'What do you think of your sister's jet-setting,' she teased, 'if you're so adamant that there's no life beside island life? Don't you think that she might fall in love with Europe?'
'Youth,' he said airily, even though Emma suspected that he could not be more than twenty-five, 'will travel. Mind you, she'll be settling down soon enough when she marries Conrad.'
Emma nodded non-committally.
'Not,' he added, 'that she's too keen on the idea, although she assures me that she wants to have babies, and the sooner, the better. Fact is, though, she's only just twenty and she can't see herself in a mansion with only herself for company. Modelling's spoilt her somewhat. All that action. You know.'
Emma replied that she didn't really have a clue.
'Still,' he sighed, 'wedded bliss. It's got to happen some time. My number'll be up before I know it.'
She laughed sympathetically and, when he slipped his arm around her waist to walk with her to the bar, she relaxed against him.
A clipped, icy voice behind her made her swing around. Conrad was staring at her, his eyes cool and disdainful.
'Hope I'm not breaking anything up,' he said with no hint of apology in his voice. His hand snaked out, grasping her by the wrist and forcing her to face him. 'I've been looking for you,' he told her brusquely.
'What for? I'm managing perfectly well on my own!'
'So I see,' he muttered sarcastically. 'Do you normally find it so easy to mix with the crowd?'
'Yes!' Emma bit out angrily, yanking her hand away. 'Especially when "the crowd" happens to be someone as pleasant as Lloyd!'
'Well said, darling.' Lloyd grinned at her and winked. Out of sheer perversity she winked back, disregarding Conrad's thunderous look.
'Lighten up, Conrad.' Lloyd draped his arm around her neck and grinned disarmingly. 'Emma's not spoken for.'
Conrad ignored his remark. He looked at Emma and said, 'You. Follow me.' Then he turned away and began walking towards the house. Emma quickly and apologetically disengaged herself from Lloyd's stranglehold and followed Conrad's rapidly retreating back.
When she finally caught up with him, she rounded on him furiously. 'Just who do you think you are, dragging me away from a conversation like some kind of prisoner under arrest? Issuing orders for me to follow you, no less! If you want to throw your weight around, then I suggest you go do it with Sophia!'
'Call me your Guardian Angel,' he bit out, barely controlling his anger, 'I'm saving you from Lloyd, whose womanising reputation precedes him by several miles. From what I saw of him draped all over you, you were next on his list of conquests.'
'Well, thank you very much!' Emma said coldly, enunciating each word carefully. 'I can take care of myself, if it's all the same to you!'
She had no intention of telling him that the womanising Lloyd had in fact spent the last twenty minutes telling her about his girlfriend.
'Anyway, I'm not here to argue with you,' he told her tightly, 'I've just had a call from Esther. Alistair's taken a turn for the worse. She's calling the doctor. I'm going there now. I thought,' he added, emphasising the word, 'that you might like to come along with me, but if you're otherwise occupied...?'
'I'll get my bag,' Emma told him quickly, throwing over her shoulder as she walked away. 'You might have said that from the start, instead of beating about the bush. I'll meet you at the car in five minutes.'
She hastily apologised to Sophia's parents for her late arrival and early exit, nodding in frustration as they invited her to come again any time.
Her mind was racing ahead, praying that Alistair was all right and that it was all a false alarm. She knew that he was not well, but had never asked exactly how unwell he was. He had always been so alert with her that she'd never imagined it could be anything serious.
She, of all people, should have known that to rely on someone being alive indefinitely was to rely on an illusion. Hadn't her mother survived the car crash, told by doctors that she would be all right, only to die two weeks later?
Conrad was waiting by the car, his long fingers drumming impatiently on the bonnet. When he spotted
her running towards him, he stepped into the driver's seat, reaching out to fling open the passenger door.
'What exactly did Esther say?' Emma wanted to know, as the engine throbbed into life and he carefully manoeuvred the car out of the drive. 'Did she give you any details? I mean, is it a heart attack?'
