Aunt Lucy's Lover

by Miranda Lee

  Sebastian was wearing a bright red bandanna high around his hair, probably to keep it from falling into his food when he bent forward. Jessica couldn't help but admire once again the natural wave in his hair, not to mention its glorious colour.

  Hers was plain black and dead straight. Its only plus was its thickness. She still had to spend a small fortune having its bulk regularly thinned then expertly cut so that it fell in a stylish curtain to her shoulders when down.

  'You're staring at me,' Sebastian commented quietly, then lifted his glass to sip his wine and stare at her over the rim of the glass.

  Pride demanded she not look away or blush with mortification. She managed the former very well, and she hoped the dim light masked the latter.

  'I was admiring your hair,' she confessed with a blunt ruefulness. 'Most women would give their eyeteeth for it.'

  'Really?' he drawled. 'I was admiring your outfit. Just how many did you bring?'

  'There's nothing about me you admire, Sebastian. You think I'm a hard-hearted, money-minded, insensitive bitch. Why not admit it?'

  He laughed. It was a harsh, caustic sound. 'Am I so transparent?'

  'You've made it perfectly obvious what you think of me.'

  'As you have of me,' he countered smoothly. 'Which is a pity, really. I'm sure Lucy hoped we'd like each other.'

  'And why would that be?'

  'So that I could more easily persuade you to stay on here, of course. That's why Lucy put that condition in her will. She knew there would be no more convincing salesman for a cause than a convert.'

  'She'll have to be disappointed then, won't she?'

  'So you're still determined to sell? You won't even consider a compromise?'

  'Such as what?'"Such as keeping the house as a holiday home and visiting here occasionally. Maybe, in time, you'll get to love it so much you wouldn't want to go back. I could look after the place for you, if you'd like. Earlier, you offered me money. Offer me a house-sitting job, instead. I'll take that.'

  He didn't understand, of course. It was his presence in the house that would keep her away, not any imagined dislike of the island.

  'I'm sorry, Sebastian,' she said, 'but I find the idea of keeping a home this size for me to holiday in only four weeks a year totally impractical. I would prefer to lease it to someone to run as a guesthouse. Or pay someone to run it for me. Would you be interested in doing that?'

  She could handle him from a distance, and on the end of a telephone. Just.

  'No, I would not,' he snapped. 'That's not what Lucy wanted. She wanted you— her flesh and blood—living here and loving it as much as she did.'

  'That's a very romantic notion.'

  'Lucy was a romantic. Not like some other women I've known.' This with a meaningful glance Jessica's way.

  She bristled and was about to bite when she decided not to give him that satisfaction.

  'If Aunt Lucy wanted me to live in this house so much,' she pointed out, 'then she should have stayed that day in Sydney. She should have let me get to know her. And she should have explained what happened between her and my mother. I'm not at all sure I could ever live happily in this house not knowing what happened here. And now I'll never know, will I?'

  Sebastian pursed his lips, then took a thoughtful sip of his wine. 'Did you ask Evie?'

  'Yes, and she has no idea what was behind their falling out.'

  'Well, if Evie doesn't know, then I can't imagine anyone else on the island knowing, either,' he muttered.

  'That's what I thought. Unless Aunt Lucy told you, of course,' she said, locking eyes with him. 'Did she, Sebastian?'

  'No,' he denied firmly. 'She did not.'

  Jessica let out an exasperated sigh. 'I can't believe she didn't tell anyone. Or leave some clues to the truth.'

  Sebastian said nothing, merely put the wineglass to his lips again and swallowed more deeply. There was something wearily dismissive about his gesture, as though he was already very tired of her and would be glad to see the back of her and her questions.

  She felt personally rejected and perversely piqued. So much for her resolve to ignore her feelings for him.

  'I know you'd like nothing better than for me to shut up about all this,' she snapped. 'But I have no intention of doing so. What peeves me most is why you all jump to the conclusion that Aunt Lucy was the injured innocent, yet she was the older sister. Maybe my mother was the wronged party. Maybe Aunt Lucy left everything to me out of guilt!'

