“I really don’t know what I have to do to make you approve of me, Justin.” About the Author Title Page CHAPTER ONE CHAPTER TWO CHAPTER THREE CHAPTER FOUR CHAPTER FIVE CHAPTER SIX CHAPTER SEVEN CHAPTER EIGHT CHAPTER NINE CHAPTER TEN Copyright

“I really don’t know what I have to do to make you approve of me, Justin.”

Justin moved so his face was in the shadows and Lucy couldn’t read his expression. “Just the one thing you won’t do.”

For the life of her, Lucy couldn’t stern the images that flooded her mind, of lying in his arms and being made love to. “But then I might not approve of myself....”

LINDSAY ARMSTRONG was born in South Africa but now lives in Australia with her New Zealand-born husband and their five children. They have lived in nearly every state of Australia and tried their hand at some unusual—for them—occupations, such as farming and horse training, all grist to the mill for a writer! Lindsay started writing romances when their youngest child began school and she was left feeling at loose ends. She is still doing it and loving it.

When Enemies Marry

Lindsay Armstrong

www.millsandboon.co.uk

CHAPTER ONE

‘JUSTIN, this is unbelievable; there’s a photographer—oh, sorry, I didn’t realise you were with someone.’

Lucinda Waite paused on the threshold of her husband’s study, then swept in, continuing, ‘But it’s only you, Sasha—well, you and someone else. How do you do?’ she added politely to the third party in the study. ‘I’m Justin’s wife Lucinda, but most people call me Lucy. Who are you?’ she enquired, extending her hand graciously.

‘Robert Lang,’ the third party murmured, rising hastily and taking the extended hand. ‘How do you do, Mrs Waite?’ He was about twenty-three and looked both embarrassed and slightly dazed.

‘Not very well, thank you, Mr Lang,’ Lucy Waite replied with a grimace. ‘My privacy is being invaded—and I can’t help feeling you might be responsible for it all.’

Robert Lang blinked beneath a clear blue gaze and made a mental note that registered some surprise. They were the colour of deep blue velvety pansies, her eyes, and her skin had the texture of cream rosebuds while her hair, caught back carelessly, was the colour of ripe wheat. Now, now, he cautioned himself, letting his gaze drift over the rest of Lucinda Waite, it can’t be all perfection. Short legs possibly, out of proportion with the rest of her, or hippy and pear-shaped, thick legs—no, his eyes widened, talk about legs, they were sensational...

‘You’re staring, Mr Lang,’ Sasha Pearson said all but inaudibly and not quite kindly She was an elegant redhead in her early thirties but whether she was family hadn’t been made clear.

But Robert Lang, despite his youth, was not without charm and ingenuity. ‘I sure am,’ he conceded boyishly. ‘In point of fact, I’m quite bowled over. I don’t think I’ve ever seen anyone as lovely as you, Mrs Waite—er—if you’ll forgive me for saying so, sir!’ He turned deferentially to Justin Waite still sitting behind his desk, not altogether in a further demonstration of his charm but because, to his mind, Justin Waite was not the kind of man one gave offence to and possibly least of all in the matter of his stunningly beautiful, flawless, twenty-year-old-if -she-were-a-day wife.

‘You’re forgiven, Mr Lang,’ Justin Waite said. ‘My wife has been having that effect on people since she was in her cradle.’ He moved in his chair and stood up, revealing most of the over six foot, lean, muscled length of him that, coupled with rather hard grey eyes and a look of worldliness and experience, had kindled Robert Lang’s wariness in the first place. ‘My wife has also,’ he went on coolly, ‘been leading people up the garden path for almost as long.’

Lang’s eyes widened and jerked to Lucinda. But, far from any expression of outrage, she merely smiled faintly, and murmured, ‘What have I done now, Justin?’

‘Invaded your own privacy, my dear, from what I can gather. Did you or did you not write to a certain publication and invite them up here to do a story on the place, and on you?’

‘Yes, I did—so that’s who you are!’ Lucy said to Lang with a glorious smile. ‘But you didn’t let me know you were coming. I thought you must be one of those maverick journalists who turn up from time to time and make my life a misery.’

‘Lucy, that happened once and has never been repeated,’ Justin Waite said in the kind of voice that caused Robert Lang some trepidation, although it didn’t seen to have any effect on his wife.

‘And the reason you didn’t know he was coming, Lucy,’ Sasha Pearson—where did she fit in? Robert wondered—rose and picked up a letter from the desk, ‘is because while Justin and I were away you didn’t bother to open any mail although you assured me you would.’

‘That’s right,’ Robert Lang said eagerly. ‘I did write and suggest today if it would suit you.’

‘Oh, dear,’ Lucy Waite said regretfully. ‘You really should have waited for a reply, Mr Lang, but now I know who you are, we might as well go ahead. I’ve got nothing else on. By the way, you are indispensable, Sasha, aren’t you? Forgive me for ever doubting it! I’ll just go and get changed.’

‘You’ll do no such thing, Lucy.’

‘Justin.’ Lucy protested. ‘Why not?’

Blue eyes stared into hard grey ones and, despite only mild protest registering in Lucy Waite’s expression, the atmosphere was suddenly electric and Robert Lang found himself, to his amazement, wondering what went on behind locked doors between Justin Waite and his wife. Did he beat her or did he throw her down on the bed and make punishing love to her...

‘Because I say so, Lucy,’ Justin Waite said with sudden detachment as he looked away from his wife thereby seeming to cut the electric current between them. ‘Go back to your horses, my dear, and I will apologise for this misunderstanding.’

Lucy Waite shrugged. ‘Whatever you say, Justin,’ she murmured. ‘Do forgive me, Mr Lang,’ she added. ‘I haven’t been married very long, you see, so I’m not altogether familiar with the rules, I guess, but I—’

‘Lucy—’

‘Just going, Justin. Bye!’ She strolled out with a wave.

‘I gather,’ Justin Waite said across the dinner table, to his wife, ‘that today’s events were more shots in the war you promised me the day you married me, Lucy.’

Lucy Waite smoothed down the skirt of the clinging, long-sleeved black dress with a heart-shaped neckline that she’d changed into for dinner and picked up her soup spoon. She’d also tucked a creamy gardenia into the hair that was lying loose and rippling on her shoulders. ‘You gather right, Justin.’

“It wasn’t much of a shot.”

Lucy sipped her soup then grinned. ‘As a matter of fact I thought it quite got you off the bit for a moment, Justin.’ She changed her expression to one of severity and mimicked, “My wife has been leading people up the garden path from the cradle.” But yes, it would have been better if it had come off,’ she conceded. ‘You do so hate publicity, don’t you, Justin?’

‘I can’t believe you really enjoy it,’ he commented drily.

Lucy wrinkled her nose. ‘It was only a rural paper. I thought it was rather tasteful to choose a rural paper instead of a national daily. And all I’d planned to do was show them the house and some of...our treasures, and all your improvements to the property. It would have been quite a scoop for that young man, don’t you think? Something about the Waites in a newspaper, even just a rural one. You’ve probably blighted his career, Justin, and he was rather sweet, really.’

‘I haven’t blighted his career at all, but he does understand now that my wife is off limits so you might as well forget him, Lucy. And any other young man who takes your fancy.’

