The Heat of the Moment Page 4

  Frances wanted to say that she had been there, for she had been very popular with the owners although she had not been impressed with the trappings of wealth, or the people who wore them.

  * * *

  Frances continued to follow young Juan Carlos’s progress until one day she arrived at the school to hear voices raised in argument. There was no mistaking the sharp, bitter tones of Pilar Mendoza.

  ‘You will be finished here when Kane hears of this.’

  ‘The school is my domain, senora. I say whom I teach and whom I do not. The senor knows this. Juan Carlos Lopez is a pupil under my tuition and he pays like everyone else.’

  ‘But he is not everyone else, is he? He has been forbidden on the ranch, you know this and yet you go against your employer’s wishes.’

  The tall dark figure of Juan Carlos stood in a nearby stable staring at Frances. He must hear them, she thought. Why doesn’t he leave? She made to join him but changed her mind and walked towards the open doors of the school.

  Pilar was dressed for riding, her whip twitching like the tail of an angry cat.

  Gilbert was standing his ground.

  ‘This matter is between myself and the senor, senora, and no-one else. Ah, Senorita Frances, you have come to find me, si?’

  Pilar turned her head as Frances came through the open doors. ‘What are you doing down here?’ she snapped.

  Frances nodded her head in greeting and said, ‘I work here.’

  Without another word, the Spanish woman turned her back on them and stalked away.

  ‘She will make trouble for you,’ Frances spoke quietly.

  ‘She will try,’ Gilbert agreed, an expression of pain stamped on his face. ‘The boy is outside in the stable.’

  ‘Si, I know, he waits for me. We must make other arrangements. It is important that he continues his instruction.’

  ‘What has he done to make Kane ban him from the ranch?’

  ‘Ah, Fran, it is a long story.’

  He took hold of her hand and pulled it through his arm.

  ‘A story which only Kane can tell.’

  They left the school together, and Juan Carlos came across the yard to meet them. Then he and Gilbert climbed into the Jeep and drove away.

  Frances returned to the house by the path through the gardens and sat for a while on a white marble seat surrounded by a hedge full of large red flowers. Deep in thought, she failed to hear footsteps pass on the far side of the hedge and so was shaken when a deep voice intruded into her thoughts a few minutes later.

  ‘No need to jump to your feet. I wondered what had happened to you. We are supposed to be entertaining guests in ten minutes and Connie said you weren’t to be found.’

  ‘I’m sorry, I forgot,’ she started guiltily.

  A frown drew Kane’s brows down over his nose as he asked, ‘Are you ill?’

  ‘No, just tired.’

  Rising to her feet, she made to leave but his hand on her arm restrained her.

  ‘Look, don’t bother about tonight. I’ll ask Pilar to stand in.’

  Anxious as she was for Juan Carlos and Gilbert, she could have burst out laughing at the thought of Pilar in the role of stand-in. sobering thoughts replaced humour when she realised that by allowing Pilar to replace her she was giving the woman a perfect opportunity to tell Kane about the secret lessons.

  ‘Just give me five minutes,’ she reassured him with a smile and ran up the verandah steps and into the house.

  The lounge was full of people when she came back downstairs. Kane was nowhere to be seen. Connie was admitting the last of the guests as Frances returned to the hall.

  ‘Have you seen Kane?’ she asked Connie.

  ‘Si, he and Gilbert are in the office.’

  Frances’s heart nearly left her body. So, Gilbert had decided to face the rage of the tiger himself rather than let Pilar twist the facts, which she surely would do.

  Moving back into the lounge, she began to circulate, making excuses for Kane’s absence, answering questions as best she could and fending off those she could not.

  When Kane did arrive, he found everything running smoothly and Frances amidst a group of laughing women. Their eyes met across the room and Frances immediately made her apologies, left the group and made her way across the floor to join him.

  ‘Thank you,’ he said in a voice like dried ice.

