Mistress For Hire

Mistress For Hire
Angela Devine

There was nothing Lisa could do to persuade Matt Lansdon that she was neither a loose woman nor a gold digger.And even she had to admit that his discovery of her practically naked in his nephew' s apartment had weakened her defense! There was of course a perfectly reasonable explanation, but Matt refused to believe that anything about Lisa was entirely innocent!

“What exactly are you suggesting?” Lisa demanded.

“I’m a wealthy man,” he said in a low voice. “I already come to Melbourne quite frequently on business and I could come even more frequently for pleasure.”

“You make me sound like a fast-food outlet,” she hissed. “Juicy steaks, medium rare, prepared to perfection while you wait! And a money-back guarantee if we fail to satisfy.”

Matt look at her from under half-closed lids.

“Oh, I don’t think you’d fail to satisfy,” he murmured.

ANGELA DEVINE grew up in Tasmania surrounded by forests, mountains and wild seas, so she dislikes big cities. Before taking up writing, she worked as a teacher, librarian and university lecturer. As a young mother and Ph.D. student she read romance fiction for fun and later decided it would be even more fun to write it. She is married with four children, loves chocolate and Twinings teas and hates ironing. Her current hobbies are gardening, bush walking, traveling and classical music.

Mistress for Hire

Angela Devine

www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)

To my sister.

CONTENTS

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER ONE

‘TIM!’ shouted Lisa. ‘Aren’t you back yet? I’m getting a cramp in my shoulder!’

She raised herself on one elbow and gave an exasperated sigh. Even with the padding of a thick Chinese quilt spread beneath her, a dining table was not the most comfortable place to lie naked except for a thin drapery of silk. She twitched the green sari impatiently back from the curve of her hip, sat up and swung her legs over the side of the table. Luckily there were no neighbours who could look in, and the tossing green canopy of a silver birch tree produced exactly the quality of shifting greenish-gold light that Tim wanted for his study. It was to be called Female Nude on a Spring Afternoon, but as far as Lisa could see, it would never be finished unless Tim got out of the annoying habit of running out for a drink whenever his inspiration flagged. Suddenly she thought she heard the sound of a soft footstep downstairs.

‘Tim?’ she called hopefully.

There was no answer. Sighing again, Lisa rose to her feet and padded around the room. She had to admit objectively that it was in a bit of a mess, not that that bothered her or Tim. Why would any sane person want to have a dining room when they could so easily turn it into a studio? Oh, there were still a few signs of gracious living—the gold and white striped wallpaper, the cream Austrian blinds drawn up into opulent swags above the large picture window, a bowl of yellow roses that filled the room with their heady perfume, not to mention the Chippendale chairs pushed casually back against the wall or the handsome mahogany sideboard that was almost buried beneath the litter of paints, rags and brushes. Yes, there were still a few faint indicators of the Lansdon family’s wealth and good taste, but on the whole the room looked exactly like what it was. A work space for two enthusiastic painters. And just at the moment Lisa felt she would far rather be painting than posing.

She arched her back, trying to stretch the stiffness out of her neck and wriggling her shoulders to loosen them. What she needed was a really good work-out to loosen her stiffness so that she wouldn’t get pins and needles and start fidgeting the moment Tim came back. Yawning widely, she reached out one hand and put a cassette in the tape recorder. Ravel’s “Bolero”—now that was the sort of music you just had to dance to! She began to move voluptuously around the room, her back to the door, letting herself sway and posture sensually with the beat of the music. Anywhere else Lisa would never have dreamed of dancing naked, but Tim was dedicated enough to art to see her body only as an interesting combination of planes and surfaces, even if he did return while she was still in action. Ever since he had met Lisa acting as a model in his life drawing classes six months ago, he had regarded her as a cross between a great aunt and guru. Since she was only six years older than him this amused her, but it also made her feel safe. Safe enough to move into Tim’s luxury flat when he made her an offer she couldn’t refuse. If Lisa would give him painting lessons, she could have free board in return. She paused fractionally in the middle of a long, sensuous stretch, expecting to hear Tim ordering her to get back up on the table and pose for him. Sure enough, she heard the unmistakable sound of footsteps halting in the doorway. Lisa gave one last, voluptuous wriggle, hoisted herself on the table, flung the drapery dramatically around her and addressed him over her shoulder.

