Vacation with a Commanding Stranger

‘Boarding-school?’

He gave her a wry

look. ‘Why so shocked? It was a very good school. What do you teach?’ he asked her, changing the subject.

‘French,’ Livvy told him shakily.

He had picked up one of the paperbacks she had bought and was studying it.

‘It’s for my French conversation classes. The girls, are at an age where it’s pointless trying to interest them in the classics. I’ve managed to persuade the head to allow me to show French videos. There’ll be a question and answer session afterwards, and a discussion group, so that they’ll have to concentrate on what they’re watching.’

‘Is it a single-sex school?’ he asked her, as he studied the paperback he was holding.

‘No,’ Livvy responded, adding wryly, ‘I know it isn’t going to be easy finding something equally appealing to the boys as well as the girls, but…’

‘Computer games…’ he told her.

Livvy stared at him, watching as his frown disappeared and a small smile tugged at the corners of his mouth.

‘I’m sorry. I’m interfering, aren’t I? It’s just that both my stepbrothers who are in their teens are mad on computer games…’

‘Your father remarried, then?’ Suddenly, for no reason she could think of, Livvy found that her heart was lifting, her own mouth starting to curve into a responsive smile.

‘Eventually.’

‘And you…you don’t mind…?’

‘No. My stepmother has made him very happy. She was his secretary for many years and knew him very well.’

‘And you get on well with her…?’

Livvy wasn’t sure why it suddenly seemed important to ask that question, why it should matter to her that there might be one woman whom he could like and respect.

When he hesitated, she found that she was holding her breath, willing him not to retreat from her, willing him to answer her. ‘I do now,’ he said eventually.

‘Now?’

His smile had gone. ‘She didn’t want me to get married. She didn’t care for my wife. Perhaps if I’d listened to her…’ He stopped abruptly and Livvy flushed, realising how inquisitive she was being. Would he put it down to mere feminine nosiness and curiosity, or would he guess that her interest had a much more personal motivation? What personal motivation? she asked herself nervously. Hadn’t she already agreed with herself that she was not going to allow herself to develop any personal interest in him? That it was far too dangerous to do so?

‘I get on very well with her,’ he told her, but his tone had become slightly brusque. Sensitively, Livvy recognised it and stopped herself from asking any more questions.

Instead she said as lightly as she could, ‘Computer games… Thanks for the tip. I suspect you’re probably right. I would never have thought of it myself. They aren’t something that appeals to me…my brain just doesn’t work in that kind of way.’

She looked up and caught the fleeting look of surprise in his eyes.

‘It’s very honest of you to admit it.’

It was Livvy’s turn to look surprised. ‘We all have our vulnerabilities and weaknesses,’ she told him. ‘I’ve never seen any point in trying to deny mine. I have a gift for languages which in its way involves a form of logic, but it isn’t the same kind of logic needed to work out mathematical sequences or become computer-adept, and besides…’

‘It’s not very feminine. Like knowing how to change a tyre. Very flattering to the male ego.’

His voice had hardened again and Livvy gritted her teeth. Why on earth was it that, every time they seemed to be talking to one another as normal human beings, he had to spoil everything by reverting to challenging her…accusing her…

Perhaps because it was his only way of protecting and defending himself. From her? Why should he need to? She didn’t pose any threat to him, did she?

He placed her papers on the table and turned away from her, walking over to the fridge.

Livvy tried to recapture her interest in her work, to concentrate on what she was supposed to be doing, but somehow her attention kept drifting away from the papers in front of her and in the direction of the man working quietly and determinedly in the corner of the room. He had his back to her and she could see the muscles moving in his back as he applied the wrench to the rusty connections of the existing gas container. He was wearing a shirt, but the pressure needed to loosen the connections was pulling it taut against his flesh.