“It’s clearly important to you that I find some way for you to pay back that money.”

“You’ve found some work for me?”

He smiled. “I’ve found a job for you—if you’re willing to do it.”

“I’ve told you, I’m prepared to do anything legal.”

“Oh, this is legal,” he assured her. Then evenly he enquired, “How would you like to be my steady girlfriend for a year?”

Merren stared at him. “You’re not serious?”

“I promise you I am.”

“But—but—we don’t even know each other!” she protested.

“We don’t have to—it will be an in-name-only courtship.”

Jessica Steele lives in a friendly English village with her super husband, Peter. They are owned by a gorgeous Staffordshire bull terrier called Florence, who is boisterous and manic, but also adorable. It was Peter who first prompted Jessica to try writing and, after the first rejection, encouraged her to keep on trying. Luckily, with the exception of Uruguay, she has so far managed to research inside all the countries in which she has set her books, traveling to places as far apart as Siberia and Egypt. Her thanks go to Peter for his help and encouragement.

Books by Jessica Steele

HARLEQUIN ROMANCE®

3588—THE FEISTY FIANCÉE

3615—BACHELOR IN NEED

3627—MARRIAGE IN MIND

The Bachelor’s Bargain
Jessica Steele

www.millsandboon.co.uk

MILLS & BOON

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CONTENTS

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER ONE

MERREN tried to look on the bright side—or even find a bright side. By nature she was a cheerful person, but just lately there had been little to cheer about.

Looking on the bright side, however, she had the money in her bag which would take the look of strain from the face of Robert, her brother. It had been extremely disappointing that the sale of her mother’s sapphire and diamond ring hadn’t fetched anywhere near its insurance valuation. But the two thousand pounds she had been forced to accept was just enough to keep the bailiffs from Robert’s door. Though since six weeks ago Robert, his wife and their three children had moved into the house she already lived in, it was her door too.

Not that he and his family didn’t have a right to live there as well, Merren reminded herself as, having delivered an envelope in the area, she made her way past elegant and expensive houses en route to public transport.

It had to be today that Robert had wanted to borrow her car to go for a job interview. Though, she acknowledged, in the last six weeks it had become more like the family’s car, rather than belonging exclusively to her. But Robert’s need was greater than hers, and if he was successful at his interview, a company car, as in his old job, went with the territory.

Just as it had to be today that Robert’s need of a car was greater than her own, it had to be today that her boss, Dennis Chapman, ‘up to his eyes in it’, to use his expression, had asked if she’d mind dropping some urgent documents off to one of his business associates on her way home. She had done so once before, and Dennis had obviously assumed she’d had her car outside today.

Merren’s thoughts went back to her brother as she reflected on the mess he was in. If only he’d told someone a year ago that he’d been made redundant they might, collectively, have been able to find some way out of his problems. But he hadn’t told anyone—not even his wife!

True, Carol, a terminal worrier at the best of times, had been four months pregnant with their third child then. But even so, though Robert had thought he’d get another job straight away, Merren felt sure that, had Carol known, she would have pulled with him rather than against him, as was happening now.

A year ago they could have…Merren’s breath caught, the sadness she was having to come to terms with coming over her. A year ago her mother had been alive. A year ago she and her mother had lived happily together in the house Merren’s father still owned. Ten months ago her mother had been out walking when a car coming round a sharp bend had gone out of control. It…

Merren turned her thoughts away from the shock and horror of that devastating time after her mother’s death. She had valued Robert’s support in the background then. But, aside from her love for her brother, Merren saw it as only right and natural that now, in his time of need, she should support him.

Their father lived in Cornwall, but, since he hadn’t stirred himself to attend his estranged wife’s funeral, they hardly expected any help from him in this financial crisis. Although before Robert had told Carol that their small savings were gone, that he hadn’t been paying the mortgage and that they were soon to be homeless, he had written a number of times to his father for help—so far, he had received no reply.

Merren was deep in thought, and was passing one of the tall, imposing houses, when a young man in his early twenties came galloping out down the steps, a travel bag in his hand, and only just avoided cannoning into her.

‘Sorry!’ he called, his eyes appreciative of her face and figure.

He was soon from her mind and Merren walked on. She must get home. She didn’t think Robert had told Carol that she was going to try to sell their mother’s—and, before her, their grandmother’s—ring. But he would be waiting. She must get home. She must…

All thought suddenly ceased when what happened next happened so fast she could hardly believe it was happening at all. One moment she was stepping purposefully out on the hard pavement; the following she was being pushed violently from behind—and the pavement was coming up to meet her.

Even while it was dawning on her that she was being mugged, three adrenalin-activated youths were pushing and shoving and hitting and generally making short work of her grim determination to hang on to her shoulder bag at all costs, and were escaping pell-mell down the road with it.

Feeling stunned and winded, it was the violence of the assault that shocked her. She had never ever been hit before and she just sat there dishevelled and decidedly crumpled for ageless seconds, dazed, sickened, a cross between tears and fury.

She did not cry, and there was no one there on whom she could vent her anger. How could she have been hit, pushed, knocked over in this salubrious area? Why not? What better place for a mugging than this well-to-do district? What better place for rich pickings.

‘Oh, you poor thing!’ So dazed and in shock was she, Merren hadn’t heard the sound of running feet; feet running towards her, not away. She looked up and recognised the young man who’d been carrying the travel bag out to his car. ‘Can you stand up?’ he asked, his face showing his concern.

Merren, with his aid, got to her feet; it was incidental that there were great gaping holes in her tights. Everything seemed to spin about her for a second, so she was glad when the man held on to her.

‘Oh, you poor, poor thing,’ he crooned. ‘Those thugs will be miles away by now. Come on,’ he urged. ‘A cup of tea’s what you need.’

With his hand under her arm supporting her he took the short way to a house where the front door still stood open. He helped her up the steps and Merren went with him.

A few minutes later she came a little out of her shock to find she was seated in someone’s plush drawing room with barely any idea of how she had got there.

Her head had started to pound when a voice, somewhere to the back of her, started to penetrate. ‘Not another of your waifs and strays, Piers!’ It was rather a nice voice. Piers, whoever he was, apparently went in for collecting waifs and strays.

‘Aw, don’t be like that, Jarad, the poor girl’s just been mugged!’

Merren jerked upright on the sofa she found herself on. They were talking about her! Waif and stray! Indignantly she went to stand up—her legs were wobbly; she sat down again. ’So had the last one been mugged, if I recall correctly.’

‘It’s true this time. Honestly, it is.’

‘You haven’t time to plead your case. You’ll miss your plane.’ The voices were moving away, the Piers voice mumbling something, then the Jarad voice answering, ‘Yes, yes, I’ll look after her—don’t I always?’

Merren made a more determined effort to get herself together. Huh, waif and stray! Look after her—he could go take a hike. But her head hurt, her shoulders hurt, and she had an idea she’d have a few bruises by tomorrow. In fact her head felt a bit muzzy, but she’d stand up in a minute and get out of there.

She could hear some sort of a conversation going on, then silence. Then she heard a car start up. Good, they’d gone out somewhere. She heard the front door close, and, as a second or two afterwards someone came into the drawing room, Merren decided it was time to leave.

