‘Grant,’ Peter returned. ‘And washing-up is the least I can do after Ryan gave me dinner.’
‘Indeed,’ nodded Grant, his sharp gaze on Ryan.
She had no idea what he was doing here, and she wiped her hands nervously down her denim-clad thighs, colour in her cheeks as she saw Grant’s gaze follow the movement, vividly remembering how his hands had touched her there yesterday. The look in his eyes, the flare of desire, told that he remembered it too.
‘Would you like to join us for coffee?’ she offered strongly, willing herself not to be affected by him, but finding him overwhelming in the confines of the small kitchen. ‘This place ain’t big enough for the three of us!’ she did her most ham gangster impression.
‘Very good,’ Peter laughed. ‘And I’m afraid I have to be the one to leave—I have a call to make.’
Ryan swallowed hard. She did not want anyone to leave, she just wanted them to move out of the tiny kitchen. She certainly didn’t want to be left alone with Grant—she had no idea what she could say to him.
She chanced a look at him once Peter had left, his expression still as derisive as when he had come in. ‘Coffee?’ she asked dejectedly.
‘Thanks,’ he nodded, leaning back against the kitchen unit, his arms folded across his chest, the dark green shirt fitting tautly across his shoulders, the brown corduroys fitting down snugly on his hips.
Her movements were selfconscious as he watched her, and she wished her hands didn’t shake so much. But the last time she had seen this man he had touched her more intimately than any other man had been allowed to.
‘I had no idea you and Peter were such good friends,’ he said suddenly.
She flushed. ‘We aren’t. He just happened to give me a lift, so I offered him dinner.’ She poured the coffee, then went through to the living-room, aware that Grant had to duck to get through the doorway as he followed her, that his head almost touched the beamed ceiling as he straightened.
He stretched out in one of the armchairs, obviously more comfortable sitting down. ‘I think these cottages were built for small people,’ he shrugged. ‘Is it all right for you?’
‘Er—fine!’ What on earth was he doing here? And how could he act so normally when she felt so uncomfortable? She couldn’t believe he had shrugged off their lovemaking so lightly, he had been as aroused as she was at the time.
‘Settled in all right?’
‘Yes—thank you.’
‘Good,’ he nodded, staring at her broodingly. ‘About yesterday—’
‘I thought we weren’t going to talk about that,’ she said sharply, feeling still too vulnerable about her weakness.
‘When you found the lamb,’ he finished harshly, his head back.
‘Oh!’ She swallowed hard at her mistake, and hot colour flooded her cheeks, only to fade again, leaving her pale. ‘Is it all right?’
‘I thought you might like to come and see it.’ He looked at her with cool enquiry.
‘Yes, I would,’ she nodded eagerly. ‘Tomorrow—’
‘Now,’ he interrupted firmly. ‘I’m working through the day, but I have the time now.’
Ryan bit her lower lip; she wanted to see the lamb, but she did not want to spend any more time with Grant than she had to. She had thought now that she had moved into the cottage that she wouldn’t have to see him, and she was terrified of the awareness between them, the way she had no defences against his lovemaking. Yesterday had more than proved that—to him as well as herself!
She stood up. ‘I’ll get my jacket.’
Ragtag wasn’t back from his exploration of his new surroundings, so she went alone with Grant, in the Jaguar this time. Grant was very relaxed behind the wheel. He didn’t seem to want to talk, and Ryan had nothing to say either. She could hardly believe the short time she had known this man, the way he seemed to occupy most of her thoughts.
He didn’t drive to the Hall, but went past it for about a mile before turning the Jaguar into a narrow lane and stopping the car outside a cottage very similar to her own. A middle-aged man came out to greet him, a short man with a lined face, his clothes as casual as Grant’s, although slightly more worn, Rex and Riba at his heels, making Ryan glad she hadn’t brought Ragtag. Grant had been right about the Labradors, they didn’t seem to like Ragtag at all.
‘Don Short,’ Grant introduced. ‘My manager and friend.’
Ryan shook the older man’s hand, revising her impression that Mandy was in love with him. She didn’t doubt that Mandy did love him, but Grant’s method of introduction showed that the other man was a close family friend.
