by Lucy Gillen
‘Well, you’d be the best person, honey,’ he assured her. ‘You’re a beautiful girl and no man likes saying no to a beautiful girl, least of all Darrel Bruce!’
‘Oh, but Iâ’ She shook her head and looked at him for a moment through the thickness of her lashes, unwilling to admit, even to herself, that she could not face being snubbed in the way Darrel was bound to snub her if she asked him. ‘IâI’d much rather you asked him, Mr. Stein,’ she said.
‘O.K.’ He looked at her for a moment with narrowed eyes that made him look far less boyish. ‘Say, you really are scared of him, aren’t you?’
‘No! No, of course I’m not scared of him!’ She was appalled to feel the warmth of colour in her cheeks and wondered what on earth he would make of that. ‘Itâit’s just thatâ’
‘O.K., O.K.,’ he said with a grin. ‘I’ll ask him, on one condition.’ Tarin looked at him curiously, and he shook his head. ‘Nothing very serious,’ he assured her. ‘Just that you call me Con. I know you British think we kind of rush things on our side of the Atlantic, but I just love your pretty name, and if you use mine then I’ll feel free to call you Tarin. O.K.?’
‘Oh, yes, yes, of course!’
He seemed bent on making up for lost time, the time Darrel had denied him by barring him from the office, and Tarin saw no reason why she should object. He was charming and attractive and she saw no reason at all why she should not further their acquaintance.
His grin widened, almost as if he knew what was in her mind. ‘Then what about coming round to the stables with me now and giving the horses the once over?’ he suggested, but Tarin, one eye on the door behind her shook her head.
‘Oh no, I couldn’t,’ she told him. ‘Not now, I’m due in the office, Mr. SteinâI mean, Con.’
He too looked at the closed door and pulled a wry face. ‘You think he’s in already?’ he asked, and she shrugged uneasily.
She felt rather like a conspirator talking about him half under her breath right outside the office door. ‘It’s quite possible,’ she said, and glanced at her watch. ‘And it is time I went in.’
‘Not just for a couple of minutes?’ he suggested persuasively.
‘No, reallyâ’
‘Oh, come on, Tarin!’ He smiled at her broadly and one hand under her elbow drew her away from the door and towards him. ‘It won’t take long.’
Knowing it was sheer folly to allow herself to be persuaded into anything so rash, Tarin held back, pulling her arm from his hold and shaking her head. ‘No,’ she insisted. ‘I haven’t the time now.’
‘O.K.’ He shrugged resignedly. ‘Then we’ll start you tomorrow.’
‘Tomorrow?’
Her surprise made him frown briefly. ‘Sure, why not?’ he asked.
There was no earthly reason why not, Tarin realised, except that no one had yet asked Darrel what he thought of her borrowing one of his horses. ‘If you think Mr. Bruce will let me take one of his horses,’ she said, ‘then I supposeâ’
Before she could finish the sentence she heard the office door open behind her and hastily bit her lip, cutting off the words. Darrel made no attempt to come out into the hall, but stood just inside the room with one hand on the door knob and his brown eyes taking swift appraisal of the situation. Then he cocked a brow at Tarin and looked rather pointedly at his wristwatch.
‘I thought you weren’t coming this morning after all,’ he said, and instinctively she was on the defensive, looking at her own watch to check.
‘I’m not late, Mr. Bruce,’ she told him. ‘At least no more than a couple of minutes.’
He ignored the argument and instead looked down at her hands. ‘How are your hands?’ he asked.
‘Better, thank you.’
She did not extend them for inspection as she had in answer to Conrad’s similar question, but curled her fingers into her palms. She felt not only nervous but quite unaccountably guilty at being caught talking to Conrad Stein in the hall, and yet there was no earthly reason why she should. It was no more than a couple of minutes past nine and he must realise that the delay was none of her doing.
Before she could take leave of her companion he reached out and took one of her hands, glancing at Darrel briefly before he spoke, half under his breath, as if he hoped he wouldn’t be overheard.
