Reasons Of the Heart Read online

  A martyr to a bunch of male chauvinist piglets more like! Francesca poured mature scorn on the disturbingly vivid images of a long-dormant memory, shocked by their erotic intensity. As she bumped down the track to the cabin she told herself sternly that she wasn't going to think about the traumatic aftermath of her first date. She had long got over her girlish disillusionment, aided by the knowledge that she had got a sweet form of re­venge at the time. Besides, Ross's cruelty had actually done her a favour. It had taught her that one couldn't build one's life around someone else's. Rosy dreams were all very well, but if she was to make her way in the world, to gain acceptance from her peers, she had to earn it for herself.

  And she had. She had gained top marks in School Certificate that year for the entire Northland region, and devoted her restricted spare time to convincing Agatha Lewis that nursing was almost as worthy a career as taking religious orders. The beginning of the new school year had found Francesca starting on a pre-nursing course at Auckland Technical Institute, living under close supervision in a girls' hostel.

  Ross had also taught her another valuable lesson. By the time that Francesca, a nervous first-year nurse, en­countered her first raft of medical students, she was well armoured against charming young men who thought that plain-looking girls should be grateful for their indis­criminate attentions.

  In a way, I suppose, I should be thanking the snake instead of resenting him, Fran thought with a wry grin. Her grin faded as she came into sight of the cabin and saw Ross rummaging around in the boot of a green con­vertible. In front of it was parked a battered-looking pick-up truck. Neither vehicle had been there when she'd left. She swung her car in beside the convertible and got out.

  'Hello, pretty lady.'

  She thought he was being sarcastic and frowned at the white smile, then blinked, wondering if she was going mad.

  'It is Francesca, isn't it?' he said, his smile widening, and the reason for her momentary disorientation clicked.

  'Hello, Jason.' How could she have thought he was Ross, even from the back? Jason was leaner, his hair the same shade as his brother's, but cut shorter. 'My, haven't you grown!' She imitated the teasing once-over he had given her. 'I thought you were Ross for a minute.'

  He laughed. 'Give me a break, I've got a few years yet before I hit the big three-O. Come and say hello to Neville and Tess. You remember Neville Wilkins, don't you?'

  'How could I forget?' Fran murmured. It had been Neville's car they had used that night. 'What is he up to these days? Is Tess his wife?'

  'Tess is nobody's wife... yet. But she has a Tarrant dead in her sights.' Jason grinned as they went into the cabin and Fran struggled with a ridiculous sense of be­trayal. She must be some woman if she thought she could domesticate Ross. 'As for Neville, would you believe it— he's a cop, stationed in Whangarei!'

  Fran burst out laughing. Neville had been the terror of the countryside in his souped-up old Zephyr, his de­linquency verging on the criminal with ominous fre­quency. Neville, a policeman! That was almost as funny as Ross a married man...

  She was still smiling when she stepped out on to the sunlit deck to greet the three people lounging in deck-chairs. Ross didn't bother to get up, but Neville did, with appreciative speed as he returned her greeting.

  'Hi, Francesca. Wow! Ross didn't tell me how much you'd changed. 'His hand froze in mid-handshake as he realised how unflattering that sounded. 'I mean—er— you're looking terrific' A slight tinge of pink entered the broad face at the compounding of his gaffe and Francesca enjoyed his momentary confusion.

  'Thank you, Neville,' she said sweetly. 'But I've been ill. Give me a few weeks and I'll be as chubby as ever.' She grinned to show she wasn't offended. Nursing had taught her to take insults and compliments with equal aplomb. It was only when you really cared about someone that their poor opinion could hurt.

  'I find that very hard to believe.' Neville recovered his cool at her relaxed good humour. As they smiled at each other Francesca noticed Ross lean back in his canvas chair. What was he looking so suspicious about? Then it came to her—he was wondering what had put her in such good spirit. He had expected her to come back from the lawyer covered in gloom and despondency. Fran stretched her smile wider.

  Neville's brawny body moved out of her sightline as he dragged up a chair for Francesca to sit on, and she got her first look at the woman sitting beside Ross. She was tall and slender, with cropped brunette hair, lovely skin and warm brown eyes. Trust Ross to have a beauti­ful girlfriend, thought Fran, feeling suddenly frumpy. Her eyes fell on the unmistakable diamond ring on the slim left hand and she stared in disbelief, her heartbeat flickering. So Ross had her dead in his sights, too!

