“I do not intend to be a part-time father,”

Harrison said, “which leaves us only one alternative.”

“Which is?”

“That Georgia has two parents.”

A frown creased Kimberley’s forehead. “But how—?”

“There’s only one way.” He said it without expression. “That you marry me.”

Kimberley stared at him. “You cannot be serious.”

“Oh, but that’s where you’re wrong, Kimberley.” He smiled. “I am. Deadly serious.”

Dear Reader,

One hundred. Doesn’t matter how many times I say it, I still can’t believe that’s how many books I’ve written. It’s a fabulous feeling but more fabulous still is the news that Mills & Boon are issuing every single one of my backlist as digital titles. Wow. I can’t wait to share all my stories with you - which are as vivid to me now as when I wrote them.

There’s BOUGHT FOR HER HUSBAND, with its outrageously macho Greek hero and A SCANDAL, A SECRET AND A BABY featuring a very sexy Tuscan. THE SHEIKH’S HEIR proved so popular with readers that it spent two weeks on the USA Today charts and…well, I could go on, but I’ll leave you to discover them for yourselves.

I remember the first line of my very first book: “So you’ve come to Australia looking for a husband?” Actually, the heroine had gone to Australia to escape men, but guess what? She found a husband all the same! The man who inspired that book rang me up recently and when I told him I was beginning my 100th story and couldn’t decide what to write, he said, “Why don’t you go back to where it all started?”

So I did. And that’s how A ROYAL VOW OF CONVENIENCE was born. It opens in beautiful Queensland and moves to England and New York. It’s about a runaway princess and the enigmatic billionaire who is infuriated by her, yet who winds up rescuing her. But then, she goes and rescues him… Wouldn’t you know it?

I’ll end by saying how very grateful I am to have a career I love, and to thank each and every one of you who has supported me along the way. You really are very dear readers.

Love,

Sharon xxx

Mills & Boon are proud to present a thrilling digital collection of all Sharon Kendrick’s novels and novellas for us to celebrate the publication of her amazing and awesome 100th book! Sharon is known worldwide for her likeable, spirited heroines and her gorgeous, utterly masculine heroes.

SHARON KENDRICK once won a national writing competition, describing her ideal date: being flown to an exotic island by a gorgeous and powerful man. Little did she realise that she’d just wandered into her dream job! Today she writes for Mills & Boon, featuring her often stubborn but always to-die-for heroes and the women who bring them to their knees. She believes that the best books are those you never want to end. Just like life…

Part-Time Father
Sharon Kendrick

www.millsandboon.co.uk

This book is dedicated to the beautiful and talented

Daniella Trendell.

Contents

Cover

Extract

Dear Reader

About the Author

Title Page

Dedication

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

Copyright

CHAPTER ONE

‘MOTHER! Mother!’ Out of breath from running at top speed up the path following her mother’s urgent summons, Kimberley dropped her suitcase on to the cold tiles of the flagged floor and listened.

Silence.

Fear gripped at her heart like a vice, and a note of uncertainty crept into her voice. ‘Mother?’

She heard the scrape of something in the small sitting-room, and, striding over in the shortest time possible, she threw open the door to see her mother just moving the small stool which stood in front of the sofa, on which she’d obviously been resting her feet.

Thank heavens! The unacknowledged fear, ever present when your elderly mother lived on her own, immediately subsided. ‘So there you are!’ said Kimberley in relief.

Her mother pushed her spectacles further back up on her nose and looked at her only child, a small smile lighting her still shapely mouth which was so like her daughter’s. ‘Where did you think I’d be?’ she enquired mildly. ‘Robbed and left trussed up in the attic? Kidnapped by modern-day pirates and heading for the coast?’

Kimberley giggled. ‘You are outrageous, Mother! Your imagination is much too vivid, and those crazy adventure stories you read don’t help.’

‘And you don’t read enough of them!’ commented Mrs Ryan sternly. ‘You’re far too serious about that job of yours.’

Kimberley decided to ignore that—for who wouldn’t be obsessively career-minded when their love-life was a total non-starter? And whose fault is that? mocked a tiny inner voice.

Ignoring that too, she went over to plant a kiss on her mother’s forehead, then perched on the other end of the sofa. ‘Why did you need to see me? I was coming down soon for Christmas anyway. You are OK, aren’t you? What are you doing lying down in the middle of the day?’ And then her attention was caught by the bandage which was tightly tied around her mother’s ankle. ‘Oh, heavens-whatever have you done?’ she exclaimed in horror.

‘Kimberley, please,’ said her mother calmly. ‘There’s absolutely no need to panic.’

‘But what have you done?’

‘I’ve sprained my ankle, that’s all.’

‘But what does the doctor——?’

‘He says it’s fine, I just need to take it easy, that’s all…’ Mrs Ryan’s voice tailed off. ‘The only problem is——’

‘What?’

‘That I can’t work.’ Mrs Ryan leaned back against the cushions piled on the sofa and surveyed the immaculately dressed form of her daughter, who was at that moment letting a frown mar her exceptionally pretty features.

Kimberley gave a little click of disapproval. ‘Then give the job up, Mum,’ she urged. ‘I’ve told you that I earn enough to send you what Mrs Nash——’ she said the name reluctantly ‘—pays you.’

‘And I have told you on countless occasions that I enjoy the independence which my little job gives me, and I have no intention of relinquishing it.’

‘But, Mum—must you do a cleaning job?’

‘You, Kimberley, I’m ashamed to say, are a snob,’ said Mrs Ryan reprovingly.

‘I am not a snob. I’d just rather you didn’t work at all, if you must know.’

‘You mean,’ said Mrs Ryan shrewdly, ‘that you’d rather I didn’t work in the big house which you almost became mistress of?’

Kimberley’s mouth tightened, but she felt tiny beads of sweat break out on her forehead. ‘That’s history,’ she croaked.

‘You’re right. It is. In fact, I’ve some news for you.’

‘What kind of news?’

‘He’s getting married. He’s engaged!’

The beads of sweat became droplets. Kimberley heard her heart pounding in her ears, felt the blood drain from her face. ‘He is?’ she croaked, drymouthed. ‘That’s wonderful.’

‘Isn’t it? Dear Duncan,’ said her mother fondly.

‘Duncan?’ asked Kimberley weakly.

Her mother gave her a strange look. ‘Yes, of course Duncan. Your ex-fiancé, the man you were going to marry—who else could I have meant?’

Surreptitiously Kimberley wiped the back of her hand over her sticky forehead, and then, terrified that her mother might notice and comment on her pale complexion, searched around for a distraction. ‘How about some tea? I’m absolutely parched. Shall I make some?’ she asked brightly.

