by Susan Napier
'True, but his offer would have to be acceptable to you,' Simpson pointed out.
'You mean I could ask some outrageous price that he couldn't afford?' said Fran thoughtfully. Actually, she doubted that there was much he could afford, if he wasn't working. But perhaps he was banking on the generosity of his family?
'If he could prove that you were demanding more than the market price simply as a device to deny him purchase he could take you to court.' Simpson didn't try to hide his disapproval.
Francesca sighed. 'So there's no way I can get him out?'
'Not until the lease expires.'
'And what about the claim of his that Grandfather left him the cabin?' Fran abandoned the hopeless for the merely hopeful. 'How much legal weight does that carry?'
'He does have a case, although as sole surviving blood relative you have a stronger one,' Simpson hastened to add as he saw the grey eyes simmer. 'However, there is the question of estrangement. It's fairly common knowledge locally that Tarrant and your grandfather were fairly good friends, whereas you and he...' He shifted uncomfortably in his swivel chair under her cool regard, as if the spare, roomy office was suddenly too small for him '... well, it had been some time since you saw each other. And, of course, Tarrant is the sitting tenant...'
'Possession being nine tenths of the law, I suppose,' Fran said, drily, conscious that she was sinking rapidly in the lawyer's estimation.
'It could be one of the considerations in this case. Your grandfather's intent could be implied by that lease agreement. Why don't you leave it with me, Miss Lewis? I'll register your claim against the estate and have the matter investigated for you.'
In other words, go home and let the professionals handle it. Fran's fingers tightened on the document in her hand. She had the sinking feeling that if she wasn't there to keep an eye on things, Ross would have everything his own way. In retrospect it had been foolish to resign before she had the money in hand, but for once in her life Fran had been guided by impulse, eager to get all the paperwork and planning out of the way by the time she was well enough to tackle the physical labour involved. She had come this far, she had no choice now but to fight for her rights, but she had better go back to taking things one step at a time. Up until now her whole life had been closely structured, from the rigidly old-fashioned discipline of her grandparents' home, through the narrowness of life in a Catholic girls' boarding school, to the methodical order of nursing. Now that she was breaking free of the mould she must be careful not to go overboard in her enthusiasm.
She sighed, and gave the startled lawyer one of her sudden, unexpectedly warm smiles. 'I'm sorry if I seem to be a bit like a bull at a gate, it's just that...well...I've been saving for years towards a dream of mine, and this puts it all within my grasp. I never expected... I mean, I never imagined Grandpa dying. I know he was old, but he's always been so enduring...' She gestured helplessly. It was still hard to believe that he was dead, so fixed was the image in her mind of him hovering: the gruff, critical arbiter of her childhood.
Arthur Simpson found himself smiling reassuringly back. He was changing his mind about his late client's granddaughter. She wasn't quite as tough and unfeeling as she tried to appear. And, as she talked about her future plans, animation chased the shadows from her eyes and the wan hollows from her cheeks. Why, she was rather pretty...very pretty, in fact, when she smiled like that, with a slightly shy diffidence that was surprising in a woman who had earlier projected such an aura of self-confidence.
'I'll do what I can to speed things along,' he promised as he ushered her out. A thoroughly nice young woman, was his final decision, if a little confused and guilty about the source of her current good fortune.
If he had known what the 'thoroughly nice woman' was thinking about on the drive back to the Bay he might have had third thoughts about his new client's character. She wasn't feeling 'nice' at all. She was brooding darkly on ways and means.
She could sink her pride and pour her heart out to Ross in the hope of gaining his understanding, or she could beat him at his own game. Fran knew which appealed more. Beating him, preferably senseless. It went against the grain to repeat an error of the past. Trust Ross Tarrant as a repository with her precious dreams? Look at what had happened last time! She frowned at the unwinding ribbon of road ahead as the years peeled inexorably back...
