Kitabı oku: «That Kind Of Man»

CONTENTS

Cover

Dear Reader

About the Author

Title Page

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

Copyright

CHAPTER ONE

‘OH, ORLANDO! Darling, darling Orlando!’ An unknown blonde wearing black gave a dramatic cry.

Abigail had noticed the woman in church. She had been sobbing loudly throughout the service, but now Abigail could observe that the tears she had cried had left her mascara miraculously unsmudged. She had wondered briefly whether the woman had been one of her husband’s lovers, before pulling herself up short—for that way lay madness.

The bitter wind lifted a stray strand of honey-coloured hair and whipped it across Abigail’s pale face, and the gentle lashing movement forced her to give herself a little shake. Because it was all like a dream—some weird and crazy dream. Not a nightmare exactly, but something pretty close to it. Unreal. Yes, that was it. Unreal. As if this were all happening to someone else. And not to her.

Abigail shivered violently as a fat flake of snow fluttered down from the gun-metal sky like a frenzied bird, to eventually settle on her hand. She had worn a pair of fine black kid gloves in an attempt to keep warm, but, even so, her fingers still shook like a drunk’s as they clutched onto a single scarlet rose.

She was cold. Cold as an arctic waste. Unprotected from the furies of the winter weather, she stood by the graveside wearing the only black outfit she had had in her wardrobe—a thin, two-piece suit whose material, if not colour, was more suited to a spring day.

Black was not a colour she normally wore, but for today it was a must. And Orlando would have expected it. Because no matter what had gone on between them—no matter what a mess their marriage had been—he should not have died.

She was too young, she thought, casting a disbelieving look around her. Much too young to be a widow at nineteen, standing with and yet curiously apart from Orlando’s wild, thespian friends, who even now were loudly reciting extravagant poetry. How she wished that they would stop. During their histrionics at the church she had been half tempted to tell them to shut up, but the last thing she wanted today, of all days, was a row.

If only she had someone there for her. Someone to rely on. Someone strong enough to lean on. Or at least to cast a few withering looks of disapproval which might make some of the people present behave more circumspectly.

But she had no one. Her mother was dead, her beloved stepfather was dead—both killed in a horrific car crash just months before her wedding. It seemed that everyone she loved was taken away from her. The only person she had left in the world was Nick, and theirs was only the most tenuous link—a link that was always in danger of being broken by their mutual dislike.

Because Nick Harrington had resented her since the moment he had first set eyes on her, on what should have been one of the happiest days of her life ...

She had been sitting on her stepfather’s shoulders at the time. Philip Chenery had been proudly carrying her into the vast hallway of his mansion, tucked away high up in the Hollywood Hills.

Abigail had been breathless with excitement. The day before, her beautiful actress mother had become Mrs Philip Chenery in the most fairytale wedding ceremony Abigail could have imagined. Her mother had married one of Hollywood’s biggest producers, and the three of them were going to live happily ever after in the most glamorous house in the world.

In the shiny marbled hallway, all the staff had lined up to meet Philip’s new wife and her young daughter—and Nick, as the son of Philip’s cook, had been scowlingly forced to stand in line too.

Abigail had only been seven at the time. Some psychologists said that it was impossible to remember that far back. But Abigail did. The memory of meeting Nick Harrington was scorched onto her mind for ever and a day.

She would never forget the way those clever, slanting green eyes had fixed her coolly in their sights. The eighteen-year-old boy had already possessed a heart-breakingly handsome face, but it was a proud and cold face. He hadn’t shown a flicker of emotion as he’d stared at her, but Abigail had immediately sensed his disapproval.

The product of a ravishing Italian mother and a brilliant English father, Nick Harrington had inherited all the very best characteristics from both nationalities. His keen, natural intelligence and outrageously good looks ensured that men would always try to emulate him and women would spend a lifetime casting hungry glances in his direction.

Abigail had discovered later that Philip had a soft spot for the boy, whose father had abandoned him just as her own father had abandoned her. He had recognised Nick’s outstanding potential immediately and had invested in his education. Not surprisingly, the two of them had formed a close bond.

