Claiming His Child
Margaret Way
A six-year-old secret…Poor boy Nick Konrads has made good and returned to the Australian town that sent him packing seven years ago. His crime? Falling for tender, innocent Suzannah–who had betrayed their love.As the new owner of her once-glorious family home, Nick now intends to make Suzannah pay. But he cannot deny his feelings still run deep for her. And then he looks into Suzannah's six-year-old daughter's eyes and recognizes…his own child.
“What are you trying to do, Nick? (#ub627f724-63ea-53a8-a5e2-c5cdd12bc613)About the Author (#ub496cad6-800c-5401-acbe-83418b7c5295)Title Page (#ua6e30a7e-ec59-5dd1-9fc1-35a192587ce5)CHAPTER ONE (#u0fcd4c7c-3612-5543-910b-018c070e5b4b)CHAPTER TWO (#u53b6e694-e347-547a-8a93-db32ec61aca6)CHAPTER THREE (#u0d0f40af-ec0c-5e5a-9f8c-862ec4bbd213)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)Copyright (#litres_trial_promo)
“What are you trying to do, Nick?
“Take my daughter from me?” Suzannah sounded desperate.
“Make that our daughter,” he said, catching hold of her as she tried to whirl past him. “I didn’t send any letter to your father. But I know exactly what was in it. You can’t get away with any more lies.” He ignored her moan. “I have irrefutable proof Charlotte is my child. You know it I know it. Now your father knows it. Plus the person who devoted their time to exposing the truth for their own ends.”
“I’m supposed to believe that?” The breath shook in Suzannah’s throat She jerked her arm away and moved into the living room, turning to confront him.
“You believe what you want to believe,” he said harshly. “It’s a handy trick hiding from the truth. Keeping quiet. Saying nothing. Ultimately, however, the truth will out. Charlotte is my child and I’m here to claim her.”
Margaret Way takes great pleasure in her work and works hard at her pleasure. She enjoys tearing off to the beach with her family on weekends, loves haunting galleries and auctions and is completely given over to French champagne “for every possible joyous occasion.” Her home, perched high on a hill overlooking Brisbane, Australia, is her haven. She started writing when her son was a baby, and now she finds there is no better way to spend her time.
Claiming His Child
Margaret Way
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
CHAPTER ONE
THERE is nothing quite like the moment of premonition. The certainty out of nowhere. The mind’s acceptance. So unscientific he thought, yet he knew the instant Bebe, his secretary, breezed into his office shuffling through the pages of the latest edition of Preview, the luxury real estate magazine, what would be in it.
“Damn you, Suzannah,” he thought. “Damn you for reaching back into my life.”
“I think we’ll find what we’re looking for here, Nick,” Bebe was saying with satisfaction, her eyes still glued to the glossy full-colour pages. Bebe Marshall, forty-eight, cheerful, enthusiastic, marvellously efficient, fiercely loyal. With an invalid mother to look after she had risked making the shift with him from Ecos Solutions when he had broken away four years ago to set up his own firm of information technology consultants. Konrads. Neither he nor Bebe had ever looked back. He was a millionaire many times over, Bebe had full-time professional home care for her mother and was now rich enough not to have to pursue work at all. In fact every other member of his team, all under thirty-five, all highly qualified, all gifted, sharing his broad vision were handsomely remunerated for their unswerving loyalty and dedication to his projects. Konrads had put itself on the map initially by creating a computer program, which greatly sped up the process followed by pathologists in the analysis of genetics and DNA testing. His current project worked on by all his staff in collaboration, was the creation of a worldwide data base contributed to by medical specialists all over the world, compiling and continually upgrading information relating to all aspects of genetics including DNA testing and the classification and trends of genetic mutations. It was important all-consuming work, which would benefit not only the medical field but the legal process and the law.
His brainchild.
“Hey, what’s up?” Bebe suddenly became aware of a certain hollowness in the silence. It was quarter to eight in the morning. She had come in early herself to clean up her workload but as usual Nick was already at his work station. “Don’t you ever sleep?” She fixed him with an eye half motherly, half yearning.
“Bebe, darling, I work here. You know that. Besides I don’t need a lot of sleep. Never did.” Nevertheless he stood up and squared his wide shoulders in readiness for what was to come.
“I suppose that’s what comes of being a genuine genius.” Bebe just clucked and shook her head in wonderment. Nick Konrads was amazing. The glowing power source. The man who dominated all the rest, and there were some brilliant people on his staff. Every last one of them with a Masters degree in computer science and information technology. She blessed the day she had ever laid eyes on him, fresh from university, fabulous brain, with Groszmann from Ecos always trying to pick it. Not that Nick put up with that situation long. He had every attribute it took for outstanding success. A computer wizard, mathematician, commanding presence, an electrodynamic personality that made people follow him like a messiah, yet inspired an enormous camaraderie. Everyone at Konrads felt privileged to be there. Nick was a great boss. He involved them all in important work. He deserved his glittering career though some in the business were bitterly envious of his meteoric rise. Nick soared above it. A man with wings. And a man who worked under tremendous pressure. Which brought Bebe back to the reason why she had bought the latest edition of Preview. Nick was in need of a retreat Some beautiful quiet place he could withdraw to to relax and entertain his friends. It was she who had touted the idea, gratified and pleased when Nick had decided to go along with it.
“So tell me,” he now invited, walking to the window wall with its spectacular views over Sydney and its magnificent glittering blue harbour. “Just what properties are you going to show me?” He spoke casually, even teasingly. He was fond of Bebe, but his mind and body were resonating with memories. Memories down the years from when he was a boy of ten and his immigrant mother and father had gone to live in the peaceful and prosperous country town of Ashbury in northern New South Wales. He himself had been born in Vienna of a German father and a Czech mother but his parents had brought him to Australia at the age of five. A new Australian they were then called. His father had been ill even then, both parents political refugees, though it had taken him a long time to find that out. Australia was the other side of the world. A country of great political and social stability. The only continent on earth that had never experienced the terrible bloodshed and upheaval of war on its own soil.
“Say, what’s wrong with you this morning?” Bebe was soaking up the mood with an antenna of her own. “You don’t seem to be listening at all.”
“I am. I promise.” He turned his head to smile at her, the flash of his beautiful even teeth breaking up the smouldering dark austerity of his handsome features. He was commandingly tall so Bebe, not short herself, had to tilt her head to look up to him, surprising something like pain, could it be grief, in his brilliant near-black eyes. Nick was a hundred times more complex than even she knew. A man who kept a lot inside himself.
“Well.” She smiled, suddenly wanting to hug him. “I know I’m prattling on and you’ve probably been up most of the night but there are three properties I think you should take a look at. I’ve flagged them in yellow. A wonderful retreat in the Blue Mountains. Magnificent site. Splendid gardens or there’s your own private Barrier Reef Island, mansion included and my favourite, a real classic....”
Bellemont Farm. He knew before Bebe ever got to the place’s name. A searing brand on his heart. He almost said the name aloud, feeling the prickling on the back of his neck, the terrible tensing of his muscles.
“A four-hundred-acre estate about twenty miles from Ashbury.” Bebe read on, unaware. “Used to be quite a successful horse operation and vineyard name of Bellemont. Farm. Sounds lovely! Rolling pastures, splendid old colonial, a winding creek that meanders through the estate, eight bedrooms, five baths, separate staff quarters, stables, fenced paddocks, riding facilities, tennis court, pool, great fishing in the nearby Ashbury River. Just the place for a high-octane guy.”
