Francesca froze too, and they stared at each other over about six feet of sand, close enough for her to see the disbelief and then the sheer, deadly anger that came to his grey eyes, the way all the muscles of his strong, streamlined torso and arms bunched and the knuckles of his hands went white.
It crossed her mind with a genuine tremor of fear that she might be about to come to an early demise on this beautiful beach so far away from anywhere, but then his eyes changed to unreadable, those muscles relaxed and he unclamped. his jaw to say roughly, ‘Fran something or other? What a fool I was not to connect the name when Sarah rang me about the gem of a new governess they’d sent her. How did you do it, Francesca Valentine? Forge a few references? Or did you buy out Acme?’
The savage scorn and disgust in his voice seared Francesca and she went a little pale. But she managed to say evenly, ‘I forged nothing.
‘Oh, come on! How the hell do you expect me to believe that?’
‘I don’t care what you choose to believe,’ she said tautly. ‘But you won’t be able to disbelieve that I have an arts degree with a teaching diploma because I can prove it. l can also prove that I’ve worked regularly with handicapped children, and those institutions were very happy to supply me with references.’
‘What about your honesty and integrity?’ he shot back.
‘Strangely enough, I had no trouble finding several people to vouch for my honesty and integrity—people who were even happy to commit to paper the fact that I had no police record, no vices, no—’
‘Vices?’ he said scornfully. ‘And what would you describe this as? Above-board as and open-handed? Honest? To change your name and masquerade as someone you’re not in order to worm your way into a household where you know damn well you’re the last person who would be wanted?’ The grey of his eyes resembled cold steel as he added, ‘And that brings use to why you did it.’
The awkward question, of course, Francesca acknowledged in her mind, and paused before answering to make sure she presented her case coolly and clinically. It proved to be a fatal pause.
Raefe Stevensen advanced several steps to stand right in front of her and look down at her with all his old insolent cynicism as he said softly, ‘Don’t try to con me further, Chessie. I know the answer. You don’t like to think any man can walk away from you, do you‘? You came here with one aim in mind, didn’t you? To add me to your list of scalps.’
There was so much tension between them that Francesca found herself briefly possessed. of the notion that the air was crackling with static, and she realised as she spoke that her voice was alive with it. ‘Don’t you kid yourself, Raefe Stevensen,’ she said unevenly, barely concealing the wild anger that ran through her veins.
But he only looked coldly amused. Then he subjected her damp, glowing body to the most minute scrutiny. Her bare necks and shoulders, her firm lovely breasts and the erect nipples clearly visible beneath the wisp of violet silk, the curve of her hips and thighs, adorned by what suddenly seemed to Francesca to be a particularly small. triangle of silk, the sweep of her legs. He scrutinised her so effectively, she was made to feel as if he was running his hands over every curve, every secret, intimate part of her.
Then he said mockingly, ‘This is really why, isn’t it, Chessie Valentine? You can’t believe any man could be unaffected by your…’ his grey gaze swept her body again ‘. . .admittedly very beautiful body, your lovely face and, most of all, your father’s millions. You assume that they will distract them from your shallow little soul.’
Francesca stared at him with her lips parted incredulously.
‘And that’s why,’ he went on, ‘you’re to be found on my beach in your designer bikini. I’m quite sure if this hadn’t happened first you’d have found the opportunity to parade yourself before me in it somehow,’ he finished with lethal gentleness.
Francesca came to life, bent to gather her towel and forced herself to tie it around her waist steadily, although her fingers were trembling, and only when she was done did she say, ‘If you ever insult me again, Raefe Stevensen, or take it upon yourself to kiss me again, believe me, you will pay—even if I have to use all of my father’s despised resources to achieve it. Now, get out of my way,’ she ordered.
But he laughed softly, and then really took her breath way. ?‘It’s no crime to look. Why don’t you come for a swim with me? Perhaps I could send you away from Bramble not entirely—frustrated.’
And he moved around her, dropped his trousers carelessly to the sand and strode into the water.
Francesca had barely reached the safety of her room and started to toss clothes into her bags when she heard, through her window, Sarah say delightedly, ‘Why, Raefe! When did you get home? How did you get home? Gosh, you’re all wet!’