At fifteen she had been as innocent as a babe in arms, released by her grandparents' financial reverses from a decade at a convent boarding school to the unimagined freedoms of the local high school. Unfortunately the transition wasn't as simple as she had expected. Plump, aware of being achingly plain, Fran tried to hide her intense shyness behind a cool facade that rapidly acquired her the reputation of being 'stuck up'. The teasing and physical jostling between the sexes was also a shock. In time Fran made a few friends, but they weren't the kind she really wanted, the bright, fun kind, the kind who flocked around Ross Tarrant and his cronies. Like every other girl in school Fran had endless fantasies about Ross. At seventeen he was almost a full grown man, his reputation as the local 'golden boy' of sport allowing him to coast through his last year of school with little academic effort. His easy-going charm meant that he was forgiven his streak of wildness, and when people shook their heads over his latest escapade they did it with a smile on their lips.
Fran longed to catch his eye, but not as part of the giggling, blushing crowd of girls who hung around him. She wanted to be somebody special, to be singled out. She wanted the impossible, to shed her pudgy, spot-prone skin and tongue-tied shyness and be transformed into the kind of sleek, bubbling, pretty blonde that Ross seemed to favour.
The day that Ross Tarrant asked Francesca Lewis to the local Saturday night dance would live, reluctantly, in her memory for ever. She accepted his casual invitation with a dazed aplomb that masked her utter stupefaction. For the rest of that week she felt like a mini-celebrity, basking in the glow of acceptance generated by the knowledge that she was Ross Tarrant's chosen date. By Saturday evening she was almost mindless with agonised nervousness and bliss. She had never been to a dance before, or even on a date. Her grandparents had an unswervingly strict moral code that had further set her apart from her fellow pupils, most of whom had grown up together, but evidently even they weren't immune to the Tarrant charm. Of course, the Tarrants were regular church-goers, and the dance was being run by the church social committee and her grandfather was going to take her to the dance and pick her up afterwards, so Francesca knew that this wasn't exactly a gesture of unreserved trust, but it was a start! Her first step towards adulthood.
The dance was a revelation to a girl starved of frivolous gaiety. Ross was stunningly handsome in his blue open-necked shirt and dark trousers and, although Fran briefly mourned the fact that her dress was so much plainer than those of the other girls, she was soon enjoying herself too much to worry about it. Ross made mixing in easy, he was so relaxed and natural that Fran blossomed under his attention, surprising even herself by the way that she laughed and joked and joined in conversations with shy wit. There was no alcohol, of course, but Fran felt light-headed just drinking in the atmosphere and revelling in the feeling of belonging. Ross never once strayed from her side to dance with anyone else, and sent warning glances to any of his friends who showed signs of lingering around Fran. Only later did she realise why he hadn't wanted them around. At the time she thought he was kindly buffering her, had fantasised that perhaps he was jealous. What a gullible little idiot she had been!
In her ignorance she had been flushed and happy, letting her feelings show in the way that she danced, her silky hair flying out around her. For Ross she dropped the barriers and was delighted by the sparks of interest that she thought she saw in his eyes.
As her curfew time of ten o'clock neared she almost suffocated with joy when he leaned over his Coke and said in a deep voice, his eyes teasingly warm, 'How about we go out for a little walk? It's a really nice night out there...'
'Neville said we could sit in his car, if we liked. Do you want to?'
Fran would have jumped over the moon if he had asked her to. He unlocked the door and helped her into the back seat. She sat, tense with excitement, trying to think of something to say that would help spin out the moments before she bumped back down to reality. Ross had been so warm and protective all night, quite unlike the arrogant, brash boy he was at school. Perhaps he was showing her a side of himself that he reserved for special friends...
'You know, you're looking pretty tonight,' he told her, his voice soft in the darkness of the car.
'Thank you.' She blushed. She had dieted madly all week, to not much avail, but at least her skin had stayed miraculously free of spots and she knew she had a nice smile. People always looked a bit surprised when she smiled.
'You should always wear your hair down like that. It's the colour of milk chocolate.'
