It was Brett who finally suggested to the children that this might be a good time for them to get ready for bed, and added that he had some work to do so he’d leave Richard and Nicola to it.
‘No—look, I’ve obviously chosen a bad time,’ Richard said as Brett started to wheel Chris away and Ellen cleared the table. ‘I won’t stay—’
‘You weren’t to know, and I’d like to see the plans,’ Nicola broke in. ‘Sit down and have a cup of coffee.’
So he did, although with an oddly thoughtful glance at Brett’s retreating back.
‘It’s been quite a couple of days,’ Nicola said ruefully as she poured the coffee.
‘I can imagine.’ He opened the folder and spread some pages out. ‘This…’ But he stopped as the doorbell rang.
Nicola frowned. ‘Who on earth is this?’
It was Tara, whom Ellen showed into the family room. Tara was bearing a bunch of flowers, a gaily wrapped present and a briefcase. But, even more spectacularly, she was dressed in a black leotard, a filmy jungle print over-blouse, open down the front, and gold kid flat shoes. Her hair was once again perfect, and her make-up was full war paint. She’d switched from Chanel No 5 to Joy.
Nicola’s eyes widened, and so did Richard’s, for this could not have been less like the formal Tara of three nights ago. This was an unashamedly sexy version of the new litigation specialist Hinton, Harcourt had hired.
She advanced with a wide smile. ‘These are for you, Nicola—’ she handed over the flowers ‘—as a thank-you for dinner. This—’ she held up the briefcase ‘—is for Brett. When I found out he’d rung in and asked for some briefs to be delivered here I thought I might as well bring them since it would give me the opportunity to discuss them with him at the same time, as well as to bring this.’ She held the present aloft. ‘It’s for Chris, poor kid. How is he?’
‘He’s…he’ll be fine. That’s very kind of you,’ Nicola said somewhat dazedly beneath this onslaught.
‘Well, don’t you two disturb yourselves; I’ll go and find them. My…’ she ran her eyes over the drawings and plans ‘…you do have a project going together, don’t you?’ she said with an oddly meaningful twinkle, and waltzed off.
Nicola clenched her teeth. ‘I don’t believe it!’
‘A bit of a metamorphosis,’ Richard commented.
‘Not only that—anyone would think she owned the place. How can Brett be so blind?’
The little silence that followed her words caused her to flinch, then resolutely look at Richard. ‘Sorry, but—’ She stopped and rubbed her brow. ‘Is it my imagination that she gives off unmistakable vibes to the effect that she’s—interested in him?‘
‘No,’ Richard said slowly, ‘I must say I found myself wondering that the other night. She seemed to be rather subtly—well, putting herself on the same plane with him, and putting you on a lower one.’
‘Thank heavens!’ Nicola said fervently, and added as his eyes widened, ‘I mean, I was beginning to wonder whether I was going mad. But what I can’t understand is why she should imagine there’s any—any hope for her. We’ve only just met.’
Something flickered in Richard’s eyes and he looked away.
‘You know something I don’t?’ Nicola said slowly.
He grimaced.
‘Well, I know you know…what Sasha said, but is there more?’ she asked.
‘Nicola, I hate gossip, and—’
‘No, please tell me,’ she persisted.
He twined his fingers, then untwined them. ‘It may be more common knowledge than you realise—oh, hell.’
He looked genuinely disturbed, then went on, ‘What happened was this. If you recall, Kim was a bit stirred up the other night. And she kept on at Rod about it on the way home—did they think it was wise to have such a man-eating woman on the loose in the profession?—the kind of silly thing Kim is prone to say at times, even if she is my mother’s cousin. And Rod—whether in his own defence or not, I don’t know—said that if anyone should be worrying about it, it was not her but you.’
Nicola swallowed. ‘Go on.’
‘Of course Kim leapt on this,’ he said with distaste. ‘And although Rod couldn’t be persuaded to say any more, she—she took to musing aloud, and said that it would make sense of the rumours she’d heard even before Sasha spilt the beans.’
‘That this marriage was…not what it seemed?’ Nicola’s voice sounded strange to her own ears.