  Jason handed Fran a cup of coffee, then circled round to stand behind the brunette. 'You don't know Tess, she only came to Whaler's Bay a couple of years ago to help her uncle at the hotel. This is my fiancée, Tessa Arm­strong ... Francesca Lewis.'

  Fran could feel herself blush faintly as she nodded hello. Why had she automatically assumed that it was Ross, not Jason, that Tessa was attracted to? She didn't even want to know the answer to that one.

  'Ross has told us the reason for your visit. I'm sorry about the circumstances,' Tess said with friendly sym­pathy. 'It must have been a shock for you to arrive and find somebody already in residence.'

  'I think it was the gun, rather than the resident that shocked me,' Fran lied with a rueful smile.

  'Gun? What gun?' Jason looked at his brother with sharp enquiry.

  So he hadn't told them. Why? She would have expected him to make a meal of the story. She met the brooding blue eyes. Surely he hadn't been trying to save her embarrassment. No, he must have an ulterior motive.

  'Didn't he tell you?' She decided to torpedo it, whatever it was. 'Ross arrived home to catch me skinny-dipping in the spa and tried to run me off with his shotgun. Maybe I should report him to the police for careless use of a firearm,' she said to Neville, catching him out in a flatteringly lecherous survey of her body.

  'Maybe I should report you for indecent exposure!' Ross fired a return volley with deadly accuracy. 'I had to haul her out and rub her down,' he told their amused audience, while Fran tried to grapple with the turning of the tables. 'Not to mention cook her dinner and tuck her in for the night.'

  'This obviously calls for a lengthy investigation,' Neville grinned. 'Are you staying on for a few days, Fran? Perhaps I could question you over dinner one night?'

  'I think you'll find that Francesca will be wanting to get back to Auckland,' Ross said smugly, and a flare of indignation banished any thoughts of conciliation from Francesca's mind.

  'On the contrary,' she said sweetly. 'I did only plan to stay a couple of days, but Mr Simpson changed my mind.' She felt a delicious fillip of satisfaction as the taunting blue eyes narrowed, revealing a distinct wariness.

  'What did Simpson tell you about me?' he demanded.

  'Exactly what you expected. That you could possibly make a claim against the estate.'

  'That's all?'

  'You weren't the prime topic of conversation, Ross,' she said crushingly. 'We did talk about more interesting things, like the weather, and the price of fish.' He raised his eyebrows and for some reason she thought that he was amused rather than annoyed by her put-down, though his face was deadpan.

  'Are you going to stay at the hotel?' Neville asked. 'They do a very nice meal these days.'

  'Oh no, I'll be staying here,' Fran said, driven by a reckless impulse to find out what was under that deadpan mask. The impulse was rewarded handsomely.

  'The hell you are!' Ross growled as he shot to his feet. 'I have a tenancy agreement, as you bloody well know. Surely you two discussed that!'

  'Language, language,' Fran tut-tutted with an irritat­ing smile. 'Tenancy, yes, but not sole tenancy. That wasn't specified.' It was her turn to be smug. My, he was steaming! How lucky that she had read over the agreement so carefully, looking for non-existent loop­holes. 'As of las
t night I'm afraid that you have gained yourself a co-tenant. Me.' Three surprised faces and a furious one egged her on. 'You wouldn't turn out the grandchild of such a dear friend, would you, Ross? Es­pecially in such sad circumstances? How would such callousness look to a judge? Sole relative, weak and helpless from a serious illness, and instead of com­passion you threaten her with a gun, molest her and then throw her out into the cold...'

  'You're about as weak and helpless as a piranha!' Ross snarled. 'What about your pristine reputation, Princess? Aren't you afraid of besmirching it by cohabiting with a commoner?'

  His sneer was a mistake. Up until then, Francesca had merely been trying to annoy him, but at his use of the hated nickname her humour took a sharp turn for the worse. If her reputation was pristine among their listeners she would be very much surprised, considering how much effort he had put into besmirching it himself thirteen years ago. She stood up and returned him glare for glare. If he was going to fight dirty, so was she!

