The Final Proposal

‘Well...’ Because she’d soon hear it from someone, Jan told her about the incident, soothing her natural maternal alarm by assuring her that she was completely unhurt.

‘At the polo,’ Cynthia lamented, as though somehow it was especially outrageous that such a thing should have happened there.

‘Ah, well, I was rescued by a superb man,’ Jan said.

‘I wish I could thank him!’

Jan recalled the splintering anger in those frigid eyes and shivered. ‘I’m not likely to see him again,’ she said, and changed the subject. ‘I thought I’d have a shower and then come on over.’

‘Oh, no, you don’t,’ her mother said sternly. ‘You’ll arrive at exactly eight o’clock. Everything is under control. The caterers are doing all the hard work. The flowers are done. The house is spotless. I don’t need you dashing around getting in the way, so have a rest. Make a cup of tea. Wallow in the bath. Read a book. Don’t come near this place until we’re all ready for you!’

Laughing, Jan gave in. Her mother much preferred to prepare for her parties in her own way.

She put the receiver down and wandered out onto the terrace. Ahead, in blissful solitude, stretched the afternoon and early evening. The polo stunt had been the last of the photographic shoots, for which Jan was extremely thankful. In a couple of months Gerry’s article and the photos would appear in the magazine.

Her cousin had even promised to slip in a mention of the centre, and that group of dedicated, mostly unpaid women who worked with and worried about the girls and young women brought to them—many in severe trouble, most just trembling on the brink of it.

Money, Jan thought; it all came down to money. Or the lack of it.

A van, which would be enormously useful, was just a pipedream.

Still, she thought drily as she moved a lounger into the shade of the sky-flower vine that rambled over her pergola, Gerry’s project would put some extra money in the coffers.

She must have gone to sleep, because although the telephone bell invaded her dreams like a berserk bee she was unable to wake herself up in time to answer it. Whoever it was hadn’t left a message, so it wasn’t a summons from the centre. However, the imperative call had destroyed her serenity, leaving her to wander restlessly around the house looking for something to do.

Yawning, she wondered how the trip was going. Ten of the girls who’d been recommended to the centre by a social agency were with selected adults at a camp on one of the islands in the Hauraki Gulf. A weekend wasn’t long enough, of course, but it would help.

Unfortunately, they needed more than an occasional weekend if the lessons they learned there about their capabilities, and the self-esteem they gained, were to stick with them. On the centre’s wish-list was a camp of their own, where the girls could stay for several weeks if needed, away from the many temptations of the city and from bad companions.

Another pipedream.

A few weeks ago Jan and her committee had worked out how much they needed. ‘We’re not asking for a lot—just the world,’ one of the women had said, staring glumly at the figures.

Now, as she recalled the enormous set-up costs, Jan’s heart quailed. Over the last few years she’d organised exhaustive and very vigorous fundraising to build up their financial base. They no longer had to worry about the rent, and they could afford the social worker’s salary, but, as costs climbed and more girls turned up on their doorstep, they needed another paid social worker.

Every year they still had to go cap-in-hand to various organisations just to get money to struggle along.

So many organisations, all worthwhile, all seeking a share from the public’s generosity.

‘I must be running out of steam,’ she told the potted bay tree out on the terrace as she watered it.

Thirty-one was not old, but it did seem to mark some sort of milestone. Perhaps it was the siren call of her hormones, warning her that time was frittering away.

For the first time Jan didn’t want the party her mother planned with such care to mark each birthday. It was a family tradition, the end-of-summer, welcome-to-autumn party, and friends and relatives from all over the city and its environs came to wish her luck and enjoy themselves enormously.

Possibly this feeling of slow melancholy was what another of her cousins had warned her about.

‘It’s a crunch year—everyone has one,’ she’d said, smiling wryly. ‘Mine was my thirtieth. I woke up in tears, and wept all day. Everyone thought I was mad, but it’s surprising how many women have one awful birthday—usually in their early thirties.’

Jan had enjoyed her thirtieth, which made it ridiculous to feel so ambivalent about her thirty-first. ‘Stop right there,’ she told herself aloud, wandering into the kitchen to pour herself a glass of feijoa and grapefruit juice.

Her gaze fell on the gaily wrapped present her half-sister had given her the day she and her husband left for their South American trip, with instructions to open it just before the party.

