Reasons Of the Heart Page 7

  Impossible as it seemed, Ross became even more casual around the cabin, until every crevice appeared to harbour evidence of his inhabitance: a discarded sock under the table, Sports Digest magazines migrating from room to room, shaving foam on the mirror, and food—he always seemed to be eating—which he would put down some­where and then forget about. He was always mildly apologetic when Fran pointed these things out to him, but he never changed one iota until at last she gave up nagging and resigned herself to cleaning up after the worst of his untidiness and resolutely ignoring the lesser irritations.

  It seemed silly to prepare food separately, so they worked out a tacit arrangement whereby Fran provided breakfast, they got their own lunches, and Ross cooked the dinner. He was a far more imaginative chef than she was, not to mention a better cook, and Fran found herself thinking that if they lived together much longer she would have to start worrying about dieting again. She had no scales to weigh herself on, but just by looking at herself in the bathroom mirror she could see her ribs filling out.

  Sometimes Ross would bring back his fishing catch for a meal and every now and then he would disappear in his rackety pick-up and return from a tour of the local roadside produce stalls laden with garden-fresh veg­etables. Fran made sure that the expense of their bought food was strictly shared. She had no idea what the state of his finances were; perhaps he was slipping into Whangarei on his outings to collect his unemployment benefit cheque, or perhaps he was still on Accident Compensation? Anyhow, once or twice he visited his parents and came back with a pie or a casserole, so perhaps his family were helping make ends meet. How awful, to be thirty and still living such an apparently meagre existence, she thought with a shudder. At least she would always have her training to fall back on. She might lose her savings in this new venture, but she need never be destitute.

  The weather over the next few days continued warm and sunny, unseasonably so, and Ross had taken to stripping down accordingly. The first time Fran walked in and saw him standing there, dressed only in tight, cut­off denim shorts, she almost had cardiac arrest. He was behind the kitchen bench, the shorts slung so low on his hips that at first she had thought he was naked. There were a few scars and still some signs of deep tissue bruising, but even so he had a beautiful body! Fran could only see slight signs of softening from his months of curtailed activity.

  'Does my body embarrass you?' He had raised inno­cent eyebrows at her dropped jaw, forcing her to reach for nonchalance.

  'Of course not, I've seen better.' A valiant lie. 'You've got a bit of weight settling in, haven't you?'

  To her delight he scowled. 'I'm working on it.'

  He got his revenge that evening as she sat by the fire, reading one of his awful paperbacks with a frown on her face and a certain guilty fascination with the machi­nations of the rich and promiscuous characters. Ross usually took a long, relaxing spa after dinner, and to­night he wandered through with only a towel hitched around his hips, apparently to fetch a magazine.

  As he bent to flick through the stack on the coffee table, Fran couldn't help seeing the towel part where the edges were rolled over at the hip, revealing the solid thigh flowing into his flank, the pale flesh there smooth and hairless in contrast to the thick dark coating on the strong legs and wide chest. He straightened and turned so that she was now staring at the front of his body, at the dangerous dip across his belly which showed the triangle of hair which faded to his navel, thickening out again below it. He sauntered casually over to stand boldly in front of her, magazines tucked under his arm.

  'You don't seem very interested in that book. Want to come and join me?'

  'No, thank you,' she said quickly, too quickly, mind tensing from the impact of all that bare male flesh.

  'Come on, Frankie,' he wheedled. 'Don't be shy. You

  told me that nurses were blasé about nakedness. Or is

  it your body that embarrasses you?' His voice became

  infuriatingly earnest. 'I know you're pretty skinny at the

  moment, but from the glimpse I got the other night you

  still have lovely breasts. Not as big as they used to be,

  but still nicely shaped. That's one of the things I remem-

  bered best about you, your—'

  'Will you shut up?' Francesca threw the book aside, her face red with embarrassment and temper. 'We both know that I was fat. Fat and plain. I admit it, OK? You've got back at me for this morning, so let's just forget it now, shall we?'

