Free The Rouseabout Girl by Gloria Bevan

lips. ‘I guess so. ’ It must be the effect of the sherry coursing through her veins together with the warmth of the firelit room, she decided, that was causing her to find the decision so easy to make. Or could it be the challenge of the master of Rangimarie? He was standing at the other end of the room and she felt sure that he was deliberately ignoring her, leaving Sandy the duty of entertaining her on this, her first night at their home. That attitude of Jard’s, she promised herself, was something she was going to change. Somehow she would make him notice her, and what was more, come to recognise her as a worthwhile, caring sort of girl despite her youth and inexperience and the utterly mistaken opinion he appeared to have formed regarding her. She would need to be on her guard, though, for there was one thing, she admitted reluctantly, that he did have, besides his wildly attractive appearance. Never before had she encountered a man who projected such a powerful aura of masculinity. What a triumph it would be to force him to admit that he had been dead wrong in his snap judgment of her capabilities. Turn her back on his job? Go rushing back to town simply because conditions here hadn’t transpired to be those she had imagined? Never!
    ‘You know something?’ she told Sandy. ‘I ’m going to enjoy the experience!’ But what she really meant was teaching Jard a well-deserved lesson and not just the matter of a different type of work and a fresh environment.
    Sandy let his breath on a long sigh of relief. ‘That’s my girl!’ The words fell into a pool of silence. ‘I t’s a deal! Shake on it!’ The next moment she became aware of Jard’s watchful glance. Could it be the bickering shadows of the f l ames, she wondered, that lent his face that tight, angry expression? Surely he didn’t imagine—he couldn’t — On an impulse she snatched her soft hand from Sandy’s firm grasp. It was ridiculous, the way she was letting Jard get under her skin!
    A little later, seated beside Sandy at the long polished table, Lanie felt glad of the older man’s championship tonight. Her gaze bickered over gleaming silverware and the fine china of the dinner service that, like the furniture in the room, she suspected to have been brought out by sailing ship from England a century earlier by a pioneer family who had sacrificed the comforts of their life to hack a way through virgin bush on the other side of the world.
    As the meal proceeded she had to admit that P aula wasn’t, as the saying w ent, just a pretty face. The chilled honeydew melon was delicious, the beef Wellington perfectly cooked and the tamarillo dessert served with rich dairy cream had a melt-in-the-mouth quality. The silver candelabrum shed its mellow light over the wine bottles, caught gleams in the table surface and made Paula look more beautiful than ever, Lanie thought. She really was attractive, she mused wistfully, with all the power that beauty gives a woman.
    Jard, seated at the head of the table with Paula beside him, appeared to be entranced by Paula’s conversation. The two seemed oblivious of both Sandy and Lanie, and once again Lanie formed the impression that Sandy wasn’t enamoured of Paula’s charms. Odd, she wondered how any man could feel that way—but then the other girl spared scarcely a glance for Jard’s father. All her attention was given to the man at her side. If this was the way girls reacted to Jard’s undeniable masculine magnetism, hanging on his every word, gazing up at him with rapt attention, then, Lanie decided once again, it was high time that he was taught a lesson.
    When the meal came to an end, Mike bade the others goodnight and went out of the room. Lanie surmised that he was going back to his own quarters. Paula moved to the stereo and soon the pulsing beat of dance music flowed through the room. She threw Jard a meaningful, laughing look, tapping her foot in time with the rhythm, but he was standing by the