A Nanny For Christmas
Sara Craven
NANNY WANTEDMillionaire seeks nanny for his seven-year-old daughter. Young Tara had taken one look at Phoebe Grant and decided she'd be a wonderful nanny. And whatever his daughter wanted, Dominic Ashton bought her. The demure Miss Grant was perfect in her new role - too bad she'd only agreed to stay until New Year's… .But Phoebe had her reasons - if Dominic Ashton had forgotten their first meeting years before, she certainly hadn't. What would happen when Dominic discovered he was employing a woman he'd once thrown out of his home and his bed!
Cover (#u5178ecd8-6048-55f8-a03d-e62a59901bee)Letter to Reader (#ubd450f1b-16e1-56fa-8e71-edfbdc1351a6)Title Page (#uf01439ee-f24b-5438-81a8-42b7cf28e035)CHAPTER ONE (#ub4795a81-06b5-50b7-be99-41a50c4049d4)CHAPTER TWO (#u180f1365-91f1-5e81-b8bd-b7fc615a6978)CHAPTER THREE (#u68cf8e58-0b76-5cd1-a665-fbf0f99a02e5)CHAPTER FOUR (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER FIVE (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER SIX (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER SEVEN (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER EIGHT (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER NINE (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER TEN (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER ELEVEN (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER TWELVE (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER THIRTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)Endpage (#litres_trial_promo)Copyright (#litres_trial_promo)
Dear Santa,
Please can I have a new nanny?
I’d like her to be good at stories, games and kind to teddy bears and to Daddy....
I really want a mommy but Daddy says she isn’t coming back, and he’s doing his best to get me a new one but in the meantime I have to have a nanny to look after me.
Love,
Tara
Dear Reader,
A perfect nanny can be tough to find, but once you’ve found her you’ll love and treasure her forever. She’s someone who’ll not only look after the kids but could also be that loving mom they never knew. Or sometimes she’s a he and is the daddy they are wishing for.
We hope you have enjoyed our compelling series, NANNY WANTED! This month’s book, A Nanny for Christmas, is from bestselling author Sara Craven.
Happy reading!
The Editors
A Nanny For Christmas
Sara Craven
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
CHAPTER ONE
‘YOUR favourite customer is back.’ Lynn shouldered her way through the swing doors into the kitchen with a tray of dirty crockery.
‘That little girl again?’ Phoebe glanced up, frowning, from her task of adding a salad garnish to a plate of egg mayonnaise sandwiches. ‘Is she still on her own?’
‘As ever was.’ Lynn began expertly to pack the dishwasher. ‘Odd, isn’t it?’
Phoebe’s frown deepened. ‘I think it’s downright irresponsible of someone,’ she said roundly. ‘She’s far too young to be wandering around the streets alone. I wouldn’t say she was much more than seven.’
‘She’s safe enough in here,’ Lynn pointed out fairly. ‘The Clover Tea Rooms isn’t exactly a meeting place for kidnappers and perverts.’
‘As far as we know,’ Phoebe said grimly, filling a milk jug and placing it on her own tray together with a teapot, a sugar basin and the sandwiches.
As she carried it through to the dining room she cast a worried glance towards the comer table by the window and its small occupant.
The child had been coming in for the past three days, at the same time each afternoon. On the first occasion Phoebe had assumed she was waiting for some adult to join her.
Instead, the little girl had asked for a menu.
‘Would you like me to tell you what there is?’ Phoebe had suggested, receiving a look of utmost scorn for her pains.
‘I can read it for myself, thank you,’ a clear, remarkably self-possessed voice told her, before placing an order for a sultana scone and a cup of hot chocolate.
Even then, Phoebe hesitated. ‘Wouldn’t it be better to wait for the rest of your family? Our food is quite expensive, you see.’
Scorn deepened into outrage in the child’s eyes. ‘I can afford to pay,’ she announced with immense dignity. She delved into her tote bag and produced a crisp five-pound note. ‘Will that be enough?’
‘More than enough,’ Phoebe allowed evenly, and went to get the order.
Her meal finished, the little girl paid, worked out a tip with frowning concentration and left. A pattern that had now become established, although it made Phoebe no happier.
This time, the child asked for hot milk with honey and nutmeg and some home-made biscuits.
‘You’re becoming quite a regular,’ Phoebe remarked, trying to sound casual as she placed the order on the table. ‘But, unlike most of our customers, we don’t know your name.’
There was a pause, then the little girl said doubtfully, ‘I’m not supposed to talk to strangers.’
‘And quite right too,’ Phoebe approved warmly. ‘But I’m hardly a stranger. For one thing I feed you every day, and, for another, my name’s pinned on my shirt. So...?’ She waited expectantly.
There was a pause, then the child said reluctantly, ‘I’m Tara Vane.’
‘That’s a pretty name.’ Phoebe gave her an encouraging smile. ‘Do you live in Westcombe?’
This brought a decisive shake of the head. ‘I live at Fitton Magna.’
Phoebe was silent for a moment, angry to realise that her heart was pounding suddenly. It’s only a place, she reminded herself. And what happened was six years ago. It has nothing to do with here and now.
‘I see,’ she said slowly. ‘Then you have a long journey home.’
Tara gave her a superior look. ‘It’s fifteen miles. It doesn’t take long in the car.’
‘Ah.’ Phoebe relaxed with an effort. ‘Then you go home with Mummy.’
She saw the small back stiffen. ‘I haven’t got a mummy. Not any more.’
Oh, God, Phoebe groaned inwardly. She said quietly, ‘I’m very sorry, Tara. It—it’s something we have in common, I’m afraid.’
Tara gave her an interested look. ‘Then do you live with your daddy too?’
Phoebe bit her lip as the pain of all too recent events slashed at her again. ‘No, I’m afraid not.’
‘I expect he’s away on business,’ Tara said thoughtfully. ‘My daddy’s away all the time. That’s why I have Cindy to look after me.’
Oh, do you? thought Phoebe. Then she’s not making a very good job of it.
Aloud, she said gently, ‘Everyone needs someone, Tara. And it’s good that we’ve got to know each other a little. Now we can say hello if we meet in the street.’
‘I’m not in the street very often.’ Tara sipped her milk. ‘When I finish school, I have my piano lesson and then I come here and wait for Cindy.’
‘Found out all you wanted to know?’ Lynn asked with amusement when Phoebe returned to the kitchen.
‘Rather too much,’ Phoebe returned. ‘Her mother’s dead, her father’s never there and someone called Cindy fills in when she feels like it.’
‘Cindy,’ mused Lynn. ‘Someone called Cindy was at Night Birds the other Saturday. People were saying they hadn’t seen her around before.’
‘What was she like?’
Lynn shrugged. ‘Australian, tall, blonde, endless legs, a bit loud and altogether too keen on other girls’ blokes. Not that I noticed her much, you understand.’
Phoebe grinned. ‘Naturally. But she doesn’t sound the ideal person to be looking after Tara,’ she added thoughtfully.
Lynn put her hands on her hips. ‘For heaven’s sake, Phoebe, lighten up. Haven’t you got enough problems of your own?’
‘More than enough,’ Phoebe agreed ruefully. ‘But that doesn’t make me indifferent to what’s going on in other people’s lives.’
‘Then maybe it should for once.’ Lynn shook her head. ‘Listen, the kid is well fed, and extremely well dressed. All her clothes come from Smarty Pants, the boutique in Market Street where my sister works. She has a fiver a day to spend, which is about one hundred per cent more than I ever did at the same age. I’d say she’s doing all right.’
‘And that’s all there is to it?’ Phoebe’s tone was wry.
‘Whether it is or not, there’s no reason for you to be involved,’ Lynn said sternly. ‘Start thinking about yourself instead. Any moment now Debbie will be coming back to work, and you’ll be out of a job.’
Phoebe sighed. ‘I don’t need reminding about that. But I knew when I took it on that it would only be temporary, while Debbie got over her appendicitis.’
Lynn snorted. ‘Lazy little cow. If Mrs Preston knew what she was really like, she wouldn’t have her back, niece or not.’ She paused. ‘How’s the landlord from hell? Still giving you hassle?’
Phoebe grimaced. ‘As ever. He still hasn’t done anything about the tile that blew down last month, and now there’s a big damp patch on the bedroom ceiling.’