“You want to take care of me, don’t you, Bebe?” he said, trying to shift his tone.
“Of course I do.” She nodded her head twice. “You’ve taken great care of me. Mum and I include you in our nightly prayers.” Perfectly true. Going with Nick had changed their lives.
The chiselled mouth with its clean raised edges gently mocked. “You have to make sure I get to Heaven?”
“When you set out to charm you’d have the angels eating out of your hand,” she remarked, absolutely sure of it.
“Thanks, Bebe.” He returned to his desk, giving her shoulder a little pat as he passed. Though his mouth still curved in a half smile his wonderful eyes were jet-black in their intensity. Whatever was wrong? Bebe was puzzled. She had rarely if ever seen Nick inwardly churning. A creature of enormous volatile energy he always held it under strict control. Bebe looked at him for a space of time then retreated quietly to the door. “Professor Morganthal’s secretary confirmed his appointment at nine-thirty.”
“I knew he’d come back to us,” Nick said. “I’m the best one to help him.”
“I’m sure he realises that now. If you want to dive into Previews for five minutes I can get you a whole lot more information. I know you’re only young, Nick.” Not yet thirty-one, she thought, to have accomplished so much. “And you’re very strong but constant pressure is bad. You still need time off like the rest of us folks.”
“All right, Bebe!” He feigned a meekness that sat oddly on his dark genius and made Bebe laugh. “I’ll go through this when I have a chance. That’s a promise. You might send Chris and Sarah in when they arrive. I need them to step up their information gathering. It’s a massive job.”
“Leave it to me,” Bebe said briskly.
He worked on for ten or so minutes but in the end gave in, pulling the magazine towards him and opened up the pages where Bebe had flagged them. The Barrier Reef Island, an emerald oval surmounting a ring of pure white sand set down in a turquoise sea, glorious but maybe too far away, then in the centre, Bellemont Farm.
The place he had learned to love then hate, learned it cruelly and indelibly like some poor dumb animal seared by a brand. Bellemont Farm, home of the Sheffields since colonial times. In his time, home of Marcus Sheffield and his only child, his beautiful daughter, Suzannah. Suzannah. Would he never be free of her?
Just to murmur her name brought back a storm of emotion, anger and monstrous grief. Suzannah with her cloud of dark hair loose from its school plait floating around her heart-shaped face. Even as a child two years his junior, on first meeting her she had seemed so exquisite, so beautifully dressed, so obviously pampered and privileged he had felt almost frightened of her. He remembered he had swallowed on a hard breath that had actually hurt his chest. It had remained like that until, maddened by his grave silence she had started pulling funny faces at him and making up silly names to call him. Rude names, too, though where she got them from living like a princess with Marcus Sheffield for a father, nobody knew. The horse crowd, his mother had said, laughing ruefully. Suzannah’s clowning had been infectious and overnight they had become extraordinarily good friends. After a while Suzannah began to take lessons from his father in languages and mathematics after it was pointed out to Marcus Sheffield that Nick’s father had been a highly regarded academic in his own country. Piano lessons, too, from his mother, a Conservatorium graduate who had had to turn her fine talents to teaching ordinary country children to bring in an income. Three years later on the day he turned thirteen, his father died of a long-standing physical condition Nick hadn’t been able to fathom, something to do with his lungs, leaving his mother and him heartbroken and alone in a strange new country where everyone seemed so extraordinarily, inexplicably carefree, with substantially more money than they had.
That was how it started. Nick began to take on jobs. Anything. Mowing, mucking out stables, cleaning cars, premises, yards, a bit of carpentry. The foreign kid who seemed to be able to take care of everything. So workmanlike for one so young, practical, resourceful. It wasn’t long after that he began to assert his natural academic superiority, to the extent he started to outstrip his teachers, all the time praying to God for the impossible, that his brilliant father, his best teacher, would come back. At least his father knew what he was all about. He could go straight to his father with the most vexing problem and his father could instantly see the solution. Even Suzannah, far more clever than she let any of her flighty friends know, had benefited greatly from having his father for a mentor. After his father died she continued to come to their modest home for her twice weekly piano lessons at which under his mother’s guidance and her own musicality she excelled. He took over coaching her with her studies, the languages at which he was adept, and also in the maths and science subjects so that she, too, began to throw off her cloak of worked-at-mediocrity and shine. Both of them had gone to the Ashbury High School. Adored and adoring, Suzannah had refused to go off to one of the exclusive boarding schools in Sydney and be parted from her father.
“You, too, Nicko,” she told him, violet eyes glowing. “I couldn’t bear to be parted from you. We’re soul mates.”
It had seemed like that to him, too. She was never an honorary sister. The sister he never had. Even as children there had always been some distinction in his feelings. Feelings so innocent and pure they didn’t disturb him until he was what? Almost sixteen and already six feet tall. After that things got terribly complicated. For him and for Suzannah. Her father no longer seemed to look upon him with the same patronising favour as before. He eyed his height, the way he had filled out, his swift move to early maturity. Over the years Nick had dedicated himself to looking out for Suzannah. Much like Marcus Sheffield. But by the time he reached sixteen he began to realise he was no longer looked on as suitable to be Suzannah’s best friend.
That role was for Martin White, icon of one of the core group families in the district. Golden-haired, blue-eyed, Martin who had done everything in his power to make Nick’s life uncomfortable. He was a “foreigner”. Martin never let him forget it, though they both knew the animosity between them, which sometimes turned ugly, had at its heart their love for Suzannah. Even at fourteen Suzannah was surrounded by admirers, entranced by her beauty and high spirits, and by her social standing as the only daughter of the richest and most influential man in the district.
River Road. A beautiful emerald place with magnificent old trees sweeping over the crystal clear waters of the Ashbury River. All of the town’s young people loved to swim there, going off in groups. But he and Suzannah preferred to be a pair. They had their favourite place, Jacaranda Crossing, where one of the water holes was considered too deep. But he and Suzannah swam like fishes. He had to thank her for that accomplishment though she had declared him a natural. They always took their bicycles, tearing faster and faster along the river road, riding down the narrow dirt track that led them to their own private jade lagoon.
“Lord it’s so hot!” Suzannah jumped off her bike lightly, letting it go almost before he caught it and propped it against a tree. “I’ve never felt so much like a dip.” She began right there and then to shuck off her school clothing, a terrible maroon-and-white check pinafore, white school blouse and tie, shoes and stockings, until finally she stood in her navy swimsuit, tall for her age, slender as a willow, her long exquisite limbs gilded from a summer sun, her small blossoming breasts thrusting against the tight, thin material.
He had seen her do this many times before yet suddenly he felt a stab like a hot rapier straight to his loins.
“Come on. What’s holding you up?” She turned to laugh at him, her eyes brilliant with the anticipation of the kiss of the cold water.
He simply stood there, almost fully grown, staring and staring, not able to get enough breath around a few words of reply.
“Hey, you idiot. What are you staring at?” she cried. “Don’t stand there like a dummy.”
How could he not when he was soaking in her beauty and her femininity through every pore of his body. For the first time he truly knew what it was to be mesmerised by a woman. But she wasn’t a woman; she was a thirteen-year-old girl. A little virgin. Her father’s princess.
He came to then, stripping down to his bathing trunks and diving headlong into the water, grateful for the tingling coldness that closed over his head and the storm in his adolescent body. Suzannah was a flame. He knew that. And he could get burned. Even then he could think very clearly.