'Grannie says it's untidy and I guess it does rather get in the way. But I like long hair... that's one reason why I could never be a nun,' she said shyly.
'You were thinking about being a nun?'
She laughed at the horror in his voice. 'I wasn't. But I think the school wanted to steer me in that direction, and I think that Grannie feels there are only two worthwhile careers for a woman: nun or wife and mother.'
'Francesca------ ' His voice was slow and doubtful, and
ever after Fran wondered whether he had actually intended to kiss her or just wanted to talk some more. She liked to think, for the sake of her wounded spirit, that he was going to confess the truth and ask her forgiveness but that her eager response deflected him. He was at an age when his sexual urges were strong and easily aroused, and the chemistry between them took them both by surprise.
She turned towards him in the moonlit darkness and somehow their lips met. With her eyes wide Fran had her first taste of man, and liked it.
'Put your arms around me.' He muttered the soft order and Fran obediently complied. Her fingers felt his shifting muscles as he pushed her against the upright seat, his hands on her shoulders burning through the thin sleeves of her white dress. He lifted his mouth from hers and this time she saw impatience written on his darkened face and felt a flutter of desperation. He was annoyed by her ineptness...
'What's the matter? Don't you like to french kiss?' he asked huskily, and she stared at him in ignorant dismay.
She opened her mouth to ask what he meant and found out. She was stunned by the intimacy of it. He was putting his tongue into her mouth and moving it around, creating a moist friction which sent a hard jolt through her body.
Her hands clenched against his back as a strange, sweet ache began to seep into her muscles, investing them with a delicious, straining tightness. She pushed her tongue experimentally against his and felt a shocking delight as he abruptly withdrew, enticing her to follow into the spicy warmth of his open mouth. She did so, eagerly, trying to do to him what he had done to her. Was he feeling the way she was... all buttery and melting inside?
He broke the kiss and they stared into each other's eyes. There was a gleam of male recognition in his that stopped her breath. Then his hands were cupping her face and his mouth fastened over hers again, gentle, teasing, yet deep and satisfying too. When she trembled, his mouth tensed and hardened, gathering her in even further, stunning her with the tremors she felt in his own body, as if it was part of hers.
'You taste good, Frankie,' he murmured in thick amazement, his trembling fingers finding and stroking her breasts in a way that made her kiss him back with untutored enthusiasm. He groaned.
'Touch me, Frankie, the way I'm touching you.' He pulled her hand to his chest, thrusting it inside his shirt. Soon both hands were roving across his skin, admiring the compact strength so different from her softness, the hot silkiness that almost burnt her fingertips. The only sound in the car was their gasping breath and the soft murmurs and groans as Fran innocently poured more fuel on the fire. Her exploring hands moved down the flat stomach to where the waistband of his trousers formed a barrier, and he stiffened with a jerk that made her freeze, afraid she was hurting him in some way. His fingers were doing things to her taut young breasts that made her feel that she was going to explode. It was so
sweet, so good, that when she felt him unzip her dress and pull it off her shoulders she couldn't believe that what they were doing was wrong.
'I won't hurt you,' Ross said huskily as he sensed her momentary doubt. 'I promise... I just want to see you...'
'If...if I can look at you, too,' she whispered, half-frightened, half-excited by the shaking plea in his voice. She trembled on the verge of a new and terrible knowledge.
He tore off his shirt and she saw the moonlight ripple over bone and muscle, and caught her breath at his sheer male beauty.
'You're beautiful,' she said helplessly and he laughed uncertainly.
'You're not supposed to say that kind of thing to guys.'
'But you are.' She hardly noticed his hands returning to her bodice, easing it down further until he could reach around to the clasp of her demure cotton bra.
'Oh, no------- '
'Only to look, Frankie...' His mouth opened over hers and this time it had less gentleness and more passion. It was an adult kiss and it drew an adult response from her body. She felt her breasts tighten painfully against the crisp cotton, the straps bite into her soft flesh, and moaned.
'I'm not beautiful... I'm fat...' Afraid that he would agree.
