Woman at Willagong Creek

by Hart, Jessica

  ‘Oh? I was under the distinct impression that you didn’t even notice I was there today, despite the fact that we were getting married! You made no effort to be pleasant, and you’ve ignored me ever since we got back!’

  ‘You’re not the kind of girl that doesn’t get noticed, Olivia, and you know it.’ Guy’s voice was deep and slow, and suddenly he was standing very close. She had her back to the veranda rail, dimly aware of the wood pressing into her as she watched, half mesmerised, his hand reach out and push her hair gently away from her face. ‘I’m not ignoring you now,’ he said.

  His fingers were strong against the softness of her cheek. A thrill of awareness shivered through her, as if every fibre of her was responding to his touch. Her mind told her to tear her eyes away from his face, move away from the disturbing excitement of his nearness, but her body refused to move, and then the opportunity was gone as he cupped her face in both hands and bent his head to kiss her.

  At the first touch of his lips, Olivia’s mental resistance shattered in an explosion of giddy delight. It was as if she had always known it would be like this, as if every second since he had turned and walked towards her in that Townsville hotel had arrowed into this moment when all that mattered was his cool, firm mouth and the dizzying rush of sensation through her veins.

  Instinctively, she leant into him, her lips warm and inviting beneath his, her hands lifting of their own accord to his chest. Guy’s fingers tightened against her face, then relaxed to slide down through her silky hair to her throat. His thumbs were hard and calloused, just as she’d imagined, as he ran them caressingly along the pure line of her jaw, and she quivered with exquisite awareness, felt herself melting in a flame of passion which ran between them, burning higher and higher until it was out of their control.

  Guy’s hands were hard, almost rough, against the soft material of her dress as he pulled her closer, and she clutched at him, aware only of a need to feel him closer still -

  ‘Yuk! Kissing!’ David’s disgusted voice jerked them apart like a douse of cold water. He was watching them from the steps, with a small boy’s scorn for a pointless pastime.

  Olivia fell back against the veranda rail as Guy released her, her eyes dark blue with arousal, and wide with the shock of the sickeningly abrupt return to reality.

  ‘What were you doing that for?’ David went on accusingly to Guy, who appeared to have himself under much better control.

  He didn’t even look at Olivia as he moved away. ‘We’re married,’ he said to David. ‘Kissing’s the reason people get married, isn’t it, Olivia?’

  Olivia swallowed, so horrified at her response to Guy’s kiss that she could hardly speak. ‘One of the reasons,’ she managed, in a thin, high voice.

  David was unconvinced, and clearly disappointed in Guy’s betrayal of manliness. ‘I came to tell you supper was ready,’ he said.

  Olivia’s knees were so weak that she wondered how she would ever be able to walk over to the cookhouse, but somehow she managed it, and sat in a daze while Guy talked to the ringers as if nothing had happened.

  How could he behave so normally? she thought furiously. His heart obviously wasn’t pounding, his mind wasn’t in a whirl of confused emotions, as hers was, where exhilaration fought with dismay at her own reaction, bitter disappointment with relief at David’s interruption.

  She stared down at her plate. She’d been kissed before, had enjoyed being kissed, but no man had ever kissed her with such devastating effect. She had always been in control before, and it was humiliating to realise how utterly she had abandoned herself - and to Guy Richardson, of all people! A man who hardly noticed her, a man who didn’t even like her, a man who could calmly sit there discussing cows while she was still aflame with his touch.

  ‘Olivia?’

  Olivia started at the sound of her own name. ‘Sorry?’ David was looking at her enquiringly.

  ‘Her mind’s on other things,’ Ben teased, with a knowing wink at Darren. ‘Being her wedding night …’

  ‘What difference does that make?’ David asked, mystified by the wink and the fiery blush that had spread over Olivia’s face.

  ‘David wanted to know if you were going to learn how to ride now that you’re staying,’ Guy interrupted easily.

  Furious with herself for her girlish blush, and with Ben for guessing so unerringly, and so tactlessly, what was on her mind, Olivia pulled herself together. ‘I don’t think so,’ she said in what she hoped was a cool way.