Yet there was wonderful exhilaration in his new discovery. Wonderful sport in swimming with her as if they were a pair of dolphins. Afterwards they pulled themselves up onto the sandy bank, their dark heads, an identical near black, sleek as seals.
“That was marvellous. Just what I needed.” Suzannah, towelled herself off quickly, passing her towel to him because he always managed to forget his.
Not surprisingly he didn’t answer, taking the towel extended to him from her long outstretched slender arm. Life is never going to be the same again, he thought. Never innocent and sweet as it once was but fraught with tension. He recognised it easily for what it was. Sexual tension. He couldn’t hold his feelings back. He had fallen in love.
“Nick?” she asked in such a strange voice. Not the usual glorious confidence, the self-assuredness befitting Marcus Sheffield’s adored daughter.
“We won’t ever come back here,” he said. “Not on our own.” The words were out in a spontaneous rush. The decision made.
“Oh, Nicko, it’s our place,” she said with a great wail. “I don’t want to stick with the others.”
“Your father won’t want us to come here,” he maintained.
“You can say that again!” Abruptly she laughed. “He’d kill us.”
“So you know what I mean, Suzy.” He looked at her, his expression barely veiled.
He remembered she stood perfectly still, fragile as a water nymph. “I’d be safer with you than anyone else in the world.” Tears suddenly shone in her blue-violet eyes.
“Yes, you are, but I’m not going to do anything that could possibly harm you. You’re a child”
“So are you.” She flashed with anger.
“No, I’m not I’ve never been a child like you and your friends are. In a way you’re all the same.”
“Well hell we are! I’m different.” She advanced on him, her cheeks stained red.
“But you don’t see what I see,” he protested. “You don’t feel as I do.”
“I know I love you.” She flipped back her silky black mane. “You’re my best friend in all the world.”
“Stupid baby. I swear I’m going to look after you.” He turned away abruptly, unaware of the muscles that rippled like a panther’s along his dark golden back.
She made the mistake of laying her hand along his bare skin. “Nick?”
“How about your clothes? Get them on,” he all but barked, outraged by his body’s powerful response.
“Nick, don’t turn angry,” she implored.
“I’m not angry. Never with you. Get a move on,” he urged. “You said yourself your father wouldn’t like us to be here.”
“I’ll be fourteen soon.” Obediently she turned away. “The same age as Juliet.”
“Don’t be ridiculous.” He tried to speak calmly, failed, and moved fast to collect his own clothes. He stepped into his trousers, zipped them, then reached for his dreary maroon shirt with the white trim. His mother had only just bought it and already it was getting too small. His father had stood over six foot three. He would be the same.
“No need to jump on me.” Anger leapt in her voice. “You’re not my big brother.” Something else in her voice made him think she was about to cry. Suzannah cry? She never cried. Even when she came a cropper from her horse.
“Ah, Suzy, come on. I never meant to upset you,” he relented.
“Well you have. I don’t like anything about this being an adult. I don’t understand what it’s all about.”
Until today.
It was then that he kissed her. Wrapping his hands around her small gilded face, touching her mouth with his own. It tasted so fresh and sweet, the shimmering joy that was Suzannah.
When he released her she held onto his wrist, the rosy delicacy of her lips pouting about to form words. Words that never came because an angry young male voice smote their ears, shouting, quivering with a kind of primal rage.
“What the hell are you up to, Konrads?” Martin White was dressed in a white shirt, jeans and sneakers, the light radiating off his thick golden hair.
He launched himself down the bank, a solid young man but no match for Nick. “Is this where you two get to?” he demanded, scarcely containing his jealousy. “Suzannah, I’m shocked at you. Wait until your father hears about this. Do you let this guy paw you?”
For answer she leapt into action, fists bunched, throwing her arm and hitting Martin squarely on the shoulder. “This guy here,” she yelled, “is worth any ten of you. He’s far and away the cleverest boy we’ve ever had in this town and probably ever will. He’s not only clever he’s highly principled and hard working. His father, the other kraut, was a distinguished man. His mother is a beautiful. talented lady. She plays the piano wonderfully. You’re the pathetic ignoramus with your offensive name-calling. Heck, you couldn’t even read until you were six. I could read when I was three!” She was so angry she was alight, pulses beating in her throat and at the blue-veined temples. “As for telling my father about anything!” she shouted. “Do that and I swear I’ll never speak to you again for the rest of my life.”
It was a threat Martin White was to take profoundly to heart. A handful of years later he married her.
Nick’s Suzannah.
CHAPTER TWO
HEADLIGHTS coming up the driveway woke her up, illuminating the bedroom. Suddenly alert to every sound, Suzannah turned her head quickly to glance at her bedside clock: 2:35. The right side of the bed was empty, the bed linen unruffled. Martin returning home. Whatever has happened to my life? she thought bleakly. I’ve tried, God knows I’ve tried, but our marriage was doomed from the start. The lies and the heartbreak. The wounds that ran deep and wouldn’t heal. She still cared for Martin even now but she had never loved him. All along Martin had known it.
The headlights didn’t swerve away to the garages as she expected. Now it occurred to her the car’s engine sounded different. It crunched around the broad loop of the driveway and stopped at the front porch.
She started up. The first hint of dread struck her. For quite a while now Martin had been drinking heavily. Had he been involved in an accident? Suzannah threw on her dark blue robe, thrust her feet into bedroom slippers then rushed through the open French door and out onto the upper balcony looking down.
A police car stood parked in the driveway, lights flashing.
Dear God! Suzannah whirled about almost overcome by the terrible trembling in her limbs. Was there anything more frightening than seeing a police car parked at one’s door in the early hours of the morning? It could only mean trouble. Perhaps tragedy. On her flight down the hallway she paused to shut Charley’s door lest her little daughter be disturbed. Her father, she knew, would be sleeping heavily. He had been taking medication since his mild stroke. She was almost at the bottom of the stain before the door chimes rang.
“Suzannah! Terribly sorry to disturb you.” It was Frank Harris, the local police chief, kneading his hat, his deputy Will Powell’s kindly rugged face totally without his usual smile, two paces behind him. “May we come in?”
Suzannah stood back wordlessly, her sense of foreboding deepening with every second. She watched them move into the entrance hall with its grand divided staircase soaring to the upper level, then turn to face her ready to show their hand.
“What’s wrong, Frank?” A voice came out, husky, strained. Not hers. “Is it Martin?” She could see it in his eyes.
“Mind she doesn’t faint,” Will Powell cried out warningly, starting forward.
Somehow they were in the drawing room, Frank gently supporting her. “I’m so sorry, Suzannah.” His voice was deep, kind, distressed. He eased her into a chair. “It was an accident. Martin ran off the River Road Piled up against a tree.”
“Oh God, no!” Her whole body sagged and her face fell into her hands. No, not Martin. Life taking another tragic twist.
“I’m so sorry,” Harris repeated, reminding himself there was worse news to come. Martin White hadn’t been alone. His passenger had been killed as well. Cindy Carlin from the town. He had known her instantly from her long blond hair. Hell, he knew them all. Knew them from when they were kids. Suzannah, Martin, Cindy, the migrant boy, Nicholas Konrads, he had all but run out of town. On Marcus Sheffield’s orders. Had to be seven years ago but he still felt terrible about it. Konrads had turned out to be a business genius. Suzannah had married the wrong man. Marcus Sheffield, arrogant, wealthy, the master manipulator had lost his substantial fortune and his once robust health. Now his son-in-law, picked by his own hand, Suzannah’s husband, little Charlotte’s father, was dead. For all its grandeur, Bellemont Farm, the town’s historic landmark, was a sad place.
