Читать книгу A Husband's Price - Diana Hamilton - Страница 7

CHAPTER TWO

SILENCE. Shock clamped Claudia into a small, dark, very tight corn. Clamped her in so tightly she could barely breathe, let alone speak.

How dared he show his face here? Oh, how dared he?

Then the thick silence eased just a little, slowly nudged away by the inevitable impingement of ordinary, everyday sounds. The sonorous, echoey ticking of the longcase clock; the stutter and grumble of machinery from directly outside as Bill, the new groundsman, tried to start the ride-on mower; Amy’s voice—the sound of the words she spoke as they fell on the still air, but not the sense of them—and the sound of the housekeeper’s feet on the polished wood floor blocks as she walked away; the thump of her own, wild heartbeats.

He’d changed, and yet he hadn’t. That was the first coherent thought she had. Though how a thought could be coherent and contradictory was a total mystery.

At thirty, Adam Weston was a spectacularly attractive man. The once over-long, soft black hair was expertly cut and those pagan-god features were tougher now, more forceful than they’d been six years ago. That superbly fit body was clothed in a silky dark grey suit, crafted by a master tailor, instead of the scruffy cut-offs and washed-out T-shirts that had been his habitual wear during that long, hot summer when she had loved him so.

A man with those looks, that kind of honed physique, would always land on his feet, especially if he still possessed that laid-back, lazy charm, the charm that had had her swooning at his feet from that first unforgettable smile.

Obviously, he’d finally married an heiress. Well, bully for him! she thought cynically, wondering if he’d come here to gloat because he’d done very well, thank you, for himself and she was practically bankrupt.

‘What do you want, Adam?’ Her voice was tight, quaky, like an old woman’s. And she knew she didn’t look anything like the lushly curvaceous, fresh-faced and dewy-eyed eighteen-year-old he’d sweet-talked into his bed all those years ago. She didn’t need that look of distaste he was giving her to tell her that, while he’d been able to bring himself to the point of actually making love to her six years ago, he found her a total turn-off now.

Claudia lifted her chin and told herself she didn’t care, in either event. ‘I’m expecting someone. Can you see yourself out?’

She knew she sounded like a snob of the first water, the lady of the manor ordering the boot boy out of her rarefied presence, and saw his eyes narrow and harden. Those smoky grey eyes that didn’t smile any more.

‘You’re expecting me, Mrs Favel.’ His voice was clipped. Hard. As hard as his eyes. ‘The Hallam Group,’ he reminded her, as if, Claudia thought resentfully, he thought she was completely stupid.

But hadn’t he always thought that? That she had rampaging hormones where other people had brains. That she’d be a pushover, blindly and ecstatically rushing into marriage with a drifter who was only interested in getting his hands on her assets, which, in those days, had been considerable.

Within a few short weeks he’d had her besotted, head over heels in love and so eager to accept his proposal of marriage she’d practically fallen over herself. And the only thing that had stopped her dragging him down the aisle had been the evidence of her own eyes...

Adam walking out of Helen’s bedroom, his face tight and furious. He’d been so furious he hadn’t seen her at the top of the service stairs, her arms full of freshly laundered bed-linen.

Helen. Helen sitting on the edge of her bed, clad only in those wisps of underwear. Furious, too, spitting out that poison about him only being interested in her, Claudia’s future financial prospects, ramming home the final nail in the coffin of her love for him with, ‘He must have seen me come up here—he knows your father’s out I was getting ready to have a shower before changing. He just walked in and started on about the way he’d always fancied me. He said we could have fun—adult fun. He was sick of playing with a child, only the child, as it happened, would one day come into a fortune. He meant you, my poor sweet! And then...heaven help me...I told him to pack his bags and get off Farthings Hall property. I said if he was still around when your father got back he’d regret it.’

‘I was told to expect the late Mr Hallam’s heir,’ she said now, her voice stiff with remembered outrage and pain. Then added insultingly, ‘Not the tea boy.’

His smile was wintry. ‘And I always thought you had such lovely manners.’ He turned, walked away, moving over the huge, raftered hall back towards the library. ‘Harold Hallam was my mother’s brother. He didn’t marry and, as far as anyone knows, he had no issue. I inherited his holding in the Group. Perhaps now we might begin our discussions, provided you’re satisfied with my credentials. Unless, of course, you’re no longer interested in any offer my company might be prepared to come up with.’