‘Best offer I’ve had all day!’

Kimberley quickly left the room and filled the old-fashioned kettle with shaking hands, reacquainting herself with her mother’s tiny kitchen, pulling biscuits out of the tin with trembling hands as she tried to put her thoughts in order. She wondered what her mother would have said if she’d known that Duncan had been the last person in her thoughts; she had thought she’d been talking about Harrison.

Harrison Nash—her ex-fiancé’s brother. The man with the cold grey eyes and the hard, handsome features and the lean, sexy body. Harrison Nash— who had changed the whole course of Kimberley’s life without even realising that he was doing so…

It had been one bright and beautiful summer’s evening, with the setting sun pouring like golden honey into the red drawing-room at Brockbank House where Kimberley had been waiting to conduct what was obviously going to be a difficult and painful interview with Duncan, her fiancé. Because, after much thought and many sleepless nights, Kimberley had decided to break off the engagement which had followed their whirlwind romance.

Duncan and his mother had recently moved into Woolton village’s most imposing building—the historic Brockbank House, left to the Nash family by a distant relative who had died without leaving an heir. Kimberley had met Duncan when she’d been visiting her mother in the village, on one of her brief but regular forays from London, where she lived.

From the first meeting he had pursued her avidly, and, flattered by his charm and his persistence, Kimberley had allowed herself to believe that she had fallen in love at long last. Already in a strong and powerful position at work, where her male colleagues tended to fear and revere her, Kimberley had been charmed by Duncan’s healthy irreverence and his ready agreement to let her set the pace physically.

He didn’t leap on her and he respected her somewhat old-fashioned view that she wanted to wait until they were married before consummating their relationship. At twenty-four she thought that she’d found the perfect gentleman—and she had.

Kimberley sighed.

It just wasn’t enough. Quite apart from the fact that she was three years older than Duncan, and that he was still at university while she had already established a successful career for herself in London, there was one even more important reason why she could not marry him.

She simply didn’t love him—or rather, she did, as the dear, sweet person he was, but not in the way that he said he loved her, and to marry him under those conditions would simply not be fair to him.

She had decided to tell him as gently as possible, but Duncan was young, good-looking and the best fun in the world. He would get over it, of that she was certain.

Kimberley sighed as she perched nervously on the edge of one of the large chairs in the red drawing-room, brushing one hand through the thick abundance of raven-black hair and pushing it off her high-browed face so that it spilled in shiny sootdark waves down her back.

She wondered how one went about breaking off an engagement. She would have to tell her mother and Duncan’s mother—both widows. She herself had no other relatives, and Duncan very few. She wondered briefly whether the older brother in America had been informed—the rich, successful one, who Duncan and his mother both seemed slightly in awe of.

Probably not. They’d only become engaged last weekend—hardly time to make it properly official.

As Kimberley stared out of the window at the magnificent grounds of Brockbank House she heard a soft noise behind her. Not a footstep exactly, it was much too subtle for that, but she suddenly experienced the unease of being watched. She turned round slowly, to discover who her silent scrutineer was, feeling her skin ice with some unknown fear as she stared at the dark, silent man who stood before her.

She had seen photos of him before, of coursevarious portraits of him scattered around the house and, latterly, newspaper clippings from gossip columns—but Kimberley would have known without being told that this was Harrison. Harrison the rich, the powerful, the blessed older son. Not that he looked in the least bit like Duncan, although the familial similarities were there.

But this man was Duncan’s very antithesis. Where Duncan’s eyes were soft, smiling, this man’s were hard and crystalline and bright. Where Duncan’s mouth was full and kissable, this man’s lips were a thin, hard line. Cruel lips, thought Kimberley wildly, and tried but failed to imagine them kissing her, her cheeks flaring red as she saw those same lips twist into a contemptuous curve.

For one frozen moment Kimberley sat staring up at him, unable to move, to think, to speak, unable to do anything other than acknowledge the dark and potent and sensual rush of desire which flooded over her with the heavy pull of a tidal wave. She stared into eyes which no longer looked grey but black as the night, she saw the heated flare of colour which scorched along his high, perfectly chiselled cheekbones—and she felt dizzy with a shameful longing.

Unnerved by that still intense scrutiny, and by his silence, Kimberley scrambled to her feet.

‘You must be Harrison,’ she blurted out, in nothing even resembling her usual calm, confident manner.

‘And you must be the fortune-hunter,’ he observed caustically, withering contempt written all over his face.

For a moment Kimberley thought that she must have misheard him; it was just not the sort of thing which one expected to hear, certainly not in civilised company, but there again, with that raw, scornful censure blazing from those amazing eyes, this man didn’t look in the least bit civilised. He looked…

Kimberley shuddered.

Almost barbaric.

She forced herself to remain calm, because some instinct told her that if she responded on his level she would live to regret it. She raised her eyebrows fractionally. ‘What did you just say?’ she queried, quite calmly.

‘Oh, dear,’ he said mockingly, and sighed. ‘I should have guessed that it was too good to be true—you couldn’t possibly have brains as well as beauty. I called you a fortune-hunter, my dear. It’s an old-fashioned term, whose meaning is quite simple——’

‘I’m well aware of what it means.’ Kimberley cut in, but her voice was shaking with rage, and deep within her a seed of hostility blossomed into rampant life. ‘How dare you?’

He shrugged his broad shoulders. ‘Quite easily. You see, you might find this peculiar, but I happen to be rather protective of my kid brother. And what else am I supposed to think when I hear that he’s about to marry someone he hardly knows, who happens to be years older——?’

‘Only three,’ she interrupted furiously. ‘And what difference does that make? Lots of men marry women older than them.’

‘Do they?’ His look was cool, assessing. ‘And do lots of older women marry inexperienced collegeboys, who stand to gain huge inheritances? Is that what turns them on—Kimberley?’

She shivered with some dark nebulous recognition as he said her name, the way his tongue curved round it making the very act of speaking into the most sensual act she had ever encountered.

‘I don’t have to stay here and listen to this,’ she said shakily, but her feet were rooted to the priceless Persian carpet and she was incapable of movement as she gazed into mesmeric grey eyes.

‘But stay you will,’ he ordered silkily. ‘And listen.’

She watched, horrified, as his eyes dropped to her body and lingered insolently on the lushness of her breasts beneath the thin cotton T-shirt she wore, and Kimberley was powerless to stop what that appraising stare was doing to her.

She felt a dart of something which was a combination of pain and acute pleasure, felt her breasts grow heavy, hard, swollen. She saw his mouth twist with derision as he observed the blatant tightening of her nipples, and at that moment she felt utterly cheap.

