The Price of Retribution

by Sara Craven

  The girl shook her head. ‘It’s strict policy not to discuss past or present employees with anyone outside the firm. If you’re related to Miss Griffiths, I suggest you ask her what you want to know. Good afternoon.’ She opened a file on the desk in front of her and began checking figures with ostentatious care.

  ‘Thank you,’ Tarn said coldly. ‘I will.’

  But when I do, she thought as she left the building, will I find myself walking into yet another brick wall? Oh, Evie, what on earth have you been doing?

  ‘I hear you’ve found a flat,’ said Grace. She and Tarn were sitting in Fortnum and Mason’s having tea. ‘I’m amazed you could prise Caz out of his old one, but I suppose love will always find a way.’

  Tarn smiled awkwardly. ‘Oh, I don’t think he minded too much.’

  ‘Well, I wish we were having the same luck tracking down a wedding dress for you.’ Grace poured the tea and proffered a plate of cream-filled pastries. She went on wistfully, ‘Have you seen nothing at all you liked today?’

  ‘I’m afraid not,’ Tarn fibbed, adding more truthfully, ‘But I feel really guilty dragging you all round London on a wild goose chase.’

  ‘I’m glad of the exercise. I was beginning to vegetate quite seriously in our rural idyll.’

  ‘Well, it seems to suit you. You look fabulous.’

  ‘I look like a pumpkin on legs,’ Grace retorted. ‘I haven’t bought a dress for your wedding either—just hired a small tent.’ She paused. ‘And while we’re on the subject of appearance, if you’ll forgive me for saying so, you’re looking a little pale and heavy-eyed.’ She gave a naughty giggle. ‘Of course, there may be a very good reason for this, but you should be aiming for radiance on the big day.’

  Tarn flushed. ‘I think I’m probably suffering from bridal nerves. Even for the tiniest wedding like ours there seems so much to do.’

  Grace nodded. ‘Tell me about it. I decided quite early on that I was in a no-win situation over the arrangements, so I stood back and let the respective mothers slug it out. It worked perfectly—for me anyway.’

  She was silent for a moment, then said, ‘Tarn—I know it’s not really my business to be asking, but he’s Brendan’s best mate from way back, and I think the world of him too, so I’m going to say it anyway.’ She drew a breath. ‘You—you do love Caz, don’t you?’

  Tarn was reaching for her cup, and her hand jerked, spilling some tea in the saucer.

  She achieved a breathless laugh. ‘Yes—yes, of course I do. Why do you ask?’

  Grace shrugged uncomfortably. ‘I suppose—because it’s all happened so fast.’

  Tarn used a tissue to mop up the spilled tea. ‘Also girl marries boss is a terrible cliché,’ she said quietly.

  ‘Well, knowing Caz’s views on romance in the workplace, it has come as rather a surprise. Besides…’ She stopped abruptly.

  ‘Besides, you thought he was going to marry Ginny Fraser,’ Tarn supplied.

  Grace sighed. ‘Let’s say we were afraid it might happen. Which was one of many reasons why we were so delighted when he found you.’ She smiled. ‘Brendan always said it would happen like that. That Caz would meet someone and fall head over heels. And clearly he has.’

  ‘But you’re wondering if I’ve done the same.’ Tarn stared down at the table. ‘And as his friend, you’re probably entitled to ask.’ She drew a breath, then said, stumbling a little, ‘I may not wear my heart on my sleeve, Grace, but I do love him, more than I ever dreamed possible, although I tried hard not to. And if I’m not turning cartwheels, it’s because, frankly, I’m feeling stunned.’

  She gestured helplessly. ‘He’s a millionaire several times over, for heaven’s sake. And he takes so much about his life totally for granted—whereas I…’

  ‘Fit into it just perfectly,’ Grace said gently. ‘But things haven’t always been easy for him, Tarn. He’s rich and good-looking and that can act like a magnet for some women.’

  She frowned. ‘For instance, he had a problem earlier this year with some idiotic female making a complete fool of herself over him.’

  Tarn sent her a swift glance. ‘Who was that?’

