CHAPTER FIVE
TWO days later, she received a call from Jackie. At the office, despite the fact that she had spent months telling her sister that personal calls were frowned upon. It was all water off a duck’s back, of course. If Jackie wanted to get in touch, and it just so happened that the inclination fell some time between the hours of eight-thirty and five-thirty, then ring the office she would, without a moment’s hesitation.
‘How are you?’
Claire heard her sister’s authoritarian voice down the end of the line with a certain amount of foreboding. Experience had taught her to decipher the various undertones her sister unconsciously used, and right now there was something vaguely meaningful about the greeting, so she frowned and said without preamble, ‘I can’t talk, Jack, Tony’s lurking around, ready to pounce.’
‘I’ll have to meet this Tony,’ Jackie replied smoothly. ‘He seems to spend all his time, according to you, lurking around, ready to pounce. Doesn’t the man do any work?’
‘He thinks on his feet,’ Claire murmured vaguely, liking her sister’s tone of voice less and less.
‘And in front of your desk, from the sounds of it. Are you sure he’s not giving you the eye? You know how incredibly naive you can be sometimes.’
‘Don’t be ridiculous!’ Claire defended, grinning reluctantly at that inaccurate shot in the dark. ‘Tony’s more attracted to himself than he is to me.’
There was a pause and Claire waited patiently for the inevitable enquiry into her frame of mind. Jackie was solicitous to the point of smothering sometimes. She didn’t want sympathy, though, not even of the well meaning variety. All she wanted was to forget that James Forrester had ever existed. If she could have somehow contracted a temporary bout of amnesia, she would have grabbed at it because thoughts of him were driving her mad, even though she knew that the best thing she had ever done, for her own state of mental well-being, was to have walked out on their abortive relationship. It was funny how she could hurt and yet still remain strong enough to realise that she was simply hurting from the inevitable.
‘How are you, Claire?’ her sister asked. ‘Really?’
‘Fine.’
‘You don’t sound fine.’
‘Jackie,’ she began, getting a little impatient, ‘I honestly can’t afford to spend too much time on the phone, chatting. I’ve got heaps of work to get through.’
‘What you mean is that you don’t want to talk about him. I understand. Enough said. I’d probably have been exactly the same. Not,’ she couldn’t resist adding, to Claire’s amusement, ‘that I would ever have allowed myself to become involved with a man who hadn’t got me way up at the very top of his list of priorities. Tom would never have used me as a bed companion. He wouldn’t have dared.’
Tom was her husband, a thoroughly nice man, and Claire wondered how he would react if he knew that his wife was quietly making him out to be henpecked. He wasn’t henpecked at all, as far as Claire had ever seen. He just knew how to handle Jackie. He gave her free rein to do as she pleased, just as long as it suited him. In his own good-natured, amiable way he never allowed her to stray too far.
‘You can be rather commanding,’ Claire murmured, her attention straying to the layout she was working on. It needed a few touches to complete it and she began doodling them in.
‘Anyway,’ Jackie said in a businesslike voice, ‘I won’t keep you any longer. The prowling boss is already probably on his way over to your desk to club you over the head for having spent four and a half minutes on the telephone when you should be doing your drawing…’
Claire smiled at that. Jackie had always thought of her job as doing a spot of drawing, like a child dabbling about with crayons in a kindergarten class. She had no idea how long it took her to perfect her lettering, or to rework her layouts when Tony threw them back at her with some vague request to make the ‘whole thing a little more modern’, or ‘take out some of the colour. We want subtle not sizzling.’
Jackie had an undemanding part-time job at a gallery, and it suited her fine. It gave her the opportunity to earn a little bit of money, though she hardly needed to given Tom’s income, and it also fitted in with Freddie, her four-year-old son, who was endearingly hyperactive and could reduce her to a dithering wreck faster than anyone else.
‘I just wanted to make sure that you were all right. Not thinking of doing anything silly.’