‘Hurry up, sweetie. I can’t wait another minute.’

‘Now there’s a tempting invitation,’ murmured the hoarse voice of a total stranger.

Lisa froze in shock, then swung round.

‘Who on earth—’ she began, then flushed to the roots of her hair as she realized she had only made matters worse. Instead of a discreet partial rear view, the stranger was now getting a full frontal and enjoying every moment of it to judge by the gleam in his ice-blue eyes. Lisa had a confused impression of a tall, powerfully built man dressed in an autumn-toned checked jacket, beige slacks and a striped tie. The amused contempt in his smile galvanized her into action. She snatched at the silk drapery and tried to wind it protectively around her as she stood up. That was a fatal mistake. As she scrambled off the dining table she tripped and fell to the floor with a startled shriek, losing half her covering in the process.

‘Dear me,’ said the stranger softly. ‘I seem to have given you a surprise.’

He crouched down as if to help her, but only succeeded in stepping on her sari.

‘Don’t touch me!’ yelped Lisa, scrabbling vainly at the length of silk. Was he deliberately standing on it? ‘Who are you? How did you get in?’

His reply came in a lazy drawl, as if this were nothing but a routine social occasion.

‘My name is Matt Lansdon. I’m Tim’s uncle. The door was unlocked so I just came up. I presume you must be Lisa Hayward?’

‘Tim’s uncle?’

Lisa stepped back a pace in shock as she realized that this was the ogre she had heard so much about, the hard-hearted trustee who had thwarted Tim’s burning desire to study art and insisted that he do economics at Melbourne University instead. Subconsciously she realized that she had been expecting a white-haired, fire-breathing old dragon of about eighty, but this man was relatively young. Certainly no more than thirty-five or thirty-six, with a hard, tough, youthful physique and only a faint silvering of the temples and an indefinable aura of authority as emblems of the power he held over his nephew. As Lisa continued to gape at him, he spoke again, like a lawyer cross-examining a witness.

‘I assume you must be Lisa Hayward?’

‘Yes, how did you know?’ she demanded defensively.

‘I’ve heard a lot about you,’ he replied.

There was a steely note in his voice, which sent a shiver of misgiving through her. For a moment he looked at her as if she was something that had crawled out from beneath a log, so that her chin came up and her eyes flashed dangerously. Then she made an effort to see things from his point of view. After all, it was hardly surprising if he disapproved of her, considering the circumstances in which they had met. In a desperate attempt to regain her poise she wrenched the sari out from under his foot and swathed herself in it.

‘I—I’m sorry about this,’ she stammered. ‘Tim and I were just about to…’ Her voice trailed away as she realized suddenly that the painting lessons she was giving Tim were supposed to be a deadly secret. Matt Lansdon gave her a sardonic smile.

‘Don’t explain,’ he begged. ‘I can imagine what you were just about to do. You’re Tim’s lodger, I gather? So tell me, what’s the arrangement? Do you pay him rent and share expenses or something of that sort?’

‘Yes,’ agreed Lisa unhappily. ‘Well, that is…I don’t exactly pay rent. We have another arrangement.’

‘Indeed? How interesting. You know, you make me more and more anxious to see Tim and have a little talk to him, Miss Hayward. And perhaps you and I should have a chat, too. Although you might like to get some clothes on first?’

Lisa’s cheeks burned. Little chat, indeed! There was no way she wanted to talk to him! Any fool could see what he thought was going on between her and Tim, and she didn’t see why she should suffer the ordeal of stammering out a lot of incoherent explanations that wouldn’t make sense. Why couldn’t Tim have the courage to come right out and tell his uncle the truth? That he hated economics and wanted to study art and that Lisa was trying to help him achieve his ambition in return for having a roof over her head? And where was Tim, anyway? How long could it possibly take to go to the pub across the road?

At that moment the telephone rang. Clutching her sari protectively around her, Lisa lunged at the receiver. A muted uproar of chinking glasses, bar-room conversation and the click of billiard balls immediately assaulted her.

‘Lisa?’

‘Tim,’ she cried gladly. ‘What are you doing? You said you’d only be gone five minutes!’