Suzannah could barely remember the events leading up to the funeral. She put herself on autopilot and somehow she got through. She never heard all the rumours and gossip that swept like a bushfire through the town. She refused help, gently turned her well-meaning friends way, explained about Daddy to Charlotte, discussed matters briefly with her father and organised all arrangements herself. Martin was gone and it was all her fault For all that her world had fallen apart years ago.
The day of the funeral there were no tears from Heaven. Martin White was laid to rest in brilliant sunshine with family, friends, just about everyone he knew, attending his funeral at the Anglican Church where he and Suzannah had been married. It was a big funeral conducted with sombre dignity as the families closed ranks. People spoke quietly, no matter what their feelings, huddling together in groups. Cindy Carlin’s funeral the day before was just the opposite with the girl’s parents loud in their condemnation of Martin White and the Sheffield family who thought they still owned the town. How young Nick Konrads had been run out of town was rehashed. A great many long-standing scandals were aired.
This isn’t happening, Suzannah thought as she listened to the minister drone on in what seemed to her in her grief, a mindless fashion. Her father, tall, gaunt, a shadow of his former handsome powerful self, stood by her side. Across from them Martin’s family were ranged all golden haired, all distraught inwardly but steady as she was herself. Martin was to be buried in the White family plot in deference to his family’s wishes. Suzannah had always got on very well with Martin’s mother and sisters but they weren’t looking at her now. Because of her Martin was dead. It would never be said. Just buried in hearts. The prominent families of the district stuck together. They left it to people like Cindy Carlin’s family to air their dirty linen.
On the fringe of the crowd of mourners, dark glasses shielding his eyes, Nick Konrads stared at the young woman he had loved so passionately. Not even extreme tragedy could rob her of her heart-stopping beauty. Against the stark black of her wide-brimmed hat and her black suit, her skin glowed with the perfection of magnolias. He knew she had a child, a little girl, but her figure was as girlish and slender as ever, her long legs exquisite. Marcus Sheffield, her father, the man who had wrought such havoc and suffering in his life, stood protectively beside her, a striking-looking man still but his body had lost its fine shape and erect posture. Nick knew about the stroke. He knew about the failed business dealings, the downturn in Sheffield’s fortunes. His agents were busy acquiring Bellemont Farm now, the scene of his humiliation. He had never thought for one moment Martin White would die an early death. No matter their tremendous differences, the way Martin and Marcus Sheffield had conspired against him, he had never wanted that. He had taken a risk, really, coming here today. Despite the superficial changes—maturity, shorter hair, grooming, expensive clothes—many people would recognise him. But he couldn’t keep away. He had received news of Martin White’s death only last night, then with a wince of pain. It wasn’t right, someone not yet thirty-one, the same age as himself, should be snatched so cruelly from life. How wretched Suzannah must feel. He knew the marriage hadn’t been happy. He knew everything. The simple ceremony was almost over. He had to go. But nothing would interfere with his plans. It wasn’t his way to hide. He would come back to this town if only as an infrequent visitor. But he could come back to this town in triumph. The new owner of Bellemont Farm, Marcus Sheffield’s castle.
He would have got clean away, because he was walking swiftly to his parked Mercedes, except for Jock Craig, his old math teacher at the high school. Craig came running up behind him grasping his arm.
“Aren’t you Nick Konrads? It is you, Nick?” His voice held surprise and an unmistakable note of respect.
There was nothing else for it but to turn and shake hands. “Mr. Craig, how are you?”
“Fine, Nick, fine.” The man stared at him with keen, shrewd eyes. “Bad business, eh? A tragedy. It must have taken some courage coming back for the funeral? Although you and Martin were never exactly friends.”
“Suzannah was my friend, Mr. Craig,” he said, not conscious of the severity of his expression.
“Of course, of course. She’s in agony, poor girl. One can see that clearly behind that ingrained poise. Actually my boy, she’s coming this way. Sheffield, too. Perhaps you’d better go?” he suggested. “I only say that with the best of intentions.”
“I know.” Nick nodded briefly. “But Marcus Sheffield doesn’t bother me any more.”
“He did once.” Jock Craig spoke kindly. He had never believed for one moment young Konrads was a thief, though Sheffield swore he had stolen a safe full of jewellery, which eventually turned up in the toolshed behind the Konrads’ modest house.
“Sheffield has had to live with what he did.” Nick’s face showed nothing, neither anger nor hatred. I’m ready for him this time, he thought.
Jock Craig shuddered. He couldn’t help it but Marcus Sheffield was way past dealing with anyone let alone the striking self-assured young man before him. Craig had followed Nick Konrads’ career with great interest. Even as a boy he’d been staggeringly clever. Pity about the mother. Never recovered from her husband’s death, the scandal about her son had almost destroyed her. Marcus Sheffield had a lot to answer for, he thought. And he wasn’t the first to think it.
Nick stood quite still while she was approaching, outwardly very calm, but his tall lean frame emanated a daunting power. Inside his blood ran cold. He had loved Suzannah. Even after her betrayal and the great humiliation he had suffered, he had still yearned to see her. Proof of his obsessive attention to her lay just beneath the skin. Scratch it and draw blood. He had never recovered from her loss even when he was sleeping with other women. He had Adrienne in the car even now promising her a drive around the beautiful countryside where he had lived as a boy, with lunch afterwards at one of the fine restaurants along the coast. It was bad to use her as some kind of shield and he felt a stab of remorse. Adrienne was a beautiful woman, a divorcee a little older than he, sophisticated, charming, witty. He had enjoyed her steady company—he was far from being a promiscuous man—for almost a year now, keeping her friendship but not offering anything. It seemed to suit Adrienne. Both of them had been badly burned.
Now Suzannah approached, utterly unforgettable, her body language taut and brittle. She was moving swiftly, like a deer in a forest, so that her father couldn’t possibly keep pace with her. Dozens of pictures flicked rapidly through his mind. Suzannah at all ages. The enchanting little girl. The bewitching adolescent. Suzannah when she had lost her status as an innocent little virgin and wept in his arms. Natural, abundant tears of rapture and ex- haustion. An act indelible in his memory. An act that had wrecked his life.
Get away from here, he thought. Just get away. You have total control over your life. This fixation on Suzannah Sheffield. Suzannah White was just too bizarre. Too damaging. He wasn’t over it yet.
Suzannah, moving over the thick emerald grass without any thought to possible grass stains on her expensive black suede shoes, couldn’t have known that. The man before her in his black funeral clothes, a long impeccably tailored topcoat with his beautifully cut suit, looked remote and unfathomable. A man whose severity of expression precluded passion. Yet how splendid he looked, how compelling. The uncanny old telepathic thing wasn’t working. She couldn’t pick up a thing. Yet why had he come here like this?
“Nick.” She reached him, lifted her head and spoke in a clipped voice that was as cool as crystal.
“Suzannah.”
His response was a faint rasp on dark velvet. He still hadn’t lost all traces of his accent. Probably never would.
“May I offer you my sincere sympathy,” he said. “You must be greatly shocked and distressed.”
