The Longest Pleasure
Anne Mather
Mills & Boon are excited to present The Anne Mather Collection – the complete works by this classic author made available to download for the very first time! These books span six decades of a phenomenal writing career, and every story is available to read unedited and untouched from their original release. How could she forget him…?Helen Michaels: Precocious and spoilt as a child, she’s matured into a self-assured, independent woman. But she still remembers Rafe Fleming, her childhood tormentor – after all, how could she forget such a man?Rafe Fleming: Compellingly attractive…and decidedly dangerous. He holds no respect for the girl he used to know – or for the beautiful woman she’s become.Helene rejects his criticism that she’s neglected the responsibilities of running the family estate. Surely it was Rafe who had driven her away and caused the family rift? Can Helen conquer her grave suspicions about his motives, or will she find herself running from him yet again?
Mills & Boon is proud to present a fabulous collection of fantastic novels by bestselling, much loved author
ANNE MATHER
Anne has a stellar record of achievement within the
publishing industry, having written over one hundred
and sixty books, with worldwide sales of more than
forty-eight MILLION copies in multiple languages.
This amazing collection of classic stories offers a chance
for readers to recapture the pleasure Anne’s powerful,
passionate writing has given.
We are sure you will love them all!
I’ve always wanted to write—which is not to say I’ve always wanted to be a professional writer. On the contrary, for years I only wrote for my own pleasure and it wasn’t until my husband suggested sending one of my stories to a publisher that we put several publishers’ names into a hat and pulled one out. The rest, as they say, is history. And now, one hundred and sixty-two books later, I’m literally—excuse the pun—staggered by what’s happened.
I had written all through my infant and junior years and on into my teens, the stories changing from children’s adventures to torrid gypsy passions. My mother used to gather these manuscripts up from time to time, when my bedroom became too untidy, and dispose of them! In those days, I used not to finish any of the stories and Caroline, my first published novel, was the first I’d ever completed. I was newly married then and my daughter was just a baby, and it was quite a job juggling my household chores and scribbling away in exercise books every chance I got. Not very professional, as you can imagine, but that’s the way it was.
These days, I have a bit more time to devote to my work, but that first love of writing has never changed. I can’t imagine not having a current book on the typewriter—yes, it’s my husband who transcribes everything on to the computer. He’s my partner in both life and work and I depend on his good sense more than I care to admit.
We have two grown-up children, a son and a daughter, and two almost grown-up grandchildren, Abi and Ben. My e-mail address is mystic-am@msn.com (mailto:mystic-am@msn.com) and I’d be happy to hear from any of my wonderful readers.
The Longest Pleasure
Anne Mather
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
Table of Contents
Cover (#u54aaaa66-9218-5461-92c3-03829957e2a7)
About the Author (#u07fdcde4-6297-5715-8bd8-0319702b02b2)
Title Page (#u609f2989-cd8e-519b-9879-fb98b55d4dde)
PROLOGUE
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CHAPTER TWELVE
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
CHAPTER NINETEEN
CHAPTER TWENTY
Copyright (#litres_trial_promo)
PROLOGUE (#u27f0c2c2-352b-5eac-bcc5-64d1489e55cd)
IT had been the best summer Helen could ever remember. Walking across the stackyard, feeling the sun beating down on her bare shoulders, she thought how perfect it had been. Long, lazy days of sunshine, weather more reminiscent of the South of France than the West of England. Since she had come home from school six weeks ago, she had wakened every morning to blue skies and dewy air, and a shimmer of mist rising from the fields around Castle Howarth.
Castle Howarth. Helen smiled. Her grandmother’s country home, and her home too since her parents had both been drowned on a sailing trip when she was little more than a baby. It wasn’t really a castle; just a rather rambling mansion much too large for one old lady and the few servants she still retained.
When she was younger, Helen had thought it was the most marvellous place imaginable, a veritable rabbit-warren of rooms and passages, ideal for games of hide-and-seek, and sardines, and for letting off steam on rainy winter afternoons. She could even remember riding her bicycle along those winding corridors, losing herself in the maze of halls and galleries that surrounded the music room, and the drawing rooms, and the fantastic mirror-lined ballroom where Nan used to dance when she had first been presented.
Of course, she had grown out of such things now, Helen reflected idly, picking up a straw and putting it between her teeth. These days, she was much too old for childish games, even though the temptation to slide down the banisters from time to time still existed. But, at fifteen, she had become aware of herself as a young woman, and other interests had claimed her attention.
Rafe Fleming, for instance, she acknowledged dreamily, the corners of her generous mouth tilting in an unknowingly sensual smile. She would never have believed she would ever like him, let alone seek his company at every opportunity. Which just went to prove she had grown up at last, she decided. She could meet him now on equal terms. She was no longer the poor-little-rich-girl he loved to torment.
She supposed she must have been about four years old when she first met Rafe Fleming. Her parents had been dead for almost a year, and gradually she had begun to adapt to her new life at Castle Howarth. Things had not been so different, except that now she lived in the country, instead of in London. Miss Paget still looked after her, and as her parents had always lived full social lives, she didn’t miss them as much as she might have done. She had probably been a rather precocious child, she reflected ruefully; spoilt, certainly, and inclined to expect her own way in all things, due no doubt to the fact that she had had no brothers or sisters.
Her first encounter with Rafe took place in the gazebo. After spending a rather lonely winter couped up in the house, she had been granted permission by her grandmother to play in the gardens. Wrapped up warmly against the cool April air, she had been walking her dolls in the rose garden when she had espied the domed, ornamental roof of the summer-house. Set beyond a hedge of cypresses, it had looked exactly like an enchanted castle to the infant Helen, and it had been something of an anti-climax to find it was already occupied. A boy of perhaps ten or eleven was sprawled on the floor of the gazebo, reading, and Helen had regarded him without liking and with a definite air of superiority.
‘Who are you?’
The boy started, evidently unused to being disturbed, but with the advantage of hindsight, Helen realised he had not immediately jumped to the offensive. ‘Rafe Fleming,’ he answered. ‘Who’re you?’
‘I’m Helen Michaels. Lady Elizabeth Sinclair’s granddaughter!’ Helen remembered the words now with a grimace of distaste. ‘This is my house, and my garden. And I want you to go.’
‘Do you?’ Rafe had made no attempt to obey her childish instructions, rolling on to his back and supporting himself on his elbows, regarding her with what she now knew had been a mixture of humour and insolence. ‘Well, well! And are you going to make me?’
He had been good-looking even in those days, Helen reflected. Tall for his age, with lean features and ash-fair hair, and thin wrists jutting from the sleeves of his jerkin. But she had not realised it then. At that moment, she had wanted nothing so much as for her grandmother to appear and order him out of the summer-house. Little as she was, she knew she had no chance of displacing him herself, and the longer he lay regarding her with narrowed mocking eyes, the more frustrated she became.
‘You’re not s’posed to be here,’ she insisted, standing her ground, but Rafe was not impressed.
‘Get lost,’ he retorted, turning back to the magazine he had been reading, and it was all Helen could do not to stamp her foot in fury.
Of course, she had been obliged to leave him then, with tears welling up in her eyes and threatening to disgrace her. But she had gone straight to her grandmother and reported the matter to her, secure in the knowledge that Nan would sort it out.
However, her grandmother had proved to have a blind spot where Rafe Fleming was concerned. ‘I expect you startled him,’ she assured her indignant granddaughter, after drying Helen’s tears and consoling her with a stick of aniseed. ‘After all, Rafe has lived at Castle Howarth most of his life, and I suppose he feels he has a privileged position. His father works for me, you see, darling, and until you came, there were no other children on the estate.’
Helen didn’t see how that gave him the right to order her about, but her grandmother would not be pressed, and in the weeks and months that followed, her resentment grew. He always seemed to be around when she didn’t want him, teasing her and mocking her, and making fun of her, particularly when she attempted to put him in his place. That first encounter had set the seal on their relationship, and nothing she could say or do could change the situation. Which was a pity because she liked Mr Fleming, her grandmother’s estate manager, and Rafe’s adopted father.
She had learned Rafe was adopted quite by accident one afternoon, when she came upon her grandmother talking to him by the lily pond. Lady Elizabeth was asking how he was getting on at school, and Rafe was admitting, not without some aggression, that he wasn’t interested in education.
‘Why not?’ Lady Elizabeth wanted to know, and Helen, crouched behind the rhododendrons, listened with some amazement to his reply.
‘Why should I be?’ he had countered indifferently, plucking the head off one of the blooms hanging above his head, and shredding its delicate petals. ‘You don’t need any brains to plough a field or muck out the cowshed! What do I want with learning? I can pick up all I need to know right here.’
Helen had been shocked that he should dare to speak to her grandmother so insolently. She had waited in anticipation for Lady Elizabeth to tell him to apologise, maybe even to box his ears—an expression Paget was prone to use, when referring to a more corporal form of punishment—but her grandmother did neither. Instead, she had laid a hand on Rafe’s shoulder, and said quietly:
‘You’re going to Kingsmead, and there’s an end of it. The Flemings may have adopted you, but you are not going to waste the brain God has given you. I’ve spoken to Tom. Term starts in September. Be ready.’
After that, Helen had some peace, in term time at least. Kingsmead, she learned, was the local boys’ public school, and although Rafe did not board, he was too busy with homework and school activities to spend much time baiting her. For her part, she attended a kindergarten in the nearby town of Yelversley, and then, when she was old enough, she was sent to a girls’ school in Kent.’
‘Why do I have to board?’ she had objected, when she first learned of her grandmother’s plans. ‘Rafe Fleming doesn’t. Why can’t I go to Ladymead?’
‘Because you are my granddaughter, and your mother went to St Agnes,’ replied Lady Elizabeth firmly. ‘Now, run along and take Hector for a walk, there’s a good girl. He’s getting fat and lazy, and I don’t have the energy to take him out as often as I should.’
Hector was her grandmother’s pekinese, a fluffy scrap of orange-coloured fur, who could still terrorise the postman when he chose. Curiously enough, the dog had never gone for Rafe’s ankles, even though he had called Hector a lot of unsavoury names. He preferred real dogs, he once told her, when she had run across him exercising his father’s golden retriever at the same time she was taking Hector for a walk. Not poor imitations, he had added, laughing at her flushed resentful face, and Helen had wished she had a Dobermann, with all the instincts of a killer.
Then, three years ago, Rafe had gone to university in Warwick. To begin with, Helen had not noticed much difference. He was still home for the holidays when she was—at Christmas and Easter, at least—and although at Christmas they didn’t have much contact, she had been aware of him watching her with a distinctly jaundiced eye, when she helped her grandmother distribute the gifts at the party Lady Elizabeth gave for the estate workers. Helen knew he would not have been there at all had her grandmother not asked him to help with the tree. But she had, and afterwards he had been obliged to stay, unable to make his escape without offending the old lady.
The Easter following, he was home again, but this time he was not alone. He had brought another young man with him; one of his friends from college, her grandmother informed her, after granting the boys permission to use the tennis court. ‘You don’t mind, do you, Helen?’ she ventured, as an afterthought. ‘I’m sure they’d give you a game, too, if you asked them.’
Helen would have cut off her right arm before asking Rafe Fleming for anything, but her grandmother was not to know that. So far as the old lady was concerned, their initial antagonism towards one another had long since been forgotten, and Helen knew she would have been most disturbed if she had suspected the hatred her granddaughter still felt towards the young man she obviously favoured. Though why her grandmother should favour Rafe, when he treated her so offhandedly, Helen couldn’t imagine. She could only assume it was her friendship with Tom Fleming that gave his adopted son such licence.
When she arrived home for the summer holidays, however, Helen discovered Rafe was not there. He had taken a job in France for three months, her grandmother told her, a faint trace of disapproval in her voice, and Helen guessed the old lady was disappointed because he had not chosen to work for her.
For her part, Helen had mixed emotions. She was delighted Rafe was not to be around, of course, but she bitterly regretted the impulse she had had to invite one of her schoolfriends to spend the vacation with her. Tracy Grant’s mother was dead, and her father lived and worked in Central America. Because there was trouble there at the moment, Mr Grant had suggested Tracy should spend the holiday at school, and Helen had seized on Tracy’s dilemma as the solution to her problems.
However, once she discovered Rafe was not to be around, Helen’s doubts took root. She discovered there was a world of difference between a friendship formed in school—compounded by school activities and school discipline—and one that relied on a genuine liking for one another and a shared enjoyment of mutual interests.
Helen and Tracy, it transpired, had little in common. Having been brought up in the country, Helen enjoyed country pursuits. She rode well; she enjoyed taking long walks with the dogs; she had a natural love of nature. Tracy didn’t. Her interest in animals only stretched to the mink coat she intended to own one day, and horses frankly terrified her.
Helen liked sports, too. She played hockey and tennis at school; she belonged to the local squash club; and she had even learned how to play golf, after accompanying her grandmother to the club for the past three years. Which was just as well, she had reflected on occasion. Having a weakness for stodgy foods, she found getting plenty of exercise helped to alleviate its effects, and she often put on leg-warmers and a leotard and worked-out until her body was soaked with sweat.
Tracy, meanwhile, was unnaturally thin, and any kind of physical activity bored her. She liked nothing so much as to lie on the couch watching television all day, eating sweets, or surreptitiously puffing on the forbidden cigarettes she bought at the shop in town. She would have bought them in the village, except that Helen had objected. She knew if her grandmother discovered Tracy smoked there would be the devil to pay, and she seemed to spend her time that summer flapping her arms in rooms where Tracy had been, trying to get rid of the smoke.
The worst moment had come when Rafe had arrived home the weekend before all of them were due to return to their studies. He had obviously turned up to spend a few days with his parents before going back to college, but apparently he felt obliged to come up to the house to see Lady Elizabeth.
It was a wet day at the end of September, and for once Helen was confined to the house, too. Tracy had been watching television, as usual, but she had joined Helen on the window-seat only moments before Rafe came riding up the drive on his motorbike. Helen hadn’t even known he had a motorbike, and she watched with almost as much interest as Tracy as he flicked down the metal rest and parked the bike on the gravelled forecourt before approaching the house.
He was wearing leathers, and the slick black material suited his dark complexion. As he crossed the forecourt, he tipped his chin and removed the concealing helmet, and Tracy’s lips parted as his silky thatch of silvery pale hair was revealed.
‘Who’s that?’ she exclaimed, pressing her face against the windows, and as she did so, Rafe looked up and saw them. Helen wanted to die at the look of derision that marred his lean features as he recognised her. Then, he lifted his hand in a mocking salute before disappearing through the gate that led into the yard at the back of the building.
She didn’t see him again, even though Tracy grew very impatient at her obstinacy. ‘Just because you’ve got some kind of grudge against him doesn’t mean I can’t find him attractive, does it?’ she argued angrily. ‘The first decent boy I’ve seen since I came to this dump, and you won’t even introduce me!’
