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The imperturbable Benedict Savage was running away. She had witnessed the temporary disintegration of his cynical self-possession and that made him uncomfortable. He knew that she was a shrewd judge of human behaviour—it was what made her such a skilled butler, responsive to the needs of him and his guests to the extent that she seemed able to anticipate their every wish—and he had no desire to be judged on his vulnerabilities. Until now he had been serene in the knowledge that his was the dominant role in the master-servant relationship and now it had probably occurred to him that that balance of power wasn’t immutable, that the power of knowledge accumulated over time might make a servant of the master.
Good! It would serve him right to wonder how much she knew or might guess. She hoped he would relive his discomfort every time he saw her for some time to come. Why shouldn’t he suffer at least a modicum of the helpless self-consciousness that she felt in his presence?
She watched him cross the cobbled courtyard that led to the stables with a smooth, lean-hipped stride, keenly aware of a unique feeling of alienation within her own body and fiercely resenting it. Suddenly she wished that she hadn’t been too embarrassed to inspect the body she had briskly scrubbed under the shower an hour ago. Whatever had happened in his bed might have left marks, evidence that might have relieved her fears—or confirmed them—instead of leaving her in this limbo of...
Evidence?
Give that fearsomely logical brain physical evidence to work on and she wouldn’t stand a chance!
She stiffened, her heart fluttering in her chest. A fresh surge of panic galvanised her into action. She darted over to the French doors and turned the key in the lock before racing out into the hallway and up the stairs, taking them three at a time, her long legs comfortably stretching the distance.
The door to her employer’s bedroom was firmly shut but Vanessa ignored any qualms she had about invading his privacy and skidded inside.
The bed was in exactly the state that she had fervently hoped it would be—abandoned and very much unmade. Vanessa blessed the fact that Benedict Savage’s parents had raised him in a rich and rarefied environment that rendered him ignorant of the kind of basic domestic chores that ordinary mortals like Vanessa grew up performing for themselves.
She quickly ripped the top sheet off the bed, rolling it into a loose ball before dumping it on the floor and attacking the pillows, cursing their ungainly size as she struggled to remove the custom-made pillowcases. Her heart pounded as she spotted the long strands on hair that straggled across one of them. She had never realised that she moulted so much at night...or had it been because this time her head had been thrashing to and fro on the pillow in the throes of unremembered ecstasy?
Her mouth went dry at the insidious image of herself writhing beneath a sleekly tapered male body. Who would have thought that under the fashionably loose clothes a man in a sedentary occupation like architectural design would have a body so hard and compact? His skin had been glossy with health, rippling over lean, surprisingly well-developed muscles.
Furious with herself for letting her thoughts run riot, Vanessa wrenched anew at the stubborn pillowcases and shook them out vigorously before turning them inside out and throwing them on top of the sheet on the floor. She stretched across the bed and had just slipped her hand under the mattress to free the far corner of the sheet when the door jarred open, and a voice rattled chills down her spine.
‘What in the hell do you think you’re doing?’
She could feel one neatly manicured nail catch and tear against the mattress as she jerked upright and around, her sensible shoes skidding on the discarded linen, tangling her feet, so that with a cry of dismay she toppled helplessly backwards across the bed.
CHAPTER THREE
ANYONE else would have reflexively reached out and tried to prevent Vanessa’s fall, but Benedict Savage was a law unto himself. He didn’t lift a finger to save her.
He merely folded his arms across his chest and watched her bounce and come to rest before coldly rephrasing his question.
‘I asked you what you were doing in my room?’
The crisp pattern of his speech was slightly blurred by his rapid breathing. He had been running. What had occurred to her had obviously also belatedly occurred to him; he was here to attempt to sort fact from fantasy.
If she had felt at a disadvantage earlier in his study, it was nothing to what Vanessa felt now.
She pushed herself upright on trembling arms, drawing her knees together and tugging down the skirt over her dangling legs in a vain attempt to recover her dignity. ‘I would have thought it was obvious,’ she snapped defensively, wishing he would move out of the way so that she could stand up. ‘I’m making your bed.’
‘Why?’
She bit back the smart-mouthed reply that sprang to her lips and struggled for a respectful monotone. ‘Because it’s my job.’