  Sebastian's right eyebrow lifted in a surprised arch. 'It's a remote possibility, I suppose. Though if you'd known Lucy personally, you'd know there wasn't a nasty bone in her body. Isn't that right, Evie?' he said as Evie bustled in.

  'What's right?'

  'Lucy would never have deliberately hurt a fly, would she?'

  'Oh, no. She was a very gentle, good-hearted woman. I never knew her to tell a lie in her life, or to speak badly of anyone. She always believed the best of people. The only time I ever saw her really angry was on the one occasion when she was confronted with absolute proof of someone's wickedness and barefaced lies.'

  Evie continued talking as she gathered their dirty plates. 'There was this girl whom Lucy used to employ to do the laundry. Her name was Marie. One day, a guest's blouse—a beautiful blue silk thing—went missing. The guest claimed she'd put it out to be washed and ironed, but Marie vowed she'd never seen it, let alone washed and ironed it.

  'Three months later, after the guest had long gone, Lucy and I dropped in to the worker's club for morning tea and there was Marie, wearing the blue silk blouse. My God, you should have seen Lucy. I've never seen her so angry. She made sure everyone on the island knew the girl was a no-good thief, so much so that Marie had to go to the mainland because no one here would give her work.'

  'Maybe that's what my mother did,' Jessica mused. 'Maybe she stole something, and Lucy found out about it and banished her.'

  'Seems a bit harsh,' Sebastian put in.

  'Certainly does,' Evie agreed. 'Joanne was family, and Lucy was big on family.'

  'Yet she didn't have a family herself,' Jessica commented.

  'It seemed she couldn't, the poor love,' Evie informed them. 'She was right cut up about it. Bill, her husband, didn't seem to mind so much. There again, he wouldn't have made much of a father. He was a man's man, always out playing golf and going fishing and the like. It was the fishing that did him in, in the end. He was washed overboard during a storm. Lucy was inconsolable for a long time. I don't mind saying it was me who got her on her feet. I gave her the idea of running this place as a guesthouse. Said I'd help her with the cooking and such. She perked up no end once there were people in the house. She always was good with people.'

  Except her own sister and niece, Jessica thought ruefully.

  'You're right there, Evie,' Sebastian agreed. 'I think Lucy's greatest virtue was her ability to lend a sympathetic ear.'

  Jessica said nothing, but privately she was getting heartily sick of feeling guilty just because she wasn't falling in with her aunt's last and probably guilt-ridden wishes. Jessica believed that no matter what her mother had done, her sister should have come after her much sooner. My God, she'd waited nearly thirty years! She wouldn't have come then, either, if she hadn't been dying.

  No, Jessica felt no deep obligation to fall in with her aunt's wishes. Her only regret was that she could not lift the whole of this lovely house and transfer it to a beachside suburb in Sydney. She would have liked nothing better than to live in it and look after it, but not on Norfolk Island, and nowhere near Sebastian Slade.

  'Both of you are having dessert, aren't you?' Evie asked.

  Jessica thought of the banana cake and her figure. 'Er...'

  'We definitely are,' Sebastian overrode her, bringing a sharp glance from Jessica.

  'Worried about running to fat, city girl?' he taunted once they were alone.

  'Won't your lover love you any more, if you deviate from your perfect size eight?' I don't
have a lover,' she snapped. 'At the moment.'

  'Poor Jess. Is that why you're so tetchy?'

  Jessica had had enough. 'What is it with you? Why do you keep needling me like this? What have I ever done to you?''

  'You were born,' came the bald and decidedly bitter-sounding announcement.

  'Meaning if I hadn't been, you'd have inherited all this yourself?'

  'Not at all. Meaning if you hadn't been, I might have been able to finish my book on time.'

  'I won't stop you. I didn't ask you to take me sightseeing tomorrow. I can get a map and take myself sightseeing. I don't need you to do anything for me.'

  'I realise that, dear Jess, but you wouldn't want me to break a deathbed promise, would you?'

  Evie arrived at that moment with dessert, a huge helping of sherry trifle and jelly and cream.