‘Does he still snoop around when you’re out?’
‘I’m sure he does, but I can’t prove it,’ Phoebe said with exasperation. ‘And if I caught him he’d quote his rotten lease at me, saying he has “right of inspection” at any time.’
Lynn shook her head. ‘Surely you can find somewhere else?’
‘Not until I find a real job as well to go with it. And the problem is there just aren’t as many library posts any more, because of all the cutbacks.’ Phoebe sighed again. ‘I apply for everything, and so far I’ve made three shortlists and one unsuccessful interview. Maybe I should train for something else.’
‘You could always be a teacher,’ Lynn suggested. ‘You must be good with children. People are always asking you to babysit.’
‘That doesn’t necessarily mean a thing,’ Phoebe said drily. ‘All the same, it’s an idea. It’s just—not what I had planned when I went to university.’
Lynn rolled her eyes expressively round the kitchen. ‘And this is?’ she mocked. ‘By the way, I think your customer’s ready to leave.’
It wasn’t simply curiosity that made Phoebe follow the child out into the gathering gloom of the November afternoon. It was wrong for Tara to be out on her own at that age, and especially at that time of year. It was growing misty, and the dank chill caught in Phoebe’s throat as she watched the small figure scamper up the street.
With a sudden roar, a motorcycle erupted round the corner into High Street and braked violently. Phoebe, shocked and with all her worst forebodings apparently justified, was about to run forward when she saw a tall figure uncoil herself slowly from the pillion seat, giving the child a casual wave. As she took off the helmet she was wearing and handed it back to the driver blonde hair gleamed under the street light.
Cindy, I suppose, thought Phoebe with relief but no particular pleasure. So this is what she does while her charge is roaming free.
The other girl stood talking to the motorcyclist for a moment or two, then blew him a kiss and turned away. Almost at once she and Tara had rounded the corner and disappeared from view.
Oh, well, Phoebe told herself. That’s all right, then. And wished she could feel more convinced.
The little house felt cold and damp when she let herself in a couple of hours later. As she switched on the light in the sitting room it flickered, nearly went out, then recovered.
Good, thought Phoebe. Because I don’t think I’ve got a spare bulb.
Unless of course it was the wiring, which would mean another unpleasant interview with her landlord.
I’ll worry about that tomorrow, Phoebe decided tiredly.
It wasn’t a very comfortable room. It needed decorating, and the square of cheap carpet didn’t match the hard two-seater settee with its spindly wooden legs. But she’d laid a fire in the narrow Victorian grate before she’d left for work that morning, and, once it was lit and the curtains drawn, there was a semblance of cosiness.
Not for the first time, Phoebe imagined having some of the things from home there. The rosewood corner cabinet, she remembered sadly, and the Pembroke table and the big winged chair from her father’s study. But, like the house itself, they’d gone, sold to pay unexpected and crushing debts.
‘I can’t believe you could be such a fool, Howard.’ She could hear her aunt Lorna’s bitter voice now. ‘The stock market indeed. Whatever possessed you?’
And her father, sounding quiet and sad. ‘I expect I was greedy, like a great many other people, my dear. None of us ever thought it would go wrong.’
‘Well, I hope you don’t expect Geoffrey and I to help you out of this mess. The recession has hit us too, you know. The most we can do is find you somewhere else to live while you get back on your feet. It will have to be modest, of course, but Geoffrey is prepared to pay a year’s rent in advance, and at least it will be a roof over your head. I’m sure one of his business contacts will be able to suggest something suitable.’
‘Modest’, Phoebe reflected drily, was not the word. Hawthorn Cottage, property of Mr Arthur Hanson, was positively retiring—and singularly lacking in hawthorns or, indeed, any kind of flower or shrub in its miserable strip of concreted-over garden.
‘Dad, we can’t live here,’ she’d whispered as Mr Hanson had grudgingly left them alone ‘to get the feel of the place’, as he’d put it. ‘It’s awful.’
‘To quote your aunt Lorna, “It’s a roof”, and it will do while we look round for something better.’ He’d hugged her.
Phoebe had been half-heartedly celebrating the end of her finals when her tutor had sent for her. He’d been very kind, very sympathetic, but there had been no way to soften the blow.
Her father had been taken suddenly ill while waiting his turn at the local DSS office. An ambulance had been called, everyone had done what they could, but he’d been dead on his arrival at hospital.
Phoebe, grieving and bewildered, had learned she could stay at the house until the lease was up—but only, she suspected, because Uncle Geoffrey had been unable to retrieve the rent from Hanson the Hateful, as her father had christened him.
She hadn’t wanted to stay there—or in Westcombe at all, for that matter—because that part of the country held few happy memories for her. But she’d realised she needed a breathing space. What she had not taken into account was the difficulty of finding work.
She knew how to operate a computer, so she’d managed to keep herself solvent with temping jobs in various offices. But, on the whole, she’d found working at the tea rooms the most congenial.
Mrs Preston might have a blind spot where her niece was concerned, but otherwise her standards were high. Trade was generally brisk, Lynn was down to earth and amusing company and most of the customers had soon seemed like old friends.
She would miss it all very much, but it had never been a prospect for life.
But what was? she asked herself now as she made toast and poached an egg for her supper. Her life had been turned upside down during the past year, and now all she was really sure of was her own uncertainty.
Did she want to be a librarian as she’d always intended? Or should she return to college and take a teaching degree?
I don’t know what I want, she thought. And, in those circumstances, Dad always said it was best to do nothing and see what life threw at you.
There was no television in the cottage—Hanson the Hateful claimed the weight of an aerial would damage the chimney—so she listened to the radio as she usually did, then went to bed.
And, for the first time in over a year, she found herself having the dream.
As always there was music playing, somewhere in the distance, and she was floating, weightless, on a bed of clouds, spinning slowly and gently in a gigantic circle, singing softly to herself. There were faces looking down at her, all smiling, and she smiled back, comforted by love and approval, until she saw that all the faces were masked and the smiles painted on, and she tried to run away, and they held her down, their laughter echoing thinly from behind the masks, drowning the music.
And then they all vanished, and he was there—the Dark Lord—staring at her with eyes so cold that they burned.
Shouting at her with words that made no sense, but she knew were full of hatred and contempt.
Threatening her, frightening her with his anger. His disgust.
And she suddenly realised that she was naked and tried to cover herself with her hands, but they were clamped to her sides, and she was spinning again, faster and faster, sinking backwards into some void, trying to hide from the ice and fire of the Dark Lord’s eyes. But knowing that there was no escape.
She awoke, sobbing helplessly as she always did, her whole body bathed in sweat.
When she’d regained control, she lay quietly, staring into the darkness, wondering what had prompted a recurrence of her nightmare.
Fitton Magna, she thought, wincing. Tara had said she lived there. That must have been the reason.
But why did it still have to happen? It was six years ago, after all, that devastating, humiliating night. Wasn’t it time she laid the memory of it to rest? Surely she wasn’t going to be haunted like this for the rest of her life?
The sooner I get away from this whole area and make a completely fresh start, she told herself, the better it will be.
The following day was Friday and market day, and the tea rooms were extra busy.
As the afternoon wore on Phoebe cleared the corner table by the window and put a RESERVED notice on it.
And won’t I look a fool if she doesn’t turn up? she thought.
But, sure enough, Tara made her appearance at the usual time, and seemed sedately pleased that Phoebe had kept a space for her.
‘What’s it to be today?’ Phoebe smiled down at her. ‘Hot milk again? And Mrs Preston’s made some chocolate muffins.’
Tara’s eyes sparkled. ‘Yes, please.’
For a child who seemed to be bringing herself up, she had lovely manners, Phoebe thought as she went to get the order.
After that there was another rush of customers, and it was an hour later that she finally had time to realise that Tara was still sitting at the corner table, staring forlornly through the window.
She checked beside her. ‘I’m sorry, poppet. Did you want to pay?’
The child shook her head, looking down and biting her lip. ‘I can’t. Cindy didn’t give me any money today. She said I had to wait here instead until she came. Only she hasn’t,’ she added on a little wail.
‘Don’t get upset.’ Phoebe passed her a clean paper napkin. ‘I’ll tell you what. I’ll pay the bill for you, and Cindy can settle with me. How’s that?’
