“Zizi never had a child!”

Alyssa said the words angrily. She gave a slightly hysterical laugh, afraid of Adam’s effect on her, afraid of the sensation, the intimacy, of his touch.

His eyes held compassion. “If Elizabeth told you so little—after all, you were a child when she was already a middle-aged woman—surely someone in your family knows. Her sister, Mariel, perhaps?”

“My grandmother? And she kept it from us? No way! Zizi never married. She never had a child. Do you seriously believe we wouldn’t know?” Why were clouds of confusion blanketing her mind?

He sat back, staring at her. “It’s happened before,” he said. “The thing is, secrets don’t always remain buried. My aim isn’t to shock you, Alyssa, but you must trust me on this. Elizabeth did have a child. And for reasons of her own, she appears to have led a life of deception.”

“Why should I sit here and listen to you destroying all my illusions about the Zizi I loved?”

“The closer the link, the more intense the pain,” he said. “Elizabeth Calvert was a riddle. Secrets were her way of life.”

Dear Reader,

Most families, even dysfunctional ones who carry the baggage of old conflicts, have within their annals a story of enduring love, a love that triumphed over every obstacle thrown in its way.

It might be a great-aunt’s story, or that of a grandparent, an uncle, a sister. Or maybe it’s the story of a veteran of war who finally got to marry his foreign-born sweetheart and bring her home.

True love dreams, even when that love seems impossible. Is it any wonder, then, that families still get caught up in the passion and excitement of a love affair that played out long ago, whether it ended happily or not? The grand passion was there, and therefore miraculous. Miracles pass many of us by, so when it happens it must be celebrated.

The story you are about to read, Hidden Legacy, is just such a tale. It begins with our present-day heroine trying to unravel a mystery; during this exploration she has to reinvent a beloved great-aunt and in the process learn that time has no place in affairs of the heart. True love has the power to outlast it.

Now welcome to Australia’s beautiful north Queensland….

Margaret Way

Hidden Legacy
Margaret Way

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Margaret Way takes great pleasure in her work and works hard at her pleasure. She enjoys tearing off to the beach with her family at weekends, loves haunting galleries and auctions and is completely given over to French champagne “for every possible joyous occasion.” She was born and educated in the river city of Brisbane, Australia, and now lives within sight and sound of beautiful Moreton Bay.

This is for Debbie Macomber,

a woman much to be admired.

Contents

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

EPILOGUE

CHAPTER ONE

SHAFTS OF LATE-AFTERNOON sunlight pierced the high arched windows of Alyssa Sutherland’s studio, turning the huge panes of glass into sheets of liquid copper. Inside the studio, it was as if someone had switched on dozens of electric lights. Caught in the golden illuminance was a large open area with white painted walls, dark, rough-hewn ceiling beams and dark-stained timber columns that supported the soaring ceiling. Visitors to the studio often expressed the opinion that it was more like a country antique shop than a workplace, for the room was filled almost to overflowing with all manner of beautiful and valuable objects, often used as props in Alyssa’s paintings. As a centerpiece stood an easel, with a half-finished canvas on it. The artist was at work, her blond head suffused by the sun’s radiance.

It took a few moments for the dazzling incandescence to pass by the windows, leaving the delicate, dusky mauve that heralded the brief twilight of the sub-tropics. Alyssa broke off with a sigh, placing her paintbrush in an earthenware pot of solvent, then wiping her fingers on her paint-spattered smock. She had lost all notion of time but a glance at the wall clock told her she’d been working all afternoon without a break, stopping now and then to stare at the painting—a still life of bread, wine and fruit in a Ming dynasty bowl—to see how things were progressing.

No magic there today. She doubted a good night’s sleep would help much, either—if she could even subdue her jangled feelings long enough to sink into oblivion. Despite the exquisite strains of Bach’s A Minor violin concerto blossoming out of one corner of the studio, her head was seething with angry words.

A serious relationship had been brought to a bruising end. Brett had packed up his possessions and left the house they’d settled into barely a year before. Only a year—that was how long their relationship had survived the initial pleasures of being together before taking the downward slope into the stresses and strains of two very different people trying to live in harmony.

Alyssa saw it as Brett’s relentless drive to back her into a corner. From the day he’d moved in, he had begun to assert an urge to dominate. That diminished her sense of guilt about the split-up. She believed in equality, but Brett had been more interested in exerting control. She’d finally had enough and found the courage to say so. What she’d often heard was painfully true—you had to live with someone to even begin to know that person…and maybe not even then.

Troubled in mind and spirit, Alyssa turned away to pour herself a cup of coffee. She knew she drank too much of it, but late at night when she was working, the caffeine kept her awake and her senses razor-sharp. Coffee in hand, she settled into a leather armchair, leaning her head against the plush upholstery, her mind returning to that final scene…

IT ALL BEGAN innocuously enough, as major upsets often do. One minute she and Brett were sitting on the deck finishing the steak and salad dinner she’d prepared for them, the next, something he said—something she found jarringly mean-spirited—triggered a powerful reaction in her. The straw that broke the camel’s back, as she now thought of it. In the preceding months she’d usually shut up at such provocative moments. Anything for peace although she realized now, with a pang of self-disgust, they hadn’t been her finest moments. But on that occasion she’d sprung up from her chair, distraught tears in her eyes.

Let it out, Alyssa! You can’t stand it anymore!

Her intense response had nothing to do with the topic at hand; it had everything to do with her growing feelings of repression. “I can’t be with you anymore, Brett! You…you damage my psyche.” That was the way she’d come to think of it. How had Brett Harris turned from the man who claimed to love and admire her unreservedly, into a partner determined on controlling her? And in such a short time? It was a side of him she’d never seen, let alone imagined.

That evening he, too, had jumped up, apparently as ready to engage in a major confrontation as she was. His action had toppled a beautiful long-stemmed crystal wineglass that predictably broke, breaking up a valuable set of six. Strangely enough, when she’d decided to use those particular glasses she had a presentiment one of them might break.

Brett cursed his clumsiness, sucked at a tiny cut on his hand, but ignored the dark-crimson wine stain that spread over the white cloth. “Damage your psyche?”

He had developed an irritating habit of repeating her words as though he found them incomprehensible. “What sort of mumbo jumbo is that?” He followed her into the house, a whipcord-lean young man just short of six feet, dark-haired, with hypnotic dark eyes and handsome if rather hawklike features. His hands, not as attractive as his face, clutched the back of the sofa. His dark eyes glittered with contained contempt. “You can’t mean that, Ally?”

“I do!” Her voice sounded stricken. “These last six months have been awful. It’s truly the end for us.”

His response was to take her forcibly her by the shoulders. Alyssa considered any sort of violence, especially violence toward women and children, totally reprehensible. She had often had occasion to express her views, working pro bono for a women’s refuge during her short career as a lawyer. He was well aware where she stood on domestic violence. “Every time you come back from visiting that bloody woman, you’re different,” he accused, his face tight. “Zizi egged you on to do this. Zizi’s always overstepping her role—ridiculous bloody name. Okay, you might’ve called her that when you were a little kid but it sounds stupid now. She’s never liked me, has she? I could kill her.” The expression on his face carried real threat.

“That’s appalling!” She shook him off angrily. “And you a man of the law!”

“I’m a man first,” he reminded her, anger flashing in his eyes.

“So, does that mean you have the right to lash out?” she shouted at him, although shouting wasn’t her style.

“Zizi is not at fault here,” she said, trying desperately to calm herself. “She had nothing to do with my decision, so keep her out of it. It’s about the two of us. It’s not working, Brett. You’re becoming intolerable to live with.”

He released a sharp whistling breath through his nose. “I’m becoming intolerable? You’re the who’s up until all hours of the night when I want you in bed with me. Goddamn that bloody woman!” he exclaimed, his handsome face ugly with hate. “She’s had far too much influence on you. She works on you until she takes over your mind.”

It was all so unfair! Zizi’s influence had always been good. Zizi was her confidante and dearest friend.

“Oh, spare me!” he groaned at her defense of her great-aunt. “The facts contradict your judgment. Your great-aunt’s never had the guts to live in the real world, floating around that old plantation house like some bloody witch. Hell, she’s more than a touch mad. Your grandmother, her own sister, has said as much.”

It was regrettably true. “Gran and Zizi are different kinds of people,” Alyssa said quietly, putting more space between them. “Zizi’s living the life she wants. Without her I wouldn’t be what I am today. She taught me not only how to paint and see beauty in so many different places, but about life in general. I don’t know what I’m going to do when she leaves me.”

“The old bitch will live until she’s ninety!” Brett scoffed.” You have me! Aren’t you supposed to love me? You have your parents, plenty of friends. You’re supposed to be such a fine painter—”

Alyssa rounded on him, saying the words she’d long held back. “You’re jealous of what I do, aren’t you?”

He didn’t even attempt to deny it. “I’m jealous of anything that takes you away from me. When you’re working you don’t even remember I exist. Couldn’t you have stayed a lawyer? You know how upset your parents were when you left the firm.”

“That was two years ago, Brett. Mom and Dad came to terms with it. I was always a dutiful daughter. I did what they wanted. I just never got any satisfaction out of practicing law. That’s your world, their world. It’s not mine. I’m an artist, but you don’t want me to be one. My painting’s only made you resentful. You’d be thrilled if I said I was going to stop painting altogether.”