He nodded his head, as though satisfied by something. ‘Yes,’ he said thoughtfully. ‘As I imagined. A hot little body and a face like a madonna—quite exquisite, but unfortunately they are such ephemeral assets. And, wisely, you’ve decided to capitalise on them. But I’d prefer you to do that with someone other than my brother. Understand?’

Kimberley bit back her rage, her normally sharp mind in dazed turmoil because he was still staring at her breasts, and her nipples were torturing her with their exquisite need to have him take each one into his mouth, to suckle slowly and lick and…

Horrified, she stared back at him, her body’s appalling reaction to his scrutiny stinging her into defending herself. ‘I don’t have to capitalise on any assets I might have, actually,’ she retorted. ‘Because I happen to have a very successful career in a merchant bank.’

‘And how did you get it?’ he queried insultingly. ‘On your back?’

His hostility rode every other thought out of her mind. ‘Why are you doing this?’ she whispered incredulously.

He shrugged. ‘I told you. I’m looking out for my brother—and he needs shielding from women like you.’

‘Women like you’.

Her face flaming, Kimberley lifted her hand and slapped him hard—very hard—around the face. She should have been shocked at her violent reaction but she wasn’t; it was the most satisfying thing she had ever done in her life. But he didn’t flinch. Only the angry spark which glittered ominously from the grey eyes betrayed his emotions.

‘In a minute,’ he said calmly, ‘I shall respond to that. But first I want you to listen very carefully to what I’m going to tell you.’

‘I don’t have to listen to anything you tell me. You insulting——’

‘Spare me your misplaced anger and shut up, Kimberley,’ he said in a voice soft with menace, and Kimberley felt a shiver ice its way down the entire length of her spine. ‘My brother is on the threshold of his life. Emotionally he is immature. If he marries now it will be a huge mistake. He is not ready for marriage.’

And neither was she, though Harrison Nash did not know that. She saw the grim determination on his face, the arrogance and the dominance. A man used to getting his way at all costs. How far, she wondered, would he go to prevent her from marrying Duncan?

And Kimberley suddenly knew an overwhelming and very basic urge to get her own back for his insults, for that sexual scrutiny which had had her responding in a way which sickened her.

All at once she was filled with the most tremendous exhilaration, exultant with the sense of her own power to anger this man. ‘You can’t stop us marrying!’ she told him coolly.

The grey eyes narrowed calculatingly as he registered her change of mood. ‘No, you’re quite right. I can’t.’ And here he paused, so that there was a brooding, forbidding silence before he resumed speaking. ‘But what I can do is to withhold any of the financial hand-outs from my company to which Duncan has quickly become accustomed. This house is legally mine, although I have always intended to transfer the deeds to my mother and Duncan, since I have enough homes of my own. However, I could change my mind…’ He gave her a questioning look. ‘I imagine that Duncan’s attraction might wane if he didn’t come with all the trappings you’d expected?’

Kimberley had met many cynical, ruthless men during her years in the City, but this one, this dark and cruel stranger, made the others look like amateurs.

She lifted her head proudly. ‘If I wanted to marry Duncan, then nothing you could say or do would stop me,’ she said truthfully. ‘So you’ve lost, haven’t you?’

‘I never lose, Kimberley,’ he contradicted her softly. ‘Never.’

She fixed him with a look of mock-polite disbelief, fascinated in spite of herself to know just how far he would go to achieve what he wanted. ‘Oh, really?’

‘I have a proposition to put to you.’

‘Go on,’ she said, very quietly.

He spoke with a certain reluctance. ‘I’m prepared,’ he said heavily, ‘to offer you a financial incentive of your own if you agree to call the wedding off. If, on the other hand, you refuse and the wedding goes ahead, then I’m warning you that you will receive nothing from Duncan’s inheritance unless I am satisfied that the marriage is a good one, and one with solid foundations. Do you understand?’

The grey eyes were so hard and so cold, making a mockery of the rugged perfection of his features, and another shiver of apprehension sent icy claws scrabbling all over Kimberley’s skin. ‘It isn’t just because I’m older, is it?’ she whispered, shaken by his venom, her desire for revenge for his insults momentarily forgotten. ‘Or even because you think that I’m marrying Duncan for his money? You really don’t like me, do you?’

He went perfectly still, so still that he might have been carved from some unforgiving stone. ‘No,’ he said eventually. ‘I don’t think I do like you, if liking can be gauged after such a short acquaintanceship, but you are correct in your assumption in one way— your age and your greed are not the real reasons why I want you to call the wedding off.’

‘Why, then?’

‘It’s simple. Because you are not the right woman for him.’

Stunned by the sheer unremitting force with which he spoke, Kimberley stared into his hard, cruel face. ‘What on earth gives you the right to say that?’ she whispered.

‘This does,’ he said, in a voice which was brutal with some unnamed emotion, and he caught her by the waist and bent his dark, savage face to kiss her.

Something happened to her—something irrevocable and mind-blowing. Something which was to change her life forever. What the hell had he done to her with just one kiss? she wondered desperately. Because sexual desire, fiery and hot and potent as life itself, began blazing its way through her veins as his mouth found hers.

Oh, God, but it was heaven.

Heaven.

She opened her mouth to him as though she had waited all her life for that sweet, punishing kiss. She found herself trembling, almost swaying, now wanting more, much more than his kiss. She wanted him to touch her where no man had ever touched her; she wanted those long fingers to remove her T-shirt, to kick away her jeans. She wanted him to lay her down on the floor and make love to her right there…

But then reality crashed in with a sickening sensation as, distantly, somewhere in the house, she heard the sound of someone shouting. She felt his hands drop from her waist, felt, too, his tongue withdraw from her mouth, where it had been inciting her with provocative little movements which had mimicked what no man had ever done to her.

She gave a kind of automatic protest as he lifted his head up and stared down at her dazed face, and she read the contemptuous look in his eyes.

‘I rest my case,’ he said insultingly.

Kimberley straightened her spine and stared back at him, hiding her shame behind the frosty glitter in her blue eyes.

In her eyes sparked the hatred she felt for him. To illustrate his point he had treated her no better than a whore, and in a way she had responded no better than a whore. The way she had felt in his arms had frightened her with its intensity, so that all her carefully fought for self-control had vanished like the wind. She was the vanquished, he the victor. He had all the power, and she had none. And she never wanted to see him again, not as long as she lived.

Never.