Where were they now, Anet and her husband of almost a year? Slashing their way through some tropical jungle, probably. For the first time, Jan allowed herself to admit that she envied Anet and Lucas the unmeasured, consuming love they shared.

Because she’d never fallen in love.

Not once.

Oh, there’d been a lover when she was twenty—she shivered, recalling the painful, humiliating end to that affair, if affair it could be called—and since then several men had asked her to marry them. A couple of them she’d liked and been attracted to, but she hadn’t ever felt that complete confidence, the essential trust that allowed normally sensible and wary people to confide their life and their happiness to another person.

She just wanted everything, she thought sardonically: the electric, passionate involvement, the eager companionship and the complete faith in each other. And if she couldn’t have it all, she wouldn’t settle for less.

Relishing the tangy flavour of her drink, she sipped slowly while into her mind came an image of the man who had wrenched her out of the way of the horse.

A disturbing heat expanded through her. He had presence. However, that wasn’t why she remembered him. She was accustomed to men with presence; her stepfather had it, so did Lucas. And so did Drake Arundell, the husband of a great friend of hers.

The stranger had more than presence; he possessed a disciplined, formidable authority that sent out warning signals. And he moved with the dangerous, predatory swiftness of a hunter.

Finishing the juice, she eyed the dishwasher, then with a half-laugh washed the glass and put it away.

‘He’s probably just your ordinary, average polo player,’ she said firmly as she walked across the passage to her office. ‘Overpaid, oversexed and over here.’

Weaving fantasies about a man she didn’t know and wasn’t likely to see again was stupid and futile. Life was not slipping by; she helped people as best she could, she was good at what she did and she earned good money doing it—and she had a warm, appreciative family. If she never married she’d be a superb aunt to Anet and Lucas’s children when they had some.

Perhaps she should see about getting a cat.

Dressed in a smooth-fitting ivory dress, its neat lines conforming discreetly to her body, Jan walked with her mother across the big sitting room and out onto the wide terrace. A group of her friends were already there, and as she came through the French windows-they began clapping, and called out birthday wishes.

‘You look great,’ Gerry said exuberantly when they had a moment to talk. She, as befitted an entirely more dramatic personality, wore a floating outfit of purples and blues and plum.

‘Thanks,’ Jan said lightly.

Gerry eyed the demure dress. ‘You’re well covered up. Bruises?’

‘A few,’ Jan admitted. ‘Nothing to worry about.’

‘I should have anchored that damned hat,’ Gerry sighed.

‘Yes, well, I’m just glad that no one got hurt. And that the horse and the rider were OK.’

‘The hero was gorgeous,’ her cousin said thoughtfully. ‘I wonder who he was.’

‘One of the polo players.’

‘Perhaps we should have suggested your mother invite a few.’ She leered unconvincingly. ‘They’d give your party a certain je ne sais quoi. All those splendid muscles rippling beneath their shirts. Not to forget the equally splendid ones beneath—’ Stopped by Jan’s raised brows, she broke into a gurgle of laughter and finished, ‘In their legs.’

‘Most of them probably can’t string more than ten words together,’ Jan said, knowing she was being unfair.

‘Who cares? They look like gods.’

‘Centaurs.’

Gerry laughed. ‘OK, although they’re not exactly joined at the waist to their horses. And even if they can’t speak in words of more than two syllables, we could just sip a little champagne and admire their form. Speaking of which—Oh, good Lord—’

Jan turned to follow her entranced gaze. There, standing beside Sally Porter, a friend from schooldays, and directing that killer smile at her mother, stood the man who had saved Jan from being squashed a few hours ago—all six feet two or three of him.

‘Sally’s latest?’ Gerry muttered. ‘I didn’t see her at the polo, but of course she could have been there.’

Jan barely heard her. A hateful, febrile anticipation prickled through her.

‘I’d better go and greet them,’ she said with enormous reluctance when she saw her mother look across to her.

‘I’ll come with you,’ Gerry offered, trying to sound heroic.

Together, they threaded their way across the terrace and inside. Sally, redheaded and vivacious, waved cheerfully. Not a muscle moving in his face, the man beside her watched them walk across the room.

‘Darling,’ Cynthia said warmly, ‘I forgot to tell you that Sally was bringing her cousin with her.’