  Grace shook her head. ‘I don’t know all the details, but Brendan says it was a real mess and took a lot of sorting.’

  ‘Yes,’ Tarn said bleakly. ‘I’m sure it did.’

  It was an effort to smile, but somehow she managed it. ‘And now to prove my sincerity about my forthcoming nuptials, let’s get a cab back to that place in Knightsbridge and take another look at that pretty cream silk. It’s the only one that’s really stayed in my mind, so maybe that’s a good omen.’

  They continued to laugh and chat all the way back to Knightsbridge and the purchase of a dress that she knew, as she paid for it, she would not be wearing on any occasion in her life.

  Twenty-four hours. That was all the time she had left.

  Tarn felt shaken and bewildered when she considered how quickly she had reached this point.

  So many staging points along the way. So many games of ‘let’s pretend’ with herself as the only participant.

  The miles of furniture showrooms traversed.

  The gallons of paint chosen for the team of decorators waiting to transform a flat she would never occupy.

  The party at Brandon to wish Caz and herself well and present them with a magnificent collection of crystal glassware.

  Her ticket booked on a flight back to New York, in the first instance. And after that—who knew?

  And now, the final act. The devastating, terrible letter that she had to write.

  Closure.

  Followed, presumably, by ‘moving on’.

  That comforting, meaningless phrase supposedly intended to salve the agony of a life torn up and thrown away, Tarn thought and shivered.

  ‘I’m on my way.’ Della emerged from her room with her travel bag slung over her shoulder.

  She was taking two days of her holiday entitlement and spending them at her parents’ home, because, as she said, she had no wish to be around when Caz Brandon came calling.

  ‘That won’t happen,’ Tarn had told her, but Della had simply pursed her lips and said she preferred not to chance it.

  Now, she gave Tarn a narrow-eyed look. ‘Are you going to be all right?’

  ‘Of course.’ Tarn lifted her chin. ‘After all, this is what I’ve been aiming for.’

  ‘Have you booked a courier to deliver it?’

  ‘Yes. It’s all arranged.’

  ‘And have you tipped off the Press, to make his humiliation as public as it gets? Put the icing on the cake, just as you’ve always said?’

  Tarn didn’t look at her. ‘Not yet,’ she said. ‘I—I’ll write the letter first.’

  ‘Well, don’t forget,’ Della cautioned. She gave Tarn a bracing hug. ‘Be brave,’ she whispered. ‘You know you’re doing the right thing.’

  Am I? thought Tarn, when she was alone. With so many questions still unanswered, I’m not as sure. But I can’t allow doubts to creep in. Not at this stage. I have to go on.

  But an hour later and on her third draft, she was struggling. Her first attempt had sounded regretful; the second, apologetic. And that wasn’t what she wanted at all.

  I have to become Chameleon again, she thought. I have to detach myself and speak with someone else’s voice. Tell it as if it was someone else’s story.

  Then maybe I can bear it.

  ‘Caz,’ she wrote eventually. ‘There will be no marriage between us today or ever.

  ‘I am leaving you, just as you abandoned Eve Griffiths, your former fiancée and my foster sister a few months ago.

  ‘Eve, as you know, was so heartbroken and traumatised by your rejection of her that she tried to kill herself, and she is now a virtual prisoner in The Refuge, where you are a trustee.

  ‘Presumably, you thought that once she was out of sight, she would also be out of mind. But not so.’

  That was the right tone. Cool and dispassionate.
Just relating the facts.

  ‘Because Eve wrote me letter after letter, talking about you and your relationship with her. She believed her passionate love for you was returned, and was overjoyed at the prospect of becoming your wife. She was even naïve enough to think that the stones in the engagement ring you gave her were diamonds.

  ‘She did not understand that you were simply stringing her along and had no intention of marrying her or that you would abandon her once you were tired of the brutal game you were playing with her heart and mind.

  ‘As soon as she realised that, she tried to destroy herself, which was when I decided your cruelty and arrogance should be punished, and that you too should discover what it was like to be humiliated and deserted by someone you trusted. So I came to England to find you.

  ‘No doubt you are used to thinking yourself irresistible to women, so you were, of course, ridiculously easy to fool.’

