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‘And, equally, who I choose to let the Dower House to and the conditions I choose to impose on that let are mine,’ Finn countered grimly. ‘Is having sex with him so much more important to you than your grandmother Maggie?’
It was like having a steel trap close round her mind. Something about him made it impossible for her to think logically and analytically, only to react emotionally, Maggie recognised as she denied furiously, ‘No, it most certainly is not. My grandmother—’ She stopped as her voice started to thicken with emotion. ‘This has nothing to do with my feelings for my grandmother,’ she insisted, almost hurling the words at Finn as she fought to avoid allowing him to verbally outwit her. ‘This is about my right to live my life however I choose to live it, to share my bed with whoever I want—’
‘And as we both know you are very good at doing that,’ Finn intervened with a softly cruel emphasis that drove hot colour burning up over Maggie’s skin. ‘Very, very good,’ Finn emphasised deliberately.
Maggie had started to clench her hands into small tense fists.
‘I am perfectly prepared to allow you to rent the Dower House for your grandmother’s occupation—Philip explained her circumstances to me,’ Finn continued.
‘He had no right to discuss my private business with you—’ Maggie began, but once again Finn stopped her.
‘You should be grateful to him,’ he told her challengingly. ‘He was, in a manner of speaking, defending you, insisting that you did not want the Dower House as a pretty country toy you could retreat to with your lover, but for far more altruistic reasons.’
‘You told him that I have a lover?’ Maggie demanded hotly. Her grandmother was old-fashioned; if she were to live at the Dower House and hear gossip that her beloved granddaughter had a lover—and, moreover, a lover she knew nothing about—she would not just be shocked, she would be hurt that Maggie hadn’t confided in her herself, Maggie knew. ‘How dare you?’ she continued furiously. ‘How dare you lie about me like that—?’
‘Lie?’ Finn cut her short, tightlipped now as anger glittered dangerously in his eyes. ‘Me? I heard you myself on the phone to him at the farmhouse. “Darling…”’ he whispered, savagely mimicking Maggie’s softly husky voice.
Baffled, Maggie stared at him. ‘The only people I telephoned from the farm were my assistant and my grandmother…’ Her voice faltered, and then grew stronger as she repeated, ‘My grandmother…my beloved, darling, grandmother.’
Finn went completely still. There was no mistaking the sincerity in her voice. And no mistaking her fury either. Perhaps there was more of the City trader left in him than he had thought, he admitted wryly, as he shrugged his shoulders and prepared to unashamedly blag his way out of the situation.
‘So I made a mistake.’
A mistake! Maggie’s chest heaved, sending the bumble bees into delicious activity—to Finn’s male eyes at least. Her eyes flashed, and he could have sworn she grew two inches taller as she confronted him.
‘You blacken my reputation; force me out of the bidding for the Dower House, send me the most repellent letter I have ever received, try to tell me how I should live my life, correct my grammar—and you call it a mistake.’
Fresh activity amongst the bumble bees held Finn’s glance awed and enthralled, but thankfully Maggie herself was far too wrapped up in her own anger to notice his inability to drag his attention from her breasts—breasts which, as he already had good reason to know, felt and tasted every bit as deliciously feminine and honey-sweet as they looked.
Later he might admit to himself that perhaps what followed was an extremely contentious piece of verbal baiting on his part, but at the time…
‘Haven’t you forgotten something in that list of supposed crimes?’
The mild tone of Finn’s voice caught Maggie off-guard. For some reason she couldn’t fathom, and didn’t dare to try to over-analyse, the sight of the muscles in his bare arms, when he folded them across his chest before leaning back against the wall, sent a soft little shiver of sensation all the way through her body, causing her to curl her toes slightly. There was something sexily awesome about Finn’s arms, something about their strength, their power to hold and protect, something about their gentleness when he had wrapped them around her, something that right now was making her want…
Shakily she forced herself to concentrate on what Finn was saying—something about a crime she’d forgotten. But before she could phrase any question Finn was answering it for her, telling her succinctly and, she was sure, with a great deal of enjoyment, ‘Going to bed with you.’
Going to bed with her? Was that how Finn saw what had happened between them? As a crime? Maggie didn’t like the sharp pain that seared her: a pain which she was determined to ignore. Well, if it was she was just going to have to make sure he knew that, as far as she was concerned, their lovemaking—no, their sex, which after all was the correct word for it—had meant nothing at all to her!
Feigning uninterest, she shrugged and looked away from him. Lying to him was one thing; lying to him when he had that penetrating gaze of his fixed on her was very definitely another. ‘I’m an adult. I can go to bed with whoever I like.’
‘Like?’ Finn pounced with lethal speed.
Hot-cheeked, Maggie tried to brave it out. ‘Neither of us has ever denied that the sex between us was good.’
Finn tightened his folded arms, not trusting himself to move. If he did, if he got within range of her, she would be right there in those arms, whilst he…
‘Anyway, I haven’t come here to talk about sex,’ Maggie told him, furiously aware of her own red f
ace and the decidedly dangerous male gleam now lighting Finn’s eyes.
‘No, talking about it is a complete waste of time,’ Finn agreed, straight-faced, ‘especially when—’
Had she any idea how adorable she looked: all furious embarrassment, all desirable woman, the only woman he…
‘I came to talk to you about your letter,’ Maggie told him sharply. ‘How dare you patronise me by offering me the Dower House at a peppercorn rent? I don’t need your charity, Finn. I can afford to pay my own way through life. And—’
‘I wasn’t doing it for you. I was doing it for your grandmother,’ Finn told her, completely silencing her. ‘You may be able to afford to pay any amount of rent, but I suspect things may be different for your grandmother.’ He held up his hand when Maggie would have interrupted him. ‘Yes, I know that you’d pay the rent for her, but if she’s anything like most other members of her generation—and I suspect she is—after all her granddaughter has to have got her determined independence from somewhere—she will want to pay the rent herself.’