His name was Kear Lannion, and for some reason the fact that he was Sally’s cousin was important.

Jan’s wary gaze met pale, crystalline eyes and a cool, unsettling smile. Suddenly, violently, awakened to awareness, she rescued her own smile from the oblivion to which shock had consigned it. ‘But we’ve met,’ she said woodenly, holding out her hand. To her mother she explained, ‘Kear was the man who probably saved my life this afternoon.’

He took her hand gently, tempering his strength to her slender bones. ‘Jan,’ he said, in a voice that was deep and rough enough to send a sensual shiver down her spine. ‘It suits you.’

Pierced by swift, sharp antagonism, she smiled. ‘Short and snappy?’

His glance mocked her. ‘Well, no, that’s not exactly what I had in mind. Have you fully recovered?’

‘Yes, thank you’

She wasn’t going to mention her bruises. Neither, although she had to bite back the words, was she going to explain what she’d been doing in that stupid outfit. And she was not going to tell him that he’d only seen the ‘before’ picture. Especially not that, because if she did he’d realise she’d noticed his absence during the ‘after’ session.

But oh, how she wanted to! She even found herself hoping that Gerry would make the explanations. Unfortunately, smiling and fluttering her lashes in a manner Jan found vaguely annoying, Gerry confined her conversation to social pleasantries.

Her mother thanked him fervently, ending with, ‘What a coincidence that you should be Sally’s cousin.’

‘The handsomest of my cousins,’ Sally informed them with relish. If she’d hoped to embarrass him she failed; he gave her that slow smile and, close relative though she was, she lost her place before summoning the poise to continue, ‘The most athletic too. I think the New Zealand team is going to lose half its fans now that Kear’s stopped playing.’

Interestedly, Gerry said, ‘Oh, have you retired?’

‘I can’t give it the time I need to pull my weight. So, yes, today was my last game for New Zealand.’

Another group of people came in through the door. By the time Jan had done her duty by them and found someone for them to talk to, Sally and Kear were deep in discussion with Gerry and another woman on the terrace.

Jan kept well away, but an hour or so later his deep, distinctive voice said from behind her, ‘You look as though you could do with a refill. What would you like?’

‘Orange juice, but I can get it.’

‘It’s no trouble,’ he said. Together they walked across to the temporary bar.

‘Are you a teetotaller?’ he asked when the barman had served her.

‘No, but when you’re my size half a glass is enough to make you uncomfortably hot,’ she said, wondering why her skin felt too tight for her.

‘Wise woman.’

Shrugging, she returned, ‘One learns.’ She covertly searched for someone she could leave him with in a little while, when it wouldn’t be too obvious that she was running away.

Just as the silence between them began to stretch uncomfortably he commented, ‘Did I bruise you when I hurled you out of the way?’ His gaze rested a moment on the sleeves and neckline of her dress.

CHAPTER TWO

JAN’S skin warmed under that deliberate survey. Hoping he hadn’t noticed her hesitation, she said, ‘It’s nothing. And I don’t think I thanked you for saving me.’

‘I’m sorry about the bruising,’ he said. ‘As for your thanks, you didn’t get a chance. I was too busy berating you.’

Startled, she looked up into eyes that shimmered like moonlight on water, a surface silver and translucent yet impossible to see beneath.

‘You had a point,’ she said, wondering why her mouth was so dry. ‘The hat should have been pinned on. Is the horse really all right?’

‘Yes, apart from a few bruises.’ He didn’t attempt to hide the surprise in his tone.

Defensively, she said, ‘I was worried about it. Life is bad enough for a polo pony without—’

His brows rose. ‘Polo ponies are fed like kings and cared for with the utmost devotion. They seem to enjoy the whole experience.’

‘I hope so.’ It had sounded ungracious, so she added, ‘Lots of people think animals are like machines-disposable.’

‘I earn my living from animals. Only a fool doesn’t care for them.’

Sally had told them he was a farmer. Before Jan could stop herself she said shortly, ‘Exploiting them.’

‘Perhaps. But as long as humans eat meat there’ll be farmers. I make sure my animals are looked after and not treated cruelly, and that their death is quick and painless. Which is more than could be said for most animals in the wild.’

‘At least in the wild they’re free,’ she said, more to provoke than because she believed what she was saying.

