Читать книгу Flirting With Danger - Kate Walker - Страница 7

‘WELL?’

The single, harsh syllable fell into the stunned silence that was the only response Catherine and her father could make to the clear and terrifyingly accurate assessment of the situation he had just given them. There really wasn’t any way they could possibly argue against it, she reflected unhappily.

‘Well?’ he repeated, more emphatically this time.

‘I—don’t know what you’re talking about.’

Stubbornly Catherine clung to her determination not to reveal anything to him.

‘You must have a very vivid imagination,’ she went on, with a touch of airiness that didn’t quite come off, instead making her sound brittle and highly-strung instead of achieving the insouciance she had aimed for. ‘You seem to have cobbled together some sort of fantasy scenario out of a lot of perfectly ordinary facts…’

Her voice failed her as Evan, not bothering to answer her verbally, turned on her the sort of cold, contemptuous look from those aquamarine eyes that made her quail fearfully inside, wanting to curl her arms round her to protect herself. Her earlier impression had been right, she told herself on a wave of unease. If provoked, Evan Lindsay could be a very dangerous character indeed.

‘It’s no good Cathy.’ Lloyd Davies pushed a hand through hair that was just a couple of shades darker than his daughter’s. ‘We can’t keep pretending that nothing’s wrong—’

‘Dad!’

‘We have to tell someone.‘ Her father ignored the reproachful glance she turned on him. ‘And it strikes me that Evan is the sort of man who might be able to help. That’s why—’

‘I don’t think anyone can help!’ The tension that Catherine had been holding in check all evening finally got the better of her, and the words escaped in a despairing rush. ‘Even the police—’

She cut herself off sharply, swallowing down what she had been about to say as Evan’s reaction told her just how much she had given away. The relaxed, almost indolent pose vanished as he sat up straight in his chair, his blue-green eyes fixed on her face.

‘The police?’

Catherine’s heart lurched painfully in her chest, every trace of confidence burned away in the cold fire of those changeable eyes, and she could only nod silently, her tongue seeming to have frozen in her mouth.

‘Why are the police involved in this?’

If he had stayed where he was then perhaps she might have been able to answer him, but to Catherine’s shock and total consternation Evan got up from his seat and came towards her, leaning down to rest both hands on the arms of her chair as he looked deep into her face.

‘Catherine?’

God, she hadn’t realised just how big a man he was— big and imposing and frighteningly strong. He was tough too; the set of his features told her that—the hard, square jaw, the tightness of the muscles around his mouth, the fierce, unblinking stare of those eyes.

A few moments earlier she had wondered what he would be like with the calm, affable veneer he had shown them up to now stripped away and the real Evan Lindsay revealed underneath. Now she was beginning to get some idea of the reality. The civilised finish had worn a little thin, exposing glimpses of a very different man—a man who was very much a force to be reckoned with.

‘Evan—I—’ her father began, but Evan let him get no further, cutting him off sharply.

‘I’m talking to your daughter,’ he flung over his shoulder, sparing the older man only the briefest of glances before turning his attention back to Catherine. ‘Why are the police involved in all this?’

Catherine struggled for some degree of control, her eyes wide and brilliant as sapphires over pale, drawn cheeks as she fought against the panic that was welling up inside her, threatening to take control. Earlier she had been fearful of Evan simply because he was a man, one she didn’t know, but now it was more personal, more specific to him. She recalled how he had told her that he had been in the army, and her imagination conjured up images of all the interrogation scenes in any film she had ever seen, making her shiver in apprehension.

‘You’re frightening me!’ she managed on a shaky gasp.

Evan’s response was immediate and unexpected. His head went back sharply, his eyes darkening in something close to shock, and he looked down at his hands, realising the aggressive nature of his position, the implied threat in the way he towered over her.

‘I’m sorry!’ he said abruptly, moving back swiftly and raking one hand through the ebony sleekness of his hair in a gesture that spoke more clearly of his mental disturbance than any words could ever do. ‘I’m sorry,’ he repeated, his voice rough and slightly husky. ‘I didn’t mean to upset you.’