Just as she went to struggle to her feet, though, a tall man with night-black hair, somewhere in his mid-thirties, came and stood in front of her, and she found herself pinned by what she could only describe as a pair of cool grey eyes. He certainly wasn’t going to believe a word she said, she could tell that, and that was before she so much as opened her mouth.

Which was why she decided that she wasn’t going to bother saying anything. Though, since he was standing so close, she had to amend that decision. ‘If you wouldn’t mind getting out of my way, I’ll leave.’

She hated his cynical right eyebrow that lifted at her haughty tone. ‘You’re different; I’ll say that for you,’ he drawled.

‘I’m certainly no “waif or stray”!’ she told him snappily. Though if she’d hoped to embarrass him by tossing back at him the words she’d overheard, she could have saved herself the bother.

He did not look a scrap embarrassed, nor in the slightest apologetic when he apologised dryly, ‘Forgive me. I find it a trifle tedious being left to care for the lame dogs my brother constantly brings home—then, when his Samaritan impetuosity wanes, leaves me to deal with his problems.’

Problems! Lame dogs! Of all the insufferable… ‘You miserable worm!’ she flared. ‘I was mugged!’

The epithet about the miserable worm didn’t touch him, either. ‘Very conveniently mugged on my doorstep,’ he drawled, giving no quarter for her ruined tights and dishevelled appearance.

But she’d had it with him. Abruptly, too abruptly, she shot to her feet. She took one step, and as waves of dizziness assaulted her she needed something to hang on to. She stretched out her hands and held on to him until her world righted itself.

‘I’m sorry,’ she mumbled from a proud somewhere, dropping her hands from his arms as if burned, going to take another step. Only this time he held both of her arms and pushed her back to the sofa.

‘Stay there,’ he ordered, and, while every instinct in her urged her to tell him what he could do with his orders, she was feeling too drained just then to do anything other than obey.

He went away, but returned in seconds with a glass of medicinal brandy. ‘Drink that,’ he commanded, and, at her belligerent look that said, Why should I? he flicked a glance over her shoulder-length natural blonde-streaked pale reddish hair, over her fine features and porcelain skin, and commented, ‘It could be that you’re naturally pale, but…’

‘Don’t bust a gut giving me the benefit of the doubt!’ Her spirit was returning—she felt better sitting down.

‘Just as it could be that you’re naturally lippy.’

‘It’s not every day I get mugged and then, while I’m coping with that, get accused of pretending to be mugged, for some reason my head’s in too much of a fog just now to be able to work out why.’

‘Drink the brandy.’

She tossed him a malevolent look, but, since it seemed the brandy might make her feel better, she took a sip, determined not to choke on the unfamiliar spirit, and took another couple of sips—whereupon her determination not to choke let her down. But only so far as a lady-like splutter.

She did, however, acknowledge, albeit reluctantly, that she was starting to recover from the shock and humiliation of being set upon by a trio of thugs.

‘Drink the rest of it and I’ll get a taxi to take you home,’ the man Jarad said.

A taxi—to Surrey! ‘I haven’t the money for a tax…’ Aghast, she stopped, fresh shock hitting her as, looking round for her bag, suddenly she fully remembered that the last time she had seen it some young thug was making off with it. ‘The money!’ she gasped in horror, she’d had two thousands pounds in that bag!

‘Here we go!’ drawled the man Jarad nastily. And, as Merren stared blankly at him, ‘Would it be very impolite of me, do you suppose, if I enquire what money?’

Merren had grown up loving her fellow man, but she had just come across one that she most definitely hated. She, who hadn’t a violent bone in her body, and maybe because of the violence recently done to her, felt she wanted to thump him, to hit him and keep on hitting him. But she had been better brought up than that. But her tone was full of loathing when she placed the brandy glass down on a nearby table and told him coldly, ‘Never, have I ever met a more odious creature than you.’

‘My heart bleeds—how much will it cost me?’

You’d have thought someone would have bashed that good-looking face in before this! ‘You—nothing.’

‘Let me try again. How much did the muggers get away with?’

Merren doubted that he’d decided to believe she’d been mugged after all. But pride about letting him know that she wasn’t the penniless ‘waif and stray’ he seemed so convinced she was made her answer, ‘Two thousand pounds, actually.’

‘In cash?’ She refused to answer. ‘You usually carry that amount of cash around with you?’ he questioned sceptically.

‘It was to pay some bills!’ Why did she feel she had to defend herself? She was going—getting out of there.

‘You don’t have a chequebook?’ he asked, before she had moved an inch.

She didn’t have two thousand in her account, nor even a quarter of that. Nor was she likely to tell him that Robert’s creditors had point-blank told him that a cheque would be unacceptable. Merren could only suppose he had tried to stave off the evil day by previously writing cheques that had not been honoured.

‘So either you don’t have a bank account or your creditors know your cheques are worthless.’ Oh, aren’t we the Smarty Pants! ‘Where did you get this two thousand?’ he wanted to know.

‘It’s nothing to do with you!’ she snapped, part of her wondering why she was still sitting there. Had that hard pavement addled her brain? Had the shock caused her to move in slow motion? Anyone would think she was enjoying having a slanging match with him.

‘Since it looks a certainty that I’m going to be two thousand pounds out of pocket, I’d say it has everything to do with me!’ he answered crisply.

Merren stared at him, totally perplexed. ‘You’re going to be two thousand pounds out of pocket?’

He clearly had no belief in her puzzlement, but astonished her when he replied mockingly, ‘I just know it’s going to cost me that much to keep my word to my brother that I’d look after you.’

‘You’re suggesting you’d lend me the money?’ she questioned, more to check that she’d got it right, that her brain wasn’t so addled she was beginning to believe.

‘I’m stating, not suggesting,’ he began, but, waking up fast, Merren was butting in.

‘Why should you?’ she asked, starting to realise she must have landed in either a most generous or most crackpot family.

‘Why wouldn’t I?’ he questioned back, his steady grey glance on her improved colour. ‘Piers, whom I promise you has cost me more than forty pounds a week just lately with his lost causes, is about to leave the country to work abroad for a year. I think I’ll be getting off lightly by making a final two-thousand-pound contribution to his waifs and strays fund.’

Insults she didn’t need. Merren got to her feet, glad to find her legs were steady and that her dizzy spell was a thing of the past. ‘Thank you for your hospitality,’ she told him proudly, and, taking a few steps away from him, ‘As for your money, I wouldn’t dream of touching a penny of it.’

Grey eyes locked with deeply blue eyes. ‘Fine,’ he said, and, his glance flicking over her, ‘You won’t want to go through the streets looking like that.’ And then, a decision made, ‘I’ll drive you home.’

Had she any other choice, Merren would have taken it. But, aside from the fact she knew she looked a wreck, she didn’t so much as have the price of a twopenny bus ticket—if there was such a thing—and she certainly wasn’t going to borrow from him. ‘I live in Surrey,’ she stated.

He didn’t bat an eyelid, but escorted her out to where his beautiful-looking black Jaguar was parked.