Tara shook her head. ‘We can’t do that. I don’t know where she is.’
‘Well, she can’t be too far away. She knows you’re waiting.’ Phoebe tried to sound casual. ‘Is she out with her boyfriend again?’
Tara’s eyes looked very big in her small face. ‘You aren’t meant to know about him. No one is. She’ll be cross if she thinks I’ve told.’
‘Well, you haven’t,’ Phoebe said cheerfully. ‘So that’s all right. Now, you stay right there, and I’ll bring you another muffin. And by the time you’ve eaten it Cindy will be here for you.’
‘What’s going on?’ Lynn mouthed as she dashed past with a loaded tray.
‘Cindy—no show,’ Phoebe returned succinctly, and Lynn’s brows shot up to her hairline.
But, in spite of her optimistic forecast, no one tall, blonde and Australian arrived at the tea rooms, and it was rapidly approaching closing time.
‘Call the police,’ said Lynn. ‘That’s what Mrs Preston would say.’
‘I can’t,’ Phoebe protested. ‘She’s upset enough as it is, poor little devil. It could create all kinds of repercussions.’
Lynn sighed. ‘Then what are you going to do?’
Phoebe took a deep breath. ‘I’ll take her home myself. And hopefully give Cindy, and this absentee father of hers, a piece of my mind in the process.’
‘You can’t just walk off with someone’s child. Otherwise it will be you the police will be calling on.’
‘That’s a risk I’ll have to take.’ Phoebe looked at the clock above the kitchen door. ‘And why isn’t there a search party out for her anyway? No, I’ve got to do it, Lynn. I’ve got to see her home safely and talk to someone in authority about what’s been going on.’
Lynn shook her head. ‘Rather you than me.’
As Phoebe had expected, Tara was reluctant to accompany her.
‘No, I’ve got to wait for Cindy.’ Her bottom lip jutted ominously.
‘But the café is closing for the night,’ Phoebe told her gently. ‘If Cindy comes it will be all dark and locked up.’
‘Then I’ll sit in her car and wait.’
Over my dead body, Phoebe returned silently. Aloud, she said, ‘Let’s go and see if it’s still where she parked it, shall we?’
The main car park was emptying fast, and the white Peugeot 205 was standing in the middle, in splendid isolation. It was also securely locked, which Phoebe secretly regarded as a bonus under the circumstances.
However, she was getting more concerned about Cindy’s non-appearance by the minute.
‘Perhaps her boyfriend’s motorbike’s had a puncture,’ she suggested neutrally. ‘Whatever, there’s no point hanging round here in the cold and dark. We’ll go round to the bus station and find out when there’s one to Fitton Magna.’
But here too she drew a blank. Buses to Fitton Magna, she learned, were thin on the ground. There was one return trip mid-morning and mid-afternoon each day. And a market day special which she’d missed as well.
‘Right,’ Phoebe said breezily, thanking her stars she’d been paid at lunchtime. ‘We’ll get a taxi.’
Even if the people at the other end weren’t very pleased with what she had to say, they would at least reimburse the fare to her—wouldn’t they?
‘Do you know the address?’ she asked, fixing Tara’s seat-belt.
‘Of course.’ The outraged note was back, if a little wobbly. ‘It’s North Fitton House.’
‘Would that be on the Midburton Road?’ the driver asked as he started the engine.
‘I don’t know,’ Phoebe confessed. ‘I’ve never been there.’ At least, I hope I haven’t, she amended silently. ‘Is it, Tara?’
‘I think so.’ The little girl didn’t sound any too sure.
‘Well, Fitton Magna isn’t exactly big. Reckon we’ll find it,’ said the driver.
It was a placid drive through the dark lanes, but, all the same, Phoebe could feel tension rising inside her. Beside her, Tara was very quiet. Perhaps too quiet?
I don’t really know anything about her, Phoebe realised ruefully. Certainly not enough to go charging in and taking over like this. Lynn was right. I should have stayed out of it. Handed the whole mess over to the police or Social Services.
What do I do if there’s no one at her home either? Why didn’t I think things through?
There was a muffled sound beside her, as if Tara was choking back a sob, and Phoebe reached out and took a small, cold, shaking hand, squeezing it comfortingly.
‘Everything’s going to be all right,’ she whispered. ‘Trust me.’
Knowing, even as she spoke, that in truth she could guarantee nothing.
They were coming to a scatter of houses, lights gleaming behind curtained windows, and Phoebe felt an icy fist clench in her stomach.
Any moment now, she thought, and she might find herself back at the place where the actual scenario of her nightmare had been played out.
But maybe that was what she needed—to go back and exorcise this particular demon once and for all. Let herself see that it was all in the past. That, even if it was the same house where she’d been so bitterly humiliated, the people had changed. Because Tara’s name was Vane, and no one called that had been involved.
I would, she told herself, have remembered that.
Ashton, she thought. Dominic Ashton. That had been his name. No Dark Lord of her overheated imagination, but a normal man caught off-guard and reacting furiously to a shameful, tasteless joke.
Who was now somewhere else, living his perfectly normal life, and who had probably never given the incident another thought. Whose biting mouth would twist sardonically in disbelief at the possibility that she could still be tormented by her memories.
It doesn’t matter any more, she told herself, drawing a deep breath. I can’t afford to let it.
‘Well, this is it,’ the taxi driver announced.
Leaning forward, Phoebe saw NORTH FTTTON HOUSE inscribed on the gate pillar, and, glancing up, the stone gryphon which crowned it. Quite unforgettably.
‘Yes,’ she said tonelessly. ‘This is the place. Could you drive up to the door, please, and wait for me?’
Tara was reluctant to leave the taxi. ‘They’re going to be so angry.’ Her voice caught on a sob.
‘But not with you,’ Phoebe said bracingly. ‘Or they’ll have me to deal with.’
She walked forward up the two shallow steps flanked by stone urns, bare now with the onset of winter. On her last visit they’d been a vibrant, sprawling mass of colour which had matched the light and warmth spilling out of the house and her own inner excitement about the party she’d been going to. The man she’d been going to see.
‘Sweet Phoebe.’ She could hear his voice whispering to her persuasively, overcoming her scruples. ‘Promise me you’ll be there.’
And I went, Phoebe thought as she rang the bell. Like a lamb to the slaughter.
After a pause, the door was opened by a stout, white-haired woman wearing a dark dress and a neat apron.
‘Good evening.’ She sounded surprised. ‘Can I help...?’ Her gaze fell on Tara, clinging to Phoebe’s hand, and her hand flew to her mouth.
‘Oh, my God, it’s the little one. You should have been home hours ago, you naughty girl. I was just going to take your supper up to the nursery. And where’s that Cindy, may I ask?’
‘You may indeed,’ Phoebe said quietly, leading Tara into the hall. ‘I’ve brought Tara home from the café where I work. There seems to have been some mistake over the arrangements to collect her.’
‘Mistake,’ the other woman repeated. ‘And what was Miss Tara doing in a café, I’d like to know? From school to her piano lesson, and then straight home. That’s her routine.’
‘Apparently not.’ Phoebe gave her a level look. ‘You mentioned supper, which is a splendid idea. Tara’s had rather a trying time, as you can imagine.’
‘Well, yes.’ The woman looked helplessly from one to the other. ‘I don’t know what to say, I’m sure.’
‘If you could take her upstairs, and see to her.’ Phoebe urged the child gently forward. ‘Go on, poppet, and I’ll come and say goodbye once I’ve spoken to your father.’ She turned to the other woman. ‘I presume he’s here.’
‘Yes, miss, but he’s working in his study.’ The woman glanced uneasily at a door on the right of the large hall. ‘Left strict instructions he wasn’t to be disturbed.’
‘I’m sure he did,’ Phoebe said with a lightness she was far from feeling. ‘But I think this is an emergency, don’t you?’
And she walked past them both, opened the study door and went in.
It was a room she remembered only vaguely, with its book-lined walls and the large desk standing in the centre of the room.
He was standing with his back to her, intent on a fax machine delivering a message on a side table.
When he spoke, his voice was clipped with impatience. ‘Carrie, I thought I said—’
‘It’s not Carrie, Mr Vane.’ The anger which had been seething in Phoebe came boiling to the surface. ‘I’ve just brought your daughter back from Westcombe, where she’d been abandoned, and I’d like to know whether you’re just totally selfish or criminally irresponsible.’