So perhaps it was only natural that Nick should have resented Abigail. She was, after all, trespassing on his territory.

Abigail had seen it differently.

She’d been a small girl already thrust into a brand-new life, miles away from England, and Nick’s attitude had unsettled her. Nick Harrington had been the serpent in her paradise, and, because of it, a silent bond of enmity had been born.

She had been grateful that he was more than a decade her senior, that she had been sent far away to her mother’s old boarding-school in England, and that their meetings were destined to be brief, during her school vacations.

As she had grown older she had supposed that the animosity might die a natural death, but her supposition had been wrong. Nick had seemed to resent her more as each year passed, and when she had blossomed into womanhood it had got even worse—he had actually seemed to despise her. So she just did the sensible thing and despised him right back.

Yes, there was certainly no love lost between her and Nick Harrington.

And yet ...

It was stupid, really, but at times today she had found herself wishing that he had bothered to come to her husband’s funeral. Nick’s might not be a face she welcomed seeing in normal circumstances, but at least it was a familiar face. And right now she longed for the sight of something familiar, for she was as lonely as she could ever remember feeling.

But, in response to the news of Orlando’s death, there had been nothing more than an exquisite display of pure white lilies and a brief, almost curt letter of condolence which had given Abigail little comfort.

No phone call. No appearance at the church—even though she had craned her neck to look for his dark head rising above all the others ...

The priest was now intoning the final words of farewell as the coffin was slowly lowered into the earth and Abigail raised the hand which still clutched the rose so tightly.

A chill breeze briefly lifted the delicate scarlet petals of the rose upwards, so that they flapped like wings, and then Abigail threw it down onto the coffin, with the kind of dramatic gesture she knew her late husband would have appreciated.

Then, without knowing why she did it, she tore the black kid gloves from her pale hands and hurled them away from her, so that they, too, slowly fluttered down to alight on top of the polished coffin.

She raised her pale, strained face, a sudden movement catching her attention, and she felt an odd, prickling sensation as she looked up and found herself staring directly into Nick Harrington’s enigmatic eyes—as cold and as green as a northern fiord.

He stood apart from the rest of the mourners, tall and lean, his dark, handsome face cruel and arrogant and proud. The narrow-eyed look he threw at Abigail was one of pure challenge.

She felt as though she had been woken from a long and drugged sleep—her senses leaping into life as though they had been newly born. Just the shock of seeing him again made Abigail’s heart contract painfully in her chest. She felt all the blood drain from her cheeks and, just for a second, she had to fight to stay upright.

He gave her a brief, frowning scrutiny as he observed her reaction, and then began walking rapidly towards her until he was standing in front of her, towering over her like some dark, malevolent statue.

And Abigail found herself having to strain her neck to stare upwards at him, even though she was wearing high, rather tottery black heels. Each time she saw him she was always slightly amazed by his impressive height and extraordinary presence—as though her memory was somehow defective where Nick Harrington was concerned.

‘Hello, Abigail,’ he said quietly, in that deep, slumberous voice whose accent defied description. But that was hardly surprising—he had been educated at the finest universities in the world. He was the original nomad—a rich, successful nomad, with his fancy homes and his rare paintings and fast cars.

She had not seen him since the eve of her wedding, close on a year ago, when he had been so unbearably rude to Orlando. And to her. When he had arrived at their hotel as if he owned the place, had coldly summoned them into his presence and threatened to call a halt to the wedding.

But he hadn’t been able to.

And how wonderful it had been to see the powerful Nick Harrington impotent for once! Unable to exert his formidable will to shape the future. Like a precious gift, Abigail had treasured the memory of his dark, implacable face as she had made her wedding vows in Chelsea’s famous Register Office.

Come to think of it, his face looked just as forbidding and implacable right now. ‘Hello, Nick,’ she responded calmly.

‘How are you, Abby?’ he said softly, and the concern in his voice sounded almost genuine.

‘I’m, I’m ...,’ she responded falteringly, only it all came out in a kind of wobbly gulp. Perhaps it was the concern that did it, or the use of her childhood nickname, or maybe even the unaccustomed gentleness in his voice. Because for the first time since Orlando’s death Abigail felt the salt taste of tears welling up at the back of her throat. She made a small, choking sound, terrified that she was going to break down in front of him.

