No Greater Joy (3 page)

Alison was shocked when he put his hand on her leg. Tight muscles jumped as liquid fire ran up her thigh to her groin. Recoiling, she pushed his hand away.

'Why did you do that?' she snapped furiously. In that moment he was not her employer; he was just a man—a dangerously attractive man—who was beginning to get. to her.

He laughed softly. 'Just proving to you that you're not relaxed at all.'

'What you just did could be taken as sexual harassment,' she said angrily.

'You know it wasn't.'

'1 wonder!'

'You don't need to wonder. I wasn't out to offend you, Alison.'

'I don't go in for touching, Mr Demaine. You might as well know that,' she said firmly.

'You must lead a lonely existence,' he drawled. But she noticed that this time he let pass the formal use of his name.

'I'm not lonely,' she said stiffly. 'It's just that nobody touches me without my permission.'

'The exception being the boyfriend?'

When was the last time Raymond had touched her? Kissed her?

Firmly, she said, 'Exactly.'

For almost an hour after that there was silence—a charged kind of silence which began to get intensely on Alison's nerves after a while. She began to wonder how ori earth she would get through the hours till they reached the camp.

Arid then, several miles further on, they saw the first placards advertising a country fair, and Clint asked, 'Would you like to look around?'

'Love to!' Just the idea of getting out of the car for a while spelled relief.

When Clint had nosed the Porsche between dusty jeeps and caravans, they made their way into the fairground.

Music blared through loudspeakers. There were crowds of people. Farmers, with floppy hats on their heads and
veldskoene
on their feet, inspected the livestock with practised eyes. Their wives, in jeans and checked shirts or light cotton dresses, engaged in animated conversation with friends they had not seen since the last get- together. Children swarmed everywhere.

'Will you know people here?' asked Clint, as they made their way between the rows of stalls.

'Maybe,' said Alison, 'though I shouldn't think so. I don't see any faces I recognise. We had a fair much closer to home about two months ago.'

'Did you have any part in it?'

'Did I! My sister Lynn and I sold six dozen jars of the best fig jam you ever tasted. And Mom won second prize for her chocolate cake.'

He laughed, the vital laugh that was beginning to sound familiar. 'Sounds as if you had a good time!'

She hadn't known about Raymond's two-timing then.

'A wonderful time.' She looked up at Clint. 'If I live till I'm a hundred, I'll never get tired of country fairs— the smells and the sounds and the people, the excitement. I love it all!'

'I can see that,' he smiled.

'Why are you smiling?' she asked, a little uncertainly.

'Because you're showing me a new side of yourself, Alison—vibrant, alive. I like you this way.'

Gold flecks warmed his eyes when he smiled, and his lips lifted in a way that was disturbingly sensuous. Alison stiffened as she tried to ignore his attractiveness.

Clint was saying, 'Do you know, it's ridiculous, but I can't remember the last time I was at a fair myself. You'll have to be my guide.' He cupped her elbow in his hand. His hand felt so big, the palm rough against her- skin, the fingers folding over on to her arm. 'Lead on, fair damsel. I want to see it all.'

It was impossible to resist him when he was in this mood. Amazingly, she found herself laughing as they began to move through the crowd.

At a baked goods stall they stopped, and Clint bought some
melktert
which they broke in half and shared. When they'd finished it, they stopped again, this time to buy some
konfyt.
The sticky confection, made of glazed watermelon, was more difficult to break. Politely, Alison said she didn't really want any, but Clint would have none of that, and he insisted on holding it to her mouth until she bit off a piece. She was laughing again when he wanted her to have more, convinced that she would burst if she did.

Eventually they found themselves at the livestock, but they looked only casually at the cattle before moving on to the horses.

Leaning their arms on the whitewashed wood railing, they watched the horses being walked around a big paddock. Alison was all alertness now, inspecting horse after horse with the eye of one who did not mean to let too much time pass before she began buying some horses of her own.

'Look at that one.' She gestured towards a high- stepping horse. 'Isn't he super?'

'Certainly is,' Clint agreed, only to say a moment later, 'But look at that roan, Alison. See it, coming up on the right? Now there's a beauty if ever I saw one.'