“You bet!” He spoke with frightening grimness. “It was Zizi who managed to convince you that you had the gift!” He couldn’t resist the note of parody. “She even managed to pull a few strings to get you a showing. She chucked her own career—it didn’t give her satisfaction or fulfillment—yet she pushed you into it.”

“I’m making money, Brett.” She was regaining a little of her composure.

“You’re making money at last, you mean,” he reminded her sharply, totally overlooking the fact that he was living in her house. “Your parents bought you this place.” Obviously that devalued her standing in his eyes.

“So you got some acclaim. You have more going for you, that’s all. You’re young. You’re beautiful. You come from a distinguished legal family. Even dotty old Zizi was a name in her day. Elizabeth Jane Calvert! What happened to her? How come she burnt out overnight?”

Alyssa tried slow, deep breathing. “No one knows the answer to that one.” Not family, friends, agents, dealers. While still in her twenties, Zizi’s brilliant talent had earned her considerable renown. Those were her glory days, the ten-year period between 1960 and 1970. But Zizi had retired at the very early age of thirty to a reclusive life in an old sugar plantation house in tropical North Queensland. It had caused a sensation in the art world.

Alyssa’s eyes rested on the middle distance. Other famous artists had fled to the North to escape the rat race and gather the beauty of the tropical environment into their souls. North of Capricorn was glorious. She and Zizi had often cruised around the dazzlingly beautiful coral cays and emerald islands of the Great Barrier Reef in Zizi’s little sailing yacht, Cherub. It was Zizi who’d discovered that she had talent as a sailor. Indeed, by age sixteen she far outstripped her mentor much to Zizi’s amusement and pride. She loved the sea. She loved sailing. It was in her blood.

From time to time, other prominent artists who’d belonged to the colony had emerged from their rain forest sanctuaries to travel south to the big cities to show the civilized art world what masterpieces they had created. Zizi, however, had stayed there.

Infuriated by Alyssa’s inattention, Brett seized her by the arms. “Snap out of it, Ally! You can’t think I’m going to let you walk away from me! Not after what we’ve been to each other. I love you. I can’t possibly let you go. I hold your precious Zizi responsible for the change in you.”

She stared into his dark eyes, seeing a tiny red glow in their depths. “All Zizi wants is for me to be happy. I tried, Brett.”

“You shouldn’t have to try!” He shook her as if she were a child and a good shake would bring her to her senses.

“Take your hands off me.” Flinching, she broke away, rubbing her shoulder.

He came after her. “You’re everything I want, Alyssa. I’d kill anyone who tried to take you from me.”

Alyssa saw the violence in him, but she was driven by a risk-everything determination.

They stood a few feet apart, regarding each other like the warring couple they’d become. “You’re very needy, Brett. You want my undivided attention and if you don’t get it I have to tread my way through a minefield of scowling and sulking that goes on for days. It has to come to an end. I’m an artist. I’m going to remain an artist all my life.”

“Like Zizi?” His voice was full of contempt.

“I hope I’ll be like Zizi one day. I certainly haven’t reached her level of excellence yet.”

Brett threw up his hands in an impotent gesture of rage. “Who the hell even remembers the genius’s name these days?”

She sighed wearily. “Everyone in the art world knows of Elizabeth Jane Calvert. The private collectors who have her early paintings treasure them. They won’t part with them. That’s why they never come on the market…something did go seriously wrong in her life.”

“She hasn’t told you all about her nervous breakdown, has she?” he sneered. “Your grandmother said she had one. The trouble with you is you’re brainwashed!”

“And you’re a coward, attacking a woman in her absence.”

He stared back at her as though she’d drawn blood. “You go out of your way to provoke me. But I love you, Alyssa. I’ve loved you since I first laid eyes on you.”

She shook her head. “You fell in love with the way I looked, Brett. And with who I was, the daughter of two senior partners in the firm.”

“I fell in love with you. I fell in love with you before I even knew who you were. There’s something missing, though. You let me make love to you, but I can’t get close to you. Not your heart or your mind. One of these days you’ll discover that painting isn’t enough!”

“That’s not going to happen, Brett.” She spoke with finality.

His face contorted. “Well, I hate it! It’s separated us.” He lunged for her and she backed away swiftly, protecting herself from possible physical harm. “We can work this out,” he insisted. “If we break up, it’ll be a huge mistake. This is all that bloody woman’s fault.”

Distressed as she was, she was still desperate to show compassion. “I’m sorry, Brett. Truly sorry. But this is my life. I don’t love you.”

Brett sloughed off his civilized veneer as a snake sloughs off a skin. He surged toward her and struck her openhanded, but with such force she staggered back and fell to the floor, hitting her head against the foot of a teak cabinet.

For long moments he gazed down at her, rooted to the spot. Her long hair tumbled around her face in an ash-blond storm. In the fall, two buttons of her silk shirt had slipped their holes, so he could see the upward curves of her breasts.

Desire soared. He wondered what it would be like to take her right there, on the polished floor. He hunched down, wanting nothing more than to have her whether she wanted it or not. “Oh, God, Ally, I’m sorry. Forgive me.” Common decency briefly exerted itself.

He tried to get his arm around her, but his sexual excitement was showing in his flushed skin and his glittering eyes. Alyssa resisted wildly. One side of her face was scarlet, her skin bearing the imprint of his hand. Somewhere deep inside her ear a phone was ringing stridently, yet the outer shell was deaf. “Get out!” she cried, swallowing down her shock. She wasn’t going to grieve over their breakup anymore. This new Brett was a monster.

He just knelt there, staring at her. “You’re so beautiful!” Lust was coming off him in waves.

It presented a clear threat. “Get out!” Alyssa repeated, beyond fear. “You’re a brute and a coward. Violence is a sickness, an illness, a disease! You’re sick!”

The cold outrage in her voice, the condemnation in her eyes, slammed the brakes on hard. Brett started to remember who he was; more importantly, who she was. He thrust a trembling hand through his hair. “How did this happen?” he asked in a wondering voice.

Alyssa scrambled unaided to her feet, although she felt ill and more than a little dizzy. “I can tell you this. It will never happen again. Get out!”

He did.

Of course there were innumerable phone calls, messages she didn’t answer. Sheafs of her favorite flowers arrived, red roses galore. She refused to take delivery. It was over. Dreams had turned to ashes. She’d seen the real Brett, the dark side that had been hidden inside him. She could never ignore it now. She prayed he wouldn’t be foolish enough to stalk her, or show up at her door. She knew he was capable of it; she’d glimpsed that disturbing glow in the depths of his eyes. She wanted to keep their breakup private. If the full facts got out, it could mean the end of Brett’s promising legal career. She had no wish to harm him. She simply wanted out!

LOOKING BACK at her life over the weeks that followed, Alyssa felt deeply perturbed at how virulent Brett’s attitude to Zizi had become. He’d actually spent very little time in Zizi’s company, only two or three visits. She had so wanted them to like each other but as Brett had been at pains to tell her, he’d immediately perceived Zizi as a threat.

How could she have been so wrong about him? Her spirits sagged beneath the weight of her bad judgment. On her most recent visit to Zizi, she’d wisely gone on her own. They had a perfect, harmonious week together, sharing an empathy that went even deeper than the one she shared with her much-loved mother, Stephanie, and certainly her formidable grandmother, Mariel, Zizi’s older sister.

Then there was Zizi’s marvelous old plantation house, Flying Clouds. She’d adored it at first sight. As a child, it had seemed to her that there was no other house in the entire world like it. For one thing, it had a widow’s walk. She’d never heard of such a thing, let alone seen one. She’d found it thrilling beyond words to pace the narrow walkway looking out to the turquoise Coral Sea.

The house, a profoundly exotic jungle mansion, had a history. Of course it did. A Captain Richard Langford, an English adventurer-entrepreneur, had built it in the late 1800s. At that time Australia had been announcing to the Old Country that it really was the land of opportunity. Captain Langford had answered the call. It was his beautiful schooner, Medora, hired out for trade or charter that had brought him a fortune before he’d eventually turned his attention to starting a small shipping line that serviced the eastern seaboard. His ancestors today ran the giant Langford Container Lines, which transported anything and everything all over the world—automobiles, antiques, fine arts, boats, industrial machinery, whole households of personal effects, you name it. There was no stopping progress, and the Langfords had prospered.

Was it any wonder that in her make-believe games she’d often played the role of wife—and sometimes daughter—of that heroic sea captain? She’d stand high up on the observation platform, waiting for a glimpse of his ship returning home. Other times she was the grief-stricken widow, shedding real tears. For a change she’d be Peter Pan or Wendy and even the infamous Captain Hook. Treasure Island was a favorite and so were all sorts of swashbuckling pirate games—anything to do with the sea. Sometimes she was the beautiful damsel in distress, held for ransom, other times the dashing pirate. Zizi had always given her just the right old clothes to turn into a costume. Those were unforgettable days for the kind of child she was. Zizi understood her imaginative nature far better than anyone else. She was a dreamer, a great reader, often devouring books way beyond her years. It was Zizi who’d understood and nurtured her compulsion to draw and finally, paint.

Zizi!

