Afraid her wet hands were going to slip on the muddy fur, she gripped harder, bit her lip at the dog’s whimper of pain, and then her body was dropped flat on the wet earth and she was dragged over the lip of the hole.
Her hands were ruthlessly uncurled, and she lifted her head to see Garde hoist the little Jack Russell into his arms and begin to check him over. ‘You’re all right,’ he said brusquely as he put him down. He sounded extremely bad tempered.
Certainly the dog looked all right as he shook himself before scampering off, nose to the ground. Sorrel hoped she was, too. It felt as though all the skin had been torn from her chest and stomach.
‘Shouldn’t you call him to heel or something?’ she asked absently as she rolled onto her back and sat up. Lifting her sweater, she stared down at herself.
‘No,’ he denied tersely. ‘Are you hurt?’
She shook her head. There was a slight redness across her ribs, but nothing else. Tugging down her sweater, she stared up at him. Tall and dark with broad shoulders, jaw unshaven and his hair wild, he looked dangerous. Sounded dangerous.
‘Thank you,’ he added grudgingly.
‘That’s all right,’ she said quietly. ‘Being skinny has its advantages.’
‘Yes.’ Moving away, he began trying to shift a large boulder that was embedded in the earth. He wasn’t skinny. He was large and well built. Even through his sweater she could see the bunch of his muscles.
‘Give me a hand with this, will you? I need to block the hole before he does it again.’
Getting to her feet, she went first to retrieve her coat, and then gave a cry of dismay at the state of it. Forgetting for the moment that this was a prospective employer, she demanded, ‘Did you have to throw it in a muddy puddle?’
He didn’t answer, merely continued trying to shift the boulder by rocking it backwards and forwards.
Pulling a face, she shoved her arms into her coat and went to help. Five minutes later they’d managed to roll it into the hole. He then dusted off his hands, and walked away.
‘Hey! Mr Chevenay!’ Hurrying to catch him up, she added breathlessly, ‘I want to talk to you.’
‘I don’t give interviews.’
‘I didn’t ask for one,’ she retorted automatically, and then halted, a little frown on her face. Was he normally plagued by journalists? Giving interviews, or not giving them, as the case may be, smacked of—fame. Seeing that he was now some way ahead, she ran to catch him up again. ‘Are you famous?’ she asked as she matched him stride for stride.
‘No. Who told you where I was?’
‘A woman at your house…’ she began, before registering the tightening of his lips. Someone was going to be in trouble for telling her, weren’t they? Damn. ‘Look,’ she began again, ‘I only wanted to ask you something.’
‘I don’t do favours, either.’
‘I don’t want a favour! In fact, I’m about to do you one! Well,’ she qualified, ‘maybe not a favour exactly. I’m here about my letter. You did get my letter? I’m—’
‘No.’ He continued on towards the house.
Taken aback, because he must have got it, hesitating only momentarily, she sprinted after him. ‘How do you know you didn’t get it?’ she demanded. ‘You don’t even know who I am! I sent it special delivery,’ she continued in the face of his silence. ‘You’d have to have signed for it.’
He didn’t answer.
‘Unless you were out when it came,’ she murmured, ‘and it went to the depot.’ Getting absolutely no response from him, she wondered if she’d got the wrong man. He hadn’t actually said who he was. ‘You are Garde Chevenay, aren’t you?’
He halted, looked at her, and then strode on.
Beginning to get cross, she grumbled, ‘Well, it surely can’t be a secret!’
He jumped the small ditch that divided the hill from the gravel drive—or, more accurately, what had once been a gravel drive, and was sadly now mostly devoid of its gravel and sprouting weeds—then crunched along it and round to the back of the old house.
Absolutely refusing to give up until she had a satisfactory answer, she trailed after him. ‘I wrote to you about your grounds. I’m a landscape gardener,’ she added for extra clarity as she followed him into what looked like a utility room. ‘So you see—’
‘You’re going somewhere?’ he enquired with hateful interest.
‘Yes,’ she agreed firmly, ‘I’m going to tell you what I can do.’
‘I wasn’t aware I’d shown any interest.’
‘You haven’t. Yet. But, Garde—’
‘Mr Chevenay, to you, and don’t tramp that mud in here,’ he ordered disagreeably.
‘You are,’ she pointed out.
‘I live here.’
With a little tut, Sorrel kicked off her ruined shoes and padded after him in her socks—wet socks—and bumped into his back as he suddenly halted to remove his own boots.
‘Sorry,’ she muttered.
He said something she didn’t catch, dragged off his wet sweater, tossed it aimlessly towards the corner, and opened the door in front of him. Striding through, rolling up his shirtsleeves as he went, he left it to swing shut behind him.
‘You are so rude!’ she complained as she yanked it open and followed him along a stone-flagged floor the colour of chestnuts.
‘Possibly because I didn’t invite you.’
‘But you must be interested! Your gardens are an absolute mess.’ Halting in pleased surprise, she stared curiously round her at white walls, a few highly polished pieces of furniture. Stark. Monastic—which was appropriate, seeing as it was an old monastery. A beautiful old staircase ran up the outside wall; a small half-moon table stood between it and the double front doors that were curved at the top. There was one door to her right, beneath the rise of the staircase, and three on her left. There was an empty niche between the first two doors and an old table beneath. ‘This is so nice—’ she began.
‘I’m glad you approve,’ he derided sarcastically.
With a little twitch of her lips, she halted before a large tapestry that hung above an old carved chest in the space between the next two doors. ‘A bit shabby,’ she added sadly, ‘but then it is rather old, I expect.’ When there was no answer, she looked round to find herself alone. The only indication of where he had gone was the muffled click of the door at the end. Hurrying towards it, she shoved it open and went into what was clearly his study. A very state-of-the-art study. Very modern, very functional, with, as far as she could see, every technological aid that had ever been invented.
‘I gather you work from home,’ she murmured as she continued to look round her.
He didn’t answer, merely seated himself behind a massive desk. But then he would need a massive desk; he was a massive man. It was nice to meet someone taller than herself.
Abandoning her evaluation of the room, she reverted to the subject in hand. ‘So, did you really not get my letter?’
‘I don’t read unsolicited mail.’
‘Not even out of curiosity?’ she asked in astonishment.
‘No.’ Linking his hands on the paper-strewn desk, he looked her up and down in a rather rude appraisal.
She stared back with humorous defiance. She knew exactly what he saw. A stork. Too tall, too thin; her strange-coloured hair would be even wilder than usual because it was wet. Even damp, it went into tight, impossible-to-comb