  The evening was a great success. When the last guest had departed, Kane came back into the house as Frances was about to climb the stairs to her room. He crossed the floor to where she stood on the third step, so they were eye to eye when he spoke.

  ‘I meant what I said earlier. Thank you for holding everything together for me.

  He looked strained and tired and for a moment she almost felt sorry for him. She wanted very much to ask him what had happened between himself and Gilbert, but she bit her tongue and only said softly, ‘You’re welcome.’

  Then she turned and continued up the stairs.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  Kane was off to Belgium for the next two weeks and Gilbert had said K nothing of what had passed between them the evening of the dinner party. Everything was as it had always been except that Juan Carlos no longer came for his lessons, and no-one had seen sight of or heard a word about Pilar.

  Frances was wandering through one of the barns of stabling instead of going back to the office after the siesta when the horse pushed his head over the door of the box in front of her.

  ‘Hello,’ she said, putting a hand out to rub his nose.

  About to pass on, she stopped and, opening the stable door, moved into the box.

  ‘Firefly, it is you,’ she whispered. ‘But I don’t understand. What are you doing here?’

  She stroked his silky neck. There was no doubt in her mind that this was the same horse who had shown such racing potential, now owned by Senora Mendoza who wanted Kane to train him up as an event horse.

  She shook her head. There was something very wrong here. Pilar must have paid a fortune for him, as a racer, so why try to change him into something he wasn’t?

  It was here Gilbert found her.

  ‘I see for myself your love of the horse. Soon we will have you riding again, no? But not this one, I think.’

  Frances frowned. She hated having lied to this friendly man but she also hated the sympathy that automatically followed any time she explained why she could not ride for the present and the probing questions her answers prompted.

  She stroked the soft muzzle that pushed at her hand. Worst of all was the thought of Kane finding out she had lied. Following the accident which had left her with broken facial bones, collar bone and two broken arms, physiotherapy had done wonders and given her back her independence, but nothing could prevent the pain that still haunted her. That pain had improved in Tenerife’s sunny climate but was still a constant reminder of what she had suffered.

  Yet she missed the feel of a horse beneath her and the wind in her hair. It was tempting to ignore all the advice and agree to Gilbert’s offer of lessons. He thought her shy of horses since a childhood fall so would not put her on anything too strong.

  She played with the idea until evening when she told Gilbert she would give it a try. He was delighted. Later, while drinking their coffee, Gilbert told her that he was still teaching Juan Carlos.

  ‘The boy’s potential is too great to be ignored. This I tell to the senor who would not deliberately deny any person a right to advancement. Unhappily, he does not want to know of the boy’s existence but has allowed us the use of a small herders’ hut in the mountains.’

  ‘May I come with you when you go?’ Frances asked eagerly.

  Gilbert laid down his empty coffee cup and made to rise.

  ‘It is a little way from here, Fran. I have to go in my own time and by my own transport. The road is rough and would soon damage a vehicle, so I ride. Perhaps when I see how your riding improves I will take you. Now, I must say good-night.’

  Frances remain
ed on the verandah calling herself all the names of stupidity she could think of. If she had been honest with him she could have ridden over there on his next visit. Now all she could hope for was to impress him with her riding skills so he would take her with him sooner rather than later.

  The evening of Kane’s return from Belgium was a shock to Frances. He looked so tried and drawn. Angrily, he made no effort to socialise, merely calling in to let them know he was back then leaving almost immediately for his house on the other side of the ranch.

  Frances, who had been storing up grievances against him on behalf of Gilbert and Juan Carlos, found herself comforting a worried Connie.

  ‘We should send a doctor to him. He his ill, I know this. He works too long.’

  ‘He’ll be all right after a rest, you’ll see,’ Frances comforted, but the little woman would not be assured.

  ‘I have known him always, since he was a little boy when his mother ran off and left him with the old senor. He was a wicked old man, the old senor,’ she said, shaking her fist at an invisible foe. ‘The boy grew wild. Too much freedom is not good. When the Grandfather died, the mother of the senor returned with a husband. The husband had a daughter a few years younger than the boy.’