Disorientated, Claudia stared at his retreating back. Such wide, spare shoulders tapering down to that narrow, flat waist, such long, long legs, and all of him so elegantly packaged in a suit so beautifully cut it could only have come from Savile Row.

‘So you finally fell on your feet.’ She truly hadn’t realised she’d spoken the thought aloud until he turned at the door to the library, grey eyes chilling, that utterly sensual, boldly defined mouth contemptuous.

‘So it would seem.’

She tilted her chin in challenging defiance, her blue eyes cool. After what he’d done to her, did he really expect to make her feel ashamed of her lack of manners? Did he seriously expect her to apologise?

It would give her enormous satisfaction to ask him to leave.

But he’d disappeared into the library—as if he already owned the place—and she pulled in a deep breath, drew back her shoulders and followed.

She found Amy practically on her heels, the delicate china coffee cups rattling companionably on the tray she carried.

Claudia stepped aside at the doorway to allow the housekeeper passage, wincing as the older woman put the tray down on the long, polished table, a huge smile splitting her rosy face as she marvelled, ‘Well, and isn’t this a turn up for the books, young Adam? Who’d have thought—?’

‘Thank you, Amy,’ Claudia interrupted smoothly. Amy had had a soft spot for the young Adam Weston all those years ago, making sure he was lavishly supplied from the kitchens, that the old caravan he was living in was packed with creature comforts. He’d had the useful ability to charm just about anyone who could do him any good!

Pointedly, she began to pour coffee, both cups black and sugarless because that was the way she liked it and he could do what the heck he wanted with his. Amy suggested, ‘Should I put a match to the fire? It’s a bit nippy, don’t you think?’

She was already bustling towards the wide stone hearth, but Adam’s smile stopped her. His smile, Claudia remembered, could stop a runaway train. No problem. ‘We’re fine, Amy. Truly. Besides, after we’ve had coffee, Mrs Favel and I will be going to find a quiet pub for lunch, but thank you for the offer.’

This man had acquired authority, Claudia decided acidly as Amy melted away. Lashings of it. But nothing would induce her to have lunch with him. As soon as Amy had closed the door she said, ‘I’m sorry to have wasted your time, but I’ve decided not to do business with your company after all.’

‘Cutting your nose off to spite your face?’ The slight smile he gave her as he picked up his coffee was a patronising insult. Claudia felt her entire body seizing up, every bone, every muscle going rigid with tension.

Over the past six years she’d really believed she had come to terms with what he had done, with his wickedly cruel betrayal. If anyone had told her that seeing him again would affect her like this—as if he still had the power to give her pain, to make her go weak and boneless with one look from those smoke-grey eyes—then she would have laughed until her ribs cracked.

He drained his cup, his eyes assessing her over the rim. ‘I’ve had a shock, too, Claudia. You were the last person I expected to see this morning.’ He put the cup back on its saucer with a tiny click and suggested, ‘So why don’t we both take a deep breath, put on our business hats, and start again?’ He made a small gesture with one lean, strong-boned hand. ‘Won’t you, perhaps, sit down?’

She ignored the seamless way he was taking over, her brows frowning above her thickly lashed eyes as she picked up her cup and carried it over to one of the deeply recessed window embrasures—because her legs felt distinctly shaky, and for no other reason at all. Sitting down on the padded cushion, she tilted one interrogative brow.

‘Who else would you expect to see? Widow Twanky? You can’t have forgotten who owns Farthings Hall.’

‘Six years ago Guy Sullivan, your father, owned the property. I hadn’t given the place a thought until the impending sale was brought to my attention. The name Favel meant nothing to me. Your father...’ For the first time he looked unsure of himself, as if he had only just realised that the change of ownership might mean Guy Sullivan was no longer living. ‘Your father always treated me fairly,’ be said quietly.

Sarcastic swine! He’d been long gone, on that rattletrap old motorbike of his, well before her father had returned that day, so he had no way of knowing what Guy Sullivan would have said and done had he been told—as Helen had threatened—what had been happening in his absence.

He’d got the treatment he deserved from her and from Helen. Had it given him pleasure to hammer home the fact that he hadn’t given her a moment’s thought in six long years?

But she put him out of his misery in one respect. ‘Dad’s visiting a friend for the day.’ She saw the slight tension drain from his face and knew with a small shock of surprise that he was actually relieved.

