The Heat of the Moment

by Margaret Carr

  THE HEAT OF THE MOMENT

  THE HEAT OF THE MOMENT

  Margaret Carr

  British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data available

  This eBook published by AudioGO Ltd, Bath, 2012

  Published by arrangement with the Author

  Epub ISBN 9781445829555

  U.K. Hardcover ISBN 978 1 405 64066 4

  U.K. Softcover ISBN 978 1 405 64067 1

  Copyright © Margaret Carr, 2005

  All rights reserved.

  Cover illustration © iStockphoto.com

  CHAPTER ONE

  Frances gardiner had only applied for the job of secretary to the internationally-famous three-day event rider, Kane Harding, because Martin Truscott, her employer and friend, had pointed out the advertisement in a popular riding magazine.

  ‘It would be just the thing, Fran,’ Martin had encouraged. ‘A change of scene to get you out of racing for a time.’

  Now, three weeks later, Frances allowed the letter of acceptance to flutter to the desk top. She rubbed a weary hand across her eyes, not quite believing what she had read. Through the window in front of her she could see down the yard and the horses, heads bobbing and weaving above their stable doors in anticipation of the midday feed.

  The letter offered her a good wage and accommodation in return for long hours and a time schedule frequently overlapping at the Harding Ranch in Tenerife.

  Frances chewed at her lips. She hadn’t really expected a reply, let alone an outright offer. Unconsciously, she rubbed both arms where they had been broken sixteen months before in a riding accident. The accident had put an end to her racing career for the time being.

  The specialist had advised a change and this job in Tenerife would certainly be that. Martin had been very kind finding another place for her here at the stables but she knew she wasn’t pulling her weight and racing establishments, especially one that had only been going a short number of years, could not afford to carry dead wood.

  Martin popped his head around the door of the tack room.

  ‘Are you planning to eat with us today?’ he asked brightly.

  ‘Coming.’

  Frances retrieved the letter and stuffed it into a pocket.

  There were four lads living in the farmhouse and another four in the bothy at the entrance to the yard. All ate their midday meal in the farmhouse kitchen, but it was still empty when Martin and Frances entered.

  Martin moved around the kitchen, taking off the slightly-damp tweed jacket that smelled of moorland and horses. He was a short man, of stocky build and in his late thirties. He and his wife, Tessa, were more of a family to her than any blood relative she had ever had. Tessa was heavily pregnant with their first child and it struck Frances that if she took this job she would miss the baby’s arrival.

  Before she could change her mind she whipped out the letter.

  ‘There’s something I want you to see,’ she said, holding the letter out towards Martin.

  He left what he was doing and came across to the table.

  ‘Good heavens,’ he said after he had read it. ‘What did you put in that application? You certainly impressed him. Never even took me up on a reference. Pity that, I had one all ready.’ He grinned at her. ‘Clever you.’

  ‘You think I should go then?’

  ‘Don’t you? I mean, aren’t you happy about it?’

  The smile vanished to be replaced by a frown.

  ‘Not many people can walk into a good job like that so easily.’

  ‘I know, and that’s what’s bothering me. Don’t you see? He didn’t take up any references or arrange an interview or anything. Why?’

  ‘Well, he does live in Tenerife when all is said and done, though with all this technology around I must say I am a bit surprised he couldn’t find a better way to contact you. You did use the headed paper with fax and e-mail information, didn’t you?’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘Perhaps he’s a devil to work for and you were his only applicant.’ Frances raised her eyebrows in disbelief.

  ‘Look, does it matter why he chose you? The letter is signed and dated. It even gives you the name of a bank to draw your air fare from.’

  ‘So you don’t think there is anything odd about it?’

  ‘No, I don’t think so.’

  ‘Right then, l”II go.’

  ‘If you think there might be something fishy,’ Martin added thoughtfully as he picked up the teapot, ‘then buy yourself a return ticket.’