‘Yes, I’m fine,’ Claire said, doodling furiously on her layout.
‘Good. Oh, just one last thing. We’re having a little party this Saturday, and I think it might be a good idea if you came along.’
‘No, Jackie, honestly, you know…’
‘No more than twenty people, and quite a few eligible young men. There’s no point pining away up there in the back of beyond.’
‘I’m not pining! And Reading isn’t the back of beyond. In fact, I have some very good friends around here. I’ll make sure that I go…’
‘Kicks off around eight-thirty. I’ll meet you at the station, as per usual. When are you ever going to get a car? Why don’t you come down in the morning and we can do a spot of shopping. Buy some nice clothes instead of your usual uniform of jeans and jumpers.’
‘No, I…’
‘OK. I’ll see you in the evening, then. Catch the six-thirty train, then you can give me a hand with everything. And please wear something dressy?’
Claire opened her mouth to protest and heard the dead sound of the dialling tone.
So that, she thought, had been the object of the phone call. Jackie wanted to rescue her from a life of maudlin moping about, and, in her usual organisational way, fix her up with some thoroughly suitable young man. That didn’t provide too much of a headache because she had no intention of going to any party, nor had she any intention of being fixed up with one of her sister’s proteges. A bit nearer the day, towards the end of the week, she would phone and make her excuses. Flu was always a reasonable alibi in cases like this.
She promptly forgot about the invitation and spent the remainder of the day trying hard to concentrate on what she was doing.
They were having a busy period. Tony was rushing about the office like a mad chicken, tearing his hair out with a theatricality which suggested that at least part of it was put on. She barely had time to look up from her drawing-board, which was something of a relief since it took her mind off things to some extent.
They had been volunteered, without exception, to work overtime and by the time Claire stood up, stretched her legs and began packing away her paper and pencils, it was after eight and already dark outside.
Tony shot her a look which suggested that eight o’clock was hardly an acceptable time for departure, considering everyone else would be working for at least another hour, and Claire met his stare with a polite but firm smile.
Just you dare saunter over here, she thought, and say anything. Little Miss Obliging Claire Harper was no more, a fact which he would rediscover soon enough if he even so much as suggested that she was deserting her post.
He must have read the expression on her face, though, because he made no attempt to stop her and she left the office with a little feeling of triumph.
It was another cold night and she pulled her jacket around her as she stepped outside. At this hour, Reading town centre was not a particularly pleasant place to be. The offices were largely deserted and a different crowd emerged to fill the streets. Young boys with weird haircuts and girls in tight skirts and high heels. All perfectly harmless, no doubt, but they made Claire feel edgy. She jumped on to her bike and was about to cycle off to Karen’s house when she heard the sharp beeping of a horn.
Of course she had no intention of looking around. She headed off and within minutes was aware of being followed by a car, cruising along with its headlights beaming down on her.
Now she was more angry than scared. She stopped, jumped off her bike and spun around to be confronted by James, who had stepped out of the car and was standing on th
e pavement watching her. There was a light, cold breeze blowing and it gave him a tousled, rakish look, despite the fact that he was still wearing his suit.
‘What,’ she spluttered furiously, ‘the hell do you think you’re doing?’
Had it only been a matter of hours since she had last seen him? she wondered. He seemed taller than ever, more powerful. She couldn’t make out the expression on his face, it was too dark for that, but she could see the hard-boned, aggressive lines and it sent a little forbidden shiver through her. It was a reaction which she stifled almost as soon as it had appeared. Once she would have let that little shiver control her, send her foolish heart spinning, but that seemed like a long time ago. Now she was developing that hard edge born out of bitterness and necessity which would give her protection against treacherous emotions.
Every nerve in her body seemed to have moved into another gear, though, and she still had to force herself to appear cool and polite.
She had no intention of forgetting his little amusing game yesterday at her expense. Turn the key and watch her react, then stand back and snigger, all to prove a point.