‘But you are the present owner?’ He was leaning back against the table, half sitting, his arms folded across his chest, his eyes narrowed as if he was weighing up everything she said.

‘Yes.’ She didn’t have to tell him any more.

‘Sole owner?’

She dipped her head in acknowledgement and he drawled, as if the prospect didn’t much appeal, ‘Then you and I do business. At this stage, there’s no need for me to view the property; I remember as much as I need to right now.’

Claudia forced herself not to flinch at that callously casual reminder. He might have been able to wipe her from his memory banks with no trouble at all but during his time here he’d surveyed every inch of the property, so no, he wouldn’t have forgotten what he’d seen, and decided to have.

They’d roamed every inch of the acreage together, the formal gardens, the paddocks, the headlands and the lovely unspoilt valley that led down to the cove, following the well-trodden path meandering beside the clear, sparkly waters of the stream, hand in hand, blissfully happy. Or so she’d thought.

And he’d obviously known enough about the interior of the house to go straight to Helen’s bedroom the moment a suitable opportunity arose. He had never troubled himself to find out where her, Claudia’s, room was. He’d made love to her in many places: the soft, moonlit grass of the headlands, the silky sand of the cove, even in the caravan on that claustrophobic bunk bed; but never here in the house.

Had he had too much respect for Helen, been too overawed by her golden, sizzling sexiness, to believe he had any hope of seducing her at all in the great outdoors or the mouldering old caravan? Had he decided his chances would be greater in the comfort of her own suite of rooms, between the luxury of satin sheets?

‘So, since the restaurant here is closed at lunchtime during the off season, I suggest we find a quiet pub and discuss generalities over lunch.’

Claudia blinked herself back to the here and now. He seemed able to operate as if there had never been anything between them in the past, or as if what had happened between them was not worth remembering, she thought resentfully, beginning to burn with a slow, deep anger. Perhaps the only way a person could live with the memory of their own despicable behaviour was to ignore it, as he seemed to be doing with great success.

Claudia rose and returned her cup and saucer to the tray. Her face was calm, icily controlled, hiding the raging inner turmoil. She was about to repeat forcefully her earlier statement that no way would she do business with him but, before she could get the words out, he stated coolly, ‘You’re married.’

That had to be obvious, of course, from her change of surname and, of course, he looked and sounded utterly detached. Why should he look anything other? His emotions had never been engaged where she was concerned, only his greed.

‘So?’ Her mouth was trembling. She thinned her lips to make it stop. ‘Are you?’

‘No. But that’s hardly relevant. Your husband isn’t a joint owner of the property?’ The grey of his eyes was, if anything, even more austere, his mouth twisting in a parody of a smile. ‘Don’t look so defensive, Mrs Favel. My interest in you and your husband isn’t personal. On a professional basis I need to know exactly who I have to deal with.’

He was astute, she had to give him that, Claudia acknowledged shakily. He could tell she felt threatened—her body language must have given her away. And, truth to tell, she had been threatened ever since she’d walked into the kitchen gardens six years ago and feasted her eyes on the stunning perfection of him.

He had threatened her happiness, her innocence, her unquestioning belief in the intrinsic goodness of human nature. Threatened and destroyed. So she had every right to look defensive.

‘I’m the sole owner.’ She could see no reason to tell him of Tony’s death, to tell him anything other than, ‘However, it’s entirely academic. Maybe you weren’t listening, but I distinctly remember telling you I’d decided not to deal with your company.’

She swung round on the low heels of her court shoes, facing the empty hearth rather than see him watching her with those chilling, empty eyes.

‘And I said you’d be cutting off your nose to spite your face,’ he reminded her dryly. ‘However, if you prefer to take your chances on the open market, and keep your fingers crossed that whoever fancies taking this place on has got the necessary financial backing to deliver the asking price, rather than consider the obvious advantages of dealing privately with a successful outfit like the Hallam Group, then that, of course, is your prerogative.’

He’d followed her. He was standing right behind her. She could smell the cool, lemony scent of his aftershave, the rugged undertone of dominant male. It flummoxed her, made her feel disorientated. She despised him totally yet could understand completely why her younger self had fallen for him, had gladly given all she had of herself, would have unhesitatingly given her life for him had it been required of her...

Claudia swallowed roughly, her movements jerky as she put distance between them. She really hated to admit it, but he was right. A private deal between her and the Hallam Group would save a lot of grief. A company as secure as his wouldn’t haggle over a fair price. She needed the best deal she could get to pay off those massive debts.