  Connie nodded her head, where she sat opposite Frances at the kitchen table, a faraway look in her eyes.

  ‘Oh, she was trouble, that one,’ she spat out as though to rid herself of a nasty taste.

  Later, in her room, Frances thought over the old woman’s story and tried to visualise the young Kane. She had known what it was like to grow up with an elderly grandparent but whereas her life had been very restricted his had been the opposite. She wondered what it would have been like and how she would have felt if her mother had come home and brought a new husband.

  Why had Connie hated the girl? What had she done that happy-go-lucky Connie could not forgive after all this time? The questions were still going in her head as she fell asleep.

  * * *

  The following morning, when Pru arrived in her office with a list of tack repairs needing to go to the saddler, Frances asked her if she knew anything of Kane’s family.

  ‘No, not really, why?’

  ‘I was just curious to know who lived with him in that house on the other side of the ranch.’

  Pru laughed.

  ‘Thinking of moving in with him?’

  ‘Not on your life. I heard his mother was still alive, that’s all.’

  ‘He lives alone, that I do know.’

  Pru was leaning against the doorpost and shot forward when an angry voice asked Frances if there was anything else he could furnish her with. ‘Far more reliable from the horse’s mouth, as they say.’

  Pru disappeared out of the door and Frances could feel the heat rise into her face.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ she said, refusing to meet his eyes. ‘Connie was worried about you last night and I was trying to ascertain if there was anyone at your home to look after you.’

  ‘Connie worries too much,’ he said dismissively.

  There was a deep silence for a time that jarred Frances’s nerves and made her stop what she was doing.

  ‘Well,’ she said, raising her head and looking directly across the room at him, ‘you did look dreadful last night.’

  ‘And do I look any better today?’

  She was caught in his stare and another wave of heat burst forth.

  ‘You improve with a shave,’ she caught herself saying, then, shocked at her own temerity, she looked away.

  He was laughing, a soft chuckling laugh, laughing at her embarrassment, she seethed.

  CHAPTER SIX

  Well, it was certainly different, Frances thought as she followed Gilbert into a small paddock. She was sitting straight up in the centre of the horse’s back as she had done when a child at the riding school.

  After spending several years as an adult perched upon a slip of a saddle with knees hunched up on the animals withers, her present position felt strange indeed. Unable to hide the secret smile as she wondered what Martin would say could he see her now, she shortened the reins and urged the horse into a trot.

  Half an hour later, Gilbert was not a happy man. She hung her head as he came over to stand by her horse.

  ‘You are not afraid of this horse, senorita.’

  She shook her head.

  ‘You have been riding for a long time, if somewhat badly.’ His frown wrinkled his face. ‘You waste my time,’ he added and stamped off across the paddock.

  Frances followed him back to the stable and handed the horse over to the groom. Gilbert was in the tack room flicking through some feed bills when she caught up with him.

  ‘Gilbert, I’m sorry I let you think I was afraid of riding but there were reasons why I didn’t want anyone to know that I could ride.’

  He shrugged his shoulders and continued to read.

  ‘It wasn’t all a lie. I did have an accident but it wasn’t years ago, it was sixteen months ago and it didn’t put me off riding, but it did mean that I was told I shouldn’t ride for the present.’

  He swung round then, his eyes full of concern.

  ‘Why did you not tell us this?’

  Frances gripped the edges of the table she was leaning against, her natural reluctance to talking about herself weighing heavily on her mind.

  ‘I wanted to keep it simple. I’m here as a secretary until my arms are strong enough to hold the reins again. I thought if people knew I could ride they would want to know why I didn’t.’

  Gilbert was frowning again.

  ‘I do not understand. You ride with the knees. The hands must only be gentle to guide the horse.’