He frowned again deeply, as if any show of vulnerability was distasteful to him. ‘Are you okay?’ He gave her a narrow-eyed look of interrogation and seemed half inclined to take her elbow, but then appeared to think better of it. He pushed his hands deep into the pockets of his grey trousers, and Abigail was appalled to find herself noticing how the fine fabric stretched almost indecently over his muscular thighs. ‘Are you okay?’ he repeated.

‘What do you think?’ she asked bitterly, because he was the only person in the world she could take it out on right now. Because surely Nick, more than anyone, knew how unfair life could be?

‘I don’t think you’d care to hear what I think,’ he said, in a bitter, impatient kind of voice, and Abigail’s head jerked up in surprise at the underlying menace she heard there.

He might not be her favourite person in the world, but at this precise moment he was her only lifeline, the person closest to her, who knew her better than anyone else in the world. Could bridges not be mended in troubled times? ‘I would,’ she answered quietly, her heavy-lidded blue eyes bright with unshed tears and filled with appeal as she sought for clever, confident Nick to make some sense of it all. ‘Tell me what you think about it, Nick?’ she appealed.

But he merely shook his dark head. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said, in a bland, steady voice, ‘about Orlando.’

Some small, vague hope which had flared up inside Abigail was snuffed out. She had never thought that Nick would be the kind of person simply to spout out polite platitudes. She lifted her chin squarely and looked him full in the eye. ‘I could have accused you of many things, Nick Harrington,’ she told him proudly, ‘but never of hypocrisy! How have you got the nerve to stand there and say you’re sorry, when everyone knows what you really thought of Orlando?’

He didn’t flinch, his unwavering green gaze not tainted by an iota of guilt. ‘Just because I didn’t like him—’

‘Hated him, you mean,’ she corrected fiercely.

He shook his head. ‘Everything’s always so black and white for you, isn’t it, Abigail?’ He sighed, as if it gave him little pleasure to say the words. ‘Hate is too strong an emotion to use in connection with Orlando. You have to feel passion before you can hate someone, and I couldn’t summon up enough energy to feel hatred for a man I did not respect.’

‘No, of course you couldn’t!’ agreed Abigail caustically. ‘Any emotion other than the desire to make money is too strong for Mr cold-fish-Harrington, isn’t it?’

He gave her a long, steady look. ‘At the moment, the overwhelming emotion I’m experiencing is a desire to put you over my knee,’ he said evenly, ‘and beat some of that damned cynicism out of you!’

His eyes narrowed and he seemed to be measuring his words carefully. ‘Just because I didn’t like the man, it doesn’t mean I wanted to see him dead, Abigail. To die at any age is a tragedy, but to die when you’re only twenty-five is a waste. An utter, utter waste.’ His mouth thinned into a disapproving line. ‘What happened? Was he drunk when he died?’

‘He was abseiling, for heaven’s sake!’ she responded in an outraged tone. ‘He would hardly be drunk!’

Broad shoulders were shrugged dismissively, but the expression in those grass-green eyes was sombre. ‘Rumour has it that Orlando was a man in search of cheap thrills. Any kind of thrills. So maybe marriage didn’t quite match up to his expectations, hmm, Abby?’

The implication behind his words was shocking. Automatically, and oblivious to the now silent stares of the other mourners, Abigail’s hand flailed up to slap him. But his reflexes were lightning-fast, and he caught it just as it was about to connect with his cheek and held it there, so that to an outside observer it looked almost as though she was about to stroke his face and he was letting her. No. Not just letting her. Encouraging her.

Her fingers inadvertently brushed against his cheek, and his skin felt like warm satin. Incredibly, she found herself wanting to stay like that. Just like that.

Angrily, a guilty blush staining her face with its stinging heat, Abigail snatched her hand away, but not before she had surprised a cold little glint of triumph lurking in the depths of his green eyes. In some mad, shaming way, she felt as though she had been compromised.