Francesca clenched her fists then moved to the window so that she could see out of its but was hidden by the yellow sherbet coloured curtain. She was just in time to see Raefe bestow a light kiss on his sister’s brow. He’d put his trousers on but his fair hair was plastered to his head and dripping and his tanned, magnificent shoulders glistened with droplets of water in the early sun.
She heard him say, ‘I’ve only just arrived. I drove down because all the choppers are out. For the last fifty miles all I’ve been thinking of is a swim.’
Sarah laughed ‘Good thinking! No one’s up yet. Raefe, you wouldn’t believe how lucky we are with the new governess! She’s even got Jess to sleep in—and she cooks too!’
‘Does she, now?’ Raefe Stevensen said on a distinctly dry note, but his sister seemed. not to notice.
‘I’m just hoping and praying she’ll stay with us. But I do wonder…’
‘What do you wonder, beloved?’
‘Well, she’s-—I’m sure she’s capable of doing much more with her life, somehow. She’s very well educated, and from the odd thing she’s let slip she’s well travelled and so on. By the way, did I mention she’s absolutely lovely as well?’ Was there a touch of ingenuousness in the way Sarah said that? Francesca wondered.
‘You did not—I can’t wait to meet this paragon. Why, if it isn’t Miss Jessica Stevensen!’ he added, and fielded a joyful, flying, fair-haired missile, sweeping her up into his arms. ‘How are you today, poppet?’
‘I’m fine, Daddy,’ Jess replied excitedly. ‘Guess what? I’ve got a new governess. She says I can call her Chessie. and she’s teaching me to do long division.’
‘Goodness me—won’t be long before I’ll be able to hand the books over to you, but—’
‘I really like Chessie,’ Jess went” on. ‘She’s also teaching me to swim—”
‘You can swim,’ her father objected.
‘But I’m learning to do backstroke now,’ Jess said proudly.
‘I see.’ Raefe put her down but kept. her by his side as his long fingers played with her fair curls. ‘Uh—would you tell this Chessie I’d like to see her in my study in half an hour, please?’
‘She’ll be starting breakfast by now—why don’t you see her in the kitchen, Raefe?’ Sarah suggested. ‘By the way, don’t forget I have to get to Cairns somehow tomorrow for an X-ray to see how my wrist is healing.
‘You know, I thought, seeing as you’re not so busy now, and seeing as Fran—or Chessie—is here and coping so admirably, I might just take a bit of a break. I haven’t been to Brisbane for a while.’ Sarah stopped, and it was as if a cloud had gone over the landscape of her expression for a moment.
‘But I really should go,’ she added quietly. ‘What do you think?’
Francesca moved away from the window with a suddenly thoughtful frown.
‘We meet again, Miss Valentine.’
‘So we do, Mr Stevensen.’
‘Sit down.’
It was about an hour later. Francesca had made and served breakfast, although not to Raefe, who had not appeared in the kitchen but sent a message to keep his hot. She had also packed her bags and was dressed in her cream trousers and cream and green checked shirt.
Sarah had taken Jess for a walk, fortuitously, so the house was empty, and Francesca had. taken the bull by the horns and walked into Raefe’s study. She sank into a chair.
They eyed each other until he said casually, ‘I thought you’d have shaken the dust of Bramble from your shoes by now, Chessie. I presume that brand-new four-wheel-drive vehicle is yours?’
‘It is—I had no intention of being at your mercy again over the matter of transport,’ she replied crisply, then added abruptly, ‘How do you want to do this?’
‘Do what?’ He’d changed into navy shorts and a white T-shirt, and the task of driving two hundred miles overnight appeared not to have made any impact on him as he lounged behind the beautiful mahogany table that served as a desk.
‘As if you didn’t know—arrange my departure,’ she said scornfully. ‘Because I refuse to simply disappear. It don’t do that to children, or people I happen to like.’
He sat up and clasped his hands on the. desk. ‘What do you suggest, Chessie?’