“Traumatised, I think.” Her violet-blue eyes looked away. “What are you doing here, Nick? You must know it’s only asking for trouble.”
If anything his striking features grew tougher. “You mean your father?” He gave her the faintest grim smile. A travesty of the beautiful one she remembered. “I really don’t think your father will present a problem ever again.” His eyes at that moment were full of knowledge.
“Did someone tell you we’ll be moving out of Bellemont?” she asked sharply.
“No,” he lied.
“Things have gone badly for us.”
“You’ve had offers for the property?” He looked down at her, concealing all his old fascination.
“I suppose there’s no harm in telling you.” She gave a weary shrug. “Negotiations are going on right now. Not as much as we hoped but we’re in no position to hold out.”
“How the mighty have fallen,” he said. “I don’t think the new owner or owners would pressure you to move out in a hurry. Given the circumstances.” He spoke with a kind of compassion.
“Who told you about...Martin?” Looking at his mouth as he spoke she could almost taste his lips. It caused her bewilderment and grief.
“I really don’t recall who mentioned it,” he said. “Bellemont Farm is an historic property, after all! Your father has changed greatly, hasn’t he? He really shouldn’t be leading a battle charge in his condition.”
“What condition?” Suzannah asked. Was it possible he knew all about their lives? He was a powerful man.
“I was just speaking to Jock Craig.” His eyebrows raised. He’d let her believe Jock had been the one to tell him about the stroke.
Suzannah glanced behind her, apprehension in her eyes. “It might be wise, Nick, if you left.”
He followed her gaze to where Marcus Sheffield was determinedly negotiating the grassy slope, righteous wrath all over his face. “Actually that had been my intention only for Craig. In any case it’s too late. Your father, stroke or not, is obviously determined on some kind of showdown.”
“He wouldn’t forget himself on a day like this,” Suzannah said, a little catch in her throat. “And in such a place.”
“I think, Suzannah, your father hasn’t changed much. It fills him with fury to see his beloved daughter within a foot of me.”
Once they had stood shoulder to shoulder, Marcus Sheffield had been a big man, now he was half a head shorter and stooped. “What the devil are you doing here, Konrads?” he snarled. “Haven’t you learnt to keep away from my daughter?”
Nick bowed slightly, his elegance quite natural. “As pleasant a greeting as I could ask for,” he answered, his tone sardonic. “I believe it was Suzannah who approached me. I had no intention of intruding upon your grief.”
“So why are you here?” Marcus Sheffield scowled, his breath shaking in his chest.
“I knew Martin for years. We grew up together.”
“He was light years away from you.” Marcus Sheffield drew his steel-grey brows together.
“I could never understand why you couldn’t see that,” Nick retorted. “I won’t add to your distress, Mr. Sheffield. Fear of another stroke must be a worry.” He turned to Suzannah with terrible power and grace. “Once again my sympathies, Suzannah. It was never in any of our minds Martin should die so young.” With that he walked away, his long legs easily covering the distance to where a big late-model Mercedes was parked.
“Why the hell should he blow back into our lives?” Marcus Sheffield furiously demanded of his daughter. “Did you see him! Arrogance of the devil. The scorn in those black eyes.”
“Don’t upset yourself, Father,” Suzannah murmured, looking pale and sad. She took his arm.
“The hide of him!” her father fumed, high colour mottling his cheeks. This was his first taste of Nicholas Konrads’ power, and the terrible loss of his own.
“We did grow up together, Father,” Suzannah said in a quiet nostalgic voice. “Nick always did have a compassionate heart. I believe he’s truly sorry about Martin.”
“Bah, they were never friends,” Marcus Sheffield scoffed.
“That all had to do with me,” she said, assuming the blame and the guilt. “Then you played your part.” It was the first time she had ventured to say it.
“Everything I did was to protect you,” Marcus Sheffield pronounced stoutly.
Suzannah couldn’t answer, a cascade of tears fell down her heart choking her. Her father was speaking the truth as he saw it, a truth that had blown her life apart. Because of her father, his powerful influence and her unquestioning belief in his integrity, she had become more deeply entwined with Martin, then a short time after the furore of Nick’s disgrace and departure had abated, married him in the same church from whence he had been buried.
Demons would pursue her all her life. Memories. The pain and the bitter betrayal in Nick’s brilliant eyes. The agony in his mother’s. The triumph in Martin’s and her father’s. They had won. In their way they had kept her a prisoner while Nick was shipped off with his long-suffering mother.
Suzannah wondered how she could ever have believed, even for one wavering moment, that Nick was a thief. Nick the hero of her girlhood. Wonderful, sweet, kind with the magic and power of a white knight. How had she ever allowed her father and Frank Harris to convince her he had stolen anything from the safe? So he knew the combination? He had been with her when she put her good pearls away. Nick noticed everything. Money had been very tight in the Konrads’ household, never more than after Nick’s father had died. Mrs. Konrads, not a strong woman after experiences she would never talk about, had had to work too hard, taking domestic jobs in the homes of the wealthy to help out. Nick had adored his mother. He could scarcely contain his anxieties about her, longing for the day when he could support her properly. The day that never came.
Suzannah’s own anguish was permanent and deep. People were following. There was to be the ritual gathering at the house. Nearing the car, an old but beautifully maintained navy Rolls, they saw Nick drive away. In the passenger seat, looking out with intense interest was a very good-looking woman with short bright chestnut hair, fine regular features, designer sunglasses perched on her nose. Just a few seconds, yet Suzannah caught the flare of her nostrils, the intensity of the stare that was directed solely at her.
Nick’s wife? She had read about him in the newspapers from time to time, seen pictures of him and various glamorous women companions in society magazines, but she had never read a word about his getting married. Not that that meant anything. Nick always had been a very private person.
Who could not fall in love with him?
Sadness seeped into her steadily. Her early womanhood had been swept away. She had bowed to intense pressure. She had bowed to a concerted barrage of lies. She had lost Nick and deserved to. She had lost Martin who had asked for nothing but the love she couldn’t give him. Charlotte was the only one to call her back to Bellemont. Her adorable dark-haired little daughter. So much like her. Except for the eyes.
Inside the Mercedes, Adrienne made a big effort to keep an uncontrollable spurt of jealousy out of her voice. “Who are these people, Nick? Did you know them well?” She took off her sunglasses, and turned her spectacular amber eyes in his direction. Things weren’t going half as well as she had hoped with Nick Konrads. They always had a good time. He appeared to enjoy her company—she knew there wasn’t anyone else—but in the end their relationship wasn’t flowering. She was desperately in love with him. Had been in love with him from the moment she laid eyes on him for that matter. He was simply extraordinary, but so complex even now she didn’t feel she knew the least thing about him. She did know however he wasn’t in love with her. She wasn’t such a fool she didn’t realise that. But they communicated very well on the sexual and social level. She and a woman partner ran their own successful public relations firm. Nick admired hardworking successful people. God knows he was the man of the moment. Businessman of the Year.
Who was that young woman he was speaking to? Although they stood a couple of feet apart, it seemed to Adrienne’s tormented eyes their bodies were almost straining towards each other. Surely an illusion? The shimmering, dancing light of the sun.
Nick took his time answering, aware of Adrienne’s powerful curiosity, the jealousy that shone in her eyes. “We all knew one another when we were growing up. Martin White, it was his funeral, was my age. His widow, Suzannah, was a friend of mine.”
“Suzannah? The woman you were talking to?” She had always felt there was someone in the background. Some shadowy figure.