She’d been totally happy at Flying Clouds, with the bond between them deepening steadily through the years. They both loved the house, although Zizi made it clear from the outset that it was haunted by the benign Captain Langford. At any rate, both of them found they were remarkably easy in his company. Captain Langford had actually died in his bed, but one of his descendants—another Richard and a renowned yachtsman—had drowned off the Reef when his yacht, Miranda, had capsized and sunk without trace during rough monsoon weather. That was in the late 1960s.

Some time after that, Zizi had made her final escape to the tropical North where, in her youth, she’d painted some of her most ravishing canvases. Back then she’d stayed on and off in the artists’ colony long since disbanded. With her intimate knowledge of the area, she’d had the great good fortune to acquire Flying Clouds cheaply, as most people, certainly the locals, believed it to be haunted.

The setting alone captured the imagination. The entrance fronted on to a private road lined by the white flowering evergreen species of frangipani that in the lush tropical climate had grown into very big trees. The rear faced the glorious Coral Sea, with a long, sea-weathered boardwalk that led to a zigzag flight of steps and on to the beach.

The house was of fine proportions and remarkably grand for the area. According to local folklore, Captain Langford’s mother was an American shipping heiress who’d lived in such a house when she was a girl. Whether that was true or not no one knew, but all agreed it was a good story.

The two-story—three if one counted the widow’s walk—was constructed of brilliant white stuccoed sandstone with deep verandas decorated and embellished with distinctive white cast-iron lace railings that appeared again on the upper walkway. The verandas shaded the house from the tropical sun while still allowing every available sea breeze to pass through. The shutters for the French doors, three to either side of the solid cedar front door, and the door itself were painted so dark a green that in certain lights they appeared a glossy black. The huge roof was a harmonious terra-cotta red.

At some stage before the turn of the twentieth century, Flying Clouds became a working sugar plantation using native labor brought in from the Melanesian and Polynesian islands. This scheme, at first a fairly innocent importation of cheap labor, quickly degenerated into the cruel practice known as “blackbirding,” when Pacific Islanders were more often kidnapped from their island homes than offered paying jobs. The Queensland government had finally outlawed the practice in the early 1900s.

These days the house was almost lost in a luminous green jungle that was forever breaking out in extravagant fruit and flower. It would be impossible to starve in the tropics. Tropical fruit in abundance, dropping most of the harvest on to the ground—pawpaws, papayas, mangoes, bananas, custard apples, passion fruit, melons, many new varieties she didn’t even know the name of. Every backyard had a macadamia tree, indigenous to Queensland and named after the Australian doctor John Macadam. This fine source of protein the aborigines had been enjoying for tens of thousands of years. Sated on fruit and nuts, one only needed to throw in a fishing line to avail oneself of some of the best seafood in the world.

The sparkling Coral Sea wasn’t visible from the ground floor, but there was a breathtaking view from the upper story’s balconies and more stupendous again, though a bit chancy in high wind, the widow’s walk. Zizi had always listened when Alyssa made up her endless stories about “The Captain.” It was a secret between the two of them. Her mother regarded Zizi as an endlessly fascinating eccentric, eccentricity being a perfectly acceptable part of the artistic temperament. Mariel, on the other hand, was of the firm opinion that her sister had lost all track of reality.

Neither woman visited Zizi much anymore. Mariel, as strong as a horse, always cited a growing number of psychosomatic ailments—high blood pressure, tachycardia, stress headaches and the like. She claimed she couldn’t abide the tropical heat, which was probably true, though she lived in subtropical Brisbane. Stephanie, though deeply fond of Zizi, was a topflight barrister who had little or no spare time to visit a place that required half a day just to get there.

An only child, Alyssa had grown up knowing her parents hoped she’d follow them into the law. She had bowed to their expectations, completing her law degree and working for three years as an associate in the firm. That was where she’d met Brett Harris, handsome, clever, ambitious. In those days he used to hang on her every word!

She hadn’t been unhappy at the firm. Most of the work allotted to her she found interesting and sometimes challenging, but her heart wasn’t in it. She actually preferred her voluntary work at the women’s refuge, where she’d made good friends and been truly effective. Zizi, realizing that she was floundering in her legal career, had come out of her shell to have an old friend of hers, the highly respected art critic Leonard Vaughn, take a look at the best of Alyssa’s work, which she’d painted while staying at the plantation.

The two of them worked wonderfully well together in Zizi’s large, airy, light-filled studio, which smelled of paint, turpentine, linseed oil, varnish, glue, fixatives and always the salty scent of the sea and a million tropical flowers. Alyssa continually strived to match Zizi’s brilliance. The irony was, within a few years she was receiving the critical acclaim, the hefty prices and certainly the media exposure that had eluded Zizi for most of her working life.

Her great quest was to persuade Zizi to give at least one showing. There were so many wonderful works of hers the public should see, if only she could persuade Zizi. So far, despite the fact that Zizi loved her dearly, she’d been unsuccessful. Zizi was adamant that her work would remain hidden from the world.

When I’m gone, my darling, maybe…

Alyssa couldn’t bear to think of the time her great-aunt would go out of her life. She comforted herself with the knowledge that Zizi was fit and healthy. Zizi might be seventy, but she easily could pass for a woman in her late fifties. And a beautiful one at that. Alyssa wanted her beloved great-aunt to live forever. There was simply no one who could replace her.

IT WAS A BRILLIANTLY fine Saturday morning three uneventful weeks later. Alyssa was extremely grateful for this hiatus, although she feared it was only the eye of the storm. Indeed, for days now she’d been tormented by a vague sense of unease she couldn’t shake off. Now she sat on her deck rereading Yann Martel’s Life of Pi when the phone rang. The kitchen extension was closest. She swung her legs off the recliner, put her book down on the glass-topped table, then went inside to answer it.

She expected it to be Zizi. She’d called her the previous evening and again earlier that morning, getting only Zizi’s charming, cultured voice saying, “I can’t come to the phone right now, but please leave a message after the beep.” She had done so. The older Zizi got, the more she intended to keep in touch with her, a daily call as opposed to twice a week. An old saying kept reverberating in her head. Live alone. Die alone. That couldn’t be allowed to happen to Zizi.

It was her mother, whose voice was so similar to Zizi’s Alyssa often mistook one for the other. Strange, how her mother, a beautiful woman, looked and sounded more like Zizi than she did her own mother, Mariel. Mariel had lacked Zizi’s beauty, although she was undeniably a force to be reckoned with.

MUCH LATER Alyssa would say she’d known at some level what her mother was going to tell her the instant she picked up the phone. Hadn’t she been experiencing those shivery little premonitions?

Her mother, the supremely calm, professional woman, sounded distraught. “It’s Zizi,” she said, with a sob. “There’s no good way to tell you this, darling, but she’s gone. We’ve lost her. A neighbor, an Adam Hunt, couldn’t raise her on the phone so he went to the house to check on her. He found her dead in the bathroom. Apparently she’d fallen while getting into the bath, cracked her head, and—” Stephanie choked on her tears.

Alyssa half fainted into a chair. “Mom, what are you saying? Zizi always took a shower! It couldn’t have happened that way. Zizi never used the bath. She’d slipped once and nearly broke her neck. She always took a shower after that.”

“Try to stay calm, darling,” her mother urged when she was anything but calm herself. “I’m so sorry. I know how much you loved her. We all did, but you two were especially close. Your father’s very upset. He took the phone call. So, of course, is poor Mother. She’s tremendously agitated. I had to call her doctor to the house but thank God he didn’t find much wrong with her. Your father can’t get away, so you and I will have to go up. This is an absolute tragedy. Zizi’s so young for her years. God, was so young. Why did I wait so long to see her?” Stephanie berated herself.

Alyssa tried to offer comfort. “Your heavy work schedule, Mom,” she said, fighting down her own grief until she got off the phone.

“Why did she choose to live so far away from us?” Stephanie lamented. “No one was happy about it. That bloody place, it’s beautiful but it’s so remote. I’ve always agonized that she might die alone.” Stephanie’s teary voice betrayed the extent of her grief. “I can’t believe Zizi’s left us.”

“Neither can I!” In the golden heat Alyssa found herself shivering convulsively.

THERE WAS AN AUTOPSY. Everyone accepted the coroner’s verdict. The blow to the head wasn’t the cause of death, although it was the major contributing factor. Zizi had drowned. She would’ve become dizzy, lost consciousness, then slipped beneath the water. It was all too tragic.

Once her body was released by the coroner, the funeral quickly followed. Zizi had expressed the wish to have her ashes scattered in the Coral Sea, but Mariel as next of kin wouldn’t have it. She overrode that wish, insisting on having Zizi’s casket flown to Brisbane where she could be buried in the family plot so “we can keep an eye on her.”

Such an odd way to put it!

It was a small, private family funeral, although Mariel had been too upset to come. No notice had been placed in the papers. Yet when Alyssa accompanied her parents back to the car after the short service, she saw Brett, dressed in a black suit with a white shirt and black tie, standing some distance off. The sight of him chilled her.

“Isn’t that Brett?” Stephanie asked. “I expect he feels dreadful.”

“How did he even know about Zizi?” Alyssa looked at her father. “Did you tell him, Dad?”

“My dear, Brett has left the firm,” Ian Sutherland answered.

“When was this? Why didn’t you say anything?” she asked incredulously.

