By Marriage Divided

by Lindsay Armstrong

  ‘Not really,’ Domenica sidestepped. ‘I just, well, don’t know if we can trust the man, for one thing. For another he did tailor his offer for Lidcombe Peace to suit our rather desperate circumstances and I find that…’ She shrugged.

  ‘But if this is true, it’s more than made up for it, Domenica. Who is he, by the way?’ Barbara asked.

  Domenica told them his name.

  Barbara looked blank but said all the same, ‘I think I’ll invite him to dinner. He must have some good reason for wanting to help out and—’

  ‘No—uh—Mum, just hang on a minute,’ Domenica broke in. ‘Let me check him out first before we plunge into wining and dining him. I’d also like to check out the Blacktown scenario for myself. Please?’

  ‘Well…’ Barbara looked undecided and Christy suddenly tapped the table with her fingers.

  They both turned to her. ‘It’s got to be the same one,’ she said, frowning. ‘Angus Keir, you said his name was, but does he own Keir Conway Transport?’

  ‘That’s him,’ Domenica agreed a shade darkly. ‘Do you know him?’

  ‘No, but I’ve been researching him for Bob’s next book tentatively titled New Money. Which he’s made a mint of, Angus Keir.’

  ‘Oh. A self-made man,’ Barbara said disappointedly and got up to make coffee.

  Domenica and Christy exchanged glances, although Domenica was actually feeling relieved, because nothing could dampen their mother’s enthusiasm more than ‘new money’. But she couldn’t resist asking Christy for more details.

  Her sister shrugged. ‘He was born and raised on a sheep station way out west. Apparently his mother deserted both he and his father, who was employed on the station as a boundary rider and wanted no other life. But Angus broke the mould. Exceptionally bright at what schooling he did grab, he—’

  ‘Started with one eccentric old truck and turned it into a transport empire,’ Domenica finished for her.

  Christy raised an eyebrow.

  ‘He told me that bit.’ Domenica propped her chin on her hands. ‘Is there more?’

  ‘He’s branched out a bit, he’s expanded his business overseas,’ Christy said thoughtfully. ‘In fact, I would say that Angus Keir knew exactly what he was talking about in regard to the Blacktown property and could probably make Mum a small fortune with the proceeds. But you obviously didn’t like him, did you, Dom?’

  Domenica looked into her sister’s dark, intelligent eyes. ‘I…don’t know why but he made me feel…nervous.’

  Christy considered. ‘On the other hand, to know that Mum was happy, settled and back in what she considers her rightful milieu would be such a weight off our minds, wouldn’t it?’

  Domenica glanced towards the kitchen doorway through which she could hear their mother musically exhorting the percolator to perk. ‘Yes, Christy,’ she said, ‘it would. But, please, just head her away from any plans to socialize with him until I, well, work a few things out.’

  ‘OK,’ Christy agreed. ‘If she mentions him again I’ll tell her he was a boundary rider’s son who didn’t get to finish high school.’

  They smiled ruefully at each other, then Domenica said slowly, ‘Not that you would know it—he looks and sounds anything but! Although—’ her mind roamed back ‘—perhaps he does have a slight chip on his shoulder. Do I often sound upper crust and la-di-da?’ she asked.

  Christy laughed. ‘Darling Dom, in fact you’re light years from being it, but there are times when you can look down your nose just like Mum!’

  Three weeks passed, during which Domenica forwarded a cheque to Angus Keir for the repairs to her car and investigated the Blacktown scenario. The cheque came back to her torn up but with no note.

  This annoyed her considerably but she decided not to pursue the matter. And, quite irrationally, it annoyed her even more to discover that his summing up of the Blacktown estate had been quite accurate. Through another real estate agent, she found out that the warehouse was, indeed, suddenly a much more valuable property.

  She tried to persuade herself that this would have become apparent to her anyway, through offers made for it, but she couldn’t persuade herself that she’d have known how much to ask for it.

  Then her mother rang one afternoon to tell her that she’d invited a few friends round for a cocktail party early that evening and would she please come.

  ‘Why such late notice?’ Domenica asked down the phone, with her mind elsewhere.

