A Seductive Revenge

She cleared her throat to let him know she was there. ‘Good morning,’ she called out politely. The figure turned slowly.

‘Bore da, Flora.’ Josh exhausted the limit of his Welsh.

She must have walked into the shop and bought it all up, he decided, giving her a quick once-over from her sunlit hair to her shiny new boots. All the stylish, squeaky new clothes were top-of-the-range mountain gear which showed off her lovely long length of leg and neat, incredibly small waist. A light crop of freckles had emerged across the bridge of her nose and her cheeks were healthily flushed, whether from exertion or from the shock of seeing him he wasn’t quite sure…but he had his suspicions.

‘You!’ Flora, who had forgotten to breathe for several stupefied moments, took a deep noisy gulp to compensate.

‘It’s enough to make a man believe in coincidence,’ he drawled, lifting a hand to shade his eyes from the sun.

She nodded in a dazed sort of way. Looking at her with a clear-eyed sardonic grey gaze, he was displaying none of the awkwardness she, because of the way they’d parted, felt—he didn’t even seem surprised to see her. Willing her eyes not to make any detours over his naked torso, she kept them firmly trained on his face.

‘Or fate.’ Now why, she wondered with a silent groan, did I say that?

‘And do you?’ he enquired, unexpectedly expanding on the theme. ‘Believe in fate?’ He speared a pitchfork into the ground and leaned on it to casually watch her. Flora found the unblinking scrutiny uncomfortable.

Her curiosity reached boiling point and she succumbed to growing temptation and risked a quick, surreptitious peek at his leanly muscled chest and flat belly. Her stomach muscles did uncomfortable and worrying things. The earthy image hadn’t done anything to soothe her jangled nerves or hot cheeks.

It was the little details like the line of hair that disappeared like a directional arrow beneath the waistband of the worn blue jeans he wore that got her especially hot under the collar. She wondered what he’d make of it if she picked up the discarded plaid shirt she’d spotted and begged him to put it on—too much is what he’d make of it, she told herself derisively.

‘Fate!’ she hooted robustly. ‘Of course not.’ Her tone was laced with a shade of indignation. What sort of silly woman did he think she was? ‘You live here, then?’ She recalled he never had got around to telling her what he did for a living. He didn’t look much like her idea of a farmer, but then what did she, the ultimate townie, know?

‘No, just helping out for a few weeks.’

A casual farm labourer! This possibility seemed even more unlikely than the first option. She’d had him pegged as someone who, even if he didn’t give orders, definitely didn’t take them off anyone. To her there seemed something of the maverick about him.

Her own father had always been proud of his humble beginnings as the son of a coalminer and it struck her forcibly that he’d be ashamed if he knew his own daughter nurtured snobbish preconceptions about manual labourers. Just because a man used his muscles to earn a crust didn’t mean he didn’t have a brain, and if she needed proof she only had to look as far as this man. Those extraordinary eyes of his held a biting degree of intelligence.

If her friend’s reports were anything to go by, babies were expensive creatures, and most of those households who were frequently pleading poverty brought in two hefty professional salaries. This man had a child to bring up alone and, it seemed, no professional qualifications. Under the circumstances he couldn’t afford to be picky about work. It must be hard worrying about money and coping with parenthood, she reflected. He faced problems every day she couldn’t begin to understand; her soft heart swelled with empathy. It made her feel guilty when she considered her own comparative embarrassment of worldly riches.

‘Helping! Is that what you call it?’ A large young man with a lilting accent and a head of shocking red hair jeered as he came up behind Josh and thumped him good-naturedly on the back. ‘Slacking more like, man.’ He laughed. He looked with interest at Flora, his bold eyes admiring. ‘Fast worker, aren’t you?’ he added slyly to Josh in a soft voice.

Flora fell back on her frozen routine, but frustratingly neither man appeared to notice. Josh gave a tolerant, unembarrassed smile.

‘Geraint, this is Flora.’ He casually performed the introductions. ‘She’s staying in the village. Flora, this big bull is Geraint Jones.’

