‘It’s gone two in the morning,’ she said breathlessly. ‘You shouldn’t be here.’

‘No, I shouldn’t.’

He bent towards her and she did nothing to avoid him. One hand closed around her wrist, drawing her into him, and the other pressed into the small of her back, urging her still closer. Marianne felt she couldn’t breathe as she waited for him to kiss her.

When his mouth closed over hers she felt the impact in every part of her body, even though his lips were gentle, even sweet. She had expected … She didn’t know what she had expected, but his tenderness was her undoing. It cut through any defences like a knife through butter, and she found herself wanting more as she pressed into him in a manner which would have shocked her only seconds before.

‘This is crazy.’ His voice was husky against her mouth, and suddenly the tempo of the kiss changed, his lips becoming more demanding as he sensed her response. ‘Madness…’

She agreed with him—but was powerless to move away.

Helen Brooks lives in Northamptonshire and is married with three children. As she is a committed Christian, busy housewife and mother, her spare time is at a premium, but her hobbies include reading, swimming and gardening. Her long-cherished aspiration to write became a reality when she put pen to paper on reaching the age of forty, and sent the result off to Mills & Boon.

Recent titles by the same author:

A RUTHLESS AGREEMENT

THE ITALIAN TYCOON’S BRIDE

THE BILLIONAIRE’S MARRIAGE MISSION

A FAMILY FOR HAWTHORN FARM*

HIS CHRISTMAS BRIDE

THE BILLIONAIRE BOSS’S SECRETARY BRIDE

*part of the Winter Waifs anthology

RUTHLESS TYCOON, INNOCENT WIFE

BY

HELEN BROOKS

www.millsandboon.co.uk

CHAPTER ONE

JUST a few more hours and then everyone would leave. She could do this; she had to. It was what her parents would have expected of her. She could almost hear her mother’s voice—warm, faintly admonishing—saying, ‘Come on, Annie, keep the flag flying high, sweetie-pie.’ It had been one of her mother’s favourite sayings when as a small child she had tried to duck out of anything unpleasant.

Marianne Carr drew in a deep breath and straightened her drooping shoulders. Checking her reflection in the bedroom mirror, she satisfied herself that the recent flood of tears didn’t show and then left the room. On walking down the wide staircase she could see the odd person or two in the hall, but the main body of guests were in the drawing room. They were talking in the hushed tones one used at funeral receptions.

Crystal, her mother’s housekeeper and friend who’d been one of the family for as long as Marianne could remember, met her at the foot of the stairs. Crystal’s eyes were pink-rimmed and her voice wobbly when she said, ‘Shall I tell them to come through to the dining room now? Everything’s ready.’

Marianne nodded. She hugged Crystal for a moment, a catch in her voice as she murmured, ‘You’ve been a tower of strength to me, Crystal. I couldn’t have got through this without you.’

Crystal’s plump chin trembled as she fought for control. ‘I don’t feel I have been. I still find it hard to believe they won’t walk in the door, to be truthful.’

‘I know. I feel the same.’ It had been Crystal the police had notified the night of her parents’ terrible car crash, two policemen calling at the house. Crystal had immediately phoned her and she had left her flat in London within minutes. On the journey back to Cornwall she had been in deep shock, praying the whole time that she wouldn’t be too late. Crystal had told her her father had been pronounced dead at the scene of the accident but her mother was still clinging to life.

By the time she reached the hospital her mother had been able to tell the police that her father had collapsed at the wheel and the car had ploughed off the road, wrapping itself round a tree. She had had five precious minutes with the woman who had been her best friend as well as her mother. Five minutes to last the rest of her life.

The post-mortem had revealed that her father had suffered a massive heart attack and had probably been dead before the car had hit the tree. It was generally acknowledged it was the worst of luck that he had been driving at the time.

Forcing her thoughts into neutral, Marianne realised Crystal was dabbing her eyes again. ‘I’ll go and announce they can come through, Crystal. OK?’

‘No, no. If you can hold it together, then so can I,’ Crystal protested shakily. ‘I’ll do it.’

The two looked at each other for a long moment, drawing from each other’s strength in the midst of their grief, and then Crystal bustled off.

Marianne glanced at her watch, a present from her parents for her twenty-first six years before. One o’clock. Hopefully the assembled family and friends would all be gone by four. She heard Tom Blackthorn’s voice as she reached the drawing-room door and saw him standing with a tall dark man she’d vaguely noticed earlier. Tom was her father’s solicitor and friend; he’d asked to stay behind after the others had gone so he could read her parents’ will to her. She knew it wasn’t just that, though. He would feel it his duty to point out that a huge rambling place like Seacrest was too much for a young woman to take on, that it would make more sense to sell it.

She wouldn’t listen to him. She mentally nodded to the thought. Seacrest was in her blood. It had been in her father’s, and his father before him. It had been her great-great-grandfather who had built the massive stone house on the top of the cliff over one hundred and fifty years ago, and Carrs had lived in Seacrest ever since. Although she had inherited it far too soon—her eyes darkened with pain—she would keep her beloved house going while she had breath in her body. It was part of her, part of her parents.

‘Ah, Annie.’ Tom had known her since she was a baby and, as he put out a fatherly arm and drew her into his side, she had to bite back the tears. To combat the weakness she kept her spine straight and her lips clamped together. ‘I’d like you to meet the son of one of your father’s old friends. Rafe Steed, Marianne Carr.’

Her inward battle to remain composed and in control in spite of her grief during the funeral had rendered her almost blind and deaf throughout. Now, for the first time that day, she looked properly at the man she had noticed earlier at the church and then the graveside with Tom, seeing him as a person rather than another sombre-clothed shape among many sombre-clothed shapes.

The polite, How do you do? which had sprung to her lips was never voiced. He was tall—very tall—and broad with it. He wasn’t smiling. Not that it was the time and place for smiles, she supposed, but there was something in the piercing blue eyes that was unnerving. After what seemed an endless moment, he said, ‘Please accept the condolences of my father, Miss Carr. Ill health has prevented him making the journey from the States himself but he wanted to pay his respects.’

His voice ran over Marianne’s overstretched nerves like icy water. It was deep, cold and liquid-smooth although the timbre was as hard as polished steel.

Mesmerised more by the coolness of his manner than his height and rugged good looks, Marianne said hesitantly, ‘Thank you.’

She could not recall her father or mother speaking of anyone called Steed. Why had this old friend who lived on the other side of the ocean sent his son to represent him after all this time? It seemed strange. ‘My father and yours were friends?’ she said carefully. ‘I’m sorry but I don’t remember the name.’

‘No reason why you should.’ The big powerful body appeared relaxed but this did not detract from the energy and force it projected. ‘My father and yours grew up together but my father left for America when he was in his early twenties.’

His accent was the type of lazy American drawl that was so attractive on the silver screen and even the lack of warmth couldn’t negate its appeal. Marianne wondered why this stranger disliked her, because he did. It was in his manner, the set of his face and, most of all, his cold, cold eyes.

