Kitabı oku: «An Exception to His Rule»

CHAPTER ONE

DAMIEN WYATT WAS lounging in an upstairs study.

He wore jeans, a khaki bush shirt and desert boots, all visible since his feet were up on the desk. His dark hair was ruffled and there were blue shadows on his jaw.

The windows were open and the roses in the garden below were in bloom. So was the star jasmine creeper clinging to the house. Beyond the garden wall a beach curved around a blue, inviting bay. You could hear the sound of the waves on the beach and there was a tang of salt in the air.

‘Hang on,’ he said with a sudden frown. ‘Is it remotely possible that this Ms Livingstone we’re talking about is actually Harriet Livingstone? Because, if so, forget it, Arthur.’

Arthur Tindall, art connoisseur and colourful dresser—he wore jeans and a yellow waistcoat patterned with black elephants over a maroon shirt—looked confused. ‘You’ve met her?’ he asked from the other side of the desk.

‘I don’t know. Unless there are two Harriet Livingstones, I may have,’ Damien said dryly.

‘There could well be. Two, I mean,’ Arthur replied. ‘After all, it’s not the wilds of Africa where it was highly unlikely there’d be more than one Doctor Livingstone popping up out of nowhere.’

Damien grinned fleetingly. ‘I take your point.’ He sobered. ‘What’s your Harriet like? Tall, thin girl with wild hair and an unusual taste in clothing?’ He raised an enquiring eyebrow.

Arthur looked blank for a moment. ‘Tall, yes,’ he said slowly. ‘Otherwise, well, certainly not fat and her clothes are—I don’t seem to remember much about her clothes.’

‘Have you actually met her?’ Damien enquired with some irony.

‘Of course.’ Arthur looked offended then brightened. ‘I can tell you one thing: she has very long legs!’

‘So does a stork,’ Damien observed. ‘I couldn’t tell with my Ms Livingstone,’ he added. ‘I mean for someone that tall she obviously had long legs but whether they were—shapely—I couldn’t say because they were all covered up in some kind of wraparound batik skirt.’

Arthur stared narrowly into the distance as if trying to conjure up a batik wraparound skirt then he blinked again and said triumphantly, ‘Glasses! Large, round, red-rimmed glasses. Also...’ he frowned and concentrated ‘...a rather vague air, although that may be due to being short-sighted, but as if her mind is on higher things.’ He grimaced.

Damien Wyatt smiled unpleasantly. ‘If it is the same girl, she ran into me about two months ago. At the same time she was wearing large, round, red-rimmed glasses,’ he added significantly.

‘Oh, dear! Not the Aston? Oh, dear,’ Arthur repeated.

Damien looked at him ironically. ‘That’s putting it mildly. She had no insurance other than compulsory third party and the...tank she was driving survived virtually unscathed.’

‘Tank?’

Damien shrugged. ‘It might as well have been: a solid old four-wheel drive with bull bars.’

This time Arthur winced visibly. ‘How did it happen?’

‘She swerved to avoid a dog then froze and couldn’t correct things until it was too late.’ Damien Wyatt drummed his fingers on his desk.

‘Was anyone hurt?’

Damien looked at him, his expression sardonic. ‘The dog was retrieved by its owner completely unscathed. All she broke were her glasses.’

He paused as he recalled the melee after the accident and the curious fact—curious from the point of view that it should have stuck in his mind—that Harriet Livingstone had possessed a pair of rather stunning blue eyes.

‘That’s not too bad,’ Arthur murmured.

‘That’s not all,’ Damien remarked acidly. ‘I broke my collarbone and the damage to my car was, well—’ he shrugged ‘—the whole exercise cost me a small fortune.’

Arthur forbore to make the obvious comment that a small fortune would hardly make the slightest dent in the very large fortune Damien Wyatt owned.

But Damien continued with palpable sarcasm, ‘Therefore, dear Arthur, if there’s any possibility it’s one and the same girl, you do see there’s no way I could let her loose here.’ He removed his feet from the desk and sat up.

Arthur Tindall discovered he could certainly see something cool, determined and even quite grim in Damien’s dark eyes but he also found he wasn’t prepared to give up without a fight.