  'Since I slept here last night, I'm afraid the damage is already done,' she pointed out acidly. 'If I'm going to acquire a reputation, I'd rather it was for something a little more flattering than a cheap one-night stand.'

  They stood, bristling, scowl to scowl until Jason broke the tension with a laugh. 'Hey, you two, break it up! I don't think you'll have to worry too much about local gossip. People will only have to take one look at you together and they'll know there's nothing going on. I swear you look like a couple of gunfighters squaring off at the OK corral!' He looked at his watch and pulled a wide-eyed Tess up from her seat. 'Much as we'd like to stick around for the draw, we're due at Neville's sister's for lunch. Nev?'

  'Huh?' The other man had been studying the protag­onists and made his decision. 'Oh, sure. Look, Fran, since you are staying, how about that dinner? How about tonight?'

  'You don't waste any time, do you?' Fran turned to meet the balm of Neville's soothing admiration. 'But yes, I'd love to,' she added hurriedly, sensing Ross's im­potent anger behind her and thinking that he couldn't very well murder her if she had a date with a policeman to keep. Besides, it would be a good opportunity to find out a bit more about Ross, and forearm herself against further nasty surprises.

  'Nice to meet you, Francesca,' said Tess as they left, and she seemed to mean it.

  'Thanks for returning the pick-up, Jason,' said Ross impatiently, obviously eager for them to be gone so that he could rip into Francesca.

  'Oh, I was also supposed to pass on a message from Mum. She wants to see you at Sunday lunch, without fail. And, hey, Francesca, if you're still here why don't you come, too? Mum loves company.'

  'Jason—' Ross's protest came through clenched teeth and his brother's mischievous expression intensified.

  'No sour grapes, now, Ross. You said you and Fran­cesca were going to settle it all amicably.' He grinned at the flash of lightning in the stormy grey eyes and the frustrated resignation in the blue. 'And you know Mum, she's certain to want to meet the girl her son is living with!'

  CHAPTER THREE

  She wasn't running away, Fran told herself, as she nego­tiated her city-slick shoes over the slippery, weed-covered rocks leading around the point, hitching up her skirt to jump the small gaps. It was just a strategic retreat. Before she moved out of sight she looked back over her shoulder and saw the distant figure on the deck of the cabin. Ross had been furious and she was nervously aware that in baiting him she had rather painted herself into a corner. How was she to get out of it without looking like more of a fool than she did already?

  The sea, modest in its demands on the beach, was more aggressive against the rocks, throwing up small swells that broke and spattered her lightly with spray. It was further than she had thought around to the next bay and she was panting as she rounded yet another curve to yet another tiny inlet. And stopped dead.

  There, sitting on a small rock, his arms folded, was the very man she had been fleeing from. And he wasn't even breathing hard!

  Francesca wobbled indignantly on her rocky perch. 'How did you get here?'

  'I know a short-cut,' he said, and she scowled at this subtle reminder that he knew more about her inherit­ance than she did. He met her glare with a lift of thick brown brows and stood, holding up his hand to help her down on to the sand.

  'You're limping,' she noticed automatically from his few steps. 'Maybe you're getting too old to take short­cuts.'

  She had thought he would laugh it off with a taunt in reply, he was obviously such a prime specimen of manhood, but instead he gave her a look of such dislike that she recoiled and slipped on the hard, wet surface. As she teetered he reached up and grabbed a fistful of her tailored skirt, jerking her forward into his arms. Angry at his ability to unbalance her both physically and mentally, she pushed at him.

  'Let me go, damn you! I want to go back.'

  'We can never go back, Francesca,' he said, giving her words a deeper meaning, but he let her go. 'Is it really just the money, Princess? Or is it specifically me that you object to sharing with?'

  He had hit the nail on the head, driving it clean through the fleeting satisfaction she had felt that he was now doubting that she had acted from purely mercenary instincts.

  'I... Why did he say he would leave it to you?' She struggled to whip up her anger in the face of his cool control. 'Grandpa always believed in the work ethic. Re­wards have to be earned with sweated labour. He be­lieved quite literally in the parable of the talents. I... why you?' She wanted him to justify himself, to give her a reason she could logically understand.