He turned slowly. The grey eyes travelled over her without haste. Like ice that burned. She had thought it then. She knew it now.
She gave a gasp, and stepped backwards.
‘I don’t know who the hell you are, bursting in and abusing me like this.’ Every word was like the slash of a whip. ‘But you’ve made a big mistake, young woman.’
He paused, taking in every detail from the top of the smooth brown head, down over her working uniform of white shirt and brief black skirt, to her slender feet in their sensible shoes. Registering it all, then dismissing it with the contempt that she remembered so vividly from six years before.
He said softly, ‘My name is Ashton. Dominic Ashton. Now, give me one good reason why I shouldn’t throw you out.’
CHAPTER TWO
PHOEBE wanted to run away, harder and faster than she’d ever done in her life. But for dazed seconds she wasn’t able to move, or think. She could only stare at him. At the nightmare made flesh, and standing in front of her.
He’d hardly changed at all. She was capable of recognising that, at least. The thick dark hair, untouched by grey, still waved untidily back from its widow’s peak. He would never be handsome. His nose was too beaky, his mouth and chin too firmly uncompromising, and the grey eyes under the cynically lifted eyebrows too piercing. But he was even more of a force to be reckoned with than at their last disastrous encounter.
She was the one who’d changed, she realised with a reviving jolt of the same anger which had driven her into this room. She wasn’t a naive, betrayed sixteen-year-old any longer.
The real vulnerable child was upstairs, and she was all that mattered in this situation.
She lifted her chin and prayed her voice wouldn’t let her down. She probably couldn’t equal his own level of contempt in the look she sent him, but, by God, she was going to try.
‘The reason—Mr Ashton—is called Tara, and for the past week she’s been spending a regular part of the day totally unsupervised in Westcombe.’
The dark brows snapped together. ‘What kind of dangerous nonsense is this?’
Phoebe shook her head steadily. ‘No nonsense at all. I only wish it were. The girl who looks after her has been allowing her to have tea on her own in the café where I work while she meets her boyfriend.’ She paused. ‘He has a motorcycle,’ she added without expression.
There was a heavy silence. Dominic Ashton was still staring at her, but Phoebe had the feeling that he wasn’t seeing her at all.
He said, half to himself, ‘I’m going to get to the bottom of this,’ and strode towards the door.
Phoebe put up a detaining hand. ‘If you’re going to look for Cindy, she’s not here. At least I don’t think she is. She didn’t turn up to collect Tara as arranged. And her car is still in the market car park.’
He stopped. Looked down at her. Aware and refocusing, his face suddenly haggard.
She had hated him for six years, for his lack of under-standing—and compassion. She had never in the whole of her life expected to feel sorry for him, yet, somehow, she did.
Here he was, in the middle of some business empire, with computers, modems and machinery as far as the eye could see, and just briefly he’d lost his power. He too was naked and bewildered, in a situation he couldn’t control.
His voice was quiet. ‘I accept what you say—everything you say. But I still think I should check—don’t you?’ He hesitated. ‘Please sit down, Miss—?’
‘Grant,’ she said. ‘Phoebe Grant.’
He nodded, as if storing it for future reference. ‘I’ll have my housekeeper bring you some coffee.’
‘I think she’s got her hands full giving Tara her supper.’ ‘Yes, of course,’ he said abruptly. ‘I wasn’t thinking.’ He looked at her again, frowning as if puzzled. ‘Where exactly did you say you’d met my daughter?’
‘In the Clover Tea Rooms. I’m a waitress there. She sits at one of my tables.’ She hesitated. ‘I followed her out one afternoon and saw Cindy meet her. That’s how I know about the boyfriend. Not through Tara.’
He looked at her as if she were mad. ‘What possible difference can that make?’
‘Tara promised not to say anything. She’s frightened of breaching a confidence.’
‘My God,’ he said. He pointed at a cupboard. ‘You’ll find a decanter and glasses. Help yourself to some brandy, and pour one for me. You look as if you need it, and I know I do.’
She said huskily, ‘I’m afraid I don’t drink.’
‘Then perhaps you should start.’ The grey eyes examined her critically. ‘Or are you always this pale?’
Phoebe looked down at her feet. ‘I have a taxi waiting. I’d really like to leave.’
‘And I’d be obliged if you’d stay. After all, you marched in, issuing some pretty dire and extremely personal accusations. I’d like the chance to defend myself. But first I need to talk to Tara.’ He paused. ‘Well?’
Still avoiding his gaze, Phoebe nodded jerkily, and walked to an armchair beside the cheerful fire burning in the grate.
As she heard the door close she felt herself go limp.
‘He doesn’t remember me,’ she whispered to herself. ‘He didn’t even recognise my name, although in fairness I only gave half of it.’
‘Who are you?’ he’d demanded with bitter intensity six years before.
And, through a haze of shame and nausea, she’d mumbled, ‘Phoebe.’
Of course, she’d looked very different too. Her nondescript brown bob had been concealed under a curly blonde wig then, and her skin had been plastered with make-up.
I thought I looked so glamorous—so sophisticated, she thought sorrowfully. And, instead, I was just being set up.
She shivered, and stretched out her hands to the fire. The burning logs smelled sweet, and the chair was deep and magically comfortable. It would have been very easy to lean back and give herself up to the luxury of the moment. But she couldn’t afford to relax.
Dominic Ashton might not have recognised her, but she knew him down to the marrow of her bones. And, when she left here tonight, she wanted him out of her system for good.
If Tara had admitted from the first that her name was really Ashton, would she have the guts to come here and face him tonight? she wondered. Probably not.
But why had Tara told such a pointless fib in the first place? And where had the name ‘Vane’ come from ?
I don’t need to know, she reminded herself firmly. I did what I set out to do and made sure Tara was safe. That’s as far as it goes. The state of the relationships in this house is none of my business.
But she couldn’t help reflecting that clearly the last time she’d seen Dominic Ashton he’d been a married man—Tara would already have been born. Now, it seemed, he was a widower. He’d had more to concern him in the past six years than a trivial prank, however cruel. And the damage caused to herself seemed positively inconsequential compared with what he must have suffered.
Oh, pull yourself together, she thought impatiently. You’ve allowed yourself the statutory glimmer of compassion. The fact remains that Dominic Ashton was a sadistic, heartless swine six years ago, and the evidence suggests he hasn’t undergone any material alteration.
It seemed an eternity before he came back. And, she saw, he was carrying a tray with a silver coffee-pot and two cups which he set down on the desk.
He said, ‘I think we should both take a deep breath and start again from scratch.’
Phoebe scrambled awkwardly to her feet, aware that her skirt had ridden up, revealing more of her long black-clad legs than she wished.
She said rather breathlessly, ‘There’s really no need for that, Mr Ashton. I did what I thought was necessary, and now I’d just like to leave. My taxi’s waiting.’
He shook his head. ‘I paid him and sent him away.’
‘You did what?’ Her voice rose. The realisation that she was as good as trapped here with him made her shake inside. ‘You had no right...’
‘Oh, please,’ he said impatiently. ‘Clearly I have every right to establish just what’s being going on. And when we’ve talked I’ll run you home myself. It’s the least I can do.’
My God, she thought. That’s one positively diametric change from our last meeting. You tossed me out then without any regard for what might happen to me. I was little more than a child, and you treated me like a whore.
She said crisply, ‘Another cab will be fine. I don’t want to drag you away from your important business.’ She put ironic emphasis on the last two words.
His brows lifted in swift acknowledgement. ‘You really don’t think a great deal of me, do you, Miss Grant? Would it earn me some Brownie points if I swore to you that I truly believed when I came home tonight that Tara was safely upstairs in the care of her highly paid nanny?’
‘Nevertheless,’ Phoebe said stiffly, ‘she wasn’t your first priority. You didn’t actually check.’
‘Touché,’ he said gravely. ‘Now, would you like to drink this coffee, or throw it over me?’
In spite of herself, she felt her lips twitch. He grinned back at her, and she realised it was the first time she’d ever seen him smile.
Realised, too, with a sense of shock, what a powerful attraction he could put out when he tried.
Thank God I’m immune, she told herself as she accepted the cup with a formal word of thanks and reseated herself.