‘Didn’t you hear me blow my horn?’ he asked, leaning casually on the open door and surveying her.
‘I heard somebody blowing their horn,’ Claire answered. ‘I assumed that if it had been someone I knew, they would have identified themselves. Though why should you? I suppose you assume that you’re exempt from little acts of courtesy like that.’ She hopped back on her bike and threw over her shoulder in the same freezing voice, ‘I’m surprised you didn’t just blow a whistle and expect me to come running and salute.’
He didn’t answer. She heard his car door slam, then the squeal of tyres as he accelerated in front of her, blocking her path, forcing her to dismount.
Claire looked at him furiously and began hoisting her bike on to the pavement, but he pushed open his door and ushered her forcefully to the passenger seat.
‘Take your hands off me!’ she yelled, attracting a few stares which didn’t seem to bother him in the slightest, even though they bothered her quite a bit. She found herself lowering her voice and glaring at him accusingly.
‘You can’t just swan along here and…and accost me!’
‘I’ll put that thing you call a bike in the boot.’ He opened the passenger door and pushed her in, then slammed the door behind her.
Claire sat there, fuming, waiting, then, as soon as he had sat down next to her in the driver’s seat, she turned to him, spitting fury.
‘Very macho,’ she snapped, twisting to look at him. The engine was still running, that distinctive deepthroated purr made by very powerful cars, but he wasn’t about to move off. His hands weren’t even on the steering-wheel. They were clasped behind his head as he leaned against the door and looked at her in a way that seemed to say, All right, if you want to yell, go ahead and get it out of your system. That made her even more speechless with anger.
‘I could report you for kidnapping,’ she said wildly because he was unnerving her with that shuttered stare of his.
‘Don’t be ridiculous.’
‘Well, I’m certainly not sitting here of my own free will! What are you doing here, anyway?’
‘I always wondered what your office looked like.’
She had no idea what that remark was supposed to mean and she gave him a look that said, Oh, really, you must think I was born yesterday. ‘That’s news to me,’ she said coolly. ‘You never expressed the slightest bit of interest in where I worked before. Maybe that would have been a little too familiar for your liking? After all, we were only sleeping together. Why on earth should you give a damn about my life outside the bed?’
‘You’re exaggerating,’ he drawled with an unsmiling face. ‘Of course I knew what you did for a living.’
‘Oh, yes,’ Claire said sarcastically, ‘I forgot. You did. After all, I spent long enough enthusiastically telling you all about my job. What fun you must have found that. You still haven’t told me what you’re doing here.’
‘When do you intend to collect the rest of your things from the cottage?’
That hurt. He wanted her out, but did he have to be so damned blunt about it?
‘As soon as possible,’ she said stiffly. ‘I would have collected it after work this afternoon, but Tony asked me to work overtime.’
‘Oh, Tony asked you to do that, did he?’ James said in a voice that made her flush. ‘And what else does Tony ask you to do, out of interest?’
‘You have a disgusting mind.’
‘Is that how you’d describe it? I would say worldlywise.’ He was watching her intently. He looked away, staring out of the window for a while, then, without speaking, he slipped the car into gear and pulled away from the kerb.
He knew the way back to Karen’s house without having to be reminded of the directions and Claire sat in an uncomfortable silence, hating being this close to him, but nevertheless feeding off his presence, off that electricity that seemed to radiate out of him. It wasn’t fair. She was beginning to get to grips with her situation, wasn’t she? Why did he have to come along and sabotage all her groundwork?
‘You used to work a fair amount of overtime when we were seeing each other,’ James said lazily, flicking her a sideways glance. ‘All at Tony’s request?’
‘No,’ Claire snapped, as the car pulled up to the kerb and he switched off the engine to face her. ‘Sometimes I volunteered the overtime myself.’
