Savage Courtship

by Susan Napier

  ‘Weren’t you anxious to show me the drawing-room a few minutes ago? I was rather distracted last time I was here—I had that Japanese consortium in tow—so I think perhaps you should just show me everything you’ve done in the last six months. I’m entirely in your hands this afternoon.’

  Vanessa looked down at the hands in question. She thought them too large, like the rest of her, but the long, ringless fingers were slender and well-shaped, the round nails short and burnished with natural polish.

  He had been in her hands this morning, too, she remembered treacherously. Her palm had been cupped over the rippling tautness of his back, while her left hand had been tucked cosily between their bodies, her fingers curled against his smooth upper chest, measuring the rise and fall of his contented sleep and tingling with the faint vibration of his steady heartbeat. But of course that had been nothing to where his hands had been...

  ‘Flynn?’

  Her head jerked up and she felt her skin begin to heat up as he regarded her with polite puzzlement.

  ‘Er...yes...good idea. In that case, we’ll start with the main dining-room. The marble mantelpiece came back from the workshop last week and you’ll be able to see what a difference a professional cleaning job is going to make on that awful one in the drawing-room...’

  She was so anxious to escape the intimacy of her thoughts that she rattled on, inundating him with technical details as she took him through the public rooms that were now almost completely restored, albeit with some discreet modern touches necessary for the comfort and healthy well-being of future guests, to what they had been in the former glory years of gold-inspired prosperity.

  Judge Seaton had had the enthusiasm and the knowledge but not the financial resources to indulge in more than cosmetic improvements to the old building and Vanessa knew that he would have heartily approved of the changes that his unknown heir had wrought to what had been a sorely neglected piece of local history, whatever Benedict’s mercenary reasons for doing so. Perhaps what had happened had been exactly what he had been hoping for when he had written that extraordinary codicil to his will. He had known that Vanessa shared his love of the dilapidated old place, that she looked upon Whitefield as the home she had never really had. He had enjoyed inspiring her with his love of history and perhaps he had been relying on the possessive sense of belonging he had engendered in her to ensure that she would maintain a careful watching brief over Whitefield after he was gone. The thought pleased her far more than did the notion that he might have made that stipulation purely out of pity, or concern that she wasn’t strong enough to stand on her own two feet.

  Her obvious pride of accomplishment didn’t escape the man at her side as he meekly allowed himself to be lectured from room to room like a laggardly schoolboy. At first largely silent, he began interrupting her flow with a pertinent question here and there, just enough to encourage her subtly out of the formal recitation of dry facts into expressing a revealing enthusiasm for her subject. When she forgot herself she even moved differently, her stride long and eager, her hips and arms swinging in an uninhibited rhythm, her head and hands contributing expressively to the conversation.

  ‘I’m glad you don’t feel that a contemporary bathroom is an unforgivable betrayal of the integrity of the restoration,’ Benedict murmured as he surveyed the chaos of plumbing that sprouted from the tiled wall in one of the small upstairs sitting-rooms which were being converted into bathrooms for the adjoining bedrooms.

  ‘This is going to be a working hotel, not a museum,’ Vanessa was quick to defend. ‘People expect a reasonable standard of accommodation for their money. Tourists may enjoy visiting museums but they don’t want to stay in them, especially if it means sacrificing their creature comforts. For the sake of strict authenticity we’d have to offer them a wash-stand and chamberpot or portable commode and I don’t see many of them wanting to put up with that! The 1870s were still pretty primitive in this part of the world... I mean, the country had only been settled for a few decades and most of the people’s energy was going into scraping a living from the land. As long as the public rooms are restored in their period I don’t see a conflict, since the kitchens and bathrooms have to be upgraded to meet modern health standards anyway.’

  ‘Mm, hip-baths in front of the fire do rather lose their rustic appeal when you know you have to haul twenty buckets of hot water up the stairs first,’ said Benedict musingly.

  ‘You wouldn’t be doing any hauling,’ Vanessa pointed out sourly. ‘Except perhaps on the bell-rope.’

  ‘You don’t think much of me, do you, Flynn?’ he startled her by saying. ‘You seem to think I’m incapable of doing anything for myself. A complete wimp, in fact.’