“We felt you had enough to contend with. Brett handed in his resignation. I accepted it. I could see he was deeply distressed by the breakdown of the relationship. I don’t think there’s any question that he was—is—madly in love with you. I was sorry to lose him, but it’s better that way, the situation being what it is. He won’t have the slightest difficulty getting into Havelock Hayes. I told him I’d put in a word for him. Brett’s certainly clever, but I have to tell you now that the relationship is over, your mother and I feel relieved. We weren’t all that happy about you and Brett.”

Alyssa looked from one to the other, having difficulty taking it in. “You never said.”

Ian Sutherland smiled wryly. “You’re twenty-six years old, Alyssa. Your mother and I left it to your own good sense, didn’t we, darling?” He glanced down lovingly at his wife. “You deserve someone with a more open nature,” Ian Sutherland said, picking his words carefully. “More openhearted. I don’t know exactly what it is in Brett, but no doubt you do. There’s something…secretive about him.”

Alyssa tried to calm her thoughts. “Things bothered you both and you didn’t tell me?”

“Actually, darling, we were on the brink of expressing our concern.” Stephanie put an arm around her daughter and gave her a little hug. “But just as your father said, you handled it yourself. Trying to put up with someone who constantly needs attention is difficult. That’s going to be a problem for Brett. In a sense he’s his own worst enemy.”

Alyssa fell silent. She was too distressed to pursue the subject.

“Well, there you go!” her father exclaimed, as though that settled it. “Best acknowledge the poor chap. It was decent of him to come, although I always got the feeling he saw Zizi more as an opponent than a friend. Still, no reason not to be kind to him. Your mother and I will wait in the car.”

Alyssa felt no desire to acknowledge Brett. Had her parents known he’d struck her, things would be very different. Brett’s certainty that she wouldn’t tell them was evident in his coming here. He had plenty of self-confidence, the ingrained belief that he was always right, and she’d come to suspect he enjoyed danger. Why was he really here? It wasn’t to pay his respects to Zizi. It could have been sadistic curiosity. That was more in keeping with his character. Or perhaps he was trying to demonstrate to her what a civilized person he was.

She moved toward him but stopped halfway, forcing him to join her on the path. No way was she was leaving her parents’ sight.

“What are you doing here, Brett?” He appeared thinner than usual in his elegant Italian suit. There were dark shadows beneath his eyes as if he hadn’t slept. He wore an air of dejection, but that, of course, could be an act. She realized Brett had the ability to play many roles.

He seemed surprised by her question. “I came to pay my respects, of course,” he said in a subdued voice.

“How extraordinary, given your attitude toward Zizi.”

His smile was more of a grimace. “I wanted this chance to tell you I can never forgive myself for the things I said about her. I never meant a word of it, Ally. That was my jealousy talking. I’ve never loved a woman like I love you. I regret my behavior more deeply than I can ever say. I beg you to forgive me. I love you so much. I’ll never stop loving you.”

Alyssa nodded slowly. “I used to hear that all the time from men who beat up their wives and girlfriends,” she said. “I love you. I can’t live without you, followed by I’ll kill you and the kids if you don’t come back to me. Some of them did. You didn’t think you could get away with it, did you? With me?”

“I went crazy!” Brett said, abandoning that dull voice. “I’ve never struck a woman in my life before.”

“Somehow I have the feeling you have,” Alyssa answered, playing a sudden hunch. “I bet if I had the firm’s investigators make some inquiries, they’d come up with something. I’m reasonably sure I’m not the first female to suffer your aggression.”

Panic flashed across his face so quickly she would have missed it if she hadn’t been studying him intently. “You wouldn’t.”

“No, I wouldn’t.” She shook her head. “But you have a violent streak, Brett. You didn’t keep it hidden for long. My advice is to seek help. I mean that. What would you have done if the crack to my head had been more serious? Would you have called a doctor, an ambulance, my parents? Would you have relied on me to lie for you? I wouldn’t have.”

“Yet you haven’t betrayed me, have you?” A flicker of triumph came into his dark eyes as he stared at her.

Alyssa stared back in stupefaction. “I kept quiet for the sake of what I thought we had, Brett. Also, I’m giving you a chance to seek professional help. I have no wish to harm your legal career, but if I ever hear you’ve attacked some other woman, I’ll come forward to back her story. So watch out!”

He took a step toward her and despite herself Alyssa felt her blood freeze. “Ally, that will never happen.”

She was in control again. “Don’t touch me, Brett.” She wondered why she felt such alarm. He didn’t look threatening, but appeared to be buckling beneath the weight of remorse.

He drew back, smiling at her so tenderly it made her ill. “Sweetest love, will no amount of repentance wash away my sin?”

Another person, another role! “What are you playing at now, Brett?” she asked. “As far as I know, you have no links with any religion.”

He looked puzzled. “I believe in good and evil, Ally,” he said with absolute conviction. “I mightn’t believe in God, but I believe in the devil.”

“Maybe that’s because you’ve seen him!” She had no idea where that remark came from. “But you can’t have one without the other. If there’s a devil, there must be a God. Pick which team you want to be on.” She was on the verge of walking away from him. “I won’t thank you for coming today, bearing in mind your attitude to Zizi. It was just a pretext to see me.”

“I admit it.” Persuasion poured into his hypnotic eyes. “Perhaps you’ll see me some other time?” he asked, his voice full of a touching hope.

Alyssa didn’t reply.

“I give you my word I’ll seek help. I love you, Ally,” he repeated passionately. “I want to be with you. You were never in any danger that awful night.”

“On the contrary, you enjoyed punishing me.” She spoke with intuitive certainty. “And you wanted a whole lot more. You wanted forced sex.”

He drew a hand across his mouth as if wiping away a bad taste. “I just snapped, Ally. It was the way you seemed to be abandoning me for your aunt.”

She felt furious and humiliated. “That was all in your own mind, Brett. Don’t say any more. It isn’t working. We’ve buried Zizi today.”

“And my heart goes out to you, Ally.” He assumed an expression of deepest sympathy she knew perfectly well was feigned.

“That does nothing whatever to comfort me, Brett.”

She walked away.

She didn’t look back.

CHAPTER TWO

THE INTERIOR DOORS were never shut. Not unless there was a cyclone. Yet several of them were closed. Perhaps the police had shut them? Or Adam Hunt, the kindly neighbor. She intended to call on him. She and her mother had not made the long trip north following Mariel’s decision to have Zizi’s casket flown back to Brisbane. No family member had entered the house until now.

Flying Clouds was hers. She was her great-aunt’s sole beneficiary, excluding some things Zizi had willed to her niece and goddaughter, Stephanie. That included the beautiful portrait of Stephanie painted shortly before her marriage. It now hung in a place of honor above the white marble mantelpiece in her parents’ elegant living room. Alyssa had often wondered why Zizi, the most generous of women, hadn’t given it to her mother all those years ago. But for whatever reason, Zizi had decided not to part with it. What was puzzling was the fact that Mariel hadn’t even been mentioned in the will. Obviously Zizi had thought there was no need to make provision for her as Mariel was sitting on her late husband’s millions.

“It makes sense logically,” Stephanie said, herself puzzled about Mariel’s omission. “And yet, they were sisters….”

ALYSSA HAD BEEN too depressed to avail herself of a nap on the long flight. Nothing improved her mood. In the weeks after Zizi’s funeral, she’d found herself unable to sleep. Sometimes she imagined Zizi sitting on the side of her bed watching her or standing at the window watching her, as if she wanted to tell Alyssa something. The feeling was so incredibly strong that one night her heart had almost seized. Not in fright but in the actual belief that Zizi was showing herself.

“Zizi?” she’d cried out, unable to stop her tears, but silvery Zizi had faded from sight. Such was grief. The living often saw their beloved dead. Maybe the recently dead stayed around for a time, watching, neither side able to completely break off communication.

ALYSSA HAD RENTED a car that had been waiting for her at the airport. It was parked in the garage now. Tears flowing, she’d let herself into the house. The key had always been “hidden” among the spectacular psychedelic colored leaves of a potted caladium on the front veranda—silly place to hide it. They both used to laugh about it. That was probably the most likely place anyone intent on breaking in would think of, but Zizi had never had the slightest bother in all the years she’d lived there. Occasionally they’d driven into the town together, leaving the front and back doors unlocked.

For many years Zizi had kept dogs for company, usually two Labradors, so each would have a friend to play with. But since the death of old age of her beautiful golden Labrador, Molly, Zizi confessed she hadn’t the heart to buy herself another pet. Of course there was Cleo, Zizi’s sleek Abyssinian, who not surprisingly greeted Alyssa ecstatically and now accompanied her on her tour through the house, every so often snaking around Alyssa’s legs.

She had to find some way of properly thanking Adam Hunt. Her father had spoken to him several times on the phone and formed an excellent impression. What a shock Adam must have received coming on Zizi as he had. She’d imagined the neighbor as someone Zizi’s age, but her father said he sounded much younger. Whatever his age, her father had taken to him and apparently so had Zizi. The really strange—and, she had to admit, hurtful part—was that Zizi had never mentioned him to her. That was decidedly odd, given that she and Zizi talked about anyone new in their lives. She tried to brush the hurt aside. Zizi would’ve had a reason. Perhaps he was too recent to the area? A fellow artist? No, Zizi would’ve said something. A would-be property developer was more like it. It was boom-time North of Capricorn. Yet this stranger or near stranger had attained such a degree of intimacy with Zizi that she felt comfortable with his looking in on her.