Whether it was the same girl or not, it did sound like it, he had to admit, but the thing was he’d promised Penny, his young and delicious yet surprisingly manipulative wife, that he would get the Wyatt job for her friend Harriet Livingstone.

He sat forward. ‘Damien, even if she’s the same girl—although we don’t absolutely know that!—she’s good,’ he said intently. ‘She’s damn good. So’s her provenance. Your mother’s collection couldn’t be in better hands, believe me! She’s worked in one of the most prestigious art auction houses in the country.’ Arthur emphasised this with rolling eyes and a wave of his hand. ‘Her father was a noted conservator and restorer of paintings and her references are impeccable.’

‘All the same, you’ve just told me she’s vague and distracted,’ Damien said impatiently. ‘And I’ve had the woman literally run into me!’

Arthur said intensely, ‘She may be vague over other things but not about her work. I’ve found her knowledgeable on not only paintings but porcelain, ceramics, carpets, miniatures—all sorts of things. And she’s experienced in cataloguing.’

‘She sounds like a one woman antiques roadshow,’ Damien observed caustically.

‘No, but she’s the one person I could recommend who would have some familiarity with most of the odds and ends your mother collected. She’s the one person who would have some idea of their value or who to get a valuation from, some idea of whether they need restoring, whether they could be restored, who could do it if it was possible, who—’

Damien held up his hand. ‘Arthur, I get your point. But—’

‘Of course,’ Arthur interrupted, sitting back and looking magisterial, ‘if it is the same girl, there’s the distinct possibility nothing on earth would induce her to work for you.’

‘Why the hell not?’

Arthur shrugged and folded his arms over his black and yellow waistcoat. ‘I have no doubt you would have been quite scathing towards her at the time of the accident.’

Damien rubbed his jaw. ‘I did ask her,’ he said reminiscently, ‘whether she’d got her driver’s licence out of a cornflakes packet.’

Arthur whistled but said, ‘I’ve heard worse. Was that all?’

Damien shrugged. ‘I may have said a few other...less than complimentary things. In the heat of the moment, of course. My car was smashed. So was my collarbone.’

‘Women don’t necessarily see things like that in the same way. About cars, I mean.’ Arthur waved his hands again. ‘Pure excellence, pure fineness in a motor vehicle and then to see it all smashed up may not affect them as deeply as a man.’

Damien chewed his lip then shrugged and picked up his phone as it buzzed discreetly.

Arthur got up and wandered over to the windows. It was a lovely view, he mused, but then Heathcote, home to the Wyatt dynasty, was a magnificent property. They ran cattle and grew macadamias with equal success in the Northern Rivers district of New South Wales but it was machinery—farm machinery, and lately mining machinery—that was the backbone of their fortune.

Damien’s grandfather had started it all with a tractor he’d designed and manufactured but, so it was said, Damien had tripled it by investing in mining machinery. And all sorts of mining was happening all over Australia, Arthur thought rather ruefully.

His own connection with the Wyatts had started with Damien’s father and his interest in art. Together they’d built up a collection to be proud of. Then, seven years ago, both his parents had been lost at sea when their yacht had capsized. Consequently Damien had inherited the collection.

It was the upheaval after this that had brought to light the full extent of his mother’s collection of objets d’art—something the rest of the family had tended to overlook. In fact it wouldn’t be unfair to say that Heathcote was stuffed to the rafters with them. But it had taken several more years for this decision to do something about them to be made, and hence to his advice being sought.

His first inclination had been to suggest that it should all be crated up and sent to an appropriate firm for assessing. Damien, however, supported by his aunt, had been disinclined to allow any of his mother’s treasures to leave Heathcote and it had been their suggestion that he look for someone to do the job in situ.

No easy task since Lennox Head, Heathcote’s nearest town, was a long way from Sydney and a fair way from Brisbane or the Gold Coast, the nearest large cities.

Therefore, when Penny had presented him with Harriet Livingstone he’d more or less looked upon it as a godsend...

Arthur turned from the view and studied Damien Wyatt, who’d swung his chair so he was partially facing the other way and was still talking on the phone. At thirty-one, Damien was loose-limbed, lean and deceptively powerful. He was well over six feet tall, broad-shouldered and he had the facility to look at ease in any milieu. Yet there was something about him that let you know that whilst he’d be good outdoors, good at battling the elements, good at managing vast properties, good with mechanical things, he’d also be good with women.

