telling him she knew his charm wasn’t to be trusted.
‘I never refuse help. Come on then: help me get the dinner.’
He followed her from the garage, around the back of the house and into the well-equipped kitchen.
‘The menu is soup, grilled kidneys and apple pie,’ she told him. ‘Can you peel a potato?’
‘I can make soup. Want me to prove it? What have you got?’
She opened the refrigerator.
‘Beef bones, vegetables, cream and flour. Anything else you need?’
‘Do fine.’
‘Well, all right, then you make the soup. I’ll run up and change. I won’t be a minute.’
She tossed him an apron and then went out of the kitchen. He watched her go: his blue eyes taking in the shape of her body. When she had gone, he stood for a moment, his smile fixed, then he turned his attention to making the soup.
When she returned, wearing her black and scarlet dress, he was already well advanced with the soup. She collected the table-ware and went into the dining-room to set the table. By the time she had returned, he had prepared the vegetables and had set the pressure cooker on the stove. He took the kidneys from the refrigerator and was skinning them expertly.
‘Where did you learn to cook?’ she asked, moving to his side.
‘It sounds corny,’ he said, intent on what he was doing and not looking up, ‘but my mother taught me. She said if ever I fell in love with a girl who couldn’t cook, it would be a good idea for me to know how. It so happened I did just that thing. She couldn’t cook, so I did.’ He looked up suddenly, his blue eyes staring at her. ‘It didn’t save the marriage. I guess my mother was just kidding herself the way most mothers do.’
Kit lifted her hair off her shoulders with an unconscious, graceful movement.
‘So what happened?’
‘Oh, the usual thing: we begged to differ and we got a divorce.’
‘I suppose I was luckier. I didn’t have to get a divorce. My husband died. It’s a mess, isn’t it when people marry and then stop loving each other?’
‘Yes… it’s a mess.’ Calvin scooped up the chopped kidneys and put them in a saucepan. ‘Have you any brandy?’
‘Yes… it isn’t much good.’
‘It doesn’t matter. Let me have it. I’ll cook these in a brandy sauce. They’ll make the major’s single hair curl.’
She went to the store cupboard and took out a half-filed bottle of brandy.
He moved to the table towards the brandy and that brought him close to her. She didn’t move out of his way and it seemed to him the most natural thing in the world to reach for her. His thick fingers dug into the flesh of her back as he pulled her to him. She didn’t resist. His mouth came down on hers. They stood for a long moment, straining against each other, then she jerked away. They stood looking at each other: her eyes were dark with desire. As he reached for her again, she moved away, holding up her hand.
‘This isn’t exactly the way to get dinner, is it?’ she said unsteadily. ‘Are you doing the kidneys or am I?’
He drew in a long, deep breath, then he managed a crooked smile.
‘I’ll do them,’ he said and picked up the bottle of brandy. ‘You’re damned attractive, but you would know that for sure.’ He put a knob of butter in the saucepan and set the saucepan on the stove. ‘I’m surprised you’ve buried yourself in this dead hole. Just why did you do it?’
She rested her hips against the kitchen table and folded her arms across her breasts.
‘I made a mistake. The house was very cheap. I didn’t have much money…’ She shrugged her shoulders. ‘Money! Ever since I was a kid I’ve wanted money. I’ve been waiting and waiting for money now for over twenty years.’
He moved the kidneys around in the saucepan with a wooden spoon.
‘Yeah… that makes two of us. I want money, too,’ he said. ‘There are people who inherit money and then don’t know how to use it. There are people who even make money but still don’t know how to use it, but there are also people like you and me who don’t have it but would know how to use it. Tough, isn’t it?’