  ‘You ought to ride.’ Corky made a surprising entry into the conversation. ‘All the Willagong women have been able to ride.’

  ‘Not this Willagong woman,’ Olivia said firmly. ‘I’ll drive.’

  ‘You won’t get very far in a vehicle round here,’ said Guy. ‘Corky’s right; the women here have all ridden, because they needed to ride.’

  ‘I won’t need a horse to do the cooking or the cleaning,’ she snapped. ‘And judging by the state of things round here, I won’t have time to do anything else!’

  ‘You could come with me and Guy when we go riding in the evenings,’ David offered. ‘Couldn’t she, Guy?’

  ‘If she wanted to.’ Guy’s eyes held that familiar, lurking gleam of amusement. ‘You’re not frightened of horses as well as spiders, are you, Olivia?’

  Terrified would be closer to the mark. ‘No,’ said Olivia haughtily. Her pride had taken enough of a battering this evening, without admitting that too, and she was relieved when the discussion turned to horses and which would be the gentlest for her to start on. They only ever seemed to become animated when they were talking about horses or cattle. Olivia had no intention of riding. She would find a better excuse when the time came; for now it would take all her concentration not to think about later, when she would have to get into bed next to Guy.

  If only he hadn’t kissed her. If only she didn’t have to lie next to him and remember the feel of his lips and the taut strength of his body against hers. If only she had never asked him to marry her. She ploughed through the meal without tasting any of it. After her embarrassingly eager response to his kiss, Guy would think she was some kind of sex-starved nymphomaniac. She would have to make it very clear to him that it had been no more than an aberration, or he would think that every time she moved in bed she was about to throw herself at him. Olivia’s pride balked at the thought. He had taken her unawares, but it wouldn’t happen again.

  It seemed that the meal would never end, but at last she used David as an excuse to slip away, and leave Guy and the men still talking about horses. He probably didn’t even notice she’d gone, she thought bitterly, undressing with jerkily nervous gestures. She was of a lot less interest than an animal as far as Guy Richardson was concerned!

  ‘Good!’ she said out loud as if to convince herself.

  In the daylight it had been an enormous bed, but now it seemed to have shrunk alarmingly. They would never be able to avoid touching each other. Olivia walked fretfully around the room, trying to persuade herself that it was no big deal.

  ‘So what if you do brush against him?’ she asked her reflection. ‘He’s not interested in you. You’re not interested in him. Just move away and go back to sleep. No problem.’ Her reflection looked a little more confident. No problem.

  If she had known that she was going to end up sharing a bed with Guy Richardson, she would have bought herself a nightdress before she came out, she reflected. She hadn’t worn one for years, but there was no way she was going to lie next to Guy with no clothes on! In the end she had found a baggy T-shirt to wear, but it felt hot and constricting as she threw back the blanket and slipped gingerly between the sheets.

  She lay rigid, willing herself to be asleep before Guy came in. The moonlight was bright in the room, but it was a hot night and to close the shutters would certainly be too stuffy. She wriggled in her T-shirt and punched her pillow into a more comfortable shape. She would never be able to sleep.

  Her stomach was knotted with apprehensio
n, her mouth dry. She longed more than anything else for this night to be over. Think about David, she told herself sternly. Think about Diane. Think about anything except Guy’s hands against your skin.

  When the door opened softly, the breath seemed to freeze in her lungs. Squeezing her eyes tight, she lay still and pretended to be asleep, acutely aware of the sounds of Guy moving around the room. She could hear the quiet thud of his boots hitting the floor, the clunk as the metal on his belt knocked against the wooden chair. Then there was the unmistakable sound of unzipping jeans, and a subdued rustle as he removed the rest of his clothes.

  Olivia, her eyes screwed shut, could visualise it all as clearly as if he had stripped in broad daylight, and her pulse began to thud so loudly that she was sure Guy must be able to hear it too.

  The bed creaked and sagged. She held her breath.

  ‘There’s no need to panic,’ Guy said into the darkness.

  She said nothing, hoping he would think that she was really asleep. She tried to breathe deeply and evenly, but it was hard when every sense was screaming awareness of the body lying so close beside her.