Zizi, the self-styled recluse, must have liked him a lot. Alyssa couldn’t see Zizi trusting just anyone. Maybe Hunt was an art scholar planning a book that included a section on Elizabeth Jane Calvert. But wouldn’t Zizi have said? She definitely had to meet this mystery man. What exactly had drawn him to seek Zizi out? Pure coincidence? Perhaps they’d met while doing some shopping at the village. Alyssa told herself to put aside all the questions buzzing around in her head until she felt more able to cope.

How different everything was without Zizi! She supposed the raw grief would lessen with time, but right now the sorrow was practically unbearable. She inspected the labyrinth of rooms downstairs. It was a huge house, but she knew it so well she could’ve found her way blindfolded. Afterward, she mounted the cantilevered staircase that led to the upstairs bedrooms and sitting rooms. She glanced into Zizi’s bedroom—ivory and pale-green with a lovely canopied bed and an antique writing desk covered in informal family photographs in silver frames. The portrait Zizi had painted of her shortly before her twenty-first birthday hung over the mantel.

Who’d made the bed? It was Zizi’s practice to turn down the covers before taking her bath. So many questions to be answered, Alyssa thought, her shoulders hunched in a sob. She avoided the adjoining bathroom. Just thinking about how Zizi had met her end was like an icy cold hand squeezing her heart. She knew she’d have to get around to it sometime. Not now.

In her own bedroom, the one she’d chosen all those years ago, redecorated as she passed from childhood to adolescence to adulthood, she unlocked the French doors and let herself onto the veranda. Her spirits lifted as she was enfolded by the breeze with its delicious tang of salt.

Another glorious day in the tropics. The sky was a cloudless electric blue, the sea like turquoise satin. She stood there, holding Cleo to her like a talisman. The cat had been fretting. It was obviously very glad of her company, although Abyssinians were usually standoffish. The grounds—the roughly thirty acres that was left—didn’t look at all abandoned. Zizi must’ve had someone in to do some slashing, although there was still a tidal wave of jungle in rampant blossom—oleander, hibiscus, frangipani, gardenia, allamanda, strelitzias, golden rain trees, angel’s trumpets—beyond the mown areas surrounding the house. There were always snakes in the undergrowth but neither she nor Zizi had ever been bitten. Unless one actually trod on a snake, they took good care to keep out of the way, except for the one Zizi had nicknamed Cairo, who liked to slide along the front railings. Cairo, mercifully, was harmless and even frightened of Cleo, who used to speed him on his way with many a hiss and a spit.

“We miss her, don’t we, Cleo?” Alyssa murmured, stroking the cat’s amber coat. Cleo meowed loudly in acknowledgment. Everyone knew cats had special powers, and in Alyssa’s opinion. Cleo was more gifted than most.

She had stopped in the village, where she was well-known, to buy herself a few basic provisions—milk, fresh bread, butter, eggs, a few slices of succulent ham—intending to return the following day to place a larger order. People had come up to her, expressing their sympathies before taking themselves off. It would’ve been evident to them that she was very upset. Eccentric Zizi might have been, but these people had loved her and guarded her privacy. It seemed that they were about to pass their loyalty on to her.

Alyssa sat down in one of the old chairs on the deck, cuddling Cleo, while she rocked gently back and forth. As always, the warm perfumed air of the tropics had a lulling effect, so in spite of her unhappiness, she drifted off….

SOME TIME LATER—she didn’t know exactly how long—she was jolted awake by the sound of a heavy vehicle driving onto the property. She sat up in confusion, startling Cleo, who registered her disapproval by digging in her claws.

“Ouch, Cleo, that hurt!” She tipped the cat on to the timber deck, then made her way back into the house, briefly checking her appearance in the mirror. She looked composed enough. She quickly ran down the staircase, to the entrance hall. There wasn’t a soul for miles around. Very few people ever ventured along the private road unless invited. For one dismal moment, the luxuriant jungle that enfolded the house now seemed like prison walls. Her father hadn’t wanted her to come until someone could go with her. Who knew when that would be, considering her parents’ heavy workload and her grandmother’s “illness.”

Alyssa’s first thought was that her visitor might be the local police chief, Jack McLean, checking on her. She knew him and his assistant, Constable Bill Pickett, well. Or it could be a neighbor? Maybe even the neighbor? She moved out onto the front veranda, seeing an unfamiliar dark-gray Range Rover pull beneath the canopy of trees, the ground beneath them carpeted with wind-stripped scarlet blossom.

Moments later a man climbed out, turned and looked toward the house.

He was tall, certainly over six feet. Even from a distance she recognized something dynamic about him. He was simply dressed, in a navy T-shirt and jeans, but his superb physique made the casual outfit look classy. Burnished by the blazing sunlight, his sweep of hair gleamed a rich mahogany. Thick and wavy, it was worn fairly long. None of the fashionable short spiky cuts for him. He walked like an athlete, loping along on the balls of his feet. Hero material dropped from the heavens, she thought cynically. After her experience with Brett she was feeling pretty wary of men.

This had to be Adam Hunt, Zizi’s mystery friend. A mystery to be solved, she reminded herself. It was important to her to get to the truth of people. She had taken way too long to get to the truth of Brett, in the process shaking her view of herself and her own judgment. She felt no fear of her visitor, yet her hand on the balustrade was trembling. She couldn’t have said why that was, but she made an urgent effort to steady it.

Her visitor covered the distance between them in no time. He was standing on the graveled drive a few feet away, looking up at her with a curious air of intensity. His eyes were startling in his tanned face, a true aquamarine like the shoals of the Reef waters. They compelled her into an extraordinary awareness of him. A sudden vertigo took hold, and she felt dizzy enough to pitch over the balustrade and into the gardenia bushes. That should get her even more attention.

He smiled faintly. “Miss Sutherland.” It wasn’t a question. He already knew the answer.

She realized belatedly that they were united in the intensity of their appraisal, matching glance for glance. He had a good voice. Voices were important to her. “Adam Hunt,” he said. “I’ve spoken to your father several times. I hope I’m not disturbing you.”

She couldn’t manage a proper smile. Not yet. Besides, there were too many loose ends she had to sort out. “Adam Hunt, of course. Please come up.” She knew she sounded very formal, but she wasn’t about to jump into the deep end of instant familiarity—despite that odd moment of…recognition?

“Thank you. I won’t stay long.” He turned his head back toward his vehicle. “I have some provisions for you in the car. I really should get them out first. Some of them will need to go in the fridge.”

“How did you know I’d be here? I didn’t tell a soul.”

“You told your parents.”

“Surely Dad didn’t call you?” she asked in dismay.

He nodded, an amused glint in his eyes. “Fathers generally like to keep an eye on their daughters. It’s very lonely here, very isolated.” He gestured about him as if he wouldn’t recommend the remote plantation to any woman on her own.

“He asked you to keep an eye on me for him?” she asked, her tone incredulous.

Now she was treated to his full smile. It was a smile of enormous attractiveness, sexy yet wonderfully open. He would find it very useful when dealing with women. “Trust me, he loves you.”

“I know that, Mr. Hunt.” She had a desire to put him in his place.

“Adam, please.”

She inclined her head. “I’m well able to look after myself, Adam,” she assured him, sounding more confident than she felt. “Nevertheless, we’re in your debt. I know my father’s thanked you but I want to add my own thanks for being on hand when you were. It must’ve been an extremely upsetting experience.”

He made no attempt to deny it. “I couldn’t believe it. I don’t need to tell you Elizabeth was always so bright and alert, remarkably youthful for her age. I’m surprised it happened the way it did, and so very sorry. We were just getting to know one each other.”

“May I ask why you wanted to get to know her?” It came out more bluntly than she’d intended.

“Certainly. She didn’t tell you?” He kept his eyes trained on her, more than a touch of skepticism in his expression.

“What do you mean?”

“I thought Elizabeth would’ve told you. I understand you were very close.”

“As close as we could be,” she answered without hesitation. “But for some reason she neglected to mention you. You were saying?”

A sardonic pause. “A close relative of mine wanted me to look her up. He knew her back in the old days.”

“And your relative has a name? Perhaps I’ve heard it. Zizi and I had no secrets from each other.” Actually they did. Him!

“Julian Wainwright,” he said.

“Julian Wainwright! Of course! Several of his paintings are in the house. They belonged to the same artists’ colony in the early sixties. His paintings are splendid, especially the seascapes.”

He nodded his agreement. “Julian had to abandon his artistic career for business. He always said he regretted it. You probably know he continued to carry a torch for Elizabeth all his life.”

Was this a joke, or was a huge chasm opening beneath her feet? “I’m sorry, I didn’t know any such thing.” Even to her own ears, her voice sounded defensive.

“You didn’t know that at one stage they intended to marry?” He maintained the look of skepticism.

For a moment she felt the reality of her life might be stripped away. “Forgive me, but I have only your word for it. Is Julian Wainwright still alive?”

“Barely.” He shrugged, regret on his handsome face. “His doctors have given him no more than six or seven months.”