“Suzannah Sheffield, that was.”
She took a moment to digest this. “Sheffield? Isn’t there a historic homestead around here someplace? Used to run sheep, then turned into a horse breeding establishment when wool took a dive? The name of the place is on the tip of my tongue.” She resisted the impulse to crease her forehead.
“Bellemont Farm,” he supplied quietly.
“Yes, of course.” Adrienne suddenly hated the slender young woman in her widow’s weeds. “Didn’t I see somewhere it’s on the market? I take all the usual magazines.”
“I believe it is,” he answered casually, curiously unwilling to take her into his confidence. “We can skirt the property if you like. Impossible to see the house from any of the roads. It’s a long drive from the front gate and the house is nestled in a grove of jacaranda trees. It’s a glorious sight when the great trees are in flower.”
“Sounds like you knew the place well?” Adrienne flashed a glance at his handsome profile.
“Every inch of it. Suzannah used to take me over it when her father was away on his polo weekends.”
Something in his voice gave off shivery little sparks.
“That sounds like you weren’t allowed there when he was?”
“You’re so right.” His tone held the weight of dislike. “Marcus Sheffield was and remains the biggest snob in the world.”
“And Mrs. Sheffield?” Nick could twist any woman around his little finger.
“She ran off when Suzannah was barely four,” he told her. “One of Sheffield’s opponents on the polo field, would you believe? They went to live in South America. There was no question of her getting custody of Suzannah. Marcus Sheffield was establishment. A very powerful and monied figure. He adored Suzannah. His only child. He was very bitter about his wife. Her name was never permitted to be mentioned.”
“That must have been terribly hard on your Suzannah,” she said a little harshly.
He did glance at her then. A penetrating look. “Her father never gave her time to miss her mother too much. He doted on her. Couldn’t bear her out of his sight. For that matter Suzannah was devoted to him. She was too young to see he ruled her life.”
Adrienne tried to give a little understanding laugh; she did not succeed. Suddenly she was afraid she couldn’t hold onto Nick Konrads much longer. She had felt that way, she now realised, as soon as she laid eyes on this Suzannah. Nick was better than anyone she knew at hiding his true feelings, but she had seen what she had seen.
Garry Hesson, his solicitor, rang him. “All sewn up, Nick,” he said, sounding pleased with himself. “They’re allowed to stay on six months or until they relocate, according to your instructions. Marvellous place. Allow me to congratulate you. And beg for a visit.”
“Make it a weekend,” Nick responded, leaning back in his swivel chair. “Bring Jenny and the kids.”
“They’d love that,” the solicitor whooped. “Won’t hold you up, Nick. I know you’re doing great things.”
Am I? In some ways, he thought, but that doesn’t absolve me. How many times over the years had he envisioned bringing Marcus Sheffield to his knees? Now it was done. He owned Bellemont Farm lock, stock, and barrel. He thought it would mean a lot, now suddenly it didn’t mean much at all. He couldn’t get Martin’s violent death out of his mind and the circumstances that had led to his having an affair with young Cindy Carlin from the town. He could just barely remember Cindy. Blond, pretty, a school drop-out, he thought. Poor little Cindy. What a terrible end. He was shocked. Martin must have been dreadfully unhappy. He had never looked at anyone but Suzannah. Challenged any of his friends who tried to get near her. Martin had sold his soul to the devil to get Suzannah, hiding the jewellery from Marcus Sheffield’s safe in the Konrads’ old toolshed. He must have hidden there for quite a while before he was able to gain his stealthy access. Martin, his face a white mask, accusing him of bragging about some “coup” he had pulled off. Suzannah on her feet, violet eyes flashing with the light of battle for him. The light had gone out later when her father accused him quietly and contemptuously of grossly abusing their trust.
“I wouldn’t care about you, young man,” Marcus Sheffield had said with icy disgust. “You could go to jail for my money. It’s the place, after all, where thieves go. It’s your mother I pity. Hasn’t she had enough to endure?”
He remembered defending himself vigorously, offering arguments to Frank Harris the police chief, who just stood there stiffly, almost miserably, as if he were in Sheffield’s employ. Finally it became starkly apparent his defence was falling on deaf ears. He was guilty. Even Suzannah never challenged her father again. She just gave up. As he did. He had stolen because he and his mother were in a precarious financial position. The ultimatum was put to him bluntly. For his mother’s sake, since every piece of jewellery had been recovered, he would leave town immediately. If he was prepared to do that, no further action would be taken.
He knew all about justice even then. He had his parents’ experiences as an example. Justice was in the hands of the powerful. Marcus Sheffield was the wealthiest and most influential man in the town. He owned many businesses, whole parcels of real estate. Hundreds of people one way or the other relied on him for an income. Suzannah had tried to speak to him the day that he left, begged him to meet her but he had hung up on her, whitefaced and furious. In the moment of crisis the girl that he loved, that he ached with passion for, had trusted her father above him. She had actually believed he was a common thief. For weeks after she had tried to speak to his mother, weeping with frustration when his mother refused to tell her where he had gone, where he was staying. Although his mother had come to love Suzannah as a daughter, a deep well of fear and anxiety had stopped her from ever allowing Suzannah to get close to her son again. It wasn’t long after that he landed his job with Ecos Solutions and his mother was able to come to him. And Suzannah, who had blazed with love for him, had married Martin White. Absurd to think of it now but he had always rated Martin’s chances as next to nil. So his parents were close friends of Marcus Sheffield’s? So Martin had been in love with Suzannah for most of his life? Suzannah had promised to be “his girl for all time”. And poor fool that he was he had believed her.
CHAPTER THREE
“YOU’RE very quiet, darling. Is everything all right?” Suzannah glanced away from the road to check on her small daughter riding in the passenger seat. Usually Charley chattered endlessly on their trips to school. This was their private time together free from the constraints of Marcus Sheffield’s uncertain tempers and pinched moods. The reversals in their lifestyle had changed him greatly, his unhappiness exacerbated by the effects of his stroke. They were living now in one of the “cottages” Marcus Sheffield, still owned, a comfortable small residence set on a quiet cul-de-sac near the river. Most people would have been very pleased to own it—it had an exceptionally beautiful garden—but Marcus Sheffield was making himself truly ill with misery. Sheffields had owned Bellemont Farm since the early days of the colony. The quality of wool from Bellemont sheep had been famous. Bellemont horses, too. The yield from their wines had been small but of great quality. Above all the property and the homestead were magnificent. Bellemont had a lot of history attached to it and Marcus Sheffield, had enjoyed tremendous standing. And then to have lost it all?
“Grandpa is very cranky,” Charley said and heaved a great sigh. Grandpa had thundered at her to eat up all of her breakfast. “It’s really funny living at the cottage. It’s such a little house. I can run from one end to the other in a minute.”
“But pretty, darling.” Suzannah threw her a comforting smile. We’ll get used to it. We have one another.”
“I’d like us to be alone,” Charley said in a little voice, looking down at the hands in her lap.
“But, darling, who would look after Grandpa?”
“I’m sorry,” muttered Charley.
“You have nothing to be sorry about. You’re such a good girl. I know Grandpa has been speaking sharply lately but he’s very upset.”
“So are you but your voice is always lovely. Grandpa is just plain rude.”
“I’ll talk to him about it, sweetheart. It’s just that he yearns to be back at Bellemont.”
“So do L It’s the bestest place in all the world,” Charley answered quite passionately. “I’m going to miss it when all the jacarandas are out.”