‘I see.’ She didn’t but it didn’t matter as the weight of her loss pressed down on her again. ‘Please thank your father for me, won’t you. I hope he is well soon.’

‘My father is dying, Miss Carr, but slowly.’

The very sharply defined planes and angles of the masculine face showed no emotion as Marianne stared at him. She was completely taken aback but, before she could bring her mind to bear, Tom Blackthorn said, ‘I’m sorry to hear that, Rafe. You didn’t say before. We had some good times when we were younger—your father, Annie’s and myself. The Three Musketeers.’

There was a small silence when Marianne wondered if Rafe Steed was going to ignore the man at his side, his eyes still intent on her face. Then, to her relief, the rapier gaze moved and he turned to Tom.

His smile wintry, he said, ‘So I understand.’

What an objectionable individual. Marianne couldn’t believe anyone would come to a funeral and then be so covertly rude to the bereaved. Drawing herself up to her full height of five feet six inches, which unfortunately was still almost a foot below the son of her father’s old friend which, she felt, put her at something of a disadvantage, she said as coldly as he had spoken, ‘Please excuse me, Mr Steed, but I have other people to talk to.’ Nice people, normal people. ‘I’ll see you later, Uncle Tom.’

It had always been Uncle Tom and Aunt Gillian since she was a child although they weren’t related. Her mother and father had both been only children and so it had been Tom’s two sons and two daughters she had looked on as cousins and, having no brothers and sisters herself, their friendship had been precious. It still was, although all but the youngest son had moved to other parts of the country.

As she made her way around the room, talking to one group of folk and then others, Marianne was uncomfortably aware of a pair of blue eyes watching her every move. Most people had plates of Crystal’s delicious buffet in their hands by now but, although Tom had wandered off into the dining room, she knew Rafe Steed had not budged from his stance by the door.

‘Who’s the Heathcliff type Dad’s been talking to?’ As Marianne joined the group consisting of Tom’s children and their partners and his wife, it was Victoria—Tom and Gillian’s youngest daughter and the only child still unattached and fancy-free—who spoke. ‘He’s new round here, isn’t he?’

‘Victoria.’

As her mother shushed her, Victoria said, ‘What? You know you want to know as well.’ Turning to Marianne, she added, ‘Dad just said he’s an old friend but Mum doesn’t know him and she thought she knew all of Dad’s friends.’

Marianne smiled. Victoria was the maneater of the Blackthorn sisters. A confirmed bachelor girl with a fantastic career in central government, she had announced early in life that marriage and children weren’t for her; neither were permanent relationships it would seem. It was common knowledge she ate men up and spat them out and, being a tall redhead with curves in all the right places and come-to-bed blue eyes, they queued up for the privilege of having their hearts broken. And Victoria had obviously set her sights on Rafe Steed. She was so welcome.

Keeping her voice light and easy, Marianne said, ‘His father was an old friend, not him. Apparently your father and mine grew up with his. His name’s Steed. Rafe Steed.’

‘Steed?’ Gillian was a Cornish lass, unlike Marianne’s mother who had moved to the district from the north of England with her family when she was a young woman. ‘He must be Andrew Steed’s son. Yes, I can see it now although he’s a head taller than his father was, but Andrew was very good-looking, too. They’ve got the same black hair and blue eyes. It was a combination that used to send the girls in a tizzwazz. With your father being so fair, Annie, and Andrew being so dark they used to have the girls throwing themselves at them.’

‘What about Dad?’ Victoria interjected a little defensively.

‘Oh, your father was always mine,’ Gillian said comfortably. ‘Everyone knew that.’

Victoria’s gaze was on Rafe Steed again. ‘He’s barely taken his eyes off you, Annie. And he’s got a very sexy mouth,’ she added, almost to herself. ‘In fact he’s “very” everything.’

‘Victoria.’

This time her mother really meant it and Victoria recognised the tone. ‘Sorry,’ she said quickly to Marianne. ‘I wasn’t being flippant regarding your mum and dad, Annie. You know how much I thought of them.’

‘It’s fine.’ It was. In fact, she preferred Victoria’s naturalness to the awkwardness with which most people were treating her today. ‘Why don’t you go across and introduce yourself?’ she suggested, knowing Victoria was longing to. ‘You’ve got the excuse he’s an old friend of your father’s and, furthermore, he doesn’t know anyone. You’ll be taking pity on him.’

‘That’s just what I thought.’ Delighted, Victoria was off.

‘That girl.’ Gillian shook her head while her two sons and eldest daughter and their respective spouses smiled indulgently. ‘I don’t know what it is about her but she attracts the men like bees to a honeypot. He’ll be taking her out for dinner tonight, you mark my words.’

Marianne said something non-committal and moved on. She didn’t care if Rafe Steed took half of Cornwall out for dinner tonight; she thought he was the rudest man she had ever met. If she saw him again in the whole of her life after today it would be too soon. Victoria was utterly welcome and, thinking about it, if anyone could bring such a man to heel, Victoria could.

She purposely didn’t look over the other side of the room for some time, but when she did it was to see that Rafe Steed and Victoria had been joined by the rest of Tom’s family and they were all chatting and smiling. Ridiculously, Marianne felt betrayed. The feeling disappeared almost as soon as it had come but it left her with stinging eyes and a trembling mouth. Suddenly she wanted her mother so much it hurt.

Don’t be stupid, she told herself silently, walking across to the french windows and gazing out over the rolling grounds which stretched down to the high stone wall separating their property from the cliff path. She was a grown woman of twenty-seven and she had lived in London for the last five years since qualifying as an occupational therapist. She had a responsible job with a top London hospital and she had long since taken charge of her life. She was grown up, not a child.

It didn’t help. Right at that moment she would have given everything she owned and was for five minutes with her parents.

You’ve still got Seacrest and Crystal. She hugged the thought to her as she fought back the tears. And, whatever it took, she would keep both. She would find a job down here and live at home and hopefully, if they were careful, she’d manage to pay the bills a large seven-bedroomed house like Seacrest produced. They could always do bed and breakfast in the holiday season; she’d been thinking about that in the last few days since the accident. And she would take care of the grounds herself rather than have the gardener her parents had employed one day a week.

If she had to, that was, she qualified, her eyes following a seagull as it swooped and soared in the blue June sky. She had no idea if there would be any money attached to her parents’ estate; she and her parents had never talked of such things. There had been no need. Her parents had still been relatively young at fifty-seven and sixty respectively, and she’d had her flat and career in London. When she had come down to Cornwall for the occasional weekend or holiday, illness and death and wills had seemed as far away as the moon.

Eventually people began to take their leave. She knew the second Victoria and Rafe Steed began to walk towards her. Somehow she had been vitally aware of him the whole afternoon. She hadn’t wanted to be—in fact, it had irritated and annoyed her—but somehow he had forced himself on to her psyche in a way which would have been humiliating should anyone have been able to read her mind.