He certainly possessed a pair of fine dark eyes that often had a glint in them indicative of a mercurial personality and a lively intelligence.

Not to put too fine a point on it, Arthur ruminated, as his wife Penny had once remarked: you couldn’t call Damien exactly handsome but he was devastatingly attractive and masculine.

He also had thick dark hair and he did possess a powerful intellect. Not only that, but he had an affection for getting his own way and a cutting, irritable way it was with him at times, as Harriet Livingstone had apparently encountered, poor girl.

So why, Arthur wondered suddenly, if she was the same girl—and he was pretty sure she was—had she been happy for him to go ahead and sound Damien Wyatt out on this job? She must have recognised the name. She must have some very unpleasant memories of the incident.

She must, above all, find it extremely hard to believe he would ever offer her a job after smashing his beloved Aston Martin with a vehicle not unlike a tank and breaking his collarbone.

So what was behind it, this willingness even to meet Damien Wyatt again? Did she have designs on him? Did she, he swallowed at the mere thought, plan to, if she got the job, fleece him of some of his mother’s treasures?

‘Hello!’

Arthur came back to the present with a start to see that Damien had finished his call and was looking at him enquiringly.

‘Sorry,’ he said hastily, and sat down again.

‘How’s Penny?’

Arthur hesitated. Despite the fact that Damien was always unfailingly polite to Penny, it was hard to escape the feeling that he didn’t really approve of her.

Or, if not that, Arthur mused further, did Damien view his belated tumble into matrimony after years of bachelorhood with some cynicism? He was now approaching fifty and was twenty years older than Penny.

Probably, he conceded to himself. Not that Damien Wyatt had anything to be superior about on that score. He might not have been twenty years older than his wife but he did have a failed marriage behind him—a very failed marriage.

‘Arthur, what’s on your mind?’

Once again Arthur came back to the present with a start. ‘Nothing!’ he asserted.

‘You seem to be miles away,’ Damien commented. ‘Is Penny all right or not?’

‘She’s fine. She’s fine,’ Arthur repeated, and came to another sudden decision, although with an inward grimace. ‘Look, Damien, I’ve changed my mind about Harriet Livingstone. I don’t think she’s the right one after all. So give me a few days and I’ll find someone else.’

It was a penetratingly narrowed dark gaze Damien bestowed on Arthur Tindall. ‘That’s a rather sudden change of heart,’ he drawled.

‘Yes, well, a blind man could see you two are unlikely to get along so...’ Arthur left his sentence up in the air.

Damien settled more comfortably in his chair. ‘Where are you going to find a paragon to equal Ms Livingstone? Or was that a slight exaggeration on your part?’ he asked casually enough, although with a load of implied satire.

‘No it was not!’ Arthur denied. ‘And I have no idea where I’m going to find one—be that as it may, I will.’

Damien Wyatt rubbed his jaw. ‘I’ll have a look at her.’

Arthur sat up indignantly. ‘Now look here; you can’t change your mind just like that!’

‘Not many minutes ago you were hoping to goad me into doing just that.’

‘When?’

‘When you told me I’d be the last person on earth she’d work for. You were hoping that would annoy me or simply arouse my contrary streak to the extent I’d change my mind.’ Damien’s lips twisted. ‘Well, I have.’

‘Which streak prompted that, do you think? A rather large ego?’ Arthur enquired heavily after a moment’s thought.

Damien grinned. ‘No idea. Bring her here for an interview tomorrow afternoon.’

‘Damien—’ Arthur rose ‘—I have to say I can’t guarantee the girl.’

‘You mean everything you told me about her provenance et cetera—’ Damien raised his eyebrows sardonically ‘—was a lot of bull dust?’

‘No,’ Arthur denied. ‘I followed up every reference she gave me and they all checked out, I’ve talked to her and sounded her out on a range of art work, as I mentioned, but—’

‘Just bring her, Arthur,’ Damien interrupted wearily. ‘Just bring her.’

* * *

Despite this repeated command, Damien Wyatt stayed where he was for a few minutes after Arthur had gone, as he asked himself why he’d done what he’d just done.