But then Kimberley discovered something else. She could see that behind the contempt which distorted the angular features there remained a hunger—a savage, sexual hunger which made his eyes glitter blackly and beat a frantic pulse at the base of his neck. He wants me, she thought, yet he despises me. And he’s a man who gets exactly what he wants.

Oh, my God, thought Kimberley weakly. He’ll come and find me. And what if I can’t—what if I just can’t resist him? What will a man who despises me offer other than instant heartbreak?

Unless she somehow contrived to make him despise her so much that he’d leave her alone forever.

She gave a small, smug half-smile, and allowed the kind of cold, calculating look which she knew he would be expecting to come into her eyes.

‘This—er—financial incentive you’re offering,’ she purred. ‘How much are we actually talking about?’

Some light in his eyes died. If she had thought she’d read scorn and derision there before, it was nothing to the look which now replaced it. He looked at her as though her very presence contaminated the air surrounding him.

He mentioned a sum, and she allowed a rapacious little smile to curve her lips upwards as she nodded. ‘I’ll do it,’ she told him. ‘On one condition.’

He shook his head, the contempt hardening his mouth into an unforgiving line. ‘No conditions, sweetheart,’ he drawled coldly. ‘Unless I make them.’

She shook her head. ‘I won’t do it unless you agree not to tell Duncan anything about what’s happened here this afternoon. I want to tell him— to break things off—in my own way.’

He stared at her incredulously. ‘Do you really think I’d hurt my brother like that? And, much though I’m tempted to tell him about his lucky escape, I’m really not cruel enough to disillusion him with the knowledge that he fell in love with a cheap little tramp. Do I make myself clear?’

‘Perfectly.’ She held out a slim white hand, which was miraculously free from tremor. ‘And now, if we can conclude our business.’

She saw his barely concealed shudder of distaste as he took a cheque-book out from the inside pocket of his suit and began to write.

What she hadn’t expected was that it should hurt quite so much…

Kimberley raked her hand roughly through her hair, as if the frantic movement could somehow magically dispel the image of Harrison which burned on her mind’s eye as if it had been branded there. After more than two years, she thought despairingly, it shouldn’t be quite so vivid. She wasn’t naïve enough to have expected to forget a man like Harrison Nash, but surely by now just the merest thought of him shouldn’t be enough to make the heat rise up in her blood with its slow, insistent throb?

She picked the tea-tray up to carry it back through into the sitting-room where her mother was waiting.

Why remember all that now?

Because she remembered it every time she came home; it was one of the reasons why her visits were more infrequent than either she or her mother liked. This place was tainted with memories of Harrison Nash and that one fateful kiss.

The day after he had kissed her she had done several things. Firstly, and most importantly, she had gone to Duncan and gently given him back his ring. He had not railed or argued with her; he had quietly accepted her stumbling explanation, saying that deep in his heart he had not been completely surprised.

The following day Kimberley had fled to stay with an aunt in Scotland, where she had remained for a fortnight, quietly licking her wounds. She had also cashed the cheque which Harrison had given her and given the money to charity. More importantly, as she’d handed the huge wad of money over to the bemused representative of Save the Children, she had made a solemn vow. That she would put Harrison Nash out of her mind forever.

And so far, at least, it hadn’t worked.

‘Kimberley!’ came her mother’s voice. ‘Where’s this cup of tea you promised me?’

‘Just coming!’ Fixing a smile on to her face, Kimberley took the tray and biscuits in, and poured out two cups.

The Earl Grey tea was deliciously refreshing, but Kimberley, though hungry, took only one bite out of a biscuit then left it—still ruffled about remembering that extraordinary day.

Forcing her mind back on to safer subjects, she offered the plate of biscuits to her mother. ‘How are you going to manage with your foot bandaged?’

‘Oh, I expect I’ll be all right,’ her mother replied unconvincingly.

Kimberley hid a smile. Her mother, love her, was like an open book! ‘Would you like me to come and stay with you until you’re up on your feet properly again?’ she asked.

Mrs Ryan’s smile could have lit up Oxford Street. ‘Oh, would you, dear? I’d be so grateful!’

Kimberley’s mind skipped along. She could telephone her bank later. She was a conscientious highflyer in the merchant bank where she’d worked for the past five years—she doubted whether they’d mind her taking a break at such short notice. ‘Of course I don’t mind,’ she said. ‘But I’ll have to drive back up to town to get some clothes.’

‘That’s fine, dear,’ said her mother contentedly as she eyed the teapot. ‘Is there another cup in the pot?’

Kimberley poured her mother another cup. ‘So, who’s Duncan marrying?’ she asked, glad that the boy she’d been so fond of had found someone else to love.

‘Some girl he met in America—an heiress, apparently.’

‘That will please Harrison,’ commented Kimberley acidly.

Her mother gave her a shrewd look. ‘I don’t know why you won’t hear a good word said about that man. He’s actually very charming.’

‘Charming?’ About as charming as a snake-pit! Kimberley gave a forced little laugh. ‘That’s the last adjective I’d use about him!’

‘But why do you dislike him so much?’

‘How can I dislike him—I’ve barely met the man?’ said Kimberley dismissively, then relented. ‘If you must know he stands for everything I hate— all that arrogance! He thinks he’s God’s gift to women——’

‘A lot of women tend to agree with him,’ cut in Mrs Ryan in amusement. ‘Or so I’m told.’

Kimberley resisted the temptation to scream. ‘I’d better leave now,’ she said hurriedly, in order to stop her mother from regaling her with any anecdotes about Harrison’s life. ‘If I set off now, I can be in London and back before dark.’

Her mother frowned. ‘Well, do drive carefully, won’t you, dear?’

‘Don’t I always?’

‘Do you? You’re a little too fond of the accelerator, in my opinion!’

But Kimberley was a good, careful driver—though she was slightly on the fast side. She made good time to London, and just over an hour later her scarlet sports car drew up outside her delightful honeysuckle-covered cottage in Hampstead.

She phoned her office and spoke to her boss, who told her to take as long as she liked off work.

‘Seriously, James?’ she laughed.

‘No! Take all that back—I’ll miss you too much!——’

‘I’ll call you when I get back—I should only be a few days!’

‘Call me sooner, if you like. That’s if you need a broad, manly shoulder to lean on.’

‘I’ll bear that in mind, James,’ said Kimberley, before ringing off.

James had never made any secret of his admiration for her, but he was confident and rich and handsome enough not to take her laughing refusals to go out on dates with him to heart. She had told him she never dated people she worked with, which was true. Although she actually had a reason for not dating anyone who happened to ask her.