  ‘You know me, darling, I’m so scatterbrained, I was quite sure I’d told you about it, then I thought I better check, just in case! I was right.’

  ‘Who’s coming?’

  Her mother ran through a list of names, and added that she was dressing up.

  ‘All right, thanks, Mum, but I’m so busy, I might be a bit late. See you!’ Domenica put the phone down and shook her head. A couple of hours later, she remembered the party and had to shower and change on the run because she was already late.

  Damn, she thought as she wriggled into her favourite black dress and did a contortionist act to zip herself up. It was short and fitted, with narrow shoestring straps that crossed over her back, and she embellished it with a single strand of pearls, another bequest from her Lidcombe grandmother. Deciding she didn’t have time to fight with tights and it was too hot for them anyway, she slipped her feet into a pair of closed-toed black patent sandals with little heels, and applied some lipstick and eye shadow.

  But she hated rushing, she hated being late although she was not a great fan of her mother’s cocktail parties, so it wasn’t in the best of moods that she let herself into the Rose Bay house, convinced she looked less than her best and feeling quite breathless.

  Nor did it improve her mood at all to discover that she’d been right about Angus Keir—he did stand out from a crowd because he was the first person she noticed amongst the throng in her mother’s living room.

  CHAPTER TWO

  DOMENICA stopped dead and looked around wildly, catching Christy’s eye in the process. She delicately pointed towards Angus Keir but all Christy could do in return was shrug helplessly in a way that told Domenica she’d also been caught off guard.

  And as she looked back in Angus Keir’s direction it was to see that he had turned, and, from the mocking look in his eyes as they rested on her, had probably witnessed the little mime between sisters.

  Then Barbara was surging towards Domenica, slim, petite and chic in a beautiful blue chiffon cocktail dress spangled with gold swirls that was also brand-new. Not only that, her mother’s hair was cut differently and exquisitely styled, her make-up was perfect and her nails freshly manicured, leaving her elder daughter in no doubt that she’d spent hours in a beauty parlour some time today.

  But Barbara Harris was obviously happy and excited and as always, managing to infect everyone with her special brand of joie de vivre. It was a laughing, light-hearted throng in the room. And even Domenica, who had a very good idea of how much her mother would have splurged one way and another, felt her ire diminishing, although she would have loved to be able to hold on to it as Barbara kissed her and whispered that she was not to be cross because Angus Keir was quite delightful!

  Then she took Domenica’s hand and towed her across the room to Angus’s side, saying gaily, ‘Here she is at last, Mr Keir! I knew she wouldn’t let me down. Stay put, Dom, I’ll get you some champers.’

  Domenica took a deep breath and rubbed her nose to make sure it behaved itself. ‘Hi.’ She contrived to smile whimsically. ‘How are you? This is a bit of a surprise.’

  ‘So I gathered but I’m very well, thank you, Domenica,’ he returned, looking down at her quizzically. ‘Would I be right in assuming you warned your mother off me?’

  ‘Yes, as a matter of fact you would,’ she answered ruefully, although still managing to project good humour and taking the glass her mother put into her hand. ‘But if I’d known you were here, I would have worn high heels.’ She took a sip of champagne and wondered what had pos
sessed her to say this.

  Because Angus Keir allowed his grey gaze to wander down her figure in the short black dress to her shoes, then he let it drift upwards again, to linger on the bare skin of her shoulders and the curve of her breasts beneath the fine black material before he looked into her eyes wryly. ‘Why?’

  ‘Dom always has trouble finding men tall enough for her, Mr Keir,’ Barbara explained. ‘I expect that’s what she means, don’t you, dear?’

  ‘I do!’ Domenica confirmed, feeling like a clown but unable to help herself. ‘Thank you very much for paying for my car, by the way, but I wish you hadn’t.’

  ‘What’s this?’ Barbara pricked up her ears but was fortunately waylaid by a couple who had to leave early.

  And she moved away leaving Angus and her daughter in a pool of silence. He was wearing a dark suit this evening with a white shirt and a plain maroon tie. And there was something about him that made Domenica feel suddenly tongue-tied and oddly helpless, and very much reminded of the three uncomfortable weeks that had passed since she’d last seen him. Because while she mightn’t have seen him, she’d been unable to rid her mind of him.