‘You make my bed?’
For a moment he looked as uncomfortable as she felt. He had refused to allow her to perform the more personal services that a butler usually provided, ones that she had cheerfully carried out for the judge—waking him in the morning, running his bath, laying out his choice of clothing for the day. Benedict Savage had informed her squelchingly at that chilly initial interview that he didn’t require nannying, and that he would thank her not to invade his privacy unless invited. She had duly kept the required distance, but it wouldn’t hurt him to realise that caring for someone’s house was, in its own way, as intimate as caring for their person.
‘I often help Mrs Riley with the housekeeping,’ she said, adding pointedly, ‘As you may have noticed from the household accounts, I only employ extra housekeeping staff when you bring guests to stay. It’s not economic to have a full household complement idle for most of the year.’
His blank look confirmed a long-held suspicion. She doubted that he ever bothered even to glance at the accounts that she scrupulously presented him with every six months. She could be robbing him blind for all he cared. Once he had decided to trust her, he had given her a totally free hand and however flattering that was to her ego it irked her that it also meant the true extent of her efficiency went largely unappreciated.
Unfortunately he ignored the red herring, and pursued a point she had hoped would not occur to such a supremely undomesticated animal.
‘Have I ever given you reason to think I’m so fanatical about cleanliness that I require my sheets to be changed daily?’ he said drily. ‘This is a home, not a hotel—I’ve barely had the chance to get them warm, let alone dirty.’
‘You do have a reputation for being extremely fastidious,’ Vanessa muttered, guiltily thinking of the silky heat that she had been cuddled up to that morning. He had certainly been warming the sheets then. However, she could hardly contradict him.
‘But not to the point of being unhealthily obsessive,’ he said with controlled distaste.
No, she couldn’t picture him being obsessive about anything. That would require a degree of passion she didn’t believe he possessed.
‘You haven’t been here since the beginning of February and your bed hasn’t been properly aired because we didn’t know you were coming,’ she invented hastily. ‘I thought the sheets might have been a bit musty.’
‘Well, they weren’t.’ He looked down at the tumble of linen at their feet, his voice acquiring a strangely husky note. ‘In fact they were quite deliciously fragrant...’
Vanessa tensed with shock at the thread of remembered pleasure in his voice, finding his choice of words disturbingly sensual for someone whom she preferred to think of as a thoroughly cold fish.
Thank God the perfume she had dabbed on at the beginning of last evening was so expensive that she only wore it when she was going somewhere special! She sought for a way to scatter whatever images were re-forming in that frighteningly intelligent brain.
‘Probably from the washing-powder Mrs Riley uses,’ she said prosaically, and rose from the bed, forcing him to step back as she summoned a brisk dismissal.
‘Well, since I’ve gone this far I’ll have to finish the job. I can’t put these sheets back on after they’ve been trampled on the floor. Excuse me.’
He looked from the bed to her and for a terrible moment she thought he was going to dig his heels in. She bravely stood her ground, banking on his intensely private nature to win the brief internal battle he was evidently waging. The thought of exposing himself to her curiosity again would be anathema to him. She deliberately allowed a hint of speculation to impinge on her expression of polite patience.
His reaction was swift and instinctive. His face shuttered and he inclined his head, saying sharply, ‘If you think it’s necessary, I suppose I must bow to your superior domestic knowledge.’
Sarcastic beast! In the past his cynical comments hadn’t bothered her. Now every word he uttered seemed to grate on her nerves.
‘Thank you.’ She hesitated, waiting for him to depart. He looked at her enquiringly, raising his dark eyebrows haughtily above his spectacle frames. It had the irritating effect of making Vanessa feel as if he was looking down on her, even though the reverse was true. She had won their little tussle of wills and now she was being made to pay for it.
Vanessa’s wide mouth pinched as she strove for the self-effacing politeness that until this morning had been second nature in her dealings with this man.
‘I’m sure you must have something better to do than watch me make beds.’
‘Not really,’ he said unobligingly. ‘When you’re on holiday there’s something very satisfying about watching other people toil.’