'She just said to come quickly. He's collapsed. She's put him to bed and he seemed to be getting his colour back, but...'
Conrad let the sentence hang in the air and Emma bit worriedly on her lip. But... That implied all sorts of things, and none of them pleasant.
And she hadn't even told him about her mother, about her relationship to him. She should have. She should have told him from the start instead of settling on some damn fool idea of keeping it to herself until she got to know him better.
Now she could only hope that it was not going to be too late.
'Hurry up,' she urged Conrad, only to be told that narrow, twisting roads did not encourage speed.
'Relax,' he told her grimly, 'And for God's sake put your seatbelt on.'
Emma obeyed without thinking.
She settled back against the seat, absent-mindedly watching the landscape roll past. Coconut trees, glimpses of some of the bluest sea she had ever seen, white sand shimmering under the heat.
'Don't think the worst,' Conrad said with maddening self-control. He placed his hand on her leg and Emma felt the warmth of his hand singe her flesh like fire. She flinched away and he immediately withdrew his hand.
'Sorry,' he drawled. 'Forgot. You're a lady who doesn't like too much physical contact. Not even, it would appear, contact of the innocent kind. You prefer Lloyd's brand of highly suspect fondling.'
i never said that!' Emma protested angrily. 'And Lloyd's so-called "fondling" was not "highly suspect".'
She looked at him covertly, her eyes taking in his strong, tanned arms, the fine black hair curling around his watch-strap, the uncompromising lines of his face.
'As you like. Although I'm amazed you let him touch you. From the way that you recoil every time I accidentally brush against you, I would have thought that contact of any kind was to be avoided.'
Emma was stung by his assumption. 'Just because I'm not attracted to you, it doesn't mean I'm afraid of physical contact.' She lifted her chin defiantly. Conrad's eyes flicked away from the road for an instant, resting on her full lips.
Emma looked away in confusion. Wasn't it a good thing that he thought her some kind of ice maiden? If she had any sense at all, she would work on cultivating the image instead of seeing it as an accusation. Ice maidens didn't react to men like Conrad. She would do well to remember that.
'Is Lloyd more your type of man?' Conrad asked in a tone of mild interest.
He had slowed the car down to compensate for the narrowing of the roads. Every so often, he would have to swerve slightly to avoid ruts in the tarmac.
Emma's stomach tightened at his question. The air- conditioning in the car had been switched on, but she felt suddenly hot. She rolled down the window fractionally, but, feeling the blast of hot air, she immediately rolled it back up.
'I don't have a type,' she replied stiffly, folding her arms across her chest. She could feel her breasts hard under the soft fall of her dress, the nipples pressing against the thin material.
She had a wild yearning desire for him to reach out and touch her. Her fingers tightened on the bare flesh of her arms, leaving red indentations.
'No,' Conrad agreed softly. At that moment he swerved to avoid a deep rut, sending the car jolting to one side. Emma's arm banged against the car door and she yelped.
'Are you all right?' Conrad asked, slowing the car to a standstill, but keeping the engine running.
'I can see why you insist on seatbelts.' Emma rubbed her arm and examined it.
'Let me have a look.'
'No!' she
snapped, watching with consternation as he unfastened himself and stretched across her. She forced herself to appear calm. 'It's fine. Let's just get going and get this journey done with. Please. I want to see how Alistair is, and the sooner we get there, the better.'
Conrad shrugged and turned away. 'Suit yourself, but I'd rather not have two invalids on my hands.'
As the car pulled slowly away, Emma relaxed against the cushioned headrest and breathed a sigh of relief.
She closed her eyes and relinquished herself to the swaying of the car. She had over-reacted again, she realised. She had spent years erecting invisible barriers between herself and the opposite sex, only to discover that when she most needed them they were lying crumbled at her feet.
When she next opened her eyes the car was swinging into the drive to Alistair's house.