“I’m sorry.” Love for her great-aunt and a feeling of apprehension were inextricably entwined. If this was true, how much more had Zizi kept from her, from them all?

“Julian is four years older than Elizabeth,” he was saying. “He’s been in ill health for the last ten years. He was devastated to hear of her death.”

“You told him?”

“Of course.” His tone was clipped. He looked back at the Range Rover. “I should be getting the cold things into the fridge.”

“Can I help? I’m stronger than I look!” This time she managed a shaky smile.

His glance, brilliant as the gemstone, touched her lightly. She was still wearing the outfit she’d traveled in—a white tank top over navy straight-legged pants. “You look fine.”

“A girl does her best!” She spoke flippantly, to combat the heat that washed over her. It irked her to feel more like a flustered teenager than an experienced woman. “Would you like a cup of coffee?” She leaned over the wrought-iron balustrade to call to him. A cluster of white trumpet flowers from the vine-wreathed pillar tickled her cheek, its perfume entrancing.

“I won’t say no,” he said over his shoulder. “Elizabeth always made me a cup.”

Did she indeed? She had to wrestle with that picture. Adam Hunt and Zizi sharing friendly cups of coffee?

Zizi, whatever were you up to?

For the first time in her life, Alyssa began to realize that her great-aunt must’ve had a life about which she knew little or nothing. She was starting to feel desperately hurt at being kept in the dark.

CHAPTER THREE

A BIG MAN, he filled the kitchen. He left Alyssa, who was above average height, feeling small. And it wasn’t only his height and breadth of shoulder that made him so powerful, but a kind of blazing energy. The two of them worked in fraught silence while they packed the provisions away. She took care of the things that went into the refrigerator. He’d brought her more fresh bread, butter and milk, and in addition a carton of cream, vanilla ice cream and some small tubs of fruit yogurt. From the excellent village delicatessen he’d thrown in some King Island Camembert, a chunk of Havarti, New Guinea coffee beans and a half-dozen little pastries. It was more than enough to keep her going.

She’d noticed him putting away a small bag of locally grown baby potatoes and some red and white onions, about the only things Zizi hadn’t grown herself. Alyssa hadn’t checked on the vegetable garden yet, but she had a feeling he would’ve given it some water as well as fed Cleo. He looked that sort of man.

“You seem to know your way around.” She couldn’t help the dryness creeping into her tone.

“Elizabeth showed me all over the house the first time I came here,” he explained as he emerged from the large pantry. “It’s a marvelous old place, incredible atmosphere. The widow’s walk is quite unique in this part of the world. I’d heard about it, of course.”

“From Julian?” She was having difficulty coming to terms with Zizi’s late-blossoming friendship with him, let alone a supposed romantic involvement with Julian Wainwright. “What is your relationship, by the way?”

“Ah, a woman who wants answers!” he jibed gently.

“Julian’s my great-uncle. Think back. Surely she mentioned their close friendship at some point? Perhaps you’ve forgotten?” There was an unmistakable note of challenge in his voice.

Alyssa stood staring at him. “I assure you I wouldn’t have forgotten.”

“So, what did she say about him?”

Alyssa felt ill at ease beneath that probing gaze. “She did speak of him, but only as a friend—a colleague—of her youth. There was never any hint of romance. Zizi never spoke of any romantic attachment to anyone. Don’t you find that extremely odd if what you say is true?”

His expression was reflective. “I do find it odd, but it would seem Elizabeth was a woman for secrets. She was beautiful at seventy. Imagine what she was like in her twenties. Very much like you, I’d imagine, except for the eyes.”

She bit her lip, feeling bewildered and upset. “That’s true. Zizi’s eyes were a definite green. No one else in the family has eyes like mine—with gold flecks. My mother’s more like Zizi than I am, but I see what you mean. Zizi was bound to have many admirers. So how far did this involvement with Julian go? Were they thinking of getting engaged?” She felt a flare of antipathy and it showed.

“Didn’t happen. Elizabeth lost her heart to someone else.”

“Another suitor?” she asked with a brittle laugh.

“Your great-uncle gave you all this information?”

“He can give it to you if you like.” He registered her every passing expression. He’d seen her portraits in the house and enough photographs of her in Elizabeth’s scrapbooks to know in advance that she was beautiful. None of them did her justice. One had to see her in the flesh to fully appreciate the exquisite complexion, the delicately sculpted bones of her face, that cascading hair, the lovely mouth and those distinctive eyes. The body matched the face, willowy and graceful. She was the kind of woman a certain type of man hungered for. The kind of woman that man could only dream about.

“That is, if you want to risk hearing what he has to say,” he added, dragging out a kitchen chair for her. “Why don’t you sit down? You’ve lost color.”

She obeyed him, waiting until the darkness at the edge of her vision receded. “Why have we never heard of Julian Wainwright in all these years?” Impatiently she pushed a long coil of hair over her shoulder.

He watched her do it, fascinated by the femininity of the movement. She was a natural ash-blonde, as her great-aunt had been. But whereas Elizabeth had worn her hair shorn like a small boy’s, she wore hers center-parted and falling in loose waves over her shoulders and down her back. He studied her; she was either a superb actress or what he was saying was a shock.

“Let me get you something to eat first,” he suggested briskly. “Then we can talk. What about a sandwich with the coffee?”

She waved a distracted hand. There was a firmness and strength about him, a masculinity that would turn any woman’s head. Wasn’t it a good thing hers was now firmly screwed on? “Would you mind answering the question?”

“Sure.” His handsome mouth compressed. “Let me grind the coffee beans first.”

“Please, don’t worry about the coffee.” She wanted to move forward with this.

“It’s no problem.”

She gave up. So many chaotic emotions were running through her. Shock, pain, confusion and a sense of wonder that he was moving so authoritatively around her kitchen. Had he done this with Zizi? She had to admit he was very deft in all his movements. In no time at all, the percolator was on the hot plate and turkey-breast sandwiches, neatly cut into four triangles, were in front of her. “Surely you’re going to join me?” She was starting to feel quite…unreal.

“Delighted to,” he said, taking a chair opposite her.

“Elizabeth and Julian corresponded for years. You didn’t know?”

“Why do you continually doubt me?” He watched the sparks in her eyes flare brightly.

“Because it’s hard to believe Elizabeth kept all this from you.”

“It is,” she acknowledged, her tone bleak.

“He used to visit her often after Langford was lost at sea.”

She was forced to take two big steadying breaths before answering. “Are you about to tell me she was friends with Richard Langford, the yachtsman?”

There was a quick flash of impatience in his eyes. “You have to know about Langford.”

She struggled to control her temper. There was flat disbelief in his voice. “Look, just take my word for it, will you? All I know is what Zizi told me. She bought this house when it came on the market. This was after Richard Langford was lost at sea. As I understand it, he took his yacht out in very dangerous conditions. The locals thought the house was haunted, so Zizi got a bargain. It is haunted, by the way.”

“I wouldn’t be a bit surprised,” he said without any trace of humor.

“I only have your word for all of this,” she reminded him. “Zizi and I were as close as we could be. I spent all my vacations with her since I was seven. We talked about everything and everyone.”

“Except Richard Langford and Julian Wainwright,” he retorted bluntly. “Both of whom were her lovers.”

She had to put a hand to her heart, it gave such a lunge. “Well, well, well! Why didn’t I see that coming?”

His features tightened. “You’re not going to say you didn’t know that, either?”

“It’s not possible.” This man was a stranger. Zizi was her much-loved great-aunt. Why should she believe one word he said? For all she knew, he could have a hidden agenda.

“But very easy to prove.” He spoke more gently this time. “Elizabeth and Julian were seriously involved. Then Langford came into her life.”

She sat there, speechless, almost in a trance.

“Alyssa?” he prompted.

She made a huge effort to respond. “This is a far cry from the encounter I expected to have with you.” She began to rub her temples, which ached.

“I know and I’m sorry. The fact is, Langford deeded this house to Elizabeth a year before he died. He also presented her with her little sailing yacht, the Cherub.”

All at once Alyssa felt a great surge of anger. She leaped up, unwilling to accept a word of it. “For pity’s sake, stop! Zizi bought this house. She bought the yacht. Either you’ve got your facts wrong, or you’re making it all up. Zizi would never have lied to me. She was a woman of integrity!”

He seemed unimpressed, although his tone was calm. “Please sit down again. I’m sorry to upset you. You may have been led to believe otherwise, but Richard Langford deeded the house to Elizabeth. The yacht, too, was a gift.”

The air thrummed with electricity. “That can easily be checked out.” She spoke sharply, but resumed her chair. “Why didn’t you tell my father any of this?”

“It wasn’t the time to talk to him about Elizabeth’s affairs. It was you Elizabeth was most focused on. She told me she was leaving you the house.”

“Do you have anything else to tell me?” she asked coldly, struggling with unfamiliar pangs of jealousy that Zizi could have been so drawn to him, confiding even that piece of information.

He seemed to realize it. “She spoke about you at length. How gifted you are, how much she loved you. How you both loved Flying Clouds. She was more than happy to speak freely about you, but it was extremely difficult to get her to talk about herself.”

“Why should she?” she asked angrily. Her heart was hammering away.

“Because of Julian,” he said, rising abruptly.