His smile was ironic. ‘Freedom is a human concept. And, even for Homo sapiens, a full belly and security are more important than any illusory freedom.’

She said, ‘Goodness, you’re a cynic.’

‘I’m a realist.’ His tone was dry as Chardonnay. ‘Most people who live in the country are. When your livelihood is at the mercy of the elements you very soon learn that nature doesn’t value any one thing above the other. Humanity is no more important than animals, and no less.’

She said pertly, ‘So rural life teaches one lessons. I must remember that next time I stay with friends in the country.’

‘I gather you don’t go often.’

‘How did you guess?’ She widened her eyes like those women who believed rapt, slightly glazed stares were a good substitute for conversation. ‘I get twitchy if I’m too far from a bookshop or café. However, if the air didn’t smell so peculiar I might be tempted to go more often.’

She’d caught his attention well and truly. “The air?’

‘Well, there’s no body to it. It hardly seems natural, somehow.’

His mouth twitched. ‘No exhaust fumes.’

He was watching her, not with the interest of a man for a woman he was attracted to, but measuringly, as though he’d like to know what made her tick. A nameless sensation clutched her stomach, tangling her thoughts into incoherence.

‘Exactly,’ she said, smiling, but thinking, I have to get away from here! Failing that, she needed a neutral subject; the usual rules didn’t seem to apply to this man. Teasing him, however mildly, was too much like walking along the edge of a cliff. ‘Sally said you live by the sea. In the Bay of Islands?’

‘No, further north,’ he said. ‘On an estuary where two small rivers join to form a harbour. A little peninsula shelters it from Doubtless Bay and my house is on the peninsula.’

‘Set in pohutukawa trees,’ she said, her voice dulcet and guileless.

‘All the clichés,’ he agreed blandly.

‘It sounds idyllic. How far from the nearest café?’

The glacial depths of his eyes were lit by a spark of humour. ‘Twenty minutes.’

‘Too far for me, alas.’

Smiling, she turned with—she hoped—well-hidden relief as Marcus Fielding came up. Marcus was a bit of a pain, but easy to deal with. Kear Lannion’s penetrating gaze made her feel as though she had to screen every word, every nuance.

‘Janny, darling, how are you?’ Marcus kissed her soundly, keeping one arm looped around her shoulders as he held out his other hand to Kear. ‘How are you, Kear? Haven’t seen you for months. Have you been overseas?’

‘I’ve been busy,’ Kear said, shaking the hand he was offered. He smiled, his striking face confident and compelling. ‘I see you won the Bremner Prize. Congratulations.’

Marcus grinned like a schoolboy. ‘I’d like to say, oh, it was nothing, but as I struggled and bled and anguished for months to get the sculpture ready I don’t feel inclined to,’ he said. ‘At least it gives me a year when I don’t have to worry about money.’

They discussed the award for a few minutes longer before Kear was carried off by Sally to meet some newcomer.

Frowning after the tall figure, Marcus said, ‘God, if I could get him to buy something of mine I’d be made.’

‘I thought he was a farmer.’

‘Darling,’ Marcus said with affectionate malice, ‘of course he is. He’s also something of a Renaissance man, is Kear Lannion. Actually, the farm is a thumping great station, but I doubt very much whether it’s his sole source of income. I’ve heard that he owns quite large chunks of various business and enterprises. I know for certain he’s a director of several companies. Rumour has it he’s got a lot of disposable cash. And he likes to spend some of it on art.’

Jan thought she hid her surprise rather well, but Marcus crowed, ‘Ah, you thought he was a philistine, didn’t you? Shame on you, darling, all your little prejudices are found out. When he buys, the cognoscenti start sniffing around.’

Jan said brightly, ‘Well, in that case let’s hope he likes your stuff’

She had allowed herself to fall into a fairly obvious trap. Kear Lannion was not a man you could slot into a comfortable niche and expect to stay there. She wouldn’t make that mistake again.

With a swift, sideways look, Marcus purred, ‘He has a reputation in other things too.’

Jan stared at him. It was unlike him to be coy; shocking people for the sheer wicked fun of it was more his style.

‘Don’t we all?’ she said neutrally.

‘Ladies love him,’ Marcus said. ‘He likes them too, if they’re tall and willowy and beautiful.’

