Vacation with a Commanding Stranger

‘Where did that come from?’ he demanded.

‘I found her outside. Not that it’s any business of yours,’ Livvy told him furiously.

He was looking at her, his eyes full of contempt and a brilliant, dangerous anger. It was almost as though he wanted her to challenge him, to provoke him, Livvy recognised, swallowing on her reaction to him.

‘You realise that it’s probably covered you in fleas?’ he told her.

Livvy refused to respond. What did he think she was? The kind of silly idiot who would immediately throw the cat to the floor in horror? Nevertheless, she made a mental note to buy some flea powder when she next went shopping.

Ignoring his comment, she walked towards the door, still carrying the cat in her arms.

His terse, ‘Where are you going?’ checked her just as she reached it, and this time as she turned round to face him she made no attempt to hide her anger. Her eyes were brilliant with it, her whole body registering her independence and resentment.

‘I’m putting the cat out for the night, before I go to bed. Not that it’s any business of yours,’ she told him fiercely.

‘Going to bed? At this time?’ His eyebrows rose. ‘Somehow you don’t strike me as the early-night-with-a-good-book type.’

‘The reason I’m going to bed early is because I can’t bear the thought of having to spend any more time than I have to in your company.’

She opened the door, put the cat down and closed her eyes, trying to steady herself. Her car was parked only yards away and for a moment she was achingly tempted to get in it and simply drive away. But how could she do that? She had promised Gale she would stay, and besides, why should she allow a man like that to bully and manipulate her? And that was what he was doing. He was probably hoping she would leave, already gloating mentally over his victory over her.

Taking deep, steady breaths of fresh air, she turned round and walked back into the kitchen.

As she walked past him, Livvy saw that he was studying the list she had left on the kitchen table. Lifting his head, he looked at her, his eyes cold and cynical.

‘I see that despite the fact that Gale doesn’t seem to want George’s company, she isn’t averse to spending his money. How like a woman.’

‘That isn’t true,’ Livvy defended her cousin hotly. ‘George is the one who…’ She caught herself up abruptly. She wasn’t going to discuss her cousin’s marriage with him.

‘Gale made those plans for the farmhouse last year…’

‘When she must have known that George had already overextended himself to buy this place. No wonder the poor devil is…’ He stopped abruptly while Livvy stared at him, her own feelings pushed to one side as she wondered how he came to know so much about George’s financial affairs. George had never struck her as the kind of man to confide in other members of his sex. Come to think of it, a man like Richard Field was the very last kind of man she would have imagined someone like George having as a close friend. They were so completely opposite. George, the devoted, mild-tempered, placid husband and father, Richard Field, so openly contemptuous of her sex, and so very obviously neither mild nor placid.

And at the back of her mind, although she fought to acknowledge it, was an awareness of the greatest difference between them: George was her cousin’s husband and she knew Gale loved him, but there was no way that even her cousin could claim that George possessed one-tenth of the intense male sexuality that Richard Field had in such abundance.

‘Did your cousin even think of the financial burden she was forcing on him when she overruled him and insisted on buying this place?’

‘Gale wanted the farmhouse so that they could all come here and relax,’ Livvy protested, but nevertheless she was biting her bottom lip, remembering how often in the past other members of the family had criticised Gale for her domineering ways, and for the manner in which she often steamrollered over any opposition to her wishes.

Gale would never knowingly do anything to hurt George, Livvy was sure, but perhaps unknowingly… She caught herself up… What was she doing, allowing him to sway her judgement, to…?

Across the table from her he gave a harsh snort of derision.

‘For them all to enjoy? Or for her to brag about to her friends…’

‘She wanted to be able to get George to take a proper holiday,’ Livvy interrupted furiously. ‘She wanted to get him away from that monster of a boss of his who treats him like a slave, making him work virtually twenty-four hours a day. If there are any problems to Gale and George’s marriage, then he’s the one who’s caused them with his impossible demands on George, not Gale… Gale and George were perfectly happily married until he took over the company…’

Livvy stopped. She was breathing hard, her face flushed, her temper high. She flicked a look in Richard Field’s direction.

His face was shadowed and unreadable, his body still.

Something about his silence, his stillness goaded Livvy on, rushing her into impetuous, angry speech as she added contemptuously,

‘No wonder his own marriage ended in divorce. I wouldn’t be surprised if he actually wanted to break up George and Gale’s marriage, if he was actually deliberately…’

‘You don’t know what the hell you’re talking about.’

Livvy tensed, blinking nervously. Something she had said had obviously touched a raw nerve. She had never seen him looking so angry, not even before when he had… She shivered and backed nervously away from the table. If he should try to take hold of her again, to punish her with a repeat performance… This time he wouldn’t find her such an easy victim; this time she would be prepared, on her guard; this time she would be able to withstand the fierce intensity of his sexuality, meeting it with icy coldness, letting him know how she truly felt about him, how…