  The tormenting mockery left his face, but Fran was too busy staring hard at her feet to notice. 'You weren't fat, you were plump and the plumpness was in all the right places. I know that thinness is fashionable, but it flies in the face of human physiology. Women are sup­posed to carry extra pads of fat, their bodies are de­signed to have curves. I personally prefer a woman to look as nature intended her to, rather than to force herself into a fashionable strait-jacket of skin by excessive dieting or the offices of some quack plastic surgeon.'

  Fran's eyes flew to his face, and away again, a warmth spreading through her body as she realised he was ut­terly sincere. It was all the more believable because he hadn't disputed her claim to have been plain. They both knew that she had been.

  'Who are you to call plastic surgeons quacks?' she said teasingly, to hide the embarrassed pleasure she felt. 'Or am I mistaken that you've had your nose fixed?'

  To her amusement Ross's hand flew to his nose and he actually flushed, forgetting he was supposed to be menacing her with his gorgeousness. 'Well, yes, but it wasn't my idea. The guy who did it got me to sign the form while I was still bleary with drugs after my first operation. He did the nose job before I realised what was going on.'

  Fran was horrified. 'That sounds like a serious breach of ethics. Who was it?'

  'Er...a personal friend,' Ross seemed uncom­fortable. 'He'd been nagging me for years to get it done.'

  'He should have left it the way it was,' said Fran tartly, when it seemed he wasn't going to enlarge on the statement.

  He raised his eyebrow with a return of humour. 'To stop me from being stuck with the 'pretty boy' label? Do you think I'm too handsome, Princess? I assure you, I may be pretty, but I'm all man...'

  The low, masculine purr made the hairs on the back of Francesca's neck rise as she watched, dry-mouthed, as he ran a caressing hand across the rippling muscles of his chest, down over the hard, slightly concave belly to the tuck of his towel. She jerked out of her chair and backed away from that awesome body.

  'Oh, go and have your damned spa!' The warmth of his laughter followed her into the bedroom where she slammed the door and stood trying to control her breathing. Involuntarily her hand moved to cup her breast, and she flushed as she remembered his admir­ation. At fifteen she had been shocked as well as excited to discover how sensitive she was there. Her next sexual encounter, several years later, had reinforced that dis­covery, disappointing as the affair had been in almost all other respects, including her ultimate satisfaction. In fact, that short flirtation with modern sexual mores had persuaded her that she was one of those women who didn't have a particularly strong sex drive... or so she had thought until now! But then, she had never met a man who exuded blatant sexuality the way that Ross did.

  She must try and conquer this silly habit of getting hot and flustered by his suggestive teasing, that was what he wanted...

  The next morning she ignored his insufferable good humour at the breakfast table and took herself off for a leisurely walk, hunting for interesting pebbles on the beach. Idly she thought how nice it would be to spend a little time every now and then in such peaceful sur­roundings. Was there some way that she could perhaps keep the cabin and...

  She stopped short, dropping all her carefully collected pebbles with a faint sound of dismay. Perhaps there was a way, but it would mean even more juggling of finances, and negotiating with the bank and perhaps trimming back on her capital investment. No, better to sell. A holiday home was hardly on the
list of her pri­orities ... it might be years before she had the time, or the spare cash, to take enough holidays to warrant one. Besides, a naughty voice whispered, without Ross around, the peaceful life would pall pretty quickly...

  'What are you doing? Put that down!' she ordered tightly when she got back to the cabin and found Ross had taken it upon himself to shift around some of her plants. It seemed symptomatic of their relationship, Ross acting and she reacting.

  'What does it look like I'm doing?' said Ross mildly, holding the maidenhair fern from the coffee table out of her reach. At least he was wearing a shirt this morning, even if it did have some interesting holes in it, matching his tattered jeans. 'I'm putting some of this greenery out. It's shedding into my coffee. If you were only coming up for a few days, what did you want to lug all these things up here for?'

  'I couldn't ask my neighbours to look after every­thing. Anyway, the ones I brought were special. Some of them are quite rare and others need specialised care.'