‘And you must be Ryan, Mark’s friend,’ Don smiled, his face rugged, his brown eyes warm and kind.
‘Yes,’ she acknowledged, aware that Grant had stiffened at her side. Surely he didn’t think that because he had kissed her a couple of times she would change her mind about Mark? If he did he was a fool. It might have started out as an act, but Mark was turning out to be as much protection for her as she was for him. How much more formidable Grant would have been if he didn’t believe her to be Mark’s girlfriend!
‘I have to thank you for finding the lamb. He’s a lovely little chap, it would have been a shame if he’d perished out there last night,’ Don shook his head.
‘He would have died?’
‘Probably,’ Don nodded. ‘Come on with me and I’ll show him to you,’ he smiled.
Ryan looked up uncertainly and saw Grant’s nod of approval, although his expression remained grim. He stayed by the cottage with the dogs as she followed Don round to the huge wooden barn at the back of the cottage and went inside with him. Inside were half a dozen or so tiny pens, each one with a ewe and a lamb in them.
‘The adoption pens,’ she realised excitedly. ‘Then you did find a mother for him? Which one is he?’ she asked eagerly.
‘Over here,’ Don smiled.
Ryan knelt down beside the pen, hardly able to believe the tiny lamb sleeping beside the ewe was the same one she had rescued yesterday. ‘It’s beautiful,’ she said in an awed voice.
‘Aye,’ he nodded, not seeming to find her show of emotion in the least strange. ‘He could so easily have gone the same way as his mother.’
Ryan looked up at him, brushing the dust from her knees as she stood up. ‘Was it shock?’
‘Mm,’ he sighed. ‘We’ve had a lot of trouble with dogs this year, and this last week’s been the worst.’
‘Can nothing be done?’ she frowned.
‘Shoot them,’ came his blunt reply.
‘The sheep?’ she gasped.
He shook his head. ‘The dogs.’
‘Oh no!’ Ryan recoiled.
‘Only way,’ he nodded. ‘You can’t have a sheep-killer in an area like this one.’
‘No, I suppose not,’ she agreed, secretly shocked by such a drastic measure. But wasn’t it just as cruel that the sheep and lambs were killed? She feared she didn’t have the hardness of heart for this sort of life. As for sending sheep off to market—she couldn’t do it! She was the sort of person who would give each sheep a name, no matter how long it took!
Grant was leaning back against the bottle-green Jaguar when she rejoined him, the dogs already in the back of the car. ‘All right?’ He quirked one dark brow.
‘Yes,’ she nodded shyly.
‘You see, it can be done.’ His voice was husky.
‘I think it’s a little late for me,’ she smiled, understanding him completely, although Don looked baffled by the turn the conversation had taken.
‘Probably as far as parents are concerned,’ Grant agreed. ‘Although not for a husband.’ His voice hardened.
Her expression became withdrawn. ‘No,’ she acknowledged distantly.
‘Thanks, Don,’ he nodded to the other man. ‘I’m sure Ryan thought I had evil designs on that lamb.’
‘Oh no,’ she denied instantly, remembering his gentleness with the tiny creature yesterday, ‘I didn’t think that at all.’
&
nbsp; ‘I should hope not!’ Don’s mouth quirked. ‘I remember that when Grant was a boy he had almost a herd of sheep for himself, he became surrogate mother for so many orphaned lambs.’
Ryan could see Grant wasn’t pleased by this disclosure of his childhood. ‘Really?’ she prompted Don, smiling herself now.
‘Aye,’ he nodded. ‘But even then he had a way with them. He used to get up all hours of the night to feed them, rush home again lunch-time, the same in the evening. It was like that every year,’ he shook his head.
‘I have more sense now.’ Grant’s voice was harsh.
Don looked at him, deep respect and love in his eyes. ‘I’ve seen you up all night with a sick ewe, and not so long ago either,’ he teased.
Grant gave him an angry scowl. ‘If you’re trying to convince Ryan I’m human then I’m afraid I’m past redemption in her eyes,’ he taunted. ‘She thinks my protectiveness of Mark very arrogant.’
She blushed as the older man looked at her curiously, then turned to glare at Grant. He must know that she knew he was very human indeed.
