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‘When will she move her furniture out?’ asked Laura, as Mr Dale showed her the en suite bathroom leading out of the bedroom.
‘She’s taken what she wanted, all her personal things—letters, photographs, ornaments. But she didn’t want the furniture. I’m to sell it in auction, unless whoever buys the cottage wants it. I got the feeling she wanted to shut the door on it all, forget her years here.’
Suddenly Laura was moved, her green eyes filling with sympathy. ‘She may regret that later.’
‘She may, that’s what I told her,’ he said in his gruff voice, his weathered face blank. ‘But she didn’t change her mind.’
Laura looked around her, sighing. ‘Well, if I do eventually buy it, I’d like the furniture—and I’d always let her have it back if she did change her mind later. It seems terribly sad to turn her back on twenty years of her life!’
‘That’s very kind of you, miss. So, what do you think, then? Going to buy it?’
‘I like it, Mr Dale,’ Laura cautiously said, ‘but you’ll appreciate that my fiancé must see it before we make a decision. As soon as he is well enough we’ll come back to look at it again. I’ll ring you within the week, I expect.’
He nodded, not surprised. ‘Aye, well, remember I’ll be showing other clients around it in the meantime, and it is a bargain, especially fully furnished. Don’t wait too long, Miss Grainger.’
She nodded. ‘I’ll be in touch as soon as my fiancé is better.’ Then she had called the models, who had come trooping out from other rooms.
‘Back in the car, girls; we’ll have to hurry to get back to York in time for your second session!’
‘Bye bye, Mr Dale,’ the girls chirped, waving scarlet-tipped fingers at him, and he had grinned back at them appreciatively.
‘Nice to meet you, girls.’ Then he shook Laura’s hand in his bone-scrunching way, nodding at her. ‘I’ll hope to hear from you soon, then, Miss Grainger, and don’t you fret about Josh Kern. His bark is worse than his bite.’
She hoped so. His bark was quite bad enough. A thought occurred to her and she asked, ‘By the way, did he say he had offered to buy the cottage?’
‘No, he made an offer, and she refused it.’
‘Why? Was it too low?’
‘No, he offered a good enough price.’ Mr Dale paused, frowning. ‘I forgot to tell you, with all the harassment we got from Josh...there is a covenant on the cottage, to the effect that whoever buys it must not resell to Josh Kern while Mrs Forest is alive.’
Startled, Laura stared. ‘That can’t be legally binding, surely?’
‘If you don’t sign the covenant, she won’t sell, and if you do sign the covenant it’s legally binding,’ said Mr Dale with one of his shrewd grimaces.
Laura had forgotten to tell Patrick about that. She must remember to tell him tomorrow when she rang. It might make a difference to his decision; such a binding agreement might be a problem later if they wanted to sell and couldn’t find a buyer.
They might then wish they could sell to Josh Kern, although Laura was already feeling very sympathetic towards Mrs Forest’s desire to keep him out of the property. It would give her a lot of pleasure to do anything that annoyed Josh Kern.
She only hoped she wouldn’t see much of him, if she and Patrick did decide to buy Fern Cottage. She bit her lower lip. Why pretend she wasn’t sure? She wanted the place. She had loved it on sight, and when she’d seen the beautifully restored interior she had wanted it badly. If someone else bought it before Patrick could see it she was going to be very disappointed.
In fact, it was exactly a week before she and Patrick drove out along the Castle Howard road again, and Mr Dale had been too busy, he said, to come with them, so he had given them the key to the cottage and left them to view the place alone.
‘Lucky he was busy. I much prefer to view a house without having an agent hovering about trying to push us into a quick decision,’ Patrick said cheerfully as they turned on to the rough track which led to the cottage.
Laura was driving, but her concentration wasn’t quite as fixed as usual. She kept looking across the fields on either side, her body tense, half expecting Josh Kern to appear at any moment. She had a shrewd idea why Mr Dale had been too busy to come out here again. She felt the same: she would rather not face Josh Kern again, even with Patrick there. In fact, having Patrick there somehow made it more nerve-racking, because Josh Kern didn’t look as if he would use violence against a woman. His face had been contemptuous and hostile, but she hadn’t actually been afraid of him. But Patrick was a man, and she sensed that Josh Kern’s rules would be very different with another man.
He might well push Patrick into a fight, and, much as she loved him, Laura knew Patrick was no fighter and never had been; he wasn’t a coward, he just lacked aggression. He believed in negotiation, not confrontation, discussion, not argument. Patrick was a reconstructed man, wanting to live peacefully in the world, in harmony with his friends and his woman.