‘Introduce yourself,’ retorted Helen tightly, holding on to her temper with difficulty. ‘And in case you hadn’t noticed, he’s not a boy; he’s a man! He’s nineteen, Tracy. Hardly likely to be interested in a kid of thirteen!’
The Christmas after, Helen herself didn’t come home. She spent the holiday skiing in Switzerland, and then joined her grandmother at an hotel in London for a long weekend before returning to St Agnes. At Easter, she didn’t see Rafe at all, and the summer after that, Rafe again found employment on the continent.
By the time this summer had come round, Helen had begun to believe there was to be no further contact between herself and Rafe Fleming. Oh, she had occasionally seen him when she was home, but only from a distance, and it was years since they had had any real conversation. He was twenty-one now, of course, and probably past the age when he could take a delight in making fun of her. In any case, she was older too, and she firmly believed that nothing he said could ever affect her again.
Until this summer, that is. Chewing ruminatively on the straw between her teeth, Helen had to admit that she had been wrong. But wrong in the nicest possible way, she amended. From the minute she had seen him at Yelversley station, sent, he told her, by her grandmother to meet her off the train, she had been aware of him in a way that was entirely new to her. To date, she had had little to do with the opposite sex, and she had listened with wonder to the stories her schoolfriends told about boys they had gone out with. It had seemed to her a great deal of fuss over nothing, and she had adapted to her maturing body’s needs without even considering the emotional upheaval taking place inside her. But that was before she met Rafe again.
It had all been so amazing, thought Helen now, wrapping her arms about herself in an excess of excitement. She had been dismayed when she saw him, and yet as soon as he spoke to her, as soon as he showed he didn’t regard her as a child any longer, everything had changed.
Of course, she had been suspicious at first. Who wouldn’t be? The boy who had pulled her hair and hid her toys and called her names was still too fresh in her thoughts. But when Rafe spoke to her openly and without malice, when the mocking smile he always seemed to wear in her presence didn’t appear, she started to relax, and her burgeoning femininity could not remain immune to his undoubted sexual attraction.
And he was attractive, she reflected, her breathing quickening as it always did when she contemplated his lean physique. He was tall, about six feet, she surmised, with a taut muscled body that looked good in the thin cotton shirts and tight-fitting jeans he wore about the estate. Because he had worked outdoors all summer, his skin was darkly tanned, a stunning contrast to the ash-pale lightness of his hair.
He was really dishy—that was the expression Sandra Venables had used when Helen overheard her discussing Rafe with Mrs Pride, the cook. Sandra was her grandmother’s new maid, and Helen didn’t really like her. She was too sly; too knowing; too conscious of her own appearance, which Helen grudgingly had to admit was quite something. Small, no more than five foot one or two, Sandra made up for her lack of height in other ways. She had a narrow waist and shapely legs, and the most enormous breasts Helen had ever seen. Top-heavy, thought Helen disdainfully, viewing her own more modest curves with some resignation. Nevertheless, she envied the other girl’s self-confidence, and she suspected she would never have the courage to wear the bodice of her dress unbuttoned so that the dusky shadow between her breasts could be clearly seen.
Helen had noticed Sandra always took particular notice of her appearance when Mrs Pride asked her to take a flask of tea out to Billy Dobkins, the gardener. Not that Billy Dobkins would notice how she looked. He was too old and crippled with arthritis to pay attention to anyone except himself. But he had a son; young Billy, he was called, though Helen knew he was in his thirties now and married himself. He sometimes came to help his father, to supplement the wages he earned driving a delivery truck for the local supermarket, and Helen had surmised that it was young Billy who had attracted Sandra’s interest.
She really was man-crazy, decided Helen, not liking the direction of her thoughts. The other girl might only be a couple of years older than she was, but Sandra was years older in experience. She probably knew more about boys now than she ever would, reflected Helen ruefully. But, she had a mind to change at least a part of that—with Rafe’s assistance.
Of course, she wasn’t at all sure her grandmother would approve of what she planned to do. It was one thing to encourage her and Rafe to be friends, and quite another to accept the fact that her granddaughter was attracted to the son of her estate manager. And yet, Lady Elizabeth never seemed to object when she and Rafe were together. Because Rafe was working at the home-farm, he was often about, and Helen had fallen into the habit of always making herself available whenever he was around. They had even played tennis together once or twice—though he always beat her—and her grandmother occasionally invited him to tea, to discuss his future now that he had got his degree.
On those occasions, Helen had been quite content to sit and listen, drinking in the sight of his lazily attractive features, imagining how he would react if she reached out and ran her fingers through the sometimes unruly thickness of his hair. Not that she ever let him see how she was feeling. If he looked in her direction, she invariably averted her eyes, hoping with an urgency bordering on panic that her grandmother would attribute her flushed cheeks to the unusually warm weather. Nevertheless, she did gain a great deal of pleasure from just looking at him, and if Rafe was aware of her covert appraisal, he gave no sign of it.
In spite of her absorption with his appearance, Helen also learned quite a lot about him during those outdoor gatherings. Because she had never asked, she had not known the subjects he had been studying at university, but now she discovered he had gained a double first in biological sciences, which evidently endorsed the faith her grandmother had had in him all those years before. What was less palatable to accept was the news that he had been offered a job with a chemical company in the north of England, and that as soon as the holidays were over, he would be moving away from Castle Howarth. Which meant she had less than two weeks left to make him as aware of her as she was of him, she realised hollowly. If only she had more experience; if only she was as sexy as Sandra.
Drawing a steadying breath now, she glanced round the empty stackyard. It was deserted, as she had expected, the men who had been haymaking all afternoon retiring to the farmhouse kitchen where Mrs Robinson, the farmer’s wife, would be reviving them with mugs of beer and plates of her home-made scones. Helen’s mouth watered at the thought of Mrs Robinson’s home-made scones, but she put the thought aside. She was aware she had eaten too many fattening things these holidays already, and her shorts were infinitely tighter now than they had been at the end of July.
But she wasn’t here to think about food, she told herself severely. She already knew Rafe had not accompanied the other men up to the house. It was a heavensent opportunity. She had sauntered down here in her scantiest vest and mini-skirt to meet Rafe on his way to the farmhouse, only to be told, with a knowing smile, that he was still stacking hay in the barn.
The light in the barn filtered down through the slats, throwing bars of sunlight across the floor. Dust motes danced in its muted brilliance, thousands of tiny particles forming a moving waterfall, yet seemingly suspended in the air.
To Helen’s surprise, the barn seemed deserted too, and she stood for a moment in the doorway, wondering if the men had been mistaken. Perhaps Rafe was in the loft, she considered, taking a step forward and opening her mouth to call his name. But before she could do so, she heard something—a sound, a muffled giggle, and then the unmistakable ripple of Rafe’s attractive laughter.
She froze, glad that the beams of sunlight did not reach her where she stood in the shadows. It was obvious Rafe was here, in the loft as she had suspected, but he was not alone. That girlish giggle was too familiar. She had heard Sandra’s laughter before. But never with Rafe? Never with Rafe!
Her breath catching in her throat, she would have left then, but a few stray words drifting down to her kept her rigid. ‘She’s crazy about you!’ Sandra gurgled carelessly. ‘Haven’t you seen the way she watches you? My God! If her grandmother only knew! And she thinks I’m the shameless one!’
‘You are,’ retorted Rafe, his voice muffled; as if his face was buried between those huge breasts, thought Helen sickly, and Sandra’s moan of approval seemed to confirm it.
‘Well, I don’t care. I know what I want,’ declared Sandra after a moment. ‘Hmm—take your clothes off, Rafe. You know I don’t like it when you just use me like this.’
‘You like being used,’ Rafe replied, a certain harshness in his voice now, and Helen put her hands over her ears. She didn’t want to hear any more. She had already heard too much. And although she despised Rafe for falling for a loud-mouthed little tart like Sandra Venables, what hurt most was that they had been talking about her!
‘Oh—Rafe——’
Sandra’s cry rang in Helen’s ears long after she had put the width of the long meadow between herself and what was happening in the barn. In all honesty, she had only a faint idea of what was happening, but she had seen animals mating, and she could imagine the rest. In her mind, it all added up to something ugly and unacceptable, and her stomach heaved in protest at such a rude awakening.
Helen was lying back on her elbows, her eyes closed, her face dewed with the perspiration that prolonged retching had provoked, when she became aware of a shadow blocking the warmth of the sun. She opened her eyes at once, seeking the source of the sudden barrier, and then wished she hadn’t when she met Rafe’s accusing gaze.
She would have scrambled to her feet at once, but his booted foot balanced precariously on her midriff kept her where she was, while his eyes raked over her. ‘How does it feel,’ he taunted, his expression grimmer than she had ever seen it, ‘to have someone creep up on you unannounced? It’s not much fun, is it? In fact, it’s bloody sick!’
‘Well, if it’s any consolation, you made me sick!’ she retorted in a small voice, realising there was no point in pretending ignorance, and his face contorted.
‘That’s what you get when you play Peeping Tom!’ he grated, allowing his weight to bear down painfully on her middle for a moment before withdrawing his foot completely. ‘What’s wrong with you, Helen? What did you hope to see?’
‘I didn’t hope to see anything,’ she exclaimed, pushing herself into a sitting position, and hunching her shoulders against his hostile stare. ‘I came to find you, that’s all. I didn’t realise you had a prior engagement!’
‘So why didn’t you make your presence known? Why were you hanging about in the doorway? Don’t tell me you didn’t know we were there, because I won’t believe you!’
Helen’s indignation gave her the strength to look up at him then, and her eyes were wide with anguish. ‘Do you actually imagine I would have followed you into the barn if I’d known that—that creature was with you?’
Rafe’s green eyes were hard. ‘Why not?’
‘Why you——’ Helen stumbled to her feet to face him, her chest heaving painfully beneath the thin vest. ‘How—how dare you even suggest such a thing? Just who the hell do you think you are?’
Rafe’s lips twisted. ‘I wondered how long it would be before that line was uttered! My God, and I let your grandmother persuade me you had changed! I should have known better. You’re still the spoiled, selfish little bitch you always were!’
Helen’s hand came up and struck his cheek almost without her volition. The first realisation of what she had done came with the stinging pain in her palm, and she looked down at her hand half-incredulously before transferring her disbelieving attention to the reddening weals on his face.
‘I——’ she began, but she was not allowed to finish what she had been going to say. She thought she had been about to apologise, but afterwards she was never actually sure. What happened next wiped all coherent thought from her brain, and by the time he released her, her head was spinning so badly it was an effort to even keep her feet.
She remembered Rafe reaching for her, and she remembered lifting her arms to protect herself. She was sure he was going to retaliate and she was half prepared for him to hit her, but he didn’t. Instead, he jerked her towards him, clamping her shaking body to the muscled strength of his, and fastening his mouth to hers with grim determination.
‘Is this what you want?’ he snarled, and she felt a hot moist pressure forcing its way between her lips and her teeth and into her mouth. It was his tongue, and she almost gagged when he thrust it back towards her throat in an ugly parody of sexual possession. ‘You should have told me!’ he taunted, and her skirt rode up to her hips as he forced his leg between her thighs. ‘Sandra said this was what you wanted, but I didn’t believe her!’
‘God! I—don’t!’ she choked, dragging her mouth from his with a supreme effort, and trying to turn her head away. But it was useless. He was so much bigger and stronger than she was, and she couldn’t escape his hand behind her head, forcing her face back to his. His mouth was devouring her, possessing her lips with a feverish urgency, making her senses swim beneath a torrent of brutal adult emotion. She hated him for hurting her; she fought his rough passion all the way; and yet, in some remote corner of her mind, she sensed he despised himself for touching her as much as she did, and for that she knew a reluctant feeling of compassion. She would never forgive him; but she could pity him.
He let go of her as suddenly as he had grabbed her. So suddenly, in fact, that Helen’s legs would not support her. She sagged down weakly on to the grass, her head turned instinctively away from him, and she was not aware that he had left her until the silence told her so. Only then did she realise how much she was shaking; only then did she feel the tears on her cheeks and taste her own blood in her mouth. She felt bruised and abused, her girlish fantasies torn apart by a savage storm of reality. But no one—no one—least of all her grandmother, would ever hear of this from her lips …
CHAPTER ONE (#u27f0c2c2-352b-5eac-bcc5-64d1489e55cd)
‘TELEPHONE, Helen!’
At the summons, the slim dark girl who had been working on a painting in the storeroom at the back of the shop came obediently to the door. ‘For me?’
‘For you,’ agreed Melanie Forster, holding out the phone. ‘Not your tame viscount though, darling. It is a man, but not one I recognise, actually.’
‘A man?’
Helen wiped her hands on the cloth she had been using to clean the painting as a frown furrowed her forehead. She couldn’t imagine any man who might be calling her at work that Melanie wouldn’t recognise, and just for a moment a frisson of alarm curled up her spine.
Then, impatient at her fears, she reached for the receiver. ‘Helen Michaels,’ she said briefly. ‘You wanted to speak to me?’
‘Yes.’ She knew a moment’s relief that the male voice was as unfamiliar to her as it had been to her friend, but the respite was short-lived. ‘I have a telegram for you, Miss Michaels. From Castle Howarth in Wiltshire. It reads: Lady Elizabeth Sinclair died this morning at 4 a.m. Funeral, Friday, 11 a.m. Fleming.’
Helen realised afterwards that she must have fainted, for when she opened her eyes she was lying on a chaise-longue in the back room, with Mr Stubbs, their handyman-cum-caretaker, leaning anxiously over her and Melanie wringing her hands just behind him.
‘Oh, thank heaven!’ Melanie’s relief was audible as her friend’s lids flickered, and Helen blinked a little bewilderedly as she took in her surroundings.
‘There you are, Miss Forster. I told you it was most probably the fumes of that chemical that did it,’ declared Mr Stubbs, stepping back and shifting the electric fan heater nearer. He straightened his rotund little body and nodded. ‘No need to call the doctor; no need at all. What Miss Michaels needs is a hot cup of tea. Like an ice-box in here, it is. I’m away to make a pot now.’
‘Thank you, Stubbs.’ Melanie cast a resigned glance after the busy little man, and then came to squat down beside the couch. ‘So—how are you feeling, love? I hope you realise you scared me half to death. In all the years I’ve known you, I’ve never known you to pass out!”
A spasm of pain crossed Helen’s face briefly as the reasons for why she must be lying on the couch came back in a deluge. But she managed to control her emotions for Melanie’s sake and, sniffing, she said a little shakily: ‘I don’t make a habit of it.’
‘Thank God!’ Melanie shook her head. ‘But you’re all right now? Who was it for Pete’s sake?’
Helen managed to lever herself up against the buttoned velvet upholstery, and then said quietly: ‘It was a telegram. My grandmother died this morning.’