‘We’re going, Annie.’ Victoria enfolded her in a hug which was genuinely sympathetic. ‘Call me as soon as you get back to the city and we’ll do lunch. I don’t know why we haven’t thought of it before with both of us based in London.’

‘Goodbye, Victoria.’ Marianne hugged her back and then extracted herself to offer a polite hand to Rafe Steed. ‘Goodbye, Mr Steed,’ she said with deliberate formality. ‘I hope you have a safe journey home and please give my best wishes to your father.’

He took her hand. ‘I have some business to attend to before I return so I shan’t be leaving for a few days, but I’ll speak to my father before then and pass on your regards, Miss Carr.’

His flesh was warm and firm and, in spite of herself, Marianne became aware of the faint scent of his aftershave. There was the shadow of black stubble on the hard square chin and the expensive suit he wore sat with casual nonchalance on the big frame. He was a man who was comfortable with himself and his sexuality. He would be dynamite in bed.

The thought, coming from nowhere as it did, shocked Marianne into snatching her hand away in a manner that was less than tactful. For a moment they stared at each other, Rafe’s features etched in granite and Marianne’s eyes wide with confusion. Victoria, who had moved slightly to their left to say goodbye to her father, was thankfully unaware of what had transpired.

‘Goodbye, Miss Carr.’ It was expressionless, cold.

For a crazy, wild moment she wanted to ask him what she had done to make him dislike her the way he did. They had never met before this day; he knew nothing about her. She had thought at first he was probably the same with everyone, but he had been altogether different when he had been talking to Victoria and her family. Instead, she said, ‘Goodbye,’ and left it at that. She just wanted him to go now. She wanted everyone to go. But first there was the formality of the will. Once that was done—she took a silent gulp of air as she turned away from Rafe Steed—she could get on with sorting out her life and the changes she would have to make to avoid selling Seacrest.

Only it wasn’t as simple as that.

An hour later, sitting across the coffee table in the drawing room from Tom, Marianne and Crystal stared in horror at the solicitor. ‘I thought you knew.’ Tom had said this twice in the last ten minutes since he had dropped his bombshell and his voice was wretched. ‘I didn’t imagine …I mean—’ He stopped abruptly. ‘Your father said he was going to tell you, Annie.’

‘I suppose he was,’ she said numbly. ‘He’d asked me to come down to Seacrest the weekend before the crash but I’d got something on. I was coming down the next…’ Her voice trailed away. ‘How, Uncle Tom? How could he lose everything?’

‘The business has been struggling for years but he hung on to the belief that the tide would turn. He thought borrowing against the house would be a short-term measure at first.’ Tom waved his hands expressively. ‘It wasn’t. There’s basically your father’s boatyard and one other left in the area and that’s one too many. They were both competing for a lucrative deal and they knew it would be the death knell for the one that didn’t get it. The other boatyard won. It’s as simple as that.’

None of this was simple. How could there be nothing left? How could her father have risked losing Seacrest? Why hadn’t he cut his losses with the boatyard and got an ordinary job somewhere? At least then Seacrest would have been saved.

As though Tom knew what she was thinking, he said quietly, ‘The boatyard and Seacrest went together in your father’s head, Annie. They were built at the same time by your great-great-grandfather—’

‘No.’ Her voice cracked. ‘No, the house is different, Uncle Tom, and he should have seen that. Seacrest is…’ She couldn’t find the words to describe what Seacrest meant.

‘There’s no way at all we can keep it?’ Crystal entered the conversation, her face white. ‘I’ve got some savings, nearly twenty thousand in the bank. Would they come to some sort of an arrangement…?’

Her voice trailed away as Tom shook his head.

Marianne reached out her hand and grasped Crystal’s. She would remember Crystal’s offer all her life. ‘What happens now?’

‘The bank will claim what it sees as belonging to it, in essence. Then Seacrest will go on the open market. In the position it occupies and being such a fine old house, you’ll be looking at a great deal of money. Even if you used Crystal’s twenty thousand as a deposit, you wouldn’t be able to make the mortgage repayments.’

‘What if we did bed and breakfast, even evening meals, too? Turned Seacrest into a hotel?’

‘Have you any idea of the cost of such a project? You’d need to do so much work before you could start taking guests. All sorts of safety procedures, not to mention converting the bedrooms into en suites and so on.’

‘Three are already en suites.’

‘Annie, we’re talking tens of thousands to get the place round if you’re going to get approval from the tourist boards and so on. Where’s your collateral?’

‘There has to be a way.’ She stared at him, wild-eyed. ‘I’m not going to give in. They can’t take Seacrest.’

‘Annie, to all extents and purposes it’s theirs already.’

‘Dad would have wanted me to fight this.’

Tom said nothing, looking at her with sad eyes as he laid out a host of papers on the table in front of her. ‘Look at these overnight. This has been a shock, I see that, and if I had thought Gerald hadn’t told you I would have said something before rather than dropping it on you like this. Take time to let it sink in.’

She didn’t want it to sink in. She wanted Seacrest.

Somehow Marianne managed to pull herself together sufficiently to see Tom out and then comfort Crystal, who was beside herself. After Crystal’s husband and two young sons of four and five had been drowned in a freak storm when he’d taken the boys out in his fishing boat, Gerald and Diane Carr had taken the broken woman in until she recovered sufficiently to decide what she wanted to do. Crystal’s home had been rented and there had been no life assurance or anything of that nature. Shortly afterwards, the Carrs’ housekeeper had suddenly upped and got married, and somehow Crystal had just taken over the role. That had been over thirty years ago and the arrangement had been a blessing for everyone concerned. Now, though, it was as though Crystal’s world had ended for the second time in her life.

By the time Marianne had persuaded Crystal to go to bed and taken the older woman a mug of hot, sweet milk and a couple of aspirin, she felt exhausted. Her head was spinning, she felt physically sick and stress was causing her temples to throb. Nevertheless, she sat down at the coffee table and began to work through the papers Tom had left for her.

There was no escaping the truth.

Tears streaming down her face, she opened the french windows and stepped into the garden, which was bathed in the mauve shadows of twilight. Immediately the scent from the hedge of China roses close to the house wafted in the warm breeze and, as she walked on in the violet dusk, pinks, sweet peas and honeysuckle competed for her attention, their fragrance filling the air. A blackbird was singing its heart out somewhere close, the pure notes hanging on the breeze, and far below the house she could hear the whisper of the sea on the rocks below the cliff.

This was her home. She had always known she would come back here one day. Boyfriends had come and gone and she had nearly had her heart broken once or twice, but deep inside she had always imagined coming back to the area she had grown up in, meeting someone local who would be able to love Seacrest like she did and settling down somewhere close. And then one day, when she was much older and her parents had had the joy of watching grandchildren grow up, she would inherit the house she loved with all her heart. And hold it in trust for her children…

Sinking down onto a sun-warmed bench which had retained the day’s heat, she shut her eyes against the pain. If she lost Seacrest, then she would really lose her parents; that was how she felt. She couldn’t explain it because of course they were gone, but here, in the house and garden which had nurtured so many generations of her family, she still felt close to them.