  ‘I know you’re not asleep,’ he said conversationally, and then, when she still didn’t reply, reached out to run a finger down her spine. Olivia flinched, unable to prevent a gasp of reaction. ‘I didn’t think you were asleep,’ he said, a dry edge to his voice.

  ‘I’m trying to sleep,’ she muttered into her pillow. ‘I’m very tired.’

  The next moment she found herself pulled roughly over on to her back to lie staring wide-eyed with shock up at Guy looming above her. ‘I’m tired too,’ he said. ‘Too tired to play games. I’m not going to sleep every night with you quaking on the other side of the bed, so I think we should get this straight now. If you think I’m overcome with desire at the thought of going to bed with you, you can think again, Olivia. I’m not interested in a woman who wishes she was in bed with another man. Don’t bother to deny it,’ he added, as she opened her mouth to protest. ‘I can tell that you’re still in love with this Tim bloke, and you can keep yourself warm with dreams of him as far as I’m concerned. I’ve already told you I won’t touch you unless you ask.’

  ‘I didn’t ask on the veranda!’ Olivia’s eyes gleamed defiantly up at his in the moonlight.

  ‘Didn’t you? Seemed to me those eyes of yours were asking me pretty clearly, and I didn’t notice you pushing me away. Quite the opposite, in fact.’

  ‘You took me by surprise,’ she said furiously, lashing out in anger and wounded pride. ‘And if you think I enjoyed being kissed like that, you can think again! Your cowboy technique might go down very well with the girls out here, but I’m used to a rather more sophisticated approach!’

  Guy’s eyes narrowed. ‘Oh, so Tim’s sophisticated, is he, as well as being sociable and successful and such fun?’

  ‘Yes, he is!’ Olivia was too angry to put him right about her feelings for Tim. She had been fond of him, and was hurt when he left her, but she had put him firmly behind her when she came out to Australia.

  ‘Well, I may not be as sophisticated as Tim, but even I can tell when a woman is enjoying being kissed or not! You just didn’t like the fact that you enjoyed the … what was it you called it? … the cowboy technique.’ Shifting abruptly to pin her beneath him, he held her wrists in a hard grip away from her body. ‘Too unsophisticated for you, was it, Olivia?’

  Olivia was trembling with a mixture of anger, panic and treacherous arousal. ‘Yes!’ she said bravely, knowing even as he lowered his head that it was too late.

  His mouth was warmer, more persuasive than before. His hands held her arms still, and there was only the heat of their bodies and the touch of their lips. Expecting him to be rough and angry, Olivia was unprepared for the gentleness which crept insidiously beneath her defences, leaving her open and vulnerable to the glow of excitement that began to flicker and then flame.

  She hardly noticed when he released her wrists, and ran his hands over the slender lines of her body, slipping beneath the T-shirt to burn against her skin. His lips explored the sensitive hollow below her ear, whispered down her throat, and she murmured low with indistinct pleasure, arching her body instinctively to his touch, arms sliding of their own volition about his neck.

  Guy was drawing away. Olivia lifted languid eyelids to encounter a blaze of expression in his eyes, but, before she had time to decipher it, they shuttered and she was left staring into opaque depths.

  ‘You might get used to the cowboy technique, Olivia,’ he said, the coolness of his voice as shocking as a slap in the face. ‘You might even find you get to like it.’

  ‘That wasn’t fair,’ she whispered.

  ‘It wasn’t gentlemanly, was it? But then I’m a cowboy, not a gentleman, and I don’t think you’re quite such a lady as you like to think. Comfort yourself with the memory of your precious Tim if that’s what you want, Olivia, but if you need … what shall I say to avoid hurting those sophisticated feelings of yours? … a physical relationship, then you only have to ask.’

  She was shaking, glad of the rush of fury that surged through her at his callous words. She knew she had provoked him with her comment about cowboys, and if she hadn’t known better she might have suspected jealousy, but her pride was badly dented by the way he seemed so unmoved by her, and, instead of talking sensibly like the cool, well-balanced adult she was supposed to be, she moved ostentatiously back to the very edge of the bed. ‘Don’t hold your breath!’ she said bitterly. Her only - faint - hope was to try and appear as unaffected as he was by those giddy moments of pleasure.