Francesca reined in her anger at the insulting way he used her name. Everything was insulting to her, including the way his grey gaze lingered on the front of her checked blouse, as if he was seeing beneath it. ‘I could claim to have had a call to go home for some urgent reason. That way I can say goodbye properly.’
He appeared to reflect for a moment, then said, ‘We still haven’t got to the bottom of why you did this—want to tell me?’
‘Oh, I thought we had,’ she replied innocently. ‘You seem to have worked it out down to the last dotting of the i’s and crossing of the t’s!’
‘I gather you have another version, though.’ There was a glimmer of amusement in his eyes.
‘Ah, but why waste my time, since you’re so determined to disbelieve anything l say?’ she murmured with irony, and added, ‘Look, let’s get this sorted out, shall we? I’d like to get back to Cairns by tonight.’
‘Chessie…’ He frowned, then sat back. ‘What would you believe of a girl who is frequently seen on the social pages in revealing gowns and with rent-a-crowd escorts‘? Whose twenty-first birthday party was a three-day event on Hayman Island? Who was given a Porsche for her eighteenth birthday? Whose name has been linked romantically with a lot of men and who, apparently, was banished up to this neck of the woods by her father because of an involvement with a married man?’
Francesca blinked. ‘Who told you that?’
‘It’s not true?’ he countered coolly.
‘No, it’s not!. Not in that sense—I wasn’t banished. If you think my father can afford to moralise to me—’She stopped abruptly.
‘Go on—so there was no married man?’
Francesca stared at him, then said wearily, ‘Yes, there was, but, believe me, it was he who was making a nuisance of himself, not the other way around.’
Their gazes locked, and held, and Francesca’s deep blue eyes did not waver. Nor did they hide her sense of outrage.
This caused Raefe Stevensen to smile briefly and say, ‘So why did you do this?’
‘For the sheer pleasure of proving to you that I am not useless,’ she said proudly.
He raised an eyebrow. ‘I must have hit quite a nerve.’
‘And I presume it would be too much to expect for you to admit that you may have made a mistake about me, but it doesn’t matter,’ she said swiftly, and stood up. ‘As they say in Asia, I hope you have an interesting life, Mr Stevensen’. Your brand of arrogance certainly deserves it!’.
But he only laughed softly. ‘Chessie,’ he remonstrated, still grinning, ‘you have at very short memory! Are you not the girl who started all this by threatening to buy out my means of livelihood and have me sacked‘? If that’s not arrogance…’ shook his head wryly.
Francesca clenched her fists, and he watched with interest the effort she made not to take the bait.
‘Look, I’m going,’ she said. ‘I’ll tell them whatever I please, and—’
He interrupted her to say, ‘I’ve got another idea. Why don’t you stay for a couple of weeks?’
‘Oh, no. Oh, no! How can you possibly—?’
‘Perhaps we could start again,’ the said smoothly.
‘Start again? You’ve got to be joking.’ Her glance was withering.
‘No, I’m not.’
‘And neither am I. You seem to forget that all I did was take exception to being kept waiting for so long—the first utterly arrogant action in this duel if you ask me—’
‘I was on the phone,’ he said mildly.
‘And you surely don’t believe what I said was anything more than a retaliatory tactic?’ she shot back. ‘Whilst you…you insulted me, kissed me against my will and this morning took the unbelievable liberty’ of—of undressing me with your eyes, which is to put it very mildly. No. And don’t bother to offer to pay me either, Mr. Stevensen. This—baggage—would rather you owed her one.’ She turned on her heel.
‘There wasn’t a lot of you left to undress,’ he said. ‘But—I apologise for that.’
Francesca looked over her shoulder. ‘Only that? Oh, well, I didn’t think you had it in you to do even that. It won’t get you anywhere, though. Good day to—’
‘I apologise for the rest of it, then. Perhaps l did rather overreact.’
Francesca paused, then swung around. ‘You must rate me as really cheap, ‘Mr Stevenson,’ she said gently. ‘That won’t do it either.’
‘All right, Chessie.’ He narrowed his eyes. ‘What would do it?’
‘Nothing that I can think of—so you might as well get right on to Joyce Cotton at Acme, although I must tell you she was at her wits’ end until I turned up.’