Alison narrowed her eyes as she focused on the horse that was just coming up alongside them, step sure yet graceful, head proud and lovely, dark coat gleaming in the sun.

'Magnificent!' she said, «wed. And then, with astonished respect, 'You understand horses, Clint.'

'I like to think I do.'

'That's one of the loveliest horses I've ever seen.' As Alison turned to Clint, her new-found respect led her to confide in him without thinking. 'The money I make at Bushveld Camp could never be enough to buy that horse. But I'm going to put it into a special account and keep it there till I have enough to buy one just like it.'

'Good lord!' exclaimed Clint.

'You don't approve?'

'I'm amazed, that's all.'

Alison laughed up at him, enjoying his confusion. 'Why?' she asked.

'I thought you might have your earnings earmarked for other things—trousseau, honeymoon, things like that.'

She managed to keep the smile on her face. 'And all the time I wanted it for a horse.'

'Mind telling me why?' His voice was unaccountably soft.

'I'm going to be starting my own stables.'

The surprised expression in Clint's eyes deepened. 'How does the boyfriend feel about that?'

'I told you,' her voice was light, 'I make my own decisions.'

After a moment, he said, 'So you're after acquiring your own stables?'

'That's right. As soon as I have enough money. I've worked with Dad for years, but I've always dreamed of a place of my own. I'll board horses for people whocan't put them up themselves, and I'll give lessons. 1 want to organise gymkhanas, and...' She stopped.

When she went on, it was in a different tone. 'Why are you looking at me like that, Clint?'

'You intrigue me,' he told her.

'I thought perhaps I was boring you.'

'Do you know, Alison,' dark brown eyes held her green ones, defying them to move from his, 'I've a feeling you have a great many qualities, most of which I've yet to discover. But boringness could never be one of them.'

'Thank heavens for that!' She laughed up at him, then turned her eyes back to the horses, but not before Clint had seen that her cheeks were flushed with pleasure at the compliment.

But a moment later the compliment was forgotten. A nervous horse was coming their way, head jerking, gait skittish, when Alison spotted a little boy climbing the slats of the paddock fence. Little more than a toddler, three years old at most, he got to the top of the fence, balancing unsteadily as he waved his hands at the horse.

'Careful!' shouted Alison in alarm.

She lunged for the child, meaning to pull him back, when he overbalanced, falling headlong into the paddock, directly into the path of the horse.

Alison was levering herself frantically over the fence when strong hands pulled her back, and in a second Clint had vaulted into the paddock. He snatched the child from ~ the ground just as the front hooves of the horse were about to smash down on it. And then he was back at the fence, passing the little boy across to Alison It had all happened so quickly that the horse's owner had not had time to control his rearing steed. From start to finish, the incident had lasted less than a minute.

Only now did reaction set in. The horse's owner, badly startled, and obviously thinking Clint and Alison were negligent parents, was cursing all three of them. The child, cradled in Alison's arms, began to cry. And then the mother rushed up, white and shaken, and took the child from Alison's arms.

'Thank you—oh, thank you!' She was crying as she turned to Clint. 'I just turned my head for a moment, and Bobby here ran away. I should have known better.'

'No harm done,' Clint said kindly.

'It's all my fault!' Tears streaming down her face, the woman hugged the child to her.

Alison touched her arm. 'These things happen. Look, you've had an awful shock. Why don't you go and get yourself a cup of tea? You might feel better then.'

'I'll go and find my husband first.' The woman turned to Clint. 'I don't know how to thank you.'

'You've thanked me already.' Clint ruffled the little boy's hair. 'Take it easy next time, cowboy.'

When the woman, still holding the little boy in her arms, had walked away, Alison said, 'That was quick thinking, Clint—and very brave.'

He smiled at her. 'I was no braver than you, Alison.'

'Me? I didn't do a thing!' she protested.

'You were going to. Have you forgotten that I stopped you from jumping into the paddock yourself?'

Wide-eyed, she stared at him. 'Yes, I had forgotten. Why did you stop me, Clint?'

The smile turned wicked. 'Put it down to masculine arrogance.'