“We can take walks along the river,” Suzannah told her consolingly. “The road is lined with jacarandas.”
“It’s not the same,” Charley maintained sadly. “When is this person who bought Bellemont going to move in? Is he going to live there? Does he have children? I’ll bet they want a pony, but they can’t have mine.”
“No one is going to have your pony, Charley,” Suzannah reassured her. “Lady is being well looked after. You can get to ride her at the weekend. As for the owners, I know nothing about them. The farm was bought in a company name. I’m going to take a run out there after I drop you off at school.”
“What for? Won’t it be terribly sad?” Charley turned huge blue-green eyes on her mother, loving the way she looked, the scent of her, the way her shining dark hair curved in under her chin. Her mother was beautiful. Everyone said so.
“It will be sad, darling.” Suzannah could hardly deny it. “But we have to be brave.”
“Okay.” Charley leaned over and touched her mother’s hand, sharing their love. “Do you miss Daddy?” she asked.
It caught Suzannah unawares. “Of course I do, darling,” she said on a wave of love and protectiveness. It was unlikely Charley had been spared all the rumours at school. Small children could be cruel.
“He didn’t like me very much.” Charley pulled vigorously at her plait, her eyes darkening to jade.
“Darling, he loved you.” Suzannah bit at her lip.
“Did he really?” The question sounded more philosophical than vital to Charley’s interest. “He never wanted to take me anywhere. He never listened to me play the piano. He never rode with us.”
“Daddy wasn’t a horse person like we are.” Suzannah quickly mustered an excuse for Martin’s behaviour. “Besides, he had lots of things to attend to for Grandpa. Grandpa kept him very busy.”
Charley consulted her mother’s face again. “Grandpa said Daddy made a lot of terrible mistakes. He said some of them made us lose our home.”
“He didn’t say this to you, Charley, surely?” Suzannah’s fine arched brows drew together.
“He said it to Mr. Henderson when he came to call.”
“And where were you, young lady?” Suzannah asked quietly. Henderson & Associates was her father’s law firm.
“Behind a chair,” Charlie admitted. “I wanted to move but Grandpa walked into the room with Mr. Henderson. He was talking very loudly. I knew he was angry. I sort of froze.”
“And you were there all the time?” Suzannah gasped.
“Until they went into the library. Grandpa said a lot of things about Daddy.”
Of course Martin had made terrible mistakes. “That’s because he had no idea you were there,” Suzannah answered.
“He was really angry about all the...talk.” Charley threw her mother an uneasy glance.
“People always talk, Charley,” Suzannah said. “We must honour your father’s memory and move on. Daddy did his best in a difficult situation.”
“That’s because he loved you, Mummy,” Charley answered her.
The wattles were out all over the rolling hillsides. Golden masses of puffball blossoms, so typically Australian, the wattle was the country’s floral emblem, wreaths of it entwined around the coat of arms. It was a glorious day, the scent of the profuse blossoming carried in heady wafts on the breeze. All the flowering prunus, the peaches, plums and cherries were out, too. “Roses by other names,” Suzannah thought, her eyes delighted by the sight of a whole line of them decorating a whitefenced property line. Another few weeks and her beloved jacarandas would burst into bloom, hazing the hillsides in indescribable shades of mauve-blue. In Australia the flowering of the great trees means exam time for all students, most crucial to school leavers vying for a place at university. She had passed her leaving exams with flying colours, Nick with a perfect score. Both of them had attended Sydney University, Nick boarding with a couple who took in the occasional student, while she lived in at one of the university women’s colleges. Both of them went home at weekends and holidays. The halcyon days when they revelled in the freedom of each other’s company. She finished her Arts course first and returned home to the father who had missed her dreadfully. Nick continued on with his studies, a brilliant student of whom great things were predicted.
It was when Nick was in Sydney she and Martin had grown closer. She had known Martin all her life. He was almost like a cousin. She was much liked by his family whose dream was the two of them should marry. They went to dances. They went to parties. They went to country club dinners. Suzannah never asked, but Martin always took her. He had other dates, of course, which pleased her. Martin had only been her friend. He had been madly in love with her. She could see that now. But then he had kept the depth of his feelings under wraps, never going beyond a quick kiss goodnight, content it seemed to be her escort. The trouble always started when Nick came home, so stunning, such an achiever, the girls all raved about him. She might have been fiercely jealous with all her friends pursuing him, only the bond between them grew deeper and deeper, dominating their existence.
They never had sex though sex was on everyone’s mind. Courting. Pairing off. Nick continued to take care of her. It was as simple as that. Didn’t they know in their hearts one day they would get married? But first Nick had to gain his Masters degree after which he would be offered the world. Such were their dreams. Dreams that would be cruelly shattered. Her father’s dream had been vastly different. Nicholas Konrads had no part in it. Nick, her honourable knight.
It was a long tree-lined driveway up to the house with beautiful views of the vineyards on the hill and the deep tranquil creek that wound its way through the entire estate. What would the new owners do with all this? Continue the same operations? Reopen the stables, the winery? Everything had become so terribly run down. Heavens alone knew why her father had placed Martin in charge. Martin had had no real head for business. He had been nervous conducting transactions. He hadn’t particularly liked horses though he drank more than his fair share of the wine. But Martin had been one of them. One of the old families of the district. Her father, astute man that he was, had gone along with that. To his cost.
The homestead rose up in front of her. Handsomely sited on a hilltop, it was a wonderful old colonial of mellow rose-hued brick with white columns soaring to the open upper balcony, its broad terrace wrapped around with white wrought-iron lace. There were other buildings ranged all around it and to the rear, but the homestead was set like a jewel in an oasis of jacaranda trees, screening all other buildings from sight. Nearing the house, the driveway went into a loop surrounding a spectacular white marble fountain her great-grandfather had had shipped back from Italy. In her childhood it used to play all the time. Now it was quiet and forlorn in the warm sun, free of the beautiful pink waterlilies that once had festooned the large bowl.
Suzannah stopped the car at the foot of the short flight of stone steps, surprised to see the front door with its splendid side lights and fan lights open. Perhaps the agent was there? Though there was no sign of her car. Had she parked it at the rear? Suzannah still retained her set of keys, making the commitment that the house would be in perfect running order for when the new owners would arrive. Hastily she climbed the steps, putting her hand to the door chimes, calling out the agent’s name.
“Kathleen, is that you?”
Absolute silence, though now that she looked a set of keys was in the lock. At least it wasn’t a burglar, though burglaries in the district were unheard of. “Kathleen?” She advanced into the entrance hall, staring first up the central staircase then walking into the drawing room. What was Kathleen doing if indeed it was she? Checking on the house? She didn’t have to worry. Suzannah made her weekly visit even though it pained her deeply to keep coming back.
The huge L-shaped drawing room, dominated by two carved white marble fireplaces surmounted by identical Georgian giltwood mirrors, was empty. A good deal of the original furnishings had been sold with the house—the heavy antique furniture, the dining-room suite and sideboards, everything in the white-and-gold ballroom, most of the paintings, the oriental screens and rugs. the bronzes. The cottage couldn’t possibly accommodate a quarter of it, let alone the grandeur. Perplexed, she found herself walking to one of the Georgian mirrors, staring at the reflection of a heart-shaped face within a frame of dark hair. It wasn’t a happy face. Even her eyes looked sad.
