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‘Ah, a scientist.’
‘I’m an ecological anthropologist.’
It sounded very impressive. She was impressed. ’do you live with the people you’re studying?’ she asked.
He nodded. ‘I live in a traditional longhouse village.’
‘Live? Are you going back?’
‘Yes.’ He was on home leave for two months, he said, working for the University of Virginia, giving lectures and interviews in various places. After that he would go back to Kalimantan. He gave her this information in short, crisp sentences.
‘Why do you want this house, then? You’re not going to live here anyway.’
He gave her a dark, inscrutable look. ‘For starters, I intended to live here for the next couple of months while I’m in the country. And more importantly, this was my grandmother’s house and the place I call home.’
The place I call home. Had he no family, then? No parents? The guilt stirred some more and again she forced it down. ‘I see,’ she said, cutting a piece of steak. ‘Obviously your grandmother had other ideas.’
His jaw tightened and he did not respond. For a while they ate in tense silence.
‘What are your plans for this house?’ he asked then. His voice was coolly casual.
She swallowed a piece of steak. ‘I told you. I’m going to renovate it, then sell it.’
‘What sort of renovation do you have in mind?’
She didn’t want to discuss it. Yet he was not being unreasonable asking these questions. Anyone coming to the house could conceivably be interested in what she intended to do. It was not exactly a terribly sensitive, private, personal thing. Only it was. She glanced at her plate.
‘I’m going to add another bathroom upstairs and modernise the two existing ones and put in a whirlpool bath. The kitchen is going to be overhauled.’ There was more. Walls were going to come down, a sunroom added. She didn’t tell him.
‘Are you an architect?’
‘No. I’m good with hammer and saw and paint.’
He studied her face. ’there’s a whole lot more to it than that.’
So there was. ‘I know what I’m doing. I’ve done it plenty of times before.’
‘Ah, a handywoman.’ He poured more wine. She kept looking at his hands, which aroused disturbing images in her mind.
If she weren’t feeling so off-balance, it would be very pleasant, actually, sitting here in such a civilised fashion eating a wonderful meal, fixed by a man. The man she married would have to be willing and able to cook. This was one of the prerequisites, if not the most important one. Most important was, of course, his eternal devotion.
He buttered a piece of bread. ‘Are you going to have contractors, plumbers, electricians, workmen around here?’
‘Yes. All the wiring is going to be replaced and most of the plumbing.’
‘And you’re dealing with these men on your own?’
She raised a quizzical brow. ‘Yes, I am.’ And she was very good, too. Growing up with four brothers was good for many things. ‘Is there a problem with that?’
‘I imagine there could be many. Many men are not comfortable taking orders from women, especially not if they perceive their manly domain invaded.’
She nodded. ‘Men with shaky egos, yes, I’ve noticed. You have to know how to handle them.’
His mouth quirked. ‘And you do?’
‘I’m an expert.’
Humour sparked in his eyes. ‘No pushover, are you?’
‘I grew up with four brothers. I learned to hold my own.’ Unfortunately she wasn’t sure she’d be able to hold her own with this man.
His eyes narrowed, scrutinising her, assessing her, and she felt again that odd reaction—the warmth, that hypnotic feeling of not being in control. His black eyes seemed to look straight inside her very soul.
She didn’t want anybody looking into her soul uninvited, and certainly not this man. She got up from the table. ’thank you for a delicious dinner,’ she said nicely. ‘Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’ll have to go back to work.’
She hoped he would leave now. Put his things in his car and go. A while later she heard strange sounds coming from outside and looked out of the window. Clint was standing on a ladder, sawing a big dead limb off one of the old oaks. Transfixed, she watched the movement of his body, noticing the effortless control he had over it. Powerful arms, a strong back straining under his shirt. The sound of the limb crashing to the ground startled her out of her trance. She closed her eyes for a moment and took a deep breath.
She stayed out of his way for the rest of the evening, knowing he wasn’t leaving, not knowing what to do about it. She slept restlessly, aware of his presence down the hall, seeing in her mind the intent look in his black eyes, feeling apprehension shiver through her body.
The next morning he was gone by the time she came downstairs, but when she looked in his room his things were still there. He hadn’t given up.
Well, she hadn’t expected him to, had she?
She was angry and relieved at the same time.
* * *
‘I thought I’d come along and see if I could help,’ said Sara. ‘My mom’s babysitting the kids.’ Sara had short red hair, lots of freckles and a big smiling mouth. She was Jack’s wife and Livia loved her. The two of them had arrived around ten that morning and Jack had brought the blueprints for the remodelling work.
Livia and Jack had had the opportunity to tour the house on several occasions before the sale was finalised so they’d been able to plot and plan and take measurements ahead of time.
Jack was moving through the house, blueprints in hand, double-checking everything, while Livia was in the kitchen with Sara making coffee.
‘I can use all the help I can get,’ said Livia. ‘I’ve sorted through everything downstairs, and now I have to do the upstairs bedrooms yet. All those drawers and wardrobes…I’ll never buy a furnished house again!’
‘You mentioned something about the attic,’ Sara said. ‘And I dreamed about it, can you believe it?’