She had tried dating, and it didn’t work. She couldn’t cope with the physical thing. The unfortunate legacy of her brief kiss with Harrison was that no other man moved her in any way that even remotely resembled the way she’d behaved in his arms that day.

Which was a good thing, she reasoned, since she had been so disgusted with herself afterwards. If passion turned you into a wild, mindless creature at the total mercy of your body—then you could keep it! Kimberley would manage just fine with her brain!

She emptied her fridge, cancelled the milk and switched on the answerphone, threw her suitcase into the back of her MG, and set off back up the motorway.

Her journey was uneventful, save for the episode when a low, black and infinitely more powerful car than her own forced her to move over into the middle lane and then roared off spectacularly into the distance. For Kimberley, who took some pride in her driving and was fiercely competitive, this proved irritating.

Obviously a man, she thought, slightly unfairly. Probably someone who’s into phallic symbols to compensate for his own weediness.

She saw the car again, parked outside the one really up-market restaurant in the village, which was a few miles from her mother’s house and well off the beaten track—not a tourist trap at all. And she wondered vaguely who, round here, was driving such an expensive piece of equipment.

She arrived back at her mother’s, unpacked and then concocted some supper from the food she’d brought with her. The two women were just enjoying a quiet glass of wine when Mrs Ryan dropped her bombshell.

‘Er—Kimberley?’

How well she recognised that voice! Kimberley felt a bubble of amusement welling up inside her. ‘Mother?’

‘I’d like to ask you a favour, dear.’

‘I somehow thought that you might. Go on—ask away.’

‘Er—it’s a little difficult to know how to put it.’

Obviously a very big favour, thought Kimberley. ‘Mmm?’

‘You know I mentioned that Duncan’s got engaged?’

Kimberley smiled. Mothers could be so transparent! ‘Yes, Mum—and I don’t mind, honestly!’

Mrs Ryan gave her a severe look. ‘I wasn’t imagining for one minute that you did—since you were the one to break it off. Still, better before the marriage than after, I always say.’

Kimberley sighed. ‘You were saying?’

‘Oh, yes. Well, the thing is that he’s due to arrive in a couple of days’ time and, with my leg and all, there’s no one to get the place ready for him…’

Kimberley put her wine-glass down on the table and looked incredulously at her mother. ‘I’m not sure what you’re getting at, exactly.’

‘Well, I was wondering if you could help me out?’

‘Help you out?’

‘Just stand in for me—until my leg is better.’

‘You mean—clean Brockbank House for you?’

‘That’s right, dear.’

Kimberley shook her head. ‘I’ll pay someone from the village to stand in for you.’

Mrs Ryan shook her head. ‘But I doubt you’d get anyone at this short notice, and so near to Christmas. Besides, you know how fussy Margaret Nash is—she won’t let just anyone near all those antiques.’ She caught a glimpse of her daughter’s expression. ‘You wouldn’t have to do much, darling,’ she said hastily. ‘Just hoover the place and flick a duster around. And the kitchen floor could probably do with a bit of a wash. I mean’ she gave Kimberley another stern look ‘—look on it as a kind of atonement, if you like.’

Kimberley blinked in astonishment. ‘Atonement?’

‘Mmm. It would be rather a nice gesture, wouldn’t it—after jilting Duncan? Getting the house nice for him. Unless, of course, you’re not being entirely truthful with me. Perhaps you are a tiny bit jealous…?’

Kimberley stared at her mother very hard, before throwing her head back and laughing loudly. ‘You know, Mum, for sheer cheek you’re world-class!’ Then she thought of something else. ‘But surely Mrs Nash wouldn’t want me near the place?’

‘Oh, no, dear—she’s quite happy to have you there. She likes you, you know—she always has. She always said that she thought you were quite wrong for Duncan.’

Interesting. She hadn’t said a thing at the time. ‘Oh, did she?’

‘Will you do it, then?’

Kimberley sighed. ‘I suppose so! Anything for a quiet life. But only on one condition.’

‘Yes, dear?’

‘Where’s—Harrison?’

‘Oh, he’s in France or Germany or somewhere. Living there while he takes over another company. His mother says he works himself into the ground. She says——’

‘Fascinating as I’m sure you and Mrs Nash find it,’ Kimberley interrupted coolly, ‘I really have absolutely no interest in hearing about Harrison.’

Her mother’s face said, Well, you did ask me!— but to her eternal credit she didn’t utter another word.

It was just unfortunate that hearing about him was one thing, but trying not to think about him was another—and the moment she set foot over the threshold of Brockbank House more memories of that hateful, scheming man came flooding back to haunt her.

Kimberley wondered how she could have allowed herself to be talked into doing this particularly distorted ‘favour’ for her mother. She hadn’t been near the house, not for over two years, not since that dreadful day when Harrison had given her the cheque.

Despite her mother’s assurances she had been dreading seeing Mrs Nash, but Duncan’s mother held her hand out immediately she opened the front door. She was a tall, graceful woman, with Duncan’s soft brown eyes; Harrison, Kimberley knew, was the image of his father who had been killed in a yachting accident when both boys were quite small.

‘Hello, Kimberley,’ said Mrs Nash. ‘It’s good of you to help me out.’

‘It’s no trouble. Really. Mother insisted I stand in for her.’

Mrs Nash smiled. ‘Eleanor’s so terribly conscientious. I really don’t know what I’d do without her.’ There was a pause. ‘She told you that Duncan’s getting married?’

‘Yes, she did.’ Kimberley hesitated. ‘I’m very happy for him, Mrs Nash. Really, I am.’

Mrs Nash smiled. ‘I rather thought you might be.’ She laid her hand on Kimberley’s arm. ‘Won’t you come and have some tea with me?’

Kimberley shook her head. ‘Another time, perhaps. I’d rather get started, if you don’t mind.’

‘I understand.’

Did she? thought Kimberley. Not really. She imagined that even the fairly liberal Mrs Nash would be shocked if she knew the real reason for Kimberley’s reluctance to linger any longer at Brockbank House than she needed to. What would she say if Kimberley told her that the sight of that framed silver photograph of Harrison on the hall table was playing havoc with her equilibrium?

She stared at it, trying to view it objectively. It was just a face, after all. The features weren’t particularly even—the eyes were too cold and the jaw much too harshly defined ever to be called handsome. The photographer had caught him smiling, but it wasn’t a sunny, happy smile. It was nothing but a cynical upward curve of those hard, sensual lips.

Kimberley turned away from the photo, removed her coat, and set to work immediately. She’d tied her hair back and was wearing a pair of ripped jeans with her oldest T-shirt, which seemed to have shrunk slightly with repeated washing. Once black, it was now a sort of washed-out grey colour, and it revealed about two inches of her midriff.