‘Don’t you ever dare do anything like that again,’ she said in a fierce undertone, and then heard a gentle cough behind her. She spun round to find the elderly priest standing there, looking almost apologetic, and Abigail guiltily realised that the service had come to an end.

And she hadn’t even noticed; she had been far too busy sparring with Nick. What must the priest think of her?

‘If you feel the need to talk any time, Mrs Howard,’ the priest was saying, in the soothing kind of voice he had used on innumerable occasions before, ‘any time at all, then please do. My door is always open for you, my dear. You know that.’

His genuine kindness affected her as much as anything had done that day, and Abigail felt her throat uselessly constricting as she struggled to find words to respond to him. Did Nick notice her discomfort? Was that why he chose to answer when she could not?

‘Thank you, Father,’ he said smoothly. ‘I know that Abigail will bear that in mind. But I’m here now.’

‘Indeed?’ The priest looked up at him almost absently from behind the tiny, half-moon-shaped spectacles he wore. ‘And you are ...? I’m sorry, but I don’t think we’ve met.’

‘I’m Nick Harrington,’ came the decisive response, and then, because the priest seemed to be waiting for some further explanation, he added, ‘An old friend of the family. I have known Abigail since she was a little girl. Her late stepfather was a great friend to me.’

‘I see.’ The priest nodded. ‘Well, I’m very pleased to meet you, Mr Harrington.’

He was probably relieved, thought Abigail, watching as the two men shook hands. He had been up to the house several times since Orlando’s death, saying that she really ought to have someone with her.

She remembered him standing in his shabby cassock, looking around the sumptuous drawing-room with a curious and yet bewildered expression. As though confused by the fact that Abigail had all the material possessions anyone could ever possibly want, and yet she had no one to come and sit with her and hold her hand while she mourned her dead husband.

‘It’s time we were leaving,’ said Nick in a low voice. Only this time he did take Abigail’s elbow, holding onto it firmly, as if he was afraid that she might stumble and fall. And Abigail let him guide her, grateful for the support he offered.

‘Won’t you come back to the house for some lunch, Father?’ he was saying to the priest. ‘Some of the others have already set off, I see.’ His disapproving gaze took in Orlando’s friends, who were noisily wending their way towards the long line of black limousines as though it were a wedding and not a funeral.

One of the women, a dark, elfin creature named Jemima, was tossing a black feather boa flamboyantly across one slim, couture-clad shoulder, her glossy black head flung back in a gesture of extravagant laughter.

Abigail noticed the twist of scorn which had hardened Nick’s mouth into a forbidding line, and wondered what he and the priest must be thinking of this whole bizarre funeral.

But the priest, at least, seemed oblivious to Nick’s disapproval, and nodded his bald head with enthusiasm. ‘Lunch would be very welcome,’ he said eagerly, ‘and I’d be delighted to join you. Friday happens to be my housekeeper’s day off and she usually leaves me a fish salad which, frankly, leaves rather a lot to be desired! I’ll walk up to the house—it isn’t very far.’

‘No, no. It’s much too far.’ Nick shook his dark head. ‘Please take my car,’ he said, and pointed to the longest of the low black vehicles which stood in line. ‘Really, I insist.’

‘But what about you?’ asked the priest.

‘I’ll go with Mrs Howard,’ answered Nick, and his eyes defied Abigail to argue with him.

But she was past caring, or arguing. She was numb and cold and exhausted. She let Nick propel her towards one of the waiting cars as though she were a mannequin in a shop-window—her limbs light and useless as if they had been fashioned from plastic. The lethargy which had been plaguing her for days began insidiously to overwhelm her.

She sank down on the squashy black leather seat and closed her eyes, expecting a barrage of questions, but when none came she opened them again and found him observing her, his face curiously expressionless. And that in itself was surprising. Normally there was at least dislike or disapproval on the face of Nick Harrington when he was in her company.

Outside the car, the trees were like charcoal line-drawings etched in stark contrast against heavy grey snow-clouds, and oddly childlike. It was funny, she thought suddenly, but even in the early days of their relationship, when they had been relatively happy, she and Orlando had never discussed having children. Abigail shivered. Not funny at all, really.

