‘It’s so crowded. You simply can’t find a decent exclusive place to stay
any more. Princess Margaret’s crowd are OK, but what about those
awful rock stars? Mick Jagger, and so forth. I want something quiet.’
I’ll bet you love hanging out with Mick Jagger, Becky thought silently, but her heart was hammering. If Katherine wanted to play that game, Becky could oblige her. It would just take a little bit of balls.
‘I know exactly what you mean,’ Becky said lightly. ‘I have a vacation
place, but it’s not shall we say suitable for the common herd. Strictly invitation only. We’re keeping the list extremely tight.’
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Katherine’s eyebrow lifted. ‘Where is it?’
‘It’s my manor house in England. It’s about five hundred years old, and the public have never been inside it. The English authorities have it listed, so I can’t afford to advertise. Unacceptable applicants, you know.’ Becky carefully lifted her glass of wine and turned to the spotty youth on her left, as though she was done with that topic.
‘Hold on a moment, Rebecca,’ Katherine Simpson said. Becky recalled Katherine - she had famously been an air hostess when she met Philip on a first-class flight somewhere. She was a huge social climber the very thought of her being in on something others couldn’t have was enough to make her drool. ‘Tell me a little about this place.’
Becky turned to her hostess, and lowered her voice confidentially. ‘It’s the family seat. My mother, Lady Lancaster, was the first American ever to set foot inside it, if you can believe that.’ That was good; she could see Katherine’s eyes glitter at the title. ‘I offer complete relaxation. Masseuses, manicurists, a private hairdresser and make-up artist all complimentary and twenty-four hours a day. A chauffeur on standby. Tours to stately homes other people can’t get into.’ How the hell was she going to pull that off?. Becky wondered. What the hell, she’d find a way. ‘It’s a spa treatment for the very discerning, for people who appreciate European elegance. There will be private concerts, chamber music before dinner, horse-riding … all the gentlemanly and ladylike pursuits. Of course, you understand, I can’t offer this to anybody but a very select group of people.’
Katherine Simpson was hooked. Her heavily mascara’d eyes were narrowing acquisitively.
‘How big is your place?’
‘Well, it’s huge,’ Becky admitted, ‘but we’ll only be accepting ten couples at a time. I don’t believe in crowds. Of course, it will be … premil, m vacationing, and only for those that can afford that sort of thing.
The price helps with the exclusivity.’
‘And are you open for business?’
The uniforms weren’t quite ready, she had no trips lined up, and no horses, and…
‘Absolutely. I have someone in mind for the opening celebrations, but I haven’t talked to them yet.’
‘Oh, but you must give it to me.’
‘To you?’ Becky did a creditable job of looking surpri;ed. ‘I don’t know, Katherine, the price…’ She looked pained. ‘It’s ten thousand a week. Pounds, not dollars, per suite.’
Katherine laughed brightly. ‘Goodness, very reasonable. I’ll take all
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the rooms for two weeks. I’ve been meaning to put together a party of girlfriends for simply ages.’
Becky had a brainwave. ‘You can have all the rooms but one. I’ve agreed to allow a photographer and journalist from Town and Country to take a few snaps of guests at the opening week.’
Katherine Simpson lived to get her picture in Town and Country. She couldn’t stop the smirk from spreading across her face.
‘Well, I suppose that would be all right,’ she said, reluctantly. Becky made her excuses after dinner, kissed her aunt on the cheek, and rushed back to JFK. Her ticket was transferable, so she caught the red-eye back to Heathrow. There was no chance of snatching any sleep. She jotted down her ideas on the back of the air-sick bag. First, call the press. Well, that wouldn’t be too much of a problem. She could sell the American society magazines on this, no problem, super-exclusive, invitation only, ultra-expensive. She remembered a couple of titled bods who had been to her first ball. She would stick one of them on the welcoming committee and call some owners who hadn’t surrendered to the National Trust and offer them a thousand pounds for the use of their halls for one night. Throw a dinner, with musicians …
She was still writing furiously when the plane touched down on the tarmac.