'No, you're not...you're soft and curving, the way a girl should be...' He drew a sharp breath as he released her aching breasts into the cool night air and saw the tight, dark discs that crested the plump white roundness.
'I... don't think we should do this...' Fran quivered at his look, torn by the racking desire to push herself against him and the innate maidenly modesty that cried
at her to cover her nakedness. But this was Ross looking at her with such an expression of longing. Ross, whom she loved with every beat of her tender young heart...
'Oh, Frankie...' His eyes rose to her face and they were black and hot and sweet. 'Can I touch you?'
His asking made it all right. He wouldn't hurt her, not Ross. She felt the pound of his heart against the dampness of his chest and nodded dumbly.
His hands traced over her fullness very lightly, then cupped her, rounding her towards him. His palms shifted to support her, scraping across her rigid nipples, causing her to arch her spine involuntarily. Her eyes fluttered closed, her head sinking against the seat as he fondled her for long, agonising minutes. Francesca felt a wild and restless growth inside her that she didn't know how to satisfy. Her hands slipped on his slick skin and fell into his lap. He gave a loud groan that startled her into pushing against the rough cloth. He groaned again and fell across her, pushing her into a lying position. Suddenly his mouth had replaced his hands on her breasts, and he was kissing and licking at her with a roughness that set off nerve-blistering explosions throughout her body. Her hands were trapped beneath his writhing hips, pressing against a growing hardness that frightened her. His body jerking against her and his mouth tugging at her breasts made her feel sick and excited at the same time. She gave a choking gasp as she felt his hand on her thigh, under her crumpled dress. She clenched her thighs together and felt a surging heat there that built with each nip and suckle of his mouth. Then, shockingly, his hand was nestling at the apex of her thighs, touching her through the thin panties. Even she never touched herself there. The nun's dire warnings about the consequences of letting a boy take 'liberties' rose up to
terrify her even more, and yet she still felt the terrible thrill. She gave a ha
lf-sob of shame.
Looking back it was amazing that the young, sexual animal that Ross Tarrant had been had even heard that pitifully weak protest, let alone been able to control himself sufficiently to pull away, taking huge, deep, shuddering breaths as he rested his head against the cold glass of the side window. But he had, and when he had calmed down he had even helped her readjust her clothing and told her that it was all right, they hadn't done anything wrong, that they had stopped in time. Not wanting to reveal the profundity of her ignorance she had allowed the moment to pass, conscious of his strained expression and feeling somehow to blame for being so inexperienced. As they got out of the car and she saw the anger on his face she touched him tentatively.
'Ross?'
He pulled sharply away, then groaned at her expression of hurt. 'Hell, Frankie, I'm sorry...'
'I'm not.' She smiled a brave, if shaky, smile. In spite of her earlier fear it was true, but the soft glow in her eyes just seemed to make him feel worse.
'Then, damn it, you should be. Frankie, you're not even sixteen yet!' He shuddered, and suddenly fixed her with an earnest look. 'I'll tell you what, Frankie, let's forget about tonight, OK?'
'Forget?' Forget the best night of her life! How could he even ask?
'I mean, let's start all over again and take it slow. As friends.'
'Oh, yes!' She blossomed anew with a painful sweetness that made the young man fighting his own inner battle wince. Her heart was in her eyes and he felt like the lowest swine, but perhaps it wasn't too late to redeem himself.
'And look, don't tell anyone else about tonight...I... we need to talk first, OK?' He took her hand and squeezed it, and thus it was they walked out of the darkness straight into her grandfather, waiting at the door of the dance-hall with a thunderous expression on his deeply seamed face. Fran was hauled off home in disgrace and delivered of a searing condemnation of her wicked, ungrateful behaviour. She had listened to the stern lecture with eyes downcast to hide her rebellious indifference. She didn't care if she was grounded for ever! She would still see Ross at school and they were going to be friends. Friendship with Ross was worth suffering chilly disapproval at home...she would be a martyr to love!