‘She did?’ Melanie moved to perch on the edge of the cushion. ‘That would be the old lady who lived in Wiltshire, right? But surely, you must have known that she was ill.’
‘No——’ Helen moistened her lips. ‘At least—well, she is—was—quite old. But I didn’t realise she—she——’
‘It happens to all of us, sooner or later,’ said Melanie consolingly, and then grimaced. ‘Oh, that sounds awful, but you know what I mean. Still, I can see it’s been quite a shock for you. Even though you didn’t see much of her, did you?’
‘Don’t remind me,’ groaned Helen, turning her face against the buttoned velvet as a wave of guilt swept over her. It was more than a year since she had seen her grandmother, and then only briefly, during one of the old lady’s infrequent trips to see her solicitor in the capital. And it was almost three years since Helen had last visited Castle Howarth. Her life in London filled her days to the exclusion of anything else, and besides, since Tom Fleming died she had had no desire to visit the estate and meet his successor.
Which reminded her of the telegram once again. Rafe Fleming’s doing, certainly, she guessed. There was no doubt that he was the ‘Fleming’ behind that cruel little missive. No one but he would have used such bald words to convey so distressing a message.
Mr Stubbs’ reappearance with a tray of tea prevented Melanie from asking any further questions and Helen was grateful. At the moment, she was having the greatest difficulty in coming to terms with the fact that Lady Elizabeth was dead, and her throat constricted tightly at the knowledge that no one—not even Paget—had troubled to call her before it was too late.
‘You’ll go to the funeral, of course,’ said Melanie, after the caretaker had departed again and Helen was sipping a cup of the strong sweet liquid he had provided. ‘When is it? Wednesday? Thursday?’
‘It’s Friday, actually,’ admitted Helen in a low voice. ‘And—yes. I suppose I’ll have to.’ She frowned as another thought struck her. ‘But how can I? You’re leaving for Switzerland in the morning!’ There was some relief in the remembrance.
‘My holiday could be postponed,’ retorted Melanie flatly. ‘But, in any case, there’s no reason why we shouldn’t shut up shop for a couple of days. It’s cold enough, goodness knows, and people don’t buy antiques in the middle of winter. Not in any great quantity anyway.’
‘Even so——’
‘Even so—nothing.’ Melanie was adamant. ‘How do you think it would look if you didn’t go to your own grandmother’s funeral? You are her only surviving relative, aren’t you? Of course you must go. I insist!’
Helen bent her head. ‘I’ll think about it.’
‘You won’t think about it at all.’ Melanie was outraged. ‘Oh, I know why you’re looking so upset. You’re feeling guilty because you’re going to inherit whatever it is she has left. The house, for example. Didn’t you say you used to live there when you were a child?’
‘Until I was eighteen,’ agreed Helen reluctantly, forced to face the truth of what Melanie was saying. Castle Howarth would be hers now however little she wanted it. The property; the farms; the people on the estate; they would all now become so much more than the source of the generous allowance her grandmother had always made her.
It was thinking of that allowance that brought another surge of guilt to engulf her. Dear God, she had always taken that monthly cheque so much for granted. Of course, when she first moved to London, it had been a lifeline, but after she and Melanie opened the shop, there had been no real need for outside support. Yet, the cheques had continued to arrive, and she had continued to spend them, moving into a large apartment and buying more—and more costly—clothes. She ran a Porsche sports car instead of just a Mini, and she had her hair done regularly by the most fashionable hairdresser in town. She had spent her grandmother’s money like it was water, and it was only now that Nan was dead that she realised how selfish—and self-seeking—she had become.
‘So you will go,’ said Melanie softly, interrupting her friend’s train of thought, and Helen put her teacup aside and swung her feet to the floor.
‘Of course,’ she answered dully, feeling the faint throbbing in her temples that heralded a headache. ‘As a matter of fact, I think I’ll take the rest of the day off, if you don’t mind. I’m feeling pretty grotty. Is that okay?’
‘Need you ask?’ Melanie gave her friend a worried look. ‘Look—let me call you a cab, hmm? You can’t drive home in that state. You look positively ghostly!’
Helen nodded, pressing down on her hands and forcing herself to her feet. ‘As a matter of fact, I came by cab this morning,’ she said. ‘Adam is supposed to be picking me up at six o’clock. We were going to have a drink at his club, and then go on to that recital at the Farraday. You remember?’
‘Well, you won’t be going to any recital this evening,’ declared Melanie authoritatively. ‘Lord Kenmore is going to be disappointed. Do you want me to ring him? Or shall I just point him in your direction when he calls at six?’
Helen felt an unwilling smile lift the corners of her mouth. ‘I’ll ring him myself,’ she said, glancing at her watch. ‘It’s only half past three. He won’t have left yet.’
Then, she frowned as another thought occurred to her. If her grandmother had died during the night, why hadn’t she been informed immediately? It had to have been at least ten hours after the old lady’s death that any attempt was made to contact her. And it hurt. It really hurt.
Helen’s apartment was in Belgravia, a bare fifteen minutes’ ride from the shop, which was just off Bond Street. The taxi dropped her at the foot of the shallow steps that led up to swing-glass doors which in turn gave access to the marble-tiled lobby. A bank of lifts faced her, and managing to sidestep the uniformed commissionaire, who liked to chat to his clients, she slipped into one of the steel-lined cubicles.
Her apartment was on the twelfth floor of a fourteen-floor block. Letting herself into the split-level lounge, she thought how awful it was that her grandmother had never even seen where she lived. But in recent years, their relationship had not been the way it used to be, and apart from cards at Christmas and birthdays, their contacts had been few and far between. Something else she had to thank Rafe Fleming for, Helen thought with sudden bitterness. He had always come between her and her grandmother, right from the very beginning; and he continued to do so now, even though she was dead.
But not for long, Helen silently asserted. She had not had time to give the matter too much thought as yet, but her grandmother’s death was going to change a lot of things. Not least, Rafe Fleming’s situation. For reasons best known to himself, and for which Helen had always nurtured the gravest suspicions, Rafe had returned to Castle Howarth three years ago when Tom Fleming died. And, in spite of the perfectly good job he already had with Chater Chemicals, he had agreed to take his father’s place. To his credit, he had not asked for the job. Lady Elizabeth had made it clear that she had offered him the position. But the reasons why he should give up a career in microbiological research to take charge of a country estate had never been satisfactorily explained, and Helen had her own theories, which were hardly complimentary to him.
Still, that was all in the past now, she reflected bleakly, closing the door behind her. Then, shedding her sheepskin jacket, she walked along the galleried landing, which overlooked the generous proportions of her living room two steps below. But for once the beauty of her apartment gave her no pleasure. She had designed the colour scheme herself, sticking to cream and gold and pastel colours, so that the room had an air of space and elegance. The long windows overlooking the immediate environs of Cavendish Court and the busy city beyond added another dimension, and at parties her view was usually a talking point. But this afternoon, with darkness shrouding the streets below and the threat of snow in the wind, Helen couldn’t wait to draw the curtains and put on the lamps. Anything to banish the feelings of sorrow and remorse which had been her constant companions ever since she received that shocking message.
Dropping her coat on to a pale green suede sofa, Helen crossed the room to pour herself a stiff drink. Two decanters, one containing brandy, the other Scotch, stood on a silver tray, and she added two cubes of ice to a measure of the latter before lifting the crystal tumbler to her lips.
The raw spirit caught her throat, and she coughed as it took her breath. But it did the trick, and pretty soon a soothing warmth invaded her stomach. Helen rarely drank alcohol. A glass of wine at dinner was all she usually required, and the spirits were kept here mainly for Adam and her friends. Still, she poured herself a second drink before reaching for the telephone. She had to talk to Adam, and she didn’t want to break down in the middle of their conversation.
As she had surmised, Adam was still at his office in Regent Street. She didn’t exactly know what he did there—something to do with the property he owned, which was quite considerable. In any event, he spent two or three days every week at his office, and the rest of the time he was a free agent. Helen had often accused him of only going into the office to thwart any charge that he was a complete playboy, and Adam invariably agreed with her. They both knew he was happiest at the wheel of his yacht or skiing down a mountainside in Italy. ‘It’s what comes of being the last in a line of aristocratic layabouts!’ he generally responded, and he said it so disarmingly she always forgave him.
‘Helen!’ he exclaimed now, after his secretary had put her through. ‘I didn’t expect to hear from you. Is something wrong?’
Helen took a deep breath. ‘I won’t be able to go to the recital with you this evening, Adam. I—well, I’ve had some rather bad news, and I don’t feel like going anywhere.’
‘If you say so, old love.’ Adam’s voice was reassuringly sympathetic. ‘What’s happened?’
‘It’s my grandmother,’ said Helen quickly. ‘She—she died this morning. I got a telegram at the shop.’
‘At the shop?’ Adam paused. ‘Do I take it you’re not at the shop now?’
‘No. I’m at home. Melanie insisted. I took a cab.’
‘You should have called me,’ exclaimed Adam at once. ‘You know I’d have run you home. Heavens, it must have been quite a shock. Isn’t that the old lady who lived near my uncle’s place at Warminster?’
‘Not far from there,’ agreed Helen flatly, taking another mouthful of the whisky. ‘Anyway, I just wanted you to know not to pick me up from work. I think I’ll have an early night instead. I’ve got all sorts of arrangements to make for tomorrow.’
‘Is that when the funeral is?’
‘No. Not until Friday actually. But, I’ve got to go down there.’ Her voice broke and she took another steadying breath before continuing: ‘I am her next of kin, you see.’
‘Well, of course, old love.’ Adam was warmly understanding. ‘I’ll take you down there myself. Do you want to leave in the morning? We can stay at my uncle’s place, if you’d rather. Dear old Willie! I doubt if he’ll even notice that we’re——’
Helen took a deep breath. ‘No, Adam.’
There was a moment’s silence, and then he said rather stiffly: ‘No?’ and Helen made a helpless gesture.
‘I don’t want you to come with me, Adam,’ she said, realising as she did so that this was really why she had needed the whisky. ‘Oh—I know you mean well, and I’m grateful for your offer, but this is something I have to do alone.’
‘Why?’ Adam took only a second to absorb what she was saying before adding tersely: ‘Helen, I don’t think you realise what you’re saying. Aren’t you letting your emotions get the better of you?’
‘Perhaps I am.’ Helen sighed. ‘But—well, my grandmother never knew you, Adam. She never even met you! I can’t go down to Castle Howarth now and introduce you as the man I’m going to marry. I—I can’t!’
‘You mean, because of what people will say?’ He sounded surprised. ‘I didn’t realise you were ashamed of me.’
‘Oh, don’t be silly!’ Helen’s nerves were already stretched to their fullest extent, and offending Adam was the last thing she had intended. ‘Darling, try to understand, please! The people on the estate are a close-knit community. Like a family, almost. They—they wouldn’t take kindly to—to a stranger attending my grandmother’s funeral.’
There was another pregnant silence, and then Adam seemed to relent. ‘Oh, well—if that’s how you feel,’ he conceded. ‘I don’t want to make the situation any more painful for you than it is already. But I want to see you before you leave, early night or not.’
Helen’s shoulders sagged. ‘All right.’ She paused, and then added: ‘Do you want to come for supper? It can only be steak and salad, I’m afraid, but you could bring a bottle of wine.’
‘I know just the one,’ declared Adam at once, his good humour quickly restored. It was one of the things that had first attracted her to him: his unruffled temperament and buoyant personality. ‘How does six-thirty sound?’ he suggested. ‘Too early? Or too late?’
It was earlier than she had anticipated, but bearing in mind the fact that she intended he should leave earlier, too, she did not demur. But then another thought struck her. ‘The recital!’ she exclaimed. ‘What about the tickets?’
‘I can listen to Vivaldi any time,’ Adam assured her carelessly, dismissing her concern about the performance. ‘See you in a couple of hours, my sweet. I’m looking forward to it.’
He rang off, but Helen replaced her receiver with rather less enthusiasm. It was sweet of Adam to want to show her how much she meant to him, of course, but for once she wished he had been more perceptive. She would have preferred to be alone this evening. She didn’t feel like talking, or stirring herself to make a meal for the two of them. All she really wanted to do was have a bath and go to bed, and try to forget that the woman who had been the only mother she had ever known had died that morning, alone and unloved.
By the time Adam arrived, however, Helen was feeling distinctly more relaxed. A long, lazy bath, followed by another Scotch—this time with soda—had done much to ease her introspection, and although she had spent little time over her appearance, she was reasonably sure Adam would not be disappointed.
Maturity—and the hectic life she led—had succeeded in banishing any lingering doubts she might have nurtured over her face and figure. The breasts she had once fretted over were now full and rounded, accentuating her narrow waist and the long, seductive length of her legs. Her face, while not being conventionally pretty, was nonetheless striking for all that, her wide almost purple eyes fringed by silky black lashes. A narrow nose, high cheekbones, and a generous mouth, completed features with the delicacy of colour of a magnolia, but it was the glorious abundance of her hair that she was sure caused her a second glance. It was still as dark and lustrous as it had ever been, and in spite of the ups and downs of fashion, she always wore it long and coiled into a knot at the nape of her neck. She still plaited it from time to time, allowing the thick chunky braid to hang over one shoulder. But as she seldom liked to be reminded of the naive girl she used to be, she usually chose a style with less significance.
When she opened the door to her fiancé, however, her cheeks were still flushed from her bath—and the amount of alcohol she had consumed. The unusual colour gave her face a feverish fragility, and Adam’s eyes darkened appreciatively as he reached for her. But for once, Helen evaded his embrace, averting her face so that his mouth merely grazed the warm skin of her temple.
‘Are you all right?’ he asked, and she thought, rather guiltily, it was a measure of his concern for her that he showed no impatience at her withdrawal. She must have hurt him, and yet his refined handsome features revealed only sympathy and compassion. She wished she could confide in him. She wished she could tell him how she was feeling. She wanted to be totally honest with him. But something—some awful flaw in her character perhaps—prevented her from explaining the real reasons why she and her grandmother had lost touch with one another.
‘I’m just—tired,’ she said now, leading the way down the shallow carpeted stairs into the centre of the living room. ‘It’s been quite a day. But then, you know that.’
‘Yes.’ Adam followed her, taking off the camel-hair overcoat he was wearing over a tweed suit, and dropping it on to a low padded stool. ‘Poor Helen! It must have been quite traumatic. Didn’t anyone warn you the old girl was ill?’
‘I don’t know that she was,’ replied Helen shortly, feeling her tension coming back in spite of herself. Shrugging, she curled her silk-trousered legs beneath her and sank into the corner of one of the suede sofas. ‘I told you. I got a telegram to say she was dead. That’s all I know about it.’
Adam frowned, taking up a position in front of a carved cabinet. ‘You mean—you haven’t phoned?’ he exclaimed in surprise. He shook his head. ‘I assumed you would.’