Catherine was shocked to find that his features seemed blurred, that tears had filled her eyes, obscuring her vision, and she blinked hard to try to clear them away.

‘I’d like you to go now.’ But even as she spoke the words she knew that she had little hope that Evan would do as she asked.

‘Oh, no.’

The hard voice confirmed her fears, the adamant shake of his dark head driving home the point without hope of reprieve.

‘You’ve involved me now. I’m not leaving until you tell me just what’s going on.’

‘But you have an appointment.’

It was a last ditch effort, the only card she had to play, and the desperation in her voice revealed how close she was to breaking.

Her hopes rose slightly when Evan looked at his watch and frowned in response to her words. An hour, he had said, and most of that time was already gone.

Catherine could hardly believe her eyes when he turned on his heel and headed for the door. Surely it couldn’t be all over; it couldn’t be that easy!

It wasn’t. In the hall she heard Evan come to a halt, and then the sound of the telephone receiver being picked up. Without so much as a by your leave he pressed the number buttons with firm decisiveness.

‘Sam?’ His voice carried clearly to where she sat. ‘About tonight—I’m afraid something’s come up and I’m not going to be able to make it. Can we arrange another time?’

This Samantha must be an amazingly tolerant woman, Catherine reflected. There had been no apology, no hint of contrition in Evan’s voice, only that laconic ‘Something’s come up.’ Or was it Samuel, and so a very different matter entirely?

‘Cathy, I think we have to tell him.’ Her father’s tone was urgent, pushing her to agree. ‘You need someone—’

‘Someone, yes—but not Evan Lindsay.’

‘But why not? It’s his line—his territory, so to speak.’

‘But we don’t know anything about him.’

Catherine couldn’t put into words the way she felt, the fear that the thought of venturing into Evan Lindsay’s ‘territory’ aroused in her. It smacked of stepping blindfolded into the lion’s den, if not precisely putting her head in its mouth.

‘We don’t know who he is—what he is.’

‘Fine.’ In the hallway, Evan was bringing his conversation to an end. ‘I’ll see you then.’

‘I know he’s very good at his job—came highly recommended—and he’s certainly been more than thorough. And you know that I can’t be here after this week—’

‘But I can.’

Catherine’s head jerked up, her gaze going to the doorway in nervous response to Evan’s low-toned interjection. Still standing just outside the room, he studied her for a long, taut moment, blue-green eyes narrowed, his expression thoughtful.

‘You weren’t joking about the bodyguard,’ he pronounced at last, making Catherine draw in her breath sharply, wondering how she had ever hoped to hide anything from this perceptive, keenly observant man. ‘Don’t you think you’d better let me in on the secret? At least that way I’ll be on your side.’

‘Cathy,’ Lloyd prompted, ‘please…’

‘I—don’t know.’ Her blue eyes were shadowed and dull, looking faintly bruised above the colourless skin of her cheeks. ‘I don’t even know if you could help.’

Evan moved suddenly, coming to sit opposite her once more, his eyes holding hers all the time. Leaning forward, he took her hands in both of his, his grip warm and firm, the intensity of his gaze seeming to have the power to draw her soul right out of her body.

‘Try me,’ he said softly.

In that moment something happened—something strange and wonderful and totally inexplicable. In the second that he spoke the quiet words it was suddenly as if a huge weight had fallen from Catherine’s heart, as if all her doubts and fears had been taken from her, washed away on a new tide of hope and fresh confidence.

Here was a pair of strong shoulders onto which she could shift the burden that had blighted her days; here was a calm, intelligent mind that could find a way through the waking nightmare that her life seemed to have become. She no longer had doubts, no longer needed to hesitate, to be wary.

‘Help me,’ she said simply, and saw his eyes darken, saw the stunning gentleness of his smile.

It would be easy to fall in love with a man with eyes like that, whose mouth could curve in that way, lighting up his whole face, she thought dreamily, allowing the fantasy to take root for a brief, delirious second, before the realisation of the foolheardy direction of her thoughts had her blinking in sudden shock.