Lucy laughed and pushed away her soup. ‘You perceive me quaking in my shoes, Justin,’ she murmured. ‘Still, all may not be lost,’ she mused. ‘There’s got to be at least one person out there now who’s thinking that the Waites of Dalkeith and Riverbend have a very strange marriage.’

‘On the contrary, there could be at least one person out there who is actually thinking that Lucinda Waite is a spoilt brat and deserves a good lesson.’

‘From my experience of young men, Justin, they don’t generally have those thoughts about me. It’s only your generation—at least, you’re the only one of your generation I have to go on, and I have to tell you that if you mean what I think you mean—’

‘That you deserve to be put over someone’s knee and ceremonially spanked?’ he broke in lazily.

‘How picturesque.’ For the first time a little glint of anger lit Lucy’s eyes. ‘I have to tell you I should probably get so angry I’d even be capable of taking a pot-shot at you. Don’t forget I’m an excellent shot and I would know exactly how to inconvenience you considerably without doing a lot of harm—and make it all look like an accident anyway.’

‘That wasn’t what I had in mind, Lucy,’ he drawled, and reached for the decanter to pour himself some wine.

‘How brave you are,’ she retorted.

‘What I had in mind—were I so minded,’ he continued, holding his wine glass up to the light meditatively, ‘was a lesson of another kind. Such as—’ he put the glass down gently and their eyes locked ‘—removing your dress from your delectable body, uncovering your breasts and the rest of you and making love to you until you’re—shall we say, in a much more amenable frame of mind? I have this theory on women,’ he went on, idly inspecting the pulse that had started to beat rather erratically at the base of Lucy’s throat. That without regular, satisfying sex they become fractious and troublesome, and in your case in particular, dear Lucy, that what you really need is a couple of kids to keep you out of mischief.’

It took Lucy several moments to gather enough composure to be able to speak, moments that were made worse for her because her tall, satanic husband did not relax his leisurely scrutiny of her in the slightest and then had the gall to pour her a glass of wine and push it towards her with a faintly amused twist of his lips.

In the end, as she sipped the golden liquid, it was he who spoke first. ‘You don’t agree?’

‘I think,’ Lucy said carefully, ‘that it’s a pity you didn’t live in a different era, a bygone era for example, when women were treated like chattels and it was accepted practice to generalise about them as if they were so many... sheep. As if they had no minds, only instincts.’

Then tell me this—you’ve ordered the course of this marriage so far; how happy has it made you?’

‘You’ve gone along with it,’ she said tautly.

‘Were you secretly hoping I’d do something as uncouth and as—exciting as taking you against your will after you made your dramatic declaration on our wedding-night?’

Lucy gasped. ‘Only minutes ago you were talking about... you were talking about...’

‘Something quite different, Lucy,’ he said.

‘I can’t see it, personally.’ She looked at him defiantly.

‘I was talking about finding out what your will really is in this matter,’ he said and his teeth glinted in a sudden grin. ‘Don’t look so worried, I’m not going to do it. Not tonight, at least. But I do make the point that to a certain extent you’ve given me yourself as a hostage in this ridiculous war, Lucy, and perhaps you should bear it in mind the next time you decide to fire any shots. Would you care to dish up the casserole or shall I?’

Lucy put down her napkin and stood up. The silver casserole was on a hot plate on the sideboard. ‘I will,’ she said, but didn’t move immediately. ‘Justin, you gave me very little choice about marrying you. You made it very plain that I could lose everything I possessed, not the least my home, where I’ve lived all my life, if I didn’t marry you. You put it to me that we could fight each other for years over Dalkeith and that you would fight for it although it was more or less all I had, while you’d inherited Riverbend and made yourself a huge fortune on top of it—’

‘That’s debatable—’

‘Don’t interrupt,’ she commanded. ‘But since you have, it was never my fault that our fathers were foolish enough to own this place in partnership and then even more foolish to fall out with each other and leave us to inherit this mess—’

‘Lucy, the cold, hard facts of the matter are a little different. Because Riverbend and Dalkeith are adjoining properties and because our fathers were friends, when your father got into financial difficulties, my father offered to inject some money into the place and accept a partnership in return—a silent partnership,’ he said significantly. And waited while Lucy tried to look unaffected but failed. He went on, ‘What broke up the friendship, despite this concession to your father’s ego, despite trying to help save Dalkeith from going under the hammer, was that your father persisted in believing that Australia could ride on the back of its sheep forever and fought every suggestion my father ever made for diversification away from growing wool.’

Lucy bit her lip. ‘I didn’t know all that,’ she said bravely, however.

‘No, but that wasn’t my fault,’ he retorted impatiently. ‘It was his fault that you didn’t know, his fault that you were allowed to queen it over all and sundry as Lucinda Wainright of Dalkeith and never suspect you’d have to share this place with anyone, let alone with me, whom your father had given you the impression you shouldn’t want to know any more anyway. Although—’ his eyes glinted ‘—there were times when you didn’t mind knowing me, Lucy.’

She coloured faintly but said with spirit, ‘If you’re referring to the days when I was barely out of rompers and didn’t know better than to follow you around whenever you were here—’

‘As a matter of fact I’m not referring to those days,’ he said softly—and said no more.

She blushed properly this time, which made her angrier. ‘If this is your revenge for—’ She stopped abruptly.

‘It isn’t,’ he answered equably. ‘Not against you, anyway.’

‘Then tell me this, Justin: what was your motivation for coming to see me only a fortnight after my father’s funeral and telling me that the only sensible course for us to pursue was to get married?’

‘Ah, well, my better nature did slip a bit then, I have to confess. You were so proud. I could also visualise the complications that might arise if someone else married you or got you pregnant before we’d sorted it all out. You have to agree, Lucy, that you left a trail of broken hearts around the district—it was really only a matter of time before you—er—fell. But of course, there was also the way you’d grown up, five foot six of sheer perfection, a bobby-dazzler in fact,’ he said with a shrug. ‘It occurred to me that not only would I not mind being married to you, but, since we had such a lot in common—’ his eyes drifted around the beautiful room ‘—it would simplify matters considerably.’

‘I’m only surprised you don’t have another theory,’ Lucy said through her teeth. ‘That wives can be schooled and trained like horses. Or is that still to come?’

‘Provided you get them young enough, it could be a possibility, even though you were so spoilt and indulged by your father,’ he said indifferently and shrugged again. ‘Lucy, how much longer do we have to wait to eat? We’ve had all this out before. And you were the one,’ he said with sudden impatience, ‘who accepted my proposal. Which to my mind, if we’re really discussing moral superiority, puts us on a par. Although you mentioned earlier that I threatened you with something like poverty. In fact I offered to buy you out, and that would have been a long way from poverty, my dear.’

‘But I didn’t want to be bought out. I decided to fight in the only way I could think of for my birthright, Justin. My great-grandparents happen to be buried here, and my mother and now my father, I love every acre of Dalkeith and sometimes, when you love something enough, you’re prepared to go to extraordinary lengths to preserve it. Besides which, it occurred to me,’ she said softly, ‘that you’d find it not considerably simpler but much more difficult to dispossess a wife, Justin.’

‘A wife, yes, Lucy,’ he said. ‘But there are certain things you have to do to become a true wife.’

