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‘Keeping up the grounds?’ exploded Ginny as she lost the battle with herself. ‘Either your memory doesn’t serve you in the least well, Mr Grant, or you know nothing about gardens. This place was a wilderness when I took it on! Nobody had touched the place since your last gardener retired.’
‘He’d only been gone a couple of months when you started,’ he retorted. ‘Hardly enough time for the place to deteriorate into the wilderness you’re claiming it was.’
Ginny took a gulp of her drink, simply to prevent herself retaliating. If what he said was true, the garden had been neglected for several months before her predecessor had retired, not that she saw anything to be gained by pointing that out to him.
‘And, even though I am technically your employer, you don’t have to call me Mr Grant—Michael will do.’
‘And you may call me Ginny,’ she retorted, incensed by his patronising tone.
‘I hadn’t intended calling you anything else,’ he informed her with a hint of a chuckle. ‘Tell me, Ginny, what brought you to France?’
‘Several things, really,’ she parried, unsettled by the sheer unexpectedness of the question and the mishmash of unpleasant memories it evoked. ‘I felt like a change of scenery.’ And that, she supposed grimly, was one way of putting it; except that with a married boss who couldn’t keep his hands to himself and an aunt who had literally shown her the door once her problems at work had become the subject of speculative gossip, a change of scenery had become a vital necessity. Libby’s coinciding cry for help had been one she had responded to by cashing in her savings and taking off for France without a moment’s hesitation.
‘What—you decided you’d like to try gardening here instead of back home in England?’
‘No, I…Yes.’ She broke off, furious with herself for having become so visibly flustered. ‘I wasn’t doing gardening in England…but it’s what I’ve always wanted to do.’ It would have been safer to lie, she thought exasperatedly, and it would have given her a bit of practice for all the lies she would have to start coming up with in the very near future.
‘So, you decided you’d cut your teeth on my property, did you?’ he enquired with chilling softness.
‘Of course I didn’t,’ she exclaimed, reliving all the misgivings she had felt when Libby had airily informed her that, apart from billing the villa accounts for the services of a housekeeper to augment their income, they would also claim for a gardener. ‘I did an introductory gardening and landscaping course——’
‘Introductory?’
‘I had hoped to go on to do the full course, but wasn’t able to.’ And probably never would, since her savings towards that course had been what she and Libby had lived on at first. ‘But I haven’t had any complaints about my work yet—unless, that is, you intend making one now.’
‘If I find anything to complain about, you’ll hear me loud and clear,’ he replied, draining his cup and rising.
Ginny watched in mounting disbelief as his tall figure strode to the terrace steps—surely he didn’t intend checking out her work here and now—in the dark!
‘I’d almost forgotten what made me fall in love with this place,’ he announced as he gazed around him.
Ginny gave a start of surprise, remembering how she too had fallen in love at her first sight of the villa, and her inability to accept the idea of such a place not being lived in to the hilt, but instead being merely one of several rarely used retreats owned by a family to whom money was plainly not a consideration.
‘One of the reasons I decided to come here was to see for myself what sort of shape the place is in and what, if anything, needs doing to it,’ he said as he returned to the table.
‘But it’s perfect,’ protested Ginny before she could bite back the words.
‘Even perfection starts fraying at the edges if it’s not properly maintained,’ he mocked, pouring them both more coffee—the first time he had lifted so much as a finger since his arrival, Ginny noted caustically. ‘And those agents of mine don’t exactly break their backs earning their fees.’ He sat down. ‘So, tell me about yourself, Ginny,’ he said conversationally. ‘I’m interested in your connection with my niece.’
‘We went to school together in England,’ she replied, striving to remain calm in the face of his aptitude for making even the most harmless of statements sound faintly derogatory.
‘Oh, the English stepmother—she didn’t last any longer than the rest of them,’ he muttered almost to himself. ‘Libby could only have been a kid then.’
‘We were both twelve.’
‘That must be one hell of a friendship the two of you struck up, to have survived that long,’ he observed sceptically. ‘She couldn’t have been in England more than five minutes.’
‘We were at school together for almost a year,’ corrected Ginny, trying in vain to mask her growing resentment. ‘And not only did we write to one another, we also managed to meet once or twice over the years. Of all her ex-stepmothers, Jane’s the one Libby is closest to and still sees whenever she can.’