  So she stared down at the glass in her hand stupidly until he said quietly, ‘You look sensational.’

  She raised her eyes to his in some confusion and put a hand to her head. ‘I was sure I looked a mess! It was such a rush I hardly had time to brush my hair.’

  A faint smile touched his mouth. ‘I guess it’s the kind of hair that would look gorgeous in any circumstances.’ His gaze rested on the glory of her dark hair, then he focused on her eyes. ‘Even straight out of bed.’

  ‘It is…’ she cleared her throat ‘…easy hair, probably because it’s thick and has a mind of its own.’ Then she closed her eyes briefly at the inference of what he’d said, and added barely audibly, ‘Don’t.’

  He raised an eyebrow. ‘Speculate?’

  She nodded, concentrating on her glass again.

  ‘I’ve been unable to stop myself from speculating about us for three weeks, Domenica.’

  Her lashes lifted and their gazes locked. And her mother’s lovely lounge at Rose Bay and all the party-goers in it receded even further as they exchanged a long, straight, telling look. Telling because she couldn’t cut the contact much as she might have wished to and, for whatever reason, neither did he. It was also an unspoken admission that, at that moment, there might as well have been just the two of them in the room.

  Because all her senses were receiving signals, she thought dazedly. It wasn’t only visual, it was much more. It was as if a slow tide of recognition was running through her that told her she enjoyed crossing swords with this man. She enjoyed pitting her intelligence against his, she would enjoy worsting him in a verbal fight, but she would also, she knew, enjoy going to bed with him.

  And demonstrating, heaven help her, she thought, that she was more than a match for his sheer, utterly sexy masculinity that no conservative charcoal suit and plain maroon tie could hide.

  But just as the colour began to flow into her cheeks at these wild, wanton thoughts that were not particularly like her, Christy came to her aid.

  ‘Excuse me,’ she said politely.

  Domenica wrenched her gaze from Angus Keir but not before she had the curious satisfaction of seeing him move his shoulders almost restlessly at the interruption.

  Then she was introducing Christy to him only to be told they’d already met, and finding herself taking several deep breaths in an effort to compose herself.

  ‘I believe Mum contacted you out of the blue?’ Christy said to him in her direct manner.

  ‘Yes,’ he agreed. ‘She said that, much as she loved both her daughters, she was finding their instincts for caution a little hard to take and she’d be only too happy to have my advice.’

  Domenica and Christy exchanged frustrated glances, and once again it was Christy who came to the rescue. ‘I guess this all came as a bit of a surprise and that’s why we thought we oughtn’t to rush into anything, Mr Keir.’

  ‘Of course,’ he murmured. ‘I quite understand.’ But the glint in his grey eyes that Domenica was on the receiving end of said something else—it was unmistakably satirical.

  She drained her champagne to stop herself from making any hot and unwise utterances, and replied evenly, ‘You were right about Blacktown, Mr Keir, that much I have established, and we’re very grateful for it. Whether we—’

  ‘Darlings!’ Barbara interrupted, coming back into their midst. ‘I hope you’re not talking business? I don’t think it’s the right time or place. Perhaps we could set aside an evening later this week. Would you care to come to dinner on Friday, Angus?’ She gazed at him appealingly.

  ‘I would have loved to but unfortunately I’ll be in Perth. The following Friday would be fine, however. Thank you.’

  Barbara looked gratified but Domenica compressed her lips as he shot her the most wickedly amused glance this time.

  ‘I was wondering if you’d like to have dinner with me later this evening, though, Domenica?’ he continued. ‘We could discuss Blacktown further in the meantime.’

  ‘I’m so sorry—’ she spoke without any plan, the words just seemed to come of their own accord ‘—but I’m otherwise engaged this evening.’

  ‘Oh, what a pity,’ Barbara said. ‘Well, let’s circulate, shall we? Angus, can I introduce you to one of my oldest friends?’ And she took him away leaving Domenica staring at his retreating back, and her sister Christabel staring at her.