  'This isn't rare. Even I know what this one is, it's as common as grass.'

  'It happens to be going through a rough patch,' said Fran, managing to snatch the offending, offended plant and set it gently back down on the table. 'Plants don't just need food and water, you know, they need company, too...'

  'You can't really believe that!' He was laughing at her, as usual.

  'I happen to know it,' she said haughtily. 'I've done experiments on my horticultural course to prove it. This little fern was ailing until I began to chat to her every day. Now she's starting to perk up.'

  'She?' He looked from plant to Fran, his face a study of disbelief. 'You divide your plants into sexes?'

  Ross would bring sex into a discussion about rocks! 'A lot of plants put out male and female flowers on dif­ferent bushes. If you want to cross-fertilise you need to know which is which.'

  'And this is female?'

  She flushed at being caught out. 'Well, I could hardly call a maidenhair "he", could I?' She was unaware she'd put her hands on her hips and thrust her chin out chal-lengingly. So she talked to her plants and invested them with personalities, so what? It was a harmless eccen­tricity. If he thought her crazy for talking to her plants, imagine what he would think if he knew that she was about to devote her life to them? He would be rolling on the floor. Sister Lewis, nursing plants rather than patients... he would tell her that it was because plants were no threat to her—they couldn't answer back.

  She built an effective case against herself that was abruptly demolished when he said mildly, 'No, I guess not. Did you propagate all these yourself, or do you haunt the garden centres?'

  Yes to both questions, she was tempted to reply, one garden centre in particular, but she contented herself with, 'I like to grow things from scratch, there's more satisfaction that way.'

  'Only pot plants, or do you have a garden?'

  'Sort of.' She hesitated but, seeing only interest in the blue eyes she continued, 'It's not really mine, it belongs to the whole block where my flat is, but it's enormous and nobody else takes much of an interest so...'

  'So it's yours.'

  She smiled a little sheepishly, grey eyes shifted to a deeper, warmer shade, her mouth curving to soften the pale contours of her face as she told him how she had slaved over that piece of land, planned and plotted and landscaped to her heart's content, until it had won a local Garden Beautiful contest. The landlord had been blasé, until he discovered that the improved environ­ment could entitle him to put the rent up when new tenants moved in. Pointing out to him that he had outlaid nothing, therefore couldn't claim increased costs to the Rent Commission, Fran had bullied him into a business arrangement.

  'It sounds as if you have green fingers. Must be a good way to work off the stress of your job.'

  Her eyes took on an intriguingly secretive glint of amusement which made him probe gently, watching as she blossomed with enthusiasm, her gestures wide and sweeping, her body held confidently, her mouth mobile with pleasure. This was how he liked her to look.

  'You really are a nature baby, aren't you?' he teased gently when she ran down and began to look abashed at her childish enthusiasm.

  'I suppose so,' she murmured, wondering what she had said to put that curious expression on his face. It was almost... tender. Her eyes dropped to see his hand stroking through the maidenhair.

  'Don't do that,' she said involuntarily, disturbed by the sexual symbolism of the gesture. Would he run his fingers through a lover's hair like that?

  'Why?' A forefinger lifted a tiny, delicate leaf so that it lay submissively on the tip. He leaned forward to in­spect it, his breath stirring the other leaves, his other hand cupping a trembling frond on the far side with a gentleness that, absurdly and totally illogically, seemed highly erotic. He looked up at her silence, the hazy blue eyes fusing with hers. 'Jealous?' he asked softly, as if he could read her mind. 'Of a plant, Frankie?'

  'Maidenhairs bruise easily,' she said huskily, thinking that she should summon anger at the arrogance of the taunt, but drawn instead by the silent message in his eyes.

  'So do people, Princess,' he said, confirming the message. 'Shall we agree not to bruise each other?'

  Francesca didn't answer. She couldn't. She had the frightening feeling that it might be already too late to escape her reacquaintance with Ross Tarrant totally unscathed...