‘Don’t forget tomorrow eveningâI’ll see you about seven by the stables,’ he said, and squeezed her hand. ‘So long for now, Tarin.’
‘Goodbye, Con!’
An elevated brow commented on the familiarity of the first names, but Darrel said nothing for the. moment, he merely stood back and held the door for her to come in. Then, when she was seated at her desk and ready to tackle the two days’ correspondence that had accumulated during her absence, he came and sat on the edge of her desk, one booted foot swinging back and forth.
His proximity made Tarin nervous and she wondered if he was going to give her a lecture on the ethics of talking to his guests during working hours, instead he simply sat there and studied her silently for several moments while she sought to control her edgy nerves.
A dark navy crew-necked shirt and navy slacks gave him a rather darkly ominous air and she knew he was watching her while she took pad and pencil from her desk drawer. His scrutiny made her so nervous that eventually she dropped the pencil, and bit her lip in vexation at her own vulnerability.
Before she could stoop and retrieve the pencil he slid swiftly from the edge of the desk and retrieved it, then stood holding it in his hand while he resumed his scrutiny of her. ‘Are you sure your hands are up to pounding a typewriter?’ he asked, twirling the pencil between his own strong fingers, and Tarin nodded.
‘Yes, I’m quite sure, thank you.’
‘Show me!’ The demand was brusque and he threw down the pencil and held out both his own hands.
After a brief hesitation Tarin obediently put her own hands into those broad, hard palms and felt her pulses respond to the touch of his strong fingers curling round her wrists. ‘They’reâthey’re fine,’ she insisted huskily, but he looked doubtful.
‘They look sore still,’ he decided. ‘You better take it easy today.’
Having no desire to be thought lacking in willingness to work she shook her head. ‘I can manage,’ she assured him. ‘There must be an awful lot to do.’
‘It’ll keep!’ He dismissed the accumulated mail with a shrug of his broad shoulders, and he still held her in that strong but gentle hold that affected her pulse rate so alarmingly. Then he raised her hands suddenly and for one heart-stopping second she thought he was going to kiss them. ‘These,’ he decided after examining her fingertips again, ‘are not fit to hold reins. In case you don’t realise it even the gentlest of horses makes a certain amount of pull on your hands.’
Tarin looked at him warily, then as hastily looked down again. ‘I wasn’t going toâ’ she began, but he shook his head and raised a querying brow.
‘That was what you were plotting, out there, wasn’t it?’ he asked softly. ‘The riding lessons you preferred to take from Con Stein?’ She did not answer, but sat with her hands clasped uneasily in her lap. ‘It had all the earmarks of a secret plot,’ he went on relentlessly. ‘Tell me, do you make a habit of meeting him out there at Stonebeck, like you did on Sunday?’
It was really nothing at all to do with him whether or not she met Conrad Stein or how often, and she was tempted to tell him so, but the idea of his being interested enough to ask was intriguing and she did not answer for a moment. ‘Not often,’ she told him at last, evading the whole truth. ‘But you don’t like him trying to see me when I’m here, do you?’
‘No.’ His answer was blandly unconcerned whether it gave offence or not.
‘Then there isn’t much choice, is there?’ she asked, and for some inexplicable reason found herself quite enjoying the situation.
‘And that’s why you chose to let him teach you to ride?’
His insistence was somehow uncharacter
istic and she was more intrigued than ever as to the reason for it as she looked down at her shiny fingertips. ‘In a way,’ she allowed warily, and he gave a short, harsh laugh.
‘In a way!’ he mocked. ‘Do you think I’m a complete idiot, Tarin?’
She looked up at him curiously, her heart tapping urgently at her ribs as she tried to find reasons for his apparent anger. ‘You think I’m taking riding lessons, if I do, just so that I can see more of Mr. Stein?’ she asked, and was surprised to notice how quiet and controlled she sounded.
‘Aren’t you?’ he challenged, and she shook her head almost without thinking.
‘No.’ She looked down at her hands again. ‘Anyway,’ she said, ‘I can’t take riding lessons at all until I can afford to have my own horse, and that won’t be for a very long time yet.’