‘If I can, I will.’ Evan’s response was low and firm, the conviction in his voice enough to inspire confidence in even the most craven of hearts. ‘But first you have to help me. I need to know just what’s troubling you,’ he added when he saw her puzzled frown. ‘Do you trust me enough to tell me?’

Did she? Could she trust him? Who else could she turn to if she didn’t tell him? There was no one else; it was Evan or no one.

‘I don’t know where to begin…’ She had kept it to herself for so long that now it was difficult actually to let it out.

‘Is it a man?’ Evan prompted when she hesitated, shaking her head in despair.

‘Yes—at least, I think so. Oh, but not in the way you mean. I’m sorry—I’m not doing this very well.’

Evan’s silent shrug dismissed her apology as unnecessary.

‘Take your time. We have all night.’

Now we have, Catherine thought, recalling the way he had dismissed the waiting Sam. But there was something very reassuring about that ‘we’.

‘Perhaps a drink would help—something stronger than coffee,’ Lloyd put in, getting to his feet and heading towards the drinks cabinet.

‘I think not.’ Evan’s incisive command stopped him halfway. ‘We’d do better with clear heads—don’t you think?’

Those last three words were added purely for courtesy’s sake, Catherine realised. Evan’s words had had the force of an order, one he intended to be obeyed without argument, and her father had recognised that, sinking back into his chair without a protest. For better or worse, Evan Lindsay was now in charge. They had put themselves into his hands and there was no going back.

Into his hands—the words reverberated inside her head as she let her gaze drop to the fingers that still held her own, recognising their strength with a shiver of reaction that was a disturbing blend of relief and fear. She was painfully aware of the potential power in Evan’s hands— the force that, if it tightened just a tiny bit more, could bruise or break. Right now, she could only be grateful for the fact that that strength would be on her side.

‘I don’t know what my father told you about me…’

It was as if that thought had given her a mental push, and suddenly the words came tumbling out, like water pouring through newly opened floodgates.

‘But I work in television—children’s programmes, actually—and a couple of years ago I got a really big break when I was chosen to host a regular weekly show. It’s called Get Up and Go. I don’t know if you’ve heard of it, but—’

But Evan was nodding. ‘Tuesdays—five till six.’

‘You know about it?’

‘My friend’s kids love it. They wouldn’t miss it for the world. You have two very loyal fans there.’

‘That’s great. How old are they—your friend’s children, that is?’

She spoke quickly, needing to distract herself from the sudden disturbing lurch her heart had given. When he smiled like that it lit up his whole face, softening the hard lines and making the blue-green eyes glow like a rock pool when the sun fell on it.

‘Five and seven—a boy and a girl. Amy’s the seven-year-old—she’s the real fan.’

‘Well, five is perhaps a little young to take it all in.’

She wouldn’t allow herself to wonder whether the friend he had referred to was the same one he had spoken of earlier. Were these the children of the Sam he had been going to have dinner with? It was worrying to find that in spite of her attempts to drive it from her mind the answer to that question suddenly seemed very important.

‘I always like to hear firsthand that people enjoy what we do. Of course, we do get a lot of letters—’

‘But not all of them from kids.’

The faint shake in her voice had betrayed her; either that or some tiny reaction in her face that had not escaped those watchful aquamarine eyes.

‘No.’ Her voice was very low.

‘And not all just expressing innocent admiration.’ It was a statement, not a question.

‘No.’ She shook her head, grateful for the way the movement made her fair hair fly around her face, concealing the vulnerability of her expression.

‘Cathy’s been the victim of a campaign of harassment,’ her father put in. ‘A stalker, I believe the current word is—an obsessive fan.’

‘An adult fan?’ Evan’s attention was concentrated on Catherine. ‘When did all this start?’

‘About seven months ago; just before Christmas. The first letter came in a bundle of ordinary mail, and really it was just very complimentary about my appearance.’ Catherine’s laugh was shaken. ‘He said I was just what he wanted in his Christmas stocking. But there was a tone to it—some rather sexual comments that made it plain it didn’t come from a typical fan. Your friend’s daughter and son are the sort who usually write.’

‘It was anonymous, I take it?’