She watched and waited, and saw his frown deepen as he studied her. Then he said abruptly, ‘Look, it so happens I really need you for the next couple of weeks. And, since it would appear that you have been both an excellent governess and cook, I would be much obliged if you would help me out. I take back the “useless” tag unreservedly.’
Francesca was silent for a moment, because she wasn’t sure that she believed him entirely, nor was she altogether sure whether she should be doing what she was doing. Then she discovered that she still had a few things to prove to Raefe Stevensen.
‘OK, I’ll do it. For two weeks.’
‘I thought you might,’ he said drily.
‘What do you mean?’ She blinked.
‘You heard Sarah this morning, didn’t you? It’s just occurred to me we had that conversation on the lawn virtually outside your window. And, accordingly, you knew I’d be fairly desperate. I’m only surprised you didn’t ask me to grovel at your feet.’
A faint tinge of colour came to Francesca’s cheeks but she didn’t deny the charge. ‘Yes, I heard. And, yes, I decided to milk as much of an apology out of you as I could. You’re welcome to sack me for it.’
‘Why?’ he said simply.
She looked at him steadily. ‘Are we back to that? Because l still have some things to prove to you, Mr Stevensen. And one of them is that when I do walk away from Bramble your—scalp or whatever you like to call it won’t be attached to my belt.‘
‘That’s can very rash statement, Chessie,’ he murmured.
‘Just wait and see.’
He considered for at moment, then said with a faint shrug and a wry little look, ‘Aren’t you at all afraid of the opposite happening?‘
‘Opposite to what?’
‘Well, in light of my “unbelievable liberties”, quote unquote, mightn’t I have designs on your scalp?’
‘You know, I almost wish you would,’ she said thoughtfully, and there was a sudden glint of contempt her eyes. ‘For the sheer pleasure of knocking you back as well as proving to you that you’re no better than the rest of them, despite the high moral tone you’ve taken with me. But in fact you’ll have to content yourself with this—one hint of any further liberties, even in anger, and I will leave you and your daughter high and dry.’
He gazed at her, then smiled suddenly
. . ‘It should be an interesting fortnight—but I give you my word; if you’re happy to leave me alone in that…er… direction, I shall be only too happy to do the same for you.’
The glint in Francesca’s eyes changed from contempt to anger, but Jess and Sarah came into the study at that point. And Raefe stood up to say, ‘Well, we’ve got Chessie for a while longer, at least, so why don’t you plan your trip to Brisbane, Sarah?’
CHAPTER THREE
‘I HOPE you don’t feel as if I’m—imposing,’ Sarah said that afternoon. Francesca was helping her to pack and Raefe had taken Jess for a drive to inspect stock and fences.
‘Why should l think that?’
Sarah gazed at her ‘I just thought I detected a slight restraint in you.’
Francesca bent over the suitcase on the floor and laid a linen skirt neatly in it. ‘She’ll be fine with me, I promise you.’
‘It’s strange,’ Sarah said after a moment, but I’ve got the feeling l know you, Fran. I’ve had it since we first met—silly, of course, because I’ve racked my brains and I know we haven’t ever met.’
Francesca sat back on her heels, pushed her toffee hair back and considered. Then she said, ‘You’ve probably seen me on what your brother so scathingly calls the ‘social pages.’ She turned to Sarah and added levelly, ‘I’m afraid I’ve misled you,’ And she told Raefe’s sister the bare bones of how she’d come to be at Bramble Downs.
Sarah sat transfixed for half a minute as it all sank in, then she said in an awed voice, ‘You didn’t—I mean, you did, obviously, but how brave!’
Francesca grimaced. ‘Not so much brave—I have an awful temper, and impossibly high-handed ways at times—but what really annoyed me was his assumption that I was a glamorous but useless and spoilt little rich girl.’
Sarah blinked.
‘Perhaps I shouldn’t have told you—if it’s going to worry you,’ Francesca said after a pause. ‘But I’ll tell Jess my real name and I do promise I’ll take great care of her, I won’t let it affect her.’
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