Laura’s mouth curled in a little smile as she looked sideways at him, and Patrick caught that glance and asked, ‘What? What are you smiling at? Tell me the joke.’
‘I was just thinking how much I love you,’ she said, leaning over to kiss him.
Just as their mouths touched, a horse leapt over a hedge right next to the car.
Laura gave a sharp cry, instinctively ducking her head. Patrick went white. Out of the corner of her eye, Laura saw the big black animal leap over the bonnet, tucking its hooves neatly under it as it sailed across in front of the windscreen. She had to admire the precision of the jump and the way the horse swung round on landing and galloped on down the lane before slowing, turning, and coming back towards the car at a slow trot.
‘Is that...?’ Patrick whispered in a dazed voice.
‘Yes,’ Laura grimly said. ‘That’s him. Josh Kern.’
‘He must be out of his mind!’ Patrick’s hands were not quite steady and he still looked pale.
‘Way out,’ she agreed, scrambling out of the car as the black horse came to a halt next to it. Laura stared angrily up at the rider, her green eyes glittering with the resentment of someone who had just had a physical shock.
‘You madman!’ she yelled at him. ‘What a crazy, dangerous thing to do!’
‘How was I to know your car was parked there?’ Josh Kern drawled, smiling with mockery in a way that told her he had known very well that their car was there before he jumped, and that, what was more, he’d recognised it from her last visit. ‘When I’m riding over my own land I don’t expect to find trespassers hiding behind every hedge,’ he added smoothly.
Very flushed, Laura snapped, ‘I’d have thought that, even if you didn’t care whether or not you killed us, you’d have minded killing your horse. Or don’t you think animals matter?’
His smile went. ‘If I’d thought for an instant that my horse might get hurt I wouldn’t have taken that jump!’ he bit out, and she believed him.
The black horse tossed its head as if in agreement with its master, shifting its feet, the hooves scraping on flint in the track, and Laura was glad there was a car between them. The horse, like the man, was a big brute.
Laura looked from the horse to its master, whose beige-jodhpur-clad thighs effortlessly controlled the animal without needing to use the reins which lay loosely in his tanned hands. Open-necked shirt, dark tweed hacking jacket, a black riding hat on his black hair, polished black leather boots knee-high, Josh Kern belonged against this background—the rolling fields, the stone walls, and elms just coming into leaf. Laura had a sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach, and couldn’t account for it. Or was it just that he looked so much at home here, and she and Patrick didn’t?
Aware of her scrutiny, Josh Kern’s sardonic grey eyes wandered over her coolly, from her blonde head to her small, delicately shod feet.
She and Patrick were going to a wedding after lunch, that afternoon, and Laura was elegantly dressed in a cream silk suit with gold buttons—an outfit from a young British designer, in classical style, the skirt straight-fitting, with a little pleat at the back, the jacket tight-waisted, with long sleeves. In honour of the occasion, she had tied her blonde hair on top of her head in a gold bow, letting it fall in a shower of ringlets around her face.
From Josh Kern’s expression he wasn’t impressed. No doubt he, too, was thinking that she was from the city, she didn’t belong around here. She saw his mouth twist, then he lifted his stare to meet her eyes.
‘You’re the model who came last week,’ he said, pretending surprise, although she was certain he had recognised her car and that was why he had jumped his black horse right over the bonnet.
‘I’m not a model! I don’t know where you got that idea,’ she told him sharply.
He shrugged. ‘Something Dale said, I think. Yes, he said you were all models.’
‘The girls with me were all models; I’m not one!’
‘No?’ His eyes went wandering again. ‘You look like a model to me.’
She knew it wasn’t intended as flattery. Josh Kern had made his views on models very plain when she was here before. All the same, under his assessment, a little flush crept up her face, especially when his gaze lingered on her long, slender legs.
‘Very chic,’ he drawled, and she felt Patrick stiffen next to her, resenting the personal nature of the remark.
Josh Kern hadn’t so much as acknowledged Patrick’s presence yet, even by looking in his direction. No doubt, Laura thought, he found her an easier target, an idea which made her bristle from head to foot like a cat that is having its fur stroked the wrong way.
‘So what do you do if you aren’t a model?’
‘I’m in public relations,’ she curtly told him, and he raised his brows in sardonic enquiry.
‘I’ve often wondered what that meant—are you some sort of journalist?’