‘It’s only your word against mine—ah,’ she said to herself. ‘So that’s why you haven’t forced me to go to bed with you! You’re keeping your options open, aren’t you, Justin? But while an annulment on the grounds of non-consummation may entitle me to less of your property, it is only your word against mine.’

He lay back in his chair and watched her. ‘Would you lie about something like that, Lucy?’

‘Where you’re concerned, I might. Don’t forget, I have to put up with your mistress parading herself around my home—who knows what flights of fancy the mere fact of that might prompt in me—where is Sasha, by the way?’

‘She’s gone back to Riverbend and she’s not my mistress.’

‘Then she’s dying to be your mistress.’

‘She happens to be an employee, my private assistant in charge of the stud at Riverbend, as you very well know, and she’s extremely good at her job, that’s all; what makes you think she has...the ambition you’re accusing her of?’

Lucy turned to the sideboard at last. ‘You’d probably have to be a woman to understand that. But I would have thought even you could see the sort of censorious way she treats me.’

‘There are times when you lay yourself open to that, Lucy.’

Lucy heaped a fragrant portion of lemon chicken on to a plate, and some steaming, fluffy rice, and laughed. ‘Perhaps I do. But she does so obviously hold this conviction that you were mad to marry me whatever else she is or isn’t, you see. On the subject of mistresses, by the way...’ She turned and carried his plate over to him, not unaware that his gaze was following every move she made, then went back for her own. ‘At thirty, you must have had some, probably dozens. You’re successful, you’re good-looking when you’re not being critical and superior—did none of them prompt you to think of marriage for all the right reasons?’ She sat down and helped herself to salad then courteously handed the crystal bowl to him. ‘Take Joanna Madden, for example.’ she added pointedly. ‘I’m sure a lot of people thought that was a fait accompli.’

‘So did I—once upon a time,’ she said musingly after a while when she thought he wasn’t going to answer.

‘What happened? Did she have nothing as enticing as the other half of Dalkeith to offer you?’

‘She—had her reasons.’

‘You don’t seem particularly perturbed,’ Lucy said witheringly.

He smiled fleetingly. ‘One lives and learns, I guess. Lucy,’ he said after a pause, ‘considering our feelings on the subject of Dalkeith—and while I acknowledge mine aren’t as unaltruistic and loving as yours, none the less it is very important to me-considering that we have its best interests at heart in other words, would it be so hard to see whether we couldn’t make a go of this marriage?’

She considered for a long time then she said rather bleakly, ‘That’s like asking a nation to love their invaders. I don’t think it’s possible. I mean, for another thing, there’s the problem that you don’t respect me—you surely couldn’t if you really believe that regular sex is all I need to keep me happy—’

‘There’s a difference between regular sex and satisfying sex.’

She shot him an oblique look. ‘Your ego is really monumental, Justin, even for a man. All right, but I’m still just another giddy girl to you, aren’t I?’

‘I suppose it wasn’t a help possessing such stunning looks on top of a father who spoilt you rotten, but you certainly don’t go out of your way to dispel that image, Lucy.’

She looked across at him and there was something curiously haughty in her eyes. ‘Perhaps not, but that might not be all there is to me. For example, I do know quite a lot about Dalkeith and how it runs—if young men can sow their wild oats, why can’t girls have a few giddy salad days, anyway?’

He put his knife and fork together and stared at them for a long moment, before raising his eyes to hers. And then there was something curiously enigmatic in them as he said, ‘I’ve told you, what’s history can remain so. Your legion of lovers and my—multitude of mistresses. Unfortunately, you’ve got into the habit of sending out unmistakable signals—you’re probably right about young Mr Lang and the kind of thoughts he’s having about you now.’

Lucy grimaced.

‘Not picking up the bait, Mrs Waite?’ Justin said softly but with an undercurrent of mockery.

She tightened her mouth and subjected him to a deep blue look of considerable scorn.

He only laughed quietly. ‘Just one more thing, Lucy. In case you haven’t already got the message, if celibacy is becoming irksome then I am your only alternative. Remember that:

She burst into speech. ‘What about you? You don’t really expect me to believe I am your only alternative.’

‘Well, you are, so bear that in mind as well, my dear. But I’m afraid celibacy, inside marriage, certainly won’t suit me forever.’ He stood up. ‘And you know, Lucy, while I give your devotion to Dalkeith full credit, there’s no way a twenty-year-old girl could run it. There was no way you could have gone on without the kind of cash it needs again—and Dalkeith has become a rather expensive pastime for us Waites.’ He stopped and watched her as she took the point and looked away uncertainly. Then he went on quite gently, ‘But this way, here you are, mistress of it, and if you’ve got as much sense as I think you have in your more rational moments you must know it’s in good hands. By the way, I’m taking a couple of weeks off and we’re giving a house party this weekend. You might need to get in extra help. Goodnight.’

A couple of hours later, Lucy walked into her bedroom and closed the door.

As part of the austerity measures her father had been forced to introduce before his death, there was no live-in house help on Dalkeith. In fact Lucy had cut short her bachelor of arts degree to come home and look after her father six months ago and after her marriage, a curious marriage to say the least, she’d decided to keep it that way. It gave her something to do, and she’d discovered that, in lieu of her deep interest in Dalkeith being taken seriously, her interest despite herself in the crops Justin planned to grow and the sheep it still ran across its thousand acres of outback western New South Wales, that only left her horses for her to occupy herself with. And two mares in foal and two gelding hacks, devoted to them though she was, didn’t take up a lot of time.

She did have a cleaning lady who came in daily and a farmhand to tend the fireplaces, but it had come as some surprise to her, in those last days of her father’s decline, to find that she enjoyed cooking and gardening.

She sighed suddenly, pushed herself away from the door and picked up the silver-framed photo of her father from her dressing-table. No matter the things that she’d come to suspect even before his death, such as his being eminently suited to being a gentleman of leisure but not a gentleman farmer, and what she’d discovered about him after his death—that he’d tried to rescue Dalkeith from the brink again by gambling on horses, despite it all, she’d loved him and, only three months later, still missed him unbearably at times. If nothing else he’d certainly loved her unstintingly, and he’d taught her all the things he held dear to his heart, among them riding, shooting and fishing. He’d also taught her about art and music, he’d taken her to faraway exotic places, he’d helped her to fix her taste in clothes and all manner of things and yes, spoilt her wildly. But he’d never foisted a stepmother on her after her own mother, whom she couldn’t remember, had died. In fact, she suspected he’d never got over her mother’s death, and certain things in life hadn’t had much meaning for him after it. Including Dalkeith.

He’d also sent her to a very expensive convent school where the Mother Superior had been strong-minded enough to persevere with the motherless, precocious, mischievous and often downright naughty Lucy Wainright despite the battles royal they’d had since Lucy had been placed in her care at nine and a half, and she’d continued there until she was seventeen and a half. They’d even parted on terms of mutual respect and by that time quite some mutual affection, although each was loath to admit it.

But had her father, Lucy wondered, as she stared down at his handsome likeness, never really realised how much Dalkeith, above all else, had meant to her? That even in her giddy salad days when she’d been queening it over all and sundry—her eyes flashed briefly—it, even more than her father, had been the rock to come back to. Did she have more of her Scottish great-grandparents in her than he’d ever had? A spiritual affinity with the land that was like a physical tie? Had he not known that, without him and without Dalkeith, brave, bright Lucinda Wainright, darling of society, was in fact lonely and more than a little frightened? But he had known how much she loved Dalkeith; wasn’t that why he’d never told her he’d lost half of it to Justin’s father?