No sensible answer presented itself other than that he had somehow felt goaded into it, although not because of anything Arthur had said.

So—curiosity, perhaps? Why would Harriet Livingstone want to have anything to do with him after, he had to admit, he’d been pretty unpleasant to her? Some quirky form of revenge?

More likely a quirky form of attaching herself to him, he thought cynically. All the more reason to have stuck to his guns and refused to see the girl.

What else could have been at work behind the scenes of his mental processes then? he asked himself rather dryly. Boredom?

Surely not. He had enough on his plate at the moment to keep six men busy. He had an overseas trip coming up in a couple of days, and yet...

He stared into the distance with a frown. Of course the possibility remained that it wasn’t the same girl...

* * *

At three o’clock the next afternoon, Harriet Livingstone and Arthur Tindall were shown into the lounge at Heathcote by a tall angular woman with iron-grey hair cut in a short cap. Arthur addressed the woman as Isabel and kissed her on the cheek but didn’t introduce her. Arthur was looking worried and distracted.

Damien Wyatt came in from outside through another door, accompanied by a large dog.

He threw his sunglasses onto a side table and said something to the dog, a young, highly bred and powerful Scottish wolfhound, that sat down obligingly although looking keenly alert.

‘Ah,’ Damien Wyatt said to Arthur after a brief but comprehensive study of Harriet, ‘same girl.’ He turned back to Harriet. ‘We meet again, Miss Livingstone. I’d almost convinced myself you wouldn’t be the same person or, if you were, that you wouldn’t come.’

Harriet cleared her throat. ‘Good afternoon, Mr Wyatt,’ she said almost inaudibly.

Damien narrowed his eyes and cast Arthur an interrogative glance but Arthur only looked blank.

Damien returned his attention to Harriet Livingstone.

No batik wraparound skirt today, he noted: an unexceptional navy linen dress instead. Not too long, not too short, not too tight, although it did make her blue eyes even bluer. In fact her outfit was very discreetly elegant and so were her shoes, polished navy leather with little heels. This caused a faint fleeting smile to twist his lips as it crossed his mind that this girl probably rarely, if ever, wore higher heels. And he wondered what it must be like for a girl to be as tall, if not taller, than many of the men she met. Not that she was taller than he was...

Then there was her hair. Shoulder-length, fair and with a tendency to curl, it no longer looked as if she’d been pulled through a bush backwards. It was neatly tied up instead with a black ribbon. Her make-up was minimal. In fact it was all so...what? he asked himself. Well-bred, classic, timeless, discreet—he had no difficulty imagining her in the hallowed halls of some revered antique and art auction company or a museum.

But, and this caused him to frown rather than smile, the main difference between this Harriet Livingstone and the girl who’d run into him was that she was no longer thin. Very slender, perhaps, but no, not exactly skinny.

Despite being slender rather than skinny and despite her more composed outward presentation, it was, however, plain to see that she was strung as taut as a piano wire.

It was also plain to see—and his eyes widened slightly as his gaze travelled down her figure—that her legs were little short of sensational...

‘Well,’ he said, ‘you were right, Arthur, but let’s get down to brass tacks. We’ve organised a few of my mother’s things in the dining room. Please come through and give me your opinion of them, Ms Livingstone.’

He moved forward and the dog rose and came with him but stopped to look at Harriet with almost human curiosity. And, as Harriet returned the dog’s gaze, just a little of her tension seemed to leave her.

Damien noticed this with a slight narrowing of his eyes. And he said, somewhat to his surprise, ‘I’m sorry, I forgot to introduce you—this is Tottie, Miss Livingstone. Her proper name is much more complicated. Something tells me you like dogs?’

Harriet put out a hand for Tottie to inspect. ‘Yes. It’s one of the reasons I ran into you,’ she murmured. ‘I thought I’d killed the dog and I—just froze.’

Arthur tut-tutted.

Damien Wyatt blinked, twice. ‘Much worse in your estimation than killing me, I gather?’

Harriet Livingstone allowed Tottie to lick her hand then said quietly, ‘Of course not. I didn’t—I’m sorry but I didn’t have time to think about you or anything else. It all happened so fast.’

