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He smiled grimly. 'You talked about blind love earlier and that really was blind love. You had no choice in your situation, no warning. She did. All the danger signals were there with bells on.' Beth stared at him. 'Did Sandra believe you?' 'Not at the time but later she did, when she was living with them after they'd married. He's an.. .unpleasant man.' 'But your mother's still with him?' she asked softly. 'She won't leave.' He shrugged. 'Misguided loyalty.'
It bothered him greatly, she could tell. Suddenly she had the crazy impulse to wrap her arms round him and kiss him, an over¬whelming flood of tenderness consuming her. It was enough to shock her into taking a sharp emotional step backwards. 'I'm sorry,' she said again, beginning to walk once more. He shrugged. 'It was a long time ago now.' She had been referring to the fact that his mother was still with a man who apparently was no good, but she didn't elaborate further in view of her traitorous hormones. Fortunately— or perhaps unfortunately, Beth wasn't sure—Harvey provided a distraction at that moment by catapulting up covered in wet mud and holding something which had obviously been dead a long time in his jaws. In the resulting mayhem—Beth had to admit afterwards she'd behaved in a very girly way by screaming and trying to "avoid the smell of what he was carrying—their previous conversation was lost, and once back at the cottage things returned to light mode again.
Travis very kindly offered to bath Harvey before they left him to go and lunch at a little country pub he knew, and Beth let him. The smell emanating from the big dog was even more disgusting than the putrid gunge she'd slipped in her first night at the cottage—which was saying something. She wondered if it was such a good idea, though, when Travis stripped off his shirt before leading a crestfallen Harvey to the shower. And she knew it definitely hadn't been a good idea when the two of them returned, Harvey sweet-smelling and Travis looking so sexy her mouth dried instantly.
He'd got wet, as his black jeans testified, but it was his thickly muscled torso gleaming like oiled silk which really caused her blood to heat. The black curly hair on his chest was glistening with tiny droplets of water and beneath the black denim his thighs looked hard and powerful. It was an uncom¬promisingly male body. Virile. Strong. Beth just looked—she couldn't help it.
'He's feeling a little sorry for himself.' Travis indicated Harvey with a wave of his hand and it was only then she managed to pull herself together and act naturally, fussing Harvey while Travis pulled on his shirt. She could still see the broad tanned shoulders in her mind's eye, and the way the hair on his chest narrowed to a thin line down into his jeans. He would be incredible naked. A rugged Adonis with a charisma that was so much more powerful than mere handsomeness.
'I'll just get my handbag,' she murmured, scampering into her bedroom and then leaning against the shut door for a moment or two to compose herself. She lifted her hands to her hot cheeks. Thank goodness he couldn't read her mind. He'd think she was the original sex-starved female. Well, maybe she was at that. She smiled wryly, her sense of humour coming to the rescue. Now she had found the on button of her libido she just didn't seem able to turn it off.
Travis was his normal cool urbane self when she joined him. Harvey, on the other hand, was definitely out of sorts and sulking. She smiled at Travis and then bent and hugged Harvey—she'd much rather it was the other way round if she was truthful—before saying, 'Do you want to change your jeans before we go for lunch?'
Travis shook his head. 'I'll soon dry in the sun,' he said lazily. 'The place where we're eating has a garden leading down to the river and I've reserved a table outside.'
Beth hoped she didn't look as flustered as she felt as they left the cottage and walked to Travis's car. Ridiculous, but she almost felt she'd seen him naked. But then she'd seen a naked man before, for goodness' sake, hundreds of times. Keith hadn't been diffident about showing off his body. So why should Travis partly clothed affect her a hundred times more than Keith had ever done totally in the buff?
She was still pondering her capriciousness when they arrived at the charming old-world pub twenty minutes later. The centuries old building, complete with thatched roof and brasses and an enormous old fireplace with ancient range, was packed to the hilt when they walked in, but almost immedi¬ately a small plump peroxide-blonde woman was at their side, her face beaming. 'Travis!' She flung her arms round him and gave him a smacker of a kiss full on the lips. 'About time you showed your face here. I was only saying to Dave the other day we hadn't seen you for weeks.'
'Sorry, Mavis.' Travis disentangled himself from the embrace and drew Beth forward. 'Meet Beth,' he said softly. 'Beth, this is Mavis, the landlady of the establishment, who is also married to my oldest friend, Dave. It was when I was visiting them some years ago I heard about the house for sale and decided to buy a weekend place here.'
