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He lifted his hands off the bike’s handlebars and spread them in a gesture of appeasement. Dressed in a faded short-sleeved shirt that hung open above his dusty denim jeans he looked the quintessential farm worker, from the scuffed boots to the battered felt hat. He looked fit, healthy and relaxed, a far cry from the raging bull she had first encountered.
‘I’m not complaining. Quite the reverse. So far you’ve been doing a fabulous job.’
She wished she knew he was referring purely to the newsletter she was still piecing together. She had the feeling that he was speaking of another agenda entirely.
‘I’d do an even better one if you’d stop interrupting me,’ she said hardly.
She found it very difficult to concentrate on her screen when at any moment she could expect to look up and find Adam there, silently observing her with that expression of amused and faintly bewildered speculation that was so unnerving.
She didn’t need to be checked up on and after their first discussion about his project he must have known it. But he still kept seeking her out with flimsy excuses, knowing what it must look like to the rest of the household, knowing how disturbing she found his persistent attention. Disturbing because she couldn’t find the strength of mind to reject it.
The trouble was that living with him, working with him, wasn’t providing the kind of cure that she had hoped. Learning about the other side of Adam, the side he had concealed in his letters, only compounded her problem. Yes, he was wretchedly stubborn and arrogant and argumentative, but he also bent like a willow for those he loved: off-beat and whimsical with his mother; a romping child with his daughter; firm and even kind, in an implacably cool sort of way, with Tania.
He was simply...Adam. And, God forbid, her beloved fantasy hero was beginning to pale in comparison to the flesh and blood reality.
‘I like to keep my finger on the pulse; that’s why I wanted you here while you worked on it,’ Adam said reasonably, interrupting her brooding thoughts. ‘It’s good to have a constant exchange of ideas going on, don’t you think? Keeps the creative juices flowing.’
His eyes half masked by the shady brim of his hat, drifted down the length of her in the loose, drop-waisted summer shift which she had fetched, along with an armload of other clothes, when Adam had driven her back to her house to fetch her computer and files and shut up the house properly. He frowned at the sight of her bare feet.
‘Where are your shoes? You shouldn’t wander around a working orchard without some foot protection. Have you a current tetanus shot?’
‘I had a booster a couple of years ago.’ Honor bent to pick up her sturdy canvas slip-ons from their hiding place in the grass, and put them on. ‘My father always worked on country papers. I spent my childhood in the country. It wasn’t so long ago that I’ve forgotten the rules. I just took them off when I sat down.’
‘In that outfit you look as if childhood was only yesterday,’ Adam said drily, crossing his arms on the chrome stem of the handlebars and leaning forward to give her another lazy survey. ‘I’m sure Sara’s summer school uniform is almost exactly the same.’
‘If you wanted glamour you should have gone to the Growers’ lunch with Tania,’ Honor sniped back, regretting the jealous retort when Adam grinned.
‘I didn’t say I didn’t like it. I’ve always been a sucker for girls in uniform...Mary was a St John Ambulance volunteer. Have you been pumping my darling daughter about my activities?’
‘No, I have not,’ she said hotly, flirting marginally with the truth as she pondered his rare reference to his wife. Joy had mentioned Mary only a few times, always with a reverent expression, mentioning her loveliness and what a wonderful wife and mother she had been, and how Adam had put away all the photographs of her because they made him so sad. If Mary Blake had been as good as she was beautiful, no wonder no living woman could match up to her memory! ‘I wish I could stop her telling me things.’
‘Do you?’ His scepticism was like a red rag to a bull. ‘She likes you. You have the Sara seal of approval. Which is fortunate considering you’re supposed to be madly in love with me.’
Honor drew a sharp breath before realising he was teasing. ‘And whose fault is it that she thinks that? You shouldn’t encourage her, Adam—’
‘To like you?’
He was being deliberately obtuse. ‘No, to laugh at your sister-in-law...to side with me against her. It—it isn’t fair!’
‘To whom? Tania? I doubt if she even realises it. She doesn’t see Sara as a separate person in herself, just as adjunct to me. She never took a blind bit of notice of her before. I have no intention of being conned into playing Tania’s lord and protector for the rest of my life so that she won’t have to bother about life’s tiresome practicalities, and the sooner she accepts it the better. Thankfully, I think the scales are finally falling from her eyes. Before she stormed out this morning she told me that Zach was worth fifty of me. The only pity was that marrying him had given her a selfish, overbearing, social retard for a brother-in-law!’
‘Well, she got that right!’ said Honor feelingly, shattered to have her suspicions so wretchedly confirmed. She had been the means to an end, that was all.
‘Oh, I don’t think of it as an end at all, Honor. I think of it as a new beginning,’ he said blandly, making her realise that she had spoken aloud. ‘You don’t have a hat to go with those shoes, do you? That wild mop of hair is no protection from the sun and your nose is already looking a bit pink. It’s a long walk back to the house. Hop on and I’ll give you a ride. We don’t want to be late for lunch.’
‘Thanks, but I’ll walk,’ Honor bit out huffily. Suddenly she felt in need of a good cry.
‘It’ll be quicker on the bike. There’s plenty of room.’ He eased his pelvis forward and indicated the back of the curving seat.
‘No, I—’
‘Never been on one before? The four wheels make it very safe.’
‘I’m not worried about that—’
‘I’m very safe, too.’ He tipped the brim of his hat to her in a parody of old-fashioned politeness.
‘I’m sure you are,’ Honor said tightly, her desire to cry evaporating in the heat of her rising temper. ‘But I’d prefer to walk.’