‘No.’ Helen bent her head and then, remembering her manners, she added swiftly: ‘Help yourself to a drink. I’m sure you must be frozen.’
‘Well, it is damn cold out tonight,’ agreed Adam, taking her at her word and turning to the tray. ‘But I managed to park in the square, so it wasn’t too far to walk. I shouldn’t be surprised if we have snow before morning.’
‘I hope not.’ Helen spoke automatically, but she meant it. She didn’t want to have to take the train to Yelversley. With her own car, she was so much more independent.
‘You’re driving down then,’ Adam remarked, taking a mouthful of the Scotch he had poured before coming to join her on the sofa. ‘You will drive carefully, won’t you, darling? The M3 is so frantic!’
‘I’ll be careful,’ said Helen, with a tight smile, wondering what he was really thinking. He hadn’t questioned her decision not to phone, yet he must be curious as to why she wouldn’t have done so. Perhaps if Adam had been more inquisitive, she would have found it easier to be entirely honest with him, she consoled herself uneasily. As it was, he allowed her to direct the conversation, and it was so much simpler not to have to explain.
‘I thought we’d eat about seven o’clock,’ she said now, changing the subject completely, and Adam groaned.
‘Dammit, I’ve left the wine in the car!’ he exclaimed, pressing the heel of his hand against his forehead. ‘That’s what comes of being too eager. I’ll have to go and get it.’
‘It doesn’t matter,’ said Helen at once. ‘As a matter of fact, I’d just as soon have water. I’ve got a bit of a headache.’
‘From the whisky, no doubt,’ remarked Adam drily, and Helen’s eyes darted to his face. ‘I smelt it,’ he added. ‘As soon as I came in. I guess the old lady’s death meant more to you than I thought.’
That was a bit too close to the truth for comfort and, uncoiling herself, Helen rose to her feet. ‘You could be right,’ she declared, purposely keeping her tone light. And then, making for the door, she added: ‘I must check on the steaks. They should have defrosted by now.’
Adam came into the kitchen as she was spreading the thick slices of meat under the grill. It wasn’t a large kitchen, used primarily by Mrs Argyll, Helen’s daily. Because she was out a lot of the time, Helen didn’t employ a full-time housekeeper, but the friendly little Scotswoman could turn her hand to anything. If she knew her employer was to be home for the evening, she generally left a casserole in the oven, or a cold meal that could be easily heated in the microwave oven. But this evening she had expected Helen to be out, and Helen would have to explain why two healthy steaks had disappeared from the freezer.
‘Something smells good,’ Adam observed now, perching his fastidious frame on one of the leather-topped stools beside the breakfast bar. ‘At least we’ll never starve after we’re married.’
‘Cooking steaks and tossing a salad are hardly culinary feats,’ responded Helen wryly, glad he was not pursuing his earlier topic. ‘You’re a much better cook than I am, and you know it.’
‘More inventive, perhaps,’ Adam conceded, taking another swallow from his glass. And then, just as she was about to make some teasing comment, he added: ‘Tell me: this affair of your grandmother; it won’t make any difference to our plans, will it? I mean, you won’t have any qualms about selling the estate?’
Helen stiffened. ‘Selling the estate?’ she echoed faintly. And then, more staunchly: ‘Why should I sell the estate? It was my home.’
‘Was, darling. Was being the operative word,’ said Adam smoothly. ‘And let’s face it, it’s years since you lived there. Almost ten, isn’t it?’
‘Seven,’ said Helen tightly. ‘I left when I was eighteen. You know that.’
‘All right. Seven, then.’ Adam finished his drink, cradling the glass between his palms. ‘But for the past—I don’t know how many years; at least as long as I’ve known you—you haven’t even visited your grandmother, let alone cared about the estate!’
Helen expelled her breath unsteadily. ‘I know.’
‘So …’ Adam spread his hands. ‘You must see that selling the place is the most sensible solution. If death duties don’t take the decision out of your hands, that is.’
‘Death duties!’ Helen stared at him. ‘Is that likely?’
‘Well, I don’t know the old lady’s financial situation, do I, so I can’t say.’ Adam shrugged. ‘But unless she had considerable private funds, I’d say it was possible.’
‘Private funds?’ Helen’s stomach hollowed. She had no idea if her grandmother had had a private income. Lady Elizabeth had never seemed short of money, but she had not wasted it either. And as long as Helen could remember, she had always lived in only one wing of the house.
‘Don’t look so shocked, love.’ Adam dropped his glass on to the bar’s leather counter and came round to her. ‘You must have given some thought to what this would mean. Is it so important to you?’
Helen quivered. If anyone had asked her that question yesterday, she would have said no, but now it was different. For some unfathomable reason, the idea of selling Castle Howarth was like the final betrayal of all Lady Elizabeth had meant to her. She would not have wanted her to sell it, and if there was any other way, she had to find it.
Torn by emotions suddenly too strong to resist, she let Adam pull her into his arms. For the first time since hearing the news that afternoon, she felt the hot sting of tears against her cheeks. Nan was dead; she acknowledged it bitterly. She would never speak to her again. Never sit with her, and talk with her, and share with her all the thousand-and-one things they used to share when she was a child. How had it all gone so wrong, she wondered. At what point had their relationship begun its downward slide? What had happened in the years between that she should be blaming herself now, because the old lady had died without her being there?
‘Hey…’ Adam’s hand beneath her chin caused her to try and take a grip on her emotions. ‘If it means that much to you, we’ll keep it; whatever it costs.’ He bestowed a tender kiss at the corner of her mouth and smiled a gentle smile. ‘Come on. This isn’t like you.’
It wasn’t, Helen knew. She was not an emotional person. Oh, she got angry from time to time, just like anyone else, but it was years since she had cried—about anything. Adam always said he liked her cool competent way of dealing with things, and it must be quite a surprise for him to discover she was so vulnerable. But grief was not like other emotions, she decided. And until today she had not realised how painful it could be.
The sound of the telephone solved both their problems: Adam’s because he wasn’t entirely sure how to deal with her; and Helen’s because she was glad of an excuse to escape from his embrace. Tonight she felt in no mood for Adam’s lovemaking. Her affection for him had not changed; it was simply that the present situation had left her bereft of feeling. She needed time to absorb this new development. Time to come to terms with the way it would affect both their lives.
Smudging her cheeks with the back of her hand, she lifted the kitchen extension from its hook and put the receiver to her ear. ‘Yes?’
‘Helen?’
The voice was unmistakable and to her dismay Helen felt a wave of colour sweep up her cheeks. Hoping Adam would assume it was the result of her emotional upheaval, she nevertheless turned her back on him to make her response. ‘Yes,’ she said tautly. ‘This is Helen Michaels. To whom am I speaking?’
‘Don’t you know?’ the sardonic voice rasped in her ear. ‘All right,’ as she made no attempt to answer, he conceded, ‘Fleming here. Did you get my message?’
‘That my grandmother is dead? Yes, thank you.’ Her voice was clipped and brittle. ‘Is that why you rang? To make sure I heard the news from you?’
There was a moment’s silence, and she thought for one anxious second he had rung off. But then, with studied insolence, he responded: ‘How or from whom you heard the news doesn’t interest me. I simply wanted to know if you intend coming to the funeral. The weather’s getting pretty bad down here, and I’d hate for you to make it a double event!’
‘You——’ The epithet was inaudible. Helen was suddenly intensely conscious of Adam, propped against the drainer behind her, listening to every word. ‘I—of course, I’m coming to the funeral. I shall drive down in the morning. There are—arrangements to be made.’
‘I’ve made them,’ retorted Rafe laconically. ‘When you didn’t ring I assumed you were leaving them to me.’
‘Then you had no right to——’ Once again, Helen broke off, biting her tongue. ‘That is, if I’d learned of my grandmother’s death sooner——’
‘Sooner?’ Rafe sounded incredulous. ‘I rang you as soon as I could. It wasn’t my fault you weren’t at either of the addresses I found in the old lady’s bureau.’
‘You looked in—in Nan’s bureau!’ Helen was incensed. ‘How—how dare you?’
‘How else was I supposed to find you?’ he retorted flatly. And then: ‘Anyway, I didn’t make this call to get into an argument over the rights and wrongs of how I found you! The old lady’s dead, for God’s sake! Doesn’t that mean anything to you?’
‘Of—of course it means something to me.’ Helen was furious to hear the tremor in her voice. ‘But—I just don’t understand why you didn’t reach me. I’ve been either here or at the shop all day. At least——’
She broke off again, remembering with despair the hour she had spent in the reference library before going to the shop. She caught her lower lip between her teeth. ‘You must have spoken to Melanie then.’ So why hadn’t she told her?
‘I spoke to some old guy who said you were both out,’ declared Rafe wearily. ‘I was going to ring you back, but I just didn’t have the time. It’s been pretty hectic here, one way and another. Paget sent the telegram.’
‘Miss Paget?’ echoed Helen faintly, and Rafe swore.
‘Yes,’ he said, impatient now. ‘Well, I guess that’s——’
‘Wait!’ Glancing anxiously at the steaks, which were starting to spit under the grill, Helen moistened her lips. ‘I—can you tell me how it happened? I mean——’she chose her words with care ‘—had she been ill?’
‘I’m tempted not to answer that question,’ responded Rafe harshly. ‘You should know.’
Helen quivered, her knuckles white as they gripped the receiver. ‘Rafe, please——’ She despised herself for begging, but she suspected she wouldn’t get much sleep until she knew the truth.
There was another ominous silence, and then he made a derisive sound. ‘No,’ he said, after a moment. ‘She seemed perfectly all right yesterday evening. Your conscience needn’t trouble you. Not on that score at least.’
Helen replaced the receiver without answering him. Uncaring at that moment what Adam might think of her behaviour, she moved almost automatically towards the grill, pulling out the pan and flipping the steaks over. She needed the reassurance of accomplishing so familiar a task to give her time to recover from Rafe’s attack, but even so her hands shook abominably.
Adam let her attend to the steaks without comment, but when she moved towards the fridge to take out the salad, his voice arrested her. ‘I assume that was a call from Wiltshire,’ he remarked quietly. ‘Is something wrong? You seem—distraite.’
Summoning all her composure, Helen took a deep breath before turning to face him. ‘I’m just—in shock, I suppose,’ she murmured, hoping he would not probe. ‘That—that was my grandmother’s agent. I’m afraid he and I have never seen eye to eye.’
‘Ah.’ Adam inclined his head. ‘Well—I shouldn’t let anything some old peasant says upset you. You know what these rustic types are like. Unless you keep them in order, they get an inflated idea of their own importance. And they’re so used to dealing with pigs, they begin to sound like one!’
The graphic portrait Adam described brought the ghost of a smile to Helen’s lips. The image of Rafe as some hoary old farmer, deep in pig-swill and manure, with brutish features and a straw dangling from his mouth, was so far from the truth as to be laughable. But she didn’t contradict him. The chances of the two men ever actually meeting one another were negligible, and Rafe’s behaviour had only reinforced her determination to get rid of him as soon as possible.
‘That’s better,’ said Adam now, seeing her smile. ‘Come on, darling. It’s not the end of the world. Oh, I know it’s a shame that the old lady died so suddenly. But isn’t it better? From her point of view, at least? You wouldn’t have wanted her to be in pain.’
‘No.’ Helen felt an involuntary shiver prickle her spine. But Adam was right. Nan could not have suffered for long. With a determination born of desperation, she put all thoughts of her grandmother—and Rafe Fleming—aside. ‘You know,’ she added, ‘I think I would like that bottle of wine after all. Would you mind?’
CHAPTER TWO (#u27f0c2c2-352b-5eac-bcc5-64d1489e55cd)
AT TWO o’clock Helen gave up the struggle to try and sleep, and got out of bed. Pulling on a beige silk wrapper over the lacy folds of her nightgown, she padded out of her bedroom and into the kitchen. Switching on the light, she opened the fridge and took out a pint of milk. Then, taking down a copper-bottomed pan from the rack above the drainer, she poured half the milk into it.
A few moments later she trailed into the living room carrying an earthenware mug of hot milk. It was chilly in the large room, the heating having been turned down before she went to bed. Helen adjusted the thermostat before crossing to the windows to draw back the heavy curtains, and then sank down into an armchair close by. Whenever she couldn’t sleep, she always opened the curtains. It was so reassuring to know that other people were not sleeping either.
Far below her, London still breathed, like a beast reclining after making its kill, she thought fancifully. Yet, to someone unused to its wakeful vigilance, the fairylike brilliance of its lights must have seemed an alien phenomenon. For herself, she was used to it. Seven years of living in the capital had given her a sense of identity with its busy streets, though she still remembered the peace of Castle Howarth with a nostalgia undiminished by time.
Castle Howarth! Her tongue appeared to lick a smear of milk from her lips, and she felt the same constriction in her throat she had fought earlier. It was just as well Adam couldn’t see her now, she reflected wryly. He had thought she was over the worst, and so had she. But she wasn’t. The inescapable fact that her grandmother was dead was the reason she was sitting here now. She would get over it; eventually. But not without some heart-searching; not without some remorse.
Adam didn’t understand, she knew that. His was a logical brain, to which an excess of emotion was self-indulgent. He couldn’t conceive why she should be so distressed over the death of an old lady she had seen only a handful of times in the last three years. Helen shook her head. Undoubtedly, he had a point. It was self-indulgent and hypocritical to display such grief when she had done so little to warrant it. As far as Adam was concerned, she was behaving illogically—and just a little egotistically—expecting him to comprehend her feelings when they were so uncharacteristic of the young woman he thought he knew.
The evening had not been a success. In spite of the heady bottle of claret Adam had produced, Helen’s behaviour had thrown them both off-key, and she was relieved when he agreed she should still have the early night she had planned. Even so, he had made one final offer to go with her, and her taut refusal had not repaired the situation.
‘I think you’re allowing this whole affair to assume unreasonable importance,’ he said, after observing his fiancée’s attempt to swallow a mouthful of her steak. ‘I’m trying to be patient, Helen, but I honestly don’t understand why you’re so upset. I assume you must be blaming yourself in some way, though how you can be held responsible for the death of someone who, on your own admission, was almost eighty, is beyond me!’
Helen had not tried to reason with him. She had suspected that any attempt on her part to try and explain would have resulted in exactly the kind of scene Adam would most deplore. So, until she had regained control of her wayward emotions, she was unable to offer any defence.
The hot milk was cloying and, putting it aside, Helen lay back in her chair. It was snowing now, she saw with some surprise—tiny frozen flakes floating past the windows, covering the roofs below with a thin crust of white icing. It reminded her of Rafe’s warning about the weather at Castle Howarth. It was always worse in the country. Without the frequent movement of traffic to keep the roads clear, whole villages were soon cut off, and Castle Howarth was no exception. She ought to have watched the forecast on television, she thought ruefully. She had no desire to be diverted into a snow-drift.
