Master of the Outback Page 11

  Ms Genevieve Grenville, no less. His tantalising, intoxicating mystery woman.

  What in the world was she doing? What was she looking for at this time of night? He could have called out to her, but he really wanted to see what she was up to, this mermaid who had put him under her spell. He got up from the desk, moving with his usual light tread. A rush of adrenalin had rid him of any sense of weariness. He was on the track of the not so innocent Ms Grenville.

  Right behind her, he was loath to put his hand on her shoulder and badly startle her, but there was nothing else for it. This was his house. Why was she roaming around in it after midnight? It wouldn’t surprise him in the least to discover she really was a witch, moving about at will when all was quiet.

  “Ms Grenville.” Voice and hand swooped low and soft.

  But it was enough to cause her to whirl, her sea-green darkly lashed eyes huge, almost on the frantic side. His physical energy seemed to radiate from him into her. “For God’s sake, you frightened me!” she gasped, one hand going to her quaking heart.

  “Good to see you too.” His glimmering eyes began an exquisitely slow dance over her. He lingered over her long flowing Titian hair, her over-wrought expression, and what she was wearing, the shape of her beautiful body touched on lightly by her robe, the curves of her high breasts. The rose-dark nipples he saw were peaked against the lustrous satin.

  My God!

  He had never seen a more seductive sight in his life.

  “You’re not supposed to be home until tomorrow.”

  “I’m so sorry,” he said, feigning an apologetic tone. “Are you actually accusing me of upsetting your plans? If so, remind me to e-mail you next time. But I’m so happy to catch you out of disguise, Ms Grenville. What a metamorphosis! You’ve no idea!” Now his deep, darkly shaded voice was laced with sarcasm. “I just love the nightgown! It’s exquisite. And that wild, glorious mane! One could weep for the way you’ve kept it confined. I’ve never thought you anything else but beautiful, but now—I have to tell you—you leave me a grown man gasping for breath.”

  His handsome face bore the stamp of self-mockery. “I don’t for a moment believe you,” she responded severely.

  “True. Absolutely true.”

  There was a provocative gleam in his dark eyes. It caused her to wrap her arms protectively around herself, all too aware of her deshabille. Her robe lacked a sash when right now she needed one. “I wasn’t to know you were home, let alone prowling around,” she said, sounding aggrieved. Why not? He stood before her—all six-three of him—the physical embodiment of splendid all-conquering male.

  “Should that matter?” he asked in some amusement. “This is my house, and you’re the one doing the prowling.”

  He was enjoying taunting her. Yet it put such a sparkle, a rush in the air. Didn’t he know he was the one with the allure? She found it as thrilling as it was intimidating.

  “Excuse me,” she said defensively. “I count myself unlucky to run into anyone. It is after midnight.”

  “The witching hour, don’t they call it?” The sexy brackets at the sides of his mouth deepened. “Magic things are said to happen. Beautiful flame-haired witches roam around at such times.”

  She could feel heat high up on her cheekbones. “I assure you I wasn’t looking for anyone to practise on. Anyway, isn’t the witching hour three a.m.?”

  “Why ask me, Genevieve?” His dark eyes sparkled. “You’re the one with the powers. I am but mere man. Are you trying to tell me you wouldn’t have dreamed of coming downstairs looking a veritable vision of man’s delight if you’d known I would see you?”

  “I wouldn’t have ventured outside my door in my nightwear if I’d thought you would see me,” she said sharply. “Now, is there anything else you want to say?”

  He spread his shapely hands. “Now you ask. What the hell are you up to, for a start?”

  That shook her—as it was meant to. “Why do I have to be up to anything?” she countered.

  “Because you are up to something, Genevieve. I thought we’d agreed on that?”

  “Not to my knowledge,” she retorted. “You have a very suspicious mind.”

  “Of course I do.” He gave her the benefit of a half-smile. “But who would blame me? Can’t you see it’s the secrecy—all the other stuff? The hairdo, the dreary clothes, etc—that’s set me off.”