‘I’m suitably damned,’ he replied. ‘All right, let’s get this show on the road.’

‘If you’re having second thoughts I’d quite understand,’ Harriet said politely, with a less than polite glint in her eye, however.

She really doesn’t like him, Arthur thought and rubbed his face distractedly. So why is she doing this?

But what Damien said took him even further by surprise. ‘On the contrary, after what Arthur has told me about you I’m positively agog to see you in action. Shall I lead on?’

He didn’t wait for her response but strode out with Tottie following regally.

* * *

Harriet put the exquisite little jade peach tree down on the table with a sigh of pleasure. And her gaze swept over the rest of the treasures spread out on the dining room table. ‘They’re all lovely—she had marvellous taste, your mother. And judgement.’ She took off her red-rimmed glasses.

Damien was leaning his broad shoulders against the mantelpiece with his arms crossed. He did not respond to her admiration of his mother’s collection but said, ‘Is that a new pair or did you get them fixed?’ He nodded towards her glasses resting on the table.

Harriet looked confused for a moment, then, ‘Oh, it was only a lens that got broken so I was able to get a new one.’

‘Red glasses.’ He looked her up and down. ‘Not quite in keeping with the restrained elegance of the rest of you—today, that is.’

A fleeting smile twisted Harriet’s lips. ‘Ah, but it makes them a lot easier to find.’ And, for a moment, she thought he was going to smile too but he continued to look unamused.

Harriet looked away.

‘How would you catalogue them?’ he asked after a moment. ‘This is not even one tenth of them, by the way.’

‘I’d photograph them in the sequence I came upon them and I’d write an initial summary of them. Then, when they were all itemised—’ Harriet laced her fingers ‘—I’d probably sort them into categories, mainly to make it easier to locate them and I’d write a much more comprehensive description of them, their condition, any research I’d done on them, any work required on them et cetera. I’d also, if your mother kept any receipts or paperwork on them, try to marry it all up.’

‘How long do you think that would take?’

Harriet shrugged. ‘Hard to say without seeing the full extent of the collection.’

‘Months,’ Arthur supplied with gloomy conviction.

‘Were you aware it was a live-in position, Miss Livingstone?’ Damien queried. ‘Because we’re out in the country here, whoever does the job will spend an awful lot of time travelling otherwise.’

‘Yes, Arthur did explain that. I believe there’s an old stable block that’s been converted to a studio and it has a flat above it. But—’ Harriet paused ‘—weekends would be free, wouldn’t they?’

Damien raised an eyebrow. ‘Didn’t Arthur tell you that?’

‘He did,’ Harriet agreed, ‘but I needed to double-check.’

‘A boyfriend you’re eager to get back to?’ Damien didn’t wait for her response. ‘If that’s going to be a problem and you’re forever wanting time off to be with him—’

‘Not at all,’ Harriet cut across him quite decisively.

‘Not at all, you wouldn’t be wanting time off all the time or not at all, there is no boyfriend?’ Damien enquired.

Arthur coughed. ‘Damien, I don’t think—’ he began but Harriet interrupted him this time.

‘It’s quite all right, Arthur.’ She turned back to Damien. ‘Allow me to set your mind at rest, Mr Wyatt. There is no fiancé, no husband, no lovers, in short, no one in my life to distract me in that direction.’

‘Well, well,’ Damien drawled, ‘not only a paragon in your profession but also your private life.’

Harriet Livingstone merely allowed her deep blue gaze to rest on him thoughtfully for a moment or two before she turned away with the tiniest shrug, as if to say he was some kind of rare organism she didn’t understand.

Bloody hell, Damien Wyatt found himself thinking as he straightened abruptly, who does she think she is? Not content with smashing my car and causing me considerable discomfort for weeks, she’s—

He didn’t get to finish this set of thoughts as the woman called Isabel popped her head around the door and offered them afternoon tea.

Arthur looked at his watch. ‘Thank you so much, Isabel, but I’m afraid I won’t have time. Penny wants me home by four.’ He paused. ‘What about you, Harriet? We did come in separate cars,’ he explained to Damien.

Harriet hesitated and glanced at Damien. And because most of his mental sensors seemed to be honed in on this tall, slender girl, he saw the tension creep back as she picked up her purse and her knuckles whitened.

