.
She had just reached her car when Finn caught up with her. He had wanted to go to her before, but he had needed to speak with the young couple who he knew had been planning to bid for one of the cottages. He had learned that they were local youngsters, and that the young man had only recently left agricultural collage with excellent qualifications. It had immediately occurred to Finn that, since he would be in need of agricultural workers for the estate, he could both offer the young man a job and throw in the rental of the cottage at a suitably low rate, and he had wanted to make this offer to them before they left the house.
So far as Maggie and her desire to buy the Dower House went, he knew he had done the right thing, the only thing he could have done, but something about the way Maggie had looked at him as she conceded defeat had made him feel as though…As though what? As though he had behaved badly, unfairly?
‘Maggie…’
The moment she heard his voice Maggie felt her emotions swamping her. Swinging round, her back against the door of her car, she glared at him. ‘If you’ve come to crow over your victory, Finn, don’t bother.’ She gave a bitter laugh. ‘I suppose I should have known that you would never allow me to win. How nice to be able to throw so much money away without counting the cost. I hope you consider it was worth it.’
‘It was,’ Finn assured her, suddenly equally angry, forgetting now, as he heard and felt her antagonism, the look of aching disappointment and pain he had seen in her eyes as she had acknowledged her inability to bid any higher. ‘I would have paid twice as much to keep the likes of you from owning the Dower House, Maggie…’
‘The likes of me?’ Maggie was too incensed to conceal her feelings.
‘City people. Weekenders,’ Finn elucidated in a curt voice. ‘The countryside should be for living in full time, not treated as some kind of manicured playground.’
‘Oh, I see,’ Maggie retaliated furiously. ‘I’m good enough to take to bed, but apparently not good enough to have as a neighbour. Is that what you’re trying to say? Well, for your information—’ She stopped in disbelief as for the second time in less than half an hour the intensity of her emotions brought her dangerously close to tears.
‘The fact that we went to bed together has nothing to do with the Dower House,’ Finn denied—untruthfully. He could feel the tinge of colour creeping up under his skin as his conscience forced him to admit to himself that, contrary to his verbal claim, the fact that they had been lovers had everything to do with the fact that he didn’t want her living in the Dower House. Not when he knew she would be sharing it—and her bed—with the man she had called ‘darling’, not when last night—all night, virtually—he had ached and longed for her, not when against everything he knew about himself a part of him still stubbornly refused to accept that there was no way there could ever be a proper relationship between them.
‘You bid for the Dower House to spite me,’ Maggie accused him once she had herself back under control.
‘No,’ Finn denied sharply. ‘I had always intended to bid for the whole estate…’
‘That’s not what the agent told me,’ Maggie argued, shaking her head. ‘He told me that no one else was going to bid for the Dower House.’
‘He may have believed that,’ Finn acknowledged ‘But—’
‘But the moment you realised I wanted it you were determined that you were going to stop me,’ Maggie cut in bitterly, too angry to conceal her feelings.
‘There are other houses,’ Finn pointed out.
‘Not for me,’ Maggie rejected grimly.
She looked white-faced and anguished, and ridiculously Finn found himself aching to comfort her. She had plainly replenished her wardrobe since she had left the farm. She was wearing the soft creamy cashmere coat he had seen her in in Shrewsbury, and a toning pair of trousers, with a fine knit top that clung to her breasts. She looked both elegant and expensive, and somehow softly vulnerable as well, the delicacy of her small heart-shaped face and huge brown eyes driving him to anger against himself for what he was feeling.
As she started to turn away from him a sudden fierce gust of wind caught at Maggie’s unfastened coat, sending it swirling around her and virtually blinding her. As she reached to push it away so automatically did Finn. Their hands touched, Maggie’s retracting as though it had been burned, leaving Finn’s to somehow drop to her body, cupping her hipbone beneath the heavy folds of her coat.
Its fragility and the memories the feel of it evoked sent desire rocketing through Finn in a way that caught him completely off guard.
‘Maggie.’
The urgency in his voice hit her senses with the same devastating impact as alcohol on an empty stomach. She could feel herself swaying in response to the desire she could hear running through that roughly urgent utterance of her name. She could almost see the images compressed in it. The two of them lying naked on his bed whilst he…
‘Let go of me,’ she demanded as she was deluged with panic—panic caused not by a fear of him but of herself and what she might do, what she might reveal if he continued to stay where he was.
But as she pulled back from him she realised there was nowhere for her to go, that she was already backed up against the car. Inside her she could feel her anger and excitement battling for supremacy. Finn was leaning towards her.
Her lips framed the word ‘no’ but it was too late. The kiss they exchanged was mutually hostile and denying, a fierce pressure of lips on lips, mouth on mouth, tongue battling with tongue as they fought to overcome one another and their own unwanted feelings.