She shook her head. 'No, it wasn't arrogance. But I could have done it—I'm used to horses and fences, Clint.'

'So am I,' he said easily.

After a long moment Alison said, 'You really did grow up on a farm, then?'

'Really. I thought that surprised you the first time I mentioned it. Why, I wonder?'

She had to think about it. 'Your image, 1 suppose. Your... your clothes, your car. All those hotels.'

He was so close to her that she could feel his laughter shaking his body. 'Trappings that all came much later. I didn't grow up owning hotels, Alison.'

After a moment she asked, 'What kind of sheep farm was it, Clint?'

'Merinos, mostly. Like you, I spent my youth on horseback—helping the men look for lost sheep, checking broken fences.'

They were still standing at the paddock, arms in front of them on the wooden rail, but now Clint shifted position, so that his arm was touching Alison's. A strong arm, deeply tanned, with the suggestion of hard muscle and sinew just beneath the skin.

Where his arm touched Alison's, her skin felt as if it was on fire. She wanted to remove herself from that touch, yet she didn't know how to do so without seeming childish in Clint's eyes.

She kept her eyes straight ahead of her. 'How long did you live on the sheep farm?' she asked him.

"Till
I was twelve. My mother died then, and the heart seemed to go out of my father. Dad sold up, and we became city people after that.'

'That must have been hard for you,'

'It was at the time.' And then in a different tone, he said, 'Alison...'

'Yes?'

'This isn't touching.' His voice was soft. 'Not the kind of touching you were referring to in the car.'

Her head swung round at the words, but after a fevered moment she looked away from him again. 'I suppose you're right... it isn't,' she agreed quietly.

'Not that I wouldn't like to touch you in just that way.'

'Don't say that—please!'

'You're so awfully uptight,' he observed. 'I wish 1 knew why.'

'It's...nothing personal. I just don't go in for touching strangers, that's all. I already told you that.'

'I thought the last hour had taken us beyond being strangers.'

On a dry throat Alison said, 'I may be working for you for a little while, but basically we'll always be strangers, Clint.'

She didn't stop to wonder why his lips tightened at that. She was only conscious of a strange sadness deep inside her. She was relieved when he shifted his arm away from hers and said, 'Would you like to try out the roan, Alison?'

'Oh, yes!'

'All right, then, let's see what I can arrange.'

Clint strode away, lithe and loose-limbed, and as tall and tanned as any of the farmers. Alison watched him stop the man walking with the roan, and talk to him for a few moments. And then they were walking back towards her.

Minutes later Alison was in another paddock, astride the lovely horse. This was her world, the world where she felt secure and happy, no matter what. There was just the horse beneath her, and the wind stinging her cheeks and tugging at her hair.In the veld she'd have ridden for hours. As it was, the ride couldn't last long. At last, reluctantly, she had to slow the horse to a gentle trot, and after that a walk.

Clint was right beside the horse as Alison made to dismount, his hands reaching for her waist.

'I haven't been helped off a horse in years,' she protested.

He laughed at her. 'Doesn't mean you can't be helped this time! Enjoy the ride, Alison?'

Her eyes were great and green and shining. 'That's just the most marvellous horse!' she told him eagerly.

'You looked marvellous riding it.'

It was the compliment that brought home to her the fact that he was still holding her—a loose hold, his hands just touching her waist. There was no reason at all why the touch had the feeling of an embrace.

She took a step backwards, away from those big hands, and Clint did nothing to stop her. Instead he said, very softly, 'Do you know how beautiful you are?'

'Shouldn't we be moving on?' Her voice was jerky.

'In a moment.'

Reaching out, he pushed a strand of wayward hair behind her ear. Alison tried to ignore the excitement that flamed suddenly inside her.

'Clint...' she began.

'that wasn't touching, either, Alison. Nothing you could object to. You know that.'

'It must be getting late,' she said, taking another step away from him.

'Does your boyfriend tell you every day that you're beautiful, Alison?'

'Stop this, Clint!'

'I'd never stop telling you so if you were my girl.' His voice was low and husky, as caressing as his touch had been.