‘From what I’ve heard, it was always handy for Libby to have England to escape to from whatever mess she got herself into in the States,’ he stated, his heavy-lidded eyes coolly watchful. ‘Though it seems she’s now traded in England for France…Or will she end up running back to England from here this time, instead of from the States?’
‘I suppose it’s never occurred to you that it might be her family she’s always running from?’ exploded Ginny, and instantly regretted her outburst. ‘Look, I’m sorry—I had no right to say that,’ she apologised, certain she had, but even more certain that if she didn’t get her temper in hand she would end up giving something away.
‘No, you hadn’t,’ he agreed, his eyes blazing. ‘So Libby’s still running, is she? If that’s the case, I think it’s time we cut the pussy-footing and got on to what it is you and she are up to here!’
‘Up to?’ croaked Ginny. ‘We’re not up to anything! And you misunderstood me—I didn’t mean to imply Libby was actually running from you now!’
‘So what’s she doing?’
‘How do you mean, exactly?’
He flashed her a look of irritation. ‘A couple of years back, Libby got herself involved with a playboy French aristocrat—a guy with about as much idea of responsibility as she has—and later followed him to France. He disappeared off the scene several months ago and she’s been living down here ever since—and no one’s heard a word from her.’
‘I’ve heard from her!’ retorted Ginny, astounded by how much he seemed to know. But if only he knew the rest of it; how, accepting they both had irresponsible pasts to live down, Jean-Claude and Libby had agreed to his parents’ conditions to giving their marriage their blessing—a year’s total separation, during which time Jean-Claude proved himself in the family business and neither came within a hair’s breadth of scandal. ‘I’ve heard from her,’ repeated Ginny, the words losing their edge of indignation as she struggled to shake free from those thoughts. ‘She wrote and asked me to join her here.’
‘That’s not the story you were giving me a few moments ago.’
‘I wasn’t giving you a story a few moments ago,’ she protested, his tone re-igniting her indignation. ‘My wanting a change of scenery happened to coincide with Libby writing to me.’
‘How very convenient,’ he drawled. ‘You housekeep and tend the gardens—but what does my niece do to while away the hours? We’re talking here about a girl who isn’t happy unless she’s surrounded by a freeloading mob of lunatics; a girl who, twice in her life, has had to be rescued by this terrible family of hers from dubious, if not downright dangerous, communes in which she got herself involved!’
‘I know about that,’ said Ginny uneasily, remembering Libby’s own retrospective horror and shame when she had confided those episodes to her only a few months ago. ‘And she’s only too aware of what you saved her from…You see, Libby’s changed; she’s——’
‘If she’s changed so much,’ he cut in savagely, ‘how come she takes off the moment I arrive?’
‘She hasn’t taken off,’ protested Ginny wretchedly, wondering how much of this she could take. ‘She had already gone when you arrived!’
‘So why did you feel obliged to call her and warn her I was here?’
‘For heaven’s sake, she rang me! groaned Ginny. ‘Simply to say she didn’t know how long she’d be staying on in Paris.’
‘Oh yeah?’ he drawled, imbuing the words with every bit as much scepticism as his niece did whenever she used them.
‘Perhaps it won’t surprise you to hear that, even had she not intended staying in Paris—which she had—she probably would have once I told her you were here,’ retorted Ginny, as her wits at last began collecting themselves. ‘I got the impression that you weren’t exactly her favourite person.’
‘And I guess I can’t exactly be yours either,’ he murmured, flashing her an unexpected smile. ‘I shouldn’t be taking out my feelings over family problems on an innocent bystander—especially not one who’s served me up such a delightful meal.’
Ginny gave him a wary look, dazzled by the smile, yet not entirely convinced there hadn’t been a measure of sarcasm in his softly spoken words.
‘And now that we’re on the subject, I have a proposition to put to you.’ He gave a throaty chuckle as Ginny’s eyes widened in consternation. ‘I know they say the way to a man’s heart is through his stomach,’ he laughed, ‘but that’s not the sort of proposition I had in mind.’
Ginny maintained a mortified silence, wondering how on earth she could be expected to feed this man a string of lies when she was so easily caught off her guard.