  ‘I won’t,’ he said. ‘As long as you stop lying there as if you’re about to be offered up for sacrifice.’ He turned his back on her, and settled for sleep. ‘Breakfast is at six. You’ll need to be up at five-thirty.’

  Chapter Five

  Olivia sat at the scrubbed table, cradling a mug of coffee, and contemplated making a cake without enthusiasm. She had never enjoyed baking - airy soufflés and subtle sauces were more her style - and the sun streaming in through the cookhouse windows only served to emphasise the grimy kitchen. She would have to clean everything before she could even start.

  It was only eight o’clock and she felt as if she had been up for hours. Guy and the ringers had eaten their steaks in taciturn silence and disappeared before seven. ‘Make the boys something for smoko, will you?’ Guy had said, settling his hat on his head.

  ‘Smoko?’ she queried blankly.

  ‘Mid-morning tea and something solid to eat,’ he explained briefly. ‘We’ll be back at ten.’

  She had nodded, still unable to look at him directly this morning. Last night’s kiss, the seeping excitement and bitter anger, had settled into embarrassment and determination never to provoke such a scene again. This morning she had wanted to run straight back to London and never have to face Guy again, but of course she couldn’t. There was David to think of. She had been ridiculously nervous yesterday and her behaviour had been out of character: from now on she would be cool and businesslike, and keep her part of the deal with Guy - for David’s sake, if not for her own peace of mind.

  In the meantime, she had better just get on with it. Olivia got to her feet and looked around the kitchen rather doubtfully. If only there was a radio, some music, any kind of noise to cut through the silence! Her whole life in London had revolved around music. She had spent her days discussing programmes, and the evenings, when Guy imagined her dancing away in some steamy nightclub, had more often than not been spent at classical concerts, or with musician friends who would end up talking, playing or improvising music into the early hours of the morning.

  Looking back, her days and nights had been played to a continuous soundtrack of music. She liked pop music as well, and would listen to the radio while she drank her morning coffee. There would be a cassette in the car on the way to the office, music in the shops, music in the restaurants. After Tim had announced his engagement to Linda, after Diane had died, O
livia had spent long evenings lying on the sofa and letting the pure notes of Mozart or Dvorak wash over her in soothing comfort.

  Never before had she wished so much that she could play an instrument herself. Then at least she would have been able to make her own music, but she had long ago had to accept that she had no talent for it, and that the closest she could get to the music world was as an administrator. At Willagong Creek she wouldn’t even be able to talk about music, and the only music she would have to work by would be her own tuneless humming.

  By ten o’clock she was hot, sticky and covered in dirt and grime from cleaning the cupboards. It was easier to clean than to think about Guy, and she had scrubbed furiously, as if she could as easily scrub away the memory of his kiss and her own humiliating response.

  She rose stiffly to her feet as the ringers came in, taking off their hats and stamping the worst of the dust off their boots.

  Wiping the sweat off her upper lip with her arm, she said, ‘I’ll put the kettle on.’ Why were they all looking so surprised? she wondered crossly, unaware of the drastic change in her appearance. At breakfast she had been coolly elegant; now she was hot and bothered, the shining hair clinging to her neck and forehead, the pale, expensive shirt stained and grubby, the trousers damp and crumpled.

  ‘I’ll do it, Mrs R,’ Joe said.

  Mrs R? Olivia looked blank, then realised that he was addressing her. ‘Oh, thank you, J -’ She stopped as Guy came in, letting the screen door bang behind him. It was odd the way he seemed to dominate the room. Joe was taller, Ben was better-looking, but only Guy could stop the breath in her throat just by standing there. The sleeves of his blue work shirt were rolled up and she could see a light film of dust on the dark hairs of his forearms. He took off his hat and rubbed a hand over his jaw as if to wipe off the worst of the dust there.

  Only now did Olivia realise what a sight she must look, and she began to brush ineffectually at the grime on her arms. ‘I was just doing some cleaning,’ she said.