  “Dreary clothes? Spoken like a snob. A rich snob.”

  “That’s nonsense and you know it.” His tone was clipped.

  “Okay, Derryl is the snob. You’re the egalitarian. Liberté, égalité, fraternité!”

  He put his long-fingered hands together in light applause. “Genevieve, allow me to applaud your accent. Pure Parisian French, down to the little throaty trill.”

  “Uvular,” she said. “I did teach French,” she reminded him. “And I had a French grandmother.”

  “What was her name?”

  “Michelle.” She spoke without thinking. But there was no link. Only to her pen-name, and he didn’t know that.

  “Beautiful!” He gave a deep theatrical exhalation. “So is Genevieve French too? But your colouring is pure Celt.”

  “And yours is pure Norman,” she retorted. “We all know the Normans were the bad guys in those days. Raven hair, coal-black eyes. The Norman invaders made an extensive penetration into Cornwall.”

  “They did. But going way back the Trevelyans were a French-speaking family,” he revealed. “May I ask how the book’s going?”

  Her expression lightened, lost some of its strain. “It’s going well. Not like work at all. I’m enjoying myself.”

  He stared down at her with sceptical eyes. “Is there really a book in it?”

  “Of course there is!” she fired back. “But I need to know all the secrets.”

  “What secrets, exactly?” he asked, his tone deepening and darkening.

  She shrugged a satin-clad shoulder. “There aren’t too many families without secrets.”

  “You mean dysfunctional families?”

  She shook her cascading hair back over her shoulders. “Unhappy families have the most riveting stories. Take the Kennedys. It was almost as though they were labouring under a hereditary curse.”

  “It seemed like it,” he agreed. “I’m sorry our family can’t deliver any curses just so you can write a bestseller, Ms Grenville. What is a ghostwriter anyway?” he asked with some humour. “You write reams of stuff, but no words actually appear on the paper?”

  “I have written reams,” she said. “Well, maybe not reams, but I’ve written a lot. You know as well as I do the reader wants to be drawn into a really good story. An exciting story. It’s no use putting down a dry-as-ash account. There are things about your family, going back to your grandfather, that I’d like to explore further. Hester is a fascinating woman. I’m getting to understand her.”

  His laugh was brief. “We must be the only two left on the planet. But what are you digging for? That’s the burning question.”

  Where is all this leading, Genevieve? The voice of caution broke in with a warning.

  She heeded it. “Look, you must excuse me. I can’t stand around chatting in my nightclothes.”

  “Is that what we were doing? Chatting?” he asked suavely.

  “Perhaps you could give me an hour or two when it’s convenient?” she suggested.

  His manner appeared perfectly relaxed. “I don’t keep any secrets, Genevieve.”

  “I think you do. I can feel the secrets gusting like the wind around us.”

  “Really? Psychic, are you? I should have guessed.” His dark eyes glittered behind hooded lids.

  “Another one of my accomplishments,” she said airily. “I don’t want to upset your theory, but what I a
ctually came downstairs for was to grab a couple of painkillers from the first-aid cabinet. I have a headache.” She’d had a headache. It had been miraculously cured by the bloodflow to her head. “I couldn’t sleep. That’s all. I’ve worked practically the entire weekend,” she tacked on virtuously.

  “Perhaps you were missing me?” There was real devilment in his mesmeric gaze. “I have a suggestion. Nothing to panic you.” He held up a palm at the wariness that came into her face. “Have you tried a single malt Scotch?”

  “I don’t have a bottle stashed away in my room, if that’s what you mean.”

  “But I do.” He waved an arm. “I’m pointing to my father’s study, by the way. It mightn’t be the best thing in the world to relax you and afterwards send you straight off into a blissful sleep, but sex is out of the question, is it not?”

  Her heart rocked crazily. Sex? “I thought we’d made that plain enough?” She overcompensated for her shocked reaction by speaking sharply.