They were silent for most of the drive. What was there to say? She didn’t want to talk to him—she certainly had no intention of answering any of his questions—and he, likewise, didn’t seem to want to talk to her.

In any case, she had a lot on her mind. Robert would be in despair when she told him she’d had the money but had lost it. She tried to think what else she could sell. There was her car, which was in good working order, but it was so old she’d be lucky if they got five hundred for it. Besides which, they seemed to need that car. In the six weeks since Robert and his family had moved in there had been countless visits en masse to the supermarket, and she’d taken her nieces, eight-year-old Queenie and six-year-old Kitty, out several times when Carol had been particularly edgy with them.

Merren wished her father would reply to Robert’s letter. She knew her father didn’t have a lot in the bank, but occasionally in the past, when her mother had hit hard times, she’d overcome her pride and accepted money he’d sent to tide them over.

Merren was just deciding that she would write to her father herself that night, when the man Jarad pulled up outside the detached house her father owned.

Jarad turned to her. ‘You’re looking better.’

‘I’m a good actress,’ she returned airily.

‘So, I may have been wrong, and you may have been mugged.’

‘Don’t strain yourself!’ she tossed at him, but belatedly remembering her manners, added politely, ‘Thank you very much for bringing me home.’

‘I’ll bet that hurt!’ Merren made to get out of the car. ‘Will there be someone in to look after you? You’re probably still in shock.’

She was more likely to have to look after them than they look after her. ‘I live with my family,’ she replied, and again made to get out of the car, when he stopped her.

He took out his wallet and extracted a business card. ‘If you change your mind about the money—give me a ring.’

She took the card from him, but, knowing she wouldn’t be phoning him, she didn’t so much as look at it. ‘Goodbye,’ she said. His car was purring away before she was halfway up the garden path.

Ignoring the general clutter of family life when she went in, Merren picked up a note from the kitchen table. ‘Gone to supermarket,’ she read. Heartily glad that she had the chance to make herself more presentable before her brother and his family arrived home, Merren had a quick shower and changed into a cotton frock. The weather was sunny—she wished she felt the same.

She mourned the loss of her mother’s ring—it had been so difficult to part with, and she felt quite dreadful that she had. Despite all her trials and tribulations her mother had always hung on to the ring, and had kept it safe for Merren, telling her that one day it would be hers.

And what had Merren done? Not only had she sold it but she’d lost the money she had received for it. Merren just didn’t know how she was going to face her brother and confess what had happened.

Knowing she should go downstairs and try to restore some order into the chaos of school bags, odd plimsolls, socks and a half-eaten sandwich she’d seen lying about, for once Merren squashed down her tidy soul and instead got out her writing pad. It was an age since she had last written to her father, and, much though she disliked asking him for money, she just didn’t know what else she could do. And he was family.

Having penned a very difficult letter—which had started along the lines of ‘as you know, Robert and his family have, in straitened circumstances, come to live with me here in your house’—she had gone on to tell him of his lovely grandchildren, which she thought might interest him, and ended with the crunch line, which had been the most difficult of all to pen—if he could see his way clear to send something to help pay off some outstanding bills. She signed her letter ‘With love, Merren’, and went downstairs to tidy the cluttered sitting room and kitchen.

Most probably they had all eaten dinner, but in case they hadn’t she began to peel a large panful of potatoes. If they had eaten, the potatoes would do for tomorrow. Now what was she going to tell Robert?

Merren knew she could only tell him the truth, but she was feeling all stewed up inside about having to confess when she heard her car on the drive.

She looked up as first her two nieces charged in. ‘Hello, Aunty Merren.’ They raced each other to the bathroom, followed by her depressed-looking sister-in-law, who was carrying a grizzling seven-month-old Samuel. Robert, laden with shopping, followed on behind.

‘Shall I have the baby?’ Merren asked, drying her hands and, while wanting to have what she had to tell her brother said and done with, found she also wanted to delay that dreadful moment when the expectant look on his face would die.

‘He needs changing,’ Carol answered, finding a smile, and disappeared to leave her alone with Robert.

‘How did your job interview go?’ Merren asked. Oh, how could she tell him?

‘I didn’t get it,’ he said glumly, and, dropping the shopping down on the kitchen table, ‘How about you—did you get it?’

He meant the money, she knew. ‘N-no, actually, I…’

‘Merren!’ he exclaimed hoarsely. ‘You couldn’t sell Mother’s ring? Oh Lord, this is the end!’ He collapsed on to a kitchen chair, his head in his hands, his despair total. ‘That’s it—I’ll go to prison, Carol will divorce me, I…’

‘Robert!’ Merren cried. Prison! This was the first she’d heard of the mention of prison! ‘You’re just being dramatic.’

‘You don’t know the half of it!’

‘You’ve been in trouble before? Financial trouble?’

‘You try bringing up a family—and maintaining a wife with expensive tastes,’ he said bitterly.

As she looked at him, Merren saw for the first time that her big, dependable brother didn’t seem so big and dependable after all. For the first time she noticed a certain weakness around his mouth. But that didn’t make her love him less. He had their father’s mouth. In fact he suddenly seemed a lot more like her father than her warm, generous-hearted mother.

‘You have a lovely wife and a lovely family,’ Merren reminded him, not liking at all that he seemed to be taking a snipe at his wife.

‘And I’ll have the not so lovely bailiffs hammering on the door if those outstanding bills aren’t settled by Monday,’ he retorted sullenly. ‘Are you sure you haven’t got that money, Merren? You promised you’d sell that ring; you know you did.’

‘I did sell it,’ she confessed, but before she could tell him how the money had been stolen from her, his face was lit by a tremendous look of relief.

‘You little terror!’ he exclaimed, his face all huge smiles suddenly. ‘You’ve been winding me up, Merren Shepherd! How much did you get for it?’

‘T-two thousand, but…’

‘Two thousand. Great!’ He beamed. ‘You were robbed, of course,’ he said of the jeweller, Merren winced at the accuracy of the remark. ‘But two thousand, as you know, will settle the blighters. Oh, Merren, it feels as if a ton of weight has been lifted off my shoulders. For a while there, you wicked imp, I felt quite suicidal.’ Oh, heavens. Merren quailed at the enormity of what he had just confessed. ‘Where is it?’ he asked.

Good question. She felt tears prick the backs of her eyes. She turned away from him, knowing that, suicidal or not, she was going to have to douse that look of tremendous relief. ‘I w-was…’ she began, and half turned. It was a mistake to look at him. She loved him; he was her family. ‘I’m—er—getting it tomorrow,’ she heard herself state.

And Robert opined, ‘Honestly, you’d think a jeweller of all people would have two thousand in cash on the premises, wouldn’t you?’

‘You would,’ she agreed, and found she was taking up Robert’s notion that she was going to have to go back to the jeweller’s tomorrow because they normally paid via cheque and didn’t deal much in cash. ‘It’s a security thing apparently.’

The conversation came to an end then, when Queenie and Kitty raced down the stairs and into the kitchen chorusing, ‘I’m starving.’

Robert looked at Merren, who would normally have seen to their appetites, but she was reeling under the enormity of what she had done—and what she was panickingly realising she was going to have to do now.