“Suzannah?” A voice said behind her, making her heart lunge in extreme shock. She put a quaking hand to her breast, then spun sharply, pulling back her shoulders as though confronting a powerful danger.
“God, Nick!” Her magnolia skin lost all colour. “How can you possibly be here?” At first it wouldn’t sink in, then she caught her breath as reasons absorbed her.
Nick had talked of vengeance as a soldier might swear allegiance. “I’ll be back, Mr. Sheffield,” he had promised as Frank Harris bundled him into the police car. “I’ll be back and it will be a bad day for you.”
Suzannah felt a chill like an icy hand to her forehead. “Of course! You bought it, didn’t you? You’re the new owner?” She was convinced she was right.
“My cup runneth over.” He spoke sardonically though pain slashed his heart. Where was her wonderful incandescence? All gone. Yet she was never more lovely, her wonderful hair loose, body thin enough to be breakable, mauve shadows beneath her haunted long-lashed eyes.
“Why didn’t we know?” she agonised.
“I didn’t want you to know,” he said, hard mockery flooding in. “That should be obvious.”
“I mean why didn’t we guess?” Something like anger leapt in her violet eyes. “I’ve always known in my heart you’d get back at Father.”
“And you. Don’t forget you, Suzannah. You’re the one who told me how much you loved me. You’re the one who was going to be my girl forever.”
“Except fate got in the way.” She wrapped her arms around herself, warding off the condemnation that flowed from him.
“You can call it fate if you like,” he said, black eyes brilliantly ironic. “I’d call it treachery, betrayal and blackmail.”
“You’ll never forget.” It made her feel desolate. Terribly alone.
“Did you think I would?”
“My father is a sick man, Nick.”
He shook his dark head. “I didn’t cause his stroke, Suzannah. I didn’t bring his world crashing down on his head. If I didn’t buy Bellemont somebody else would.”
“Why would you want it at all?” she flared. “Your life is elsewhere. Your company, your career. You must be married?” That woman in his car. She’d felt seared by her stare.
“I haven’t had the slightest urge to get married,” he told her curtly. “Unlike you. To answer your question. This is a magnificent property. I’m in need of a country retreat. Somewhere to relax. Bring my friends and overseas guests.”
“A retreat?” That checked her. “You’re not going to return it to a working farm?”
“As a matter of fact I am. If that’s all right with you and your father,” he said, freezing her out.
“You’re so bitter.”
“I most certainly am, but don’t worry about it.” He moved nearer, making her feel she was being backed into a corner. “How are you settling into your new home? I took a run past it last night. The Saunders used to be tenants, didn’t they?”
“So you didn’t arrive this morning.” Her brain seemed to be wrapped in cotton wool.
“No, Suzannah,” he explained patiently. “I drove up from Sydney yesterday. Stayed the night.” In her bedroom where he had made love to her that one time. Trapped her into surrender with his overwhelming passion.
“But where did you sleep?” she asked. The furniture from the guest bedrooms had been sold. They had taken theirs with them.
“What does it matter?” In fact, he had brought a sleeping bag. Dossed down on the floor. “I might ask the questions. What are you doing here, anyway? On my property.” This wasn’t the way it was meant to be but he couldn’t stop himself.
“Making sure it remains in the same condition as it was sold to you.” She flushed.
“You have no obligation to do that.”
“Can’t you stop, Nick?” she begged, knowing nothing would heal the wounds.
“Stop what?”
“Being so hateful.”
That made him smile. A flash of white teeth, no humour at all. “That’s good coming from you. The fact remains, Suzannah, and nothing can change it, you accused me of being a thief.”
“I didn’t.” She had trusted her father who had never lied to her. What she had felt for Nick was an overwhelming pity.
“Your very silence condemned me.”
There was no cure for injustice. “I bitterly regret it, Nick.” Tears came to her eyes. Tears from a deep place inside her. “Can’t you forgive me?”
He turned his handsome head abruptly. “You want the bad news? No. My mother died, did you know that?”
“We heard.” It had come as a tremendous blow. “I wanted to write to you but I thought you would only hate me.”
“I’m afraid you were right,” he answered, very soberly. “She died of a broken heart.”
Suzannah moved away from the fireplace, sought the French doors and opened one to admit the breeze. “I cared about her, Nick. So much.”
“She cared about you.”
“She would never tell me where you went.”
“You should know the answer to that. She thought quite rightly you had done me enough harm. Anyway, it must have been a fleeting idea of yours. The next thing we know you married poor Martin. He must have swept you off your feet.”
She had the sensation the room was swirling around her. “It made my father happy.”
“And you were born to make your father happy. What about you, Suzy? It seems terrible to talk about it at a time like this but it’s no secret your marriage wasn’t a great success.”
She moved slowly to one of the big custom-made sofas and sat down before she fell. “I have my daughter. I adore her.”
His expression tautened. His black eyes studied her. “She could have been our child.” A long pause. “What’s her name?”
Colour flamed into her white face and she dropped her gaze. “Charlotte. We call her Charley.”
For a moment he was at a loss to answer her, then he rasped. “Charlotte? How dare you use my mother’s name.”
Her own anger flowed hot and swift. “This is me, Nick, remember. Me. Suzannah. Your mother told me once I was the daughter she had always wanted. Through your mother I became an accomplished pianist, more valuably, a better person. I had a perfect right to call my child after a women so influential in my life.”
“You expect me to believe that?”
“I do,” she cried in sharp defence.
“Your father must have loved the sound of that. So must Martin.”
“Neither of them knew,” she said, suddenly quiet. “Your mother was Mrs Konrads. Her Christian name didn’t come into it. Your father called her Lotte. Father and Martin didn’t see the connection.”
“Come on,” he jeered. He came behind her, his hands slipping onto her shoulders, holding her fast.
“They just didn’t,” she protested, as many emotions enveloped her. “Charlotte is a beautiful name.”
He withdrew his hands instantly before he lost himself in sensation. “You must be a lot happier with Charley.”
“It’s just a nickname,” she said in a confused voice. “She’s only six. Adorable.”
“Does she look like you?” he asked harshly, feeling tremendous anger for all he had lost.
Suzannah nodded. “Almost my minor image so they tell me.”
“So you fell pregnant the night you were married?” He looked down at her as she sat folded into the sofa, the vulnerable slope of her shoulders, the delicate curve of her breasts clearly outlined against her thin pale pink sweater.
She enunciated her words very carefully. “I’m not going to discuss my married life with you, Nick.”
“When everyone knows it was unhappy. I couldn’t believe it when I was told Cindy Carlin was with Martin at the time.”
Martin starved for love and laughter. “I feel very badly about that, Nick. You can’t know.”
“I think I do.” He forced himself to look away from her. “What I can’t figure is why? Martin was crazy about you.”
“Not for long.” She shook her head vehemently.
“What is that supposed to mean?”
“The best way to say it is we didn’t have a lot in common.”
He shrugged his shoulders, their width apparent under the black polo knit. “I could have told you that a long time ago. Why did you marry him, Suzannah?” A question he had asked himself at least a million times.
What was she supposed to tell him? “God knows,” she said, focusing on her hands. “On the rebound. Never a word from you. Your mother choosing to clam up on me.”
“That happens with mothers. She was thinking of me. Me with my anger and humiliation. Before God I swore to get even. Your father would have had me in jail. Did you realise that? In jail for something I didn’t do. It’s called fabricating evidence. And Frank Harris went along with it.”
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