She sat on in the quiet of the night until it was quite dark, the leaves on the trees surrounding the grounds of Seacrest trembling slightly in the summer breeze. The moon had risen with silvery hauteur in the velvet-black sky, the stars twinkling in deference to their sovereign. It was a beautiful night. It was always a beautiful night at Seacrest, even in the midst of winter when harsh angry winds whistled over the vast cliffs, melancholy and haunting as they rattled the old windows and moaned down the chimneys.

Be it in the spring, when the swallows began to build their nests under the eaves; summer, when wild rabbits brought their babies onto the smooth lawns to eat grass that was sweeter than on the cliffs beyond Seacrest’s boundary; autumn, when the trees were a blaze of colour and squirrels darted here and there anxiously burying nuts; or winter, when the sound of the sea crashing on the rocks filtered through shut windows and flavoured dreams, Seacrest was possessed of her own magic. The house was more than a house; it always had been.

She had to do something, but what? Marianne held her aching head in her hands, bewildered at how quickly her calm, happy life had been turned upside down. She didn’t know which way to turn.

At midnight she walked back to the house, turning off the lights downstairs before retiring to her room. As she opened the door and looked at the room which had been hers as long as she could remember, desolation claimed her anew.

‘Sleep.’ She said the word out loud into the stillness. She needed to sleep and then she would be fresher to think of a way round this. This was the twenty-first century, an age of miracles when things were happening which would have been considered unthinkable a century before. It couldn’t be beyond the wit of man—or woman in this case—to think of a way to keep Seacrest. She’d work twenty-four hours a day if necessary.

Stripping off her charcoal-grey dress, she threw it into a corner of the room. She would never wear it again. Nor the black shoes and jacket she had bought specially for the funeral.

Without bothering to brush her teeth or shower, she crawled into bed in her slip, an exhaustion that rendered her limbs like lead taking over. In contrast to the last few nights after Crystal’s shocking telephone call, she was asleep as soon as her head touched the pillow.

CHAPTER TWO

OVER the next couple of days Marianne and Crystal followed one fruitless idea after another, but by the end of that time Marianne was forced to concede the situation looked hopeless. If either of them had shedloads of cash they could afford to pour into the old house it might be different, but if they had then they wouldn’t be in the position they were anyway. Her father had gambled on the business reviving and he had lost. End of story, end of Seacrest. The debt was huge, colossal.

Marianne telephoned Tom Blackthorn on the third morning after the funeral. She and Crystal were sitting close together on one of the sofas in the drawing room, so they could both hear the conversation, their faces tight and strained. In a way it was even worse for Crystal than for her, Marianne silently reflected as she dialled Tom’s number. At least she had her flat in London and her job to take her mind off things. Crystal had built her life around Seacrest and the family.

When Tom’s secretary put her through, Marianne came straight to the point. ‘I need to speak to you, Uncle Tom. It’s no use burying my head in the sand and Crystal and I realise nothing can be done. How do things progress now? Am I allowed to keep any family belongings? Paintings and so on?’

There was a brief pause and then Tom said, ‘I was going to phone you this morning, Annie. There’s been a development we couldn’t have foreseen.’

‘What?’ She glanced at Crystal, who stared back at her, eyes wide.

‘I think it’s better if I come and explain it in person.’

‘Tell me.’ There was no way she could calmly sit and wait for him to call. ‘Please, Uncle Tom.’

‘Someone’s offered to pay the debts, lock, stock and barrel, so Seacrest doesn’t go on the open market. Your idea of turning the house into a hotel would be part of the deal and this person would effectively expect to be a sleeping partner and receive fifty per cent of any profit once the hotel was up and running.’

Marianne blinked and kept her eyes on Crystal, who was looking as confused as she was. ‘This person would buy Seacrest, then?’ she asked numbly. ‘It would belong to them?’

Again, there was a pause. ‘Well, normally, yes, that’s how it would be, but he’s saying he wants only a fifty per cent ownership.’

‘He’d own half and let me own half?’ Marianne found herself floundering. ‘I don’t understand, Uncle Tom. Why would anyone do that? It doesn’t make sense.’

‘It’s not unheard of for one partner to put up the capital for a venture and the other to take responsibility for all the hard work and the running of it, Annie. And it would all be legal and above board of course. I’d see to that.’

Her heart was beating so fast it was threatening to jump into her throat. She could tell Crystal was feeling the same. ‘Who is it?’

‘I was instructed to put the proposition to you and see if you agreed before I make the client known.’

‘Uncle Tom, it’s me, Annie. Surely you can tell me?’

‘I gave my word.’

Marianne sank back on the settee. Crystal looked as though she didn’t know what day it was and hadn’t said a word. Reaching out her hand, Marianne grasped the older woman’s. ‘What do you think?’

‘Oh, Annie.’ Crystal couldn’t say any more—she was crying too hard—but she nodded vigorously through her tears.

Marianne tried to compose herself before she said, ‘We’re for it, Crystal and I. It would be daft to look a gift horse in the mouth.’

‘I think so. This is the sort of break that comes only once in a lifetime.’

‘And this person realises Crystal would be part of any venture?’ Marianne asked. That was of vital importance.

‘Oh, yes.’

‘Then we’ll do it. Who’s the mysterious benefactor?’ She’d been racking her brain for the last minute or two. She knew her father had had lots of good friends but most of them would find it difficult to raise the capital for a new car, let alone pay off a mountain of debt. It had to be a businessman in the town, one who’d known her father and who Tom trusted enough to listen to. That thought prompted Marianne to say, ‘Did you approach this person or did they come to you?’

‘It wasn’t quite as straightforward as that.’ There was a pause and then Tom said, ‘You remember Andrew Steed’s son?’

Marianne’s heart missed a beat. Not him. Anyone but him. He hadn’t even tried to hide his dislike of her.

‘He came to dinner last night and he was asking about you and so on. I’m afraid Gillian spoke out of turn and told him about the current situation.’

Oh, dear. Marianne could imagine how that had gone down with the solicitor. Her father’s friend was one of the old school and he played everything absolutely by the book. A client’s confidentiality was of paramount importance. She could imagine Gillian had received a lecture once they were alone.

‘Anyway, it appears that Andrew owns a string of hotels in America which Rafe now manages. Over the last few years since Andrew’s wife died and he became ill, he’s been looking to return to the old country to end his days. Rafe’s been in this area several times over the last twelve months apparently, looking for the right sort of place for his father. It’s leukaemia,’ he added.

‘I’m sorry,’ Marianne said mechanically.

‘Anyway, apparently he has good patches and not so good, and it’s not so good at the moment. Rafe feels his father’s better when he is motivated. He always was something of an entrepreneur, was Andrew. He went to America with nothing and now it would seem he’s an extremely wealthy man indeed. But I digress.’

Tom cleared his throat and Marianne waited.

