The Cinderella Factor. Sophie Weston
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changed his face completely, emphasising those startling good looks. It made him look like a fully paid-up heartthrob, she thought sourly, rubbing water out of her eyes.
In some ways it was a relief that the grim look had gone. So had that electric awareness. That should have been a relief too. Yet, if she was honest, Jo did not know whether she was glad or sorry. On the whole, she thought, it was probably just as well.
And yet…And yet…
He said, ‘Hadn’t you better come out and get dry? You don’t look very safe.’
Putting her disturbing reflections away from her, Jo shook her damp head vigorously. ‘I’ll have to run around to get dry,’ she warned him cheerfully. ‘No towel.’
The man’s look of amusement deepened.
‘An impulse bathe, then?’
She looked guilty. ‘I just saw the water and couldn’t resist.’
He shook his head. ‘Dangerous.’ But he was still laughing.
Jo liked him laughing at her. She decided to tease him back. ‘Giving in to your impulses is dangerous?’
‘Usually.’
He stood up and shrugged off his dark jacket. He was wearing a soft navy shirt underneath, open at the neck. Without bothering to undo the buttons, he hauled it over his head and held it out to her.
‘There you are—dry yourself on that.’
His chest was a lot paler than his face. There was a dusting of dark hair along the ribs. Jo’s mouth dried. This sudden nakedness seemed to give off a primitive heat. And he looked so strong.
She stepped back, but the water resisted. The little river seemed to be pushing her towards him. She fought not to look. She did not know why. It had something to do with getting herself back under control.
Am I out of control, then?
Despising herself, she said hurriedly, ‘That’s very kind of you, but I don’t need it. Really.’
‘You might not,’ he said with wry self-mockery. ‘I’m not sure how much of your running around to get dry my self-control could take.’
‘Oh,’ said Jo, completely taken aback.
So the awareness was still there after all. Just coated lightly with good manners. Jo did not know a lot about manners, but she was certain that this man knew all there was to know. He had decided they were civilised strangers meeting in unusual circumstances. And he had almost convinced her that was all they were. Almost.
Her eyes fell. She felt shamefaced, yet oddly excited.
‘Go on—take it,’ he said. ‘In weather like this, I can certainly spare it.’
She nodded, not lifting her eyes. As quickly as the water would allow, she waded forward and took it from him. Their fingers did not touch.
Was that because it was me being careful not to touch? Jo wondered. Or was it his decision? And was that good manners? Or something else?
She held the shirt high out of the water and waded back to the other bank. Putting one hand on the bank, she vaulted lightly up onto it and disappeared among the trees. The shirt was linen, soft against her tingling skin. In fact, her whole body was tingling, her bones, muscles and nerves and all.
Ridiculous, Jo told herself. Because of a man I’ve never seen before and won’t again?
But she fluffed up her damp hair before she climbed back up the stone steps and emerged into the sunlight.
He was waiting for her. He had strolled along the bank and up the other set of steps. Now he was leaning on the stone coping, looking upriver.
‘It’s beautiful, isn’t it?’ Jo said, approaching softly.
Even more ridiculous, now that she had her clothes on she felt shy. It was crazy. She was never shy. And she had talked to him without constraint when he’d surprised her cavorting naked in the stream. So why this crushing embarrassment now?
With a great effort she met his eyes and gave him what she hoped was a friendly smile without complicated shadows. From his wry look she wasn’t sure she had succeeded.
She thought suddenly, There’s a game going on here. He knows how to play it and I don’t.
But all he said was, ‘Yes, beautiful. It’s also private. How did you find your way here?’
‘Oh, I’ve been to the farm,’ Jo said, with a wave at the distant farmhouse.
‘Ah. The old back drive. I see.’
‘No one uses it,’ she assured him, blushing at the criticism she detected. ‘I was sure I was alone.’
‘So was I,’ he said with a sharp sigh. ‘It seems we were both wrong.’
It occurred to her that he might have wanted to be alone with his thoughts. That harsh voice had not sounded happy. Suddenly she felt less shy.
‘I’m sorry,’ she said with quick contrition. ‘I know what it’s like to want to get away from people. Were you fishing or something?’ she added, remembering Mr Morrison’s daily pilgrimages to the other river.
‘No. Not fishing. Thinking. Trying to work out what to do—’ He broke off, gritting his teeth.
Jo recognised that look. ‘Ouch,’ she said, with sympathy.
He gave a fierce shrug, as if he were angry with himself. ‘I can normally find my way through things. But this time—there are just too many people getting in the way.’
Jo nodded. ‘Been there,’ she said, with feeling.
He was glaring at some unseen enemy. ‘I doubt it,’ he said impatiently.
She bit back a smile. ‘You’d be surprised.’
He looked at her then. In fact he swung round on her, and the fierce look went out of his eyes.
‘What?’
Jo was running her fingers through her wet hair.
‘Other people have always been my biggest problem,’ she said wryly and—to her own amazement—without bitterness. ‘You just have to go round them. Or turn and face the enemy.’
‘You’re very wise for nineteen.’ He sounded startled.
She shrugged. ‘I told you. Experience puts a lot of extra miles on the clock.’
He leaned against the parapet, the curious golden-brown eyes searching her face.
‘Yes, I can see that,’ he said slowly. Almost as if he were thinking of something else.
Jo remembered The Furry Purry Tiger: those warm eyes that lured and lulled the tiger’s victims. Look deep into my eyes, my dears. Can you resist me?
She gave a gasp and took two sharp steps backwards.
And the spell was broken.
The man looked at her frowningly. ‘Who are you? What are you doing here?’ he said in quite another tone. ‘A student on some exchange?’
Jo realised for the first time, with a start, that he knew she was a girl. It was like a douche of cold water. Her face went blank.
The Morrisons spoke to her and about her as if she was a boy. The kindly farmer’s wife accepted her as a boy. When she went into the bank, the bored counter clerks treated her as a boy.
And now here was someone who had the most precise and irrefutable evidence that she was a girl. And that she was English. If he asked in the neighbourhood the local people would recognise the English factotum looking after the château’s antique cars, all right. And this stranger was now able to tell them that she was not everything they had thought.
Jo went cold.