  'What makes you think that I buried mine?' he asked tautly, refusing the opportunity. 'Because I don't wear designer jeans and drive an imported status symbol? Is that how you measure success, Francesca? If so, I'm sorry for you. One can have all the material trappings of success and yet still be a failure as a human being.'

  'Is that what you think I am?' she was goaded into asking, as if she cared what he thought of her.

  'That's not for me to judge. Unlike you, Princess, I don't estimate a person's worth on appearance.' A faint smile touched the sensuous mouth as he allowed his eyes to peruse her stiffened figure. 'If I did I would be thoroughly confused by now, wouldn't I? Are you the satin-skinned sensualist who likes skinny-dipping and french kissing? Or the neatly tailored spinster who doesn't approve of anything or anyone that deviates from her prim conception of the norm?'

  His reference to french kissing was unnerving. Had it been a deliberate reminder of her youthful indiscretion, or was she reading things into his words that didn't exist? Satin-skinned sensualist? Absurd!

  'If you really want to live at Whaler's Bay, why don't you go and live with your family... or don't they want you around, either?'

  He merely grinned at her abrupt change of subject. 'Quite the contrary. Mum would love to have me back in the nest but I'm way past the stage, in age and experi­ence, where I'd be comfortable there for any length of time. They're a great crowd, but they're just that, a crowd. Tess is living there until the wedding, Dave has started a rock band who seem to have taken up perma­nent residence in the barn and little Beth has blossomed into a seventeen-year-old beauty trailing clouds of mooning youths who clutter up the passageways. Add to that a mother who longs to have me safely married off, and a father who cons any hands idle for more than a few seconds into helping on his interminable home-improvement projects and you have some idea why I ap­preciate the peace of my own establishment.'

  'My establishment,' Fran corrected firmly, 'and since when did you ever seek the peaceful life?'

  'Ever?' he repeated mockingly. 'We were only ac­quainted for a shortish while, Frankie, so you can't claim that sort of knowledge. Any at all in fact—you didn't want to contaminate that dainty, narrow mind of yours by mixing with a crude lout like me, remember? Crude or not, I've lived and learned a lot since then.'

  'Oh, really, learned what?' she snapped, stiffening her spine against that silky Frankie. Ross had been the only man to c
all her that. And the crack about louts came dangerously close to an open reference to that awful Monday she had tried so hard to forget. 'Learned how to con old men? Is that how you scratch a living?' She had to insult him. He wasn't going to slip past her guard by making her curious about what he had been up to in the meantime. She didn't care, except so far as it affec­ted her.

  His nostrils flared slightly, but there was no other outward sign of temper. Instead he squared his stance and cocked his head and said, very, very blandly, 'Women.'

  'What?'

  'I make a living from women.' He enjoyed her startled suspicion. 'They pay to visit me, or sometimes they ring me and I visit them. We exchange...er... intimate in­formation and part with satisfaction on both sides. I have a lot of very satisfied clients.'

  'You're... a... a gigolo?' Fran's shock and suspicion melted into distaste. She had expected something dis­reputable, but this...!

  He gave her a smouldering smile. 'That term is a bit outdated, not to say obvious. I prefer to think of myself as serving mankind...or, in my case, womankind.'

  'I...that's disgusting!' Fran spluttered.

  'Is satisfying human need disgusting?' he said, feigning surprise. 'You should be the first to congra-tulate me, Princess. You were the one who told me I was wasting my potential.'

  'I didn't mean your sexual potential!' she hissed, flushing furiously when she realised where the conver­sation had led her.

  'As I recall, you didn't specify, but perhaps your memory is more vivid than mine,' he goaded her softly. 'No? Then let me see if I can refresh it. You told me, after making sure that half the school was listening, of course, that I was quite fun on a date, but a little too crude and clumsy for your taste. That the boys you used to sneak out on dates with when you went to that snooty girls' school of yours had much more class. Who wants to be friends with a guy on the fast-track to nowhere? you said. I was spoiled and lazy and I would never re­alise my potential because whatever natural talent I had would always be stifled by my even greater talent for taking the easy option...'