‘I’ve a letter I need to post,’ she excused, and, finding a stamp in the bureau, went upstairs to collect the letter she had written to her father.

She stayed in her room some minutes, contemplating her options while the words ‘prison’, ‘suicide’, ‘divorce’, ‘family break-up’ whirled around in her head. She couldn’t allow any of that to happen. So what options were there?

She’d post her letter to her father, though since he hadn’t even bothered to reply to Robert’s letter, she saw little hope that any plea from her would fare any better.

As if trying to avoid thinking of the man whose parting words had been, ‘If you change your mind about the money—give me a ring,’ she dwelt on the eldest member of their family, Uncle Amos.

Amos Yardley lived a ten-minute drive away, was her mother’s brother, and Merren thought the world of him. He had been more of a father to her than her own, even before her parents had separated.

Dear Uncle Amos. ‘Are you all right for money?’ he’d asked when her mother had died. Merren had determined he would never know how the funeral had nearly cleaned her out; only the best had done for her mother.

‘Absolutely!’ she’d assured him. His two up and two down cottage was collapsing about his ears—he was poorer than they were.

It was partly because she hadn’t wanted him to worry, when she knew he could do nothing to help, that she hadn’t told him the true reason Robert and his family had moved in with her. She had let Uncle Amos believe it was because it was so quiet and empty with her mother gone that she had asked Robert to move back to the family home.

But Uncle Amos, who was an inventor and often quite vague about matters outside his work, had given her a shrewd kind of look, as if suspecting she was doing a little inventing herself. To her mind, though, hers was a necessary invention. For, while Uncle Amos’s inventions earned him nothing—he seemed to subsist by writing articles for clever magazines and barely scraped a living for himself—so Merren knew she would not be approaching him to help Robert out.

Which left her with the one option she was trying to avoid. She flicked her glance to the dressing table where, without so much as bothering to read it, she had dropped the man Jarad’s card. A sick feeling entered her stomach. She didn’t want to do it; she didn’t.

Merren went over to the dressing table and picked up the card, and read it, and, oh, grief! She worked for an electronics company herself—only a tiny one by comparison, but large enough for her to be familiar with the name Roxford Waring, one of the biggest and most highly respected multinationals in the electronics field. The man Jarad had given her his personal business card, which also listed his home number. Oh, heaven’s above, Jarad Montgomery was a director of Roxford Waring! Was she really contemplating contacting one of their board members with a view to borrowing some money from him?

Merren needed to think, so she escaped from the house and posted her letter, and, knowing the utter futility of it anyway, called in at the police station and reported having been mugged. She thought it unlikely they would catch the criminals, and knew she would never see her bag again.

Which, as she bowed to the inevitable and searched for a telephone kiosk—no way could she make this call from home—reminded her that she didn’t even have the price of a phone call with her.

She didn’t want to make that call; she didn’t, she didn’t. What she wanted to do was to go home, go to bed, and stick her head under the bedclothes—and stay there.

But there wasn’t only herself to think of here. By reminding herself she had a deeply stressed brother, a deeply depressed sister-in-law, two young nieces and a baby nephew, Merren located a phone box.

She went in, grabbed at what courage she could find, quickly dialled the operator and asked the operator for a transfer charge call. And, even while she knew her name wouldn’t mean a thing to Jarad Montgomery, she gave it to the operator—and waited.

The operator went off the line and Merren, feeling all hot and wishing she wasn’t doing this, started to feel certain that even if Jarad Montgomery didn’t refuse to accept the call from her, he most definitely wouldn’t be expecting her to take him up on his offer of, ‘If you change your mind about the money.’

By the time she heard his ‘Hello’ on the line, Merren was battling with pride—she didn’t want his money anyway.

But—she needed it, so it was stiltedly that she answered, ‘Hello, Ja…Mr Montgomery. Er—Merren Shepherd here.’ Oh, drat, the operator would have already told him who his caller was.

‘Merren Shepherd?’ he replied, obviously not knowing her from Eve, for all he had accepted the charge. Either that, or he was playing with her.

That thought nettled her. ‘As in “waif and stray”,’ she enlightened him shortly.

There was a pause, for all the world as if he was trying to place her. Then, ‘That Merren Shepherd!’ he responded smoothly, and Merren hated him again, with a vengeance.

But he was waiting, and there just wasn’t any way of dressing it up. ‘You were—um—Were you serious—about the m-money?’ she questioned.

‘Two thousand, you said.’

‘Yes.’

‘Come to my office tomorrow,’ he instructed.

Her hands were all clammy; she gripped the phone hard. She swallowed. ‘What time?’

‘Eleven,’ he said, and knowing she was going to have to take time off work, Merren also knew she was in no position to argue. Not that it would do her much good anyway—the line had gone dead.

Merren reeled out of the telephone kiosk, feeling a mixture of very intense emotions. She didn’t like what she was doing, but by the sound of it Jarad Montgomery was prepared to help her.

She didn’t like him, was niggled by his ‘That Merren Shepherd!’ as much as she was niggled by, ‘Come to my office tomorrow’ and his short ‘Eleven’ before he’d hung up.

No, she very definitely didn’t like Mr Jarad Montgomery. But beggars couldn’t be choosers, and Mr Jarad Montgomery was the only hope she’d got.

CHAPTER TWO

MERREN had a nightmare that night. She awoke frightened, breathless and crying out. Feeling stiff and bruised, she switched on the light and calmed herself by reflecting that it wasn’t surprising she should dream violently of being hit, being chased—chased to the edge of a cliff—and of falling, falling.

She didn’t know how long she had been yelling, but supposed it couldn’t have been for very long, or very loudly either, because she hadn’t disturbed anyone. Though, since she had moved up to the attic bedroom, it was unlikely anyone had heard her. No one was rushing up to rescue her from her night-time villains anyhow.

She felt wide awake, and would have liked to go down to the kitchen and make a warm drink, but feared, albeit that Robert and his family were heavy sleepers, that she might wake the baby. Baby Samuel had been fretful from birth, and, as she well knew, could cry for hours!

Not unnaturally, she supposed, thoughts of Jarad Montgomery came into her head. Had she really asked him for two thousand pounds? Had he really agreed to loan the money to her? And, if he had, how on earth was she going to pay it back?

That one thought kept her sleepless for the next hour. She still hadn’t come up with any answer when from utter weariness, she fell asleep again. It was daylight the next time she awakened—and the baby was crying.

Merren left her bed to go down a flight of stairs to see to her little nephew. She couldn’t remember having been hit on her shoulders, but her shoulders ached when she moved, while other parts of her body were vying with each other for rainbow effect bruising. The baby seemed heavier to lift out of his cot than usual, but, for once, he was being a little gentleman and decided to beam gummily at her after she’d changed him and given him a drink.

‘You’re a rascal,’ she told him affectionately, and he grinned some more.

Then her dressing gowned brother came to join them, and, clearly wanting a word before anyone else was about, began, ‘I’ve been thinking, Merren, that if I met you at the jeweller’s at lunchtime, I could take the money and settle the…’

‘Actually,’ she butted in quickly, ‘I’m—er—taking the day off work. I’ll have the money back here by one.’ Fingers crossed.