‘Yes. There was another one the next week, and the next, and every week after that—sometimes two or three in a row. They started off mild enough, but they soon got more and more sexually explicit—more expressive of his personal fantasies—more disgusting.’ She shuddered, remembering.

‘But they just came to the television studios?’

‘No. I think I could have coped with that, but after a month or so they started arriving at my flat. He’d got my address from somewhere—where, I don’t know. And the letters were just the beginning. The next thing that happened was the parcels—’

‘Parcels?’

Catherine nodded miserably.

‘They contained underwear mostly—stockings, suspenders, G-strings. He’d write that he wanted to see me in them.’ She tried another laugh, one that broke up in the middle. ‘He must have spent a fortune.’

But Evan wasn’t laughing. As she’d told her story his expression had grown grimmer, darker, more dangerous—so that, looking at him, she could barely suppress a shiver of fearful reaction.

‘Go on,’ he prompted harshly when she hesitated. ‘I take it there was more?’

‘That was only the beginning…’

Now she wanted everything out in the open, wanted to pour the whole story out, as if by doing so she could purge herself of the horror, the fear with which she had lived for so long. So she told him how the letters had grown more and more sexually threatening, how the unknown stalker had declared that he believed she was his destiny, that one day they were meant to be together.

‘He even started to interpret things I’d said on the programme—things I’d said to children—as being messages just for him.’

Once again she shuddered, her blue eyes dark and shadowed.

‘He referred to them in his letters, giving them totally different meanings—making them disgusting and dirty. That was when we called the police, but of course there was no real evidence.’

‘The letters?’

Sadly, Catherine shook her head.

‘I burned most of them. Oh, I know I shouldn’t have done, but at first I just didn’t think it would last—I thought he’d soon get tired of pestering me. And then, later, they were so horrible that I couldn’t bear to have them around, and I destroyed them without thinking that they would be needed. Once I’d told the police they said I should pass the letters on to them unopened.’

‘Good advice,’ Evan put in quietly. ‘Did that help?’

‘I wish I could say it had; if anything, it made matters worse. It was as if he knew what I’d done and he changed his routine as a result. That was when the phone calls started.’

Evan muttered something violent and obscene in a savage undertone, drawing her pansy-dark eyes to his face. Seeing the cold fury etched around his nose and mouth, she hesitated, almost fearful of continuing. Immediately he made himself relax, wiping the harsh lines from his face with a speed that made her blink.

‘Go on,’ he encouraged with an unexpected softness, warm fingers tightening slightly on hers.

‘He started ringing me at my flat—sometimes in the evening, just after I’d got home from work, sometimes in the middle of the night.’

‘Did you recognise the voice?’ The question came sharply.

‘No—but I think he’d done something to disguise itput a handkerchief over the mouthpiece or something— and he always whispered, so that distorted it too. He seemed to be getting more obsessed—more angry. There was one time when he’d seen me on the show with another presenter. He thought I’d been flirting—“unfaithful” he called it! He said I was a two-timing bitch and if I didn’t change my ways he would punish me—’

Her breath caught in her throat, threatening to choke her, and she had to pause, struggling to control the panic that rose up in her. Evan waited silently, seeming to sense intuitively that to speak would be to destroy her composure completely, but those strong, warm fingers still intertwined with hers tightened in an eloquent communication of sympathy.

‘I’d had an answering machine installed, but I found that I was just standing by it, waiting to hear his voice, and he always seemed to know when I was there. He said that he’d make sure I never had a relationship with anyone else—he’d kill anyone I dated—and—and if necessary he’d kill me.’

Her voice broke again, her eyes flooding with tears, but it was as if Evan was passing his strength on to her through his touch on her hands, and in a moment she was able to continue.

‘The police did what they could. They tried to trace the calls, but they were all from payphones scattered all over London. They even offered to escort me to and from work, but I couldn’t take that—it was like being a prisoner—and I couldn’t rest in my flat, never knowing when the phone might ring again, whether it would be him…It all came to a head last week when I was out shopping. I’d just gone to the supermarket to get some groceries, but suddenly I heard someone running behind me.’

Once more she shuddered, reliving the fear she had felt in that moment.