  ‘Of...of course not, sir,’ she denied, not deceived by his mildness. No man who was a complete wimp could have a body that felt like tensile steel wrapped in warm silk, or dominate, as he did, with a mere look. ‘I—it’s part of my job to make sure you don’t have to do manual labour around the house—’

  ‘During holiday breaks when I was studying architecture, I worked as a building labourer—much to my parents’ disgust. I may give the impression that I’m a pampered rich brat but I do make some effort to keep in touch with the real world.’

  ‘Of course you do, sir.’

  Her soothing tone made his eyes narrow. ‘Are you going to “sir” me to death again now?’

  ‘No, s—’ She cleared her throat. She hadn’t realised how automatically the word sprang to her lips when she was feeling defensive. ‘No, of course not.’

  ‘I hate it when you do that.’

  ‘Do what, s—? Do what?’

  ‘Agree with me in that unspeakably pleasant voice,’ he said succinctly. ‘And don’t say that’s what I pay you for. I never did have much respect for yes-men. Or yes-women.’

  It was unfortunate that he tagged on that last phrase. It had connotations that made her go hot all over. If she had said yes to him last night she had forfeited a lot more than mere respect!

  She stiffened at the dawning gleam of predatory amusement in his gaze as her slight flush made him aware of the sexual overtones of his throw-away remark.

  ‘Although, I’ll have to admit, there are certain situations where I love to hear nothing from a woman’s mouth but the word yes...’ he added limpidly, for the sheer pleasure of provoking her.

  Her tanned cheeks acquired a deeper, carmine tint and her eyes darkened until they looked like smouldering black coals surrounded by a thick fire-screen of gold-tipped lashes. Her first instinct was to flare back at him, but she resisted fiercely.

  ‘I’m sure there are—’ She bit off the sentence before it reached its natural conclusion, but the contemptuous ‘sir’ hovered unspoken in the air between them and it goaded him further.

  ‘You’re blushing, Flynn.’

  ‘That’s because I’m embarrassed for you,’ she said defiantly.

  ‘Oh?’ He looked justifiably wary. ‘And why is that, may I ask?’

  ‘Because taunting an inferior who can’t fight back is beneath you,’ she said with icy disdain.

  He winced, acknowledging the skilful thrust before parrying quietly, ‘I agree, except that I don’t happen to think of any of the people in my employ as inferiors. They are people who work with me as well as for me, and there’s give and take on both sides. Your job title may appear to make you subordinate to my will but I think we both know that you have a degree of autonomy here which puts you in a rather unique position of authority. I wouldn’t even be surprised if, where Whitefield is concerned, you actually consider me your inferior...’

  Vanessa’s eyes flickered guiltily and his expression eased. ‘As for fighting back,’ he continued, giving her a look of wry respect, ‘I think you’ve just proved that you’re more than capable of doing that. I’m duly chastened by your polite disdain for my needling.’ He moved restlessly over to the small window which overlooked the kitchen garden and low-walled brick courtyard behind the stables. �
�Unfortunately I can’t promise I’ll never do it again. My moods have been rather unpredictable lately. Maybe I’m going though an early mid-life crisis.’

  He sounded irritated with himself and Vanessa was so amused by his unlikely depression that she dared to say, ‘I found an old walking stick in the attic last week, Mr Savage; perhaps you’d like me to fetch it for you?’

  He spun around. ‘Now who’s being provoking?’ But he was smiling the small, cool smile that was his trademark. ‘I suppose you still approach each birthday with joyous anticipation. Wait until you hit thirty, then your perspective will change. I’m amazed that someone so young should have such a preoccupation with history.’

  ‘It’s an interest, not a preoccupation, and I’m not so many years younger than you—’

  ‘A decade.’ Again he exhibited his phenomenal memory for detail. ‘You should still be looking dewy-eyed to the future, not back over your shoulder at the cobwebbed past.’

  ‘We can learn a lot about our options for the future from the evidence of the past,’ said Vanessa piously. ‘I’m not the youngest in the historical society by a long chalk; we even have primary-school children as members.’ She paused, then was unable to resist saying tartly, ‘And I was never dewy-eyed.’