‘The heir apparent,’ Geraint told her, swaggering in an inoffensive way. ‘You going to actually do any work today, Josh?’ he added sarcastically, jumping into a tractor and revving up the engine. ‘See you later, cariad,’ he called to Flora. ‘And remember, if you want any real work done I’m your man,’ he boasted. ‘Now, if you want a bit of sissy painting…’ he taunted, driving noisily off.

It was similar to an encounter with a bulldozer. ‘Is he always so…?’

‘Always, but a bit more so when a beautiful woman is around.’

She’d been called beautiful so often it didn’t even register now, so why were her lower limbs suddenly afflicted by a debilitating weakness?

‘You paint? I mean, that’s your real trade?’ An idea, probably not a good one, was occurring to her. It would be foolish to blurt anything out before she’d considered the implications of her inspiration.

‘You could say that,’ Josh confirmed a shade cautiously.

Flora was so excited by the brilliance of her idea that she decided that she’d throw caution to the winds.

‘Well, I don’t know what your schedule’s like at the moment…?’

‘Flexible,’ he responded honestly.

‘Well, I might be able to put some work your way. My friend Claire,’ she explained hurriedly, ‘the one who is letting me use her cottage—she asked me to find someone to redecorate the small bedroom in the cottage while I’m here. It’s really dark and poky and she’s just had a baby…Emily…’ On anyone else Josh would have called that soft, fleeting little smile sentimental. ‘And she wants the room redone before she comes up at Christmas. If you’re interested…’

‘You’re offering me a job?’ He was looking at her oddly.

‘You wouldn’t be working for me,’ she informed him, anxious to make this point quite clear from the outset. ‘I’m only acting as an agent for Claire.’

‘Decorating a bedroom? You want me to decorate a bedroom?’

Flora glared. Was it such a revolutionary notion? Hadn’t he decorated a bedroom before? Anyone would think she’d said something funny. She hadn’t expected or wanted gratitude but he looked as though he was about to fall about laughing.

Maybe it was a male pride thing, she pondered. He might not like people, especially a woman, to know he was strapped for cash. She tried to see it from his point of view and had to concede it was possible she was coming over a bit lady bountiful.

‘If you’re too busy…’

‘Aren’t you afraid I’ll kiss you again?’

She didn’t see the question coming until it hit her dead centre; it completely threw her off balance. Aren’t you more afraid he won’t? the sly inner voice silkily suggested.

Taking a deep breath, she made emergency repairs on her shattered poise. Her slender shoulders lifted casually. ‘I hardly think that’s likely,’ she scoffed laughingly. ‘I’m aware it was just a…’

One dark brow quirked enquiringly as she searched for words. Flora flushed.

‘A momentary impulse,’ she choked resentfully.

‘Aberration, even,’ he agreed soothingly.

She frowned at him with irritation; she knew deliberate provocation when she heard it. She needed to knock this kissing thing on the head once and for all.

‘For your information, I’ve just broken up with my fiancé kissing isn’t on my agenda.’

‘Why did you do that?’

Flora looked at him blankly.

‘Break up with your fiancé, that is.’

Flora glared at him. ‘None of your damned business,’ she declared hotly.

‘Sorry,’ he sympathised with a patently false sincerity that set her teeth on edge. ‘Sensitive subject.’

‘Not at all sensitive!’ she snapped immediately. ‘Paul asked me to make a choice and I didn’t make the one he expected.’ Paul had been astonished when she had failed to see how imperative it was for her to distance herself from her disgraced father. His astonishment had eventually turned to anger at what he perceived as her selfishness. ‘Also,’ she added with feeling, ‘he was a prize prat!’

‘In fact,’ Josh drawled, his eyes on her mutinous, flushed face, ‘it was a normal, mutually amicable parting.’

‘I’m just trying to explain why kissing isn’t high on my agenda just now, so you can rest easy,’ she told him, regretting her outburst.

She couldn’t help recalling that kissing her had not exactly made him happy the first time, so he probably wouldn’t want to again. She remembered the bleak expression in his eyes as he’d made that extraordinary statement. If he really hadn’t kissed anyone for some time that meant he had a whole lot of sexual frustration to get rid of. She didn’t want to be his therapy. Although, she conceded, letting her eyes roam at will for one self-indulgent moment over his sleekly powerful body, there would be fringe benefits! It was almost enough to make a girl sorry she wasn’t into shallow and superficial relationships.