‘It was only a man running for a bus, but it panicked me. I realised that he could be watching me all the timefollowing me. I just snapped. I came straight here, didn’t even go home to get any clothes. I was afraid he might be there waiting for me.’

Abruptly Catherine became aware of the fact that she was still holding onto Evan’s hands, her fingers clenched on his, tightening in response to her inner distress, and with a muffled exclamation she released them sharply, her confusion growing as she saw the red marks on his skin, the indentations where her nails had dug into his palms.

‘Oh, I’m sorry!’ She couldn’t believe her own thoughtlessness.

Evan barely spared his hands the briefest of glances, his shrug dismissing both the damage she had done and her apology.

‘And what’s happened since you came here? Have things been easier?’

‘Oh, yes. Only one person knows where I am and that’s my agent. I had to tell her, because she’s a special friend as well as working with me. And I rang work and told them I was ill—exhaustion due to stress. Well, it’s near enough to the truth. Luckily, we’ve just finished filming the last of the current series, so I’m not leaving anyone in the lurch—and I was due two months’ leave anyway. They probably realise something’s up; my mind hasn’t exactly been on my job lately.’

‘But what will happen when your leave is up? You can’t hide away here for ever.’

‘I know. I have to admit that I haven’t really thought beyond that. I suppose I’m just praying that something will be resolved before I have to go back—that the police track him down, or he loses interest in tormenting me and gives up. I just know I can’t bear the thought of him being out there—watching.’

‘Are you sure you’re not letting him win by giving in to him in this way—letting him ruin your life?’

‘Oh, you would say that! You’re a man!’ Catherine couldn’t believe she had actually trusted this man, poured her heart out to him, only to get this typical masculine response. ‘You don’t know what it’s like to live in fear-not to feel secure in your own home—’

‘It was a question that had to be asked.’

‘Of course you’d see it that way.’ Unable to bear that intent sea-coloured gaze any longer, she got to her feet in a restless, disturbed movement. ‘I don’t know why I ever told you.’

If she had expected that confiding in him would bring a sense of relief, then she had been desperately wrong. Instead, she felt even more vulnerable than before, frightened by the way she had let a complete stranger into the carefully restricted, protective world that had enclosed her safely until now.

‘You obviously can’t or won’t help me.’

‘Did I say that?’

It was his very stillness that shook her, making her stop dead in the middle of the room. Evan hadn’t moved an inch; he still sat in his chair, his hands lying loosely on its arms, his hard-boned face turned towards her. He was so big that even sitting down he didn’t have to tilt his head much to look up at her.

‘Don’t put words into my mouth, Catherine.’ The ominous quietness of his tone was somehow more disturbing than if he had shouted, and it dried Catherine’s mouth so that she had to swallow hard.

‘I—’ she began, not really knowing what she was going to say, but at that moment the shrill of the telephone slashed through her words. Immediately she froze, her eyes, dark with fear, going to her father.

‘Dad—’

But Evan had already reacted. Getting up and out of his chair in one swift, lithe movement, he was in the hall and had snatched up the receiver before Catherine had even registered the action.

‘Yes?’ he snapped. ‘Who do you want to speak to? Who shall I say? If you’d just hold the line a minute, please.’

‘Please’, Catherine noted, relief breaking over her like a fierce wave, so that she had to cling to a nearby chair for support. Obviously not anyone she should fear, then. The release from the tension that held her prisoner every day was so intense that she felt tears prick at her eyes.

‘Catherine?’ Evan had his finger on the secrecy button of the phone. ‘Do you want to speak to someone called Ellie?’

‘Oh, yes.’ The strength returned to her legs at the sound of the familiar name. ‘It’s my agent,’ she explained, taking the telephone from his hand, expecting that he would move away, at least to a discreet distance. But instead he lingered, leaning back against the wall, his arms folded. ‘Ellie—is that you?’ She forced herself to ignore him.

‘None other,’ her friend’s voice said clearly on the other end of the line, and Catherine smiled to herself, picturing the older woman’s smiling face, her once bright red hair, now fading to a sort of pepper-and-salt effect. ‘Though I’m not sure I dare speak to you after that cross-examination. Just who is the pit bull, and is he as terrifying as he sounds?’