Don’s eyes narrowed thoughtfully at the high colour in her cheeks. ‘I doubt that,’ he said slowly, enigmatically.
Grant frowned at him, looking sharply at Ryan, and then away again. ‘We’d better be going,’ he said tersely, and opened the car door for Ryan, not noticing her almost dazed expression.
She slid into the seat, staring sightlessly ahead of her. It couldn’t be true! She wouldn’t believe it! A month ago she had thought herself in love with Alan, she couldn’t now think herself in love with Grant!
She turned to look at him as he spoke briefly to Don, loving everything about him, the dark sweep of his hair, the mesmerising green eyes, the firmness of his mouth that could reduce her to a trembling mass of wild sensations, the hard body that moved so erotically over hers. She had fallen in love with Grant Montgomery, and Don Short had guessed at the secret she had only just realised herself!
***
She kept well out of Grant’s way for the next two days, not going up to the house until she was sure he was out on the estate, taking a packed lunch with her so that she could eat up in the studio, only leaving when she knew Grant had gone back to work.
It was a conscious avoidance on her part; she did not know how to handle her love for him. She didn’t stand a chance of him feeling the same way about her; she knew from Mandy’s daily visits up to the studio that Grant was still seeing Valerie in the evenings, and that knowledge filled her with desolation.
She had to be mad, insane, to have fallen in love with such a man. And yet that love was now as much a fundamental part of her as breathing, making a mockery of the infatuation she had felt for Alan. He had been one of the tutors at the college, and had seemed exciting and unattainable. The fact that he had turned out to be very attainable indeed, and had thought she was too, had been the deciding factor in their relationship. With Grant she didn’t even stop to question whether or not they should make love, she only knew that she wanted to, that as she lay in bed at night she wished he were beside her.
Such wanton thoughts were new to her, so that she hated to be alone, at a time when she was almost constantly nothing else. She couldn’t even lose herself in her work as she had used to, finding she didn’t have her usual concentration.
When Grant suddenly walked into the studio late Thursday afternoon her hands began to shake, and she picked up one of her cleaning cloths to cover their trembling.
And all the time she gazed at him angrily, taking in everything about him, from the darkness of his hair, his grim expression, to the leashed power of his body in the dark clothing.
She really did love this man, she acknowledged it even while she feared it.
‘Ryan,’ he greeted tightly.
‘Grant,’ she nodded, swallowing hard.
His mouth twisted as he faced her. ‘Am I allowed to see the masterpiece?’ he taunted.
Ryan flinched as if he had physically hit her. ‘It isn’t a masterpiece,’ she said stiffly, and moved round the easel, giving him no chance to look at her partly finished painting.
‘How’s it going?’ His voice softened, as if he regretted his mockery.
She shrugged. ‘Not too badly,’ she avoided, knowing she had never worked so slowly, or so laboriously, in her life.
Grant’s hands were thrust into his denims pockets, his shoulders hunched over. ‘Mandy tells me you’ve turned down her invitation to join us for dinner this evening,’ he said at last.
Wild colour flooded her cheeks. ‘Yes,’ she confirmed huskily.
‘Why?’
‘I—Well, because—’
‘Mandy seems confused by your refusal,’ he bit out at her stumbling effort to find an excuse.
She hung her head, looking at her hands, the gold of her hair dulled to amber in the confines of the single plait down her spine. ‘I’m sorry.’ Her voice was husky.
‘Are you?’
Her head went back at the derision she heard in his voice. ‘Yes,’ she snapped.
‘Then why refuse?’ he asked softly.
Ryan touched her lips with the tip of her tongue. ‘I didn’t come here to be a house-guest.’
‘Ryan, are you avoiding me?’ His eyes were narrowed as he forced her to meet his gaze, amber lights in the green depths as he probed the blue oceans before him.
She shook her head in denial. ‘Why should I do that?’ She made her tone light.
‘You know why,’ he scowled.
‘No, I—’
‘Yes, damn you!’ he rasped. ‘The other day I tried to make love to you.’
‘Please—’
‘And you didn’t try to stop me,’ he added hardly.