  Oh, Caz—Caz…

  ‘But now I’m the one tired of pretending, and it’s time to bring the whole charade to an end.

  ‘I hope you will have the decency to allow my foster sister to be released so that she can start to rebuild her life without further harassment from you or the police.

  ‘Goodbye.’

  She signed her name, folded the sheets of notepaper and put them in a padded envelope large enough to accommodate the box with his grandmother’s ring as well.

  But she couldn’t bring herself to take it off quite yet. Knew how accustomed she had become to the glimmer of the stones and how bare her hand would seem without them.

  ‘You’re being sentimental,’ she said aloud. ‘And you can’t afford that.’ But the words were spoken without emotion or even conviction. And the ring stayed where it was.

  In fact, she felt strangely blank, as if putting her accusations against him down on paper at last had somehow purged her of all the anger and bitterness that had brought her to this moment.

  The evening stretched ahead of her like a wasteland, yet, at the same time, the walls of the flat seemed to be closing round her, leaving her feeling cramped and uneasy. No matter where she looked in the room, the envelope seemed to be in her sight lines, waiting.

  And there was something else that must go into it before it was sealed, she reminded herself. The key to the new flat.

  She remembered their first viewing of it, the whole top floor of an apartment building from an earlier century with high ceilings and large windows. How she’d walked from room to room at his side, in spite of herself almost breathless with excitement. Imagining the flat neutral colours on the walls replaced by something with more depth and glow—a gleaming ivory in the sitting room perhaps as a backdrop for Caz’s pictures.

  Space and light, she thought. And, in the master bedroom’s en suite, a shower big enough for two.

  ‘I hardly dare ask,’ Caz had said softly when the agent had withdrawn tactfully into another room. ‘But do you feel about it as I do? Do you think we could make it into a home?’

  For a moment, she was silent, recognising the enormity of what was happening. When she spoke, it was in a voice she hardly recognised, expressing a truth she could not avoid or dissemble.

  She’d said simply, ‘I could be happy here.’

  And knew that her words concealed a world of regret.

  She hadn’t been there for several days, so she had no idea how it looked now that their decorating ideas had been put into operation.

  ‘You’ve got to promise me you won’t go and peek,’ Caz had said, laughing. ‘I want it to be a surprise.’

  But I mustn’t think about that, she told herself. Not any more, or I shall go crazy. And switched on the television, looking for distraction.

  ‘Starting next,’ a disembodied voice informed her, ‘is a new series, The Body Politic, which will take a close look at parliamentary democracy in the whole of the United Kingdom. The presenter is Ginny Fraser.’

  ‘Some distraction,’ Tarn muttered, her throat tightening painfully as she reached for the remote control. ‘And the last person I want to see.’

  Caz would probably go back to Ginny in the end, she thought, finding consolation in taking up where he’d left off. Her mouth twisted as she visualised Grace’s reaction.

  Then she stilled. Brendan and Grace, she thought, imagining their shock and anger when she failed to show. What would Caz say to them? What explanation could he possibly offer? Or would it come as no surprise because they’d known about Evie and her part in his life all along?

  She found she did not want to believe that.

  Do something useful, she told herself as she got up restlessly and fetched her bag. The key to the new flat was in an inside pocket, and she held it in the palm of her hand, looking down at it. Struggling with herself as temptation beckoned.

  Where would be the harm, she thought, in taking one last look? Caz’s ban had not been serious. Besides, he would never know, she assured herself. It was the eve of his wedding, so he would be enjoying his stag night, celebrating what he supposed would be his last night of freedom.

  And, anyway, she needed to say goodbye.

  She slipped a thin jacket over her dress and went out to find a cab.

  Even as she was paying off the driver, she was still hesitant, but at the same time knew there was little point in turning round and going meekly back to the empty silence she’d left.

  She tapped in the entry code at the front door, and rode up in the lift to the top floor.

  ‘There’s a roof garden here too.’ She could hear Caz’s voice. ‘But the tubs are filled with flowers, not hot water.’

  She unlocked the door and stepped into the hall, pausing for a moment to inhale the clean smell of paint and newly varnished wood floors.