Emma sat up abruptly. All her previous anxiety had resettled like a knot in the pit of her stomach. Before the car had stopped, she was fumbling with the doorhandle and unfastening her seatbelt.
She ran up to the front door and let herself in, aware that Conrad was following behind her but at a more leisurely pace.
'Where is he?' she asked Esther, who had appeared from the kitchen.
'Upstairs, with the doctor.'
Emma turned to Conrad. 'What shall we do? Do you think we ought to go up and see what's happening?'
'I think we can rely on Doctor Tompkins to emerge in due course and tell us what's happening,' he replied drily. 'There are no ambulances and he hasn't been taken to hospital, so I think we can assume that he's in a stable condition.'
'You're so practical!'
'Well, one of us has to be.' He smiled at her and his face was transformed.
'You should smile more often,' she said impulsively.
His smile broadened to a grin. 'I do. Quite often. You just spend so much time arguing with me that you don't get to see it.'
'Me?' Emma's green eyes looked at him incredulously, 'I never argue with you! It's always the other way around!'
'There you go again.'
She felt a sudden surge of warmth towards him. She knew instinctively what he was trying to do with his light- hearted bantering. He was trying to relieve some of her tension, to relax her, and it was working.
She heard Doctor Tompkins descending the staircase and raised her eyes to him with a sense of dread.
is he going to be all right?' Conrad strode towards the doctor, looking strangely incongruous in his shorts and T-shirt next to the doctor, who was more formally dressed, and carrying his black bag.
Doctor Tompkins was thin and dark, his curly hair almost completely grey, with a crisp, efficient manner. He looked reticently towards Emma, as if asking himself whether he should recognise her.
'She works for Alistair,' Conrad informed him in a clipped voice, correctly interpreting the question mark in his eyes. 'You can speak freely in front of her.'
The doctor nodded and said in a precise, professional tone that Alistair had expressed a desire not to have him discuss his condition with either Conrad or Emma.
Conrad looked at the doctor in surprise. 'Why not?'
Doctor Tompkins shrugged and looked at his watch. Tm running late for another appointment.' He glanced at them and his face softened. 'I've given Mr Jackson a prescription. Two tablets to be taken three times a day. He's to take it easy. Rest, relaxation and no drink whatsoever, not even a smell of whisky.'
'But he's going to be fine,' Emma interjected. 'Isn't he?'
'He wants to explain it to you himself, i really don't know why, but, as you are well aware, I'm duty-bound to adhere to a patient's wishes.'
Conrad nodded in silence.
'I'll be back in a couple of days' time to check him over.'
They both watched as the doctor shut the front door firmly behind him, and turned to each other. Coming hard on the heels of her anxiety of a few moments before, Emma had a feeling of bewildered let-down. What did the doctor mean that Alistair wanted to talk about his condition to them himself?
When they entered his room, it was to find the old man propped up in his bed, his face pale and subdued.
He looked at them both and gestured to Emma to sit next to him.
'I'm an old man,' he began pathetically. He looked at his hands and shook his head.
'What did the doctor say?' Conrad asked, breaking into what looked like a budding monologue on old age. He had his emotions under a tight rein, but even so Emma could detect in him the same worry that she was feeling.
Only, she guessed, he would not be the sort to rant and rave and tear at his hair. That strong, self-imposed
discipline of his was too ingrained in his personality to .ever give way like that.
'I'm to rest,' Alistair told them in a low voice. He turned to Emma and informed her sadly that he was not the man he used to be.
With an impulsive gesture, she reached out and slipped her hand into his. She looked up at Conrad and met cool, icy eyes.
'You still haven't told us what the doctor said, apart from that you need to rest. Which, incidentally, is what he's been saying for the last five years.'
Conrad approached the bed, his hands in his shorts pockets. 'What did the doctor say?'
'I'm sorry I dragged you both away from your party.'