  CHAPTER FIVE

  'Come on, Francesca, jump! I'm not going to wait around here all day.' Ross sounded thoroughly fed up.

  'I can't, it's too far.' Fran hated the slight whine in her voice. She was fed up with him, too. It wasn't enough for him that they were out in the fresh air. Oh, no, Ross always had to go that extra distance, round the next point or over the next ridge. Looking down at the sea boiling into the crevasse below her, and Ross impatiently waiting on the rocks on the other side, she decided that enough was enough.

  'I can't do it.'

  'There you go again. Every time I ask you to make a little extra effort it's the same: I can't! Until I make you.'

  'Little?' Fran exploded at him, trying to force the tangle of curls out of her eyes as the wind whipped them to a froth. 'I don't call this little. "Let's go around the rocks," you said. You didn't say you were taking me mountaineering!'

  'Don't exaggerate, Fran,' he drawled, with a grin at her flushed face and heaving breasts.

  'This kind of thing may turn you on, Ross Tarrant,' she said bitingly, unreasonably annoyed by that mascu­line gleam. 'But I don't find it at all exciting.'

  'What kind of thing?' He leaned his shoulder against the rock, as if there was a square kilometre of solid ground beneath his feet instead of a narrow ledge above a three-metre drop to some treacherous seas.

  'Danger,' Fran gritted at his handsome, dangerous face.

  'It's not really dangerous, if you know what you're doing.'

  'But I don't know what I'm doing!' she wailed with a shiver. Down on the beach it had been warm, the sun high in the sky, but up here the wind cut through her sweater and chilled her skin.

  'I do, and that's all you have to worry about,' he said complacently. 'Now jump, sweetie, and I'll catch you.' He held his arms wide, bracing himself with one hip and knee against the rockface.

  'What if I fall?'

  'I won't let you fall.'

  'What if you can't help it?' she persisted. 'You know your shoulder's still weak. What if your arm gives way?'

  'It won't give way.' Some of his impatient humour died and she regretted reminding him of his weakness. It had been fear finding an outlet but, from his brooding expression, he thought she had done it deliberately. 'Are you going to jump? Because if you're not, you can damned well stay there.'

  'You wouldn't leave me!' Fran exclaimed accusingly, looking behind her and remembering all the encourage­ment she had required to get this far.

  'Wouldn't I?' he smiled grimly. 'A no-good layabout like me? If you fell, there'd be no one standing between me and the cabin, would there?'


  'Oh, don't be ridiculous,' she snapped, fingers digging into rock as she looked nervously down. Neither of them had mentioned their dispute for days and he had to bring it up now!

  'My, my, Princess, we have progressed. At one time you intimated that I had murdered your grandfather for his property. Have you changed your mind?'

  'I... I was angry, I didn't mean it,' she said sulkily, adding, with immense reluctance, 'I'm sorry. Now can we go back?'

  'A handsome apology,' he said softly and her flush deepened.

  'I am sorry... I... you make me so angry sometimes I forget myself...'

  'Or, sometimes remember... mmm?' he said with un­nerving accuracy. His voice became coaxing instead of challenging. 'I would never have brought you round this way if I really thought you couldn't do it, Fran.'

  She wavered, knowing she was being silly, but unable to make the move. How did he know what she could or couldn't manage, when she wasn't sure herself? 'I'm going back,' she decided firmly.

  'You can't. The tide will have covered all those con­venient stepping-stones we hopped across on our way around the point. You have to come this way, you haven't got any choice.'

  'You didn't tell me this was a one-way trip!' Fran screeched at him. 'How do we get back? Swim?'

  'A little further round there's a reserve that comes right down to sea-level. It's a gentle stroll up the hill and across the fields to home from there.' He was unmoved by her spluttering fury. 'I didn't tell you because I knew you wouldn't come if there wasn't a comfortable option for you. Now, are you going to jump or do I go on without you?'

  'You wouldn't dare!' The unwise words were out before she could stop them. There was an infinitesimal silence, then he smiled, a predatory-shark smile.