She couldn’t find a mop, so she filled up a bucket with hot soapy water and set about cleaning the floor the old-fashioned way—on her hands and knees!

There was something curiously relaxing about seeing the floor clean up beneath her cloth. Her busy life in London meant that she employed someone else to clean her house, but actually it was really quite satisfying to do it yourself, she decided—if you had the time.

She was just about to wring out her cloth when she heard the kitchen door open. Kimberley looked up, expecting to see Mrs Nash, her smile of greeting fading into frozen disbelief as the longest pair of legs she had ever seen swam into her field of vision. She let her gaze wander up into a hard and cruel face.

And the cold grey eyes of Harrison Nash.

CHAPTER TWO

‘WELL, well, well—how the mighty have fallen,’ came the sardonic drawl.

His voice sounded exactly the same—-rich and deep. And as contemptuous as it had ever been. Kimberley dropped the cloth and it splashed water on to the front of her T-shirt.

‘Do you know,’ he continued, in that same, silky tone which sent prickles of excitement and dread down her spine, ‘I rather like to see you in such a subservient position, Kimberley? Rather fetching. And, funnily enough, I was never particularly turned on by wet T-shirt competitions—but I can now see that I’m going to have to revise my opinion.’

His cool grey gaze had travelled to her sopping T-shirt, where the water had cruelly outlined the rounded swell of her breasts with detailed precision. Under his gaze she felt the nipples tighten immediately into those exquisitely painful little peaks, and she felt a hot weakness kick at the pit of her stomach. She saw the flash of hunger which darkened his eyes and he moved the tip of his tongue over his lips in a gesture which shrieked pure provocation.

Remember what he did to you.

‘What the hell are you doing here?’ she demanded as she flung the cloth back into the bucket and scrambled to her feet.

‘I really should be asking you that question, don’t you think? Are times hard for merchant bankers? Supplementing your income with a spot of charring——’

‘My mother happens to do the charring in this house,’ she cut in icily. ‘God knows why she does it, but she does—and I will not have you insulting her.’

‘I wouldn’t dream of insulting your mother, whom I both like and respect.’ His eyes narrowed; she could barely see them. ‘Unlike her little madam of a daughter. Tell me, did you hatch a plot to get back into this house, somehow—anyhow? What are your intentions—to try to ruin Duncan’s life a second time?’

Kimberley stared at him, wondering genuinely if his memory was defective. ‘You’re mad! What are you talking about?’

‘I’m talking about your motives for being here.’

‘My motives? You really aren’t making yourself at all clear, I’m afraid, Harrison.’

‘Then allow me to elucidate,’ he said softly. ‘My brother is returning from America, where he went after you dumped him, and he’s bringing with him his new fiancée. And now you’re here. Again. I’m just interested to know what you’re up to. Do you want him back? Or do you just want to rub in what’s he’s been missing all these years? Are you planning to flaunt that beautiful, hot, rapacious little body around him?’

‘You are mad,’ she said scornfully. ‘If your memory serves you as well as mine, you will recall that you were the one determined to break our relationship up.’

He gave her a ruthless little smile. ‘You think so? If you’d really loved him you’d have told me to go to hell! As a matter of fact, that’s what I expected to happen.’

Kimberley’s eyes narrowed suspiciously. ‘Expected? Are you telling me that you were calling my bluff? That it was some kind of little test which I had to pass to be allowed to marry your brother?’

He inclined his head. ‘If you like. When a rather wild young man—who stands to inherit the kind of money Duncan will one day have—announces he’s about to marry, it’s wise to put the commitment of both partners to the test.’

It was unbelievable! The man was living in the Dark Ages! Kimberley shook her head slowly and incredulously. ‘Did your mother know this—that you were conducting this barbaric little experiment?’

He gave her a bored smile as he ignored her question. ‘As I said—I expected to be sent away with a flea in my ear. Instead of which you went out of here clutching a big, fat cheque in your greedy little hand. But that was nothing to what you very nearly gave me. Was it, Kimberley?’ he mocked.

Kimberley blushed scarlet. Only someone as hateful as Harrison Nash would take such pleasure in reminding her of her behaviour that day.

He moved a little towards her and instinctively she stiffened, her head held proudly high, her eyes slitted into glittering blue shards.

‘So what did you spend the money on, hmm? Easiest bit of money you ever made in your life, wasn’t it, Kimberley?’ He gave an empty-sounding laugh. ‘My God—you stand there so cold and so damned beautiful, as though ice were running through your veins instead of blood, and yet I only have to touch you and you go up in flames—don’t you? Tell me, Kimberley, do all men have that effect on you, or is it just me? It could prove quite embarrassing, surely?’

She fixed him with a frosty smile, though her heart was beating like a bass-drum in her ears. ‘I rather think you overestimate your own attraction, Harrison.’

He gave a half-smile. ‘You think so? Perhaps I do, but I’m pretty confident in your case. Maybe we should put it to the test.’

She saw the hungry intent on his face, and understood his meaning immediately. ‘Don’t you dare try!’

He came one step closer, totally ignoring what she was saying. ‘But you want me to, don’t you, Kimberley? We both know that. You hate me, yet you want me…’ He pulled her into his arms, not roughly but not gently either.

‘If you dare continue, then I’ll scream as loudly as——’

There was no scream. Not even the smallest attempt at resistance, which would have left her with some dignity. But there was no resistance, and no dignity. Just an overpowering reaction to him which took all her will away, sapped her strength and her resolve and left in their place the swamping, unbearable cocktail of desire and frustration as she let him kiss her.

And, as she’d done once before, she opened her mouth wide beneath his—so wide because she wanted to eat him up, to lick him all over. She gave a little moan as she found her hands winding themselves around his broad back, and she clung on to him as though she were clinging to life itself.

‘Oh, baby,’ he murmured into her mouth. ‘Yes. Show me. Show me just how much you want me…’

She didn’t know what he wanted her to do. She was responding through pure instinct, kissing him back with frantic fervour as though she had never before been kissed. As indeed she hadn’t.

Not like this.

‘Or shall I show you?’ he whispered, and pulled her into him, as close as it was possible to be. She felt his arousal immediately; no garment in the world had yet been designed which could disguise how hard and hot and turned on he was.

Her hips swivelled in instinctive excitement against him, and he gave a low laugh. ‘You want that, don’t you? Don’t you?’ He kissed her again, and one hand slid to her back, underneath her Tshirt, and he rubbed his hand sensually against the silky bareness of her skin, a soft, tantalising caress, a tiny circular movement which cajoled an instinctive response, and she felt as though her veins were being transfused with thick, sweet honey.