‘Can I have the car?’ he asked, assured of the money, wasting no time going on to his next priority.

But for once—feeling extremely vulnerable about money-carrying after her mugging yesterday—Merren just had to refuse.

‘It’s yours after one o’clock,’ she replied, and would not be persuaded otherwise.

Once she’d handed the baby over, Merren bathed and returned to her room, and kept out of the way until Robert walked Queenie and Kitty to school and Carol was occupied with Samuel.

Merren studied her wardrobe. She did not want to remember the sketch she must have looked yesterday. She wouldn’t forget Jarad Montgomery’s, ‘You won’t want to go through the streets looking like that’ in a hurry. Today, when she saw him again, she wanted to look smart. Why she should feel that way she didn’t know. Her old friend pride, she supposed.

Dressed in her newest suit of deep blue, which brought out yet more blue to the colour of her eyes, Merren was walking through the revolving doors of the office of Roxford Waring before it so much as occurred to her that she might not even see Jarad Montgomery! ‘Come to my office’, he said. But he hadn’t actually said he’d see her.

She approached the reception desk and almost asked if Mr Montgomery had left a package for her to collect. But quickly she pulled herself together. Get a grip! He’d want to know how she was going to pay him back—if only she knew! No one was going to hand over that sort of money to a complete stranger without asking some pretty pertinent questions.

‘I’m here to see Mr Jarad Montgomery.’ She smiled at the smart receptionist. ‘Merren Shepherd,’ she gave her name.

She was expected! Merren rode up in the lift with her insides all of a churn. She did so hope she wasn’t here on a fool’s errand. He’d meant it, hadn’t he? She just wouldn’t be able to go home again, wouldn’t be able to face Robert if he hadn’t.

She tapped on the door she had been directed to. She’d expected his PA to invite her in. But the door was opened by Jarad Montgomery himself. Though for a moment he did not invite her in, but just stood there looking at her. But, while his glance went over her blonde-streaked reddish hair—tidy today in comparison to yesterday, for all she still wore it loose—Merren took a moment to study him.

He was as tall as she remembered. But in his immaculate business suit, crisp shirt and tie, he looked even more authoritative today than he had yesterday—and that was saying something.

‘You’ve polished up well,’ he drawled, and suddenly her nerves were disappearing.

You’re looking pretty snappy yourself. ‘I made an effort,’ she countered, hoping he would think she was joking.

‘Come in.’

Merren entered his office, noticed the communicating door to his PA’s office was closed, and was glad about that. By the look of it he was treating this as a private matter.

‘How are you feeling?’ he enquired, indicating a chair before going and taking a seat behind his desk. ‘You were pretty shaken up yesterday,’ he recalled.

‘The bruises will soon fade,’ she smiled. And, not wanting to prolong this interview any longer than she had to, she went on, ‘I’m sorry I had to reverse the charges last night when I rang. I didn’t have any change with me.’

‘You didn’t want to ring from your home?’

Sharp! Merren quickly realised they didn’t come very much sharper than him. ‘I—er—didn’t—don’t want my family to know that I was mugged.’

‘Or that you were robbed of that two thousand pounds you were carrying?’ She didn’t answer. ‘Where did you get it?’ he wanted to know.

‘I came by it honestly,’ she bristled—but, recognising that perhaps he had some right to know, she added more evenly, ‘I sold an item of jewellery.’

‘It was yours to sell?’ he asked quickly.

She resented his question, and resented his tone. ‘I…’ she began sharply back, and then realised she couldn’t afford to fire up at him. She needed his help. And, she supposed reluctantly, his question, since he didn’t know the first thing about her, was a fair one. ‘It was a ring belonging to my mother.’

‘Your mother’s in need of two thousand pounds?’

‘My mother died ten months ago,’ she replied stonily.

‘So the money’s for you. What for?’ He pursued his line of questioning, and, as if he’d summed up why she hadn’t wanted her family to know, his look was suddenly fierce. ‘You’re pregnant!’ he rapped.

‘No, I’m not!’ she snapped back. Honestly! ‘Chance would be a fine thing!’ His hint about what she wanted the money for infuriated her!

‘You haven’t…?’

‘I don’t.’

‘Not ever?’ he questioned, his anger gone, polite interest taking its place.

‘I’m working on it!’ she retorted crisply. Was she really having this discussion? ‘I told you—I needed that money to pay some bills.’ She brought the subject back to where she wanted it. She took a steadying breath, her pride buckling as she made herself ask, ‘Do you have the m-money for me?’

His answer was to open a desk drawer and withdraw a plain envelope. He stretched over and placed the envelope on the corner of his desk nearest to her. ‘Cash,’ he stated, seeming to know she wasn’t interested in a cheque.

‘Thank you,’ she said, not touching the envelope. ‘Do you want me to sign something to say I’ve received it?’

‘Not necessary,’ he replied.

‘Oh,’ she murmured. ‘Er—about paying it back.’

Jarad Montgomery stared at her, seemed about to say something, but instead invited, ‘Go on.’

‘Well—I—that is, I think you’ve already worked out, as I did last night, that it—um—may be some while before I’ll be in a position to repay you.’

‘I appreciate your honesty,’ he drawled. ‘Though I can’t quite remember asking you for repayment.’

‘You can’t be lending—giving—me the money out of the goodness of your heart!’ she erupted.

‘You’re suggesting I have a black heart?’ he enquired coolly.

She wasn’t. How could she think that when he was doing this enormous deed for her? But, ‘You must want something in return?’ she said in a rush as the thought came. She knew she was green, but nobody parted with that sort of money for nothing.

Jarad stared at her for long, silent moments. Silkily then, he murmured, ‘You’re prepared to sell your—um—services?’

She had the most awful pride-denting feeling that he was playing with her, and—even while ready to accept his enormous favour—Merren felt she hated him. ‘I’m a very good secretary,’ she informed him bluntly.

‘You have a job?’ He seemed surprised.

‘I rang my employer this morning and asked for the day off, out of my holiday entitlement,’ she answered stiffly. ‘I could work evenings and weekends if you’ve any secretarial…’

‘I’ve a perfectly efficient PA.’ He turned down her offer.

And Merren was out of ideas. ‘You’ve a perfectly efficient domestic staff too,’ she thought out loud, remembering his well cared for, polished and gleaming house.

‘You’d do cleaning?’ He stared at her as if she was some new kind of species as yet unknown to him.

‘I’m prepared to do anything legal.’

‘I see,’ he murmured, and, every bit as if it needed some thinking about, he continued, ‘You’d better come and see me tomorrow—I’ll let you know my requirements then. Er—don’t bring an apron.’ Merren was off her chair making for the door when his voice stopped her. ‘Haven’t you forgotten something?’ She spun round, and inwardly groaned—she had forgotten to pick up the money.

It was him! Somehow he had the power to unsettle her, making her swing from an urgent desire to hit him, to wanting to smile and be grateful. She went back to the desk and picked up the envelope. ‘Thank you,’ she said quietly, with what dignity she could find.