If the time she had spent in Finn’s arms had opened her eyes to the danger of her own susceptibility to his sensuality, then the kiss they were exchanging now was confirming just how right she had been to reject her feelings for him.
To feel such an intensity of emotion frightened her. To know that she was capable of wanting so passionately a man who made her feel so angry, of wanting him so intensely that a part of her was actually relishing the furious savagery of their intimacy, shocked and appalled her. And to know that she of all people was capable of being totally overwhelmed by emotions in a way that ran contrary to everything that was important to her filled her with a blind panic that somehow gave her the strength to wrench her mouth away from Finn’s, to push him out of the way long enough for her to be able to pull open her car door and get inside.
As she drove off in a furious spray of gravel Finn stared after her, fighting to regulate his breathing and his feelings. Where the hell had that come from? Absently he lifted his hand to his jaw, and then winced as his thumb pad brushed his bottom lip and found the place where Maggie had briefly savaged it with her teeth. He had never known such a passionate, contrary, downright dangerous woman—and he wished he didn’t know her now.
Not when that woman was Maggie—and most definitely not when she was involved with another man.
CHAPTER FIVE
‘I’M REALLY glad I managed to catch you before you left town,’ Philip exclaimed as he came rushing into t
he foyer of the hotel just as Maggie was on the point of leaving. ‘I’m really sorry about the Dower House,’ he plunged on, ignoring Maggie’s cool reception.
‘You virtually told me that there were not going to be any other serious bidders for the property,’ Maggie burst out, unable to keep her feelings to herself as she had promised herself she would do when she had first seen him hurrying towards her. After all, a humiliation like the one she had endured at Finn’s hands was hardly something anyone would want to dwell on.
Unable to endure the thought of spending another night in Shropshire, she had decided to travel back to London immediately.
‘I didn’t think there were going to be,’ the agent insisted.
He looked so anxious for her to believe him that Maggie knew he was telling the truth.
‘Finn had told me that he intended to bid for the house, and the land, but I assumed that they were all that he was interested in. Like you, he asked me about the possibility of pre-empting the auction, but of course I told him that the owner was insistent on the property being broken up into lots and sold separately. We very often find a large house with land sells for more as separate lots, as indeed was the case. Finn has been looking to buy either a farm or a small estate locally for some time.’ He paused and shrugged, looking uncomfortable as he told her, ‘I really am sorry. I had no idea he intended to bid for the Dower House.’
Maggie gave him a thin smile. She suspected she knew exactly what had prompted Finn’s unexpected decision to bid. The minute he had realised she wanted it he had obviously decided he was going to prevent her from getting it, no matter what it cost him.
Feigning a casual disregard she did not feel, she told the agent truthfully, ‘Well, there was certainly no way I could have afforded to outbid him.’
Maybe not, but she had certainly tried hard enough, Phillip reflected inwardly. The Dower House had gone for more than twice its real market value.
Of course, he was very familiar with the red mist that could so easily overwhelm rival bidders, each determined to better the other, however, he could not remember ever experiencing such a charged atmosphere as the one generated by Finn and Maggie as they had fought for possession of the Dower House. It had been his concern for her ashen-faced despair as she had left that had prompted him to come in search of her, to assure her that he had had no prior knowledge of Finn’s intentions.
‘I know how much securing the Dower House meant to you,’ Philip continued. There had been, he was sure, a sheen of tears in her eyes earlier as she had conceded defeat to Finn. ‘Finn is a very generous man, something of a philanthropist. Perhaps if you were to approach him he might be prepared to rent the house to you…I know that he’s offered to rent one of the cottages to Linda and Pete Hardy—they were at the auction. They’re both over the moon and singing Finn’s praises to whoever will listen to them, and now Pete is going to be working for Finn as well.’ The agent chuckled. ‘One of the reasons they had hoped to pick up the cottage cheaply was because whilst Linda works full time as a nurse, Pete didn’t have a job.’
Even as she was digesting the agent’s surprising news about Finn’s generosity to the young couple who had wanted to bid for one of the cottages, Maggie’s reaction to his suggestion that she throw herself on Finn’s charity was as immediate as it was instinctive.
‘No.’
Maggie could see that the harshness of her denial had shocked him. Forcing her lips to part in poor imitation of her normal smile, she told him in a less emotional voice, ‘I wanted to give the house itself to my grandmother, not a rental agreement.’
She knew her excuse was not exactly logical, but there was no way she could tell the agent the real reason why she knew that Finn would refuse any request from her—for anything.
‘Well, if you’re sure, I’d better go and see Finn,’ Philip was telling her a little awkwardly. ‘Buying the estate is going to leave his bank account several million pounds lighter. Not that he can’t afford it, of course.’
He was talking about Finn as though Maggie herself knew his circumstances, and even though she knew she would regret giving in to the temptation Maggie found it impossible not to say a little acerbically, ‘I hadn’t realised there was so much money in farming.’