‘I keep you on as housekeeper and gardener—and you help me mend my bridges with Libby. You see, she’s probably not aware that about a year ago I took over the European side of the family business—my base is now Paris.’
Libby was most certainly not aware that there was a member of the Grant family on the same continent, let alone a few hundred miles up the road from here, thought Ginny, her heart plummeting.
‘Now that I’m settled in Paris, I’ve decided to combine a vacation with a look at our banking connections in the south. No doubt I’ll have to make the odd trip or two back to Paris, but, for the next month, I’ll be based here.’
‘You…’ began Ginny, and had to clear her throat when she discovered her mouth was bone-dry. ‘You’ll be staying here for a month?’
‘That’s what I said,’ he replied, the heavily lashed midnight blue of his eyes drilling through her. ‘Does the idea disturb you, Ginny?’
‘What a strange thing to say!’ she blustered, but what should have been a careless laugh came out as a strangled croak.
‘Right,’ he stated briskly. ‘I’ll let the agents know I’m here and they can arrange for extra staff for laundry and housework—I don’t intend overworking you. As I see it, the only extra work for you will be cooking for three instead of two once Libby gets back.’
‘Fine,’ managed Ginny, so limp with shock that she was astounded she had actually got the word out. Right now she had to accept she was in no fit state to absorb any of this, she warned herself. ‘Would you like me to make fresh coffee?’ she offered, her mind beginning to ease into the blank state that had become its refuge during the years of mental warfare with her aunt.
‘No, this is fine,’ he said, producing a smile that penetrated her blankness and forcefully revived the memory of her initial reaction to his stunning looks. ‘But I wouldn’t mind a cognac—you will join me, won’t you?’ he asked, rising.
Thrown by her reaction to what, after all, had only been a smile, she decided she would join him, despite the fact that she rarely drank spirits…A cognac might be just what her strung-out nerves needed.
But after her first few sips of the fierily velvet spirit she found herself wondering if it wasn’t over-stimulating her awareness as she began feeling she was hearing the odd note of mockery creeping into the tone of his desultory, though studiously polite conversation. Though it might have nothing to do with the cognac, she reasoned uncertainly, because even in the best of circumstances he wasn’t the sort of man in whose company she would ever have felt in the least relaxed. And it wasn’t simply his scarcely credible looks, it was everything else about him—from the almost arrogant ease oozing from his every pore to the careless expensiveness of every stitch he wore—that made him the sort of person who left her feeling gauche and vaguely inadequate.
‘I’m sure that drive from Paris must have been tiring,’ exclaimed Ginny, rising also and reaching over to collect the coffee-cups. ‘I’m sure I’d have—’ She let out a gasp of horror as she knocked a heavy crystal glass off the table. ‘Oh, heavens!’ she groaned, sinking to her knees and attempting to pick up pieces of the shattered glass. ‘I’m so sorry!’
‘For God’s sake, what do you think you’re doing?’ he exclaimed impatiently, striding over and hauling her to her feet. ‘You’ll cut yourself!’
‘I really am sorry,’ she muttered dazedly.
‘So you broke a glass—it’s no big deal.’
But a glass, judging by the weight and feel of it, that probably cost a small fortune, she fretted, her head beginning to swim. ‘I’ll replace it—I promise.’
‘I’m not too sure about that,’ he said, something in his tone drawing Ginny’s eyes to his. She had thought for an instant he had been about to laugh, but there was no trace of laughter in either his expression or his tone as he continued. ‘You see, that was one of a set, made exclusively for my great-great-grandfather—I guess they could be described as priceless.’
Ginny felt herself slump weakly against the table.
‘So…I don’t think you’ll be replacing it in any hurry.’
This time when she looked up at him, she actually caught a glimpse of amusement on his face, before it instantly disappeared—or had she imagined it?
‘I…This isn’t your idea of a joke, is it?’ she asked uncertainly.
‘Of course it is,’ he groaned exasperatedly. ‘But it riled me the way you were carrying on as though the darned glass really had been priceless.’
‘You have an extremely warped sense of humour,’ she retorted with as much dignity as she could muster.