‘Stay put,’ was her answer. ‘You’re obviously not safe to be let out on your own; I’ll get a driver to take you home.’

The sauce of it! It gave her a great deal of pleasure to be able to tell him, ‘Actually, I have my car today.’

Her pleasure was short-lived. ‘I’ll get someone from Security to walk you to it,’ he pronounced.

Merren couldn’t remember actually saying goodbye to him, but as she and the security guard left the Roxford Waring building she owned to feeling glad to have the solidly built fit-looking man by her side. That episode yesterday had left her feeling more vulnerable than she’d realised. Not that she thanked Jarad Montgomery for his thoughtfulness. Him and his ‘not safe to be let out on your own’! Huh!

The closer she drove to her home, however, Merren began to experience a decided aversion to handing Jarad Montgomery’s money over to her brother. The feeling was ridiculous; she knew it was. For goodness’ sake, the whole point of her visit to the Roxford Waring building had been to get the money for Robert. Her reluctance, she suddenly comprehended, was because once the money was gone from her keeping, gone to pay Robert’s long outstanding bills, she would be committed. Committed—in debt to Jarad Montgomery.

Robert came hurrying out of the house the moment he saw her car, and, seeing his tense expression, Merren could not hesitate to hand him the money. ‘I won’t forget this,’ he beamed, but she guessed, as she handed over her car keys too, that forget it he would.

She went indoors; Carol was out somewhere with the baby—and the house was a tip. Merren went and changed out of her suit. Dressed in cotton trousers and a tee shirt, she was vacuuming the sitting room carpet when thoughts of Jarad Montgomery returned to disturb her.

She supposed, in view of what had happened, it wasn’t surprising he should be in her head so frequently. He had just done her one very generous kindness. That she was going to have to pay for that kindness by some means or other was only to be expected. Besides, she wouldn’t have it any other way. Pride alone decreed that.

‘Come and see me tomorrow,’ he’d said. He hadn’t said where, he hadn’t said when, but, since tomorrow was Saturday, he must mean that she should call at his home to discover in what way he’d decided she should repay him.

Having cleaned and tidied everywhere, while knowing it would be utter chaos again within hours of her family coming home, Merren made a cake to take to Uncle Amos the next day. Her mother had always presented him with a cake every Saturday. It had pleased Merren to take that small pleasure over. Uncle Amos was very partial to sultana cake.

Bertie Armstrong rang around seven that evening. He and Merren were around the same age, and had always been the best of friends. ‘I’m going to The Bull for a jar later on—fancy coming?’ he asked.

Merren wasn’t particularly keen, but, having told Jarad Montgomery that she could work evenings and weekends, decided to take Bertie up on his offer. Heaven alone knew when, after she saw the man Jarad tomorrow, she would have another evening free for a ‘jar’.

‘Nineish?’ she enquired.

‘I’ll call for you,’ he said, and, even though she would be seeing him later, such was their friendship that they stayed chatting about inconsequential matters for the next twenty minutes. But, good friend though Bertie was, she couldn’t tell him of the recent happenings in her life.

Having gone to The Bull with Bertie for a drink, Merren returned home just after eleven to find the house in darkness, everyone in bed. She had thought her few hours in the uncomplicated company of Bertie Armstrong had relaxed her. But later she had a frightening nightmare similar to the one she’d had the night before, and she began to realise that the trauma of being the victim of a street assault, didn’t end once you’d picked yourself up and dusted yourself down.

Eventually she managed to get back to sleep, but was awakened early by the baby testing his lung power. It amazed her that she could hear him when no one else could. Though, since his mother coped with his incessant demands on a daily basis, Merren felt Carol could be forgiven for pulling the bedclothes over her head and hoping someone else would attend to him. Merren got out of bed.

She was uncertain about what time she should go and see Jarad Montgomery, but as it was her habit to go and spend some time with Uncle Amos on a Saturday morning, she decided to leave her visit to Jarad Montgomery until the afternoon. He knew where she lived, she was in the phone book, and if he got tired of waiting she felt confident he would telephone and leave some short, and to the point message.

Realising that nerves were getting to her at the prospect of seeing Jarad again, and that she was getting uptight and just a little irked by him—though how she could when she owed him so much—not least her brother’s peace of mind and his family’s security—Merren took herself off to see her Uncle Amos.

‘Had a good week?’ she asked him as she replenished his cake tin.

‘Running into trouble with my latest brainwave,’ he acknowledged. ‘How about you?’

No way could she tell the dear man about the horror of Thursday, or her visit to see Jarad Montgomery yesterday. Uncle Amos would be up in arms that anyone had dared to assault her, and he would fret himself silly that he wasn’t able to help with the money.

‘Fine,’ she smiled. ‘Shall I make some coffee?’

‘Er—the kitchen’s in a bit of a state.’

She’d never known it any different. After coffee, and as her mother had before her, Merren returned to the kitchen and got busy with his backlog of used crockery. ‘Fancy coming to lunch with us tomorrow?’ she invited, knowing in advance that he wouldn’t.

‘After last time?’ he grinned, and Merren grinned back. Uncle Amos had been married once, before—as he’d told Merren—his wife had got fed up with him and had gone off. There had been no children from the marriage; his only dealings had been with Merren and her brother, who’d been vastly different from the screeching and over-excited Queenie and Kitty, who’d shattered his eardrums that Sunday lunchtime when, against his better judgement, he’d decided to take a look at his great-nieces and great-nephew. Baby Samuel’s lung power that day had been astronomical. ‘Are they any better behaved?’ he wanted to know.

‘The girls are—er—settling in their new school,’ Merren answered diplomatically.

She felt in much better spirits when she left than she had when she’d arrived. But anxiety started to nibble away at her as she drove back to her home. There was no putting it off. She was going to have to go and see Jarad Montgomery that afternoon.

With that visit in mind, and again finding her confidence in need of a boost, Merren changed into a smart cream linen skirt and jacket, checked what little make-up she wore was just right, also checked that she didn’t have a hair out of place, and, by using avoidance tactics, managed to get out of the house untouched by small, but inquisitive jammy fingers.

She parked near to where Jarad Montgomery lived, but owned to feeling on edge when walking to his house, she had to pass the spot where she had been set upon two days ago. Telling herself not to be silly, she was nevertheless glad to make it to Jarad Montgomery’s front door. She rang the bell, and waited.

Jarad Montgomery himself opened the door, though why her heart should pick up a beat when she saw him, she had no idea. Probably because he looked a shade surprised to see her there. Had he forgotten she was going to call today?

She thought she should remind him. ‘You said I should come and see you today,’ she began quietly, when all of a sudden she saw that two women, both carrying handbags, and clearly on their way out, were coming along the hall behind him. One of the women was touching sixty, the other was somewhere in her early thirties, Merren judged. Both were smartly and expensively dressed. ‘I’ve called at an inconvenient time,’ Merren began to apologise as the two ladies halted at his shoulder.

‘Not at all,’ Jarad was beginning smoothly, when he glanced from her to the two females who were positively beaming at him. He paused for the briefest of moments, then, glancing back to Merren, he was suddenly all smiles himself as he stated, ‘This is a delightful surprise,’ and, while she stared at him—delightful?—he was going on, ‘I hadn’t expected to see you before this evening.’