‘May I recap on a few points?’ Dominic Ashton handed her the cream jug. ‘You actually saw Cindy with this guy—how many times?’
‘Only once—yesterday. I followed Tara into the street to see where she went. To make sure that she was all right.’ Phoebe stirred her coffee.
‘It hasn’t taken Cindy long to get fixed up,’ he said grimly. ‘We only moved down here three weeks ago.’
Phoebe moved a restive shoulder. ‘I suppose she is allowed a social life.’
‘Naturally. She has most weekends off, and usually each evening too. The whole point of moving my business down here was so that I could spend more time with Tara.’
‘But I thought—’ Phoebe stopped abruptly.
‘What did you think?’
She drank some coffee. ‘That you’d have to be away a lot on business.’
‘Well, it does happen, of course. I was away overnight earlier in the week. But Tara understands, I think. At least I hope she does.’
I wouldn’t count on that, Phoebe thought. Aloud, she said slowly, ‘She seems very mature for her age. Very self-possessed.’
‘In some ways, perhaps.’ He looked down at his cup. ‘She’s had to grow up quickly.’
‘Yes.’ She hesitated. ‘It must have been hard on her—losing her mother like that.’
‘You make it sound as if she’s been deliberately careless,’ he said lightly.
Her lips parted in a silent gasp of outrage. She said thickly, ‘I hope you don’t refer to your late wife quite so casually in front of Tara.’
‘I try not to refer to her at all,’ he said curtly, his grey eyes scanning her stormy face. ‘And when you talk of my “late” wife, are you referring to Serena’s chronic unpunctuality, or are you under the misapprehension that she’s departed this life?’
Phoebe nearly spilled her coffee. ‘You mean she isn’t dead?’
‘Good God, no,’ he said derisively. ‘Only the good die young, Miss Grant. On that assumption, Serena should outlive all of us.’
‘Oh, Lord.’ Phoebe was scarlet with mortification. ‘It’s just that Tara said she didn’t have a mother, and I assumed...’
Dominic Ashton shrugged. ‘It doesn’t matter, and in many ways Tara’s right. Serena and I have been divorced for the past two years, and she’s pursuing her career in California. It was agreed that Tara should remain with me.’
Phoebe said numbly, ‘Serena Vane—of course—the actress. I should have realised.’
‘I thought you did know. After all, you addressed me as Mr Vane when you came bursting in here.’
Phoebe looked at the floor. ‘I—I’m sorry. That must be very—disagreeable.’
‘Extremely,’ he agreed calmly. ‘But during the period of our marriage I became used to it, if not resigned.’
‘I saw her in Tess of the D’Urbervilles on television,‘ Phoebe blurted. ‘She was wonderful.’
‘Yes,’ he said. ‘Acting is what Serena does best. And I don’t blame her for wanting to try her luck in Hollywood.’ He paused. ‘But I didn’t want that life for Tara. Any more than I wanted her to be called that absurd name,’ he added, his mouth twisting. ‘But Serena was convinced, just before the christening, that she was going to be cast as Scarlett O’Hara in some remake of Gone with the Wind that never actually transpired.’
He swallowed the rest of his coffee and put down the cup. ‘But I suggest we make a joint vow to make no more assumptions. We’re clearly not very good at them. You were convinced that I was an uncaring absentee father, and I assumed that because Cindy was pleasant and came with glowing references that she’d be reliable too.’
‘What are you going to do about her?’
He shrugged. ‘I’ll have to find her first. All her clothes and personal things are still in her room, so I guess she’ll be back, sooner or later.’
‘And she left the car in the car park.’ Phoebe paused for a moment, then said diffidently, ‘Perhaps you should phone the local hospitals—and the police. I mean—she could have had an accident.’
‘At this precise moment, I’d be glad to hear she’d broken her damned neck. But you’re right. I’ll start ringing round after I’ve taken you back.’
She said with a touch of desperation, ‘It would save a lot of time and trouble if you’d just get me a taxi.’
‘You brought my daughter safely home. I want to do the same for you.’
Which, of course, was unanswerable, Phoebe thought, gritting her teeth.
She said, ‘I’d like to say good night to Tara, first, if that’s all right.’
‘Of course. Whenever you’re ready.’
Halfway up the stairs, she began to tremble. What room was Tara going to be in? If it was—that room, then she couldn’t go through with it. But then it wouldn’t be. Then, as now, it would be the master bedroom.
It was still a relief when they went past the door, Phoebe staring blindly ahead of her. At the far end of the landing, there was another flight of stairs curving away to the left.
‘This has always been the nursery suite,’ Dominic Ashton said as he led the way. ‘Cindy’s bedroom is up here too, and a big playroom, and there are two bathrooms, and a kitchenette to make hot drinks and snacks. It’s quite self-contained.’
Phoebe murmured something indistinguishable.
Tara was in bed, looking mutinous.
‘Carrie said I had to have an early night. But I wanted to come downstairs and play Snakes and Ladders with you and Phoebe.’
Dominic ruffled her hair. ‘I’m on Carrie’s side. You’ve had enough fun and games for one day, madam.’
Tara turned pleading eyes on Phoebe. ‘Will you come another time and play with me—please?’
This, thought Phoebe, was not part of the plan.
She gave Tara a constrained smile. ‘I can’t promise anything. I—I do have to work for my living. And you have Cindy to play with.’
‘Not any more.’ Tara grinned naughtily. ‘I heard Daddy tell Carrie that Cindy would come back over his dead body.’ Her eyes brightened. ‘Daddy, why can’t Phoebe be my nanny instead?’
There was a silence. Then Dominic said easily, ‘I’m sure she has a hundred reasons. I’ll leave her to tell you some of them while I make a few phone calls.’
‘Don’t you really and truly want to be my nanny?’ Tara asked when they were alone. ‘I thought you liked me.’
‘I do like you.’ Phoebe sat on the edge of the bed. ‘But it isn’t that simple. I have a job already.’
‘But it’s much nicer here than it is in that café,’ Tara urged. ‘You’d have a lovely bedroom. Would you like to look at it?’ She began to scramble out of bed, and Phoebe restrained her firmly.
‘And I have a home, too.’ With a roof that leaks and wiring on the blink and a nosy landlord ‘Your father will soon find someone else to look after you.’
‘I don’t want someone else.’ Tara sounded rebellious and fractionally close to tears.
Phoebe took her hand. ‘Look, I came to say good night, not have a fight. Everything will work out, poppet. You’ll see.’
Tara pulled her hand away and turned over, burying her face in the pillow. ‘I don’t like being on my own,’ said a muffled voice.
Phoebe sighed soundlessly. ‘Listen, if you’re a good girl, and stop fussing, I’ll come and play Snakes and Ladders with you one day. If your daddy will let me, that is.’
A transformed and beaming face was lifted from the pillow. ‘Will you come tomorrow?’
‘No, I have to go to work. Besides,’ she added with a touch of sternness, ‘Saturdays and Sundays are your special time with your father, aren’t they?’
‘Ye-e-es.’ Tara wriggled a bit. ‘But he wouldn’t mind if you were there too.’
‘Oh, I think he might,’ Phoebe said lightly. And I certainly should. ‘Cuddle down now, and I’ll tuck you in.’
Tara obeyed. ‘You sound like a nanny,’ she said.
Phoebe bent and swiftly kissed a pink cheek. ‘That’s the easy part,’ she said.
She closed the door softly behind her, and started down to the floor below. All the doors were shut there too, but she could remember what the rooms were like, she thought, her footsteps faltering a little. Especially one of them. The one with the big four-poster bed with a canopy over it. The one she’d been taken to...
Out of the past, she could remember someone saying, ‘It looks like a bloody altar.’
And Tony’s voice drawling, ‘Then let’s supply the virgin sacrifice.’
She shivered violently, trying to blot out his voice as well as the more potent memories of his lips on hers, his hands moving over her, undressing her slowly...
‘Is something the matter?’ Dominic Ashton’s voice, speaking sharply, broke across her reverie.
She realised she was standing, rooted to the spot, outside his bedroom. He was at the top of the stairs, staring at her.
He said, ‘I’ve never heard that this house is haunted, but you look as if you’ve seen a ghost.’
‘No—no, I’m fine. I—I thought I heard Tara calling,’ she improvised rapidly.