Livia took out three coffee-mugs and spooned coffee crystals into them. ‘With you, I believe anything. So what did you dream?’
’that we found a huge box of valuable antique jewellery.’
Livia laughed. ’they took her personal belongings out of the house, Sara. Her papers, jewellery, that sort of thing.’
‘Maybe they didn’t look in the attic. I can’t wait to get up there and see what treasures are hidden there. Maybe a long-lost Van Gogh painting! Or maybe a Picasso! Just imagine! You’ll be rich!’
Livia laughed and poured hot water into the mugs. ‘Oh, be quiet, Sara! You read too many hidden treasure stories to your children. It’s gone to your head.’ Sara and Jack had two little girls and Sara loved reading to them.
‘Well, it could happen, couldn’t it? You hear about that sort of thing sometimes. This coffee is awful. Is it instant?’
‘You were sitting here watching me make it. Of course it’s instant.’
’so tell me about this guy.’
Livia told her about Clint Bracamonte. It felt good to be able to talk to somebody.
‘Wow,’ said Sara. ‘Where is he going to live for the next couple of months?’
It wasn’t what she’d expected Sara to say. ‘I don’t know. I don’t care.’
Sara frowned, looking like a worried mother. ‘You can’t rent anything that short-term, you know. It’s almost impossible. And he’ll need a furnished place.’
‘It’s not my problem,’ Livia said tightly.
‘No, I know, I’m just thinking. He’s in quite a bind.’
‘I’m not responsible for his problems!’
Sara raised her brows. ‘I didn’t say that, but it must be quite a surprise to come back from overseas and find your home sold out from under you. No place to go. No bed to sleep in.’
‘Oh, please, don’t be melodramatic!’
Sara grinned. ‘But I’m so good at it! How does it feel to have added to the homelessness statistic?’
Livia glared at her. ’the man has a ton of money in the bank, which, for all practical purposes, I put there personally. Don’t ask me to feel sorry for him.’
Toys. A box of toy racing cars, a plastic bucket of Lego blocks, adventure books.
’these must be his,’ Sara said, rummaging through the trunk.
‘I suppose so.’ Livia felt something pressing on her breastbone. She did not want to think of the big, rugged man as a little boy. A little boy playing with Lego blocks. A little boy visiting his grandmother in this house.
They’d crawled up a rickety pull-down ladder into the attic, fighting cobwebs and dust. Sara simply had to see what riches lay hidden in the dark there, and her enthusiasm had been contagious. A single small light bulb hung suspended from a wire, spreading a vague, dull light. Several pieces of old furniture, none of them precious antiques, languished in the dusty darkness. No paintings, famous or otherwise, revealed themselves. Instead of treasures, they found boxes and trunks full of old clothes and trinkets and draperies, and now they’d opened one full of toys. The trunk was newer than the others, just a cheap storage locker students took to college to keep their possessions in.
Sara kept pulling things out—a heap of typical boy toys lay spread out in front of them.
‘Liv, look! A train set!’ Sara said. ‘It has everything! Mountains and tunnels and everything.’ She looked up at Livia. ’this is worth money. What are you going to do with it?’
‘I don’t know,’ she said tonelessly.
‘You can’t sell it, Liv. You’ll have to give it back to him.’
‘Yes.’
At every turn she was reminded how much the house belonged to him. His past was here. His memories. His damned toys!
* * *
Mrs Fletcher, the estate agent, drove up the drive in her big shiny car as Jack and Sara were leaving late that afternoon. The attic was empty. Tired of sorting odds and ends, Sara and Livia had stripped the dining-room of five layers of wallpaper. Jack had made himself useful by cleaning out the gutters and digging up a giant dead rhododendron bush. After that they’d all carried the good pieces of furniture down to the basement and covered them up for safe keeping. Livia was exhausted.
‘I have some interesting news for you!’ Mrs Fletcher said with a bright estate-agent smile. ‘I have someone who’s interested in the house and wants to make a deal.’
Alarms went off in her head. ‘Let me guess,’ she said calmly. ‘His name’s Clint Bracamonte.’
Mrs Fletcher nodded. ‘Yes. He mentioned you were not interested in selling the house back to him as is.’
’that’s right.’ She wondered if Mrs Fletcher blamed her, but she heard no censure in her tone. She imagined him going to his lawyer, trying to find a way to get the house back. She wondered what he might have said about her. She sighed. ‘Come on in and I’ll make us some coffee.’
Mrs Fletcher followed her in. ‘I told him he’d be nuts to want it back the way it was because it needs work and he’d end up having to deal with too many repairs and other upkeep problems anyway and who’s going to deal with it once he’s left the country again? The place is going to fall apart.’
They sat on the back porch, the fragrance of lilacs strong and sweet around them.
‘What Mr Bracamonte suggested,’ said Mrs Fletcher after Livia had brought out two cups of coffee, ‘was an option to buy. He was willing to plunk down ten grand for that. Cash. I didn’t think you’d go for it, though having ten thousand dollars as working capital must be a temptation.’ She gave Livia a questioning look.