He’d thought she would call that evening to discuss the money she owed him? Well, she didn’t want to discuss it in front of these other people, that was for sure. Merren took a tiny step back, but before she could tell him that she would call later, that perhaps she should have telephoned first, he had taken a swift hold of her upper arm and was drawing her closer to his front door.

‘Don’t be shy.’ He was smiling. Shy? ‘My mother and sister are just leaving, but come and say hello to them before they go.’ And before Merren could do more than think his manners were truly outstanding, she found herself in the hall with him, the front door closed, as he made the introductions.

‘I’m so pleased to see you, Merren,’ his mother beamed; her manners, Merren swiftly realised, every bit as outstanding as her son’s.

‘Do you live in London?’ his sister, Veda Partridge, smilingly wanted to know.

‘Surrey.’

‘Do you and Jarad often get to meet?’ Mrs Montgomery enquired pleasantly.

‘Mother!’ Jarad inserted warningly. ‘We saw each other yesterday, and the day before that, but I wouldn’t have told you anything about Merren had I thought you’d give her the third degree.’ And while Merren went a pretty pink, because Jarad had obviously told his mother and sister that he’d loaned her some money, his mother suddenly seemed overjoyed by what he had just said.

‘Oh, I’m so sorry,’ Mrs Montgomery apologised earnestly. ‘I’ve made you blush,’ she added, and, to Merren’s amazement, she kissed her cheek and said hurriedly, ‘We’re going before I embarrass you further.’

‘Bye, Merren,’ Veda smiled.

‘You must come down to Hillmount as soon as you can,’ his mother invited, and while Merren stood there—it didn’t seem to her to be very polite to suggest that the Montgomery family were a touch on the strange side—mother and daughter bade Jarad goodbye and went cheerfully from his home.

Jarad closed the door after them and guided Merren into the drawing room she had barely taken in last Thursday. It was high-ceilinged, elegant, with several extremely good oil paintings adorning the walls, and yet was a comfortable room with its well-padded sofas and scattering of chairs and low tables.

‘I’m sorry about that,’ he said, as he invited her to take a seat.

She opted for one of the easy chairs, and he did the same. ‘I know I’m in no position to mind, but I’d have preferred it had you not told your family about the money,’ Merren responded, to what she thought was his apology for discussing the matter with his mother and sister.

She was therefore a little shaken when he denied that he had done any such thing. ‘Anything to do with that money is just between you and me,’ he asserted evenly.

Merren stared at him. ‘You didn’t mention it in any way?’ Looking steadily at her, he shook his head. She owned she was puzzled. ‘Then—what was that “I wouldn’t have told you anything about Merren” about? You must have told them something about…’ Her voice trailed off. ‘Were you meaning you told them about me being mugged? Though that doesn’t…’

‘That doesn’t explain why my mother and sister would be ready to give you the third degree,’ he took over. ‘I’m afraid, Merren,’ he went on pleasantly, ‘that your timing today could have been better. Though I must say your blush was right on cue.’

‘Is everybody in your family eccentric?’ she enquired nicely, the fog getting thicker instead of clearing.

‘My father, bless his heart, keeps strictly out of it. I wish,’ he muttered, ‘that I were allowed to do the same.’

‘You mentioned explaining.’

‘I’m not doing a very good job, am I?’ He looked at her, smiled at her—it was rather a nice smile she thought—and she waited. ‘So here goes,’ Jarad continued, and went on, ‘For years now my mother—my sister holds the same view—has been of the opinion that I should marry and settle down.’

‘You’re not married?’ Merren queried, feeling oddly content that it should be so. Weird—that mugging Thursday had a lot to answer for.

‘Never felt the need,’ he replied. ‘To be frank, I very much enjoy my life just as it is.’

‘You don’t feel at all that you’re missing anything?’ He didn’t answer, but thinking about it, his home, his position on the board of Roxford Waring, and glancing at him—a good-looking, all virile male—there was no need for him to answer—he had it all. ‘That was a dumb question,’ she granted. ‘Your mother doesn’t know your views about…’

‘Oh, she knows. I’ve repeatedly told her. But that’s never stopped her from doing a trawl of her friends every now and then for likely daughters, nieces, friends of daughters, friends of nieces—it’s been hell!’

Shame. ‘There must have been one or two acceptable ones.’

‘Acceptable for what? If I’d given in and taken just one of them out, my mother would have been wondering what to give us for an engagement present!’

‘As bad as that?’

‘Believe it. Though,’ he conceded, ‘things did get a little better when Piers left university and came here to live with me.’

‘Your mother thought it better that you looked after him?’

‘That too, of course. But mainly she saw that if she was wasting her time with me, then Piers was just coming up to marriageable age. Piers is fifteen years younger than me. Love my mother though I do, I loved her more when she started to leave me alone and give Piers the treatment. Though in his case it was granddaughters of friends and great-nieces who were brought out for inspection.’

‘Is that why your brother took off abroad?’ Merren asked. It seemed logical. ‘To get away?’

‘No, nothing like that. Piers had a whale of a time. He thoroughly enjoyed not having to hunt, but finding his supper there, handed to him on a plate.’ Which wouldn’t suit you, Jarad Montgomery, Merren guessed. He’d want to hunt. He wouldn’t want conquests handed to him on a plate. Which was why, she saw, he’d been unable to find a flicker of interest for any of the women his mother had introduced. ‘Piers came out of it unscathed, and has gone abroad for a year because that’s what he always planned to do. Which, Merren Shepherd,’ Jarad said, ‘brings me round to letting you know why I’ve been confiding what is exclusively a family matter.’

Merren looked at him warily. He was serious now, unsmiling. Why, she wondered, when she felt certain he was a rather private man, with a great affection for his family, would he tell her, a person he barely knew, details about his family—as he just had?

‘It’s got something to do with the money, hasn’t it?’ was the best guess she could come up with. ‘The two thousand pounds you’re out of pocket?’

‘Got it in one,’ Jarad congratulated her. ‘When earlier I opened my door and my mother and Veda walked in, I feared the worst. Piers only left last Thursday, and already I’m back being the target!’

‘You think they’ll revert back to trying to get you to the altar?’

‘I know it!’ he stated unequivocally. ‘They’ve started already. My mother, ably abetted by Veda, came today to insist I’d be letting her down if I didn’t pay Hillmount a visit next weekend. They’re up to something.’

‘You think they’ll have someone on hand for you to—er—partner?’

‘I’d bank on it. I told them I’d got plans—and of course they wanted to know what plans.’

‘Well, if you’ve something on, surely they won’t expect…’

‘I’ve nothing on that’s so important I can’t change it. But, having had a breathing space while Piers was here, I saw at once that the year ahead was going to be pretty diabolical if I couldn’t head them off.’ He broke off for a moment, but then resumed, ‘Which was why, partly for the hell of it, partly in an attempt to knock on the head any “casual” introductions they have lined up for me in the coming twelve months, I told them that I’d met someone special and that I didn’t want to miss any chance of seeing her. That I hoped they’d understand, and not be hurt that I wouldn’t be going down to Hampshire next weekend.’