He said abruptly, ‘I’ll sleep up there tonight, in case she needs anything.’
Phoebe walked ahead of him down to the hall. ‘You don’t think there’s a chance Cindy will turn up?’
‘I know she won’t,’ he said grimly. ‘You were quite right. She’s in hospital—and the boyfriend too. I’ve just been on to the casualty department at Westcombe. They had an accident on the bike—hurrying back for Tara, apparently.’
Phoebe gasped. ‘Are they badly hurt?’
‘Tom ligaments for him, and a broken collarbone for her. It could have been very much worse. I’ll call in there after I’ve dropped you off, with a dose of unpleasant medicine for the pair of them.’
She said quickly, ‘Don’t be too angry with her, please. She’ll know how stupid she’s been, and be feeling really bad about it. And anger’s such an awful thing—when you’re frightened and ashamed, any way...’ Her voice tailed into silence.
‘Well,’ he said at last. ‘That was certainly a cry from the heart.’ He held out her coat for her. ‘Do I really seem so formidable?’
‘I—I was speaking generally.’ Phoebe slid her arms into the sleeves and began to fumble with the buttons.
‘Were you?’ His grey gaze was searching. ‘I’d have said you had something very particular in mind, and—’
To her intense relief, his analysis was interrupted by a sharp peal of the doorbell.
Dominic Ashton’s brows rose. ‘Now, who can this be?’ he said, half to himself.
He went to the door and threw it open.
‘Darling.’ The woman who swept in with immense assurance was tall, with pale blonde hair swept back by a velvet Alice band. Her wine-coloured cape swirled around her. ‘Mummy and Daddy are having an impromptu drinks party—such fun—and—’ she gave a girlish laugh ‘—they’ve sent me over to scoop you up.’
Now that, thought Phoebe, her own troubles forgotten in sudden relish, is something I’d really like to see. Dominic Ashton didn’t seem a man who’d ‘scoop’ easily.
He said courteously, ‘Good evening, Hazel. That’s very kind of you all, but I’m afraid I’m not available tonight. We’ve had a slight domestic crisis.’
‘Oh, dear.’ The newcomer’s rather prominent blue eyes focused on Phoebe, taking in her ordinary appearance and the elderly waxed jacket she was wearing. ‘Have I arrived at an awkward moment? Are you in the process of firing a member of your staff? I can wait in the car till you’ve finished.’
‘No,’ Dominic said pleasantly. ‘Actually that’s not it. This is Phoebe Grant, who doesn’t work for me in any capacity. Miss Grant, may I introduce you to Hazel Sinclair, who’s the daughter of some neighbours of mine?’
Phoebe murmured, ‘How do you do?’ and, in return, was given a bright smile which revealed very white teeth.
‘All the better to eat you with, Grandma,’ she said under her breath.
The social niceties concluded, Hazel Sinclair returned to her prey. ‘So what’s the problem, my pet? Is there anything I can do to help?’
He shook his head. ‘I doubt it. Tara’s nanny’s made rather a fool of herself and ended up in hospital.’
‘Oh, these ghastly girls.’ She flung her hands in the air. ‘I really don’t know how anyone copes with them. And I have to say she always did seem rather—flighty to me. Now, what you want is an older woman, a nanny of the old school, who’d keep a firm hand on poor little Tara.’
‘Is that what you think she needs?’ Dominic asked mildly.
‘All small girls do, my dear.’ She tapped him roguishly on the arm. ‘Especially charmers like your Tara, who can twist their fathers round their little fingers. She’s a delight, but you must be careful not to—overcompensate for the fact you’re a one-parent family.’
‘I am aware of that,’ he said, a touch drily. ‘I thought until an hour or so ago that I’d got the balance about right. Until Miss Grant arrived to correct me, that is.’
‘Oh, really?’ Phoebe found herself subjected to a somewhat sharper scrutiny. ‘Are you some kind of social worker, then?’
‘No,’ Phoebe said. ‘I’m a waitress at the Clover Tea Rooms, in Westcombe.’
‘I see.’ Hazel Sinclair clearly didn’t. She gave a silvery laugh. ‘It’s not an establishment I’m familiar with, I have to say. Is it one of your haunts, Dominic? It doesn’t sound very likely.’
‘It isn’t,’ he said briefly. ‘But Tara likes it, apparently.’ He paused. ‘I don’t want to seem ungracious, Hazel, but I was just about to run Miss Grant back to Westcombe and then visit the hospital.’
‘Of course. I must be getting back myself. The first guests will be arriving.’ She smiled at him dazzlingly. ‘If you’ve time when you’ve completed all your errands of mercy, call round. So many people want to welcome you back after all this time. Besides, it’s essential for you not to be a hermit.’
‘I think I can promise that.’ He took the hand she’d archly extended and dropped a quick kiss on it. ‘Tonight just isn’t on, Hazel, but I’ll ring you next week and we’ll have dinner.’
‘I’ll hold you to that, darling.’ She bestowed a distinctly less radiant look on Phoebe. ‘Good night, Miss—er...?’
‘Grant,’ Phoebe supplied helpfully. ‘Clover Tea Rooms. Home-baking a speciality.’
As he closed the front door behind Hazel Dominic Ashton turned back to Phoebe with a wintry look.
‘You’re not quite as demure as you look, are you, Miss Grant?’
‘I don’t understand.’ Phoebe returned the look. ‘Is there a problem?’
There was a brief, oddly pregnant silence, then he said slowly, still staring at her, ‘Do you know, Miss Grant? I think there might be. I really think there might.’
He sighed, swiftly and sharply. ‘So—shall we go now?’
‘Please,’ said Phoebe. And thought, The sooner, the better.
CHAPTER THREE
IT WAS a largely silent journey. Dominic Ashton seemed lost in thought as he expertly threaded his powerful four-wheel drive through the lanes.
And Phoebe, sitting with her hands clenched tightly in her lap, was far too uncomfortably aware of his physical proximity to be capable of producing any intelligent topic of conversation to fill the void.
‘Only six weeks until Christmas,’ and, ‘Do you think we’ll have snow before New Year?’ were all she could think of, and she instantly discarded both of them. Silence was preferable to total banality.
‘Whereabouts in Westcombe?’ he eventually asked abruptly as they approached the outskirts.
‘You can drop me in the High Street.’
‘I could also throw you in the river,’ he observed icily. ‘But, as I intend to take you to your door, let’s drop the evasions and give me your address. It will save us both time and temper.’
‘Hawthorn cottage—twenty-nine, Rushton Street,’ Phoebe said eventually, and mutinously.
‘Simplest solutions are always best,’ he murmured, and her hands curled into fists.
Hang in there, she adjured herself silently. A few more minutes and he’ll be gone. And as soon as Debbie comes back to work you can go too—as far and as fast as possible. And you’ll never, ever have to see him again.
As they drew up, she said, ‘Thank you.’
‘I wish I could think you meant that.’ He leaned forward, studying the narrow little house crammed awkwardly between its neighbours. ‘Astonishing.’
‘I beg your pardon?’ Phoebe felt herself bristling.
‘Granted.’ He swung himself lithely out of the driving seat and went round to open the passenger door. ‘I was thinking what a strange mass of contradictions you are.’
‘Well, please don’t lose any sleep over it, Mr Ashton,’ she snapped, ignoring the helping hand he’d extended as she scrambled out.
‘On the contrary,’ he said softly. ‘I have a strong feeling that you’re going to cost me a lot of sleepless nights, Miss Grant.’
Phoebe, shaken, and for once at a loss, gave him a fulminating look and stalked to her gate.
As she opened it she heard, quiet but unmistakable, the creak of her front door closing. She stopped dead with a groan. ‘Oh, no.’
‘I’ll deal with it.’ Dominic Ashton strode past her towards the shadowy figure hovering in the porch.
Phoebe, close on his heels, heard a slight scuffle and a yelp. ‘Oh, don’t hurt him. It’s my landlord.’
‘But he was coming out of your house.’
‘She’s been complaining about a leak in the roof,’ Arthur Hanson squeaked in breathless outrage. He was a thin man, balding, with a straggling beard. ‘I came round to look at it.’
‘In the pitch darkness?’ Dominic asked contemptuously. ‘You haven’t even got a flashlight.’
‘I decided to have a look in the loft first,’ Mr Hanson said, with an attempt at dignity.