‘Ah, you’re afraid of the rebound thing…?’

Her teeth clenched. Was he jumping to all the wrong conclusions deliberately? She met his eyes—you bet he was, she concluded instantly. There was no mistaking the fact he was enjoying her discomfiture. He’d probably taken delight in depriving flies of their wings when he was a little boy.

‘There’s absolutely no prospect of me rebounding in your direction!’

‘You mean you don’t encourage the hired help to take liberties. This isn’t actually about being off men in general, just a particular category of men, for which read those without the fancy cars, fancy clothes and fancy salaries to match.’ His voice was coldly derisive.

He made her feel so guiltily defensive that she almost began searching her conscience until she realised that, whatever other faults she had, she had never judged people by their bank balances, although she knew plenty of people that did.

‘Are you implying I’m a snob?’

He considered the heated accusation. ‘I don’t know you well enough to imply anything—yet,’ he qualified.

Flora didn’t like that little contemplative smile that accompanied the qualification one little bit. For starters it made her pulse-rate do slightly scary things.

‘Do you want the job?’ she snapped, already regretting her silly altruism. The man had got by before she’d come along; it wasn’t as though he looked malnourished or anything—far from it!

Josh looped his thumbs in the loops of his waistband and looked thoughtful. ‘What’s it pay?’

‘Pay!’ she echoed in a startled voice.

‘You didn’t expect me to do it for free, did you?’

Her lips tightened at the sarcasm; he really did have a knack of making her feel embarrassed and just ever so slightly stupid. If anything, she normally played down her intellect in front of men; for some reason this one made her feel positively inadequate!

‘Of course I didn’t. I just hadn’t thought…’ God, what happened to detached and businesslike? I sound like a real pea brain! She cleared her throat and tried to retrieve the situation. ‘What’s the going rate?’ she enquired briskly.

He named a figure and she nodded sagely.

‘That sounds fair,’ she agreed gravely. She didn’t know what she was talking about and she suspected he knew it. If he was trying to rip her off she’d have to make up the excess from her own pocket; she couldn’t make Claire suffer financially because she wasn’t prepared to admit her ignorance in front of this man.

‘That’s a deal, then.’ He approached her, hand extended.

Flora stared at the strong hand as if it were a snake. As she tentatively placed her own in his the scent of his warm body reached her nostrils. She tried not breathing but the faint musky smell still made her stomach muscles twang like the entire string section of an orchestra. The unseasonally hot day wasn’t entirely responsible for the sweat that trickled slowly down between her breasts.

He didn’t shake her hand, instead he raised it to his lips in a gesture that should have been absurd, only she felt no desire to laugh at all…melt, well, yes…that was another thing entirely!

He lifted his head and looked directly into her eyes; the expression in those silvery depths was explicitly sensual. It was at that second that she knew exactly how big a mistake she’d made in virtually inviting the man into her home!

Calm down, Flora, she told herself firmly as her heart-rate rocketed. Think worst scenario: you bump into him—not literally, of course—occasionally. She stubbornly worked around images that wouldn’t quite clear from her head of several interesting varieties of collisions she could have with Josh Prentice. She bit back a horrified whimper.

Cope, of course she could cope! She hadn’t reached her advanced years without being able to survive mentally and emotionally intact the odd bit of sexual craving. She could cope with anything. She was going to fill her lungs with gallons of fresh country air! Wholesome, emotionally untaxing pursuits like walking the hills and talking to the odd sheep were going to fill her days, not steamy daydreams.

‘If you have other commitments,’ she began hopefully, putting her tingling hand behind her back and rubbing it against the soft wool of her sweater. ‘It might be more convenient for you to decorate the nursery after I’ve left.’

‘And when would that be?’

‘I’m not entirely sure yet.’ Dad didn’t want her to visit while he was in the programme.

‘You must have very understanding bosses.’