Livia nodded. ’sure it is, but I don’t want to sell an option. It means we have to set a sale price now and I don’t feel I can do that reasonably yet. So much depends on the way the various jobs will go and how it all turns out. It’ s hard to tell what will happen.’
Mrs Fletcher nodded, stirring three spoons of sugar in her coffee. ’that’s what I thought. And besides, with an option in his pocket, he’s going to want his finger in the pie, making sure things are done a certain way. He’s going to want to know what colour paint you’re going to use and what quality tile in the bathroom and the kind of doorknobs on your doors, and so forth. Somehow I don’t think you’ll be able to work under those kind of conditions.’
Not in a hundred years. ‘Right.’ She would lose interest in the work very quickly. ‘I want to do the job my way.’ She liked her work. It was a real challenge to make the very best out of the house. And this house was special. She didn’t want any interference.
‘I made another suggestion,’ said Mrs Fletcher. ‘I told him he could offer to buy the right of first refusal. A thousand dollars is about standard.’
The right of first refusal. This meant that once the house was finished, she’d have to offer it to him before she put it on the market. Was there any reason not to?
Was there any reason why she shouldn’t sell him the house once it was finished? After all, it didn’t matter who bought the house.
‘A thousand dollars is a thousand dollars,’ said Mrs Fletcher practically. ‘And you’ll be free to determine the price the market will bear once it’s finished and you won’t be obliged to discuss any of the work with him. You’ll be a free agent.’
‘All right, you get the contract ready and I’ll have a look at it.’
After Mrs Fletcher had left, Livia made herself some soup and crackers and went back to work. She put the train set and the other toys in the room Clint had slept in. She stared at his duffel bag, her stomach churning. She wanted him gone. Maybe signing a contract would get him out of the house.
It’s the place I call home…
Just imagine coming home and finding your house has been sold out from under you…
Damn, damn! She hated feeling this way. As if she owed him something. As if she was guilty of something.
She lay awake for a long time that night, listening for his car, but it never came. Finally she fell into an exhausted sleep.
The next day she emptied one more bedroom and took up what seemed like miles of carpeting, listening all the time for his car, feeling nervous and jittery and hating herself for it.
Clint came back just after eight that evening. From the living-room window she saw him climb out of his car and her heart turned over. He looked like a different man. He wore new clothes—stone-coloured cotton trousers, navy jacket, a shirt and tie. His shoes gleamed with newness. His hair had been cut. Everything about him was crisp and streamlined—an image of professional confidence and authority. He even carried a leather briefcase. Very impressive.
She wasn’t too impressive herself in her dirty jeans and T-shirt, but that was the way it went. She slipped back to the kitchen, feeling a breathless sense of trepidation. What would he think when he saw the house, which was now basically empty apart from his bedroom and one small room on the third floor?
‘Hello, Livia.’
‘Hi.’ She felt tense all over. Brittle. Angry. ’the door has a bell,’ she said coolly. ‘Please use it.’
He ignored it, put the briefcase on the kitchen table and opened it. He extracted some papers. ‘I have something for you to look at.’
She glanced at the papers. It wasn’t difficult to see what it was. A contract for the right of first refusal.
‘I understand Mrs Fletcher was here to discuss this with you yesterday afternoon.’
‘Yes.’ She glanced quickly over the paper. Then her eyes stopped. He intended to pay two thousand dollars. Cash, non-refundable. It was way more than the average fee. It was a very generous offer.
Her stomach churned. There was no reasonable way to refuse this deal. It was excellent business on her part to accept it. It would give her valuable cash upfront while she was doing all the work. And she was free to do what she wanted with the house.
But would she be? She bit her lip.
‘Is something wrong?’
‘No.’ She swallowed. ‘You’re willing to pay a high fee.’
‘I want to make sure you have no reason to refuse,’ he said evenly.
She didn’t. Not any reason that would make sense. Only reasons for which she had no words. Feelings, fears, apprehensions. And the damned little fairy jumping up and down inside her.
She collected herself. This was absurd. It was nothing more than a standard business agreement and the price was right. More than right. She sat down and began to read more carefully, making sure all was in order.
All was. It was a simple agreement, wrapped in legalistic jargon with which she was quite familiar by now.
’do we have a deal?’ He was still standing, looming over her, tall and commanding.
She met his eyes. ‘It would be unreasonable to refuse it, wouldn’t it?’
He gave a crooked smile. ‘Yes, it would be,’ he said quietly. There was something else in his voice, something beyond the calm tone. Anxiety plucked at her insides.
‘And if I want to be unreasonable?’ she asked.
He leaned towards her, bracing his hands on the table, his face close to hers. ’then so will I.’ There was a devilish gleam in his black eyes. ‘I will haunt you, sweet Olivia. One way or another I will own this house again, don’t doubt it for a moment.’
She didn’t. Once she was done with it it would be up for sale. Anybody with money could buy it. She shrugged. ‘I don’t doubt it.’ He was so close that she could smell the warm male scent of him. It had a disastrous effect on her heart rate.
He straightened, and tapped the document with a brown finger. ‘You sign this and I’ll get my things and be gone.’ Pushing his jacket back, he slipped his hands in his trouser pockets and observed her calmly, waiting for a reply.
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