page9 (1/2)

She dropped the tapestry and spun round, feeling at a disadvantage in her kneeling position, as her eyes slid upwards over long, lean legs encased in jeans

‘Co to check up on me?’ she asked sweetly

‘Your ehts,’ Slade told her ‘The letter passed on toter in my home…’

‘Your hoe until you inherited you barely visited the place’

He shrugged, patently unconcerned by the housekeeper’s criticism ‘She doesn’t approve of me, or rather the fact that my father ca I used to spend a fortnight with my uncle every year while she ay Perhaps er than the southern, I don’t know, but certainly I feel s’

‘I’ll bet,’ Chelsea e would be just your style!’

‘We considered it taking back as rightfully ours and righting old wrongs,’ he countered sle over her skin as she re debt

His abrupt, ‘Have you finished here for today? Mrs Rudge tells uard

‘I can’t work once the daylight fades,’ Chelsea defended herself, thinking he wasa crack at lack of application to her job ‘And I don’t take a lunch hour’

‘Neither, it seems, do you possess a powerful torch,’ he frowned ‘You shouldn’t be walking out there alone’

‘Who’s going to hurt me?’ Chelsea scoffed ‘A stray sheep—or perhaps you’re thinking of the ghosts of your rebellious ancestors?’

‘What I’ers of all too alive poachers and vagrants We’ve already had proble the suirl-friends anted to take up residence at Darkwater’ He saw her shiver and se for you to have transport There’s a car in the garage that used to belong to my uncle, while you’re up here you’ll use it Understood?’

‘You’re too kind’

‘Very probably,’ came the dry response, ‘but rape and violence aren’t made more palatable siht I’ll walk back to the house with you myself’

The terees while Chelsea had been working and she was glad of her thick hooded jacket when they stepped out into the darkness of the lane A cold east wind seeh her, and she stifled a small start of surprise when she suddenly found Slade Ashford standing between her and the icy blast which had set her shivering As they walked down the lane he uide or touch her, which for some obscure reason increased her tension He was only a man, she reminded herself; no different from any of the others she had known And yet he was different For one thing, he was the only man who had ever penetrated the barriers she had erected around herself after Darren She shuddered suddenly; not because of the wind, but because of the memories suddenly evoked; the response of her own body to those lean knowing hands

‘Cold? We’ll soon be there They’re forecasting snow in the wake of this cold spell’

As they walked he talked about the area and his faht have disarmed someone else, but to Chelsea his very urbanity only served to deepen her distrust of hi other than a brief armed truce between battles When she had walked out on him she had hurt his pride, and he was a ths to assuage such a hurt

The e pounced on Slade, relaying a string ofChelsea a chance to escape to her own rooe came up with a tray of tea and an envelope addressed in Ann’s sloping handwriting