And he heard himself say something he hadn’t expected to say. ‘If you’d like a cup of tea, stay by all means, Miss Livingstone. We haven’t finished the interview anyway.’

She hesitated again then thanked him quietly.

Isabel retreated and Arthur, looking visibly harassed, subjected them to an involved explanation of why he needed to be home. Plus he was obviously reluctant to miss any of the verbal duel he was witnessing. But he finally left. And the tea tray arrived but this time Damien introduced the bearer as his aunt Isabel, and invited her to join them.

‘Sorry,’ Isabel said as she put the tea tray down on the coffee table set in front of the settee in a corner of the dining room, ‘but I’m popping into Lennox to pick up our dry-cleaning. Please excuse me, Miss Livingstone,’ she added.

Harriet nodded somewhat dazedly and once again the door closed, this time on his aunt.

‘I don’t think there’s anyone else who could interrupt us,’ Damien Wyatt said with some irony. ‘Do sit down and pour the tea.’

Harriet sank down onto the settee and her hand hovered over the tea tray. ‘Uh—there’s only one cup.’

‘I never drink the stuff,’ he said dismissively, ‘so pour yours and let’s get on with things.’

Harriet lifted the heavy silver teapot and spilt some tea on the pristine white tray cloth.

Damien swore beneath his breath, and came over to sit down beside her. ‘Put it down and tell me something, Harriet Livingstone—why are you doing this? No, wait.’

He picked up the pot Harriet had relinquished and poured a cup of tea without spilling a drop. Then he indicated the milk and sugar but she shook her head. ‘Th-that’s fine, just as it comes, thank you.’

He moved the cup and saucer in front of her and offered her a biscuit that looked like homemade shortbread.

She shook her head.

‘I can guarantee them. The cook makes them himself,’ he said.

‘Thank you but no. I—I don’t have a sweet tooth.’

He pushed the porcelain biscuit barrel away. ‘You look—you don’t look as sk— as thin as you did that day,’ he amended.

A flicker of amusement touched her mouth. ‘Skinny you were going to say? I guess I did. I lost a bit of weight for a time. I’ve probably always been thin, though.’

‘Sorry,’ he murmured. ‘But look, why are you doing this?’

Harriet hesitated and watched the steam rising gently from her tea.

‘You obviously haven’t forgiven me for the things I said that day,’ he continued. ‘Most of the time since you’ve been here you’ve been a nervous wreck or, if not that, beaming pure hostility my way. The only thing that seems to relax you is contact with my dog or my mother’s odds and ends.’

He broke off and looked rueful as Tottie rose, came over and arranged herself at Harriet’s feet.

Harriet glanced at him briefly. In jeans, boots and a khaki bush shirt, with his thick hair ruffled and blue shadows on his jaw, he looked the epitome of a man of the land whereas, when she’d bumped into him, in a grey suit, he’d definitely been more of a high-flying businessman.

She shivered involuntarily. He’d been so angry in a quiet but deadly sort of way.

‘Talk to me, Harriet,’ he said firmly.

She took a sip of tea and then a deep breath. ‘I need a job, quite urgently.’

‘You—according to Arthur, anyway—are highly, if not to say über-qualified. Why would you want my job?’ He frowned. ‘It’s stuck out in the country even if you don’t have an army of lovers to worry about.’

‘It...’ Harriet paused ‘...suits me.’

‘Why?’

A short silence developed between them and lengthened until he said impatiently, ‘Oh, come on Harriet! I—’

‘I just want to get this job,’ she said with sudden intensity, ‘on my merits.’

‘Well, your merits are fine but I need to know more,’ he said flatly.

‘This kind of job doesn’t grow on trees,’ Harriet said after a long moment. ‘And it so happens it’s the right district for me.’

‘Why?’

Harriet sighed. ‘My brother was badly injured in a surfing accident. He’s now in a rehabilitation centre at—’ she named a facility ‘—that’s handy to Lennox Head and Heathcote. He has to learn to walk again. That’s why—’ she looked up at last and smiled with considerable irony ‘—when this job came up, it seemed like an answer to all my prayers. Until, that was—’ She stopped abruptly.

‘You found out whose job it was,’ Damien supplied.