‘Well then. Now we really are kissing cousins.’
The smile that curled his mouth made her pulses race. His eyes on her lips, he said softly, ‘I certainly hope so.’
* * *
She was still half in a daze when the others came home. Oliver was full of the war stories the colonel had been telling him, and Tara was talking anxiously about the labrador puppies who needed a good home.
‘Tom is such a sweet man,’ Fanny told her when the children had been put to bed. ‘And so thoughtful. He told me he thought I ought to get away for a little while… have a holiday. Of course I told him it was out of the question. For one thing there simply isn’t the money. And then I could hardly go off and leave you alone to cope with Oliver and Tara.’
At first inclined to agree with her, it occured to Lucy that her recent irritation with Fanny might have sprung from the fact that they were both still suffering the after-effects of her father’s death and, that being the case, it might possibly be a good idea for Fanny to have a short break.
‘If you wanted to go away I’m sure something could be arranged,’ she suggested thoughtfully.
‘Do you think so?’ Immediately Fanny brightened. ‘Tom did mention that a friend of his has an apartment in Marbella which he is sure I could rent for next to nothing.’
Privately Lucy doubted that, but she held her peace. They were not so short of money that Fanny couldn’t go away if she wanted to and although she was determined to take a responsible and caring attitude towards her guardianship of the children, it was no part of her brief to monitor Fanny’s spendings or say what she should spend her allowance on.
‘I think it would do us both good,’ Lucy told her generously. ‘We’re neither of us used to living so much on top of one another. The Dower House is quite sizeable compared with most houses, but it is an awful lot smaller than the Manor.’
‘Oh, Lucy, you are a darling.’
She found she was being enthusiastically hugged. ‘I’m sorry I’ve been such a beast lately. But I’m so lost without your father. Would you like me to speak to Saul and tell him that I was wrong—that you don’t dislike him?’
Lucy shook her head, giving her a small smile.
‘No—it’s already done,’ she told her wryly. ‘By me!’
Within a couple of days everything was arranged. Fanny would fly out to Marbella at the weekend for a fortnight’s stay in the colonel’s friend’s apartment.
During those two days Lucy had seen Saul on several occasions. Nothing personal had occurred between them, no reference had been made to the way he had kissed her or the way she had responded, but she was conscious of a complete change-about in his manner towards her and she basked in the warmth of it, like a small cat indulging herself in the heat of the sun after the coldness of winter.
Without her knowing it there was a subtle change within her, a certain feminine chemistry that made her more alluring… softer. Tara noticed it.
‘I really like living in the Dower House,’ she confided in Saul one morning when he found her in the stables where he had insisted that Harriet remained.
‘Lucy likes it, too. She’s always laughing—and she cuddles me a lot. I like that!’
Lucy, coming into the stable in search of her just in time to catch her last words, felt herself go a vivid scarlet. Saul, who was looking at her, grinned as she turned to leave the stable; he paused beside her and murmured so that only she could hear, ‘So would I!’
CHAPTER FOUR
FROM then on it seemed at though both she and Saul were possessed by an inner radar system that caused them both to gravitate to the same point at the same time.
Every time it happened Lucy found herself less and less sure that she was too old for the folly of falling in love. Saul only had to look at her and smile for her insides to start melting and her heartbeat to thud. And with every smile, every small gesture he made towards her, Saul said silently that her feelings were not hers alone. Outwardly there was nothing obviously lover-like in his behaviour towards her, but her senses so delicately attuned to his informed her that he was quite well aware of what it did to her when he placed his hand on her arm when he was talking to her, or pushed a wayward curl of hair back off her face with gentle fingers. And his eyes told her that he enjoyed the contact just as much as she did, promising that what was happening between them was merely a tentative, learning prelude to what was to be.
It pleased Lucy that he didn’t rush her. Her feelings towards him were powerful enough to make her slightly afraid. Desire of such a voluptuous intensity was unfamiliar to her and, even while his touch delighted her, it was frightening to realise how vulnerable she was to him.