‘You’re on holiday?’ Vanessa hoped she didn’t sound as appalled as she felt. He had never spent more than a long weekend at Whitefield before. Surely he wasn’t staying any longer than Sunday? She didn’t think she could take the strain.
An idle Benedict Savage would undoubtedly be a bored Benedict Savage, and when bored he might look around for something to engage his intellect—like solving a puzzle that was best left unsolved.
To hide her agitation Vanessa gave the remaining sheet a huge yank to free it and rolled it clumsily up over her arm.
‘More or less,’ he replied absently, watching her bend to pick up the rest of the linen. ‘You could say I’m in between jobs at the moment.’
She was so used to hearing that euphemistic phrase trotted out by people who came to the door applying for casual work, thinking that domestic service was a sinecure for which they needed no skill, training or enthusiasm, that her soothing response was automatic, her mind occupied with more weighty matters.
‘I’m sure you’ll find other employment again soon.’
‘I’m flattered by your confidence. But if not I suppose there’s always the unemployment benefit.’ His smooth answer followed so seamlessly on hers that it was a moment before she realised her faux pas.
‘I’m sorry, sir, I wasn’t thinking,’ she said, mortified by her slip.
‘I thought it was the reverse,’ he murmured with dismaying perception, his blue eyes studying her flustered face. ‘You seemed to be very deeply immersed in uneasy thoughts. Is there anything worrying you, Flynn?’
Another unprecedented personal question. Now was the moment to confess all and throw herself on his mercy!
Only Vanessa didn’t think that he had any. She vividly recalled his declaration at their meeting that he never made an idle threat and she had seen him deal ruthlessly with those who proved to be dishonest or disloyal. Employee or friend, they simply ceased to exist for him. Vanessa was already in over her head in deceit and, in addition, she had broken his golden rule: thou shalt not be a woman.
‘No, why should you think that?’ Unfortunately her voice cracked on the last word.
‘There’s a slightly...fraught air about you this morning.’
Oh, God!
‘Is there?’ she said brightly. ‘Well, your arrival did rather catch me on the hop.’ She was glad of the ready excuse. ‘I’m afraid I don’t react well to surprises.’
‘Really? Congreve would have it that uncertainty is one of the joys of life,’ he said suavely, no doubt trying to intimidate her with his intellect. Well, Vanessa wasn’t impressed. Anyone who could read could trot out quotations from classic English literature. She might not have gone to university but she could, and did, love to read widely. With anyone else she might even have enjoyed a foolish game of duelling quotations. As it was she just wanted him to find her dull and boring and totally unworthy of his interest.
‘Not mine,’ said Vanessa firmly, starting to edge towards the door, clutching her burden. She didn’t trust this sudden communicativeness of his. He had never shown any inclination to discuss literature or philosophy with his butler before...or ‘household executive assistant’ as he had ludicrously suggested she be re-titled.
She had given that idea short shrift. She was a butler and proud of it. It was what she had trained for. It was in her blood. Her English father was a butler and she had grown up in the stately British household that was his fiefdom, fascinated by the day-to-day management of what was not only a home but a family seat, and a three-hundred-year-old one at that. It had been her fond ambition to hold a similar position one day but, as she had discovered, life had a nasty way of subverting youthful ambitions.
‘No? That surprises me. I thought that coping with the unexpected was one of your great strengths. You certainly never had any problem accommodating the most bizarre requests of my guests... You didn’t turn a hair at the pet lion cub, or the demand to find enough sculls for a wagered boat race on the lake, or, for that matter, the man who collapsed in the soup with a newly developed seafood allergy. Without your prompt action he might have died.’
‘I didn’t say I couldn’t cope,’ said Vanessa, taken aback by his easy recall of incidents she had assumed were long dismissed from his mind as supremely unimportant. At the time they occurred she had merely received a cool word of approval, as if she had done nothing more, nor less, than was required of her. ‘I just said I didn’t react well—personally, I mean. I get churned up inside...’
‘It doesn’t show.’
‘Thank you.’ She was already regretting having told him that much. He was studying her with an intentness that increased her anxieties.