  She went first to the sitting room, halting with an involuntary cry of pleasure. The furniture that they’d been told would take several weeks to arrive had been delivered and unpacked. Only Caz’s pictures, placed carefully in a corner, were still in their wrappings.

  The image in her head had become reality and it was beautiful, she thought, swallowing.

  She turned away, her eyes blurring suddenly. She was heading for the kitchen but on an impulse opened the door to the master bedroom instead.

  Someone had been busy here too, she saw as she walked slowly forward, because the bed had been made up with the creamy linen they’d chosen, and the exquisite coverlet, like a golden sunburst, was folded neatly across its foot.

  I could be happy here…

  She closed her eyes and stood, motionless, her arms clasped around her body, until the sudden, tingling moment when she realised she was no longer alone.

  She turned slowly and looked at Caz, leaning in the doorway.

  He said, ‘So you couldn’t keep away.’

  ‘Nor could you.’ She was trembling inside, the blood singing in her veins. She spoke huskily. ‘I—I thought you’d be out on the town with friends.’

  ‘Getting blasted?’ His own tone was faintly caustic. ‘Not very flattering to one’s bride, I’ve always thought. Anyway, I went out a few nights ago for a quiet dinner with Brendan and a few other friends.’

  ‘Oh,’ she said. ‘I see.’ She paused. There was tension in the room, warm and living like an electric current. She touched the tip of her tongue to her dry mouth, searching for something to say. ‘They haven’t hung the pictures in the sitting room.’

  ‘No,’ he said. ‘I thought we’d do that together, when we came back from our honeymoon.’

  ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘That’s a—lovely idea.’

  How can you look at me? she wanted to scream. How can you be so blind as not to see what I mean to do to you?

  Aloud, she said, ‘It all looks wonderful. Better than I ever dreamed.’ She shook her head. ‘But I’m sorry if I’ve ruined your surprise.’

  He said slowly, ‘You haven’t spoiled a thing.’

  She went on quickly, ‘You see—I just needed so very much to see it.’

 
Caz moved away from the doorway and walked forward, halting a few yards away, the hazel eyes tender and hungry as he looked at her.

  ‘How strange you should feel like that,’ he said. ‘Because, although I didn’t know it, I also needed—so very much—to see you here.’

  He held out his arms and Tarn ran to him like a homing bird, a sob rising in her throat.

  Their mouths met and clung with a stark and heated urgency.

  And when he lifted her and carried her to the bed, Tarn knew she could no longer deny him. Or herself.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  THE mattress felt soft and yielding as Caz placed her gently down upon it. She stared up at him, aware of the thunder of her heart, and the soft trembling building inside her that she knew, in spite of her comparative inexperience, was born of excitement, not fear.

  Yet as he turned to switch on the ivory-shaded lamp on the night table, she sat up, reaching for his arm. ‘No—please.’

  ‘Ah, but I need to see you, darling,’ he told her huskily. ‘I want you to look at me too. So—no darkness between us. Not tonight, Tarn, my love. Not ever.’

  She watched as he began to strip, his movements totally unself-conscious, until he wore only his shorts, the cling of the silk in no way concealing the stark reality of his arousal. And when he came at last to lie beside her, drawing her close, she went to him without reserve.

  They lay, wrapped in each other’s arms, bathed in the soft light falling across the bed, exchanging slow, sweet kisses. And when, at last, he looked at her, a question in his gaze, she lifted a hand and touched his cheek, sliding her finger along the firm line of his mouth. He captured its tip with his lips, suckling it gently, making her feel the heat building inside her, and the sudden frantic scald of desire between her thighs as she wound her arms around his neck, lifting herself towards him in mute offering.

  He began to undress her, his hands moving without haste, but with heart-stopping purpose as he dealt with the fastenings on her clothes and laid them aside, one by one.

  When her last covering had gone, he stared down at her, his eyes rapt, almost wondering.

  He said shakily, ‘Oh, God, you’re so lovely. More beautiful than I could have dreamed. I’m almost scared to touch you. Scared I’ll lose control and ruin everything for you.’