Katherine Simpson was the perfect guest. She gleefully reported to Becky that she’d had girlfriends in tears because she had no space for them to buy tickets. She also took two weeks lnd had all her guests send over their money in advance. Becky instantly gave small bonuses to all her staff, with the promise of more to come if the guests were satisfied. She took the same trouble with the non-payingjoumalists that atteneled as she did with the wives of the bankers and senators, greeting them with vintage champagne and Charbonnel and Walker chocolates in their rooms, providing caviar and vodka, and filling each room with a huge bouquet of roses, each room having a different colour bloom. Finding the private houses was easy - everybody wanted money towards their heating bills. Becky organized a dinner with musicians in Elizabethan costume in the hall of Caerhaven Castle, she hired an impoverished academic from Oxford to offer a tour of the prettiest colleges, and went one better, paying drama students to put on a private performance of A Midsummer Night’s Dream on her lawn.
The weather cooperated only fitfully, but Becky made a virtue of the autumn chill. She had warm fires laid and blazing in every room, she served liqueurs and she brought in soft lambswool robes from the Shetlands. One day, when there was an unseasonal hailstorm, Becky
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declared it ‘Beauty Day’, and the women were rubbed and primped and made up all day long.
It was an incredible success. The next set of guests were ringing Becky and begging to be admitted before the first set even left. Becky paid her staff handsome bonuses and set about putting together a winter holiday - an English Christmas package, with trips to Paris and private shopping in London, West End shows, boxes at Covent Garden and three more massage therapists.
She was busily negotiating with a local florist for a year-round rate when there was a rap at her door.
,
‘Come in, Sharon, Becky said, coveting the phone with one hand. It wasn’t Sharon. It was Logan.
He was wearing a faded pair of jeans and tough work boots for the garden, along with a crumpled T-shirt that looked as though he had slept in it. He was unshaven and his hair had bits of grass in it.
He looked sensational.
couldn’t herself of her skin. She hated
Becky
stop
jumping
out
herself, but her nipples started to contract at the mere sight of him.
Thank God she was wearing her thick leather jacket today. Her
body,
the traitress, remembered, as if in a flash, every last second of his caresses, the way he had stroked her from the inside, the way she had lifted up her body to meet his tongue.
The heat of sex with him, because God knew it wasn’t ‘making love’, at least not for him, felt sick and wrong now.
‘Six weeks,’ he said simply. ‘It had to be finished. And now here I am.
‘That’s fine,’ Becky said icily:
Logan’s dark eyes bored into hers. ‘You didn’t get the card I sent?’
‘Oh, yes. The card,’ Becky snapped. ‘It was so long ago, I forgot all about it.’
Will Logan looked her over, then shrugged. ‘You want to fight? I told you, I don’t do well on the phone. I rather thought we were too
serious for I wait until I talk to
telephone
relationship.
prefer
a
to
can
my women in the flesh. If you have something, you only find that out face to face.’
‘Or body to body, in your case.’
He regarded her calmly. ‘Did anybody ever tell you you’re a petulant little brat? I can’t be the first. But never mind. I’ll get on with the garden.’
‘That’s fine,’ Becky said. ‘And, please, let’s keep our relationship strictly professional. I think we’ve both moved on from that mistake. Don’t you?’
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‘Aye, lass,’ Logan said. His voice moved into a thicker Yorkshire accent the angrier he got, Becky noticed. He moved to leave.
‘Wait.’ She gestured imperiously for him to stop. ‘Your money. I want to pay you in advance this time.’
He nodded. ‘I see you’re taking in boarders.’
‘Not boarders,’ Becky said, furious. ‘Guests. This is a hotel now.’ ‘I’ll take the money,’ Logan said, holding out his hand for the cheque she ripped off and practically threw at him. ‘If only because it means I won’t have to see you after I’m done.’
He folded the cheque up neatly, put it in his jeans pocket and walked out.
Becky waited till he had gone to slam her fist against the wall.
Goddamn him. He took his sweet time, Becky thought as she watched the team of workers on their knees in the chilly autumn air, digging and sweating and planting what looked like an unimpressive mass of greenery. She knew enough about his talent to understand that it would be sensational when it was finished, though. And now Fairfield and its grounds were her business, she felt she needed him.
She tried to concentrate on work, but it was hard. Sharon was very competent at carrying out her vision. Becky had meetings with banks, showed them her new figures and raised some money. But she couldn’t get the thought of Logan out of her mind.
