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The calf was penned into a stall with her e-eyed creature as she watched it suckle greedily

‘Everything obviously went all right, then,’ she observed as he walked her back to the car

‘It was touch and go for a while, but in the end it wasn’t as bad as we feared—which reies to Val Could you dropnew tyres fitted ready for the snow they’re forecasting I can pick it up and ies at the same time’

Chelsea had to suppress a se frame into the small front seat of the car

She was a competent driver and was pleased to see that Toainst female drivers It took thee Tom directed her to park in a quiet side street off the e

‘Why down here?’ she asked hih the back ards the e’

‘I know, but if you had I wouldn’t have been able to do this,’ Tom said softly

His kiss took her by surprise The pressure of his mouth arm and firm with no hint of the steelto adh the brief embrace had been it in no way stirred her blood as Slade’s had done, Chelsea ly in Tom’s arms

A dark car flashed past and he released her reluctantly ‘I’’s not as roised ruefully ‘I’ll give you a ring later in the week Perhaps we can arrange to go out together?’

As she watched hihed She liked To her, and it made her wary After Darren she had vowed that no h to her emotionally to treat her as he had done—and yet here she was breaking that voice over Shivering a little, she re-started the car and drove slowly back towards the Dower House

She parked the car carefully in front of the house and then let herself in with the key Mrs Rudge had given her The first thing she saas a note on the hall table froe to do the flowers for the church

Chelsea knew that Mrs Rudge was one of a s the se, and normally on these occasions the housekeeper was absent for several hours, spending the evening with a friend who collected her in her car and then brought her back again

She would just ht o her way upstairs She felt tired and was unwilling to ad it hard to deal with the physical presence of Slade Ashford in the sa on a stone, his acerbic co away her self-possession,it harder and harder for her to assume a mask of indifference towards him

Even without the added complication of what had happened at Melchester she would have found hinore, she admitted wearily, but at least without it she would not have been forced to bear his gritty deterhtful dues In fact she doubted that he would have spared her lance Men like Slade Ashford were used to having woht bitterly; she doubted that he had ever in his whole life needed to do the chasing, and she was pretty sure that in normal circumstances the coldly indifferent attitude she wore like a protective arainst men of his type would have kept him at a distance—she had very little illusions and had always suspected that to men of his type the fruit which remained elusively out of reach at the top of the tree did notit when exactly the saround quite freely

She had no one but herself to bla her; albeit for theshe could do noas tobut distaste and dislike

Not given to self-delusion, she paused with one foot on the upper at the corners of her mouth as she asked herself inwardly how exactly she hoped to achieve that after last night’s performance!

And it was no use trying to pretend that she had not responded to hinised her response; he had made it only too plain that he had

What was the ly; was she destined always to fall into the sarammed to respond only to the type of man common sense warned her to avoid, or was it simply that at heart she was still every bit as foolishly vulnerable as her own niece?

Pushing aside the thought, she opened her bedroom door, and then stood frozen to the spot as she saw the ainst the casement

‘What are you doing inher bag on to a chair as she walked determinedly towards him Two yards away she calea in his eyes