“Julian deserves some consideration. Julian is the issue for me. Here, let me pour the coffee.” The rich fragrance pervaded the kitchen. “There’s no question that was a very painful area of her life. She was loath to talk about it, although I think she accepted that she’d soon have to.”

An awful suspicion came into her mind. “You’re not a writer, are you? I shudder at the thought of some unauthorized biography of Elizabeth Jane Calvert, full of shocking disclosures.”

He didn’t answer until he’d placed her coffee before her. “It could happen,” he said with a shrug. “It’s quite a story, but it won’t be written by me. I’m an architect.”

Something clicked. “Hunt Hebron?” She referred to a Sydney-based firm, multi-award winners for many years.

He nodded, setting his own coffee down on the table. “My father, Philip Hunt, heads the firm since Uncle Julian retired.”

“I daresay you’ve won a few awards of your own.” She allowed her eyes to rest on him, struggling to keep the slow burn of hostility and a perverse awareness out of her voice, although it must have been obvious. Brett had always told her she was hopeless at hiding her feelings.

“A few,” he answered, “with better to come, I hope. I’ve checked out your work, although I’ve never managed to get to Brisbane to a showing. It seems to me that you’re on your way to matching and—who knows?—one day surpassing Elizabeth.”

“I doubt it. Zizi was wonderful.”

“And you aren’t?” A smile curved his lips.

He’d shared that smile with Zizi. No wonder she’d softened toward him. Alyssa had no difficulty picturing the two of them sitting here in the kitchen as they were doing now, sharing a cup of coffee. She could see Zizi letting him make it.

Alyssa shook her head, trying not only to conceal her reaction to this man, but also to push it away. “Not yet,” she answered. She picked up another sandwich, scarcely aware of what she was doing. “Does your father know any of this? If it’s true.”

“Everyone in the family knows that Julian was madly in love with Elizabeth Jane Calvert when they were young. We also know it was serious between them. Everyone expected a wedding, but in the end nothing came of it. Julian never married.”

“Neither did Zizi. So what? Perhaps they were genuine loners. There are people like that. Zizi was reclusive. She was eccentric—I can’t deny that—but she was the most lovable woman in the world.”

“And one of the most secretive, it seems,” he said with quiet irony.

Alyssa shook her head once more. “Provided what you’re telling me is true,” she repeated. “We’ve only got your great-uncle’s word for it. Artists are highly imaginative people. Perhaps he dreamed up this epic love affair? Perhaps the love was all on his side? He wouldn’t be the first or the last to get it all wrong.”

“You wouldn’t say that if you knew him.” He swallowed a mouthful of coffee. “Besides, there’s more.”

Her laugh was slightly hysterical. “Of course there’s more! Next you’ll be telling me there was a child, in the true tradition of soap opera.”

“Which nevertheless manages to echo real life.” His voice was so grave it gave her a jolt of foreboding. “Why don’t you finish those sandwiches,” he urged.

Her skin flushed. “I must really look like I need reviving.”

“You do. More coffee?”

“Yes, please.”

He refilled her cup, topped up his own, then sat down again. “There’s no easy way to go about any of this, Alyssa. Not for you, not for me, certainly not for Elizabeth. Not for Uncle Julian. Or for that matter, the Langfords.”

Her tenuous control snapped. She set down her coffee cup so forcefully, it clattered against the saucer. “What on earth have they got to do with it?” she asked. “They’re ancient history. I assume you’re talking about the Langfords, as in LCL?”

He nodded, a glitter in his eyes. “Richard Langford had a great many shares in the family company, as you might imagine.”

“So? They would’ve passed to his heirs. Why have you really come here, Adam? To stir up trouble?”

“I told you.” Muscles bunched along his firm jawline.

“I came as my great-uncle’s emissary. He desperately wants to know before he dies if Elizabeth’s child was his or Langford’s.”

Shock flooded her. She opened her mouth to protest, but no sound emerged. For an instant she feared she might faint. Her brain seemed totally dislocated from her heart. Elizabeth’s child?

“Alyssa!” He was on his feet, shoving back his chair.

“Here, put your head down.” He placed his hand on her nape, his touch gentle but nonetheless compelling.

For a full minute she obeyed, then when she felt better, she shook off his hand. She was angry and afraid of his effect on her. She’d felt that touch of his hand not only on her neck, but in her breasts, the pit of her stomach, between her legs. If she put all those sensations together, what did she get? She fought to compose herself. “I’m fine.”

“Just sit quietly for a moment,” he advised, himself so affected by a moment so intimate he wished now he hadn’t touched her. Was it possible she truly didn’t know about Elizabeth’s baby?

I’ve got to stop this, Adam thought. Start again another time.

“This is a shocking conversation, isn’t it?” she lamented. “Zizi never had a child. I’m sorry to have to say it, but Julian Wainwright must be crazy. There’s a name for it, isn’t there? Erotomania, something like that. The poor man must be fantasizing, especially if he’s pumped full of drugs.”

He looked at her with compassion. “If Elizabeth told you so little—after all you were a child when she was already a middle-aged woman—surely someone else in your family knows. Her sister, Mariel, perhaps?”

“No way! Zizi never married. She never had a child. Do you seriously believe we wouldn’t know if she had?”

He sat back, staring at her. Her emotional upheaval appeared real. “It’s happened before,” he mused. “All families have secrets, even from one another. The thing is, secrets don’t always remain buried. My aim isn’t to shock or upset you, Alyssa. I see I have, but you must trust me on this. Elizabeth did have a child. What Julian’s desperate to know is who was the biological father. Julian’s a very rich man. He’s made his will, but it’s obvious to us all that he doesn’t feel he’s put his affairs in order. Over the years he begged Elizabeth for the truth. She always said the child died within twenty-four hours of its birth. We now know that’s not what happened.”

“We?” she cried. “Who’s we, your dying uncle and you? It’s all hearsay in your case. And it’s not true! None of it is true! I hate when people make up lies. I hate you. Zizi must have hated you.”

He gave a half smile. “I think Elizabeth braced herself the moment she laid eyes on me. I’m told I look very much like Julian as a young man. Elizabeth, for reasons of her own, appears to have led a life of deception. In doing so she turned her back on fame and fortune, a full life, a successful career. All the things most people would give anything to have. I think some part of her was greatly relieved it was all coming to an end.”

Every nerve in her body was jittering. “Was she going to rejoice that all the skeletons would come tumbling out of the closet?” She didn’t hide her outrage at the insult to Zizi’s memory.

“Can’t you see it as a release? Elizabeth didn’t bar me from the house. The truth is, she was comfortable with me. Unfortunately I’d barely begun my voyage of discovery before she had her fatal fall.”

“Are you sure you weren’t there at the time?” It simply stormed out of her before she could claw back control.

“I’ll forget you said that.” His expression went taut.

“I’m sorry.” She rested her aching head on her hand.

“I hardly know what I’m saying. But why should I sit here and listen to you destroying all my illusions about the Zizi I loved?”

“The closer the link, the more intense the pain,” he said. “Elizabeth Calvert was a riddle. Secrets were her way of life.”

“Secrets and secret lovers!” Alyssa laughed bitterly.

“I’m sorry, but it’s all too far-fetched for me. Sadly Zizi’s not here to defend herself. Julian Wainwright might well be delusional. It’s not uncommon. Even so, lovers are one thing, but saying Zizi was an unmarried mother not even sure of the identity of her child’s father is quite another. Zizi may have been different, but she was much loved by her family. They would’ve looked after her. They would have protected her. She had her sister, as you seem to know—my grandmother, Mariel. Do you really believe Mariel would have let Zizi go through a pregnancy by herself?”

“Very possibly Mariel didn’t know about it,” he suggested. “Based on the little I saw of Elizabeth, I’d say she would try to see it through by herself. Again, not uncommon.”

Alyssa found herself grinding her teeth. If all of this was true, nothing could restore her faith in Zizi. “There’s never been one word about any unwanted pregnancy.”

“Who said it was unwanted?” he asked.

Anger spurted again. Had Zizi really had such a tempestuous past? What was I really? she thought wretchedly, as doubts started to pour through her breached defenses. The perennial seven-year-old who implicitly accepted whatever Zizi told her? Of course she was.

“Elizabeth was only starting to open up,” Adam Hunt was saying. “She’d committed her youth to the deepest vault. I suspect that whatever happened to her so traumatized her, she withdrew from the world. The further tragedy was her accidental death.”

Alyssa lifted her hands helplessly. “Something I just don’t understand. Zizi didn’t use that bath, not since she had a near-accident some time back.”

He shook his head. “I wouldn’t know anything about that. There was no hint of anything untoward. It was a tragic accident. One that’s quite common in that age group.”

It was difficult to deny. “That must have been awful for you.” Her beautiful eyes welled with tears she blinked away.

“Devastating,” he said, still seared by the memory.

“When I first entered the bathroom, for some reason, suicide came to mind.”

Alyssa drew back obviously, astounded. “Suicide? I can’t consider that for a moment. Zizi wasn’t the type.”

“Is there a type?” he asked. “Might she have thought of it as a way out?”

“Out of what, damn it!” Alyssa exploded. “I think I’d like you to leave.”

“I don’t blame you.” There was a grim understanding in his voice. “In my own defense, please remember that I’m carrying around my own burden of shock and bitterness. Julian held fast to his secrets, too. Only his impending death has fully opened up the past.”