‘Rafe was concerned with this desire to return home to die. That was his terminology, I might add. Not mine. He did not feel it was altogether healthy and furthermore that it was out of character. Seacrest might be just the sort of tonic his father needs. He can take as large or as small a part in the proceedings as he feels able to, but Rafe would want you to make Andrew a part of it. Humour him, if necessary.’

‘I see.’ She glanced at Crystal, who nodded. ‘I suppose that’s fair.’ They clearly didn’t have any choice in the matter.

‘Rafe was over here looking for a place for his father when he heard about the car crash from one of the locals. He told his father about it, who immediately wanted him to make himself known to you.’

‘I see,’ she said again, although she wasn’t altogether sure she did. ‘And has Rafe found somewhere for his father?’ If this Andrew expected to stay at Seacrest she could see the project was going to be made more difficult with a very sick man to consider.

‘Yes. A day before he heard about your parents’ accident he put in an offer for the Haywards’ place at the edge of the village. Made them an offer they couldn’t refuse, apparently.’

Marianne knew the house, a great thatched whitewashed cottage with a dream of a garden. ‘I didn’t know the Haywards were thinking of moving.’

‘There wasn’t even time for a For Sale board to go up. When the estate agent contacted Rafe he offered an amount to seal the deal immediately, which knocked anyone else out of the water.’ Tom’s voice was wry when he added, ‘I think he’s a lot like his father.’

Oh, dear. In that case she wasn’t going to like Andrew Steed one little bit.

‘How about we do lunch today, the four of us? You and Crystal and me and Rafe Steed? Iron out any wrinkles before we commit ourselves properly. I want you to be completely happy about all of this, Annie. Your father would expect me to guard your interests as best I can. I’ve already informed Rafe Steed he will need another solicitor to represent him as you are my client.’

This was all happening so fast. Marianne swallowed hard. But what was the alternative to agreeing to Rafe Steed’s amazing proposal? Losing everything, that was what. ‘Lunch would be fine,’ she said weakly.

‘One o’clock in The Fiddler’s Arms, then. To be honest, I’d like to get this sorted before Rafe changes his mind,’ Tom said, and she could tell he wasn’t joking.

When Marianne put down the telephone the two women stared blankly at each other for a second before Crystal gave a whoop and a holler that made Marianne jump out of her skin. ‘I’ll never say again there’s not a Santa Claus. Who would have thought this could happen? It’s unbelievable.’

Yes, it was a bit. Marianne let Crystal have her moment of joy but her main feeling was one of trepidation. It was a wildly generous offer and she was grateful to Rafe Steed—eternally grateful—but something didn’t sit right. She didn’t know what, but she’d bet her bottom dollar there was more to this than met the eye.

A little while later, as she walked up to her bedroom to get ready for the lunch date, she was no nearer to finding an answer for her inward unease. Whatever way she looked at this she couldn’t lose, could she? It was a win-win situation. On one side of the scales she lost everything, on the other she kept a fifty per cent stake in Seacrest and in the future might even be able to buy the Steeds out if all went well. OK, it might take years, decades even, but it was a possibility and one she would work towards.

Opening the bedroom door, she walked over to the wardrobe. She needed to look businesslike, she told herself firmly. Cool and businesslike and in control. She always left a selection of clothes at Seacrest for holidays and weekends with her parents, but they were much less formal than her things in London. She must have something that would do. She glanced at the charcoal dress and black jacket, which were still where she had thrown them on the night of the funeral.

No. She couldn’t bear to wear them again. Silly and emotional perhaps, but that was the way she felt.

The June day was a warm one, the sky blue and cloudless with just the slightest of breezes whispering over the garden and through the open window. Pulling out the most sombre dress in the wardrobe—a sleeveless sheer twisted tulle dress with attached dress underneath in pale brown—Marianne quickly divested herself of the jeans and vest top she was wearing.

Hair up or down? She surveyed herself critically. Up. More tidy and neat.

It only took a few seconds to loop her shoulder-length hair into a sleek shining knot, and she spent the remaining five minutes before she left the room applying careful make-up to hide the ravages a night spent crying had wreaked. True, her eyelids were still on the puffy side but only the most discerning eye would notice it.

By the time she joined Crystal, who was waiting for her in the hall, Marianne was satisfied that her overall persona was one of cool efficiency. Tom’s last words, although spoken lightly, had hit a nerve. With salvation just a lunch away, she didn’t want to blow this. She needed to instill in Rafe Steed the assurance that she could cope with whatever was necessary to get Seacrest up and working as a successful hotel.

‘Annie. Crystal.’ Tom stood up as they approached him and his companion in The Fiddler’s Arms lounge bar, the tall dark figure at his side rising also.

Marianne kept her eyes trained on the middle-aged face in front of her until Tom had hugged her briefly. Then she forced herself to turn polite eyes to Rafe Steed. ‘Hello, Mr Steed,’ she said carefully. ‘I didn’t expect we would meet again so soon.’

‘Likewise, Miss Carr.’

His voice was just as she remembered—silky, cold—but his face was as unrevealing as a blank canvas.

In spite of herself she was slightly taken aback and that annoyed her more than his coolness. She had expected… What had she expected? she asked herself silently. Some shred of warmth? Enthusiasm? Something, for sure.

Clearing her throat, Marianne said flatly, ‘I appreciate the fact you might be interested in a business proposal involving Seacrest, Mr Steed.’

His eyes were very blue and very piercing. ‘It’s a little more than a might, Miss Carr.’

‘Good, good,’ Tom intervened, his voice brisk. ‘But, in view of the circumstances, I think we can do away with such formality and move on to Christian names?’ Crystal nodded her agreement. Marianne’s inclination of her head was less enthusiastic and Rafe Steed could have been set in granite. However, when he next spoke it was to Marianne that he said, ‘I think our table is ready in the restaurant. Shall we?’ and he took her arm in a manner that brooked no argument, leaving the other two to follow them as he walked her out of the lounge bar and through wide-open doors into the inn’s restaurant.

Taken aback, Marianne didn’t object but she was unnervingly conscious of the warm hand on her elbow and the height and breadth of him as he escorted her to a table for four in a secluded spot at the edge of the room. Once seated next to Crystal with the two men facing them across the table, she tried to relax her taut muscles but it was difficult. She didn’t think she had ever felt so tense in all her life. Part of the problem was that she could feel Rafe’s eyes moving over every inch of her face although she purposely hadn’t glanced at him, pretending an interest in the room in general.

‘So, Marianne…’ He brought her eyes to his as he spoke, the deep voice with its smoky accent giving her name a charm she’d never heard before. ‘What would you like to drink?’

‘Drink?’ She flushed as she realised she must sound vacant. Praying he hadn’t noticed, she said quickly, ‘A glass of wine would be nice.’

‘Red or white?’

‘Red.’ Why had she said that? She never drank red. Was it because she felt he had expected her to say white? But that was ridiculous. He probably hadn’t been thinking any such thing.

She watched as Rafe raised a hand and a waitress immediately appeared at his side. She had lunched at this particular pub many times in the past and she had never seen anyone get such prompt service before, not in the summer when the restaurant was always packed to bursting.