Flora smiled vaguely and didn’t explain that since she’d been made a partner last year she was one of the bosses. Actually her colleagues had been incredibly supportive throughout the ordeal of the trial.

‘There’s actually no hurry or anything.’

‘It’s very considerate of you to worry about my welfare.’

Flora didn’t feel considerate, she felt cornered!

‘But I’m quite adept at juggling more than one task.’

This boast drew a small, wry grin from Flora. ‘Not like any men I’ve met, then,’ she snorted.

‘No,’ he mused with an arrogantly confident smile. ‘I think you’ll find I’m actually not like any other man you’ve met.’ His voice flowed over her like warm, rich molasses.

Flora swallowed nervously and dabbed the tiny pinpricks of sweat that beaded her upper lip with the tip of her tongue.

His grey eyes zoomed in on the nervous gesture; his nostrils flared. ‘Besides,’ he continued hoarsely, ‘we won’t be here long.’

‘You mean you and Liam don’t live here? I assumed… Do you move around a lot?’

‘A man has to go where the work is.’

His hard, emotionless statement confirmed her initial suspicions concerning his finances and she was glad she’d been able to put some work his way, even though he was a very hard man to relax around.

‘That must be hard with a child,’ she sympathised softly.

‘You disapprove.’ His lip lifted in a faint sneer as he pounced on this evidence of her judgemental nature with relish.

‘I’m no judge of such things—’ and never would be if her track record so far was anything to go by, she thought gloomily ‘—but Liam looked a pretty happy, well-adjusted child to me.’

‘You’ll find out when you have one of your own that all kids have a little bit of the Jekyll and Hyde in them.’

The idea of having a child of her own brought about an odd, achy sensation—had her biological clock swung into action early? she wondered. At twenty-seven she’d always considered she had plenty of time to think about children.

‘That presupposes I want some of my own.’

‘And you don’t.’ His expression seemed to suggest he wasn’t surprised.

‘I didn’t say that,’ she countered crossly. ‘I just don’t like it when people make assumptions. Besides, call me an old-fashioned girl, but I think it sensible to think about babies after I find a suitable father for them.’

‘Paul the prat wasn’t keen on kids, then,’ he sympathised.

‘Paul,’ she felt goaded into rashly revealing, ‘requires all the proper accessories in his life.’ Her lips acquired a cynical twist as she considered Paul’s priorities. He’d probably have expected her to time the pregnancies to coincide with election years; a baby or a pregnant wife must be good for the odd vote or two.

‘It sounds like the perfect match to me. You look like an accessory sort of lady yourself.’ He was looking appraisingly at her very expensive clothes.

‘You do insults amazingly well, Mr Prentice.’ Flora’s nostrils flared. ‘Strangely, I don’t feel inclined to discuss my shallowness just now.’

‘You remembered my name…eventually, and it’s Josh.’

Truth be told, she remembered everything about him including the expert way he kissed. ‘Your name, but not how offensive you are, obviously,’ she hissed, ‘or I wouldn’t have offered you the job.’

‘I wondered how long the “I’m not the boss just the agent” line would last,’ he fired back with a cynical sneer. ‘I suppose you’re going to be watching everything I do, stifling my artistic freedom…’

The sheer bloody-minded silliness of this accusation ought to have made her laugh, but it didn’t. Did he take his shirt off indoors too? Perspiration prickled over her entire body as for the duration of a single heartbeat she contemplated what watching this man at work would do to her indiscriminate hormones. It made her bones ache just thinking about it.

‘Nothing,’ she told him, her voice shaking with sincerity, ‘could be further from the truth and you can let your artistic inclinations run wild,’ she promised recklessly.

‘Every man has his price,’ he admitted solemnly. ‘That sounded suspiciously like an offer I can’t refuse.’

He made it sound as though she’d been begging for his professional services. ‘That’s…that’s marvellous,’ she responded weakly.

‘I’ll make a start tomorrow.’

‘That soon!’

Her spontaneous dismay made his lips twitch. ‘Before you change your mind.’