‘In Miss Grant’s absence?’ Dominic released his hold on the other man’s collar.
‘He’s always doing it,’ Phoebe said wearily.
‘I have a right to conduct regular inspections.’
‘From now on, telephone Miss Grant and make an appointment.’
As Mr Hanson scuttled off Dominic turned a frowning gaze on Phoebe. ‘Has this been going on for long?’
‘Ever since I moved in.’
‘Then I strongly recommend you have the locks changed. He may be your landlord, but you have a right to your privacy.’
He followed her into the hall, looking around him critically. Comparing it, no doubt, with North Fitton House. ‘How much rent is he charging you?’
Phoebe lifted her chin. ‘Isn’t that covered by the right to privacy you just mentioned?’ she challenged.
‘It’s not just idle curiosity. I have contacts in the private rental market,’ he said. ‘I’m sure you could get something better than this.’
‘It’s perfectly adequate for my present needs,’ she said stiffly.
‘And your job represents complete fulfilment too?’ There was a note of faint derision in his voice.
She shrugged defensively. ‘I like my colleagues, and the customers are pleasant.’
‘Give or take the odd waif and stray.’
‘Tara was hardly that.’ She paused. ‘Please don’t let me keep you, Mr Ashton. You must be keen to get to the hospital. I don’t know when visiting hours end...’
‘There’s plenty of time.’ His mouth curved in amusement. ‘You’re not very subtle, Miss Grant. Or very hospitable,’ he added. ‘Considering I’ve driven you home, and got rid of a pest for you.’
‘I didn’t ask you to do either.’ Phoebe jiggled the sitting-room light switch in increasing irritation. ‘I don’t need your help, Mr Ashton. I can handle my own affairs.’
‘In the same way as you’re dealing with that light, I suppose?’ With infuriating coolness, he moved her gently out of the way, clicked the switch and the light stuttered on. He looked, frowning, at the old-fashioned flex supporting the central pendant. ‘Does that happen much?’
‘It’s temperamental,’ she conceded.
‘Perhaps it’s the effect you have on it,’ he murmured. ‘Does the kettle not work either?’
There was a silence, then Phoebe took a deep breath. ‘May I offer you some coffee, Mr Ashton?’ she asked grimly.
‘How kind of you, Miss Grant,’ he mocked. ‘I thought you’d never ask.’
So did I, Phoebe thought, seething as she went down the narrow passage to the kitchen.
She was totally aware of him, lounging in the doorway, watching her, as she filled the kettle and set it to boil. She had fresh coffee and a percolator, but instant would do for this occasion, she thought, getting down the jar and spooning granules into two mugs. Instant coffee and, hopefully, instant departure. Certainly she’d give him no excuse to linger.
But as she added the milk he’d politely requested, and stirred the brew, she had the uneasy feeling that he knew exactly what she was up to, and was laughing at her.
Jaw set, she led the way back to the sitting room, pausing in surprise to see that he’d kindled the fire.
‘I believe there’s a superstition that you shouldn’t tend anyone’s fire until you’ve known them for seven years, but I decided to risk it,’ Dominic Ashton drawled. ‘After all, we’re practically old acquaintances.’
Her heart skipped a panicky beat. ‘Not,’ she said, ‘as far as I’m concerned.’
His mouth twisted. ‘You don’t take many prisoners, Phoebe.’ He paused. ‘That’s an unusual and charming name. May I know how you came by it? Or is that another invasion of privacy?’
Phoebe looked at the flickering fire. ‘My mother was playing the shepherdess in an amateur production of As You Like It when she met my father,’ she said, her voice unconsciously wistful. ‘It was love at first sight.’
‘Even though Phoebe isn’t a very likeable character in the play?’
She was startled. ‘You know Shakespeare?’
‘I’m not a complete Philistine.’ Leaning back on the cramped settee, his long legs stretched out in front of him, he dwarfed the room. ‘Where are your parents now?’
Phoebe sank her teeth into her lower lip. Then she told him, ‘My mother died when I was a child. I—I lost my father just over six months ago.’
He closed his eyes for a moment. ‘Oh, God, I’m sorry. My facetious remarks about Serena were totally out of place.’
‘You couldn’t have known,’ she said. ‘Please don’t worry about it.’
‘Have you any brothers or sisters?’
She shook her head. ‘I was an only child.’
‘No relations at all?’ He was frowning.
‘My father’s sister is still alive,’ she said. ‘But we’re not close.’ She paused. ‘My father put all his energies into work after my mother—went. He was very successful, and eventually sold his business for a great deal of money. He should have been secure for life. He invested in a secondhand book shop, which he ran himself as a hobby. He was really happy, probably for the first time in years.’
‘And?’ he prompted when she hesitated.
‘Only someone persuaded him to play the stockmarket. He ended up owing enormous sums—debts he couldn’t possibly pay. We lost everything. The house, the shop, the furniture—it was all sold off.’
She shook her head. ‘My aunt seemed to feel that Dad had shamed the family name, and she wrote us off, even though he’d helped her husband out several times in the past.’
‘And she wasn’t prepared to do the same, and couldn’t live with the guilt,’ he said calmly. ‘It’s quite a familiar story.’
A story that she couldn’t believe she’d actually told him. It was something, like her grief, which she’d kept private, hugged fiercely to herself. She’d never confided in anyone. How had he, of all people, managed to break through the shell?
She gathered her defences. ‘What do you know about it?’
‘I come across similar cases all the time in my work. I’m a financial adviser—a troubleshooter, if you like. I go into companies, large and small, which have hit problems, and try and provide realistic solutions.’
‘I hope,’ she said, ‘that you don’t look at me in the same light.’
‘Certainly not,’ he said. ‘Your path is clearly strewn with primroses.’
‘Because,’ she went on, as if he hadn’t spoken, ‘I don’t need your charity.’
‘And I wouldn’t dream of offering it,’ he said coolly. ‘I’m very highly paid for what I do.’
‘Encouraging people at their wits’ end to get into more debt?’ she said bitterly. ‘Raising false hopes?’
He finished his coffee and set down his mug. He said slowly, ‘Your poor opinion of me seems to have all kinds of ramifications.’
‘We’re strangers,’ she said. ‘I don’t have an opinion.’
‘Lady, you could have fooled me,’ he drawled. ‘I’d say I was tried and condemned before you ever set eyes on me.’ He leaned forward, his grey eyes fixed on her face.
Today,’ he said. ’You did me a tremendous service. When we were at my house, I suggested that we make a fresh start. I’d still like to do that.’
‘Why?’ she asked baldly.
‘Because I want to be your friend.’ He spoke very gently. His eyes were gentle too, and his mouth curved suddenly in a smile without mockery. Despite herself, Phoebe felt a sudden pang of emotion akin to longing twist deep inside her. And it frightened her.
She said tonelessly, ‘That’s very obliging of you, Mr Ashton. But I have enough friends already.’
‘Indeed.’ He got to his feet. ‘Well,’ he went on, his face and voice expressionless, ‘that must make you unique to the rest of the human race. Then can I ask instead that you don’t consider me an enemy when we meet in future?’
Phoebe rose too. ‘It’s unlikely our paths will ever cross again, Mr Ashton.’
‘I’m sorry to hear that because I know Tara has her heart set on seeing you.’ He walked to the door, then turned. He said quietly, ‘Phoebe, please don’t allow your judgement of me to affect my daughter. That wouldn’t be fair. Good night.’
She heard the front door close behind him, and sank back onto her chair, aware that her legs were shaking under her.
‘And that’s not fair either,’ she whispered under her breath. ‘Oh, so clever, Mr Ashton.’
She couldn’t sleep that night, although she tried the usual anodynes of a warm bath and hot chocolate. She found herself tossing restlessly from one side of the bed to the other.
Dominic Ashton filled her mind, precluding all else.
She could hardly believe her own bad luck. On his own admission, he’d only been back at Fitton Magna a short time. If she hadn’t been offered that temporary job at the tea rooms, she might have moved away from West combe in complete safety, her peace of mind intact.