His face didn’t change, but the expression in his eyes hardened. ‘They say that bosses can have an awful lot of sex appeal, because of their position.’ He tapped the keys dangling in the ignition, lightly. ‘A bit like the way a doctor invariably has a supply of adoring patients somewhere in the background. I never paid too much attention to what you used to tell me about Tony, but I can remember his name cropping up frequently enough.’
‘I work for him. Of course, his name was going to crop up.’
The green eyes, fringed with black lashes, shot her a brooding look. ‘Of course. Now, though, I wonder whether I should have been a bit more suspicious.’
‘You’re right,’ Claire said on a sigh, ‘you should have been more suspicious. We’ve been indulging in a torrid affair for months. In fact, we can’t keep our hands off each other!’
Something dangerous flickered in his eyes, but then he glanced down and it was obvious that he was amused by her response.
‘When do you want me out of the cottage?’ she asked. ‘I’m tired and I don’t feel inclined to spend the remainder of the night sitting in this car squabbling with you.’
‘You’ve really changed, haven’t you, Claire?’ he asked in an odd voice.
‘You make that sound like an insult,’ she said, looking away. She hated this drag of her senses that she felt whenever she was near him, this compelling urge to be near him even though they really had nothing further to say to one another. She realised that she was clenching and unclenching her fists and she had to make an effort to sit still and calm. It was all so much easier being reasonable and logical and pleased with herself when he wasn’t around.
‘You’ve shed some of that wide-eyed trust.’
Claire shrugged. ‘Don’t we all, at some point?’ She met his eyes steadily. ‘Maybe I picked that up from you, a little trait of yours that rubbed off. Not that I can picture you ever being the trusting sort. Were you? Did your wife’s death turn you into the person you are today or were you always suspicious and cynical?’
His mouth tightened and she could see in the shadows that his face was clenched in anger.
Where was this light-headed courage coming from? she wondered. He was right. She had changed and she couldn’t believe that she had ever been that naive, innocent girl. She had thrown herself at him, been so eager to please; was it any great surprise that he had accepted what she had bent over backwards to hand Him on a silver plate?
‘Experiences made me the man I am now,’ he said. He reached out and, before she coul
d stop him, his hand was on her chin, forcing her to look at him. ‘Not that you ever seemed too dissatisfied with me—or should I say with what I could do for you?’ His eyes flicked to her mouth and she read the sensual demand there with detachment. Was he trying to prove, yet again, that he still had a great deal of power over her, despite what she said?
‘When,’ she said calmly, even though her heart was hammering, ‘did you say you wanted me out?’
‘I didn’t and I don’t. A business acquaintance from America is going to be here for a few weeks, but I can always make alternative arrangements if you want to stay on. We’re both adults, and let’s not beat about the bush here: I want you and the feeling’s mutual. So why throw what we have to the winds because of some misguided sense of morality?’ His voice was husky, full of that smouldering charm that could knock you sideways.
She just hoped that he wasn’t going to try and kiss her. It was bad enough keeping up this mimicry of self-control, but she knew that if those firm, warm lips descended on hers there was a good chance of her precious self-control being blown to bits.
‘You mean you’d sleep with me even though you think I was after your money?’ She injected incredulity into her voice.
‘Yes,’ he replied bluntly. ‘I would.’
‘How flattering for me!’ she exclaimed with an icy smile. His face was inches away from hers, and she had to steel herself against the disturbing images that threatened to grab her by the throat. Images of them in bed together, talking, laughing, eating out in various pubs and restaurants. Had he enjoyed any of those things or were they necessary evils to be borne in his game of seduction? If he had kept his wife a secret from her, then what else had he been hiding?
‘I wouldn’t dream of putting you through that crisis of conscience, though,’ she added soothingly. ‘So you’d better start looking for someone else to share your bed.
I’ll collect my things tomorrow, and now’ she drew
back and flipped open the car door ‘—if you’ll excuse me? And,’ she said, turning to face him, ‘another thing. Please don’t come near me again.’
Shadows of Yesterday Page 8