'Never mind about the party,' Emma murmured reassuringly, receiving an affectionate pat on the hand.
Alistair sighed deeply, and was it her imagination or could she see tears pricking at the back of his eyes? She felt her heart constrict. All those feelings that had assailed her in the wake of her mother's death were with her again, and there was regret too. She had known Alistair for so short a time, too short.
She had still not recovered from the death of her mother. She still felt the loss that came when someone whose presence had been around from time beginning suddenly was no longer there. She did not want to think of the pain of having to endure a second loss.
'He doesn't know how much longer I've got,' Alistair said heavily. He pressed his fingers to his eyes as though wanting to shut out the seriousness of his words.
Emma gasped in shock. She had been expecting the worst, and now that it had been confirmed an icy chill settled on her.
Conrad was looking at him, his face controlled, his expression unreadable. He sat on the side of the bed, opposite Emma, his vivid eyes resting on Alistair's face.
'Is there anything we can get for you?' he asked roughly.
'My children.' Alistair either didn't hear or else chose to ignore Conrad's question. 'I've spent a long time acquiring wealth, and at the end of the day I'm not sure if I've managed to acquire happiness. There are a lot of things in life that I regret doing, and even more I regret not having done. Now I'm an old man with not much longer left to live. I want to speak my mind.'
He turned to Conrad, 'You might tell me that it's none of my business, but you really musn't marry Sophia. She's too young, and too...' He searched for the right word. 'Too stupid for you. I know it's convenient and that you've known her off and on for a long time, but that doesn't make it right. I guess I'm the last person in the world to offer advice about marriage, but you can forgive the frankness of an old, dying man.'
'I know how you feel about this engagement, Alistair,' Conrad said, with a touch of impatience in his voice. 'You've spoken to me about it frequently enough. What we want to find out is exactly what the doctor said to you.'
Alistair ignored him. it would be different if you were madly in love with her, but this plan of yours to commit yourself for life to someone merely because it happens to be convenient... Well, it can only end in tears.'
Conrad was wearing the caged, helpless look of someone who wanted to argue a point, and was resisting through sheer will-power.
He ran his fingers frustratedly through his black hair and frowned heavily. 'We've been through this a thousand times, Alistair, from every conceivable angle, and..
it would, of course, be my dying wish,' Alistair treated
Conrad's interjection with admirable nonchalance, 'to see you married, but to the right girl. Someone with energy and a mind of her own. Someone who could
relate to you on an equal basis.' He glanced at Emma and smiled, absent-mindedly patting her hand.
Oh, no, she thought; oh, no. Matchmaking? He had just finished informing them that he was old and ill, and yet he still could find time for matchmaking?
A hundred little things suddenly slotted into place, like pieces of a jigsaw puzzle. She was torn between an aching compassion for Alistair—a sick man after all— and a strong desire to inform him that there was no way that Conrad was going to find someone with energy and a mind of her own, if that someone just happened to be her. They only just managed to tolerate each other, for heaven's sake! Besides, Emma was convinced that men did not suddenly change their tastes in women. They were drawn to variations of the same type, either physically or intellectually. And she had seen ample proof of the sort of women Conrad preferred.
For that matter, he was hardly to her liking.
She sat upright.
'I think we should leave you to rest now.' Conrad's words managed to rescue the silence which had threatened to become embarrassingly prolonged. 'There's no point in overtiring yourself, that much the doctor did impart,' he added pointedly.
'Yes, perhaps you're right.' Alistair shut his eyes and sank lower into the bedclothes. 'Could you send Esther up with some lunch for me?' he asked in a weak, tired voice. 'A poached egg and some salmon, and perhaps just a piece of some of that coconut sweetbread she made yesterday. Also a cup of sweet tea and a slice of her ginger cake.'
'Salmon? Coconut sweetbread? Ginger cake, for heaven's sake? Should you be eating that sort of stuff?' Conrad stood up and looked down at Alistair through narrowed eyes.
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