‘The—? Oh—yes.’

As light dawned as to just what Ellie was talking about, Catherine couldn’t resist a swift, laughing glance across at where Evan stood, still very much on the alert.

‘Yes, he is,’ she managed, wondering if he had heard himself described as a guard dog.

‘All ripping teeth and vicious snarl?’

‘Hardly!’ This time her amused eyes met those watchful turquoise ones. ‘This is a private phone call, Evan,’ she added with a pointed glance at the door into the lounge.

She might have spared herself the effort. Evan simply ignored her reaction, returning her look with disturbing lack of reaction, all emotion blanked out as if he hadn’t heard a word, and settled himself more firmly against the wall.

‘Evan, eh?’ Ellie had heard her aside. ‘So who might he be? Anyone interesting?’

‘Not at all.’ Furious at Evan’s deliberate rudeness, Catherine no longer cared what he heard, and she deliberately turned her back on him. ‘He’s just some security man who works for my father.’

‘And now for you, is that it? Are you finally seeing sense and hiring yourself a bodyguard? About time, too. So tell me—’ a hint of wicked humour lit Ellie’s voice ‘—what’s he like? I mean, we’ve all seen the film…’

‘Forget it, Ellie!’ The knowledge that Evan was still there, a silent observer of her every move, provoked some imp of mischief in her to add, ‘This guy’s no Kevin Costner—you were closer with the pit bull terrier.’

‘All brawn and no brain, huh?’ Ellie didn’t sound too disappointed. ‘Oh, well, that type’s good for other things, I suppose. I mean, if you can’t enjoy his conversation, at least you can enjoy something else…’

‘Ellie!’ As her friend’s salacious laugh made it plain exactly what she meant, Catherine struggled to resist the urge to look over her shoulder and see how Evan had taken that comment. ‘No one would believe you were a respectable, mature married lady. Anyway, it’s not like that.’

‘Not your type?’

‘Definitely not.’ The sudden prick of her conscience, reminding her of the sensual awareness she had felt while alone with Evan in the kitchen and at other points of the evening, gave Catherine’s tone an unwarranted decisiveness. ‘Besides, I’m definitely off men at the moment, after all that’s happened.’

‘Of course you are, love.’ Ellie’s tone had sobered. ‘It must be hell to feel so hunted. That’s why I rang, to find out how things are on that front. Any news?’

‘If you mean do the police have any leads, then the answer’s no. And I daren’t go back to my flat—I reckon I’ll- Hey!’

She broke off on a cry that was a mixture of nervous reaction and outraged fury as there was a sudden movement from behind her and Evan’s strong finger came down hard on the disconnect button, cutting her off abruptly.

‘What the hell did you do that for?’ Blue eyes blazing, she swung round to face him. ‘Just what do you think you were doing?’

‘Stopping you from giving too much away,’ was the imperturbable reply.

‘But Ellie’s my friend, for God’s sake! She wouldn’t—’

‘No? Can you be sure of that?’

‘Of course I can. I’ve known her almost all my life; she was like a mother to me when mine walked out. She wouldn’t—you can’t think that!’

‘All I know is that you were about to tell her exactly what your plans are, and as far as I’m concerned the fewer people who know, the better. You did ask me to help,’ he pointed out, with an infuriatingly exaggerated reasonableness that set Catherine’s teeth on edge.

‘But not in this arrogant manner!’ Ruthlessly Catherine ignored the memory of her own voice pleading, ‘Help me,’ a short time before. ‘Ellie is my friend!’

‘In that case she’ll understand. And if nothing else, your friend has a very loud mouth. If you want my opinion.’

‘I don’t think I do!’

Catherine slammed the phone back down onto its rest and, turning on her heel, stalked back into the lounge, her head high. Right now, she felt that having to put up with Evan Lindsay’s high-handed behaviour was too high a price to pay even for protection from the menace of the stalker. In a moment of weakness she had turned to him, but that didn’t mean she wanted him to move in and take over her life!

‘I don’t want your opinion, or your help—or anything!’