They had always had a lot of snow at Castle Howarth, she remembered wistfully. When she was young she had loved the cold frosty mornings, when her fingers tingled and the snow had been deep enough to cover her rubber boots. Sometimes the pond had frozen, and if Mr Dobkins had pronounced it thick enough, Nan had let her go skating. Nan! Helen’s breath caught in her throat. Oh, Nan, she thought miserably, why had their relationship floundered? After all they had meant to one another, how could such a thing have happened? They had been so close. The only surviving members of a family stricken by bad luck and misfortune. They should have fought for what they had.
Sometimes, she wondered if it had not begun when she was four years old. That first occasion when she had learned of Rafe Fleming’s special place in her grandmother’s affections. Had she really been hurt—or jealous—of Nan’s stand over Rafe’s rights? Hadn’t she secretly resented her grandparent’s defence of someone she considered her inferior? What an abominable little prig she must have been, she thought with disgust. But Rafe Fleming had always brought out the worst in her.
She sighed. She probably brought out the worst in him, too. Certainly, when she was fifteen, she had done little to warrant the unprovoked assault he had made on her, and it had taken years for her to recover from that particular anguish. What had made it worse was that she had been too ashamed to tell her grandmother. Rafe had expected her to, she knew. She had been aware of his wary eyes watching her on more than one occasion. But it was something she could not share with anyone, and unconsciously she blamed Nan for it.
Of course, after Rafe had gone away to work, it had been easier. Outwardly, at least, her life had gone on as before. But there was something missing; the innocent faith she had had that Nan could protect her from any danger was gone, and in that realisation had been sown the first seeds of dissension.
She knew it had been because of Rafe that she had insisted on striking out on her own. His accusations, however unfounded, had soured and festered, and as soon as she was eighteen, she had announced her intention to get a job. But not in the village, or even in the nearby town of Yelversley: Helen proposed to go to London, and nothing could dissuade her.
Not unnaturally, her grandmother had not wanted her to leave. There was no reason for her to take a job, she said. There was plenty to do at Castle Howarth. Not least, be a companion to her, she suggested. Now that Paget was getting old, she needed someone younger to handle her correspondence. But Paget—Miss Paget, of Helen’s pre-school days—had stayed on long after her young charge had need of her. She and Lady Elizabeth got along together very well, and even had she wanted to, Helen knew she could never replace her.
At last, convinced that her granddaughter meant to find employment in the city, Lady Elizabeth had offered to make enquiries for her, with friends and acquaintances. But Helen had refused to accept any help. She wanted to do this herself, she said. She wanted to prove to her grandmother—and anyone else who might be interested—that she was capable of supporting herself, of being independent; she had worried the old lady, she knew, but her freedom had meant more to her than Nan’s peace of mind. Another barrier between them, she acknowledged now, the distance creating a gulf that was mental as well as physical.
To begin with, she had found it very hard to live alone. She had known few people in the capital, and the temporary receptionist’s job she found hardly paid her food bills. Without the allowance her grandmother had insisted on paying her, she wouldn’t even have been solvent, and she had fought a losing battle with her conscience every time she cashed a cheque.
Her meeting with Melanie Forster had come at a time when she had seriously begun to question the sense in what she was doing. It was January, and having just been home to Castle Howarth for Christmas, Helen had been made acutely aware of the shortcomings of the life she had chosen to lead. Everything at home had been so warm; so familiar; returning to her poky, one-roomed flat in Kensington, she had been sorely tempted to abandon her bid for emancipation.
A few years older than Helen, Melanie was another ex-pupil of St Agnes, and that had been sufficient reason for their friendship to develop. Unlike Helen, Melanie was a Londoner, born and bred. Her mother was dead, and her father was a politician, struggling against a failing economy to sustain the life he had always led. In no time at all, their house in St John’s Wood became a second home to Helen, and she was always welcome, whenever she chose to call.
It didn’t take long for Helen to discover that Melanie was looking for someone to help finance a business venture she was considering. She owned the lease of a small shop in Beatrix Street, and she wanted to use the shop to sell antiques. Looking back, Helen occasionally wondered whether Melanie’s insistence that they should be friends had been as innocent as it had at first seemed. Certainly, as Lady Sinclair’s granddaughter, she must have seemed like a gift from the gods. Melanie needed finance, and after some persuasion on Helen’s part, her grandmother had agreed to advance her the money. After some initial hiccoughs, Pastiche had opened, and right from the beginning, their gamble had paid off.
The success of the shop had exceeded their wildest dreams. The combination of Melanie’s shrewdness and Helen’s instinctive feeling for old furniture and paintings had proved effective, and the position of the shop made it a focal point for tourists. It was also true that Helen’s striking appearance and forthright manner had disarmed some of the toughest dealers in the trade, but it was their mutual skill in business which had made the venture a success. If Melanie’s talents were best employed in selling, Helen had found her niche in uncovering items of value in the most unexpected places. Because she was young, and feminine, old people tended to trust her, and she acquired a reputation for honesty and fair dealing. She had patience, and compassion, and although the shop’s turnover couldn’t match the larger of their competitors, their profits pleased their accountant.
Of course, her grandmother had known of her success. Helen had been unable to hide the pride with which she had returned her grandmother’s investment to her—with interest. Besides, she had since admitted that she had also wanted Rafe to hear what she had done. Knowing Nan, as she did, she felt pretty sure he would hear of it, one way or another. And this awareness, in its turn, assuaged a little of the bitterness she felt every time she thought of him.
Tom Fleming’s death had been, she supposed, the final contributory factor to the breakdown of her relationship with her grandmother. At the time, she had thought no more of it than she would of the death of any of her grandmother’s employees. It was sad. He had been comparatively young—only fifty-seven—but these things happened. It was the way of the world. She had not attended his funeral but, once again, her grandmother had not expected her to. She had sent condolences to his widow—and, reluctantly, to the family—but that was all.
The first inkling she had had that Rafe had come back to Castle Howarth had come a few weeks later. Helen had driven home for the weekend and, after parking her car in the courtyard, she had walked nonchalantly into the house. It had been a dull November day, she remembered, and she had been anticipating warming her hands over the open fire in her grandmother’s sitting room. Nan had always kept an open fire in her sitting room, even though the other rooms were heated by rather ancient radiators.
The sight of Rafe Fleming, lounging in the armchair opposite her grandmother, taking tea, had caused a feeling much like a body blow to Helen’s midriff. It wasn’t so much seeing him—although it had been some years since she had done so; it was the apparent intimacy of his relationship with her grandmother; the cosy way Nan was sharing her tea with him, and Rafe’s evident ease in these familiar surroundings.
Of course, the impact of his presence had twisted like a knife. The hatred she still felt for him had never faltered. What shocked her most was the ability he still had to strip her of her defences, and although her anger sustained her, she was shaken to the core.
And, as always, her frustration had turned on her grandmother. Had she no conception of what it meant to her to come home and find him—the usurper—occupying her place? she demanded wordlessly. Didn’t she know what he was like? Couldn’t she see the kind of man he was?
But, of course, only the bitter voice inside her answered. No, it said, her grandmother had no conception of Rafe’s real character. She didn’t know how he had teased and tormented her granddaughter over the years. She didn’t know of his sexual exploits, or of the near-rape in the long meadow, which had left Helen wary of any man, good or bad. So far as Nan was concerned, he was almost family; the son she had never had. And Rafe took damn good care not to jeopardise their relationship by showing her his darker side.
To his credit, Rafe had not lingered long after Helen’s arrival. With the sinuous grace that had always come so naturally to him, he had risen to his feet at her entrance and offered her his seat. The fact that she had refused it didn’t seem to trouble him. The cool green eyes she remembered from her nightmares were as enigmatic as a glacier. The polite words that moved his lips gave no inkling of what he was really thinking, but he must have made the right noises because her grandmother had noticed nothing amiss.
For her part, Helen had barely glanced at him. After that first visual confrontation, she had avoided looking at him: but for all that, she had been unable to prevent his image from imprinting itself on the insides of her eyelids. She recalled thinking that Tracy would have been impressed to see him now. He had fulfilled all her girlish fantasies, and the slim, good-looking boy had become a lean, attractive man. He was different, though; she sensed that. His face was still familiar, but it was tougher; harder. Evidence of the life he had been leading, she had assumed, her lips curling contemptuously when she was unwillingly reminded of how slavishly she had once hung on his every word. What a fool she had been, she thought wryly. Thank God she had had the good fortune to find out what he was really like, before it was too late.
But the news Nan had had to impart had driven all other considerations out of her head.
Rafe had apparently offered to take his father’s place on the estate. As Helen was absorbing this unbelievable piece of information, Lady Elizabeth had gone on to say, with evident satisfaction, that he was doing it for her! In a pig’s eye! Helen had thought furiously, but her grandmother would hear no dissent. If Rafe was willing to leave an apparently secure position with Chater Chemicals and return to Castle Howarth as her agent, she was grateful, and there was no one else she would trust implicitly.
Of course, Helen had been unable to hide her disapproval, and the weekend had been an unmitigated disaster. Helen had returned to London on Sunday afternoon, and that was the last time she had visited her old home. The few subsequent occasions when she and Nan had met had been in London, and although at Christmas, particularly, she had felt a sense of loss, Adam’s entry into her life had filled the empty space.
It was strange, she thought now, her hands involuntarily seeking the tail of her braid and spreading the hairs between her fingers; Rafe had been the cause of the rift between her and her grandmother, and yet they had never actually talked about it. Oh, she had grumbled about him when she was younger, just as she had when she was four, but Nan had never allowed a discussion on the subject. Even that last weekend at Castle Howarth, when the news of his appointment as agent had been the most obvious talking-point of all, Rafe’s name had seemed taboo. Why? Why wouldn’t her grandmother listen to reason? Had she really been indifferent to his faults, or had Rafe actually seemed a paragon to her? Whatever her reasoning, she would never know now, Helen reflected with bitter acceptance. But when she drove down to Wiltshire in the morning, she would assume her role as Castle Howarth’s mistress, and nothing Rafe said or did could change her opinion of him …
Helen left the motorway at Basingstoke and took the A30 to Salisbury. It would have been quicker to go via Andover, but she was chary of crossing Salisbury Plain in the worsening weather conditions. At least the more southerly route looked a little less hazardous, but by the time she reached the old cathedral city, her windscreen wipers were clogged with driving snow. It was just as well Adam couldn’t see her now, she decided wryly. He worried if she drove in frosty weather, and today would more than justify his concern. The snow was thickening by the minute, and she thought how fortunate it was that she had set away early that morning. It hadn’t even been light when she drove out of London. The going had been slow but it was only a little after twelve when she drove into Salisbury.
She hadn’t stopped at all during the journey, but now she was obliged to do so, the physical needs of her body demanding relief. The car-park of the Blue Boar seemed to offer the easiest solution, and after locking the doors of the Porsche, she struggled across the slushy yard and into the hotel.
It was years since she had last used the old hotel’s amenities, but she remembered her grandmother bringing her here for afternoon tea during shopping trips to the city. The entrance from the car-park brought her into the carpeted corridor next to the powder-room, and she made use of its facilities before walking on into the attractive reception lounge. A log fire was burning in the huge hearth, and several people were clustered about the chintz-covered settees, drinking tea or coffee, or eating some of the delicious sandwiches the management provided for guests only requiring a snack meal.
Helen hesitated on the fringe of the group, wondering if she really had the time to wait for sandwiches. There was no sign of the waitress, and while it would have been pleasant to relax in front of the fire, she was apprehensive of becoming stranded.
She was also aware that her appearance had attracted an undue amount of attention. Not caring much for anything beyond keeping dry and warm, she had dressed in a black jumpsuit and long leather boots, with a knee-length orange parka overall. It was its vivid colour which was attracting attention, she decided, ignoring the fact that to the residents of the quiet hotel she herself was an exciting diversion. With her pale skin showing just a hint of becoming colour, and her smoky-purple eyes shadowed with anxiety, she was quite startlingly beautiful, without the silky richness of her hair to add to her individuality. In the conservative surroundings of the Blue Boar’s panelled lounge, she was as alien as an exotic bird of paradise, and it was difficult to ignore so many curious faces.
At that moment, she caught the eye of the hotel receptionist, and with a smile of acknowledgement, he came out from behind his desk to walk towards her. At last, she thought, looping the strap of her bag over her shoulder. If he could just tell her how long it would take to get something to eat, she could decide then whether or not she had the time.
With her attention concentrated on the approaching receptionist, she was unaware of a man who had been drawn to the doorway of the adjoining bar by the sudden buzz of speculation. A tall man, dressed in tight-fitting woollen pants and a black leather jacket, he surveyed the newcomer with grim concentration for a moment, before abandoning his stance and starting purposefully towards her.
The two men reached her simultaneously, and Helen, suspecting his motives, turned to give the second man a freezing look. However, her intentions received a sudden reversal. Even as her astonished eyes registered who it was, the receptionist identified him, and his polite: ‘Is this the young lady you were waiting for, Mr Fleming?’ left no room for manoeuvre.
‘Helen,’ he acknowledged unsmilingly, his expression impossible to read. Then, turning to the hotel employee, he added smoothly: ‘Yes. This is Miss Michaels, Trevor. And we’ll have that soup now, if you don’t mind.’ Ignoring Helen’s indignant face, he glanced around before indicating a table at the far side of the lounge. ‘Over there. Speed it up. We don’t have much time.’
The young man didn’t wait to check if these arrangements suited Helen, she saw to her fury. He simply grinned her way before hastening off towards the kitchens, and she was left to confront the one man she least desired to face.
‘You have a nerve!’ she exclaimed in an undertone, still overwhelmingly aware of their audience, but Rafe seemed unperturbed. With supreme indifference, he gripped her upper arm and guided her across the room to where a table was waiting, practically pushing her into the depths of the armchair beside it before taking the settee opposite.
Helen glared at him, but his clear green gaze was more than a match for her sparkling resentment. Settling himself more comfortably against the cushions, he rested one booted ankle across his knee, surveying his surroundings critically before returning his attention to her.
‘What are you doing here?’ she accused, wondering what he would do if she attempted to leave. It was a temptation to find out, but she loathed making scenes, and she very much suspected Rafe would have no qualms about humiliating her.
‘What do you think?’ he responded now, the thick, sun-bleached lashes that fringed his eyes narrowing his gaze, and she gave an impatient shrug.
‘If I knew, I wouldn’t be asking,’ she retorted, keeping her voice down with difficulty. ‘I wouldn’t have thought the Blue Boar was your kind of habitat. Isn’t it rather old-fashioned for someone with your tastes?’
‘You don’t know what my tastes are,’ remarked Rafe without heat, and Helen was furiously aware that he was handling matters better than she was. ‘Here’s the food. I hope your animosity won’t prevent you from enjoying it. It’s usually rather good.’