‘I’m sorry,’ Richard murmured. ‘But it would explain why Tara is—if she’s heard the rumours, too…’ He gestured. ‘That’s assuming—’ He broke off abruptly.
Nicola stared at him. ‘Assuming Brett hasn’t instigated it?’
‘It…only crossed my mind,’ he said awkwardly. ‘But I wouldn’t imagine he’d—well, publicly embarrass you, Nicola.’
‘No,’ Nicola said slowly. ‘No…’
Richard sat forward. ‘Can I tell you something?’
She looked at him blankly. ‘There’s more?’
‘No. Not that I know of. This—is different.’ He paused, moving his shoulders restlessly, and Nicola was suddenly gripped by a presentiment of what was to come. She swallowed, and cast around desperately for something to say. But her tongue seemed to want to cling to the roof of her mouth.
Richard finally went on, ‘The thing is, I fell in love with you the moment I laid eyes on you, standing on the garden path, and if there’s anything I can do, please let me.’
Nicola’s mouth fell open, then she jumped at a sound and turned to see Brett standing in the doorway.
CHAPTER SIX
THE silence stretched, then Richard stood up and began to gather papers. ‘I’ll get going,’ he said quietly. ‘I chose a bad time.’
‘Not the easiest time, no,’ Brett responded, and the two men looked at each other—a steady grey glance from Richard, that wasn’t exactly challenging but wasn’t any kind of a backdown either, whereas Brett returned it coolly.
Then Richard said to Nicola, ‘It’s Saturday tomorrow. How would it be if I came back on Monday? Things might be calmer.’
‘Yes. Uh—I’ll—if you’d like to leave the plans I can go over them, though. Oh! I haven’t had a chance to show Brett the contract yet.’ She stopped, and wondered why she should sound disjointed and uncomfortable.
‘No matter.’ Richard smiled at her. ‘Monday will do for that too.’
‘I’ll see you out, then,’ Brett said briefly.
‘Don’t bother. I can find my way. Goodnight.’
‘Goodnight,’ she murmured, but Brett merely inclined his head.
‘He wasn’t to know,’ she said to Brett as they heard the front door close.
Brett stirred. ‘No. I—’ But he broke off and swore as the front doorbell rang again. ‘Bloody hell, the place is becoming like a railway station!’
But this caller didn’t bother to wait to be let in, and as they both turned it was Marietta who waltzed into the dining room. ‘Hi,’ she said breezily. ‘Couldn’t wait until tomorrow to see my chickadees, so we flew up today. How are you, Nicky darling?’ And she advanced to plant a kiss on Nicola’s cheek.
It was at that moment that Tara entered the lounge from the opposite direction, saying, ‘Brett…’ and a curious little tableau ensued.
Marietta, dressed in a pink and scarlet outfit which should have clashed with her hair, let alone each colour, but which she carried off with great style and her usual vibrant beauty, blinked as her eyes fell on the other woman.
For almost a full minute they stared at each other, two mature, elegant and very sophisticated women who contrived to make Nicola, still in her khaki shorts and blouse, feel as if she hadn’t left her teens. But as their gazes clashed you could almost see their hackles rising, and you could have cut the atmosphere with a knife.
Then Marietta turned to Brett and said with a jerk of her head, ‘Who the hell is this?’
It was Nicola who stepped into the breach. She wasn’t sure wher
e or why she found the composure to do it, but she said gravely, ‘Tara, this is Marietta, Chris and Sasha’s mother. She’s just arrived from overseas. And Marietta, this is Tara Wells. She’s joined Hinton, Harcourt as a litigation specialist and she very kindly brought out a present for Chris because he fell and broke his leg yesterday—but he’s going to be fine,’ she said reassuringly.
Marietta snapped her suspicious gaze from Tara. ‘Broke his leg—oh, why wasn’t I here?’ She looked anguished.
‘That’s exactly what I said; I wasn’t there either. Poor Ellen had to bear the brunt of it—but why don’t you go and see him?’ she said warmly. ‘I can guarantee it’ll make him feel a hundred per cent better.’
Brett spoke for the first time. ‘He is going to be fine; it’s a clean break. Come.’ And they walked out together.