  “We did.” He bowed his head, his smile brushing her skin like silk. “So let’s go. One nip and I promise you it’ll work better than any painkiller.”

  “I think I’d better stick with the aspirin.” Hester couldn’t have said it in a haughtier or more repressive fashion.

  Only he laughed.

  She sooo liked the sound of his laugh.

  “Let me offer reassurance, Genevieve,” he said. “You’re completely safe. I won’t eat you. I might want to, but it won’t happen—I promise. Your well-being is sacred to me while you’re under my roof.”

  “I think you lie.” The excitement had increased one hundredfold.

  He caught her hand, further undermining her resistance. “I don’t lie, Ms Grenville.” A steely note came into his voice. “No harm will come to you from me. A man can be tempted without crossing the line.”

  “And what line would that be?” She knew she shouldn’t be provocative, but her hand being held captive by his had set loose a torrent of sensations like sparkling water gushing from a great fountain. “More experiments?”

  “Do shut up, Genevieve,” he said gently, drawing her back along the passageway. “One nip and we’ll go upstairs. You to your room. Me to mine. Though it’s probably the hardest thing I’ve had to do all week.” He said it like a joke. It wasn’t. He had thought of her continually.

  Genevieve had to trip along to keep up with him, the hem of her nightdress and her light robe flying around her. “For goodness’ sake, Bret, isn’t this inappropriate?”

  He had never heard his name sound so good. “Come on, now. You’re a grown woman. And one of the smartest women I’ve yet met.”

  “Smart? Your tone implies I’m also on the sly side.”

  He didn’t answer, but pulled her inside the door of his father’s study, shutting the door. “Highly intelligent, bilingual.” He turned back to her. “Or do you speak other foreign languages? Nothing would surprise me.”

  “I’m tempted to take up Japanese,” she said, taking the much needed opportunity to wrap her flyaway robe more firmly across her body. She wished for a safety pin. A big one. But she could hardly ask for one. “This is a magnificent study.”

  She was brought to a halt, dazzled by the bold masculine furnishings and the “inner sanctum” atmosphere. A large portrait of a very handsome man in his prime hung high behind the imposing red cedar desk. The walls had been panelled in the same glossy timber as the imposing desk. The valuable rug on the floor she thought was antique Sultanbad. There were lots of bronze-mounted bookcases—some holding trophies galore. This was one room Nori hadn’t shown her into.

  Her eyes were drawn back to the large canvas. The resemblance was obvious. The same extraordinary eyes. They blazed in the hard handsome face rather fiercely, Genevieve thought. There was strength and much arrogance there. It was not a kind face. “Your father?” she asked.

  “Yes.”

  A too brief answer?

  “A strikingly handsome man. You have a strong look of him.” At the same time Trevelyan was very much himself. For one thing she knew he was kind, and his expression lacked that slightly repellent arrogance. She did think he could be fierce if the occasion demanded it. “It must have been a dreadful shock, his tragic premature death?”

  He turned away. “Sometimes I think the reverberations will go on for ever. Take a chair, Genevieve. I’ll pour you a drink.”

  “Please, not bath-sized,” she cautioned, sinking into a dark green leather armchair and arranging her robe modestly across and around her. “I actually like a fine single malt. Now and again, I hasten to say.”

  Right now she was in need of something to calm her leaping nerves.

  “Here you are. Just a little water.” He handed her a crystal tumbler. “Drink up. You might as well.”

  “Might as well what?” Her green eyes flashed up at him.

  He had already decided he liked sea-green eyes the best of all. “Settle down, Genevieve,” he said mildly, resting back himself against the desk.

  It gave him a powerful advantage. “I’ll settle when I’m back upstairs,” she said, fortifying herself with a long sip. “Forgive me, when your pain is still raw, but have there been lesser tragedies on the station? It has a long colonial history. I haven’t as yet found many, beyond the sometimes fatal accidents that happen on a working cattle station.”