She pushed off her shoes and curled up in the pink velvet armchair beside the fireplace, and stared into the flickering flames with a faraway look in her eyes.

It was ironic but true that she had hero-worshipped Justin Waite as a child. It was also true that Justin had, without her quite understanding it, achieved the status of a hallmark in her mind during her adolescent yeais. A hallmark that she had involuntarily found herself measuring other boys, then men up against, and finding most of them wanting. This had also led her, once she’d left school and on the few social occasions that they had met, to treat him with cool hauteur, yet to experience an undoubted desire to be noticed.

‘And he noticed,’ she murmured a little bitterly, her cheeks feeling warm again. ‘Although the only sign he ever gave of it was that hateful little glint of amusement in his eyes—I really do hate him now!’

She sat up breathing quickly but also feeling a curious mixture of confusion and guilt. Why hadn’t she pressed her father for details about his rift with the Waites, daspite his extreme reluctance to say more on the subject? Well, I did try, she admitted. And of course I know now that he couldn’t bring himself to tell me what was going on—the fact that Riverbend did diversity and go into breeding racehorses with spectacular success must have been an awful blow to his pride, but why couldn’t I have realised it at the time? And then what he did say, about us no longer being good enough for the Waites, set my back right up. With the result, she conceded gloomily, sinking back in the chair, that I made myself ridiculous by treating Justin the way I did. But did I really offed him enough for him to take this kind of revenge? To make me marry him although he didn’t love me and so he can get all of Dalkeith? she asked herself miserably.

And answered herself a little tartly—apart from amusing him, I doubt it. I mean, I never saw him without some beautiful woman on his arm or doing something spectacular like playing polo or crewing on some twelve-metre yacht, and of course he then proceeded to make his own fortune.

She brooded darkly for a moment on how Justin had taken a run-down saddlery business and built it into a nationwide success story—another one—and so not only did Riverbend Stud produce top-flight progeny, but Riverbend Saddlery produced saddles of the finest quality, with an international reputation and all sorts of horse products, as well as clothing—riding boots et cetera. Yes, Justin was clever and not only with horses—and there was a ten-year age gap between them, damn it!

She got up and paced about angrily. ‘So what?’ she murmured to herself, and picked up her silver-blacked hairbrush and turned it over and over in her hands. Then she stopped and looked down at it and fingered the ornate ‘W’ engraved into the handle, and drew herself upright and stared at her reflection with cold eyes. ‘Just remember what he said when he proposed. He said, “We won’t even have to change the monograms, will we? Surely that demonstrates what a practical arrangement it would be.”’

But she shivered suddenly because, in a moment of rage and panic, she had accepted. And then, in a moment of further panic on her wedding-night had made her ‘dramatic declaration’. That she’d never willingly sleep with him. Had she in fact been seriously unbalanced by grief and everything else?

CHAPTER TWO

‘I NEED you. Justin—’

‘Well, well—’ Justin Waite put out a lazy hand and grasped his wife’s wrist ‘—did my little lecture set you thinkimg, dear Lucy?’

Lucy closed her eyes, attempted to free herself to no avail and ground her teeth. ‘I need to talk to you. About this party.’

It was a bright, chilly morning but Justin had apparently been up well ahead of her, which was how she’d encountered him coming in through the kitchen door as she was on the way out. Normally she’d have kept on going.

‘Ah.’ He released her wrist. ‘Then talk away while I start my breakfast.’

‘What have you been doing?’ she said involuntarily as she followed him reluctantly back into the kitchen where his breakfast was keeping warm on the range. He had on jeans, boots and a yellow sweater, his thick dark hair was ruffled and the cold morning air seemed to have agreed with him. In other words he looked fit, tough and capable, alert and slightly mocking, and more than a match for her. But when did he look any different these days? she wondered bitterly.

‘I’ve been out and about,’ he said idly, and carried the plate of sausages, scrambled eggs and toast to the kitchen table. There was a pot of coffee bubbling gently on the stove.

Lucy went over to it and poured two mugs which she carried to the kitchen table and sat down opposite him. ‘You can tell me, you know. Not only is the place still half mine but I’m intemted,’ she said with extreme frustration before she could stop herself. ‘Wouldn’t I under normal circumstances have some sort of voting power or some say in what you do?’

‘I’ve only been inspecting fences in the twelve-mite paddock, Lucy,’ he said mildly. ‘I made no momentous decisions other than that they need repairing.’

Lucy drew a breath and thought how much she’d have enjoyed a gallop down to the twelve-mile before breakfast instead of the lonely, aimless ride she’d been about to take. ‘What about the boundary rider’s hut?’ she asked tonelessly. ‘The last time I saw it it was a bit ramshackle. Grandad always liked to keep it provisioned and weatherproof because the twelve-mile can flood, but it’s on the only high ground, so if you did get marooned out there—’

‘That too. They’re starting on it today.’

She lowered her lashes instead of glaring at him. ‘Well,’ she said even more tonelessly, ‘tell me about the house party. You haven’t given me much notice.’

Justin spread marmalade on his toast. ‘I can get someone in to do it all if you like. I have mentioned that there’s no need for you to do so much of your own work, Lucy.’ He put the lid on the marmalade with some impatience.

‘And I’ve told you, I’d go round the bend that way, Justin, not to mention feeling as if I was on the receiving end of your patronage.’

He smiled. ‘I can assure you it’s not patronage to provide one’s wife with household help.’

‘But then we’ve agreed I’m not much of a wife. Look, I can do it. I can get Mrs Milton and her sister to come up—as I’ve done before on Dalkeith.’

‘Then do it,’ he said curtly. ‘What do you want to know?’

‘When they’re arriving, when they’re leaving, who they are and just what kind of a weekend you have in mind!’

‘Why, the kind of weekend Dalkeith is famous for, Lucy,’ he said blandly. ‘I’m sure I don’t have to tell you. There’ll be four guests and Sasha.’

She stared at him then forced herself to relax. ‘Well, if they come on Friday afternoon, we’ll have an informal dinner, a buffet and a simple evening—music, cards and so on. Saturday, a picnic at the creek, some sightseeing around the place, some target shooting or archery, a little gentle croquet for the ladies, then a formal dinner to which I could invite some locals.’ She considered. ‘Yes, I could invite the Simpsons, and Miles Graham for Sasha! That should even things up.’ Her eyes glinted. ‘Then on Sunday morning a late breakfast, and they can do what they like until they leave after lunch.’

‘And you and Mrs Milton and her sister can cope with all that?’ he queried.

Lucy shrugged. ‘They’ve got it down to a fine art. Mrs Milton does the cooking, although a lot of it is prepared beforehand, and her sister makes the beds, tidies up, waits on table et cetera. It’s all in the preparation, Justin. So long as you feed people really well, the rest seems to take care of itself.’

‘It’s Tuesday today, Lucy,’ he warned.

‘That gives me three full days, Justin,’ she said wearily. ‘Besides, I think I need a challenge,’ she murmured, and propped her chin on her hands.

He regarded her steadily then said quietly, ‘You’re making things awfully hard for yourself, Lucy.’