She had to concentrate. “You believe this story about a child?” she ventured.

“You’d better believe it, too,” he said, his voice oddly harsh. “Julian called in a private investigator. You would know that the Freedom of Information Act changed things overnight. Julian could never quite accept Elizabeth’s story. He now knows the child lived.”

Alyssa shut her eyes, appalled. “And no doubt his whereabouts. Are you going to share this big secret with me?”

“Certainly, but not today.” He stood up, pushing in his chair. “I can see the anguish on your face. We’ll talk again later.”

“I don’t think so,” she said coldly, rising to join him.

“I do!” He spoke as though it was a foregone conclusion. “I can’t leave here without the truth. I explained that to Elizabeth. Now I’m telling you. I look on it as a duty to my great-uncle, a good man, a dying man.”

“And you’re expecting to get this supposed truth out of me?” She laughed as if he’d made a bizarre joke. “I don’t know anything.”

“There must be letters, papers, documents,” he suggested. “Some sort of written confirmation. It would be a first step.”

“It’s a wonder you haven’t gone in search of them,” she snapped. “You would’ve had the run of the house before I arrived.”

Anger was apparent beneath the calm. “I doubt anyone but you could get away with talking to me like that. I’d been hoping we could work this out together, Alyssa. Time is running out for Julian.”

She released a breath. “If you know the identity of Zizi’s child, why don’t you just go and speak to him?”

“Her,” he corrected.

She looked at him sharply.

“Elizabeth had a daughter, not a son. DNA testing would confirm the identity of the biological father if certain people were prepared to cooperate. No one can be forced. As I said, the whole story was news to me until very recently. Julian had always clung to the idea that the child was his, not Langford’s. There was apparently some incident that made him think so.”

“Good God!” She was swamped by feelings of utter unreality. “I don’t know what to make of all this. I’d hate to have to live with the thought that Zizi kept such secrets from us. I’m certain my mother knows nothing. She’d be horrified. So would my grandmother.”

“Are you sure?”

“Of course I’m sure!” She made an effort to calm down. “My mother wouldn’t keep something like that to herself. As far as we all knew, Zizi had no all-important man in her life.” Even as she said it, she realized it sounded absolutely ludicrous. Zizi would have been a beautiful vibrant young woman. She was bound to have had some sort of sex life, even if things went drastically wrong.

“That’s unbelievable and you know it,” he said. “Elizabeth may have elected to live alone after Langford was lost at sea, but Julian told me she was brimming over with life when she was young. She was the honeypot for the bees. Men fell for her in droves, and why not? She was very beautiful and very gifted.”

“And she lied to us all?” Bombarded with information, she couldn’t figure it out. “Why? Zizi wouldn’t have been abandoned by her family. They loved her. Come to that, I have no proof that you’re who you say you are. I don’t know whether to see you as friend or foe. You could be a journalist poking your nose into an old story. You could be part of some art conspiracy. Maybe you know that I’ve wanted to arrange a showing of Zizi’s paintings. I’m positive it would be an enormous success even without publicity stunts. People play so many devious games.”

“No games,” he said, shaking his head. “You’re welcome to check me out. My license is in the car.”

“I’ll come out with you,” she said, walking toward the kitchen door. “What do I owe you for the groceries?”

“Nothing. Just a friendly gesture.”

“Except we’re not friends nor are we likely to be. I’d prefer to pay you.”

“As you wish. The bill’s in my wallet.”

“Where exactly are you living?” She turned to confront him, hating him for making so many allegations. She was being asked to take in so much information yet given no time for the information to settle. She couldn’t pretend she wasn’t also drawn to him. Was the attraction real, or were her defenses down? Never for a moment had she pictured anything like this.

“I’ve rented the old Gambaro farm,” he said.

She nodded curtly. “I know it. How long have you rented it for?”

“I had to take it at the agent’s three-month minimum.”

“Well, you can’t squeeze blood from a stone,” she told him, moving out to the hallway. “I’ll be of absolutely no help to you. You might as well turn around and go back to Sydney.”

“I’m staying,” he said. “I had a break coming and I’m taking it. This is a glorious part of the world. But there’s a dying old man in Sydney who needs a few answers before he goes. When you’ve had time to process all this information you claim you don’t know, you may feel inclined to help.”

She shook her head grimly. “Not at this point.” Not ever!

They had reached the entrance hall before he spoke again. “Elizabeth told me you worked pro bono for a women’s refuge. That makes you a compassionate person. Unless Elizabeth was totally paranoid about her past, in all probability she kept letters and papers that would confirm the truth. She wouldn’t have had time to arrange a bonfire. She didn’t know she was going to die, after all.”

Would the grieving ever pass? “And what if these mystery documents open up a Pandora’s box? Have you thought of that?” Her lips were trembling. “Families stand to get desperately hurt. What good is the truth when there could be a huge scandal? I don’t think the Langfords would thank you.”

He took a deep breath, keeping his hands rigidly by his side. “Some things demand clarification,” he said. “Julian only wants to know if Elizabeth’s child is his, a child she led him to believe died soon after birth. If this person is shown to be his daughter, she’s going to inherit a great deal of money.”

She looked at him with scorn. “And how should she take that, like a rain of diamonds out of the sky? What’s Julian after, exactly? Does he want to set the record straight once and for all? Does he want revenge? And more to the point, what do you get out of this?” she challenged. “You, the favorite great-nephew? Won’t you come out of it second-best? Wouldn’t it benefit you to simply go away? Concoct some story for your dear Uncle Julian? What if this mystery daughter would rather not know? After all, she must’ve been put up for adoption. Zizi didn’t keep her. This daughter, if she exists, has lived her life thinking she was one person, now your uncle wants to tell her she’s someone completely different? Can’t you see that this could turn out to be a total mess? The safest course might be to keep quiet.” She felt tears well in her eyes again.

“I’m sorry, Alyssa.” He moved quickly to the front door, in case he did something crazy, like sweep her into his arms. He had never in his life felt such desire for a woman. “Life isn’t simple,” he mused. “If you were adopted, wouldn’t you want to find out who your biological parents were?”

“I’m actually familiar with two cases when the people involved were devastated to discover that the parents who’d reared them weren’t their biological parents at all. Both took the truth very, very badly. Better to live in your comfort zone than know the brutal truth.”

“I would need to know,” he said somberly.

She was terribly afraid she would, as well. “Coming here was a bad idea of yours.”

“Elizabeth didn’t think so.”

“Only she isn’t around to back that up.” She frowned at him with accusing eyes.

He smiled. “Why not try finding whatever documents Elizabeth might have put away? Apart from that, she had many paintings stored here. Maybe there are some portraits. Who knows? I’m sure you haven’t seen them all.”

“Perhaps not.” She had never felt free to delve into Zizi’s large body of work. Zizi had showed her only what she meant to show her, she now realized.

“Will you tell me if you find anything?” he asked.

She shook her head. “I don’t want to see you again.”

“Why don’t you look at me while you say that?”

It wasn’t a challenge. It was more an overt acknowledgment of their mutual attraction.

Betraying color came into her face. “I can’t make any promises.”

“I rely on your integrity, Alyssa.”

She nodded curtly. “Wait here. I’ll get the money I owe you.” She walked toward the staircase, desperate for him to leave, yet knowing if she never saw him again she’d always remember him.

“Do you feel safe here?” he asked abruptly.

In the act of mounting the staircase, she turned to look at him, one hand resting on the banister. He had taken up a position in the entrance hall beneath her, his aquamarine gaze keen as a laser. It seemed to go deep inside her; much deeper than she dared to go. “I’ve been coming here all my life,” she said in a deliberately offhand tone. “I’m rooted to the place. Besides, I’m not afraid of things that go bump in the night. No old house is without its resident ghost.”

He nodded, a vertical line between his brows. “Who, I haven’t the slightest doubt, is Richard Langford.”

Alyssa felt her throat dry up. She’d always accepted that, but now wondered if the original Captain Richard Langford who’d built the house was the only one who haunted it. Perhaps the more recent Richard Langford, the famous yachtsman, had joined his ancestor. “Did your uncle hate him?” she asked.

He continued to stare up at her. “Deep in his heart he did. He was madly in love with Elizabeth. Forget all the years in between. Talking to him now, the years were as nothing. He might have been talking about yesterday. She was the love of his life.” He shook his head. “I find it almost too much to grasp, but maybe there is such a thing as everlasting love. Julian blamed Langford for everything that went wrong in three lives. He even blamed Langford for his own death.”

She couldn’t have been more unnerved. “But…that makes no sense at all.”

“Langford was a married man with two small children,” he said tonelessly.

Something like shame burned in her cheeks. “Zizi would never have had an affair with a married man,” she protested, affronted by the very idea.

“Blame it on passion.”

Passion in the past. Passion in the present? Alyssa had a presentiment that life-changing emotion was waiting for her.

With a shiver she continued up the stairs. Richard Langford had been Zizi’s lover and possibly the father of her child? A married man, an adulterer? And Zizi had never told a soul? Had she been too ashamed? Zizi had supposedly let her child go, not knowing how that child grew up, if she was all right, no doubt praying she had love and security and all the things a child needed to be happy.

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