  ‘So,’ Christy said, ‘that’s the problem!’

  Domenica blinked at her. ‘What?’

  Christy smiled gently. ‘Dom, the air literally sizzles between you two. When I came up, you might as well have been on another planet.’

  Domenica’s lips parted incredulously, then she took hold to say a little grimly, ‘Chris, the man rubs me up the wrong way and now Mum is calling him Angus and he’s calling her Barbara!’

  ‘I think I know why he rubs you up the wrong way.’

  Domenica gazed at her sister. ‘You do?’

  ‘Uh-huh. He’s not your type of man. You generally go for—’ Christy gestured ‘—more…more diffident men.’

  ‘I—do?’

  Christy smiled a little wryly. ‘You must admit you like to be in control of yourself, Dom. You always have. That’s why you and Mum clash sometimes, it’s why you’ve had the single-mindedness to make a success of Primrose, it’s why you sometimes come across as a bit high and mighty. But, so far as your love life goes, I don’t think it’s been such a good policy for you.’

  Domenica reached dazedly for another glass of champagne from a nearby table and regarded her little sister rather as an owl awoken in the middle of the day might. ‘And I thought you lived in a world of your own, Christy,’ she marvelled. ‘How long have you been cherishing these sentiments about me?’

  This time Christy grinned impishly. ‘A few years,’ she confessed. ‘But I wouldn’t have said anything if I hadn’t seen you and Angus Keir striking sparks off each other and I’m only saying it now because I don’t think it’s ever happened to you before and—’ she broke off and grimaced warily ‘—well, you could regret it if you don’t go for it—I think you deserve to live a bit.’

  ‘So does he—think that,’ Domenica commented a bit grimly.

  ‘There you go, then. It has been tough and you have been such a rock since Dad died.’

  ‘No, Christy, there I do not go. If it had come up any other way—’ Domenica shrugged ‘—who knows? But in these circumstances, it’s a bit like being held to ransom.’

  ‘Oh, well. But he is rather gorgeous.’

  Christy’s sentiments stayed with Domenica for the next half-hour, causing her to be a little preoccupied. Then something happened that put a different complexion on things. She’d managed to avoid Angus, although it could be seen that he was quite at ease and generating a lot of interest amongst her mother’s circle of friends.

  But
she happened to be standing next to him, although half turned away and talking to someone else, when Barbara’s clear tones and perfect diction made themselves heard in a slight lull.

  ‘Keir and, no, I’d never heard of the name either—new money, of course,’ she was explaining to someone, ‘but you really wouldn’t be able to tell he’s a self-made man.’

  The whole party missed a beat but only for a nanosecond, then it continued to flow but in that second Domenica caught sight, out of the corner of her eye, of Angus’s fingers tightening around the stem of his glass, then deliberately relaxing. In the next second, she made a surprising decision.

  She turned fully to him and, cutting across the conversation, said, ‘I’ve changed my mind. I will have dinner with you, if you’re still of the same mind. The only problem is—’ she smiled at him charmingly ‘—I’m starving so the sooner we go, the better.’

  His eyes narrowed and he paused, as if debating something, then he said formally, ‘It would be my pleasure, Miss Harris.’

  It wasn’t until they were in his Range Rover, driving away from her mother’s house, that they spoke directly to each other again.

  ‘What about your previous engagement, Domenica?’

  She ran her fingers through her hair. ‘I actually said I was otherwise engaged. Which was true. I was planning to do my washing and ironing but there’s always tomorrow for that.’

  ‘Believe me,’ he said dryly, ‘you didn’t have to give up a date with your washing and ironing on account of your mother’s unguarded tongue.’

  ‘Well, I thought I did, Angus.’ She used his first name for the first time. ‘I may look…stuck-up—’ she raised her eyebrows ‘—but I’m not really and I thought it was unforgivable—what she said.’

  He made no further comment until they were seated in a restaurant of his choice that was renowned for its food. But not only the food was exceptional, the ambience was superb. Each table occupied its own wood-panelled alcove with burgundy banquettes that you sank into against the lovely grain of real leather, while your feet sank into a thick-pile watermelon-pink carpet.