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'What makes you think that I buried mine?' he asked tautly, refusing the opportunity. 'Because I don't wear designer jeans and drive an imported status symbol? Is that how you measure success, Francesca? If so, I'm sorry for you. One can have all the material trappings of success and yet still be a failure as a human being.'
'Is that what you think I am?' she was goaded into asking, as if she cared what he thought of her.
'That's not for me to judge. Unlike you, Princess, I don't estimate a person's worth on appearance.' A faint smile touched the sensuous mouth as he allowed his eyes to peruse her stiffened figure. 'If I did I would be thoroughly confused by now, wouldn't I? Are you the satin-skinned sensualist who likes skinny-dipping and french kissing? Or the neatly tailored spinster who doesn't approve of anything or anyone that deviates from her prim conception of the norm?'
His reference to french kissing was unnerving. Had it been a deliberate reminder of her youthful indiscretion, or was she reading things into his words that didn't exist? Satin-skinned sensualist? Absurd!
'If you really want to live at Whaler's Bay, why don't you go and live with your family... or don't they want you around, either?'
He merely grinned at her abrupt change of subject. 'Quite the contrary. Mum would love to have me back in the nest but I'm way past the stage, in age and experience, where I'd be comfortable there for any length of time. They're a great crowd, but they're just that, a crowd. Tess is living there until the wedding, Dave has started a rock band who seem to have taken up permanent residence in the barn and little Beth has blossomed into a seventeen-year-old beauty trailing clouds of mooning youths who clutter up the passageways. Add to that a mother who longs to have me safely married off, and a father who cons any hands idle for more than a few seconds into helping on his interminable home-improvement projects and you have some idea why I appreciate the peace of my own establishment.'
'My establishment,' Fran corrected firmly, 'and since when did you ever seek the peaceful life?'
'Ever?' he repeated mockingly. 'We were only acquainted for a shortish while, Frankie, so you can't claim that sort of knowledge. Any at all in fact—you didn't want to contaminate that dainty, narrow mind of yours by mixing with a crude lout like me, remember? Crude or not, I've lived and learned a lot since then.'
'Oh, really, learned what?' she snapped, stiffening her spine against that silky Frankie. Ross had been the only man to c
all her that. And the crack about louts came dangerously close to an open reference to that awful Monday she had tried so hard to forget. 'Learned how to con old men? Is that how you scratch a living?' She had to insult him. He wasn't going to slip past her guard by making her curious about what he had been up to in the meantime. She didn't care, except so far as it affected her.
His nostrils flared slightly, but there was no other outward sign of temper. Instead he squared his stance and cocked his head and said, very, very blandly, 'Women.'
'What?'
'I make a living from women.' He enjoyed her startled suspicion. 'They pay to visit me, or sometimes they ring me and I visit them. We exchange...er... intimate information and part with satisfaction on both sides. I have a lot of very satisfied clients.'
'You're... a... a gigolo?' Fran's shock and suspicion melted into distaste. She had expected something disreputable, but this...!
He gave her a smouldering smile. 'That term is a bit outdated, not to say obvious. I prefer to think of myself as serving mankind...or, in my case, womankind.'
'I...that's disgusting!' Fran spluttered.
'Is satisfying human need disgusting?' he said, feigning surprise. 'You should be the first to congra-tulate me, Princess. You were the one who told me I was wasting my potential.'
'I didn't mean your sexual potential!' she hissed, flushing furiously when she realised where the conversation had led her.
'As I recall, you didn't specify, but perhaps your memory is more vivid than mine,' he goaded her softly. 'No? Then let me see if I can refresh it. You told me, after making sure that half the school was listening, of course, that I was quite fun on a date, but a little too crude and clumsy for your taste. That the boys you used to sneak out on dates with when you went to that snooty girls' school of yours had much more class. Who wants to be friends with a guy on the fast-track to nowhere? you said. I was spoiled and lazy and I would never realise my potential because whatever natural talent I had would always be stifled by my even greater talent for taking the easy option...'
'I'm flattered you bothered to remember what I said,' Fran murmured stiffly, unnerved by the thought that his memories might be just as vivid as hers. 'What a pity you obviously didn't take it to heart.'
'What makes you think that?'
'Well,' she floundered, trying to come up with a reason for her reasonless conviction. 'You were just as much a hell-raiser as ever when I left, and I didn't see your name listed in the Bursary examination results...'
'Keeping tabs on me, Princess?' he needled softly.
'Nothing of the kind,' she denied, pink-faced. 'I just happened to notice.'
'I got by without.' Surprisingly he didn't pursue the blush, but he didn't hide his humorous satisfaction either. 'I decided to exploit my natural talent with women...and guided by your advice I decided not to stifle my skills by restricting myself to only one...'
'No wonder you don't dare live at home!' She drew in her mouth primly, unable to help responding to the provocation, even though she knew it was deliberate.
Her antagonism towards the man seemed inbuilt, and
drove her into uncharacteristic over-reaction. 'If you
think I'm going to let you use my cabin to—'
'Rest—I told you I was after some peace. Even gigolos need holidays.' His mouth quirked as she bridled. 'Don't worry, Princess, I won't ask you for money. I doubt that, even with your inheritance, you could afford my rates!'