He regarded her for a moment with his head tipped back slightly and one brow expressing doubt. ‘From what I overheard just now, I thought you had that problem solved,’ he said. ‘Or was that all Con’s idea?’
Tarin bit her lip wondering just how much he had heard through the door before he opened it and overheard her remark. Thinking to forestall the inevitable refusal she set her small chin at a firm angle and looked up with eyes that were much darker blue than usual, and dared him to think she was going to ask him about borrowing one of his horses.
‘Mr. Stein had some idea about asking you to lend one of your horses,’ she told him in a small, tight voice, prepared for a brusque refusal. ‘But I told him I’d sooner not ask.’
‘You did?’ He sounded faintly surprised and his voice was quiet and incredibly soft, playing havoc with her senses, but she curled her hands tightly into themselves and refused to be touched by it. ‘But why would you say that, Tarin?’
‘Because I prefer to forget the whole thing rather than ask any favours!’ she said, realising too late just how provocative it sounded.
‘I see!’
There followed a long uncomfortable silence during which Tarin sat with her hands in her lap, regretting having been so impulsive. A glance at that strong face saw it set firmly against yielding an inch now that she had once again declared war, and she felt suddenly as if she wanted to cry. Quarrelling with him was the last thing she wanted and yet, as always she had made it inevitable and, as always, she regretted it bitterly.
His strong, square chin with its deep cleft, and the wide, stern mouth looked exactly like those fierce, red-haired old warriors out there in the hall, and they were enough to convince her that if the deadlock was to be broken, it would have to be through some move on her part. Sighing inwardly at the inevitability of it, she yielded to the inevitable.
‘I don’t expect you to lend me one of your horses,’ she said in a small husky voice. ‘You keep them for the use of your guests and I don’t expect you to lend them to the people who work for you.’
His expression made his opinion of that quite obvious, and he looked at her down the length of his nose. ‘Did Con Stein give you the idea that I was that much of a snob?’ he asked. ‘Or is it your own?’
He spoke quietly, although she sensed that being misjudged mattered quite a lot to him, and she suddenly felt rather small and mean. ‘IâI just thought you mightâ’ she began, and glanced up to find him shaking his head slowly.
‘You really think that badly of me, Tarin?’ he asked softly, and she shook her head silently. ‘Then why imply it?’ he pressed relentlessly, and again she shook her head without speaking.
For several seconds he stood looking at her, then he moved suddenly and came and perched himself once more on the edge of the desk. So close that she was enveloped in the warm vibrance of his masculinity and felt her pulses racing uncontrollably. When he swung one foot the taut, muscular tension of his thigh brushed against her and the open neck of his shirt, when he leaned forward to rest one forearm on his knee, gaped and gave a glimpse of reddish brown hair on the tanned breadth of his chest.
‘What is it about me that keeps raising those McCourt prickles, Tarin?’ he asked softly, and again she shook her head without answering. This time, however, he was not prepared to let her remain silent. He bent his head even lower and looked up into her face. ‘Tarin?’
The gentle prompt was disturbing in itself and she bit her lip, looking down at the palms of her hands. ‘IâI don’t know thatâ’
The denial was cut short as she should have known it would be. ‘Oh yes, you do,’ he insisted, still in the same soft voice. ‘Is it simply because of my name and you don’t want to forget that outdated old feud you pretend to despise? Do you want to keep it going after all, Tarinâis that it?’
She shook her head more firmly this time. ‘No, no, of course I don’t want to keep it going,’ she denied. ‘You know it isn’t that.’
‘Then why the prickles?’ he insisted. ‘Hmm?’
He reached out with one hand and touched her only lightly with a fingertip beside her left ear, but it was a sensual, shiver-inducing touch and she instinctively closed her eyes on the effect it had on her senses.
‘Prickles aren’t peculiar to the McCourts,’ she told him in a small and rather shaky voice. ‘You agreed that you’re just as much to blame as I amâ you know you are!’
His smile was brief and ironic and she half expected him to argue the point. ‘Two hundred odd years have conditioned us to hate each other,’ he said quietly, ‘so I suppose no one can really blame us if we behave as if we do, can they?’