‘No, you’re making them hard for me, Justin.’

‘I hesitate to labour this point, but if it weren’t for me you wouldn’t be here.’

‘Perhaps. But I might have felt I’d gone down in a fair fight—who knows?’

‘How are you going to handle us in front of these people?’

She blinked, then grinned. ‘I hadn’t thought of that—yet.’ She sat up suddenly and tossed the thick plait she’d braided her hair into over her shoulder. ‘Do you mean we’ll have to put on a loving show?’

‘It’s not unexpected in newly-weds,’ he observed.

‘Oh.’

‘And I don’t expect I’d take kindly to being made a fool of,’ he added without the least emphasis, yet a curious underlay to his words that made her nerves prickle oddly. Perhaps it was something in his eyes as well, as they rested on her.

She opened her mouth, closed it then said with dignity, ‘It’s not a pre-requisite to... I mean, some of the people I’ve known who really were in love didn’t...sort of flaunt it.’

‘Perhaps not,’ he agreed. ‘What I’m trying to get at is, are you prepared to be sensible or are you going to cook up something like yesterday to advertise to the world that we’re not in love?’

Lucy pursed her lips. ‘I might just be normal and let them work it out for themselves,’ she said thoughtfully. ‘I don’t think you can expect much more from me, Justin.’

‘When you say normal, do you mean you’ll include me in your come hither—?’

‘I don’t do that,’ she cut in sharply.

‘Perhaps you don’t realise you’re doing it. Perhaps it’s second nature now. Didn’t you notice Robert Lang going weak at the knees when you smiled at him yesterday?’ He lifted a dark eyebrow at her.

Lucy set her teeth.

He waited then gathered his plate and took it over to the sink.

‘I can’t help how I smile!’ she said in a goaded sort of voice at last.

‘No, but with a bit of age and maturity you should be able to use it with discretion. Otherwise you could find yourself in a situation you might find hard to handle one day.’

Lucy tossed her head and stood up, with not the slightest idea, as he came back to the table, what he had in mind. ‘Like this,’ he said softly, standing right in front of her so she had to tilt her head back, and taking her in his arms as her eyes widened. ‘In the position of being kissed by your sworn enemy.’

Her lips parted. ‘Justin...’

But he ignored both the look in her eyes and the incredulity in her voice, and held her closer so she couldn’t help being aware not only of the feel of his hard, muscled body against her own but of the faint tang of aftershave and sheer maleness about him—and finding it curiously heady, like some primitive assault on her senses. This both stunned her slightly and made her less able to cope with what followed. A searching, not particularly deep kiss to which she didn’t respond particularly yet which didn’t exactly repel. It was really strange, she reflected afterwards. It was as if her body had gone languid and her mind was suspended above her, recording and storing the event, monitoring her own reactions but, above all, searching for his.

And when he lifted his head at last she blinked once then stared into his eyes, with her heart in her mouth suddenly at what she might see.

What she did see was the way he narrowed his eyes immediately, and then the little laughter-lines beside them creased. ‘Well, Lucy,’ he said wryly, ‘you have got that down to a fine art, haven’t you?’

She licked her lips and said huskily, ‘What do you mean?’

His hands slid down her back to her waist and he lifted her off her feet and moved her away, and steadied her but didn’t take his hands away. ‘The art of kissing and giving nothing away at the same time.’

A tinge of pink came to her cheeks and a pulse beat at the base of her throat, a pulse of anger as it happened. ‘If that’s not exactly what you did, I’ll eat my hat,’ she retorted, and removed herself from his grasp but sat down almost immediately.

‘Then why are you so cross?’ He leant against the corner of the table and folded his arms.

‘Perhaps I’m tired of having it continually pointed out to me what a femme fatale I am.’ She picked up the lid of the sugar bowl and replaced it not gently. ‘And if that was a warning of the deluded sort you were issuing yesterday—’

‘It was a warning to behave yourself this weekend, Lucy.’

‘Listen, Justin!’ Her eyes were a deeper, decidedly stormy blue now.

‘No, you listen to me, Lucy.’ He unfolded his arms and pinned one of her wrists to the table as her hand wandered towards the sugar bowl again, and he lifted her chin in his other one, also not gently as she resisted stubbornly. And his eyes were a cold, hard grey as he said, ‘You can fight me all you like in private, but not in public, because if you do, I’ll retaliate, believe me, in a way you wouldn’t like at all, and in a way that will make your little war look like child’s play. Do we understand each other?’

It was Mrs Milton who broke into Lucy’s reverie. Mrs Milton came in daily and Lucy was still sitting at the kitchen table where Justin had left her, staring into space, as she arrived.

‘Morning, Miss Lucy,’ she said brightly and placed a parcel on the table. ‘There’s those sheets that needed mending.’

‘Oh!’ Lucy jumped. ‘Oh, thank you, Mrs Milton—sorry, I was miles away. How are you?’

‘Fine, love. Miles away where?’ Mrs Milton poured herself a cup of coffee.

Lucy grimaced. ‘Are you doing anything this weekend? You and your sister?’

‘No. Got a party on?’

‘Yes, and I want it to be—something special, Mrs Milton. Hang on, I’ll get a pen and paper.’

Whether by design or not, Justin stayed out of her way over those next three busy days, although they did meet for breakfast on the Wednesday morning.

‘You have a dirty mark on your chin, Lucy,’ her husband said after a more formal greeting had got him a cool look and a barely audible murmur in reply.

This time she responded with a raised eyebrow and a shrug, causing him to narrow his eyes and appear to drop the subject. But as they passed each other later, he stopped her with a hand on her shoulder and put his forefinger on the ‘mark’ on her chin.

‘Did I do that?’

She merely nodded.

He took his finger away and inspected the faint blue bruise. He also let his gaze wander over her mouth, innocent of any lipstick yet rose-pink and finely chiselled, the smooth lucent skin of her cheeks, the deep pansy blue of her eyes with their sweeping lashes, darker than her hair, and the escaping tendrils of wheat gold curling on her forehead. ‘My apologies,’ he said. ‘I didn’t know you bruised so easily.’

‘I don’t bruise so easily. Perhaps you don’t know your own strength. Or perhaps you do.’

‘What I haven’t known,’ he said with a twist of his lips, ‘is anyone quite as stubborn as you. I suppose you’ve now added the fact that I’m a callous brute to your list of my sins.’

‘Some of your threats left me in no doubt of it at all even before this,’ she murmured coldly. ‘May I go now? I have a lot to do.’

‘How’s it going?’

‘It’s all under control.’

‘Do you need any assistance? From me,’ he said gravely.

Her look spoke volumes. ‘All you have to do is be here, Justin.’

‘I still haven’t told you who’s coming—apart from Sasha.’

Lucy shrugged. ‘I rang Sasha myself and got it all from her. She was a mine of information, in fact. Two couples, although one unmarried couple who will nevertheless share a bedroom—’

‘Unlike some married couples I know. I wonder if it’s a new trend? Go on,’ he said politely.

‘Yes, well,’ Lucy said evenly, ‘Sasha also told me that although it’s not strictly a business weekend, they will be inspecting some yearlings at Riverbend on their way here and might be interested in buying them at the upcoming yearling sales in Sydney—she said that very significantly, Justin. In other words—don’t rock the boat, Lucy, if you can help it! And, she also gave me some helpful suggestions which—’

‘You will go out of your way to ignore,’ Justin said amusedly.