‘Oh, baby.’ He dropped his head to whisper against her hair. She felt him shudder—such a wild and uncontrolled shudder of excitement—and it made her realise that he teetered on the very edge of control. She pulled away from him, afraid of what might happen if she didn’t. He stopped kissing her immediately, and she almost gasped as he stared down at her, for she barely recognised him, the stark hunger on his face turning him into a stranger.

But he is a stranger, she thought. What do you know of Harrison Nash, other than the fact that he represents nothing but a wild and elemental danger?

‘You were wise to stop me,’ he said, in a flat, deliberate voice. ‘Because I’m afraid that if we carried on kissing then I would not have been responsible for my actions. Much more of that and I would have been unable to stop myself from removing every single item of clothing from that beautiful body of yours and taking you right here, because all my reason seems to have deserted me.’

And then he shook his head in some kind of despairing disbelief. ‘Dear God!’ he exclaimed. ‘What am I saying? What am I doing? My mother could have walked into the kitchen. The gardener’s outside——’

She’d had enough of his self-disgusted confession, and every word he uttered only added to her own despair. ‘Let me go——’

‘No.’

She stared up at him, her mouth quivering, on the brink of tears. ‘Harrison, please.‘

His eyes narrowed at her trembling state. ‘Kimberley—this thing between us——’

She shook her head distractedly, as if trying to remove a very heavy burden which simply refused to budge. ‘It’s sex!’ she asserted. ‘Nothing but sex! That’s all. Just some unfortunate accident of nature—a chemistry between two people who happen to loathe one another. And I hate it, if you must know.’

His eyes were bleak with self-loathing. ‘You can’t hate it any more than I do,’ he said bitterly.

She tried to pull away, but he still held her firm, and her determination to escape him was only rivalled, infuriatingly, by the desire to give in—to him, and to herself. To give herself up to the white-hot passion which threatened to devour her. ‘Will you please let me go now?’ she asked quietly.

‘Only if you promise not to run away.’

‘I’m promising you nothing. You have no right to ask anything of me.’

‘Not even to leave Duncan alone?’

She could have wept. That he could have started to make love to her, yet still think her duplicitous enough to imagine that she would scheme to steal Duncan from his new fiancée. ‘Oh, for goodness’ sake! It’s all over! It’s history!’

‘You mean you no longer care about him?’ he asked quietly.

‘That’s right,’ she answered, equally quietly.

‘But maybe you never did care?’ he challenged, in a voice of pure steel.

She took a deep breath. She wanted him to despise her so much that he would be repulsed by her. To hate her so much that he would never try to touch her again. And if he never touched her again she would be safe from the power he wielded over her. ‘Sure, I cared for Duncan,’ she said, in the husky kind of voice she’d heard bimbos use. ‘But maybe I cared about the money more. You did me a big favour, Harrison. Does that make you feel better?’

His mouth became an ugly line. ‘God, you are nothing but a little bitch,’ he ground out. ‘And if I ever doubted whether I’d done the right thing in trying to buy you off, you’ve just convinced me.’

Her cheeks flamed. Knowing that his rejection of her was the only sure route to sanity was one thing, seeing that look in his eyes was another.

‘So, was it worth it, Kimberley?’ he asked, still in that cold, scornful voice. ‘Did the money I gave you compensate for any fleeting regrets you might have had that you’d made the wrong decision?’

She picked up her handbag from the table. ‘I think that we’ve exhausted the whole subject. I’m going now, Harrison. I can’t say that it was nice seeing you again, because I’d be lying. I’ll leave it to you to explain to your mother why I can’t continue with the cleaning. I’m sure you’ll think of something.’

His voice was soft; it echoed in her ears as she left the room. ‘There’s only one thing that I can think of right now, and that’s how much I want you, Kimberley. As much as you want me. Whichever way you look at it—there’s unfinished business between us.’

She composed her face, then turned. ‘In your dreams, Harrison,’ she said coldly. ‘Goodbye.’

CHAPTER THREE

KIMBERLEY left Brockbank House mixed up, het up and downright angry with herself at the way she’d handled Harrison. To say nothing of the way he’d handled her—both literally and figuratively, she thought disgustedly.

She walked home by a circuitous route, and by the time she’d reached her mother’s cottage she had calmed down enough to realise that she hadn’t hurt more than her pride—and since only one person knew about it, and she wasn’t planning on seeing him again, then, so what?

She had managed to avoid him successfully for two years, and if she managed to avoid him for the rest of her life, then the situation need never arise again. He rarely visited Woolton—she knew that. He was only here now, she presumed, because Duncan was bringing over his new fiancée to meet the family, and once he’d celebrated the engagement Harrison would be off again, to France or Germany or wherever it was he lived, pulling off the kinds of huge deals her mother kept harping on about.

The way to avoid him would be simple. She might actually have to come clean with her mother. Not exactly telling her the whole truth—that would be far too upsetting—but perhaps explaining to her that for very personal reasons she simply couldn’t stand the man, and she would like to be informed if he was planning any trips home. Then she would just avoid setting foot in the village to visit her mother until he was safely on his way again.

And, for the moment, she wished for two things. That her mother’s ankle would heal very quickly, so that she could escape from the danger of his close proximity. And that something horrible would happen to Harrison Nash. Perhaps he could go bald and lose all his money?

Kimberley bluntly told her mother that she had no intention of cleaning the Nashs’ house while Harrison was there. ‘Let him do it!’ she declared.

Mrs Ryan had been brought up in a very different generation from her daughter. ‘But he’s a very important executive, dear,’ she said reprovingly.

Kimberley glowered. ‘And so am I, Mum. So am I!’

The next couple of days passed uneventfully. She took her mother out for long drives, she cooked meals, and they had companionable chats over a couple of glasses of wine in the evenings.

She saw Harrison just once—when she went shopping one day and spotted him just pulling to a halt in the fiendishly expensive black car which had nudged her out the fast lane on the motorway the day she’d arrived. She should have guessed it was him at the wheel of such an outlandishly expensive piece of driving equipment, she thought resentfully.

She saw him climb out. He wore black jeans and a black polo-neck sweater, with a black leather jacket protecting him against the cold of the December day, and he looked suitably diabolical, thought Kimberley. He was unshaven, and the thick black hair was ruffled by the breeze. He glanced up and her heart seemed to still with the sheer physical impact of his presence. It was like being given a solid punch to the solar plexus, robbing her of air and of comfort, and then, suddenly and devastatingly, he smiled.