‘Tara, would you like a cup of coffee or a drink?’ Nicola offered. ‘I was just going to have another cup of coffee myself. It’s been one of those days,’ she added humorously.
Tara came out of the reverie that had held her uncharacteristically silent for so long and took her gaze from the door Marietta and Brett had gone through to rest it somewhat bemusedly on Nicola. ‘I…no, thanks. I’m on my way to the gym, actually.’
‘Then I’ll see you out. Thanks again for the flowers and the present.’
‘It…was a pleasure.’
Nicola paused in the hall after Tara had left, listening to the sounds of joyful revelry coming from Chris’s bedroom, then quietly closed herself into her own bedroom.
Some time later Brett knocked on her door.
Thinking it was Marietta, she called to come in, then sat up abruptly on the ruby couch, where she’d been lying in her favourite position in her polka dot pyjamas. ‘It’s you.’
‘Yes,’ he agreed with some irony, and closed the door. ‘You didn’t have to incarcerate yourself in here.’
‘I wasn’t.’ She eyed him as he wandered over to her unicorn poster and stood staring at it with his hands shoved into the pockets of his jeans. Beneath the thin white knit of his cotton T-shirt, the set of his shoulders was tense and irritable.
‘She is their mother,’ she added, with a little glint of anger growing in her eyes at his words, his tone, and because he was tired and cross and there was nothing she could do about it.
‘And you’re their stepmother.’
‘In name only,’ she murmured with her own irony. ‘But even so, even if I were real, I’d have left them alone.’
‘You’re very full of wisdom and serenity tonight, Nicola,’ he said with a faint undercurrent of sarcasm as he turned to gaze at her. ‘I can’t help wondering if it has anything to do with Richard Holloway’s declaration.’
‘I thought you might have heard—’
‘Oh, I heard.’
‘Then you might at least,’ she said swiftly and coolly, ‘credit me with having absolutely no control over something that happened before I’d even been introduced to the man!’
‘I believe we’ve discussed this before,’ he shot back.
‘No, we haven’t!’ she cried frustratedly, and jumped up.
‘If you’re contemplating slapping my face again, Nicola, don’t,’ he warned, and when she ground her teeth he smiled dryly and continued, ‘I meant, we’ve discussed the fact that men tend to take one look at you and be instantly attracted. That does not necessarily mean they’ve fallen in love with you.’
‘Well, at least he thinks he is,’ she said passionately, ‘whereas all you’ve offered me is a lot of plusses—like a checklist. Tick, tick, tick!’ She gestured graphically.
‘You’re being childish, Nicola.’
She raised an eyebrow. ‘A moment ago I was being wise and serene. But here’s something for you to think about, Brett—I don’t care what you think of me any longer. Because I intend to do what I see fit, and don’t imagine the fact that you’re my trustee will stop me.’
They stared at each other. ‘And what is that?’ he drawled finally.
‘I…haven’t decided yet.’ She met his look unflinchingly, though.
‘I see.’ His gaze slid up and down her slim figure and lingered on the shining mass of her hair. She’d washed it and dried it with her hairdryer, so it was full of bounce and vitality. ‘And very proper too,’ he murmured then, with a wicked little glint in his eyes.
‘If you’re laughing at me, Brett—’
‘Not at all,’ he denied. ‘I’m suitably impressed. However—and I’ve asked you this before—may I expect you to maintain the status quo until your twenty-first birthday?’
Nicola considered this with a frown in her eyes. ‘I don’t see—that’s only a date. What difference does it make?’
He shrugged. ‘It’s looked upon as a milestone in most people’s lives for some curious reason, I agree, but perhaps, as a social custom, it does mean more than an excuse to have a party.’
‘Are you proposing to give me the key of the door?’ she asked, somewhat sceptically.
He paused. ‘On behalf of your father, Nicola,’ he said at last, ‘in a manner of speaking.’
There it is again, she thought dismally. We always seem to come back to my father. She sighed. ‘All right. It is only a week away—although I still think it’s…’ She opened her hands.
‘He would be relieved to know you hadn’t made any momentous decisions before then.’
Nicola blinked and sniffed.