Once Rafe had given the order for drinks and they were settled with a menu in their hands, Marianne forced herself to raise her gaze as casually as though it wasn’t taking all of her will-power and meet Rafe’s eyes as she said, ‘I understand you’ve bought the Haywards’ place for your father. It’s a beautiful old cottage, isn’t it, and the garden is wonderful. I’m sure he’ll love it.’

‘I hope so.’ It was flat, the tone contrary to the words. He swallowed some wine before he said, ‘Personally, I think it is a mistake, this desire to come back to a country he left some four decades ago. All his friends and colleagues are in the States, that’s where his life is.’

‘What about his heart?’ She hadn’t meant to say it; the words had popped out of their own volition.

‘His heart?’ The blue eyes had iced over still more.

‘Maybe his heart has never really left the area he was born in.’ She paused for a moment. ‘I could understand that, to be honest. I live and work in London, as you know, but I’ve always known I’d come back here one day to put down roots. Cornwall…well, it gets in the blood somehow. It can hold a person. But of course you would know your father far better than me,’ she added hastily, sensing she was treading on thin ice.

‘Quite.’

Oh, he definitely wasn’t amused. She took in the tight line of his jaw and, as he cut the conversation by looking down at his menu, she noticed he had thick lashes for a man. Long and silky and curly—the sort of lashes a woman would kill for. His open-necked grey shirt showed the beginning of soft black chest hair and his broad shoulders accentuated the flagrant masculinity she had noticed the day of the funeral. She felt a little thrill in the pit of her stomach and hastily averted her eyes but for a moment the small neat words on the menu swam mistily.

Get a grip. She sat perfectly still for some moments, willing her racing heart to slow down. As her pulse gradually returned to normal she took a few discreet calming breaths.

Crystal, obviously sensing the tense atmosphere, dived in with the stock English fallback comment about the weather. ‘Lovely for June, isn’t it?’ she said brightly. ‘It was awful this time last year, one storm after another.’

Marianne raised her head in time to see Rafe’s mouth twitch as he continued to keep his eyes on the menu. It annoyed her. He knew exactly how his attitude was affecting everyone, she thought irritably, and he didn’t care. Possibly because he considered he was holding all the cards. Which he was, of course. Nevertheless… Expressionlessly, she said, ‘Why haven’t you bought Seacrest purely for yourself, Mr Steed? Or for your father, for that matter?’ It was a question that had been burning in her mind since Tom had first told her about the proposal. She hadn’t meant to put it so baldly originally but Rafe Steed had got under her skin.

Blue eyes met chocolate-brown and Marianne didn’t try to hide the dislike she felt for this overbearing individual in her face. She felt Crystal squirm at her side and felt a moment’s contrition. Crystal would be devastated if Rafe pulled out of this merger.

‘I have a home in the States,’ he said coolly after he had allowed one or two seconds to tick by. ‘And Seacrest is too large an establishment for my father. The Haywards’ place is much more suitable. But I think he will enjoy seeing it renovated and turned into a first-class exclusive hotel.’

Marianne’s eyes narrowed. There had been something in his tone she couldn’t put her finger on but which sent alarm bells ringing. ‘As a project, you mean?’ she said, a sudden tightness in her chest.

He gave her a hard look. ‘What else?’

What else, indeed? Feeling as though she were wading through treacle and oblivious to the anxious glances the other two at the table were exchanging, she said, ‘Correct me if I’m wrong, Mr Steed, but I felt there was something more to it than that when you just spoke.’

He settled back in his seat a fraction and the male face went blank, but she had seen the momentary surprise when she had pressed the challenge. Surprise and something else. She had been right; there was more to it than he had admitted thus far. Like a bolt of lightning, Marianne knew she had to get to the bottom of this. ‘Am I right?’ she asked directly.

He stared at her. It took all of her strength not to let her eyes fall away but she was determined not to be the one to look away first.

Tom began to say something into the taut silence which had fallen but in the next instant Rafe was on his feet, glancing at the other two as he said, ‘I think Miss Carr and I need to talk privately for a few minutes. If you’ll excuse us? We won’t be long.’

‘Annie?’ Tom glanced at her, his face concerned.

‘It’s all right, Uncle Tom.’ She had risen to her feet and now she smiled at the solicitor and Crystal. ‘Order for us if the waitress returns, would you? I’ll have the butter bean bruschetta with toasted wholegrain bread followed by the tarragon chicken with green beans and new potatoes.’ She didn’t think she’d be able to eat a thing but she was blowed if she was going to let Rafe Steed know that.

She glanced at him, waiting for him to express his choice, and for a second she thought she caught a glimpse of something which could have been admiration in the blue gaze. It was gone in an instant as he turned to Tom. ‘The same.’

She didn’t want him touching her again and so she quickly retraced her steps to the lounge bar. There she stopped long enough to glance over her shoulder and say, ‘I suggest we go through to the garden. It’s more private there,’ before continuing on.

Once in the grounds of the inn she realised the tables and chairs scattered about the big lawn were full, which she hadn’t expected. Normally, apart from the six weeks in July and August when the schoolchildren were on their summer vacation and even more holiday-makers flooded into the area, there was always a table or two to be had outside.

‘My car’s in the car park.’

Now Rafe did take her arm again; too late Marianne realised she should have been content with talking in the crowded lounge bar. The last thing she wanted was to sit in his car with him. Far too cosy.

As he led her out of the little side gate and into the large drystone-walled car park, Marianne was attacked by a number of conflicting emotions. His height and breadth made her feel very feminine, almost fragile, and it wasn’t an unpleasant sensation. He smelled nice. Not so much the scent of aftershave but more the faint perfume of a lime or lemon soap on clean male skin—or perhaps it was aftershave? She didn’t know but it was attractive. The set of his face told her she had been right in her suspicions that there was more to this than met the eye; furthermore, she wouldn’t like what she was about to hear, and apprehension curled in her stomach. The sun was hot on her face and, as they reached a low silver sports car crouching in the far corner of the car park and he opened the passenger door, the smell of leather hit her nostrils.

Once she was seated he shut the door and walked round the bonnet of the car, sliding into the driver’s seat as he said, ‘I’m aware you have just lost your parents suddenly, which has been a great shock. If you would rather we had this conversation some other time that’s fine.’

‘Because I won’t like what you say to me, Mr Steed?’ Marianne asked steadily, refusing to be intimidated.

‘Exactly.’ He turned to face her, one arm along the back of her seat. ‘And what I have to say doesn’t alter the current proposal so it really isn’t necessary to voice it.’

‘I disagree.’ Marianne folded her arms, wishing they weren’t alone like this. ‘I noticed at the funeral you had to force yourself to be civil to me and just now, when you mentioned Seacrest, there was something…’ She swallowed hard. ‘Perhaps you’d like to explain exactly how you feel?’

‘Very well.’

It was said in a tone of you asked for this and Marianne’s stomach turned over. Since she was a child she had always disliked confrontation but if and when it came she had invariably met it head-on.