There was no malice in that smile today, not even desire. Kimberley would have challenged anyone in their right mind to have resisted that smile, and she had to fight hard with herself to maintain the cool, haughty look she was giving him. Yet she couldn’t look away; something kept her staring at him.

She felt the wind lift up the heavy silken tresses of her hair, and it tugged at the hem of the short tartan mini-skirt she wore, revealing the slim length of her thighs, encased in ribbed woollen tights. She saw the dark eyebrows rise fractionally, and she turned hastily and almost ran into the local grocery store.

Conversation stilled immediately. It was a small enough village for memories to be long, and Kimberley’s inexplicable jilting of Duncan had kept the locals in gossip for a good few months.

After replying politely but in a restrained manner to the curious questions of Mrs Spencer—the owner—she had bought her eggs and her bread, and the fresh fruit her mother had asked for, when the tinkling of the shop-bell behind her announced that someone else had come in behind her. She only had to look at the barely concealed excitement on Mrs Spencer’s face to know just who that someone was.

‘Can I help you, Mr Nash?’ asked Mrs Spencer obsequiously.

‘No, thanks,’ came the deep voice. ‘I came to give Miss Ryan a hand with her shopping.’ The grey eyes were shuttered. ‘I’ll give you a lift home, Kimberley.’

He thought that he had her out-foxed. He was probably assuming that she cared too much for what others thought of her to resist him, that she would meekly agree to the lift.

Well, he was wrong.

‘I have my own car, thank you,’ she answered coolly. ‘I’ve never had to rely on men for lifts.’

His mouth quirked a little. ‘Very commendable. I’m sure that you make a lot of men feel very redundant. And I realise that you have your own car, but you’ve left it sitting outside your mother’s house. It’s a small red thing, isn’t it?’

Calling Kimberley’s beloved MG a ‘small red thing’ was tantamount to asking her if she knew how to change a plug, and her breathing quickened in temper.

‘It’s a damn sight better than that ridiculous monstrosity which you drive!’ she retorted. ‘But then women don’t have the need to use a car as a substitute for any areas in which they might beer—lacking.’

She had allowed herself to get carried away, and as soon as the words were out she regretted them— not just because Mrs Spencer was bristling with undisguised indignation, though frankly Kimberley doubted whether she’d actually got the gist of what she’d been saying, but also because Harrison’s sickeningly sardonic smirk left her in no doubt that he knew and she knew that he didn’t have any areas in which he was lacking.

‘Are you quite sure you won’t change your mind?’ he mocked softly, and Kimberley knew that he wasn’t just talking about giving her a lift home.

She blushed madly. ‘No, thank you,’ she reiterated. ‘I’ll walk.’

She heard Mrs Spencer’s sharp intake of breath, as though she was indignant that someone like her, a little Miss Nobody, should have the temerity to turn Mr Nash down—and on more than one occasion!

‘You can’t walk—it’s started to rain.’

He didn’t give up, she would say that for him. She knew exactly what he wanted—to get her in his car so that he could begin to seduce her again. At least here, in the shop, she was safe from that. And she doubted that Harrison would be desperate enough to follow her home. Ice-blue eyes were turned disdainfully and decisively in the direction of the grey glitter of his. ‘I don’t care. I like the rain.’

His eyes flickered over the brief little tartan mini, with its short matching jacket. ‘I’m quite sure you do. But, exquisite though you may look, you’re hardly dressed to combat the elements,’ he said softly.

‘Let me be the judge of that!’ she answered coolly, and walked out of the shop.

He walked directly behind her, staying her with a hand on her arm, and she had to steel herself not to respond to the fleeting contact. He bent his head close to her face, and she was caught up in the dazzle from those glittering grey eyes. ‘I told you,’ he said softly, ‘that we had some unfinished business to settle.’

‘Oh, go to hell!’ she said exasperatedly, infuriated when he laughed at her, and she stalked off in the direction of her mother’s.

Even so, she wondered if he’d follow her. But he didn’t, and she walked home with the steady drizzle slowly soaking the woollen fabric of her suit until it clung to her in a soggy mass. Her hair was dripping; the egg-box was drenched, and the bread was virtually inedible—but her mother hardly noticed; she was bobbing up and down with excitement when Kimberley walked through the door.

‘Should you be hopping around on your bad ankle like that?’ observed Kimberley mildly.

‘Oh—it’s almost better, darling. Dr Getty says I’m as fit as a flea. Listen—they’ve just delivered an invitation from Brockbank. Margaret Nash is throwing a party to celebrate Duncan’s engagement tomorrow night. I’m invited—and so are you!’

Kimberley put the shopping on the kitchen table and eyed the invitation her mother was proffering. ‘I’m not going,’ she said flatly.

Her mother’s face fell. ‘Oh, Kim—why ever not?’

Kimberley sighed. ‘Just think about it, Mum. If I go it’ll just put people’s backs up—especially his new fiancee. I’m sure that if I were her I wouldn’t particularly want his ex-fiancée turning up. People would be bound to make hurtful comparisons—and I don’t expect that Duncan would want to see me either. In fact, I’m surprised that I was included on the invitation.’

But she wouldn’t even admit to herself the real reason why nothing would make her set foot inside Brockbank House again.

‘You go. You’ll have a great time.’ Kimberley picked up a towel and began to rub at her sopping hair. ‘Will you ring up and RSVP for me?’ she asked. ‘Please?’

Mrs Ryan’s eyes narrowed. ‘I’ve a feeling there’s more to this than meets the eye, but, yes, darling— if you’re absolutely adamant.’

‘I am.’ She stared down at her mother’s ankle. ‘And if you’re feeling better now, Mum, then I’ll have to think about getting back to London.’

Mrs Ryan sighed. ‘I can’t say I wasn’t expecting it. Such a pity, though—I could quite get used to having you around the place again.’

Kimberley had planned to leave the following afternoon. She had just finished packing after lunch when there was a knock at the front door. Thinking it might be her mother, who had insisted on hobbling next door to see her neighbour, just to prove she could do it, Kimberley opened the door. Before her stood a young woman in her early twenties— someone Kimberley didn’t recognise.

She had shiny shoulder-length fair hair, which was cut into a bob, and she wore a superbly cut pair of trousers in an immaculate but very unseasonal cream colour, with a matching cashmere jacket. Gold gleamed discreetly at her ears and neck and she exuded a kind of confidence which only money could give you. And lots of it, too.

‘Can I help you?’ asked Kimberley uncertainly.

The girl creased her eyes into a frown. ‘Are you Kimberley Ryan?’ Her voice was American—cultured and direct.

‘Yes, I am—but I’m afraid I don’t——’

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