‘Ever since then you’ve been deliberately avoiding me—oh yes, I’ve been aware of it,’ he added as her eyes widened. ‘Mandy tells me this isn’t the first dinner invitation you’ve turned down.’
‘Not because of you, I can assure you.’ Ryan’s expression was fierce.
‘No?’
‘No!’
‘I think you’re a liar, Ryan. Or do you allow other men to kiss you the way I did, to touch you the way I did?’ His voice had softened to a caress, the amber flames becoming a fire.
‘Not other men, no—only one other man,’ she added challengingly. ‘I think you know who I mean?’
‘Mark!’
His anger didn’t please her, but it was her only defence against a situation that was fast moving out of her control. If Grant should kiss her here and now, make love to her, she had no way of stopping him, and she knew she wouldn’t want to stop him.
Her silence seemed to damn her in his eyes. ‘You miss him?’ he demanded tautly.
‘Of course.’
‘Then you’ll be pleased to know that he’ll be here on Sunday,’ Grant bit out coldly.
Relief flooded through her, though her eyes were suddenly feverish. ‘He will?’ she said weakly.
‘Yes.’ Grant spun away from her, glaring angrily out of the window. ‘Your reaction tells me you’ll be pleased to see him.’
‘Of course,’ she gasped her surprise.
He glanced round at her, a hard tension about his mouth. ‘Did you tell him I kissed you?’
The reason for his own reluctance to see his brother suddenly became apparent! ‘The first or second time?’ she taunted.
‘Either!’ he ground out.
‘No,’ she sighed. ‘Look, Grant, I have no wish to come between you and Mark—’
‘Don’t you?’ his eyes glittered. ‘It’s too late, Ryan, you are irrevocably between us. The sooner you leave here the better!’ He slammed out of the room.
Ryan didn’t move, but stood there biting her top lip to stop the tears flowing. Grant wanted her away from his home as soon as possible. And she wanted to go, wanted to leave here and never have to see Grant again. But would the pain of loving him go away just by her not seeing him again, would she stop loving him then? She didn’t think she
would ever stop loving him, even if she never set eyes on him again.
She turned away as the door opened to admit Mandy. The last thing she wanted right now was to talk to the other girl. She wanted to be alone—No, no, she didn’t! Oh, she didn’t know what she did want any more. Peace of mind, probably. But she doubted she would ever get that again.
‘Grant says you still won’t join us for dinner,’ Mandy spoke tentatively.
‘No.’ Ryan blew her nose noisily. ‘I think I’m coming down with a cold,’ she invented.
Mandy nodded. ‘It’s the change in the temperature.’
For the last two days the weather had been very stormy, although luckily Ryan’s roof had held out. ‘Probably,’ she agreed.
‘Did Grant tell you about Mark?’ Mandy enquired.
‘Yes.’
‘Good news, isn’t it?’
‘Yes.’
‘Are you sure you won’t join us for dinner?’
‘Very sure,’ Ryan snapped.
‘Is it because of Grant?’
‘No!’
‘Because I know he’s been extra grouchy lately. Maybe he’s taken it out on you?’ Mandy looked at her anxiously.
‘No,’ she sighed. ‘I’ve hardly seen him.’
‘Oh,’ Mandy walked further into the room. ‘He’s had a lot on his mind.’
‘Oh?’ Ryan began to clear away, knowing she wouldn’t be able to do anything else today.
Mandy shrugged. ‘The dogs have been at the sheep again.’
‘Oh no!’ Ryan was horrified.
‘Yes,’ the other girl nodded, frowning. ‘It’s very strange, really, it’s only been happening the last week or two. It’s probably a stray,’ she dismissed. ‘I’ll go and let you get on with your work. See you tomorrow?’
‘Yes,’ Ryan nodded, a thought so disturbing bothering her that she didn’t even notice the other girl leave.
There was only one stray in the area that she knew of, a stray that she knew from personal experience liked to go off on his own, a stray who had probably only been in the area a matter of weeks. Ragtag!
She tried to tell herself it couldn’t be so, she remembered his gentleness with the lamb, and yet she couldn’t dismiss it that easily. Ragtag could be the sheep-worrier, and if he was they would shoot him!
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