  He downed his Scotch in a couple of gulps. “What exactly has Hester given you? I have to tell you this all started out just as a diversion for her. She’s been lost in the years since she could no longer play. No matter what Derryl has to say—he’s a real Philistine—Hester was a very fine pianist.”

  “I’m sure she was. I’m hoping she’ll allow me to listen to her recordings.”

  “Only two we could salvage,” he said. “They’re now safe on CD. It is the digital age.”

  “And the sound is good?”

  “As good as very expensive technicians could get it. I think you’ll be impressed.”

  “I can see I’ll have to work very hard on my technique,” she said. “One fears comparisons with a fine pianist.”

  “What technique would that be?” There was a slightly cynical twist to his mouth. “How to seduce a man on sight? How to keep him tantalised?”

  She swallowed so fast she choked, had to cough. “Excuse me?”

  “Get your breath back,” he urged kindly. “Try as I might I can’t exactly trust you, Genevieve. The ghostwriter is a cover-up.”

  “Is it? Why, then, am I expending so much time and effort? You don’t trust me. But I’ve accepted you the way you are. And don’t laugh.” She saw the amused mockery that flared across his striking face.

  “I wasn’t planning to,” he lied. “Come along, Genevieve. Let me take your glass. Empty, I see.”

  “Lord knows you didn’t give me much.”

  He laughed. “Just a therapeutic dose. Where do you keep your stash when you’re at home?” He placed the two tumblers on the open lid of the cabinet.

  Genevieve rose to her feet, feeling she had lost so much grip on the situation it had robbed her of her normal composure. “As if I’d tell you.” Her robe securely wrapped around her like armour, she started to move to the door.

  “Wait for me.” Again the inbuilt voice of command. “I don’t want you tripping over the hem of that ravishing nightgown.”

  He could do anything with his voice, she thought. Command attention. Reduce her legs to jelly. She stood there, heart palpitating. The pace of events was incredible. No wonder she felt so stressed. “I had no idea you were such a maddening man. I thought you’d be remote—on the severe side.”

  “Well, you got that wrong.” He reached out for her and turned her so her back was pressed against the door.

  Genevieve heard the sw
ift rise of her own exhalation. She stared up at him, making a great effort to control her voice. “You gave me your solemn promise, remember?”

  “Yes, yes, I did.” He put his hands flat to the door on either side of her, effectively keeping her contained.

  All chance of escape was gone.

  “But surely that was a solemn promise not to take you to my bed?” he asked. “Well, not until such time as I’m invited.”

  Instantly she felt her body break out in a fine dew of perspiration. His bed! His king-sized bed! His mouth on her. His hands on her, gliding all over her responsive body. His touch on her breasts. Just the thought had her long slender legs wilting like flower stalks beneath her. She’d had no idea that with the right man she could morph into a voluptuous woman, waiting…longing…yearning…for that man to take her.

  “I said nothing about not giving you a goodnight kiss.” He was staring into her widened green eyes. “Again, therapeutic. We need to blot out that ex-fiancé who shall be nameless for ever. What exactly did he do wrong?”

  Fiancé? What fiancé? She received more sexual stimulation from the sound of Trevelyan’s voice than from anything Mark had ever done to or with her. “It’s a long story,” she murmured, in a strangely somnolent voice.

  “I’m sure you have plenty of those.”

  “Don’t we all?” Somehow she rallied. “Your ex-fiancé—Liane—wouldn’t make allowances for experimental kisses. She’s still madly in love with you. Very stupidly, she lost you. Why is that? The short version will do.”

  He moved a hand to brush her cheek, as though gauging her temperature. “Maybe I’ll tell you eventually—but not tonight. So, should I be flattered? Why would you think I broke it off?”

  “I know you did.” She spoke with certainty.

  “Ah, a beautiful magnolia-skinned woman, with rippling Titian hair and sea-green eyes, is clairvoyant as well. I’m sure Liane confided she became very tired of being, in her words, ‘second best’.”

  “Was she?” she asked with a troubled note. “Would any woman have to take second place to Djangala and the Trevelyan business empire?”