‘But, Cathy—’ Her father’s concerned face showed his worried response to her outburst. ‘What will you do next week?’

‘Precisely what happens then?’ Evan asked from the doorway.

‘I have to go to Japan.’ Lloyd ignored his daughter’s furious glare, the message not to answer that she was trying to telegraph with her eyes. ‘I’ll be away for nearly a month. I don’t want to leave Cathy on her own.’

‘I can cope—’

‘Oh, sure.’ Evan’s tone was rich with sardonic disbelief. ‘You can cope the way you were doing before tonight—jumping at your own shadow, frightened by the least sound, imprisoned in—’

‘I’ll be fine!’

She would be, just to spite him. Give this man an inch and he took five hundred miles. She didn’t want him trampling all over her life with his great size elevens, putting his nose in where it wasn’t wanted, cutting her off from her friends.

‘I’ve changed my mind. I don’t want anything—’

Once more she was silenced by the sound of the telephone. Ellie, she thought, ringing back to find out just what had happened before. She actually had her hand on the receiver when it was wrenched away from her.

‘Yes?’ Even curter than before, if that was possible.

‘How dare you? It’s only Ellie—’

She was reaching out to snatch the phone back when she saw his expression change, the hardening of those strongly carved features, the cold light that came into his eyes, and a sensation like the shiver of icy water slid slowly down her spine.

‘There’s no one called Honey here.’

Honey. It was all she could do to suppress a moan of terror. The sound of the name had the force of a blow to her head, filling her mouth with a taste that was bitter as acid.

Honey. That was his name for her—the name he had written at the beginning of each letter, and, more recently, the way he always started each hateful, horrible phone call. She could hear it now inside her head, that terrible, terrifying whisper—’Hello, Honey.’

Every trace of colour drained form her cheeks, leaving them white and ashen, and she took a shaky step backwards.

At once Evan’s gaze went to her face, aquamarine eyes narrowing swiftly as he took in her reaction. His response was immediate, no questions needing to be asked.

‘There’s no Honey here, and there never will be again—not for you. Do you understand that? No, you can listen! You’re not dealing with Honey now; you’re dealing with me. No, it doesn’t matter who the hell I am. All you need to know is that I’m here, and I’m in charge, and I don’t take too kindly to—’

He broke off sharply, listening intently to whatever the person on the other end of the line was saying. To Catherine’s shock and consternation his response was laughter, but laughter that was so terrifyingly hard and humourless that it worried her almost as much as the knowledge that her tormentor had tracked her down once more.

‘Do that.’ The brutal satisfaction in Evan’s tone made Catherine’s stomach clench painfully. ‘And I’ll derive a great deal of pleasure from taking you apart, limb by limb. What? Oh, no, pal, I won’t be going anywhere. I’m staying right here, and I don’t intend to leave until you’re safely locked away. So if you want to get to your Honey, you’ll have to come through me first!’

Then, as Catherine watched with the sort of transfixed fascination that a rabbit displayed when confronted by a predatory snake, he grinned suddenly, with grim triumph, and let the phone drop onto the table with a clatter that to her overwrought nerves seemed as loud as thunder overhead.

‘He’s gone,’ he said, that dark satisfaction still lingering in his words. ‘He’s a man of limited vocabulary, isn’t he, your Joe?’

And if she had any doubts as to who the caller had been then that drove them away. Honey was what he called her; Joe was his name for himself. Joe as in Joe Public—ordinary Joe. She had no doubt that it was not his real name.

‘Oh, God!’ Her hand went to her mouth, her eyes deep pools of fear above her concealing fingers. ‘What am I going to do?’

‘Do?’ To her consternation, Evan smiled with sudden, disturbing gentleness. ‘You don’t have to do anything.’

‘But—’

‘But nothing. Didn’t you hear what I said? I’ll handle things from here on in. I’m in charge now.’

If it was meant to reassure, then his harsh declaration didn’t have the desired effect. In Catherine’s mind there was not all that much to choose between Evan Lindsay and the stalker who was hounding her. And she couldn’t help wondering just what sort of a force she had unleashed by getting this man involved in her situation— in her life.