‘You know your father and mine grew up together, that they were boyhood friends?’ said Rafe evenly.

‘Yes.’ Marianne nodded. ‘Not until the funeral, though, but you already know that.’

‘The three of them—your father, mine and Tom Blackthorn—were very close through their teenage years and then, when they turned twenty, something happened. Or someone.’

‘I don’t understand.’ Marianne stared at him. He was speaking in a steady controlled voice but she knew he wasn’t feeling calm inside.

‘My father met a girl—a young woman. She’d recently moved to the area with her family. Your father and Tom had gone abroad for the summer—they had comfortably well-off parents, unlike my paternal grandparents, who were fisher-folk. My father’s parents couldn’t afford to send him to France and Italy to see the sights. He was expected to work on the fishing boat once he was home from university. They’d had to sacrifice much to allow him to go in the first place.’

He looked away from her, staring through the windscreen. His profile might have been sculpted in granite. The clear forehead, the chiselled straight nose, the firm mouth and strong square jaw. He really was a very good-looking man, Marianne thought vaguely, but disturbing. Infinitely disturbing.

‘The two of them fell in love, my father and this young woman. He was besotted by her. He couldn’t believe such a beautiful young girl had fallen so madly for him. They had a wonderful summer together. She would wait each evening for him to return from fishing so they could be together. They had barbecues for two on the beach with the fish he’d caught, walks through the countryside, evenings sitting in the gardens of village pubs, things like that. She had golden-blond hair and the bluest of eyes, my father said. In that respect—the eyes—you are not like your mother.’

She had been expecting it, realisation dawning slowly as he had talked, but it was still a shock. Licking her lips, she said, ‘Your father fell in love with my mother?’

‘Not just fell in love with her—he always loved her. He still does. And my mother knew. She knew there was a girl in England he was trying to forget—a girl who had broken his heart and left only a small piece for anyone else. But my mother loved him enough to take what was left and make it work. They had a good marriage on the whole, even though she knew she was second-best.’

The bitterness in his voice broke through for a moment and Marianne watched as he took a deep breath, gritting his teeth. When he next spoke his voice was steady again, unemotional. ‘Your father and Tom came back from their travels one week before the university term began. By the end of it your mother had switched her affections from the son of a poor fisherman to a man who had wealth and power in his family, the son of a successful businessman who owned a big fine house which would one day become his.’

Marianne’s throat constricted. She cleared it, then said tightly, ‘If you are insinuating my mother married my father for his wealth and property, you are wrong. They loved each other.’

He ignored this. ‘The three of them—my father, yours and Tom—had one year left at university. On the eve of my father’s graduation his father and brother were drowned in a storm and the fishing boat lost. My grandmother went to live with her widowed sister some miles inland. At the same time your father and mother got engaged. There was now nothing to hold my father here. A mixed blessing in the circumstances. Certainly I don’t think he could have stood seeing your parents settling into married bliss.’

She stared at him, colour burning in her cheeks and her hands clenched in her lap. How dared he say these things about her mother? How dared he? ‘I don’t know what went on all those years ago, Mr Steed, and neither do you, as it happens. You only have your father’s side of things. But I do know my mother and she would never have done what you’ve suggested. If she cared for your father as you say I’m sure she was in turmoil when my father came on the scene and she realised what she felt for him was the sort of love that lasts a lifetime. Because that’s what they had.’

‘How nice and how fortunate it was the wealthy son of a businessman and not the poor fisherman who made her heart beat faster.’

He was doing it again—saying her mother had married for money. ‘You’re disgusting, do you know that?’

‘Why? Because I’m telling you the truth?’

Marianne called him a name—one that made his eyes widen. ‘It’s not the truth, just your distorted version of it. I can’t help it if your father is a bitter old man who has poisoned your mind as well as his.’

‘Don’t talk about my father like that.’

Marianne reared up at the hypocrisy, her voice flying up the scale. ‘Your father? Your father! I’ll say what I like after your insinuations about my mother. She was a wonderful woman, the best, and never in a million years would she have married my father simply because he was going to inherit a business and a big house. She wasn’t like that.’

Her fury strangely seemed to calm him. His voice lower than it had been a moment ago and without the growl to it, he said, ‘Calm yourself, woman. You’re overreacting.’

Marianne didn’t think about what she did next; it was pure instinct. The sound of the slap echoed in the close confines of the car and immediately the handprint of her fingers were etched in red on his tanned face. She stared at him in the silence that had fallen, inwardly horrified at what she’d done but determined not to let him see it. She had never struck another person in her life.

Seconds ticked by. ‘Feel better?’ he drawled coldly.

She raised her chin. If she had tried to answer him she would have burst into tears and that was not an option.

‘I can see we are going to have to agree to disagree about certain elements in the past.’ He raised a hand to his face, flexing his jaw from side to side, one eyebrow raised. ‘That taken as read, at least we now have all the cards on the table, so to speak.’

Marianne gathered herself together with some effort. Cards on the table? Hardly. If Rafe Steed and his father bore such an immense grudge about the past, then why the proposal regarding Seacrest? It didn’t add up. Her voice as chilly as his had been, she said, ‘Why are you and your father buying my home, Mr Steed?’

He made a show of relaxing back in his seat but Marianne was sure it was just that—a show. He was as tense as she was inwardly, she knew it.

His blue eyes narrowed against the sunlight streaming in through the window, he said quietly, ‘I’ve told you why the offer has been made. My father and I are in the hotel business and have converted several suitable properties in the States. I think it would be healthy for him to have a project here rather than having to concentrate on his illness away from family and friends. He liked the idea of obtaining the house when I put the idea to him.’

‘Because you both feel you’re getting one over on my father?’ she asked baldly, deliberately not mincing her words. ‘Acquiring Seacrest would mean you’d secured the main thing which had persuaded my mother to marry my father, the way you see it, surely? Isn’t that so?’

He surveyed her indolently for a moment or two. ‘What a suspicious little mind you have, Miss Carr.’

‘What a nasty little mind you have, Mr Steed.’

‘I understand from Tom and Gillian that you are very like your mother.’ It wasn’t laudatory. ‘In looks, personality—everything.’

‘I hope so.’ Her head was high and her eyes steady.

‘She must have given the same appearance of fragility while being as—’ he paused, obviously changing his mind about the next word before he continued ‘—strong as an ox beneath that delicate exterior.’

He had been going to say something unpleasant. Marianne’s gaze never wavered as she said, ‘My mother was a very strong woman, as it happens. She was also gentle and sympathetic and loving. You needn’t take my word for that, ask anyone. But, on second thoughts, no, don’t. It doesn’t matter what you think. Not one iota.’

Hard-eyed, he said, ‘And mine was equally loved, so how do you think it makes me feel, knowing she never had the marriage she should have had?’

‘I don’t know, Mr Steed. But that was your parents’ business and no one else’s, not even yours. From what you’ve told me, your mother married your father knowing about his past and how he felt so she knew where she stood. If they were unhappy—’

‘I never said they were unhappy,’ he interrupted brusquely. ‘I think they were very happy in their own way.’