‘You’re seeing someone special?’ Merren checked.

‘I don’t know anyone that special,’ Jarad denied, with a grin. ‘But by that time both my mother and sister were quite positive I was going steady.’

‘Didn’t they want to know more about her?’

‘You’re getting to know them,’ he commented lightly. ‘I told them they’d meet her in due time—which, left in peace, would give me time to work out my next move. Happy when at last it appeared I’d been nailed, they were on the point of leaving, in fact were all at the bottom end of the hall, when you rang the bell.’

Merren looked at him, but when he held her gaze it seemed he had nothing more to say, and she played back in her mind Jarad opening his door to her, his mother and sister appearing behind him, their questions, Mrs Montgomery kissing her cheek. Merren’s eyes widened.

‘They think—th-think I’m your steady girlfriend, don’t they?’ she gasped. And, as more brain power arrived—‘This is a delightful surprise,’ he’d said!—‘That’s what you wanted them to believe, wasn’t it?’

‘Not until I glanced at my mother and saw that eager glad light in her eye. Both she and Veda were speculating like mad—Is she the one? It seemed a shame then to waste the opportunity—tailor-made—on my doorstep.’

‘Opportunity?’ Merren questioned, not certain how she felt about any of this, but striving to keep up. ‘You used me to…’

‘Don’t look at it that way,’ he cut in.

‘What other way is there to look at it?’ she bridled. ‘In that one glance to your mother you read the situation and decided to make capital out of it—using me! How else am I supposed to look at it?’

‘Are you always this fiery?’ he wanted to know, and, not giving her chance to answer, he went on, ‘If you’ll bear with me for a short while, I’m sure you’ll agree that we can work everything out to our mutual advantage.’

Merren opened her mouth. Mutual advantage! He was hinting at the money she owed him—must be. Oh, crumbs—whatever was worked out she was still left owing him two thousand pounds—which she hadn’t a hope of repaying. ‘I’m listening,’ she mumbled.

‘It’s obvious to me that you can’t manage on your salary or you’d never have got yourself into debt.’ Given that Robert and his family were in receipt of State benefits, a good part of her salary went to assist a family of five, but she wasn’t about to tell him that. ‘Which makes it equally obvious that you’re never going to be in a position to repay the two thousand I handed you yesterday.’ Merren shifted uncomfortably in her seat, deciding she could do without this tell-the-truth-and-shame-the-devil tactic. ‘Equally obvious, too, is the fact that, while you might get yourself into debt, you have every intention of settling all those debts—which is why you’re here now.’

‘You said to come.’

‘You needn’t have.’

‘You know where I live,’ she thought to mention.

‘You wouldn’t have come otherwise?’

It didn’t take any thinking about. ‘Oh, I would,’ she answered. Pride, honesty. She’d have come. ‘It’s a pig being honest.’

‘Good,’ Jared smiled, having no doubts about her honesty, apparently—she had an idea he would never have introduced her to his mother and sister the way he had if he’d had any doubts about her. ‘It’s clearly important to you that we find some way for you to pay back that money—you wouldn’t be here at all otherwise.’

‘You’ve found some work for me?’

He smiled. ‘I’ve found a job for you—if you’re willing to do it.’

‘I’ve told you, I’m prepared to do anything legal.’

‘Oh, this is legal,’ he assured her. Then, evenly, he enquired, ‘How would you like to be my steady girlfriend for a year?’

Merren stared at him. She wasn’t sure that her jaw didn’t drop. ‘You’re not serious?’

‘I promise you I am.’

‘But—but—we don’t even know each other!’ she protested.

‘We don’t have to—it will be an in-name-only courtship.’

‘For your mother’s sake—er—or rather, yours?’

‘Don’t forget about my sister being my mother’s trusty lieutenant.’

Merren didn’t like it. ‘You’d deceive them, carry on deceiving them? For a year?’

‘Until Piers gets back and they can turn their attentions on him.’

She still didn’t like it. ‘Can’t you just explain that you don’t want their attention? That you’re happy as you are?’

‘Do you think I haven’t tried?’

‘It didn’t work?’

‘Three weeks at most is the longest they’ve backed off. You’ve a family yourself. You know the pressure that sometimes brings.’ Didn’t she just! If it wasn’t for Robert and that two thousand pounds he needed she wouldn’t be in this mess. ‘Friends, acquaintances, they understand the word “No”; families just don’t recognise it. Unfortunately, where you can tell friends or acquaintances where to go, if you’re so minded, some family members—who take liberties friends wouldn’t dream of entertaining—cannot be told.’

‘But have to be shown?’ Merren queried.

‘Exactly.’

Merren still didn’t like it any better. But she owed him. ‘What would I have to do?’ she asked reluctantly.

‘Probably nothing at all,’ Jarad answered. ‘But if for the next twelve months you could be “on call”, as it were, it should resolve matters to everyone’s satisfaction.’

‘By “on call” you mean, let you have my phone number, and be available to drive here the moment you ring—that sort of thing?’

‘I doubt very much that I’ll have to bother you,’ Jarad commented easily. ‘Though, with your permission, I’d like to drop your name into the conversation whenever I feel it appropriate. My mother seldom calls to see me—which is why today’s visit has such ominous overtones. Ye gods, my brother only left the country a couple of days ago!’

‘You—um—don’t think you’re being just a little unfair to your mother and sister—fooling them…?’

‘Unfair! Was it fair of them to poke their matrimonially-minded noses in, and then to spoil what is a very enjoyable lifestyle?’

‘Life’s a toad!’ she commiserated, though with not much sympathy. But seriously needed to recap. ‘You’re saying, Mr Montgomery, that all I have to do to repay that loan is to be ready to shoot over here to your home occasionally when the call comes?’

‘The situation may never arise, as I’ve said. But that’s about it.’

‘Two thousand pounds seems a lot of money to pay for something that may never arise,’ her innate honesty compelled her to point out.

Steady grey eyes pinned her deeply blue ones. ‘Call it a retainer,’ he suggested, and before she could comment on that, he added, ‘Just in case, you’d better recite the name “Jarad” ten times a day.’

Merren laughed. She guessed it wouldn’t look good were she to dash ‘on call’ to see him, to greet him as ‘Mr Montgomery’ in front of his mother. ‘I’ll practise,’ she promised, and, unable to think of anything else they might need to discuss, she got to her feet.

Jarad went to the front door with her. But before he opened it he looked down at her as they stood there, and told her, ‘I think you and I are going to fare very well together, Merren Shepherd.’ Then he gave a sigh, ‘Such a pity—I may never need to see you again.’

Merren laughed again. He seemed to have that effect on her—or was it just that she was relieved that she wasn’t going to have to work every night and all weekends? ‘We can only hope,’ she grinned, and went home still smiling.

When she thought over all that had been said, as she did on that drive home, Merren realised that, when it came to it, even though it was pretty obvious that she’d have to drop everything and dash if his phone call came—a two-thousand-pound retainer wasn’t half bad.

She pulled up at her home, fancying that she could see a glimmer of a silver lining behind her dark cloud.

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