Only four inches shorter than Kear Lannion, not unhandsome, very smartly dressed and with his full mouth set in a modish sneer, he was no match for Kear’s effortless male magnetism. And he knew it.

Jan said cheerfully, ‘Perhaps you should produce some tall, willowy, beautiful pieces of sculpture for him.’

Laughing, he surprised her by kissing her on the mouth. ‘Jan, you’re incurably nice. Ah, he’s coming back. If I leave you alone, will you sing my praises to him?’

She began to tell him he’d got things wrong, but he grinned and headed off, leaving her caught, as defenceless as a possum on the road at night, in Kear’s dispassionate gaze.

‘Is he your lover?’ Kear asked coolly.

Startled by his unexpected crudeness, she snapped, ‘No, he is not.’

Although discretion warned her to be careful, her pulses raced with a keener, more eager beat. Her reaction, half excitement, half antipathy, bewildered her, because she’d never responded to a man like this before. It wasn’t as though she had anything to base her dislike on either. Kear was interesting to talk to, with a presence that made him an asset at any social occasion; apparently he was also a worthy member of society and an honest businessman.

She was being absurdly sensitive. Clutching precariously at her temper, she said, ‘Now, is there anyone I can introduce you to?’

He didn’t even glance around the room. ‘I think I know most people,’ he said. ‘Sally tells me you’re an image consultant. What exactly does that mean?’

There was no sign of emotion in his voice, none revealed in the arrogant contours of his face, but she sensed a note of irony that further irritated already raw nerves. ‘Basically, I give people confidence,’ she said sweetly.

He raised his brows. ‘And how do you train for that?’

‘I worked in fashion for a while, and then I became intrigued because some people seemed to know instinctively what suited them, whereas others didn’t have a clue. I started to read up about it, but there wasn’t much to be learnt here, so I had to go to America to find someone who knew what he was doing in the field. When I came back to New Zealand three years ago I decided to set up for myself.’

‘You’d be the perfect person,’ he said.

It should have been a compliment. However, some primitive sense picked up the meaning of words he wasn’t saying, of expressions he controlled, and she said without knowing why, ‘I hear you have an excellent collection of art.’

He made no modest disclaimer. ‘I think so,’ he said.

‘Marcus was very enthusiastic.’

His mouth curved in a smile that conveyed amusement without softening its naturally hard line. ‘I buy what I like,’ he said. ‘He has talent, but he still feels that emotion and desire are all-important. When he develops discipline I might buy from him.’

She said firmly, ‘I think he has a great future.’

‘It will be interesting to see,’ he said.

She caught Gerry’s eye. Muscles she hadn’t known were tense relaxed as her cousin moved in with her attendant group of dazzled males, saying cheerfully, ‘You look as though you’re having a terribly earnest discussion.’

Jan shook her head. ‘Not earnest—but definitely interesting.’

Her cousin beamed up at Kear, who returned her smile with his overwhelming one.

He was too astute not to know how potent a weapon that smile was, Jan decided, watching her cousin almost buckle under its impact. However, Gerry had potent weapons too. She’d made the phrase ‘divinely fair’ her own.

She was tall and willowy as well.

Provoked on some basic level, Jan summoned her best hostess’s smile, made an excuse and left them talking. Ten minutes later a swift, unnoticed glance revealed that the men Gerry always collected had drifted off, leaving Kear Lannion. in sole possession.

‘You shouldn’t let her get away with it,’ Great-Aunt Kit said abruptly. She was Jan’s only surviving relative on her father’s side of the family, the sister of her father’s mother. They were seated in armchairs under the pepper tree, enjoying the warm, rose-scented air.

Jan grinned. ‘Gerry’s been getting away with it all her life,’ she said cheerfully. ‘She can’t help it. As well as being gorgeous she’s nice. Anyway, he’s not mine.’

‘Time you thought of getting married.’

‘I’ve decided to follow your example,’ Jan said, smiling at her aunt, who’d never made any secret of her satisfaction with her single state.

‘Well, I’ve enjoyed my life, I don’t deny it, but I think you were made for marriage.’

‘I haven’t met the right man,’ Jan said, stifling a little sigh.

From the edge of the terrace there came a muted peal of laughter from Cynthia. Great-Aunt Kit said, ‘There’s no such thing. Look at your mother. She adored your father but she couldn’t be more happy than she is with Stephen.’