‘But it didn’t measure up to what you demanded they should feel about each other? They were supposed to have been the one and only loves in each other’s lives, is that it?’

She watched as a veil came down over the blue eyes, making his gaze unreadable. ‘There is no point in discussing this any further.’

She had never met a man who could get under her skin like this one. The arrogance—the sheer arrogance of thinking he could dismiss her after what he’d accused her mother of. ‘I disagree. You started this and you can jolly well do me the courtesy of answering. And don’t think you can hold the carrot of Seacrest dangling in front of my nose to make me agree black is white, because that won’t work. I’d rather lose Seacrest completely than compromise on what I’ve said to you. Do you understand?’

He glared at her. ‘Don’t talk to me as though I were ten years old.’

‘Then don’t act like it.’ She drew in a shuddering gasp of air, feeling as though someone had punched her in the solar plexus and desperately trying to firm her wobbly bottom lip. She would rather die than let him see how he’d devastated her.

She heard him swear softly under his breath and the next moment a large, crisp white handkerchief was placed in her hands. She reacted as though it were scalding-hot, shoving it back at him as she said, ‘I’m perfectly all right, thank you.’

‘Look, I didn’t mean to say all that, but you’re so…’

‘So what?’ Adrenaline was rushing in and it couldn’t have been more welcome after the last few seconds of being in danger of losing control and bursting into tears. ‘So like my mother? Well, I’ll take that as a compliment if you don’t mind.’

‘For crying out loud!’

The irritation in his voice was acute and, as Marianne fixed her eyes on her hands, she willed herself to calm down. He was a pig of a man and she hated him, but what upset her most was the knowledge that she could never agree to the proposal to work with him and his father and keep Seacrest now. Desolation as deep as the Cornish sea claimed her and she sat in silent misery as she forced her racing heart to steady.

Rafe had jerked to face the dashboard, his hands gripping the steering wheel and his countenance as dark as thunder. Out of the corner of her eye, her gaze fell onto his hands. They were powerful and very masculine, his fingers long and strong and a light dusting of black hair coating the backs of his hands. He wore no rings but what looked like an extremely expensive watch sat on his left wrist. His nails were short and immaculately clean. She liked that in a man.

Hauling her thoughts back from the path they were following, she asked herself why on earth she was thinking about Rafe Steed’s hands at a moment like this. Shock, most probably. The mind retreating into the mundane to cushion itself from the blow it had received. Not that there was anything mundane about Rafe Steed, she added with dark humour. That was one crime which could never be laid at his feet.

‘To address your accusation about our motives for acquiring Seacrest, Miss Carr,’ he said flatly after a little while. ‘I plead not guilty, all right? And I know for a fact there was nothing of “getting one over on your father” in my father’s motives for being interested in the property. He knew the house from a small boy and had spent many happy hours in its grounds playing with your father and Tom, added to which he was upset to find out that Diane’s only child was to be turned out of her home. Genuinely upset. He is not a vindictive man, whatever you might think. It was as we were discussing the situation that the idea of acquiring Seacrest came to us. After all, Gillian had said something about you considering the possibility of a guest house.’

‘That was when I didn’t know about the debts and everything. I thought, at the worst, I had to pay for its upkeep and so on,’ Marianne said numbly. She didn’t know what to think about Andrew Steed’s apparent pity for her. It rankled acutely that she would be beholden to someone who had maligned her parents so badly.

‘My father and I thought of the partnership for practical reasons,’ Rafe continued, as though he had sensed what she was feeling. ‘I’m in the States most of the time and my father will not be in a position to contribute much physically to the alterations needed to set the hotel up and then the running of it once it’s a viable proposition. We’ve found in the past it pays dividends if someone is on board who actually has a fondness for the property, who cares about it.’

In spite of herself, Marianne’s interest was stirred. ‘Are your hotels in the States converted old houses and that sort of thing, then?’

‘Mostly, yes. We offer something different from the ultra-modern, chrome and glass establishments of the twenty-first century. Each of our properties are converted sympathetically. Some are large—eighty rooms or so—and others have merely a handful of rooms, as Seacrest will.’

He turned to face her again and she was conscious of the dark shadow of his chest hair under the thin cotton shirt he was wearing. Her mouth went dry. Ridiculous, but somehow her body kept insisting that she acknowledge her sexual awareness of this man when it was the last thing she wanted to do.

‘I don’t want to argue with you, Miss Carr,’ he said flatly. ‘I mean that. But I’m not prepared to let Seacrest go now my father has expressed an interest in acquiring the property. For that reason I shall buy the house, with or without you on board. If it helps your ultimate decision, most of my time will be spent seeing to our business in the States.’

Marianne flushed in spite of herself. She liked plain speaking but this man took it a step further. Nevertheless, it did help to know he wouldn’t be around much. She had the feeling one male Steed would be quite enough to deal with, even if Rafe’s father was an invalid. And if he was speaking truthfully when he’d declared their reasons for buying Seacrest—if it wasn’t some twisted way to get even with her father—then she’d be crazy to refuse the offer. Once Seacrest had been converted into a small hotel and everything was running smoothly, she might be able to find another post as an occupational therapist down here and leave things more to Crystal. Anything was possible, after all.

She raised her eyes, to find Rafe giving her a long, searching look. ‘The way I see it, my father was the injured party in all of this,’ he said expressionlessly, ‘although I appreciate you feel differently. I think he is being amazingly generous in honouring the memory of your mother by trying to help her daughter.’

‘You think I’m ungrateful.’ The antagonism which had begun to die down a little rose like a hot flood.

‘In a nutshell.’

Charming. ‘And I think you’re rude and overbearing and narrow-minded.’

‘Narrow-minded?’ Rafe objected, raising his brows. ‘Never.’

‘Blinkered, then.’ She wondered why he hadn’t minded rude and overbearing. ‘Seeing things only your way—the way your father has put them.’

‘Excuse me for pointing out the obvious, but aren’t you doing exactly the same?’ Rafe said mildly. ‘Seeing things purely from your mother and father’s standpoint?’

Whilst mentally acknowledging he was right, Marianne said vehemently, ‘That’s different.’

‘I thought it might be.’

Impossible man. Feeling outmanoeuvred, Marianne took refuge in cool dignity. ‘I’m not prepared to discuss this any longer and I suggest if this deal goes through that ought to be the criteria for the future, too. On the rare occasions we meet,’ she added crisply.

‘Suits me.’ His eyes had gone flat and cold.

‘Good.’ She looked at him and swallowed, feeling miserable. ‘Shall we go back to the others now?’

‘Of course.’

He had slid out of the low car and walked round to open her door for her while she was still fumbling with the handle, helping her out of the vehicle with the old-fashioned courtesy that was rare these days. But nice—very nice. Whilst being extremely capable and even fiercely independent on occasion, Marianne had never understood why some women objected to such little expressions of chivalry from a man.

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