A quick, private sale would be easier on her father, too. He wouldn’t have to suffer the local speculation that would precede a public auction. Having to sell up at all would affect him badly—he could do without the added stress of having to explain why to anyone who felt inclined to ask.

The book she’d been reading recently was lying on a side table. She hadn’t been enjoying it. She picked it up because it was something to do, and hopefully it would make him think she was perfectly composed, unaffected by having to share room space with him.

But her fingers were agitated, clumsy, as she tried to slot it into a vacant space on the packed bookshelves. It fell, spine up, to the floor, the snapshot of her and Rosie, taken earlier this year, the one she’d been using as a bookmark, landing on the soft, jewel-coloured Persian carpet.

He had picked the book up before she had time to think, handing it to her but keeping the snapshot. Claudia felt physically sick, her hand going up to cover her mouth. A dull flush mounted his jutting cheekbones, his eyes glittering hotly as he raised them to meet hers.

‘You have a daughter?’ he asked harshly, glancing down again at the two grinning images and swiftly back up at her, forcing her to nod the affirmative.

‘Look—about lunch. I agree. We can discuss business in neutral surroundings. I might as well hear what you have to offer.’ She would have said anything—anything at all—to change the subject, to take his mind off that photograph. She swept past him, plucking it from his fingers with a murmured, ‘Thank you,’ as she went. She felt his eyes boring into her back, right between her rigid shoulder blades, as she made for the door. ‘I’ll collect my handbag and let Amy know I’ll be out. I won’t keep you waiting more than a minute or two.’

Back in her bedroom, she pressed her fingertips to her throbbing temples. If the past six weeks had been a nightmare, then Adam Weston’s appearance put the tin lid on it! After her meeting with the bank manager she had foolishly imagined that nothing very much worse could happen.

How wrong she had been!

Stifling a groan, she surveyed her image in the dressing-table mirror. She looked haggard, middle-aged, careworn. She shrugged, turning away, taking her bag from the top of the chest of drawers where she’d left it earlier and tucking the photograph safely inside.

So what did it matter if she looked like death warmed up? He wasn’t interested in her, in the way she looked. He never had been. All he’d been interested in was her prospects.

Nor did she want him to be interested in her. Of course she didn’t. She was no longer a silly teenager who thought the world a beautiful place and the people in it perfect angels. She knew better now. And she could hack it; she could face having lunch with that snake. For the sake of her father and her child, she could endure it and would, she determined grimly, stick out for the best price she could possibly get.

Business, it seemed, wasn’t on his mind. And it had fled from hers as soon as they’d realised where they were.

The Unicorn. A mythical beast, which was fitting because it had been here that he had declared his mythical love all those years ago, she thought bitterly as she eyed the tiny, stone-built pub from the side window of Adam’s Jaguar.

‘Remember it?’ he asked now, removing the key from the ignition, and she gave him a blank-eyed stare.

‘Should I?’ She exited the car.

Of course she remembered it. The tiny pub, tucked away in a narrow, wooded valley, well off the beaten track. She hadn’t been back in all this time, but she could have given him an inventory. However, she wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of knowing she’d ever thought about the place after that night.

They’d ridden here on his motorbike one glorious evening, scraping enough money up between them to buy a glass of cider each and an enormous, bursting-with-flavour Cornish pasty, which they’d shared.

After they’d eaten, they’d sat outside on one of the picnic benches, slowly drinking the cider, and he’d reached over the table and wiped a bead of moisture from her mouth with his thumb, rubbing softly, slowly, his eyes heavy, his voice low and warm, so warm. ‘I love you, Claudia. I want you. Always. So now you know.’ His eyes had lingered on her mouth and she had known he wanted to kiss her. ‘You’ve got the rest of the summer to get used to the idea of having me around, loving you, wanting you.’

She hadn’t needed the rest of the summer to get used to that. She’d gloried in the idea of him loving her and wanting her. She’d felt exactly the same and had been ecstatic about it.

He’d touched her before, of course, the slide of a hand over her hip, a kiss—nothing heavy—stroking her breasts very, very lightly, as if he wasn’t sure of himself, or of her, making her hold her breath with the wonder of the sensations, of what was happening to her body. After his declaration of love she’d known there would be more; known that neither of them would be willing or capable of holding back.