Her fingers curled into her palms as she fought the desire to check her hair. As it dried it would lighten several shades to the warm caramel that was so susceptible to the bleaching effects of the summer sun, although thankfully the gel she used to keep the sides tidy would prevent its waviness becoming too obvious. Still, Benedict Savage was an architect, skilled in the interpretation of line and form, observant of small details that might escape others...
‘It was a comment, not a compliment.’
‘In my profession that is a compliment,’ Vanessa retorted with an unconscious air of smugness that prompted an amused drawl.
‘Being a servant is hardly one of the professions.’
Vanessa bristled at the implied slur. Snob!
‘Of course not, sir. I humbly beg your pardon for my presumption, sir.’ She would have bowed and tugged her forelock but that would be going over the top. As it was his eyes glinted dangerously.
‘You have a devastating line in obsequiousness, Flynn. One might almost suspect it was insolence. Why have I never noticed that before, I wonder?’
Because she had never allowed herself to be so fixed in his attention before. Aghast at her foolishness, Vanessa tried to retrench.
‘I don’t mean to be—’
‘You mean you didn’t think I’d notice. Have I really been so complacent an employer?’
‘No, of course not,’ she lied weakly, and watched his thin mouth crook in a faint sneer.
‘Sycophancy, Flynn? Was that on the curriculum at that exclusive English school for butlers that you graduated, drenched with honours, from?’
This fresh evidence of the acuteness of his memory was daunting. She hugged the trailing sheets to her chest and refused to answer, realising that no answer, however cunningly phrased, would please him. He didn’t want to be pleased. He wanted a whipping-boy for his frustration. The irony was that she had richly earned the position!
‘That’s right,’ he said silkily. ‘Humour me. After all, you can afford to. You know I can’t fire you.’
‘Can’t you?’ Vanessa said, sensing an unforeseen trap in his goading.
‘Well, I could, but that would jeopardise all that I’m doing here, wouldn’t it?’
‘Would it?’ Vanessa was now bewildered.
‘You could tie me up in legal manoeuvring for years—’
‘Could I?’
Her response was a little too quick, a little too curious. His eyes narrowed. Vanessa straightened her spine and squared her shoulders, lifting her chin in a characteristic attempt to establish her physical superiority.
‘I could, couldn’t I?’ she rephrased with a suitable tinge of menace, but not all the threatening body language and fighting language at her disposal could redeem that brief and telling hesitation.
‘Could you?’
‘Yes.’ Her teeth nibbled unknowingly at her full lower lip.
‘And how, precisely, would you do it?’
She was even more at sea, the look in his blue eyes creating a turbulence that reminded her what a poor sailor she was. He looked amused and—her stomach roiled—almost compassionate!
‘Well, I...I...’
‘You don’t know, do you?’ he said gently. ‘You have absolutely no idea what I’m talking about.’
She lifted her chin even higher. ‘No.’ Her tone implied that neither did she care to find out.
He knew better.
‘Did you not understand Judge Seaton’s lawyer when he explained the situation to you?’ he said, still with that same, infuriating gentleness. ‘He assured me that he’d spoken to you directly after the funeral and that you’d appeared quite calm and collected.’
Vanessa frowned, trying to remember, her brows rumpling her smooth, wide forehead.
She had looked on Judge Seaton as not only a saviour but also as a man she had respected and admired and come to develop a fond affection for.
He had rescued her from the depths of misfortune and she, in turn, had travelled across the world with him, rescuing him from the inertia of his unwelcome retirement and the vicissitudes of old age and an irascible personality. Solitary by nature and never having married, when the judge had started having difficulty in getting about and suffering short memory lapses Vanessa had been the one who chivvied him out of his fits of depression and inspired him to start the book he had still been enthusiastically working on when he died—a social history of his adopted home, Whitefield House, and the surrounding Coromandel region.
His death, though not unexpected in view of his failing health, had been a shock, and at the time of the funeral Vanessa had still been numb and subconsciously hostile towards any threat of change in the haven that she had striven to create for herself at Whitefield. She had mentally switched off at any mention of an arrogantly youthful usurper who, it seemed to her, was proposing to take up his inheritance with unconscionable speed, given the fact that he had never bothered to visit his benefactor while he was alive, nor deigned to attend his funeral.