‘I wouldn’t go back on a deal, despite provocation…’ she told him, angrily defending her integrity. The man somehow managed to twist everything she said to his own advantage. With that marketable ability combined with his indisputable physical attributes—which, sad though it was, did make a difference—she was amazed he hadn’t found a lucrative niche somewhere. ‘I think you’re in the wrong job,’ she reflected drily.

‘You’re not alone there.’ He grinned wryly, recalling how horrified his family had been when he’d turned his back on the academic avenues open to him and announced his intention of becoming an artist. They’d come around now, of course; success made a lot of things acceptable.

‘You should use your natural talents.’

He looked struck by the idea. ‘Like kissing, you mean,’ he suggested with a hungry-tiger smirk.

‘Why,’ she ejaculated, ‘do you keep bringing that up?’ Her teeth hurt as she ground them yet again.

‘Because it’s on your mind, not to mention mine…? Yes,’ he confirmed, giving the subject some thought, ‘that’s it. I keep thinking about kissing you.’ His jaw tightened. It was true and unforgivable: when he ought to be concentrating on other more vital issues his mind kept returning to that single brief, unsatisfactory kiss.

His resentful glare suggested it was all her fault—the cheek of the man—and typical of men, full stop!

‘Why? Do I look like your wife? Do I remind you of her or something?’

Flora was so shocked to hear the words leave her lips she gave a horrified gasp and pressed a belated silencing hand over her mouth. True, this question had been nagging away at her since yesterday, but, assuming she’d never see him again, she hadn’t thought she’d ever have the opportunity to ask him, or for that matter the lack of judgement to do so!

Josh had gone very still. Flora started when he slowly began to move towards her. Her attention was riveted by the graceful, lithe way he moved, beautiful but almost menacing. His blank expression told her zero about his intentions, but as he came closer she could see the slashing angle of his chiselled cheekbones seemed more pronounced and a solitary muscle pumped in his lean cheek.

He stopped just in front of her and, reaching out, took her chin in one hand and swept it upwards. His eyes swept dispassionately over her beautiful oval face; he seemed to be unmoved by what he saw.

Flora didn’t move; she couldn’t. Sexual anticipation mingled with mind-numbing apprehension inside her, creating sheer havoc. Wide-eyed, she watched as he slowly shook his dark head firmly from side to side, never for one instant releasing her from the merciless grip of his gaze. Despite the relentless intensity of that stare she couldn’t shake the conviction that he somehow wasn’t actually seeing her, perhaps it was the face of his lost love, little Liam’s mother, he saw.

‘No, you’re nothing like her.’ His voice was harsh. ‘Nothing!’ he added as if he couldn’t emphasise this point too much.

Flora felt a shaft of relief quiver through her. It mattered, she wasn’t quite sure why, but his reply had mattered a lot to her.

‘She wasn’t a blonde.’ His eyes touched the silver strands clustered around her face. ‘But then who’s to say you are?’

‘I think I’m the definitive expert on that subject.’

His hand dropped away and a sudden devilish grin abruptly banished the brooding shadows from his expression. ‘You have no idea how tempted I am to say prove it,’ he suddenly confessed.

‘Restrain yourself!’ She sniffed, wondering how she ought to go about distracting him from this ticklish subject.

‘If I kissed you now would it constitute a sacking offence?’

Flora’s heart turned over in the confined space of her tight chest. As shock seeped steadily through her she caught her breath raggedly and her hot colour faded of its own accord, leaving her pale.

The expression perfectly pale flitted through Josh’s head as he feasted his eyes on the delicate symmetry of her clear-cut features, resting the longest on the full curve of her softly sumptuous lips. His bold, sensual survey made the blood pound noisily in her ears.

Some dim memory of self-preservation told Flora she ought to summon some cutting witticism that would cool his ardour and cut him down to size. After all, didn’t she have enough in her repertoire to suit any occasion?

As she met the smouldering intensity of his speculative gaze the memory flickered and died. Truth told, there was nothing in the world she wanted more than to be kissed by and kiss Josh Prentice. The admission cost her what little sense of what was appropriate she had left. Honesty, even with yourself, especially with yourself, wasn’t always the best policy!

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