She made a point of coming home after he would have left, to check that all was running smoothly with her guests nd to work in her study. Today she had been finalizing a loan for a small, dilapidated theatre in the West End. Becky couldn’t afford hotels, so she had been forced to think laterally. Theatres were priced differently. She had enough to convert the structure now.
Becky pulled into the small garage at the end Of the drive, locked her car and got out. The sun was setting, and she tugged her cashmere scarf round her neck for warmth. She had washed her hair this morning and was wearing it loose; her make-up was light and simple. There was no need to have to dress older than she was now. Her heels pinched, though, and she was longing to slip them off and get into her own, unrenovated bath …
Suddenly she went crashing to the ground, a thick male body on top of her.
‘Hey.’ Two hands shot out, Logan holding himself above her. He wore black work pants, there was a faint masculine tang of aftershave and sweat about him and his chest was bare, the way he usually worked in the sun. ‘Are you OK? Are you hurt?’
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‘No more than usual when somebody uses me as a rugby ball,’ Becky said. She found Logan’s body on top of her incredibly disturbing. ‘Where’s your shirt?’
‘Why? Does this body offend you?’ Logan teased. ‘It never used to.’
He rolled off her, propping himself up on the grass. ‘I was running into the house. You walked out in front of me.’
‘You should look where you’re going,’ Becky snapped.
‘You look good like that,’ he said idly, trailing rough fingers through her hair.
‘Leave me alone,’ Becky said, but her voice cracked annoyingly in her throat.
‘No,’ Logan said slowly, ‘I don’t think I will.’
He reached up one calloused paw, slipped it behind the silk of her platinum hair and pulled her mouth towards him in a kiss. His lips half crashed hers, his tongue slipping between them, barely touching her upper lip, lightly brushing the skin. A silver fire of wanting him slid from her throat down to her breasts, instantly swelling the nipples, dampening her between the legs. There was just too much of his bare skin next to her to resist. She made a half-hearted movement to push from him, but Logan, merciless, raised his left hand and touched her little hardened bud through the fabric of her dress. His slightest touch rocked pleasure through her breasts, down between her legs.
‘You want me.’ His low murmur in her ear was supremely confident. ‘You’ve been thinking about me all the time. The way I’ve been thinking about you.’
Becky couldn’t even manage a lie.
‘Let’s go somewhere,’ he suggested. ‘You don’t want to be an extra entertainment for your guests.’
‘There’s a back entrance to the east wing,’ Becky muttered. She had grass stalks on her clothes and skin, and there was a suspicious bulge in Logan’s tight jeans she’d never be able to explain.
He led her round the back, his hand locked on hers, roughly tugging her along. The small wooden door opened easily and Logan had to duck as he led her through the winding wooden passage, up to the back of Becky’s bedroom.
‘Wow.’ He emerged into the master bedroom suite and took in the beam across the ceiling, the priceless Persian carpet in pale blues and golds, the lead-panelled windows and the antique furniture. ‘It’s good to be you.’
Becky was fumbling at the buttons of her dress. ‘I guess.’ She was hot and impatient.
‘What was that little doorway doing leading into here?’
26I
Becky smiled. ‘To smuggle in the servants maybe?’
Logan stopped dead. It was as though a shutter had been lowered over his eyes. ‘What?’
Becky was oblivious. ‘Maybe the master of the house used it to bring up his kitchen maid.’
‘Fuck,’ Logan swore softly. Her head lifted. ‘I should have known. Your kind is all the same, milady. That’s what I am to you, right? A servant?’
‘Of course you’re not,’ Becky said angrily. ‘Don’t blow this up into something.’
‘Something like being the hired stud? The gardener? Yeah, very Lady Chatterley.’ Logan shook his head. ‘I don’t think so, Becky. You’ll have to get your diversions somewhere else.’
‘Just get out,’ Becky said, frustrated and furious. ‘You bastard.’
‘My pleasure, ma’am,’ Logan said. He touched his forehead in ironic deference, then walked out.
Becky flung herself on to her bed and burst into tears. Unreasonable, unlikeable, proud son of a bitch. She hated him. And she hated that she wanted him so badly.