  Frances gave him a beautiful smile, lighting up her pale face with its deeply shadowed dark blue eyes. In height, she was not far short of Martin, yet her bones had no more weight than a bird’s and no matter how much she ate, she always stayed the same.

  Her dark hair was tied up in a ponytail and swung in a fat ringlet as she walked. She had taken much teasing from the lads when she first started, but in time she had won their respect and affection and she would miss them.

  Tessa walked into the kitchen carrying a heavy box of books. The kettle crashed on to the stove and Martin shot across the room to prise the box from his wife’s arms.

  ‘What have I told you!’ he scolded.

  Tessa sat down on a chair by the table and winked at Frances.

  ‘Have you two been planning behind my back?’ she asked, her head perched on one side like an inquisitive bird.

  ‘Yes, we have,’ Martin replied. ‘Fran has been offered the Harding job.’

  ‘You haven’t. Oh, Fran, that’s super, and such a gorgeous man, too.’

  ‘How do you know he’s gorgeous?’ Martin asked, dipping over the back of the chair to plant a firm kiss on his wife’s cheek.

  ‘Because, oh, worldly wise, he came to stay at the Running Fox in the village many moons ago when I was a receptionist there.’

  ‘What was he like, Tessa?’ Frances asked.

  ‘Tall, dark, long, straight hair that fell on to his collar. Latin-ish really except for those eyes. They were the kind of eyes you never forget, know what I mean—so bright they look unreal.’

  ‘Like Paul Newman, you mean.’

  ‘Not the same colour,’ Tessa said with a shake of her head. ‘Green, a beautiful bright green. He was very polite as I remember and gave me a large tip when he left.’

  ‘Ah, well, that says it all, of course, if he gave you a large tip.’ Tessa swiped over her shoulder at her husband.

  ‘Be quiet, you.’

  ‘Is that enough to tickle your interest, Fran?’ Martin chuckled.

  The lads were coming in now and Frances moved off silently to help serve the dinners.

  In her room later that night, Frances pulled an old-fashioned trunk out from beneath the washstand. It hadn’t been opened in the six years she had been here and was covered in dust. Grabbing an old cardigan, she wiped the top then opened the lid. This was all that was left of her past—a photograph of her parents before their divorce when she was seven; her grandmother’s china tea service wrapped in tissue paper and packed in a cardboard box; a couple of empty silver photo frames; a pair of china parrots; an autograph book from schooldays and a plastic bag full of plaits of horse hair from all the horses she had ever looked after.

  She sat back on her heels and thought about the strict disciplinarian who had been her grandmother, overruling every wish of Frances in the name of doing right by her. To this end she had been educated to a fitting standard and fitted for a suitable position in life.

  The training had been a secretarial one and the position in a stuffy country solicitor’s office, a job she had hated. Within a week of her grandmother’s funeral, Frances had thrown caution to the winds and sold their home and resigned from her job.

  She smiled to hers
elf as she remembered the exhilaration of those first heady days of freedom. After many months of rejections from trainers who told her she was too inexperienced to be a jockey or who were brazenly sexist in their rejection, when her savings were sinking fast and she feared defeat, Martin Truscott had opened the door for her.

  The rest was a real success story and she had repaid Martin’s faith in her one hundred fold until a day at Lingfield sixteen months ago. They had been bunched up tight on the rails before the home straight when a drunken man made a dash across the course for a bet. The first Frances knew of fear was when the horse and jockey immediately in front of her disappeared. She threw her weight back in the saddle as the cry of the jockey behind her rang in her ears.

  Her mount’s hindquarters were bunched to jump but his front feet were knocked from under him by the bulk of the fallen horse. The voice through the Tannoy remained with her, though everything else collapsed around her. It was four pain-filled weeks before she knew exactly what had happened.

  * * *

  The following Saturday, Frances stood beside Tessa in Manchester Airport. Martin joined them and pushed some magazines into her hand luggage.