‘Indeed I will.’ Lucy’s eyes flashed briefly, recalling Sasha’s helpful advice which had included the maxim that keeping things simple might be a good idea. ‘How you put up with her I’ve no idea!’

‘I’ve told you, she’s very good at her job.’

‘She’s certainly got a superiority complex. Is that why you two get along so well?’ she asked innocently, and went on impatiently, ‘Besides, being good at your job doesn’t mean you have to be treated as a friend, necessarily.’

‘Well Sasha is both actually, Lucy. And since I moved to Dalkeith, so that you might remain in your ancestral home,’ he said and held her eyes in a suddenly cool look, ‘she is more up to date on matters relating to the stud and this crop of yearlings than I am. So she will be here in what you might call an unofficial business capacity.’ He paused then added with that same cool look. ‘Don’t upset Sasha, Lucy. She may rub you up the wrong way but she has a brain like a computer when it comes to horses, and extremely good judgement.’

‘As a matter of fact I believe you, Justin. I’ve even thought she has a certain horsey look about her—nothing less than a chestnut thoroughbred with wonderful lines, of course!’ she finished with a grin. ‘As for upsetting her,’ she added, ‘I wish you would tell me how to, because it doesn’t seem possible.’

They stared at each other—rather, Lucy found it suddenly impossible to evade his gaze or to understand why it made her suddenly feel a bit small, but it did and she said at last, ‘Oh, all right! I won’t upset Sasha—so far as it’s humanly possible for me not to!’

‘Good.’ He said nothing more but moved out of her way.

‘Am I being dismissed now?’ she demanded.

‘Why not?’

‘There are times, Justin Waite, when you irritate the life out of me,’ she said precisely. ‘And what with you and Sasha telling me what I should do and what I shouldn’t do, it will be a miracle if this weekend doesn’t turn out to be a disaster—’ She broke off and made a disgusted sound.

‘And there are times, Lucy, when it’s impossible to tell you anything—I wouldn’t be too happy about this weekend turning into a disaster, so if you have any doubts tell me now.’

‘I don’t—’

‘I suppose the proof of that will be in the pudding,’ he said drily, and studied her. ‘By the way,’ he said, flicking his gaze over her denim overalls, and the two pigtails she wore her hair in, ‘Would you mind not wearing your hair like that over the weekend?’

She blinked. ‘Why not—as if I would, anyway.’

‘I could be accused of cradle-snatching, that’s all. Off you go.’

‘Perhaps you are!’

‘Now, Lucy, we both know I’m not. Don’t we?’ His grey gaze bored into hers until she reddened and turned away abruptly and angrily but without words.

Fortunately for her seething state of mind, there was enough to be done to calm her and force her to concentrate—and not only that. There was the knowledge that both Justin and Sasha had doubts about her capabilities as a hostess. In her less angry moments she recognised that it was a useful spur, in her more angry moments she told herself she would certainly show them a thing or two. And by Friday midday the fruits of her labour and Mrs Milton’s were very evident. The house was polished and shining and filled with flowers. The guest bedrooms were impeccable, with not a wrinkle in their bedspreads, and the cold room was filled with a selection of pies and pastries, cold meats, quiches, fruits and vegetables and three splendid, plump ducks hung there, ready to be roasted for Saturday night’s dinner.

It was also not long past midday when disaster struck, in the form of a distraught phone call from Mrs Milton who’d gone to pick up her sister to take up residence in the staff quarters for the weekend.

‘...Your mother? Oh, I’m so sorry, Mrs Milton,’ Lucy said into the phone and a moment later, ‘Yes, of course if it’s that serious, I do understand. Um...you and your sister must be worried sick and will want to be with her... Look, if there’s anything I can do, please—’

‘You’ve got enough on your plate as it is, pet,’ Mrs Milton said down the line in tones quite unlike her normal cheerful ones. ‘I’ve been racking my brains and all I can come up with is my niece, Shirley. How would it be if I send her up, Miss Lucy? She’s a good cook, that I can guarantee, and doesn’t mind what she turns her hand to. There’s only one problem and that’s—’

‘Oh, Mrs Milton, please do,’ Lucy said into the phone. ‘I’d be so grateful, and between us we’ve done most of it, haven’t we? What’s the problem?’

‘Well she’d have to bring her son, Adrian—’

‘That’s no problem!’

‘Mmm, I haven’t told you about Adrian, have I? Look, just...if you’re firm with him he’s fine, but his father ran off when he was two, so... And Shirley worships the ground he walks on.’

‘Don’t worry, I’ll tie him up if...no, of course not, Mrs Milton, I wouldn’t dream of it, but I’m sure we’ll be able to cope with him between us. Now you just worry about your mother and give her my love—I’ll be thinking of you all.’

She put the phone down and took several deep breaths, then remembered she’d forgotten to ask how old Shirley’s Adrian was.

He was ten, with red hair, prominent blue eyes and buck teeth. He walked with a swagger and didn’t reply when spoken to. His mother had faded blonde agitated-looking hair but otherwise was clean, neat and presentable and obviously anxious to do her very best.

‘well, Shirley,’ Lucy said with a dazzling smile, half an hour before the guests were due to fly in, ‘I guess the important thing is not to panic. Everything in the buffet is either cold or only needs heating up so tonight will be quite simple, and I’ll nip in later to give you a hand.’ And she took Shirley step by step through the eventing’s requirements. Then she showed them to their room and showed Adrian the television and even fetched some of her old books and games for him.

‘He’s not much of a reader,’ his mother said with an apologetic smile, ‘but it’s lovely of you to bother, Miss Lucy. Now, Adrian, you will be a good boy, won’t you?’

At five-thirty, the long, lovely veranda room played host to the glow of lamplight, the chink of glasses and some exuberant conversation. And despite the fact that part of her mind was elsewhere, Lucy was in the thick of it.

She wore slim scarlet trousers, matching flat shoes and a cream pullover with a wonderful red, green and cream scarf worn shawlwise. Her hair was loose and she was faintly pink from some of the extravagant compliments she’d received—most on the subject of new brides and early wedded bliss. Their guests were of course all older than she was, the two women in the same mould as Sasha, elegant late twenties or early thirties, experienced and articulate and both with careers of their own. But apart from that aspect of it, it was a milieu she was very familiar with and one her father had taught her to hold her own in some years ago. She’d been hostessing his parties since she was about eighteen, after all. And if she had fewer resources to hand than she’d ever had before, plus one Dennis the Menace on hand, she was damned if anyone was going to know it. Least of all Justin, although she’d caught him looking at her once or twice with something oddly alert in his eyes. But he’s not a mind-reader, she reassured herself, and there’s no earthly reason for him to go into the kitchen tonight, anyway. The longer I can keep him in the dark and still cope, the better, she reasoned—somewhat obscurely, she realised briefly, but didn’t have the time to elaborate.

All the same, at six-thirty, when she suggested to everyone that they might like to freshen up although not to worry about changing, she breathed a sigh of relief when they all took themselves to their bedrooms and she repaired to the kitchen as unobtrusively as she could. To find Shirley standing in the middle of the room looking wild-eyed and tearful.