‘I’m sorry,’ Brett said quietly. ‘I didn’t mean to make you sad.’
‘It’s all right.’ She brushed at her eyes. ‘How are the kids? Is Marietta still here?’
‘No. But she sang them to sleep. She’s coming back tomorrow morning.’
‘With…?’
‘Yes. Another big day.’ He grimaced. ‘Mind you, as mistress of the house, you were—perfect, earlier.’
Nicola tried to stop herself, but to no avail. She started to smile, then she started to laugh, and when he took her hand in his she didn’t resist. ‘Have you ever seen two people take such an instantaneous dislike to each other?’
‘No,’ he responded with a look of rueful amusement, and kissed her knuckles. ‘Will you sleep all right now?’
She looked up into his eyes, and the smile on her lips wavered and died. ‘I guess so,’ she said huskily. ‘Will you?’ She bit her lip and looked away.
‘So long as I know the mistress of my house is comfortable and reassured, yes. Look at me, Nicola.’
‘Brett,’ she said on a breath, ‘I’m fine.’
‘Nicola.’
She hesitated, then lifted her lashes uncertainly, ‘What?’
Something flickered in his eyes, but she couldn’t read it. He said, ‘I just wanted to tell you that in all the drama earlier you were so…nice, so sane, your father would have been very proud of you.’
‘Now you are going to make me cry,’ she said helplessly.
‘No.’ He took her loosely in his arms. ‘You should feel proud too.’
She shook her head, but felt the emotion gripping her begin to subside. ‘I don’t think I should fall into that trap, actually,’ she said with a grin. ‘I’m sure the Reverend Callam would tell you pride comes before a fall—although he did have some rather un-Christian notions for a—’ She stopped.
‘Who is the Reverend Callam?’ he queried quizzically.
‘Uh…’ Nicola mused regretfully that she should always think before she spoke. ‘Well…’ She hesitated, but encountered a look in Brett’s hazel eyes that was at the same time patient yet fully expectant of receiving an answer. ‘Oh, well, he was the marriage counsellor I went to see.’
One eyebrow shot up as Brett reviewed this piece of information, then he looked at her searchingly. ‘What un-Christian notions did he put into your head?’
‘Nothing terrible, just—I guess you could call it something to do with human nature, that’s all.’
‘The mind boggles,’ he said dryly. ‘Nicola—’
‘No, I’
m not going to elaborate,’ Nicola said firmly, ‘so don’t waste your breath, Brett. It…it’s nothing for you to worry about.’
For a moment he remained unimpressed, then a glint of devilry gleamed in his eyes. ‘That’s usually my line.’
She smiled faintly. ‘Perhaps a bit of role reversal wouldn’t do us any harm.’
‘Does that mean you’re about to lecture me on the error of my ways?’ The devilry was still there, although his expression was grave.
‘No. But it can’t hurt to put yourself in someone else’s shoes occasionally,’ she said tartly.
‘Indeed it can’t,’ he replied softly, and ran one hand absently up the back of her neck beneath the fall of her hair. ‘Although I wonder if you’ve ever tried to put yourself in mine?’
Nicola said nothing as two things struck her with unusual force and a sense of poignancy. How many times had she tried to do just that? she wondered. Only to be met by a seemingly impenetrable barrier. And secondly, had he any idea how fragile her neck felt with his hand curved about it, and how the feel of it sent ripples of awareness flowing through her body?
Not only that, it opened up channels of thought, as well as the trickles of arousal running through her. How different, for example, this embrace was from the one three nights ago, with its exchange of hostilities and that electric spark that had flamed between them. How much wanner this felt, and how those channels of her mind were passing messages to her senses.
So that she observed and thought about little things, like the lines beside his mouth, which she’d always loved, and felt her fingertips tingle with an urge to touch them. It was the same with his hair, brown, crisp and clean, giving off chestnut glints beneath the ceiling light, and the darker tips of his eyelashes, and the shape of his chin—which Sasha had inherited, despite the overall look of her mother. A chin which, when she tilted it, left no doubt that she could be quite as determined as her father.
Then there was the fact that to be so close to him in this tranquil way was to be able to breathe in the scent of him and find it fascinating and different.
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