  ‘I feel such a fool.’ Frances turned to Tessa. ‘Here I am, twenty-five years old, and a bag of nerves because I’ve never flown before.’

  ‘Once you’re in the departure lounge it’s just a matter of following the herd,’ Martin said with the confidence of one who had flown all over the world. ‘Watch for your gate number on the monitor and you’ll be fine.’

  ‘You’ll be met?’ Tessa checked anxiously.

  ‘Yes. The man at the bank asked for my arrival time and said he would fax it out to Mr Harding.’

  ‘Good. Well, let’s hear from you as soon as you get settled.’

  There were tears in her eyes and Frances leaned forward to hug her.

  ‘I will, and look after yourself,’ she called as Martin chiwied her towards the departure lounge.

  One last hug and an assurance that there was always a place for her with them should she need it, and then there was no turning back.

  CHAPTER TWO

  Five hours later, Frances was beginning to wonder if she and Kane Harding were destined never to meet. Most of her fellow travellers had already left the building and the Tannoy was announcing in Spanish the arrival of the next flight. Once more she allowed her eyes to wander over every person in sight.

  No-one seemed the least bit interested in her. The loudspeaker fell silent and Frances chewed at her lip as the first feelings of panic gurgled in her stomach. She considered whether or not to take a taxi as, after all, she did have the address of her destination.

  The Tannoy rasped, then came to life again, this time with an English voice, asking for a Mr Francis Gardiner to go to the information desk, please. Frances was horrified. Did this mean her new employer was expecting a man or had they just mixed their facts at the desk? With her heart in her mouth, she pushed her luggage trolley in the direction of the information desk.

  There was a uniformed person talking to the girl behind the desk. At the end of the counter was a group of three men. The short, fat one was gesticulating wildly with both hands, while the taller of the group appeared to be in an extremely bad temper about something.

  Frances waited patiently by the desk until the girl detached herself from the official who then turned to the couple behind him. The girl frowned when Frances told her who she was and asked to see her passport. After studying it carefully, she waved it in the direction of the group standing at the far end of the counter and called to them in Spanish.

  The tall, angry one questioned the girl in her own language then turned to Frances.

  ‘You say you are Frances Gardiner?’

  Frances struggled to reply for there was no doubting who this man was for the green eyes blazing down into her own could only be those of Kane Harding. Battling for the control of her emotions and on the point of hysteria, Frances managed a cool, ‘I am.’

  ‘Then I’m afraid there has been a mistake and you will have to catch the next flight back.’

  Frances gasped.

  ‘I b-beg your pardon?’

  ‘I think you heard me.’

  ‘I did, but I find it hard to believe I heard right.’

  ‘Then I suggest, Ms Gardiner, you try a little harder,’ he snapped and made to walk away.

  ‘You didn’t stipulate the gender of the secretary in your advert,’ she called after him.

  Swinging round to face her he said, ‘You can’t do that these days, didn’t you know? It’s called sexual discrimination.’

  ‘That’s exactly what this is. I can do this job as well as any man, probably better, and the only reason you have for not giving me a chance is because I’m a woman. If that is not discrimination I don’t know what is and I’ll shout it to every riding magazine that will listen.’

  ‘Why, you . . .’

  Frances thought she was about to be attacked there and then in the airport terminal. She ducked instinctively then felt a large hand grab the shoulder of her jacket. Sweeping her off her feet like a wayward child, she was hustled outside.

  Concentrating all her efforts on trying to release herself from the undignified position she was in she failed to notice that another plane load of passengers was disembarking.

  ‘Unless you want to make a scene in front of all these people,’ he said, drawing her attention to the swelling crowd behind them, ‘I suggest we hold this conversation somewhere more fitting.’

  A white four-wheel-drive vehicle stood in the carpark, with Harding Ranch emblazoned in brown scroll across its door panels. He opened the passenger door for her and threw her case into the back before climbing in and starting the engine.