‘What’s wrong?’ she demanded.

‘He’s gone!’

‘Who?’

‘Adrian! He could be anywhere out there! He’s not a country boy, Miss Lucy; we’re just spending a holiday with Auntie Vera!’

‘The little...um, calm down, Shirley. I’ll find him. You just keep on with the buffet. We’ve got an hour.’

It took her half an hour to locate Adrian in the loft above the garage. And the mild lecture she gave him brought no visible reaction from him even when she told him he’d frightened the life out of his mother. ‘Now just stay put,’ she admonished as she marched him back to his room. ‘Tomorrow you can go out and see the horses, I’ll organise a ride on a tractor for you, whatever you like—and your dinner’s coming in a moment.’

‘Are you all right, Lucy?’

‘Fine, Justin,’ she said brightly, finding him alone in the lounge. He’d added a sage-green sweater to his informal gear and his hair was brushed and tidy, his grey eyes watchful. ‘No one down yet?’

‘No. Have you been running somewhere?’

She laughed. ‘No. Why?’

‘You look a little—harassed. Are Mrs Milton and her sister coping all right?’

‘Everything’s fine. If you could just have some confidence in me, it would be a big help.’

‘Very well, Lucy. Ah, here are the first of our guests.’

The buffet went off smoothly and with plenty of compliments and afterwards for a while they played music and all chatted together, and then the men tended to group together at one end of the room, leaving the women at the other and Sasha looking for once in her life as if she didn’t quite know which group to join.

Lucy seized the opportunity and murmured in her ear that she’d be grateful if she could deputise for her for a moment, while she checked that all was well behind the scenes. Sasha looked gratified, as much, probably, Lucy reflected, that ‘behind the scenes’ should need checking. But she did as she was asked.

Behind the scenes, there was another story. The dining-room was cleared, the kitchen was tidy and a tea tray was set out but there was no sign of Shirley. What she was doing in fact, was swabbing out the staff bathroom and passage leading to it because Adrian had allowed the bath to overflow. He’d got so wrapped up in the television programme he’d been watching, his mother explained, he’d forgotten.

Lucy closed her eyes and counted to ten. And, on opening them, noticed Adrian watching her interestedly. Why, he’s testing me out, she thought, the little wretch.

‘Isn’t it time he was in bed?’ she said as mildly as she could.

By the time she got back she was feeling decidedly limp—it had taken the two of them a good twenty minutes of vigorous mopping to dam the flood, her feet were damp inside her shoes and she had trickles of sweat running down her back, but no one appeared to notice and the party had come together again and was dancing to the CD player.

‘Oh damn,’ she muttered to herself.

But two hours later her ordeal was ended, or so she thought. The party broke up at last and everyone went up to bed appearing happy and contented with their stay on Dalkeith so far.

‘Let’s hope I can keep it that way,’ she murmured to herself as she tidied up. She’d sent Shirley to bed, reasoning that it might keep Adrian out of more mischief as well as having her bright and fresh for the next day. But when it was all done she stood in the middle of the dining-room, thinking about the three other women in the house, excluding poor Shirley.

Thinking about them in a context that surprised her a little. In other words, how much more appropriate any one of them would be as a consort for Justin than she was. How, for example, they would react to being told that without regular, satisfying sex they could become—what had he said—fractious and troublesome?

Well, she mused, she couldn’t imagine him saying something like that in the first place. To them. So how would communication on the subject take place with someone older and wiser? A more sophisticated play on words? A simple expression of need—with Sasha he’d probably only have to crook his finger, she thought somewhat maliciously, then sighed.

But a moment later she discovered herself feeling a sense of righteous indignation—talk about her come hither smiles! Had he not noticed that despite two of their female guests being partnered there had been throughout the evening a discreet summing up of Justin taking place, an awareness—yes, very subtle, but there. Of course it was always there with Sasha and he must be blind not to notice it. Why didn’t he? But not only that, her thoughts ranged on, a subtle summing up of herself had been taking place all evening, in the direct context of her suitability for Justin.

She stood in the middle of the dining-room deep in thought, wondering if it was all part of the games people with a bit of age and maturity played, wondering if he played it himself, or wondering finally if he just had this devastating effect on women and had got so used to it that he didn’t notice it any more!

‘Lucy.’

‘Oh!’ She turned with a start to find the object of her deep, dark musings regarding her with some amusement. ‘You—I didn’t hear you,’ she said lamely.

‘I gathered that. You seemed to be a hundred miles away.’

‘Not really,’ she replied ruefully. ‘Well, that’s all done. I think I’ll go to bed now—goodnight.’

‘I’m coming up myself.’ He strolled beside her to the foot of the staircase. ‘It was a very successful evening, by the way.’

Lucy paused with her hand on the banister and tried to think of something to say but ended up unsuccessfully trying to smother a huge yawn. ‘Sorry, I—’

‘You’re exhausted. Come,’ he said, and without further ado he picked her up and started up the stairs.

After a moment of supreme surprise, she lay quiet and composed in his arms, her lashes fanning her cheeks, her only thought to wonder what was coming.

But all he did was to put her down on her bed and turn away to stoke up her fire. She lay quite still, watching him and feeling an odd little sense of loss, which translated upon a moment’s thought to the realisation that she hadn’t felt quite so lonely or strung up in his arms as she did lying alone on her bed the way she was... She bit back a husky exclamation and sat up, feeling unreasonably annoyed and stung to retaliation.

‘It’s a pity we couldn’t have done that for the benefit of the gallery,’ she said ironically. ‘Justin, is it important to you the kind of impression I make on these people? I mean, are they going to judge you on me, sort of thing?’

He straightened and came over to the bed. ‘Why?’

‘Why what?’

‘Why are you asking me that, Lucy?’

She stared up at him. ‘Why shouldn’t I? I’m curious, that’s all.’

He looked faintly sceptical but said, ‘I guess it’s human nature to wonder what people see in each other and make some sort of judgement.’

‘So,’ she said slowly, ‘were I to be judged—if they were to think for example, well, she’s pretty enough and all that but mightn’t she bore Justin to tears after a while?—how will that affect how they think about you?’

He frowned. ‘Lucy, if I knew what was behind this I might—’

‘You’re the one who wanted me to make a good impression and not look as if I’d been snatched from my cradle,’ she broke in tartly.

He smiled. ‘Is that how you’ve been feeling tonight? A little out of your depth? I thought you were a bit wrought up about something.’

The accuracy and the inaccuracy of his words brought a faint blush to her cheeks and a further sense of maltreatment to her heart. ‘You can’t have it both ways, Justin. You did marry me, even if it was for all the wrong reasons, but they don’t know that, so—’

‘Lucy,’ he interrupted gravely, ‘let me set your mind at rest. I don’t give a damn what people think about my private life; I never have. My concern about how you might behave this weekend was motivated by this—when you invite people to spend time with you, especially way out in the backblocks like this where they can’t get up and go that easily if they want to, I think you’re fairly obliged not to make them feel uncomfortable and as if they’re in the midst of a domestic brawl. Don’t you agree?’

She opened her mouth, closed it then said scathingly, ‘Of course! That doesn’t explain the cradle bit, though.’

‘Well, as to that,’ he said musingly, and picked up a strand of her hair, ‘I wondered if it mightn’t be part of your strategy, that’s all.’