The agent laughed. ‘There isn’t. And I’m afraid Finn’s plans to extend the scope of his organic farming venture are not very popular with the likes of Audley Slater. But then of course Finn is not reliant on the land financially. He made a fortune as a City trader in the boom, and he had the foresight to take a large proportion of his bonuses in share options. He’s worth millions,’ he told Maggie.
Finn had been a city trader. Maggie fought to conceal her disbelief—she found it almost impossible to equate the man Finn had seemed to be with the stories she had heard about groups of wild young men who had become almost a byword for all types of excess. Things were different now, of course; there had been too many falls from grace for it to be otherwise.
The agent’s revelation had affected her more deeply than she wanted to acknowledge, but somehow she managed to force a polite smile as he shook her hand before turning to leave.
Why hadn’t Finn said anything? Told her—told her…Why had he let her think that the City was an alien concept to him? The certainty that she had known so little about him, been so wrong about his background, reinforced the fear she had fought so determinedly to subdue that with Finn, both he and their relationship would be outside her control.
The square was virtually empty as she hurried towards her car. What had she expected? To see Finn’s Land Rover parked there? A dirty muddy old Land Rover! City traders drove up-market gleaming sports cars, the faster and more expensive the better. They dated models and actresses, and they loved city life and city women. But Finn did not. Finn felt only contempt for city women…
City women…or just one city woman…just her?
Sombrely Maggie got into her car. She had a long drive ahead of her, and the one thing she was determined she was not going to do was spend it thinking about Finn Gordon. Why should she? After all, he meant nothing to her. Nothing at all.
Finn didn’t know why on earth he was bothering wasting his time like this. After all, he had far better things to do. And why should he apologise anyway? Grimly he crashed the Land Rover’s gears, his attention more on his thoughts than what he was doing as he drove through the small town’s narrow streets, heading for Maggie’s hotel. Anyone would think he was looking for any excuse he could find just to see her And there was no way he was fool enough to do anything like that. She already had a man in her life, and even if she hadn’t she had made it more than plain that she wasn’t prepared to give up her city lifestyle.
Swinging into a convenient car park space, he reminded himself that he had had to come into the town anyway, to see Philip.
‘Finn, I was just on my way back to the office to ring you.’
Cursing under his breath as Philip hailed him, Finn couldn’t resist looking past him and across the square to the hotel. The memory of the angry kiss he and Maggie had exchanged outside the house still burned at danger heat…
‘I’m just on my way back to the office now,’ Philip was telling him. ‘I’ve just been to see Maggie Russell—I felt I ought to. I hadn’t realised that you were intending to bid for the Dower House, and I’m afraid I encouraged her to believe she had every chance of bidding successfully for it herself. Luckily I just managed to catch her before she left.’
Left? Maggie had gone?
That wasn’t some crazy desire to go after her that had him half turning back towards the parked Land Rover was it?
‘I did suggest that she should ask if you would be willing to rent the house to her,’ Philip continued, as Finn checked his reckless impulse. ‘After all, from your point of view it would make much more sense to have it tenanted than left empty, especially with such a potentially good tenant—an elderly widow living on her own, and…’
‘A what?’
All thoughts of going after Maggie gone, Finn stared at the agent, the brusque sharpness of his voice causing the younger man to look confused.
‘An elderly widow,’ he repeated, persisting when Finn continued to look sternly at him, ‘Maggie’s grandmother. Maggie told me the story when she came to my office to ask if she could buy the house prior to auction at the reserve price. I’m sure she won’t mind me repeating it to you.’
Finn had his doubts about that, but he quelled his conscience and gave Phillip an encouraging look.
‘It seems that her grandparents lived in the Dower House as a young married couple. Maggie’s grandfather has recently died, and she is concerned about the effect his loss is having on her grandmother. When she saw that the Dower House was coming up for auction she hoped that if she could buy it for her grandmother it might help to cheer her up a bit.’
Her grandmother. Maggie had wanted the house for her grandmother! Silently Finn digested the information Philip had given him. Equally silently he recalled Maggie’s stricken look when she had realised that he was not going to allow her to outbid him.
The story the agent had told him was forcing him to see Maggie in a different light; to see her as someone who cared very deeply about those she loved. There had been no mention of her grandmother when she had told him about her successful business, but then there had been no mention of a lover either; in fact she had denied flatly that she had one.
Later that afternoon, as he drove back to the farm, Finn discovered that he was still thinking about Maggie. As he drove across the ford he found he was actually looking down into the water, as though he might see one of her ridiculously impractical shoes there. He had noticed that she was wearing another pair of impossibly high-heeled shoes again today—only instead of seeing the choice of such footwear in the country and in such weather as gross folly, rather dangerously it had taken on an almost endearing quality, a special something that made her wholly and uniquely Maggie.