‘You know something, Ginny?’ he drawled. ‘I’ve a feeling I’m really going to enjoy my stay here—what with my warped humour and——’ He broke off, frowning as he leaned forward and peered down into her face.
‘What is it?’ she exclaimed, alarmed.
‘Just indulging my warped humour,’ he murmured, taking her by the shoulders and drawing her closer to him. ‘I’m beginning to wonder if I didn’t make the wrong proposition to you earlier,’ he added huskily, lowerng his head towards hers.
Her entire body stiffened as his lips touched, then gently stirred against hers. Her first thought was to wonder where, exactly, she should attack him; her second was that it might not be such a good idea to attack any part of someone of his build. And then there was the fact that he wasn’t using the slightest force as his mouth played in soft invitation against hers and that all she had to do was step back to escape. But at some point during those thoughts, her own lips had parted in a manner that could only be described as inviting, and her arms had somehow become entwined around his neck. And it was then, and only then, that his arms encircled her, drawing her body fully against the muscled leanness of his. It wasn’t until a hint of demand entered his kiss that she began fighting—not the man, but the sensuous softness slinking insidiously throughout her entire being.
‘You took your time deciding to spurn me,’ he mocked softly as he released her, but there was a slight breathlessness to his words and a trace of bemusement in his eyes.
‘That’s because I shouldn’t drink!’ she exclaimed, then cringed at having come out with so pathetic an excuse.
‘Yes, and you were really knocking it back,’ he murmured. ‘You must have had—well, all of two sips, by my reckoning.’
‘I…What I meant was…’
‘No, Ginny, the damage has already been done to my ego,’ he sighed, walking towards the veranda doors. ‘I’m sure that if I ever took the liberty of trying to kiss you again, I’d get an instant brush-off…And leave that broken glass alone, I’ll see to it in the morning—I don’t want you going anywhere near it in your drunken state.’
CHAPTER TWO
WHY she had assumed she would feel any better, having made a phone call to Libby during her visit to the market, was beyond her, thought Ginny irritably. She placed the last of her purchases in the basket of the bicycle she had found rusting in a shed at the villa soon after she had arrived, and climbed on to it.
Of course, she should have known she would end up lying to Libby, she mused dejectedly as she rode along. There had always been a mutually protective element in their relationship which, on her own part, had gone into overdrive now that Libby was pregnant.
‘Ginny, just get the first train you can up here,’ had been Libby’s reaction to the news of the length of her uncle’s proposed stay. ‘Jeanne has plenty of space and can’t wait to meet you.’
‘And then we’d lose the money Michael’s paying, not to mention what we get from my odd gardening contracts—Libby, we can’t afford it.’
Not that long ago it had been a source of hilarity between them, thought Ginny wryly—Libby’s being an heiress and their having to count every penny. But it had been only within the past month that Libby had managed to pay off the small fortune in debts that had littered her life, and now all her generous monthly allowance, together with anything they had left over from their strict budget, was set aside to cover the birth and any related expenses that might crop up—and they kept cropping up.
Of course she had lied, she thought wearily, oblivious of the azure blue of the sea now coming into view, a sight which usually filled her with peace and contentment. Last night, for the first time she could remember, she had gone to bed, her mind and body churning and reeling from the after-effects of what had only been a kiss: this morning she had woken to the same sensation—and it had frightened the wits out of her… Which was one of the reasons it had seemed safer, when talking to Libby, to weave a tale of a pleasantly courteous man who had apologised for the fact that he would be far too engrossed in business matters to be able to pass more than the time of day with her, and who had shown mercifully little interest in his absent niece.
‘That could be the lull before the storm,’ Libby had warned, plainly not altogether convinced. ‘You wait till he gets suspicious and starts turning on the charm.’
It was at that point she had panicked into embroidering with a vengeance. ‘You needn’t worry on the charm score—there’s some woman he’s forever on the phone to. If I’m not mistaken, he’s in love and I’ve a feeling she’s going to join him any day.’
‘Wow, Mikey in love!’ Libby had gasped, unwittingly dispelling Ginny’s immediate panic but also confirming her suspicion that Libby, despite her protestations to the contrary, retained a great deal of affection for her uncle. ‘What I wouldn’t give to see what she’s like! But it’s still not going to be that easy for you. I’ll do what I can from this end, calling and speaking to him from time to time, but, like all the Grants, he has a very suspicious nature where I’m concerned. To be honest, if you had uppped and left, as I suggested, I’d not have put it past him to get the cops out looking for me.’
