The Seduction Trap by Sara Wood Page B

Disappointment flooded through her. She’d hoped her mother was wrong. It seemed not. Guy was being nice to her for his own selfish reasons. And this time, she vowed, she wouldn’t let herself be bettered by a ruthless man!

 

     
Hewlett-Packard

CHAPTER SIX
    TESSA’S eyes narrowed. She resented being played like a fish on a line and felt like making him sweat. ‘I might hang onto the cottages,’ she said airily, testing his reaction. Not surprisingly, there wasn’t one. A plan began to form in her mind. ‘I don’t have a job at the moment,’ she said casually, ‘and I have some savings left. I could stay here and work on their restoration myself. They’d be an investment.’ She flung him a bright and perky smile.
    Guy’s face didn’t move a muscle. He lifted his cup and drank, then produced a convincing frown and looked deep into her eyes as if he’d thought of something worrying. ‘I wouldn’t advise it. You’d get yourself into debt, like your mother. You’ve seen the condition of The Old Bakery. The other two houses aren’t much better.’ He gave a rueful laugh. ‘I imagine they’re holding each other up. It’ll take considerable funds and time to bring them up to a decent standard-and an expertise I doubt you have. You’d need quite advanced skills, to say nothing of a working knowledge of French to deal with builders and so on. It would be like throwing your money and time into a bottomless pit.’
    ‘I spent five years with a team of craftsmen and tradesmen on the restoration of a stately home. I know more than the next person about damp and dry rot.’ She smiled with far more assurance than she felt, and was pleased that he looked annoyed.
    What was she going to do with the cottages? Her mother had told her not to let Guy have them. That meant eventually selling them to someone else, or quietly doing them up herself from the proceeds of the income they made from the holiday lets-whatever that might be. Getting a job over here to support herself was out of the question, with her ignorance of French.
    ‘Oven Cottage still retains the oven,’ he told her idly. ‘It’s blocked off at the moment. It’s as large as a room and built like a beehive, which gives it immense strength. You’d need a team of navvies with pickaxes to make any impression on it.’ Making a great show of quartering the chocolate croissant, Tessa hid her qualms and said blithely, ‘I’ve picked up a lot of skills. I’ve even wielded a pickaxe. It’s surprising what you can do if you persevere. It might be rather fun doing my own restoration. I can see that The Old Bakery has a lot of potential.’
    ‘I’m impressed,’ he said doubtfully. ‘I think even my builders might refuse to take on such work virtually single-handed.’ As bad as that? she thought in alarm, but smiled a confident smile. ‘I’ll see. I’ll do an assessment of each cottage over the next few days,’ she said importantly, hoping to impress him. He leaned forward. ‘Don’t delay,’ he advised. ‘You’ll have one almighty insurance claim from one of your unfortunate holidaymakers if you don’t do something soon. From a cursory assessment of the exteriors, I think all the roof timbers are unsafe. At a guess, I’d say you had trouble with termites. Or maybe the capricorne beetle. You know how devastating that is.’
    ‘Er... yes,’ she said, hoping she sounded knowledgeable about a creature she’d never heard of. It sounded as bad as the death-watch beetle. Just her luck. ‘If I can’t tackle the work, I can find a local builder, she said airily.
    ‘No. I don’t think you will.’
    ‘No local builders?’ she hazarded.
    ‘Two. But I’m afraid,’ he said with regret, ‘that no local of any description would set foot in any of your cottages.’ Her eyes narrowed. He was trying to put her off! ‘Surely they’re not haunted?’ she suggested sarcastically. Unperturbed by her waspishness, Guy reached for the coffee¬pot.