  ‘Yes, you were,’ he said unexpectedly, studying her wide eyes and grave mouth with its hint of repressed emotion. ‘I bet you were brimming with painful innocence until adolescence hit you with a wallop. You must have had more difficulty adjusting than most girls. I suppose you were teased about your size by girls and boys alike, and treated as more mature than you actually were by the world in general.’

  Now it was his turn to be amused as she backed off, startled by the thumbnail description of her awkward puberty. ‘Don’t look at me like that, Flynn; it’s not sorcery, it’s called applied intelligence. I can make an educated guess because I was teased for exactly the opposite reason. I was a late bloomer, both physically and intellectually. I was nearly seventeen when my voice broke, a string-bean with hardly a muscle to my name at an élite boarding-school where physical evidence of masculinity was the main criterion for judging peer status. To add to my misery I had an astigmatism that means I couldn’t wear contact lenses. I passed most of my high-school years as a four-eyed wimp. On the other hand being slight did force me to learn the valuable art of talking my way out of trouble, which in the long run is a far more useful life-skill than the ability to thump the life out of someone smaller than you, don’t you think?’

  As Vanessa remained silent, stunned by yet another startling new facet of her employer’s complex personality, he added coaxingly, ‘That’s your cue, Flynn, to say, Indubitably, sir, in that insufferably stuffy butler voice that you use to squash my pretensions.’

  ‘I wouldn’t dream of it,’ said Vanessa weakly, wondering why he was opening up with such devastating intimacy to her just now, when it was vitally important to her mental well-being that he remain a convenient cypher, not a living, breathing human being riddled with intriguing weaknesses.

  ‘Oh, well, in that case, shall we soldier on?’ He moved to the open doorway and indicated that she should precede him. ‘You can tell me more about the original inhabitants of the inn as we go. The extent of your research certainly makes them seem real. Have you ever been tempted to trace your own family tree? The lawyer said that your mother is a New Zealander...’

  ‘She was,’ Vanessa was forced to respond reluctantly. ‘She died a few years ago.’ Just before the storm over Egon St Clair’s death had broken over Vanessa’s unsuspecting head. It had highlighted her sense of isolation and, not wanting to worry a father already burdened with grief, she had made mistakes that had only added fuel to the ugly rumours that the St Clair family had circulated.

  ‘I’m sorry. Was it an accident or had she been ill?’

  ‘An illness, but it was very sudden.’ Uneasy with the continuing thread of intimacy in the conversation, Vanessa distanced herself with a shrug. ‘I do have a few great-aunts and uncles and some second cousins around but most of them live down in the South Island, and that’s where the family history is. My mother never really kept in touch after she married Dad and went to England.’ A fact Vanessa had been extremely glad of when she had first arrived in the country. The last thing she had wanted was to be inundated with family concern and curiosity.

  They were coming to the head of the stairs and Vanessa was about to point out the handmade reproductions of the missing balusters when there was the sound of a car tooting in the front driveway.

  ‘Excuse me, I’ll just see who that is,’ said Vanessa, welcoming the interruption.

  ‘It can’t be anyone for me. No one except Dane knows I’m here...and my personal assistant in New York, but she has express orders not to give out the information.’ He kept pace with her on the stairs, reaching the front door first and opening it as if he were the butler and she a departing guest.

  ‘Nice vehicle,’ he commented as they stood on the stone steps and watched the driver unfold his considerable height from the front seat of a forest-green Range Rover.

  ‘It’s Richard.’

  ‘The stud?’ murmured Benedict, eyeing the brawny build and handsome features of the man striding across the gravel towards them.

  ‘He owns a stud,’ Vanessa hissed, pasting on a smile as Richard approached. Richard usually called before dropping in and if he had done so this morning she could have warned him off. As it was he couldn’t have chosen a worse time to turn up out of the blue.

  To compensate for her guilty thoughts she strove to sound as welcoming as possible and ended up sounding disgustingly coy. ‘Hello, Richard. I didn’t expect to see you again so soon.’