  She tutted as she placed their plates in front of them. 'I could hear you two out in the hall, bickering away like naughty children. I won't come cook for either of you if you don't start behaving yourselves. You are going to let Sebastian take you sight-seeing, my girl,' she said sternly to Jessica. 'And you're going to be very nice about it, aren't you, Sebastian?' She folded her arms and glared at him.

  'You've shamed me into it,' he said dryly.

  'I sincerely hope so.' Her hands moved to her hips. 'Now smile at her, me lad, and use some of that charm of yours to sell her this place and Norfolk Island. That's what Lucy wanted you to do, wasn't it? Why else would she have arranged for you to be here during Jessica's stay?'

  'Why else, indeed?' he muttered.

  Evie rolled her eyes and left the room.

  Jessica went to say something, but her words died when those incredible blue eyes of his fastened onto hers. He lifted his wineglass in a toast, his mouth pulling into the most appallingly sensual smile.

  It electrified every nerve ending she owned, tugged at her heart and turned over her stomach.

  'To my new-found charm and your unlikely conversion,' he mocked softly. Jessica was proud of herself when she scraped up a cool smile in return. She even raised her glass in a counter toast. 'You've got a snowball's chance in hell, Sebastian,' she said, not a quiver in her voice. 'But best of British luck to you.'

  Jessica woke at three. Exhaustion had sent her to bed straight after dinner, and she'd quickly fallen asleep. But now she was wide awake, and there would be no more sleep for her that night.

  She lay in the huge four-poster bed meant for a couple and watched the lace curtains blowing beside the French doors. Sebastian had told her to leave them open to let in the cooling night breezes.

  Sebastian...

  He was there, in the bedroom next to hers. Only one wall away. Less than twenty feet.

  So near and yet so far.

  Jessica groaned softly into her pillows. Why did she want him so much? It was perverse in the extreme when it was obvious he didn't even like her, let alone want her in any way, shape or form.

  Could that be part of the reason? Was she challenged by his indifference? Jessica had to admit she wasn't used to men being indifferent to her. Even the ones who hadn't liked her professionally had found her physically attractive.

  Sebastian, however, seemed immune to her looks. Or was it career women he was immune to? There was no doubt he was scornful of her ambition and drive. Scornful of her unwillingness to throw in her life in Sydney and move here to live.

  Yet that was so unfair! Why should she abandon everything she'd worked for because an aunt she didn't know wanted her to? And why should she adopt a lifestyle that would not come naturally to her? It was all very well for Aunt Lucy to leave her everything now, then try to manipulate her from the grave, but where had she been when Jessica had really needed her, when her mother had needed her?

  No. Aunt Lucy had a lot to answer for, in Jessica's opinion. If she'd been the wronged party in the feud between the two sisters, then why hadn't she told someone about it? Why keep silent?

  'Because she was probably the guilty party, that's why,' Jessica muttered.

  'She left me everything out of guilt!'

  A creaking floorboard outside her door stopped Jessica's heart in its tracks. As she lay there, deathly still, her instantly alert ears made out the soft footfall of someone walking down the hallway. The sound of a door opening and shutting was more distinct.

  Eventually, Jessica let out her long-held breath, though her heart was still racing. It seemed Sebastian was having trouble sleeping, too. Or hadn't he gone to bed yet? There was a dull light on the veranda, which she'd thought was moonlight, but which she now realised was coming from his room. Maybe he'd stayed up late, writing.

  More sounds filtered through the door. Sebastian moving around somewhere, possibly in the living room across the hallway. What was he doing? Getting a book to read? Pouring himself a nightcap, perhaps? She'd noticed earlier that that room contained quite a library, plus a large rosewood sideboard with decanters full of whisky and sherry and port sitting in a row on lace doilies.

  The thought of Sebastian awake and prowling around the house gradually began to unnerve Jessica. What was he doing? What was he wearing? Why didn't he go back to bed, damn it?

  Time passed. Three-thirty came and went, then four. Finally, Sebastian returned to his room and switched off his light. She heard the squish of his mattress as he climbed into bed. Soon, the house was deathly silent. Jessica couldn't go back to sleep. She lay there, thinking thoughts that unnerved her even more. She was becoming obsessed with the man, she realised. Totally obsessed.