The receptionist served them himself, setting down earthenware bowls of a thick chicken soup, and a napkin-lined basket filled with warm bread rolls. There were creamy curls of butter in an earthenware dish, set beside wooden salt and pepper shakers, and a generous jug of steaming coffee, with cups and saucers made at the local pottery.
‘Is everything all right, Mr Fleming?’ he asked, after checking that the rolled napkins contained the correct amount of cutlery, and Rafe nodded.
‘Thanks,’ he acknowledged briefly, pressing a note into the young man’s hand, and although Helen would have preferred to pay for her own meal, she could hardly say so, not just then.
In fact, the soup was delicious, and Helen was too hungry to spite him by not eating. Besides, she doubted he would care, one way or the other. Whatever his reasons for being here—and it appeared he had been waiting for her—there would be time enough to consider them after the meal was over. For the moment, the fact that she had left that morning without breakfast seemed to have most significance, and she felt sure she would find it easier to deal with him once the emptiness inside her had been filled.
The coffee was just as she liked it, strong and black, but she added a spoonful of sugar to take away any bitterness. As she poured herself a second cup, she noticed Rafe had eaten rather less enthusiastically than she had, and although he had drunk one cup of coffee, he made no attempt to pour a second.
She had shed her parka as they ate, but now Helen shouldered her arms back into it, feeling considerably warmer than she had before. It had been warm enough in the car, but outside it was decidedly chilly, and she had no doubt that if it stopped snowing it would probably start to freeze. Which reminded her of the number of miles she still had to cover and, looking at Rafe, she arched her dark brows: ‘May I go now?’ she inquired coolly.
‘Are you still driving that sports car?’ he asked, without really answering her question, and Helen seethed.
‘If it’s any business of yours!’
‘It is.’ Rafe wiped his mouth on the napkin and rose abruptly to his feet. ‘You’ll never make it to Castle Howarth in a sports car. The roads beyond Yelversley are practically impassable to any vehicle without a four-wheel drive. You can leave your car here. I’ll take you myself.’
‘You won’t!’ Helen came instinctively to her feet, and then, aware that once again she was drawing attention to them, she added huskily: ‘Why can’t I just—follow you, if you insist on escorting me? I’m not inexperienced. I’ve been driving for years!’
Rafe shrugged. ‘Like I said, the roads are impassable. Now—do you want a lift, or don’t you? You can always take a room here, if you’d prefer to wait and see if there’s any improvement tomorrow.’
Helen pressed her lips together. ‘How did you know I’d come this way?’ she exclaimed resentfully. ‘I could have gone via Andover.’
‘It was an educated guess,’ he replied, connecting the two sides of his jacket and running the zip half up his chest. His eyes were disturbingly intent. ‘As there was a white-out warning for the Andover road, it was reasonable to assume you’d choose the A30.’
‘Even so…’ Helen was not convinced. ‘What made you think I’d come in here?’
‘Your daily woman said you’d left without breakfast,’ retorted Rafe surprisingly, and Helen gasped.
‘You rang my apartment this morning?’
‘To tell you not to come,’ agreed Rafe, stepping round the settee and gesturing towards the exit. ‘Shall we get moving? It may be that we’ll both have problems before we get there.’
Helen shook her head, but she was obliged to follow him. The snow had become a little too thick for comfort, and if she was honest she would admit to a certain relief at not having to drive any further on her own. All the same, she resented the arrogance with which he had made himself responsible for her safety. She would like to have told him she didn’t need anything from him, but for the present, it seemed, she had no choice but to do as he suggested.
Rafe unlocked the door of a dark green Range Rover which was also parked in the hotel yard, and then said: ‘Give me your keys?’
‘Why?’
Helen was unwilling to be more amenable than she had to, and Rafe’s nostrils flared. ‘All right,’ he said, opening the door of the Range Rover and climbing indolently behind the wheel. ‘Get your own luggage then, but be quick about it. As you can see, the conditions are getting impossible. And I have no intention of spending the night trapped in here just because you choose to be awkward.’
Helen’s jaw clamped, but she had brought this on herself. With ill-grace, she slipped and slid across the yard, almost losing her balance as she lifted her bags out of the Porsche, and then struggled back again to deposit them on the back seat.
‘Is that all?’ inquired Rafe drily, viewing the two suitcases and the navy-blue canvas hold-all with a sardonic eye. ‘You don’t believe in travelling light, do you?’
‘Is it any of your business?’ snapped Helen, casting one last regretful look at the sleek little sports car, now becoming submerged beneath the unabating blizzard. Her lips tightened as she turned back to observe his comfortable vehicle. ‘Does this belong to the estate? It’s quite an improvement on the Land-Rover your father used to drive.’
‘It’s mine,’ remarked Rafe in a laconic tone as he reversed out of the space the Range Rover had occupied, and swung the wheel towards the road. ‘Sorry to disappoint you. I bought it myself.’
‘With money my grandmother gave you, I suppose,’ retorted Helen tartly, still smarting from having to carry her own cases, and Rafe cast her a brief look.
‘With money she paid me,’ he amended, with an inclination of his head. ‘I’ve worked for the old lady for the past three years. Naturally, I was paid a salary.’
‘Worked!’ Helen was scathing. ‘I can think of other names for it!’
‘As I can for the allowance she made you,’ conceded Rafe, revealing a discomfiting familiarity with her grandmother’s affairs. ‘Now, shut up, there’s a good girl! I’ve got enough to do here keeping us moving.’
‘Don’t patronise me!’
Helen fairly flung the words at him, but Rafe ignored her. As he had said, the treacherous conditions left little room for error, and although she was tempted to tell him exactly what she planned for him right there and then, common sense warned her to wait until she was on her own territory. She had plenty of time to deal with him. He would soon learn the difference between a gullible old lady and an astute young one.
CHAPTER THREE (#u27f0c2c2-352b-5eac-bcc5-64d1489e55cd)
OUTSIDE the town, the lowering skies made headlights a necessity, even in the middle of the day. Such traffic as there was could only move at a snail’s pace, and although the Range Rover would have had the advantage, the crawling stream of vehicles made overtaking impossible.
Yelversley was still some fifteen miles away when Rafe turned right on to a side road which, though being blessedly free of other traffic, was obviously more hazardous. Helen, who did not recognise any of the names on the partly obliterated signpost gave Rafe a wary look and, as if relenting, he explained:
‘We can get on to the Castle Howarth road if we cut through Farnham Woods,’ he told her evenly. ‘With a bit of luck, the snow won’t have drifted among the trees. It may be a bit rougher, but it should be a damn sight quicker.’
Helen lifted her shoulders. ‘If you say so.’
‘A concession?’ Rafe’s mouth took on a mocking slant. ‘Do you want to take a turn at driving?’
‘No, thanks.’
Helen looked away from his humorous expression, unwillingly aware that even with the advantage of being able to control all four wheels she would not have wanted the responsibility. She didn’t want to admit it, but she knew that if Rafe hadn’t come to meet her, she would never have got this far. As it was, she realised that for all her dislike of the man, she had complete confidence in his abilities, and if anyone could get her to Castle Howarth, it had to be Rafe.
Of course, he knew the area so much better than she did, she consoled herself defensively. He had lived here most of his life, whereas she had spent her formative years at boarding school and left home as soon as she gained her maturity.
All the same, she had reason to admire Rafe’s driving skills as they turned on to the woodland track and began the perilous passage through the trees. He had been right in assuming the snow would be less deep here, but the earth beneath the tyres was frozen solid, and the Range Rover skidded frequently on patches of black ice. Helen’s fingers were locked on the rim of her seat, even though her seat-belt provided adequate protection. Nevertheless, her hands were sticky by the time they emerged from the wood, and she didn’t relax until they had covered the width of the verge and made a crab-like swerve back on to the road.
‘All right?’ Rafe inquired, as she ran her tongue over her dry lips and shuffled back in her seat, and after a moment Helen nodded.
‘Fine,’ she proffered in a taut voice, and he gave her a half-amused look.
‘It’s no shame to admit to being scared now and then,’ he observed. ‘I was a bit scared myself back there. Especially when I felt the wheels going away from me!’
Helen held up her head. ‘And is that supposed to make me feel better?’ she demanded, her tone deliberately scornful. ‘The fact that the macho Rafe Fleming was scared, too?’
There was a pregnant pause and for the space of a heartbeat Helen thought she had gone too far. She had a momentary image of Rafe stopping the Range Rover and tipping her out into the snow—but, thankfully, it didn’t happen. Instead, he cast another hooded glance in her direction before saying: ‘you!’ in such a pleasant tone, that Helen could hardly believe he had used a word she had hitherto only encountered on the written page.
Thereafter, there was silence between them. Helen’s hands were balled into fists, but she refused to sink to the level of bartering that kind of language with him. Besides, she wasn’t at all convinced she would come off best in such an exchange, and she contented herself with anticipating his fury when he learned what she had in mind for him.
The road to the village had been reduced to a single track, but they met no other vehicles before turning into the lane that ran along beside the churchyard. The church itself looked like a cut-out from a Christmas card, thought Helen fancifully, the gravestones softened by the clinging flakes of snow. Across the yard stood the grey-stone mausoleum, where generations of Sinclairs had been laid to rest, and where her grandmother would be interred on Friday. It was a forcible reminder that Nan would not be waiting for her at the house, and a wave of shame swept over her. Ever since encountering Rafe, she had thought of nothing but the revenge she was going to have on him. The reasons for her being here; the guilt she had felt in London; all normal, human instincts, had been obliterated by the hatred that was simmering inside her. And it didn’t help to acknowledge that without Rafe’s intervention, she would probably have been stranded in Salisbury. It was galling, but she had to admit his behaviour today had not warranted so ungracious a response.
The stone gateposts that guarded the boundary of the estate were only a short distance from the village. The gates themselves were open and someone, one of the estate workers probably, had used a snow-plough to clear a path through them. Beyond the grid that prevented cattle from straying, acres of rolling countryside lay beneath a winter carpet. They were still some distance from the house itself. A slight rise, on which a stand of larch and pine trees grew, provided a natural screen to the chimneys of Castle Howarth, but once that rise had been breached, the sprawling elegance of the mansion would be visible.
The Range Rover had no difficulty in negotiating this final hurdle and Helen, still feeling an unwilling sense of gratitude, was obliged to say something. ‘We made it,’ she murmured, forcing a note of courtesy into her voice. ‘I suppose—I suppose I should thank you.’
‘Don’t waste your breath.’ Rafe’s response was chillingly curt. ‘I only came to fetch you because I knew it was what the old lady would have wanted. Though I wonder if you have any conception of what you meant to her.’
Helen choked. ‘Are you accusing me of——’
‘I’m not accusing you of anything,’ he cut in shortly. ‘Just don’t expect those of us who cared about the old lady to feel much sympathy for you. You didn’t care about her. You almost broke her heart.’
Helen was speechless. She wanted to protest. She wanted to scream at him that she hadn’t broken her grandmother’s heart, he had; but the words wouldn’t come. The awful choking sobs were filling her throat again, and it was as well he could not hear them. She didn’t need anything from him, least of all his sympathy. She would suffer her grief in private, not in the company of the man who had done more than anyone else to reinforce the rift between them. He must know it. He must know how she despised him. Yet he could sit there and accuse her of not caring. It wasn’t fair. It simply wasn’t fair!
The Range Rover crested the rise and now the lights of the house were spread out below them. Even through the driving veil of snow, it was painfully familiar, and she remembered the first time she had seen Castle Howarth. Nan had brought her back here, after her parents’ funeral, and although she had been shocked, and a little tearful, her grandmother had quickly made her feel at home. Nan had always made her feel wanted, she acknowledged now, stifling a sob. Although their lives had drifted apart, she had always been there in the background, someone to turn to if things went wrong. For the first time, she wondered if her grandmother had ever felt the same way. And who had she turned to when she needed consolation?
Helen’s uneasy thoughts were interrupted by the realisation that the lights she could see seemed to be coming from the first floor as well as from the ground floor of the house. There were lights, too, in what she knew to be the formal reception rooms and the hall. The whole house seemed ablaze with lights, and her head jerked towards Rafe, seeking an explanation. The main apartments were never used, and someone must have authorised this extraordinary extravagance.
‘The old lady made me promise to open up the house for the funeral,’ he remarked, turning his head to meet her half-accusing gaze, and she saw the challenging glitter of his eyes. ‘There has been a stream of visitors ever since your grandmother died. I guess she knew what would happen, and she wouldn’t have wanted them received in her sitting room, even if that was where she spent most of her time.’
Helen found her voice. ‘Are—are you saying she asked you——’
‘I was there,’ Rafe responded flatly. ‘If you don’t like it, it’s just too bad. The dust-sheets have been removed, and Paget and the rest of the staff have been working themselves rigid trying to get the place in some kind of order before the old lady has to leave.’
Helen swallowed. ‘She’s—I mean—Lady Elizabeth is still in the house?’
‘In the master bedroom, yes. It’s the apartment her parents used. The bed she was born in. But not, regrettably, where she died.’
Helen moistened her lips. ‘You seem to know a lot about it,’ she said tightly.
‘She talked to me,’ Rafe replied without expression. ‘Well—here we are.’ He brought the Range Rover to a halt and switched off the engine. ‘You go ahead. I’ll fetch your things.’
Helen didn’t offer any protest. Now that she was here, the impact of death seemed all around her, and she climbed out of the car with an overwhelming feeling of loss. In spite of the lights burning so brightly in the windows, the house was empty, she thought dully. No false illumination could rekindle her grandmother’s spirit. She had to face the fact that Castle Howarth could never be the same. She had been welcomed here as a child, but she felt like an interloper coming back to claim her inheritance.
She guessed Rafe would expect her to climb the steps to the main doors, but she couldn’t do it. Time enough to stand on ceremony when she had to. Instead, she trudged through the snow to the side entrance she and Nan had always used. Right now, she needed the reassurance of familiar things, and she hoped Miss Paget had not neglected to light a fire in her grandmother’s sitting room.
The west wing curved in a half moon, away from the porticoed façade of the main building. Although the central elevation had three storeys and a castellated parapet, the wing Helen and her grandmother had occupied had only a single level. It was reached through a narrow arched doorway at the far end of the building. The door gave on to a short flight of steps that led up to a central corridor, and the windows of the apartments were at least ten feet from the ground.
Helen cast a fleeting glance over her shoulder before opening the heavy door and stepping inside. Rafe was still sitting in the Range Rover, evidently giving her time to make her entrance, but she found herself wishing he had come with her. It was ridiculous, after all they had said to one another, but Rafe seemed the one remaining link with her grandmother, and although she knew it would pass, right now even his cynical company would have been welcome.
She had reached the top of the steps and was hovering there, one hand still gripping the banister, when the door to the dining room opened and an elderly lady emerged. Small and rather dowdy, her thin, mostly-grey hair cut in its usual severe style, Miss Paget had aged considerably since Helen had last seen her. Yet, it wasn’t so much in her looks or her appearance, which Helen had always privately considered far in advance of her years. It was more in the way she moved, in the stiff, unyielding way she held her body; as if her bones had lost their flexibility and her limbs ached because of it.