Peace of mind? a scornful voice in her head seemed to ask. You don’t even know what that means. For six years you’ve been torturing yourself over this man. Doing endless penance for something that wasn’t even your fault. Flaying yourself over a humiliation that he doesn’t even remember. Not even your name rang any bells with him. It was all far too trivial for that. You’ve been beating yourself to death for nothing, you stupid bloody idiot
And now you’ve seen him again. You’ve talked to him and the world hasn’t come to an end. In fact, this could just be the impetus you need to get you out of West combe and onto this new life that you want. If you’re not careful, you could end up feeling grateful to him.
‘Oh, no,’ Phoebe said aloud, and forcefully. ‘Not that. Never that’
She pushed the quilt away, got out of bed, put on her robe and trailed downstairs.
There were still embers glowing in the grate, and she added a few sticks and some lumps of coal, then curled up in the corner of the settee, staring at the flames.
Whatever she did, the bad dreams, the obsession with Dominic Ashton as the villain who had scarred her for life had got to end, she told herself. And that wouldn’t happen unless she went back to the beginning. Remembered, and placed in perspective, everything that had happened.
Up to now, she’d never really allowed herself to do that, telling herself it hurt too much. Finding it easier to focus only on the culmination of the whole wretched chain of events.
Now she made herself recall how it had all begun.
Which, of course, had been with Tony...
‘You fancy him, don’t you?’ asked Tiffany, laughing.
Phoebe blushed. ‘No, of course not’
They were in Tiffany’s bedroom, trying on clothes. Phoebe looked at herself in a tiny scarlet Lycra skirt and a black bustier. She’d never worn anything like them in her life. She’d never been allowed to. Her father was ultraconservative about clothes. When Phoebe needed anything, a personal shopper from one of the big department stores was employed and her instructions were clear.
In fact, it was amazing that her dad had allowed her to spend a few days at Tiffany’s. But then, as she admitted to herself, if he’d had any idea what a comparatively short time Phoebe had known her, he would probably have refused. The fact that Tiffany had only arrived at the school the previous term had been kept strictly under wraps.
Tiffany’s house was a revelation. It had been designed along the lines of an ante-bellum mansion of the American Deep South, because, as Tiffany’s mother had explained, she’d spent her honeymoon in New Orleans and felt it was her spiritual home.
The decor was lavish. Phoebe, more used to book-lined walls and faded chintzes, thought, a shade uncomfortably, that it was like a Hollywood movie set. Every bathroom gleamed with gold fittings. Every window seemed to droop under the sheer weight of swagged and festooned velvet. The kitchen seemed as elaborate as the control capsule of a space craft, and as sterile, because no one ever cooked in it.
Outside, there was a heart-shaped swimming pool, with an adjoining Jacuzzi, and a tennis court.
Partly because of this, but mainly through the totally casual welcome extended by the Bishops to anyone who turned up, the place was always teeming with people.
Tony Cathery was one of them.
He was at university, reading Fine Arts, because, as he’d said, he couldn’t think of anything more useful, and Tiffany, apparently, had known him ‘for ever’.
He was tall and blond, with blue eyes which crinkled at the corners, and a glossy Mediterranean tan acquired in the Greek islands earlier that summer. And, yes, he’d confirmed, grinning, it was all over, if anyone wanted to check. He was a marvellous swimmer, a terrific tennis player and an exuberantly sexy dancer.
Phoebe had never encountered anyone quite like him. Up to the time of his arrival, she’d been feeling very much the odd one out. There was no one else she knew there, and everyone else seemed so much smarter and streetwise than she did.
She was miserably aware that a couple of the girls had christened her ‘Feeble Feeb’ and laughed at her behind her back, and there had been times when she’d wondered if Tiffany was regretting that she’d ever invited her. Certainly she didn’t seem to want to spend much time with her. And, in a house virtually devoid of books, Phoebe often found herself at a loss.
Eventually, she discovered an elaborate onyx and ivory chess set on a table in the ornate conservatory which served as an extension of the drawing room.
She was hunched over it one day, half-heartedly working out a chess problem—and considering the more pressing dilemma of what excuse she could make to cut her visit short—when a voice behind her said softly, ‘My God, I don’t believe it. At last, a woman with a brain.’
Startled, Phoebe turned to find Tony Cathery smiling down at her.
‘Black seems to be in a hopeless position,’ he went on, pulling up a chair opposite her. ‘Let’s see what I can do.’
By the time the problem was solved, Phoebe was shyly hanging on his every word.
That night he sat beside her at dinner, and made her join in the dancing afterwards. Phoebe could see the surprise on the other girls’ faces, and revelled in it.
Not so Feeble Feeb, she thought joyously.
But she was also a little nervous. Her sexual experience, apart from a few kisses, was nil. She might be dazzled, but she was also wary, unsure what Tony wanted from her.
But Tony, oddly, seemed wary too—hesitant to push things too far or too fast between them—and she was grateful for his restraint, at first anyway. Then, as time went on, she began to wonder. To worry a little.
She was cheered, however, when he told her there was going to be a party the following Friday evening at a house some miles away.
‘You are going to come with me, aren’t you?’ he asked almost anxiously.
‘I haven’t been invited. Besides, I said I’d go home at the weekend.’
Tony groaned. ‘Oh, sweetheart, you can’t do this to me. Ring home. Say you’re staying on for a few days.’ He put his hand on the nape of her neck, under the heavy fall of brown hair, and stroked the slender curve very gently, making her body arch in delight.
He put his lips to her ear, and whispered, ‘I don’t want to part with you, darling. Not yet.’
The next day, she phoned her father, making some excuse, trying not to hear the disappointment in his voice.
Because she needed to be with Tony. She couldn’t bear to leave either. Not before...
Always, at that point, her mind closed off.
She believed that Tony must want her, otherwise why would he spend so much time exclusively with her? She just wished he would show it rather more openly. Each time he kissed her, he seemed to be holding back. The caresses he offered were exciting, but fleeting too, always short of any real intimacy, leaving her unsatisfied and longing for more.
And she had other, minor worries too. She wanted to look wonderful for Tony at the party, but she was dismally aware that he’d seen all the clothes she’d brought with her, and there was nothing sensational among them.
So, when Tiffany had asked her casually what she was planning to wear, and she’d confessed she didn’t know, she’d found herself immediately up in Tiffany’s room, confronted with a whole range of the kind of gear that looked so terrific on the others.
‘Well, he certainly fancies you.’ Tiffany, lounging on the bed, wouldn’t let the topic rest.
Phoebe tried pulling her hair up on top of her head, but it was too heavy and too thick, and kept sliding down again.
She sighed. ‘I don’t think so.’
‘That’s crap. He never leaves you alone.’
Phoebe sighed again. ‘Actually, he does. He treats me as if I was made of glass and might break.’
‘He wouldn’t if he saw you dressed like that,’ Tiffany giggled.
‘But he won’t see me.’ Phoebe tried not to sound desolate.
‘Of course he will.’ Tiffany sat up. ‘Y’know, your problem is that you give off the wrong vibes. The way you dress and talk and present yourself all says “hands off”, and guys like Tony pick that up. So, on Friday, you’re going to give him a signal that says “I’m available”. And I’m going to help.’
Phoebe gave her a quick, rather shamefaced look. ‘Are you sure, Tiff? It’s just that I thought—at the beginning—that it was Tony and you...’
Tiffany laughed. ‘Hardly. We know each other far too well.’ She contemplated Phoebe with a satisfied smile, like the cat with the cream. ‘Put yourself in my hands, and you’ll knock his eyes out on Friday.’
Phoebe could hardly believe her own eyes when she was finally allowed to look in the mirror on Friday evening. Her own hair was concealed under a shoulder-length blonde wig, which Tiffany had purloined from her mother’s room. Her eyes were slumbrous with kohl, and her lips gleamed a deep, wicked red.
‘You look more like Madonna than she does,’ said Tiffany.
Downstairs, Phoebe was disappointed to discover that Tony had gone ahead to the party with some of the others.
‘Whose party is it, anyway?’ she asked Tiffany, who shrugged vaguely.
‘Just the usual bash,’ she returned. ‘Don’t worry about it.’
She’d expected the house to be another designer nightmare, like Tiffany’s, so North Fitton House came as a pleasant surprise. She lingered on the steps, breathing in the fragrance of the night-scented stocks which filled the stone urns flanking the front door.
Tiffany gave her a little push. ‘Come on. There’s a hungry man waiting in there.’
Tony’s reaction was all that she could have desired.
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