  Tomorrow was going to be a nightmare!

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  'IT'S beautiful, isn't it?' Sebastian said as he pulled the Mazda to a stop and cut the engine. They were less than a minute from Lucy's Place, halfway down the steep hill she had seen from the back veranda.

  What she hadn't been able to see from the back veranda, however, was this magnificent view of the foreshore below, not to mention the collection of impressive Georgian buildings at the base of the hill.

  'Captain Cook described the whole island as paradise when he first saw it,'

  Sebastian informed her, 'but this part is my favourite. That's Kingston down there, where the British first settled and built the convict gaol early last century. The gaol is in ruins now but the government buildings are all still in use. They're well worth a look, inside as well as out.'

  'Not this morning, though,' Jessica vetoed, thinking that would take hours. And she didn't want to be with Sebastian for hours. Their brief moments at breakfast together had been trial enough.

  Jessica had risen around seven, showered and dressed sensibly in fawn Bermuda shorts with a striped fawn and cream shirt, which was slightly baggy, revealing nothing of her figure. She'd wound her hair into a tight knot and applied no makeup except a coral-coloured lipstick and some mascara, emerging from the bathroom looking cool and composed while inside her stomach was a mass of butterflies.

  Silence from Sebastian's room had assured her she'd be able to breakfast in peace, and she'd almost managed it, too. But he'd appeared as she lingered over a second cup of coffee, looking slightly bedraggled but appallingly sexy in black satin boxer shorts and nothing else.

  Jessica had fled the room as quickly as politeness allowed, but there was no fleeing now, ensconced as they were in the small Mazda.

  Thank goodness he'd put on a T-shirt to go with the white shorts he was wearing today. At least she could look at him and not want to touch him so much. But it was still difficult to sit so closely to him in a car and not be brutally aware of every living, breathing pore in his beautiful body.

  'Why not this morning?' Sebastian asked.

  'First, I really need to go to the bank before lunch,' she said, thinking up any excuse she could to shorten her torture. 'And I have a couple of personal items I simply have to buy. There's no rush for me to see everything this morning, is there? I can drive myself down here any time now that I know the way. It's not far.'

  'It's no
t the same on your own,' he said. 'You need a proper guided tour. There's always this afternoon, I suppose.'

  'Oh, no, you don't. You said you write every afternoon. Can't have you accusing me of holding up your writing, can I?' she finished, throwing him a false but very bright smile.

  His laugh surprised her, for it had an odd note to it, as though she'd made a sick joke. 'I'll just give you a quick drive-by tour of the major points of interest, then. After all, we can't risk yoy actually soaking up any of the atmosphere of the place. You might find you like it, and then what would you do?'

  Jessica declined to answer his sarcastic question because he didn't expect her to. But she did deliver a droll glance his way then turned to look through her window while he reengaged the engine and drove slowly down the hill. After being whisked around Sydney a lot in taxis, it felt to Jessica as though they were crawling. When Sebastian slowed down to snail speed at the bottom of the hill, she sighed in exasperation. This was his idea of quick? At this rate their drive-by tour would take hours, as well.

  'I thought you were allowed to do fifty around the island,' she pointed out tartly. 'Are you trying to annoy me on purpose?'

  'Heaven forbid I'd do such a thing, or delay the time it will take to satisfy Evie that I've done the right thing by Lucy's wishes. Unfortunately, the speed limit through the town and down here in Kingston is only twenty-five. Didn't they tell you that when you arrived? Drivers also have to give way to all livestock,' he added when he pulled up abruptly.

  One of the cows grazing on the common had done an unexpected right turn onto the road, followed by a flock of geese.

  'Or are you so desperate to vacate my company that you would rather I ignore the rules and run them down?' he added.

  Jessica decided enough was enough. Things were getting out of hand. She had two courses of action. She could return sarcasm for sarcasm, whereby the month ahead would quickly deteriorate from one of secret sexual frustration to a very nasty episode indeed. Or she could attempt to defuse the growing antagonism between them, thereby making the situation tolerable, at least.