  ‘I’m a race jockey, Gilbert.’

  The shock and amazement on his face would have been funny in different circumstances.

  ‘Ah, now I understand why you ride so badly. I have a lesson now but we will meet this evening and you will tell me all, si?’

  For the rest of the day, her arms ached intolerably, not because of anything she had done to aggravate them, more, she suspected, because of her tense state of mind. She was not given to confidences and sharing, not even to the Truscotts, so to open her heart to Gilbert would be a break from her normal pattern of behaviour.

  By late evening, when she was due to meet Gilbert, she was a whirlpool of emotions.

  ‘I thought we would have more privacy at my home,’ he told her as he escorted her to the Jeep.

  They drove away from the ranch and out on to a narrow, dusty road, until they came to a row of cottages by the roadside. Leaving the car tucked into a gap beneath the house Gilbert led her up the path and into his home. A pretty woman greeted them in her own language then left them with a wave.

  ‘She goes to the house of our neighbour,’ Gilbert explained after introducing his wife, ‘to gossip, you understand.’

  When they were both comfortable and Gilbert had poured the wine, they sat in silence as Frances decided how much she would tell of her past. In the end she told him everything. He let her talk without interruption and then there was silence again.

  ‘Thank you,’ he said in acknowledgement of her confidence.

  ‘My arms may never be strong enough to race again but I will ride and would love to come with you to see Juan Carlos.

  ‘You will ride for me each day and soon we will see the boy together.’ Gilbert was as good as his word and made time to watch her ride most days. Kane also noticed and mentioned it in passing one day in the office. ‘How do you feel up on a horse again?’

  ‘Fine, thank you,’ she said but kept her eyes on her work.

  He was standing with his back to her, studying the calendar on the wall behind her.

  ‘I’ll be going away shortly to Munich for two days. I would like you to accompany me. I’ll be lecturing and will need someone to take notes and organise my time there.’

  Frances thought she was going to choke. She snapped the top on her pen and fiddled with the papers in front of her.<
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  ‘What about my work here?’

  ‘It will only be for two days. You will catch up easily when we return.’

  He had returned to the front of the desk as he spoke and was looking down at her.

  ‘You have done a good job helping me socialise with the horsemasters, now you must widen the experience.’

  This I can do without, Frances fretted. Supposing I bump into someone from the racing fraternity who recognises me? How do I explain that away? She was still worrying about the situation long after Kane had left.

  ‘What am I going to do?’ she begged Gilbert later that evening when they were sitting alone on the verandah with their coffee.

  Gilbert ran his fingers through his hair.

  ‘Tell the truth. A little misleading is not a sin.’

  Frances was shaking her head.

  ‘No, it might be a little misleading to you, Gilbert, but believe me, it will be a sin to him.’

  Gilbert laughed.

  ‘You have been here only a short time, but you know already.’ Frances felt the blood run to her face.

  ‘Well, no, not really, but, well, he didn’t want me here in the first place. I’ve worked hard and he’s accepted me. If he finds out I’ve lied to him he might just fire me after all.’

  ‘No, senorita, you are his secretary, not his pupil. He will have no interest in your reasons for coming here, only your ability to do your job.’ But Frances was not convinced.

  * * *

  The day of the visit to Munich dawned bright and sunny. Frances had packed a few essentials into a straw bag she had bought at the local market and dressed in the smart lightweight suit she had arrived in.

  Kane made no comment as they climbed into the station wagon and headed off to the airport. On their arrival at the ticket desk, the bottom fell out of Frances’s stomach when they were joined by Pilar Mendoza. She came forward and kissed Kane on both cheeks before casting a disdainful glance at Frances. Ignoring Kane’s introduction, she clung to his arm and talked incessantly until they were aboard the plane and settled into their seats.

  They travelled first class which delighted Frances who sat alone across the aisle from Kane and Pilar. They had to change planes on mainland Spain and here, much to Frances’s relief, Pilar left them.