Neither of them had spoken much about that. They’d ridden back to Farthings Hall, her arms clasped tightly around his body, and she’d known what it felt like to be in a trance. The moon had been up by then and after he’d parked the bike he’d drawn her away from the caravan when she would have gone inside to make coffee, as she always did after one of their evening excursions.

She hadn’t asked where they were going. She hadn’t had to. Somehow she’d known that the moonlit cove would be where she would give herself for the first time to the man she would love for all time.

Only she didn’t love him for all time, of course, she reminded herself staunchly as she trod firmly over the cobbled car park ahead of him. Her love had died the moment she’d learned the truth from Helen. And she’d die herself before she allowed him to know that she remembered anything about this place or had anything but the very haziest of memories about that lost summer.

Small though it was, the Unicorn had a reputation for good, unpretentious, home-cooked food. At a table in a quiet window alcove, Adam handed her the menu. Claudia put it down, unopened. ‘I’ll have a green salad and coffee.’ Her mouth compressed. It would be foolish and wasteful to order anything more when she had the feeling her stomach would reject whatever she tried to feed it.

A sable brow quirked with sardonic intent. ‘Is that how you’ve lost so much weight? Living on a lettuce leaf washed down with black coffee?’

So he hadn’t totally forgotten. He remembered enough about her to be able to compare the gaunt woman opposite with the eighteen-year-old who’d been blessed with all those lush curves. Hearing him as good as admit it gave her a spurt of savage pleasure. He’d tried to give the impression that he hadn’t given the Hall, or her, a second’s thought in all these years, and had just now proved himself wrong.

But then, he was an expert liar. He probably had a first-class degree in the twisted art!

‘We’re here on business,’ she reminded him, unfolding the large linen napkin and shaking it out over her knees as their food arrived. ‘I suggest we stick to that, rather than descend to the personal.’

‘Descend?’ He almost smiled. ‘In the past, when talk reached a personal level, things tended to go up, not down.’ He forked up some of the seafood pie he’d ordered but didn’t eat it, she noticed as she ignored his unsubtle innuendo, applying herself to her salad. She managed to swallow some but gave up altogether when he leaned back in his chair and asked, ‘Your daughter... What do you call her?’

‘Rosie.’ She hated having to tell him, but she could hardly refuse. She didn’t want to discuss her beloved, infinitely precious child with him at all. Ever.

‘Pretty.’ His unsmiling eyes bored into hers. ‘Rosie Favel. It rings a faint bell. Favel? Should I know your husband?’ he persisted.

Claudia sighed. It was none of his business. She would have told him just that, but practicalities had to come before pride. She had the future welfare of her father and her child to consider. She needed to get the best deal she could out of this man and continued rudeness wouldn’t do anything to help in that respect.

She stirred her sugarless black coffee slowly, gathering patience. ‘Perhaps,’ she granted, then took a heartening sip of the hot and excellent brew. He was not to be fobbed off with that, however. His intent, unblinking expression told her that much.

‘You probably saw him around at odd times during the summer you worked here.’ She refused to elevate the couple of months he was at Farthings Hall higher than that, give it more importance. ‘Tony was my father’s accountant. He came around fairly regularly.’

‘That fair-haired guy who always seemed to be hanging around your stepmother.’ His mouth curled derisively and his voice was bitter. Because Helen had shown the young and sexy part-time gardener off the premises, preferring the more experienced attentions of her so-called distant cousin?

Had he seen what she and her father had signally failed to recognise—the ongoing affair between those two? She felt her face go red. The idea was hurtful and somehow very degrading.

‘He has to be twenty years your senior.’ His eyes were cold, as if he despised everything about her.

Claudia corrected him hotly, ‘Twelve, actually. Not that it mattered. He was kind.’

Whatever else Tony had been, or hadn’t been, he had always shown her kindness. It was ironic, really, that she hadn’t discovered how cruelly he’d treated her until after his death.

‘How nice for you.’ Adam showed his teeth. As an attempted smile it wouldn’t rate one out of ten, and his subsequent, ‘So when did you marry your well-healed, ageing Lothario?’ made her grind her teeth.

‘October. Exactly six years ago. Satisfied?’ He hadn’t picked up on her earlier use of the past tense and she frowned, wondering, just for a moment, why she didn’t come right out with it and tell him Tony was dead. And knew the answer: because she couldn’t afford to have him know too much about her situation. ‘Maybe now we can change the subject and talk about why we are here at all.’