  ‘Where are we going?’

  She was anxious not to get stranded somewhere where it might be difficult for her to find her own way back to the airport.

  ‘To the ranch, where else,’ he snapped. ‘In case you hadn’t noticed, it’s getting quite late, thanks to your fooling around back there. And while I am sure a night in the airport wouldn’t do you any harm, you can stay at the ranch instead and we can carry on our discussion in comfort.’

  Frances tried to ignore him. At least she was to have a bed for the night. The dark had swept down unnoticed, Frances realised, as she tried to see something of the countryside they were passing through. They were on a wide, well-made road that was carrying them north through chains of hills. Now and again they would pass through small villages of flat-roofed, shuttered houses clustered by the roadside.

  It was over an hour since she’d landed, and Frances’s stomach was rumbling with hunger as he spoke again.

  ‘It won’t be long now. We are climbing into the hills and the ranch lies in a valley on the other side, just north of La Laguna.’

  Tall trees closed around them, darkening the interior of the car. The road began to wind and the sound of the car’s engine changed as it pulled up a hill.

  ‘Do you have family at the ranch?’

  She sneaked a glance at the dark profile of his head barely discernible in the light of the dashboard.

  ‘No, I live alone.’

  ‘Are there any other women at the ranch?’

  Frances tried to sound nonchalant, failed and swallowed hard.

  Turning his head momentarily, the green eyes flashed out through the darkness.

  ‘Are you afraid I may seduce you before I set you free, Ms Gardiner?’ Frances felt ridiculous.

  ‘No, of course not. I was just curious about the place, that’s all. I have never been abroad before. I was looking forward to this job very much.’

  Liar, she accused herself, you’d much rather be back at Martin’s and Tessa’s settling the horses for the night.

  ‘Well, that’s a pity because it is essential I have a man for the job.’

  ‘Why?’

  His voice was hard when he spoke.

  ‘Because men can separate business from plea
sure. Women seem unable to grasp even the rudiments of this separation. I refuse to have my working life interrupted and messed about by silly females who dress up and prance around believing you should take notice of them and go into sulks when you don’t. When they consider a cup of coffee more important than a telephone message, then they are no use to me.’

  Frances gazed back at her reflection in the darkened window, embarrassed by the vehemence in his statement.

  The road dipped down now and across the darkness lights were winking in the valley below them. She was dying to ask more questions about the place but wisely decided to hold her peace. In silence they approached the ranch. Lights flooded from the front door at the sound of their vehicle. It was too dark to see much but Frances got the impression of a long, low building with a verandah running the entire length. The heavily-carved door was flung back and a small bird-like figure all in black called out in Spanish to Kane.

  He answered her in the same language as he swung Frances’s case from the vehicle. There came an explosion of laughter from the tiny woman on the steps as she flung her hands up to her face then clasped them tightly in front of her flat chest.

  ‘Connie will show you to your room,’ he snapped to Frances, a deep scowl between his brows. ‘I will see you in my office after dinner.’

  Barely giving her time to ease the stiffness from her limbs, he climbed back into the Jeep, revved the engine and was away before she could ask where his office was.

  ‘Please, senorita, to come.’

  The small woman was beckoning her to enter the house, so she picked up her case and, mounting the two steps, crossed the verandah to the front door.

  ‘Connie,’ she asked hesitantly.

  ‘Si, Coney.’

  Frances smiled at the pronunciation wondering who on earth had first called her by that name for it obviously wasn’t her real name.

  The hall was beautiful with its polished wood floor and curving staircase. Roughcast white walls were hung on two sides with full-length tapestries whose aged colours still drew the eye to their unfolding stories. Wall lights in wrought-iron brackets stood out against smutty shadows and in the large hall itself there were only three pieces of furniture, two heavy, ornately-carved, tall-backed chairs and a massive box, much scored, with metal handles on each end.