‘I doubt anyone would want to steal it.’
Megan mentally agreed with him as she stood at the sink washing the dishes. The tractor could be clearly seen from the kitchen window, and like the rest of the farm was badly in need of attention. Its red paint was badly rusted, showing its age. Megan had noticed yesterday that the farmhouse was badly in need of a coat of paint, the white paint having gone grey and was flaking in places.
It was curiously relaxing feeding the chickens. They were such uncomplicated creatures, pecking away at their feed all day, occasionally at each other, seemingly in fun, laying a few eggs if they felt like it, and then sleeping in their nice warm roost at night. What a life! And what Megan wouldn’t give for their simple happiness.
Now she just had to see to Bertha, make sure her mother was comfortable and had everything she needed, and then she could get over to The Towers. The trouble was actually finding Bertha. She looked everywhere for her, in the shed, in the neighbouring fields, but Bertha wasn’t to be found.
And then she saw her! She was being led back into the dusty dry yard by the man Megan presumed to be Jeff from The Towers. He was very handsome, extremely so, and she was made to feel conscious of her grubby denims and tee-shirt. Then she dismissed the feeling of inadequacy, no one could look bandbox-fresh working on a farm, and Jeff would appreciate that fact.
The only trouble was, this man managed to look reasonably smart, the beige corduroys and black sweatshirt he wore emphasising the muscled perfection of his body. He was tall, almost six and a half feet she would have said, at least ten years her senior, with thick black hair brushed back from his face, a strong tanned face with a deep cleft in the chin. She couldn’t see what colour his eyes were from this distance, but she would take a bet on them being blue. They had to be, in every other respect this man was her ideal, his eyes had to be blue to complete that ideal.
She stood and watched him as he led the cow over to where she stood, the docile Bertha looking perfectly happy to be taking this morning stroll. The man at her side moved with the grace of a cat, lightfooted and very sure, making Bertha look more ungainly than usual.
Megan was wrong, his eyes weren’t blue, they were brown, a deep velvety brown that on reflection she thought she preferred. But they didn’t look very friendly at the moment, appearing to look down disdainfully at both her and poor Bertha. And Brian had said he was a ‘nice bloke’! Still, maybe he was when you got to know him. After all, by the look of things Bertha had been wandering again. Megan couldn’t remember a time when she hadn’t done it, but maybe being a newcomer to the district Jeff hadn’t heard of Bertha’s wanderlust.
‘The absent Megan, I presume,’ he drawled, his voice husky, with no trace of an East Anglian accent, pointing to him not being a local of Norfolk. Megan wondered what had made him decide to work in an area that was flat and lacking in outward beauty, although she had always thought it had a certain charm of its own.
‘Yes—I mean, no. What I really mean,’ she blushed at her confusion, ‘is that yes, I’m Megan, and no, I’m not absent any longer.’
He frowned. ‘I thought you were training to be a nurse?’
‘I was,’ again she blushed, ‘but I—I’ve been ill. They thought I wasn’t strong enough to carry on such arduous work,’ she invented, her fingers crossed behind her back as she told the lie.
‘They?’ He raised one dark eyebrow.
‘Er—yes, they. The senior nursing officials.’
‘I see.’ He was watching her closely with narrowed brown eyes. ‘And are you back to stay?’
‘Oh yes,’ she smiled. ‘I’m going to help Brian on the farm.’
‘And won’t that prove rather—arduous too?’ he queried mockingly.
Megan gave him a sharp glance. Surely he hadn’t heard of her dismissal and the reason for it? No, he couldn’t have done. It had only happened two days ago, hardly time for her to have realised it herself. Her one consolation in the whole affair had been the fact that they had asked Roddy Meyers to leave the hospital too. Of course he was recovered from his illness, but it had still afforded her some satisfaction to know she hadn’t taken the blame alone.
‘Oh, I’ll only do the light jobs to start with.’ That one little lie was taking her deeper and deeper into a web of deception. She just hoped Brian wasn’t friendly enough with the man to tell him the truth. ‘And the fresh air will do me good,’ she added for good measure.
‘Yes, you are a little pale.’
She was naturally pale, but she wasn’t going to tell him that. She blushed at the intentness of his arrogant gaze, feeling as if he stripped the clothes from her back and explored every curve of her body. It was extraordinary to feel this way with a total stranger—even if he was so attractive.
‘I see you brought Bertha back,’ she patted the cow affectionately on the neck. ‘Where did she go this time? Not the Towers?’
He nodded. ‘I’m afraid so.’
‘Well, well, Bertha, you can’t be as old as we thought you were.’ The Towers was at least a mile away, and much too far for the aged cow to have walked, she would have thought. ‘I hope she didn’t trample on the snooty Mr Towers’ flowerbeds or anything?’
Was it her imagination or did he seem to stiffen? ‘I beg your pardon?’ he said in a stilted voice.
‘Sorry,’ Megan blushed, ‘I shouldn’t have spoken like that about your employer.’ She gave an involuntary jerk as their hands touched as she took Bertha’s rope out of his grasp and tied the cow to a post. This man had nice hands, long and hard, and very confident. It was the hand of a man who wasn’t afraid of hard work, and seemed to go with the rest of his rugged appearance. ‘But don’t you find him snooty?’ she asked interestedly.
‘I can’t say that I have. Did someone say that he was?’
She shrugged. ‘It was just the impression I got. Still, it isn’t important. The tractor is over there,’ she pointed to the stationary vehicle.
‘Yes?’ He appeared puzzled.
‘The tractor Brian called you about this morning.’ Surely this man couldn’t have these looks and body, and be a fool? That just wouldn’t be fair. But he didn’t look a fool, far from it. There was a shrewd hardness to his eyes, a determination to the firm mouth and jaw. No, this man looked far from being a fool. There had to be some misunderstanding. She frowned. ‘Didn’t you take the message yourself?’
‘I couldn’t have done,’ he told her abruptly, ‘or I would have known what you’re talking about.’
She tried to ignore the sharpness of his tone. He had had to walk back here with Bertha, and knowing the speed the cow walked it must have taken him ages, so she could make excuses for his shortness of temper. ‘Brian called The Towers this morning and asked if you could look at our tractor. I was under the impression that you had agreed to come over.’
‘I see. Well, perhaps you could put—Bertha?—into a shed, and I’ll take a look at it.’ He began striding towards the tractor. ‘Any idea what the trouble is?’ he shot the question over his shoulder.
Megan came back from settling the cow into her stall. ‘Something to do with the fuel getting through,’ she told him vaguely, no more familiar with the workings of this machine than Brian was. She knew nothing about mechanics; she had tried to learn how to drive once, but much to the relief of her driving-instructor she had given up after a couple of lessons. She had turned out to be one of those people whose personality changed as soon as they got behind the wheel, becoming aggressive and unmanageable.
‘Thanks,’ he taunted her lack of knowledge, ‘that will be a great help.’ He lifted up the side covering of the engine before getting up behind the wheel and attempting to start it. The engine gave a couple of stutters, roared into life, and then stopped. ‘Fuel starvation,’ he muttered as he came back to look