‘Gladly.’ He drained his coffee cup. ‘How old is Rosie?’

Her blue eyes clouded with anger. Why the heck couldn’t he leave it? ‘What my daughter’s age has to do with the sale of Farthings Hall escapes me.’ She bunched up her napkin and dropped it on her largely untouched salad, gathered her handbag and swept to her feet. ‘I can only imagine you have no intention whatsoever of making an offer, that you brought me here with the sole objective of causing me as much aggravation as possible because, six years ago, I had the temerity to dump you!’

Claudia stalked out, leaving him to settle the bill, and she was waiting impatiently by the Jaguar when he finally strolled out after what seemed to her to be an inordinate length of time.

‘I liked the outraged dignity act.’ He was actually smiling for the first time that day. Claudia looked quickly away. That smile of his had always been lethal and nothing had changed in that respect except he used it a lot less often. Round her, at least.

‘I hate wasting time, Mr Weston.’ She glanced at her wristwatch. They should be back at Farthings Hall in time for her to collect Rosie from the village primary school. She prayed that he wouldn’t hang around. There wasn’t going to be a deal. This morning had been a painful waste of time.

‘So, Mrs Favel, do I.’ He opened the passenger door. ‘Though I wouldn’t agree our time has been wasted—even though more questions have been raised than answered.’ He ushered her into the passenger seat and closed the door. While he walked round to the driver’s side she wondered what he was talking about and decided she definitely didn’t want to know.

One thing she was sure of was the unlikelihood of him making any offer for her home on behalf of his company. That, she reasoned, would have been ruled out of the question the moment he’d realised who she was. He probably still felt bitter about the way he’d been ordered off the property six years ago when he’d been just the hired help.

He wouldn’t be inclined to do her any favours. She breathed out raggedly, shifting in her seat as the powerful car tucked neatly into the side of the narrow lane on a particularly tight bend.

‘Relax,’ he said coolly. ‘I’ll have our surveyor go over your property. One day next week, perhaps. Our formal offer will depend on his report.’

Claudia did as she was told. She relaxed. Well, as much as she could, given the company she was keeping. He hadn’t written off the possibility of a sale, so she could keep the harmful truth from her father for another few days—until she was forced to tell him everything by the imminent arrival of the surveyor. Every day he got a little stronger, so the longer she could keep the dreadful news from him, the better.

A few more minutes and they would be back at the Hall. After Adam dropped her off he’d drive away, she consoled herself, and she would never have to see him again because all further business could be handled through their solicitors. And she could begin again the process of forgetting how very much she had once loved him, and how very much she had hated him for the first few years, and—

‘That is Rosie?’

The car had swept up the gravelled driveway and she hadn’t noticed. His query brought her out of her bitter ruminations. Her daughter was careering down the flight of stone steps from the open main entrance door, dressed in cotton dungarees, her soft black hair flying around her face, Amy red-faced and puffing in hot pursuit.

Adam braked, the action controlled and smooth, and Claudia practically fell out of the door, reaching out and catching her squealing and giggling offspring and lifting her protectively into her arms.

‘Mummeee! Amy said to watch for the car—I saw you come!’ That wide, heart-stopping smile lit up the gorgeous little face, the wide, smoke-grey eyes. ‘The roof of the school fell down,’ she exaggerated wildly. ‘The whole school nearly fell down!’

‘Just the ceiling in the cloakroom, and only part of it at that,’ Amy explained breathlessly. ‘But Miss Possinger phoned at lunchtime to say could one of us collect her because all the children were being sent home early. They’re getting the plasterers in to fix it this evening.’

Claudia unwound her daughter’s arms from their stranglehold around her neck, her poor heart pounding. ‘Run along in with Amy, darling. I won’t be a moment.’ She wouldn’t have been that long even if, in her haste to stop her exuberant little girl hurtling off down the drive, she hadn’t left her handbag behind in the car. ‘Then I’ll get changed and maybe we’ll take a picnic down to the cove.’

She didn’t want her daughter around Adam Weston for one split second longer than necessary and she cursed the fates that had made it necessary at all, and held her breath as, the promise of a picnic as bait, Rosie slid to the ground, took Amy’s hand and trotted willingly back to the house.

Everything was OK. Claudia let out a relieved sigh of pent-up breath, then broke out in a cold sweat and felt the ground tilt beneath her feet as Adam said, his voice very cold, very precise, ‘That child is mine.’