  Before he could reply Benedict Savage smoothly interposed himself into the conversation by holding out his hand. ‘Hello. Wells, isn’t it? I was just saying I didn’t realise anyone knew I was home.’

  ‘Actually, I came to see Van,’ said Richard, smiling pleasantly as he shook hands. Even standing on the second step down he almost topped them both, his bulky oatmeal sweater under the well-worn tweed jacket and working jeans tucked into calf-length boots emphasising his powerful frame. ‘She gave me the impression last night that you weren’t expected back for a while yet.’

  Vanessa tensed. It wasn’t beyond the realms of possibility for Benedict, in his present self-confessed state of unpredictable moodiness, to make some crass joke about the cat being away.

  To her relief, ‘I’m beginning to recognise a certain charm about the place,’ was all he said. ‘Would you like to come in? We’ve been looking over the house and were just about to break for coffee.’

  That was news to Vanessa, since she would have been the one serving it. He also gave their activities a companionable sound that they had definitely lacked.

  ‘No, thanks.’ Richard shook his blond head. ‘I just called to drop something off to Van.’ He produced the ‘something’ from his jacket pocket—the tiny vial of perfume that she had filled from the fragile main bottle in her bedroom so that she could carry it in her evening bag. ‘It must have dropped on to the floor of my car when you got your keys out.’

  Vanessa was hard put to it not to snatch it out of his hand. All it would probably take would be one whiff and Benedict Savage, with his wretchedly superb memory, would connect it instantly with his fragrant ghost!

  ‘Thank you, Richard,’ she said, taking it gingerly in her long fingers and tucking it securely in the buttoned breast pocket of her blouse. ‘But you needn’t have made a special trip.’

  ‘I didn’t,’ he said in his usual prosaic manner. ‘I’m on my way to the vet’s and had to go past your gate anyway, so I thought I may as well stop.’ His brown eyes crinkled knowingly. ‘I also thought it’d give me a chance to check on your health. How’s the head this morning?’

  Vanessa was aware of Benedict’s own head turning her way. ‘Fine, thanks,’ she said hurriedly.

  ‘Were you feeling ill last night?’ Benedict sou
nded nettled as he studied her profile. ‘You could have asked me for the day off. I don’t expect you to work until you drop.’

  ‘I was thinking more of her feeling ill because of last night.’ Richard grinned genially. ‘Vanessa had a few too many glasses of champagne.’

  ‘Oh?’ Even though she wasn’t looking at him she could just see the blue eyes sharpen with interest. For the first time Vanessa regretted the qualities that had attracted her to Richard in the first place—his frank openness and the friendly good nature that was incapable of recognising malice. ‘Celebrating something, were you?’

  ‘The sale of a stallion of mine...and the pleasure of a pretty lady’s company, of course,’ added Richard gallantly.

  ‘Of course,’ repeated Benedict drily and Vanessa swung her head to glare at him. ‘I hope you don’t mind accepting second-place stakes,’ he said blandly, confirming her suspicion that he was laughing at them.

  She forgot that she was only interested in curtailing the conversation. ‘I’m flattered that Richard wants to share his successes with me. His stud is developing a reputation for producing some of the best thoroughbred horses in Australasia.’ There—now let him try to dismiss Richard as an unsophisticated country hick!

  ‘You mean I can expect my butler to come home legless at fairly regular intervals?’ was the droll reply.

  ‘I wasn’t legless,’ Vanessa protested coolly, ‘I was merely...’ She searched for a properly dignified word.

  ‘Over-tired,’ Richard interceded diplomatically, then spoiled it by joking, ‘Van is a very quiet drunk.’

  ‘No sea-shanties? No brawling? No dancing on the tables?’ Benedict smiled engagingly and Richard’s good nature fell for it like a ton of bricks.

  ‘I should never have let her polish off most of that second bottle,’ he confided, with a grin of masculine fellowship. ‘But since I was driving she said it was her moral responsibility to make sure I didn’t stray over the alcohol limit. What could I say? Of course, that was before she began to see the funny side of things. I’m afraid I had to hustle her home early when the dreaded giggles struck.’