She saw Helen at once, though she gave an involuntary start, as if her appearance was not altogether expected. ‘You came!’ she exclaimed, and then, as if realising her words could be misconstrued, she made an effort to recover them. ‘I mean—Rafe found you then. I heard the car, but I thought he was alone.’
‘No, he found me.’ Helen made an effort to keep her tone light. ‘It’s lucky he did. The weather is quite appalling.’
‘Yes.’ Miss Paget nodded. ‘I was just saying to Mrs Pride this morning, it’s just as well Lady Elizabeth isn’t going to be bur—I mean——’ She broke off in obvious confusion. ‘Forgive me. I’m afraid I hardly know what I’m saying.’
‘Oh, Paget!’ Helen made an involuntary movement towards her, but to her dismay the old lady stepped back from her.
‘Please,’ she said, glancing a little apprehensively behind her. ‘I’m sure you must be tired after your journey. Why don’t you go and freshen up? I don’t have to show you where your room is, do I? Your grandmother wouldn’t allow anyone else to use it. I’m sure you’d like some time to wash and,’ her gaze flickered over the vivid orange parka, ‘—and change your clothes. I’ll go and ask Mrs Pride to make you some tea.’
Helen stared at her without moving. ‘Paget,’ she said uneasily. ‘Paget, is something wrong?’ She shook her head. ‘Surely, you don’t believe I didn’t want to come to the funeral?’
‘Of course not.’ But Miss Paget’s denial was just a little too vehement. She pulled the shawl she was wearing closer about her shoulders and forced a faint smile. ‘Look, I must go and tell Mrs Pride you’re here. We’ll have plenty of time for talking later.’
Her retreat was slow and evidently painful, but it was a retreat just the same, and Helen felt a hollowing in her stomach. She stared after the old lady, unwillingly aware that what Rafe had said was true. Until now, she had been unable to believe that Paget had sent that awful telegram. But now she did. They had spoken together like strangers!
‘Do you want these in your room?’
Helen jumped violently at the unexpected sound of Rafe’s voice, and her vocal chords shook a little as she conceded that she did. ‘It—it’s along here,’ she said, avoiding his eyes as she led him to a room at the end of the hall. ‘Or—or do you know that, too?’ she added, a trace of bitterness invading her tones. ‘You seem to know everything else.’
She opened the door, and Rafe shouldered his way past her, carrying the cases into the room and dumping them unceremoniously in the middle of the faded Aubusson carpet. Then he straightened and regarded her without hostility.
‘I did try to warn you,’ he said, and when she could no longer sustain that cool green gaze, he cast a speculative glance about the apartment.
Seen through his eyes, it must look very old and very worn, thought Helen reluctantly, noticing the evidence of moth in the heavy damask curtains, and the bare patches in a carpet which had once been richly patterned. There was even a faintly sour smell of mildew in the air, as if the clumsy iron radiator, grunting in the corner, was having little success in banishing the damp atmosphere.
‘I suppose your apartment in London is the exact opposite of this place,’ Rafe remarked carelessly, and Helen stiffened.
‘It’s modern, if that’s what you mean,’ she agreed, holding meaningfully on to the door handle. ‘Thank you for——’
‘But I bet it lacks character,’ Rafe continued, pushing up the leather jacket and sliding his hands into the pockets of his trousers. ‘Doesn’t it?’
Unwillingly, his leisurely action had drawn her attention to the powerful width of his thighs, outlined beneath the fine woollen material. He had strong legs, long and muscular, and when he flexed his hands in his pockets, the cloth was stretched tautly across his flat stomach. His movements were not intentionally suggestive. She doubted he was even aware of her watching him. His muscled frame was entirely male; she would have had to have been blind to be unconscious of that fact. But what disturbed her was her awareness of the lean powerful body beneath the tight-fitting trousers, and she was shockingly reminded of how once she had thought of little else.
The memory stunned and sickened her. Dear God, she thought, why had she thought of that now? Ever since that terrible day, when Rafe had followed her from the barn and taken his revenge upon her, she had built a barrier between herself and any strong sexual emotion. Oh, she was not a virgin—her relationship with Adam had seen to that. And he had been flattered that she had, as he put it, saved herself for him. But the truth was her instincts in that direction had been strangled on that August afternoon when she was fifteen, and it had been a simple matter to keep her other boy-friends at bay when she herself had felt no compunction to change things.
And now, after all these years, to find her pulse-rate quickening and a feeling of moist heat flooding her thighs, she was filled with revulsion. She had only to remember what he had been doing to Sandra in the barn to rekindle the loathsome images that had haunted her for years. But those images didn’t help her here. She despised him, she told herself fiercely. He was an animal! And if her body had betrayed her, it was a measure of the fear he still provoked.
‘Doesn’t it?’
Rafe’s lazily provoking voice aroused her from the blackness of her thoughts, and she saw him looking at her a little strangely as she pushed the door back and forth on its hinges. ‘Wh—what?’
‘Your apartment,’ he jeered softly. ‘I was suggesting it had no character. But then, character doesn’t mean much to you, does it!’
Helen stared at him angrily, and then stepped stiffly aside. ‘Will you please go?’ she ordered coldly. ‘I’d like to have some time alone before Miss Paget comes back.’
‘Before you go to see the old lady?’ prompted Rafe, reminding her of the unwelcome duty ahead of her, and Helen’s lips tightened.
‘I shall pay my respects to Lady Elizabeth in my own time, Mr Fleming,’ she retorted, using the formal mode of address deliberately. ‘Now, if you don’t mind …’
Rafe lifted his shoulders in an indifferent gesture, and then strolled carelessly out of the room. Helen closed the door behind him with a satisfying thud. Then, resting her shoulders against the panels, she took several steadying gulps of air. She had to get a hold on herself, she thought furiously. If Rafe Fleming could disconcert her that easily, what chance did she have of establishing her authority here? She had to remember who she was, and who he was, and if she could only survive until the funeral was over, her problems would resolve themselves. No one, not even Rafe Fleming, could force her to keep him on her payroll. If, as she feared, judging by the deterioration of this room, the house had to be sold, he could take his chances with the new owners. She would not stoop to blackening his character, even though it was what he deserved. But it was unlikely he would find another employer as trusting as her grandmother.
Reassured by this assessment, Helen left the door to walk to the windows. Already her presence in the room was causing a film of condensation to form, and after casting a regretful look at the snow, she turned to survey her domain. She hoped the bed was aired. Lady Elizabeth had had no liking for modern springing, and all the beds had feather mattresses. They could be cosy on cold winter nights, Helen remembered, when their downy softness closed around you. But they could also be very uncomfortable if the mattress hadn’t been shaken and the feathers lumped together beneath your weight.
The room itself was much as it had been when she first came to live with her grandmother. A carved fireplace, seldom used now, and screened by a tall earthenware vase, occupied a prominent position on one wall. The windows took up a second wall, and the door into the adjoining dressing room and bathroom opened from the third. The bed, a square four-poster, stood against the wall backing on to the hall outside, its faded pink tester and embroidered satin coverlet matching the carpet and curtains. There were several pictures on the walls: old oil paintings, most of them; hung there in the days when it was considered unfashionable to waste any inch of space.
Now, realising she was just wasting time, Helen bent and lifted one of her suitcases, putting it on the carved oak chest conveniently placed at the foot of the bed. It was the chest where she used to keep her toys, and she wondered if her grandmother had kept all her old dolls. But there would be time enough later to find out. Particularly if she was forced to consider selling the house and everything in it.
Helen was in the bathroom when she heard someone come into the bedroom and, expecting it was Miss Paget, she came to the dressing room door. But it was not her old nurse who was standing in the middle of the room, holding a tray of tea. It was a young woman, probably about her own age, whose cool blonde features wore an expression of impatience. She was of medium height, perhaps a little heavier than Helen, but not much. However, she was wearing a striped nylon overall over a skirt and blouse, and Helen was obliged to assume that she was another employee.
Even so, Helen couldn’t help feeling embarrassed at her own appearance. It was one thing to confront her old nurse in her bra and panties, with strands of dark hair escaping from the coil at her nape, and quite another to confront a complete stranger. Of course, the lace-trimmed bra and silk briefs were probably as respectable as a bikini, but they were not a swimsuit and she was not on the beach.
‘I’ve brought your tea, Miss Michaels,’ the girl said, the look she cast about her eloquent of her disdain for a room already strewn with Helen’s belongings. In addition, every flat surface was covered with ornaments or photographs, and the suitcase Helen had opened seemed to be occupying the only remaining space.
‘Please—just put the tray on the bed,’ said Helen quickly, wishing she had been more prepared. ‘Er—thank you, Miss—Miss——’
‘It’s Mrs Sellers,’ replied the girl unsmilingly, setting down the tray with evident misgivings. ‘Oh—and Mrs Pride said to tell you she’d like to see you, when you have a minute.’
‘I see.’ Snatching up a silk wrapper, Helen pushed her arms into the sleeves, and came more fully into the room. ‘Do—do you work here, Mrs Sellers?’
‘Yes, miss.’ She was non-committal. ‘Is that all?’
‘As—as what were you employed by my grandmother?’ Helen persisted, unwilling to let her go without at least learning her occupation. ‘Have you been here long?’
‘About six months, on and off.’ Mrs Sellers evidently resented this inquisition, but Helen refused to be intimidated.
‘On and off?’ she prompted, and the girl expelled an obvious sigh.
‘My husband works for Mr Robinson,’ she explained after a moment. ‘When Mrs Pride needs someone to help out, she asks me.’
‘Oh.’ Helen nodded. Amos Robinson, as she knew very well, ran the home-farm. That was how Sandra Venables had come to be employed. Her father had worked for Amos Robinson, too.
‘Can I go now?’
There was a definite edge to the girl’s voice, and Helen wondered why. As far as she knew, they had never met, and she couldn’t believe her grandmother would have discussed her with the staff. With Miss Paget, perhaps. She had been more in the nature of a friend—a companion. And Rafe, for reasons best known to herself. But not with this sullen female, surely. Mrs Sellers simply did not inspire anyone’s confidence.
‘Yes. Thank you,’ said Helen now, dismissing the young woman with some misgivings. If Mrs Sellers was an example of what she was going to have to face by becoming mistress of Castle Howarth, perhaps she ought to consider selling the place with rather more enthusiasm.
Still, the tea was hot, and there was a plate of Mrs Pride’s home-made Dundee cake residing on the tray. Anxiety had made her hungry, Helen found, and she ate two slices of the rich fruit cake before replacing the black jumpsuit she had travelled in. It seemed as appropriate as anything else, and at least it was warm. She had already been reminded that this was not a place where one could trail about in one’s underwear without inviting goosebumps.
It was completely dark outside by the time Helen made her pilgrimage to her grandmother. Although it was barely four o’clock, night had closed in. Casting one final look out of her windows before drawing the curtains, Helen guessed the snow had finally brought traffic to a standstill. Nothing moved in the black and white landscape; nothing, that is, except the snow itself.
To reach the main portion of the house, she had to open the door into the corridor that led to the huge reception hall. For years now, the door had been kept locked, ever since a would-be burglar had broken into the conservatory and ruined all Mr Dobkins’ plants. The fact that Miss Paget had heard him and raised the alarm was no guarantee he would not come back, the police declared. Thereafter, a complicated warning system had been fitted to the doors and windows, and the door between the family wing and the rest of the house had been properly secured.
It was strange, walking through the empty building after so many years. Strange, and eerie, Helen decided, even though the lights were on, and someone had made an obvious effort to clear the place of dust. She had never thought about the shortness of life before, but she discovered death made one aware of one’s own mortality. It was chilling to remember the generations of Sinclairs who must have trod these corridors who were now only dust in the mausoleum at the church.
The great hall soared above her, two storeys high, with the galleried landing circling its cathedral-like dome. The staircase alone was at least twelve feet wide, and the twin banisters which marched beside it had been carved by a master craftsman. As long as Helen remembered, there had never been a carpet on the stairs, but now a richly-patterned broadloom had been spread from top to bottom. It cushioned her feet as she began to climb to the first floor, and added to the sense of other-worldliness that just being here had created.
The bedroom where her grandmother was lying was directly ahead of her at the top of the stairs. The huge crystal chandelier which had once lighted the way to the ballroom was dark this afternoon, the only illumination coming from wall-lights set in their sconces around the gallery.
Helen pushed at the door with fingers that trembled just a little, and then stepped back in alarm when the door refused to open. But it was only the heavy velvet curtains that hung inside the room catching under the door that prevented her entry, and she knew an hysterical urge to laugh when they finally fell aside. Just for a moment she had imagined it was an inhuman hand holding her at bay and, after all her self-analysis, she was inclined to give it more significance than it deserved.
All the same, her knees were decidedly unsteady as she advanced towards the bed. To her relief, lamps and not candles burned beside her grandmother’s body. She didn’t think she could have borne their wavering light in her present state of suggestibility and, even now, she was very tense. She had never seen a dead body before. She had been too young when her parents died, and there had been no one else. Of course, she hadn’t told Rafe that—or anyone else, for that matter—and in consequence she was apprehensive and perhaps a little bit fearful.
The sight of her grandmother, lying quietly beneath the embroidered bedspread, reassured her. Nan could have been asleep, she thought, impatient with herself. How could she have imagined she could be afraid of someone who had loved her? If Nan had done her no harm in life, why on earth should she be afraid of her in death?
Kneeling down beside the bed, she gazed at the much-loved figure. Oh, Nan, she thought, feeling the prick of tears behind her eyes, if only I had been here when it happened!
CHAPTER FOUR (#u27f0c2c2-352b-5eac-bcc5-64d1489e55cd)
HELEN saw Miss Paget for a few moments before dinner. The old lady knocked at her door soon after six o’clock to ask if she would like her meal serving on a tray, but Helen demurred.
‘We’ll eat dinner together,’ she said, and Miss Paget’s lips twitched a little involuntarily before she nodded her head in acquiescence.
‘As you wish,’ she agreed, the note of studied politeness still in her voice. ‘I’ll tell Mrs Pride. She wondered which you would prefer.’
‘Oh! Mrs Pride!’ Helen belatedly recalled the message the maid had given her. But since returning from seeing her grandmother, she had been sitting silently in her room, and she had completely forgotten the cook’s inquiry. ‘Yes. Yes, would you tell her, please? And—and would you also ask her to forgive me for not going to see her. I—well, I’ve had other things on my mind.’
‘Yes.’ Miss Paget received her explanation without comment. ‘Is seven o’clock acceptable?’
‘The usual time? Of course.’ Helen wished she knew how to get under her reserve. ‘I’ll look forward to it.’