‘Except that we’re supposed to be the ones who are burying the hatchet,’ Tarin reminded him with a resigned smile, and he nodded.
‘Well, at least we’re trying, aren’t we?’ he said quietly. ‘If youâwe stray occasionally who can blame us? At least we’re making the effort!’
‘On and off!’
Her attempt at lightness seemed to amuse him and he shook his head with a small, wry smile on his lips. ‘We’re not doing too badly,’ he told her. ‘Being the founders of aâa new age, I suppose you’d call it, isn’t going to be easy, we shall have to work at it.’ Tarin felt her heart fluttering wildly in her breast as she looked up at him, and again that evocative finger slid caressingly against her neck and set her pulses racing. ‘A lot depends on us, doesn’t it?’ he asked softly.
‘IâI suppose it does.’ She felt strangely as if they were somewhere far distant from the rest of the world, and the subject of her borrowing one of the horses seemed to have been forgotten completely.
Someone, she thought dizzily, should do something about bringing them both back to earth, but she was strangely reluctant to do it. She realised how much her hands were trembling as she reached for the pencil he had discarded, and sat looking down at the blank pages of her notebook with unseeing eyes.
‘You’re very lovely.’
The deep, quiet voice slid along her spine like a shower of ice and she felt as if someone was depriving her of breath as she tried to control her chaotic emotions. That gentle, evocative caress stroked her neck until she could have cried out for it to stop if she was to keep her sanity.
‘Darrelâ’ she was unaware of having used his Christian name instead of the more formal title she usually gave him. ‘Pleaseâ’
‘Please?’
His eyes looked dark and glowing, but she was horribly unsure whether it was amusement for her almost childlike plea or some deeper emotion that made them glow like that. Then he leaned forward suddenly and the caressing hand curved to fit warmly round the smooth softness of her neck, drawing her towards him. His other hand reached out and curved about her waist, pulling her inexorably to her feet, and she noted vaguely that even seated on the desk he was still taller than she was herself.
His mouth had the firm warmth she had always expected, and she yielded to it without question. Lightly brushing her lips at first, he suddenly pressed his mouth so fiercely hard on to hers that her lips parted and her senses went spinning out of control. His hands held her relentlessly firm, with t
he hard palms warm through her dress, holding her against the sinewy strength of his body, and Tarin did nothing to resist, for it seemed so inevitable.
It was something she had been expecting to happen ever since those days as a schoolgirl, when she had contrived in so many ways to be wherever Darrel happened to be, just for the pleasure of seeing him. It was the culmination of all those dreams she had ever had of being wooed by Darrel Bruce and for a few moments she allowed herself to believe that they had actually come true.
It was the shrilling voice of the telephone that brought her abruptly back to reality, and she pulled away from him swiftly, as if a third person had invaded their privacy. Her eyes were wide and only half believing and she found it hard to understand how he could look so cool.
For a moment longer he still held her with his hands still spanning the slimness of her waist, then he shook his head and put one hand on the shrilling telephone, the other again reaching out, a finger stroking briefly against her neck in that gently evocative caress.
‘I think we’re a bit nearer burying that hatchet, don’t you?’ he asked softly, and smiled as he picked up the telephone while Tarin gazed at him for a moment uncomprehendingly. For a long, incredible moment she had forgotten that there was any hatchet to be buried and seeing him so easily restored to normal, her first instinct was to run away somewhere and hide for being so easily convinced there were other reasons for being kissed like that.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Tarin decided, after much thought, that the best thing to do was to forget all about the kiss Darrel had so unexpectedly given her and carry on as if nothing had happened. It was obvious that the incident had meant nothing more to him than a move towards more peaceful relations between their families, and she could hardly blame him for that, although it had been rather more disturbing than that to her.
His behaviour for the rest of the day had been no different from usual, so either he did not realise the effect he had had on her or he did not care. She preferred to think he didn’t know, for she hated to think of him finding her reaction amusing, and perhaps laughing about it to himself.