‘No,’ she said coolly, aware that he was making fun of her, but taking his question totally seriously. ‘My firm is a buffer between a client company and the public, or the media. I deal with the Press, TV, radio, on behalf of the company, or arrange for publicity for them—when they’re launching a new product, for instance—smooth their way, make their lives easier, entertain overseas buyers for them.’
‘Ah, I see,’ he murmured, his mouth twisting cynically. ‘So that was why you had a carload of model girls with you? Were you all going off to “entertain” some overseas buyers the other day? I hope you gave them a good time.’
The insult made her flush hotly, and Patrick lost his temper. ‘Now look here, Mr Kern,’ he burst out, ‘that’s enough! You’re being damned rude...’
Josh Kern turned his dark head, and stared at him with icily arrogant indifference.
‘And who the hell are you?’ He took in Patrick’s appearance with a dismissive flick of the eyes, noting that he was dressed as formally and elegantly as Laura, in a smooth pale grey suit, expensively tailored, a crisp white shirt and a dove-grey silk tie, his black shoes shining like mirrors.
‘I’m Patrick Ogilvie, Laura’s fiancé! And I resent your tone, Mr Kern!’
Josh Kern flicked a look at Laura. ‘You’re going to marry him?’
‘Yes,’ she snapped, tense as she waited for what he might say next.
What he did was laugh. In a way that made her burn with rage. He looked Patrick up and down again, his black brows signalling contempt and amusement.
‘Now, he has got to be a model!’
Patrick went red.
‘I’m an artist, as it happens!’ If he had ever thought she was exaggerating her description of Josh Kern, Laura thought, he certainly wouldn’t after this! The man was living up to everything she had said about him.
‘An artist? Not a model?’ Those black brows shot up, signalling disbelief. ‘You amaze me. But I bet you work for glossy magazines, or do the artwork for an advertising firm.’
‘I’m freelance; I do whatever I’m commissioned to do, Mr Kern,’ Patrick said with dignity, refusing to apologise for his work or himself, and, proud of him, Laura moved to his side and slipped her hand through his arm, leaning on him. Patrick glanced down at her and then looked back at Josh Kern, his face smoothing out into courtesy again.
‘I’m sorry you dislike the idea of having us living in the cottage, Mr Kern. I realise the circumstances are difficult for you, but be fair—it’s hardly our fault that the owner doesn’t wish to sell it back to you.’
Josh Kern’s face tightened and darkened, but he didn’t say anything when Patrick paused to let him.
After a moment, Patrick went on quietly, ‘Somebody is going to buy the place, you know. Sooner or later. You might as well accept the idea.’
Josh Kern’s teeth parted and he bit out, ‘Like hell. I can’t stop you buying this place...’ His narrowed stare shot from Patrick to Laura, glittering and dangerous. ‘But, believe me, you aren’t going to enjoy living here!’
Laura’s head went back, her blonde curls blowing in the spring wind, her eyes defiant. ‘If you keep threatening us, you’ll find yourself in trouble with the police, Mr Kern!’
‘Threatening you? I wasn’t threatening you,’ he lied blandly. ‘I was warning you. About the inconvenience you’re going to suffer when I put my grids across the track.’
‘Grids?’ she repeated, thrown by that word. ‘What do you mean, grids?’
‘Cattle grids,’ he coolly said. ‘I have a very valuable herd of cows and I don’t want them straying off my land, so I’m having gates put up at the end of our private road and there will be a wide cattle grid in front. I should have done it before, but we’re so far off the beaten track that I hadn’t thought it was necessary, but now I think I will have to get it done without delay.’
‘That won’t inconvenience us,’ Laura told him. ‘I’ve often driven over cattle grids; my car can cope with them, and so can Patrick’s. As for the gates, you’ll still have to allow us free access. It will be very expensive for both sides if you make me prove my rights in court, but I will, believe me, if I have to!’
He didn’t argue with that, just murmured, ‘It will take weeks to do the work on the road, by the way. Sorry about that; there will be quite a mess.’
She laughed scornfully. ‘What? A set of gates and a cattle grid? I wouldn’t have thought so. Unless you deliberately drag it out, just to make life difficult!’
His hard mouth mocked her. ‘Well, you know country workmen—they never hurry themselves. Amazing how long they can take to do one simple little job. And the ground is pretty rocky there; they’ll probably have to use pneumatic drills, I expect, which will be noisy for you, especially as they start very early in the morning. Crack of dawn, probably.’
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