Lucy blinked at him. ‘I don’t understand.’

‘Don’t you? I thought since I’d made it plain that your femme fatale act—your words, not mine, but not inappropriate—was something I wouldn’t approve of you might—change tack.’

Lucy closed her eyes. ‘Funnily enough, it didn’t occur to me at all,’ she said bleakly.

‘You wouldn’t be losing your grip on this—war, would you, Lucy?’ he queried, slipping her hair through his fingers then smoothing it back into place and standing back a step.

For the briefest moment Lucy wondered if she was. But she said, ‘I’m rather tired, Justin, that’s all.’

‘Is it, Lucy?’

The way he said it, on a different note entirely made her open her eyes. ‘What more could there be?’

‘Unless you tell me, I don’t know.’ His eyes searched hers.

She looked away and found herself considering telling him that she didn’t have Mrs Milton and her sister, only one flustered and anxious substitute—and Adrian, and that if the rest of the weekend went well it would be something of a miracle—he’d probably find out soon enough, anyway. But almost immediately she decided she couldn’t stand his scorn, not tonight, so she said wearily, ‘There’s nothing,’ and lay back exhaustedly.

‘Perhaps you’re trying too hard, Lucy.’

She stretched her throat and rubbed it. ‘I really don’t know what I have to do to make you approve of me, Justin.’

He moved so his face was in the shadows and she couldn’t read his expression. ‘Just the one thing you won’t do.’

For the life of her she couldn’t help it, couldn’t stern the images that flooded her mind, of lying in his arms and being made love to, of not being lonely, at least. Images of surrender in the most complete way a woman could to a man, but... ‘But then I might not approve of myself. It’s a real dilemma, isn’t it?’ she whispered, and sat up suddenly with her hands to her face as hot tears sprang to her eyes. ‘Please, just go away, Justin. I can’t cope with you and all this at the same time.’

He stared down at her shaking shoulders for a long moment, then he said evenly, ‘All right, I’m going. But if there is a problem you don’t have to—’

‘There’s nothing!’ She raised her tear-streaked face abruptly. ‘Other than that you’ve now managed to undermine my self-confidence.’

‘Why, Lucy, I never thought to hear you say that. Goodnight, my dear. Don’t do anything stupid, will you?’

She didn’t, not then, but before the weekend was over she seriously interfered with Adrian’s freedom and committed a social solecism of considerable proportions.

CHAPTER THREE

IT WAS Sasha, who else, who broke the news on Sunday morning.

She came into the veranda room where everyone was lounging around comfortably just prior to getting ready to leave, still commenting on the great dinner party last night and lovely day they’d had yesterday, and she said into a lull in the conversation, ‘Justin, there’s a child handcuffed to a fence outside. He says Lucy did it and that she threatened to shoot him.’

Everyone sat up with wide eyes and turned to Lucy.

‘Oh,’ she swallowed, ‘that’s Adrian. He’s only been there for about ten minutes. I...’ She stopped and blushed bright red.

Incredibly, it was Justin who came to her rescue. ‘What’s he done now?’ he said resignedly, and added for everyone’s benefit, ‘Adrian is the son of our cook, Shirley—a great cook, I’m sure you’ll all agree.’

Lucy stared at him open-mouthed but he murmured gently, ‘Tell us, Lucy, otherwise people will think you’re some sort of a monster.’

‘He...’ Lucy licked her lips. ‘Yesterday he handcuffed me to the towel rail in the kitchen. Um—one of his uncles is a policeman and he gave him this set. Fortunately his mother came to the rescue—eventually... And today,’ she said hastily, ‘he actually picked the lock of the gun cupboard—I caught him at it but of course luckily we keep the ammunition in a safe and I didn’t threaten to shoot him... but in light of the fact that he laid waste every tomato plant in the vegetable garden yesterday, lit a fire in the chicken shed and downed all the washing on the line in the duck pond, I thought some of his own medicine might be good for him... You knew!’ she said to Justin. ‘All the time you knew.’

‘Not all the time. Where are the keys? I’ll...let him out on parole.’

But a combination of all sorts of factors worked powerfully in Lucy and she was deaf to discretion. ‘How could you?’ she accused. ‘Of all the low-down things! To let me go on pretending...oh!’ She ground her teeth. ‘I hate you, Justin Waite, you’re the most arrogant, self-opinionated man I’ve ever met and that’s only some of the things I hate about you.’

The silence was electric but Justin laughed, as if he was really amused. ‘Well, we nearly made it,’ he said obliquely. ‘Sorry, friends, but Lucy has had a traumatic weekend, haven’t you, my love? I’m sure you only need to apologise, though. To them, not necessarily to me,’ he added, and his eyes mocked her.

Lucy glanced round, flinched visibly as no one’s eyes quite met hers, then became aware of an agitated murmuring she was coming to know well behind her. She dug into the pocket of her jeans and removed a set of keys. ‘Here you are, Shirley,’ she said swinging round. ‘He hasn’t been there long and if I were you I’d confiscate those handcuffs—they’re more of a temptation than some people can bear. I am sorry,’ she said contritely, swinging back. ‘I’ve been short-staffed this weekend and I have an unfortunate temper, apparently. I do hope you’ll all forgive me.’

She lay on her bed with her eyes closed but knew it was Justin when she heard the door open and close. She’d heard the plane take off about half an hour earlier but she’d made her farewells—she winced as she thought of it—from the house.

What caused her to open her eyes was the sagging of the other side of her double bed, and she saw before she closed them again that, not content with sitting, he’d stretched out with his hands behind his head. He also said, ‘You’re not sulking, are you, Lucy?’

She sat up abruptly and crossed her legs. ‘No. I’m still angry as a matter of fact, so if you’ve come to lecture me you’re wasting your time.’

‘The thought never crossed my mind,’ he murmured.

She frowned then turned to him. ‘Aren’t you—angry?’

‘Do I look it?’

She hesitated because in fact he looked perfectly relaxed and at home and there was only a sort of bland query in his eyes. ‘I—there are times when I don’t understand you, Justin,’ she said at last.

‘That’s rather obvious.’

‘I mean, I’ve just done the one thing you didn’t want me to do: discomfited our guests in other words—yet you—’

‘They were on their way out, but go on.’

She breathed deeply. ‘All right. I displayed sentiments not exactly common to new brides, I’m sure; I probably gave them cause to wonder whether I wasn’t round the bend, handcuffing children to fences! Isn’t that enough?’

‘And all without even trying.’ He smiled unexpectedly. ‘Are you so annoyed because you feel its sheer spontaneity robbed it of malice aforethought and robbed you therefore of some satisfaction?’

Lucy bit her lip.

‘As for my—low actions, what actually happened was that I knew something was up so I bearded a lady I thought must be Mrs Milton’s sister in the kitchen yesterday morning, only to have the whole sad story explained to me—although she didn’t tell me what a monster young Adrian is. I then acted as if I’d in fact known and decided to resume my mantle of ignorance with you mainly because you did seem to be coping admirably and I thought it would help restore your confidence. That same confidence you accused me of undermining. I now realise I should have bucked in and helped or something like that but then that would have meant explaining to people like Sasha—’

‘That I’d got myself in a bind,’ Lucy said gloomily.

‘I thought you might not appreciate that.’

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