However, when Helen made her way to the dining room some three-quarters of an hour later, she discovered they were not eating alone. Three places were laid at one end of the long rectangular table, and even as she was absorbing this astonishing phenomenon, Rafe Fleming appeared in the doorway that led to the adjoining library.
Helen’s anger was swift and overpowering. Who had invited him to join them? She had been anticipating an intimate dinner with Miss Paget, but how could she talk privately to the old lady with Rafe present? Or had Miss Paget brought him here? Was she so alarmed at the prospect of spending the evening alone with her erstwhile charge that she had begged Rafe to join them? Of course, he could have invited himself? He was very sure of his welcome here, and he might have decided to observe Helen’s difficulties first-hand. It was not a satisfactory explanation, but it was the one she liked best.
‘Do you want a drink?’ he inquired, propping his shoulder against the doorframe, and she saw the whisky tumbler hanging from his fingers. He had changed his clothes, she noticed inconsequently. The leather jerkin and woollen trousers had gone, and in their place was a flecked grey suit, with a loose-fitting jacket and narrow trousers. The fact that he wore the suit with a black collarless body shirt should have reassured her that he had no taste, but it didn’t. In fact, he looked disturbingly handsome, and the fact that Adam would not have been seen dead in such an outfit was no consolation.
‘What are you doing here?’ she demanded, taking refuge in an outright attack, and he straightened to regard her with weary tolerance.
‘I asked if you wanted a drink,’ he reminded her, raising his glass to his lips and throwing the remainder of the liquid in it to the back of his throat. Then he lowered the glass again, and arched a brow that was several shades darker than his hair. ‘Well? Do you?’
‘Where is Miss Paget?’ exclaimed Helen, not answering him. She pushed her hands into the pockets of her jumpsuit to hide their trembling and squared her shoulders. ‘Did she invite you here?’
‘Do I need an invitation?’ he countered, and then casting a glance over his shoulder, he stepped back into the room behind him. ‘Excuse me. I need another drink.’
Seething, Helen could only stand there while he sauntered across to the drinks cabinet and poured himself a generous measure of her grandmother’s Scotch—her Scotch, she corrected herself fiercely. He had a nerve, she fumed. She wished she had the guts to go and snatch the glass out of his hand.
‘Good evening.’
Miss Paget’s entry behind her provided a welcome diversion, and Helen turned eagerly. ‘Apparently we have a visitor,’ she said, trying not to sound too disapproving. ‘Mr Fleming is joining us for dinner. Did you know?’
‘Rafe?’ Miss Paget’s nervous fingers toyed with the fringe of her shawl. ‘Oh—didn’t he tell you?’ She moistened her lips as the object of Helen’s fury resumed his indolent stance. ‘I—he lives here.’
Helen sighed. ‘I know that,’ she said, somewhat tersely. What did Miss Paget think she was? An idiot? ‘I—just wondered why you had invited him to join us this evening. I had—hoped we might have an opportunity to talk.’
Miss Paget looked from Rafe’s knowing face to Helen’s, and then back to Rafe again. ‘I’m afraid you don’t understand, Helen,’ she said uncomfortably. ‘When—when I said Rafe lived here, I didn’t mean—on the estate.’
‘You didn’t?’
Helen was confused, but before she could begin to comprehend what Miss Paget was telling her, Rafe intervened: ‘What Paget is struggling—unsuccessfully—to convey is that I live here, in the house,’ he told her. ‘The old lady had one of the guest rooms and the maid’s room adjoining it turned into a self-contained suite. I’m sorry to disappoint you, but this is where I always eat. When I’m at home.’
Helen stared at him. ‘You—live—here?’ She couldn’t believe it.
‘For the past two years,’ said Miss Paget, evidently relieved that the onus had been taken from her. ‘It was what your grandmother wanted. She liked having a man about the place again.’
Helen said nothing, but her expression was eloquent of her feelings. So, he had actually insinuated himself into the house, had he? While she had been working to make a go of the shop, he had been working his way ever further into her grandmother’s confidence. Heavens, no wonder he had had the nerve to go through her grandmother’s correspondence looking for her address! He was probably used to taking advantage of his position! But not for much longer …
‘You look pale, Helen,’ he remarked now, and her nails drew blood in her palms. God, how she wanted to wipe that smug expression from his face. And she would—just as soon as her grandmother’s body was out of the house.
She didn’t remember how she got through dinner. Mrs Pride served the food herself, and Helen knew she must have said something to her, but she didn’t remember what. The meal—a savoury minestrone soup, followed by a joint of beef—was as appetising as Mrs Pride’s meals usually were, but Helen was too choked to even taste what she was eating. She swallowed little, pushing the food around her plate so that it would look as if she had eaten more than she had. But she was aware that Rafe was not deceived, and even Miss Paget looked a little anxiously at her plate, as if she was in some way to blame for Helen’s lack of appetite.
Refusing any dessert, Helen made her escape as soon as the meal was over, saying she would take her coffee in the sitting room. ‘If that’s all right with you,’ she remarked to Rafe, as she got up from the table, her eyes glittering with malevolent sarcasm, and he made a careless movement of his shoulders.
‘Why not?’ he drawled, making no attempt to deny that he had the right to choose, and her blood boiled.
‘Perhaps you’d join me, Miss Paget,’ she invited tensely, turning to the other occupant of the table. ‘I would be grateful.’
Miss Paget looked flustered, but as Helen had suspected, she had no convenient excuse. ‘Well—if you’d like me to,’ she mumbled, gathering the folds of her shawl about her shoulders, and Helen inclined her head. ‘I would.’
It was Helen’s first visit to her grandmother’s sitting room since she got back, and it was heart-achingly familiar. A piece of the crochet-work Nan used to enjoy was still lying on the arm of the chair she always sat in, and her spectacles were propped on the mantelpiece. It would have been so easy to give in to the emotional demands of the situation, but Helen could not permit herself that indulgence. If she allowed her feelings to get the better of her, she would never be able to meet Rafe on his own terms. Somehow, until this was over, she had to keep her feelings under control and, to do that, she had to know more about Rafe’s influence over her grandmother.
Miss Paget came into the sitting room with evident reluctance, and Helen made an effort to put her at her ease. ‘I believe it’s still snowing,’ she said, nodding towards the curtained windows. ‘What a pity we didn’t have a white Christmas.’
Miss Paget gave a birdlike nod, and seated herself in the chair Helen indicated. ‘We had a white New Year,’ she offered, holding out her hands towards the logs smouldering in the hearth. ‘Was it cold in London?’
‘Oh——’ Helen spread her hands in a rueful gesture. ‘It’s always cold in London.’ She hesitated a moment, and then determinedly seated herself in her grandmother’s chair. ‘So—how are you, Paget? You look tired.’
‘I’m all right.’ Miss Paget’s eyes flickered away from her companion. ‘Are you?’
‘As well as can be expected, as they say,’ Helen remarked lightly. And then, realising something more was required of her, she added: ‘I’ve been thinking of getting married, as a matter of——’
‘Married!’ Miss Paget’s agitation was totally unexpected. ‘Oh, no! You mustn’t!’
‘Mustn’t?’ Helen echoed the word disbelievingly before she realised Miss Paget was referring to the present situation. She hurriedly reassured her. ‘No,’ she said gently, leaning towards the old lady and touching her sleeve. ‘Not now, of course. Don’t upset yourself, Paget. Adam—my fiancé—he quite understands that what’s happened is bound to delay things.’ But did he, she wondered doubtfully. That particular aspect of the situation had never been discussed.
Miss Paget did not look too convinced and, changing the subject, Helen brought the conversation back to her original theme: ‘I suppose this has been an upsetting time for you. Nan’s death; it must have been quite a shock.’
‘It was.’ Miss Paget bent her head. ‘She always maintained she was so well. But Dr Heron says she’d had angina for years.’
‘Angina?’ Now it was Helen’s turn to be shocked. ‘And you never knew?’
‘None of us did,’ declared Miss Paget sadly. ‘Except maybe Rafe——’
‘Rafe!’ Helen was staggered.
‘I suspect she confided in him,’ the old lady continued. ‘They were very close towards the end.’
Mrs Pride’s intrusion with their coffee gave Helen time to gather her scattered senses. And as she did so, she realised this was the opportunity she had been hoping for. It was hard not to succumb to the impulse to tell Miss Paget how she really felt about Rafe’s influence over her grandmother, but she held her tongue. There would be time enough to explode that particular bombshell. For the present, it was better if Miss Paget thought her interest was innocent.
‘I think you said Rafe had lived in the house for the past two years, didn’t you?’ Helen ventured casually when they were alone again and, as she had anticipated, Miss Paget was not unwilling to answer questions of a more personal nature.
‘Almost,’ she replied, watching Helen attending to the coffee cups. ‘Ever since his mother died.’
Helen lifted her head. ‘Mrs Fleming’s dead!’ She had hardly known the woman, but she was surprised all the same.
‘Yes, it was a tragedy,’ agreed her companion ruefully. ‘Poor Rafe! To lose both his parents so quickly after one another. Of course, Mrs Fleming had had cancer for years, you know. I think everyone was surprised when Tom went first.’
Helen pushed the old lady’s coffee towards her, not trusting herself to hand the cup to her. In spite of her determination not to be so, she was nervous, and she had no desire for Miss Paget to notice the weakness.
‘So, that was when he moved in here?’ she prompted, refusing to feel any pity for him. No doubt it had worked out very well from his point of view, enabling him to prey on an old woman’s sympathy.
‘Your grandmother insisted,’ Miss Paget declared, lifting her cup and nodding over the rim. ‘And it’s been much better, having a man about the place; permanently, I mean. Two old women living alone: we used to be very vulnerable.’
‘Here?’ Helen couldn’t prevent the exclamation, but she hurriedly amended her tone. ‘I—wouldn’t have thought you were in any danger here.’
‘We did have that attempted break-in,’ Miss Paget reminded her sharply. ‘And one’s always reading about muggings in the newspapers. Besides, your grandmother liked having Rafe around. Ever since that business with Antonia Markham, I think she liked to know what he was doing.’
Helen smoothed her palms over her knees. ‘Antonia—Markham?’ she murmured, feeling an unwelcome stab of an emotion she refused to identify. ‘Who was—is—Antonia Markham?’
‘You remember the Markhams, don’t you?’ Miss Paget seemed to see nothing wrong in the question, even though it was hardly relevant. ‘They own High Tor. Antonia’s a couple of years older than you, but don’t you remember? You used to go to school with her brother.’
‘Oh—Julian Markham! Yes!’ Helen remembered him now. ‘We were in kindergarten together.’
‘That’s right.’ Miss Paget finished her coffee and set down her cup. ‘I knew you couldn’t have forgotten them. I believe you and your grandmother were invited to Antonia’s wedding. Only—of course—you were in London, so Lady Elizabeth … didn’t go.’ Just for a moment, Miss Paget’s confiding tones faltered. Evidently, she had just remembered to whom she was speaking, and Helen hurriedly urged her on:
‘Antonia’s married?’ she ventured, wondering at her own sense of relief, but the old lady ruefully shook her head.
‘She was,’ she murmured. ‘But it only lasted a couple of years. About four years ago, she came home again. That was when she took a fancy to young Rafe.’
Helen felt as if she was moving into ever deeper waters, but something was compelling her to go on. She wanted to know everything about him, she consoled her conscience, and ignored the small voice inside that insisted this was prying.
‘Thank heavens it wasn’t serious.’ To her relief, Miss Paget went on without any prompting. Apparently her desire to gossip far outweighed any scruples she might have, and Helen guessed she missed her grandmother’s sympathetic ear. ‘I was sure Rafe had more sense than to get involved with a girl like that,’ she added with a little snort. ‘Not that you can ever be entirely certain, of course. It was worrying while it lasted, I can tell you. Lady Elizabeth was very relieved when Miss Markham took herself back to London.’
Helen absorbed this information silently for a moment, and then she remarked guardedly: ‘He’s never been married then?’
‘Who? Rafe?’ Miss Paget gave her a curious look. ‘No. No, of course not!’
Why ‘Of course not!’ Helen wondered, but that was one question even she was too discreet to ask. Still, to her knowledge, Rafe had a perfectly normal interest in the opposite sex and, just because he had once assaulted her, was no reason to assume he had any other dubious proclivities.
‘My grandmother—trusted him, didn’t she?’ she tendered after a moment, realising she had now reached the most difficult part of the discussion. ‘I mean—she must have done, mustn’t she? To invite him to live in her house.’
There was a prolonged silence and then, just as Helen was deciding she would have to look elsewhere for her answers, Miss Paget cleared her throat. ‘Of course she trusted him,’ she said, and there was a note of accusation in her voice now, which had not been there before. ‘Who else would she turn to? After you—abandoned her!’
Helen had expected something like this, but even so she was taken aback, and because of that she was reckless. ‘Is that what he said?’ she demanded, casting caution to the winds. ‘Is that how he insinuated his way into her affections? By using my short-comings to endorse his own advantage?’
‘No!’ The old lady was appalled and, clutching at her shawl, she got painfully to her feet. ‘No, that’s not true!’
‘Isn’t it?’ Helen knew she was beyond redemption, but she had to make one last effort. ‘Oh, come on, Paget! He’s fooled you, just like he fooled my grandmother! The man’s an opportunist! He’s been using Nan to—to feather his own nest!’
The cliché was unworthy, but just at that moment Helen couldn’t think of an alternative. She was trying desperately to appeal to someone who by her very frailty, proved her fallibility. For heaven’s sake, she had to make her see that Rafe was out for all he could get.
Miss Paget was horrified. ‘Oh dear,’ she said, turning blindly towards the door. ‘Oh dear! I suspected this would happen. I told Rafe, but he wouldn’t listen to me——’
‘You told Rafe!’ Helen came to her feet in one shocked motion. ‘Just—just exactly what did you tell Rafe?’
‘No.’ Miss Paget shook her head. ‘No, I don’t want to talk about it any more. I knew I shouldn’t have come in here, but I did think that—that out of respect for your grandmother, you might desist in these—these unfounded accusations against a man who has never done you any harm!’
Helen caught her breath. ‘You can’t believe that!’ she exclaimed in a strangled voice. ‘Paget——’
‘My name is Miss Paget, if you don’t mind,’ the old lady declared, with a dignity that would have touched Helen had she not felt so betrayed. ‘And now, if you’ll excuse me …’
Конец ознакомительного фрагмента.
Текст предоставлен ООО «ЛитРес».
Прочитайте эту книгу целиком, купив полную легальную версию (https://www.litres.ru/anne-mather/the-longest-pleasure/) на ЛитРес.
Безопасно оплатить книгу можно банковской картой Visa, MasterCard, Maestro, со счета мобильного телефона, с платежного терминала, в салоне МТС или Связной, через PayPal, WebMoney, Яндекс.Деньги, QIWI Кошелек, бонусными картами или другим удобным Вам способом.