Ginny cycled up the drive and round to the back of the house.
‘Where have you been?’
Almost falling from the bike with fright, she turned and flung a mutinous look in the direction of the scowling Michael Grant.
‘I really don’t think it’s any of your business where I’ve been,’ she retorted, wheeling the bike to the side of one of the garden sheds.
‘As I see it, it’s very much my business,’ he snapped, dogging her footsteps. ‘I employ you, don’t I?’
‘Indeed you do,’ she replied, her tone saccharinsweet while her blood boiled; this she most certainly could do without. ‘But I wasn’t sure that entailed my reporting my every move to you. But, if you must know, I was at the market, buying the food necessary for the meals my employment requires me to cook for you.’
‘Fine, that’s all I needed to know.’
Ginny flung the bicycle against the shed, fury making her reckless. ‘But this afternoon I shall be elsewhere,’ she announced, unloading the basket. ‘Yours isn’t the only garden I tend.’
‘Well, it is now.’
‘I beg your pardon?’ she enquired icily, while a frantic voice inside her asked just what she thought she was doing. The fact that she hadn’t any other gardening lined up was neither here nor there—her utter stupidity in even mentioning that she did other work was beyond belief.
‘I think you heard well enough,’ he informed her in steely tones. ‘But if you want to play dumb, Ginny, dumb is what we’ll play. So tell me, how many hours would you say constitute a full day’s work?’
She had asked for this, she berated herself angrily, and she would no doubt get it in full.
‘Eight,’ she muttered.
‘I’ll be generous and call it seven…Now, by my reckoning, your only free time from working for me would be between the hours of ten at night and eight in the morning and I don’t imagine too many folks would be lining up to have their gardens messed with during those hours.’
‘I don’t mess with gardens,’ Ginny informed him frigidly, ‘and anyway, I was only joking.’
‘Glad to hear it,’ he drawled, his eyes flickering with barely concealed disdain over her dungaree-clad figure before he turned and walked towards the house. ‘We need to talk,’ he called over his shoulder, ‘so how about if you make us some coffee so we can do it in comfort?’
And how about if you took a running jump? fumed Ginny to herself, convinced he intended complaining about her appearance. What had he in mind—decking her out in a uniform?
Muttering angrily to herself, and convinced she wouldn’t survive two hours of this treatment, let alone a whole month of it, she took herself off to the kitchen. But at least some good had come out of this ghastly encounter, she thought, calming a little as she put her purchases away. Her lying awake half the night racked by memories of being kissed by him had been no more than a stress-induced mental aberration—that was for sure.
She got out coffee-beans and the grinder, her moment of relief swiftly dissipating into frustration. She was beginning to feel as though she had a terrible weight on her shoulders. Libby seemed to thrive on intrigue, whereas she simply wasn’t cut out for it. Perhaps it was because Libby’s background was so steeped in wealth that she had such a cavalier attitude towards money.
‘OK, so I’ll pay it all back once I come into my inheritance,’ Libby had laughed, when Ginny had balked at the idea of their claiming the two salaries—and in Ginny’s name—from the villa. ‘No sweat.’
The idea had disturbed her then, thought Ginny miserably, and now it made her shrivel with embarrassment every time she thought about it. If Michael had fired her on the spot, or threatened her with legal action, she couldn’t honestly have blamed him. But her guilt in that respect didn’t alter the fact that his gallingly high-handed attitude was touching a particularly raw spot in her; she had had enough of being treated like an unpaid skivvy by her aunt ever to take it again—and especially not from this over-prvileged, autocratic American!
‘What are you doing—growing the beans for that coffee?’
Ginny responded to those words from a few paces behind her with a jump that sent the coffee she had just ground scattering everywhere.
‘Now look what you’ve made me do!’ she exclaimed accusingly. ‘I’ll have to grind more!’
‘I’ll grind—you clear up that mess,’ drawled Michael.
‘Excuse me,’ hissed Ginny, her hackles rising, ‘I might be employed by you, but would you mind not issuing me orders as though I were some sort of serf?’