Nick saw the shiver and rapped on the glass immediately. ‘Could you increase the heating?’ he instructed the driver curtly. ‘It’s like Siberia in the back here.’

A welcome, warm blast of air hit Abigail immediately and she expelled a breath of relief as some of the icy chill left her body.

She seemed to have been cold for days now, a dull, bone-deep coldness she couldn’t shift, not since the night the policeman had knocked on the heavy oak door and had waited to give her the momentous news.

She had known immediately that her husband was dead, from the grim look on the policeman’s face, but long, agonising seconds had passed before he had asked her that chillingly final question, ‘Are you the wife of a Mr Orlando Howard?’

There had been shock at first, deep and profound shock, but hot on its heels had come relief. Blessed relief that Orlando could never taunt her again.

And Abigail had had to live with the guilt of those feelings ever since ...

‘Are you okay?’ Nick’s deep voice seemed to come from out of nowhere, and Abigail forced herself back to the present with an effort.

‘I suppose so.’ She nodded her head stiffly. That dream-like feeling had washed over her again, and all her reflexes seemed to be on auto-pilot. It seemed easier to cope when she felt that way.

‘You’ll feel better now that the funeral is over.’ His eyes were fixed on her face, like a doctor waiting for a reaction from a patient.

‘Yes,’ she replied. But will I, she wondered? Would she ever feel better again?

‘You look tired, Abby,’ he observed neutrally. ‘Exhausted, in fact.’

‘I am.’

‘Then rest,’ he urged. ‘At least until we get back to the house.’

Her normal response to him—if any of her responses to Nick could ever be described as normal—would have been to tell him to mind his own business. His high-handedness was something she usually resented. But he was right, she was too exhausted—even to resist him.

Abigail tried to lean her head back, but the hat she wore prevented her from doing so. She lifted her hand and removed first the pin securing it and then the black, wide-brimmed, rather exotic creation from her head.

She never wore hats as a rule, she found them too constricting. She had chosen this one today because Orlando had loved hats, the more outrageous the better. And she had failed him in so many ways as a wife. The least she could do was to don a fancy hat in his honour—to play the part he would have wanted her to play at his funeral.

But it was such a relief to remove it. She tossed it on the seat beside her and shook her head vigorously, allowing the thick, straight honey-coloured hair to fall down unfettered around her shoulders.

Nick was watching her, his eyes narrowed as the bright hair spilled down in contrast against the black suit, and it was several moments before he spoke. ‘You didn’t contact me directly when Orlando was killed.’

It was as much a question as a statement, Abigail acknowledged. Almost an accusation, too. She absently pushed a lock of hair off her pale cheek. ‘I didn’t see the point. I knew that you’d read about it in the papers. We haven’t exactly been living in each other’s pockets since my marriage, have we? Or before it either, come to that. And you never bothered to hide your dislike of Orlando.’

‘The feeling was entirely mutual. Orlando made no secret of his aversion to me, you know.’

Stung into defence, Abigail sat up in her seat. ‘He, at least, had a reason for disliking you!’

‘Oh?’ The green gaze was unperturbed. ‘And what was that? Envy of my material status? Because if there was ever a man who demonstrated avarice like it was going out of fashion, then it was Orlando.’

‘Why, you ... you ... unbearable brute!’ Abigail only got the words out with a monumental effort. ‘How can you speak so ill of the dead!’

‘I said the same when he was alive, and to his face,’ Nick contradicted coolly. ‘The reason Orlando hated me was because he was a failure and I wasn’t. And because he knew that if I’d stuck around I might just have been able to knock some sense into your pretty but dense little head and stopped you marrying him.’

Disbelief stirred in the depths of Abigail’s eyes, so dark blue that they looked like ink. ‘You really think you would have been able to stop me marrying him?’

He shrugged. ‘It was a pity that he managed to talk you into a register office wedding which could be performed relatively quickly.’

‘That made a difference, did it?’ she challenged.

His eyes glittered. ‘Of course it made a difference. You see, I had rather counted on your love of the big occasion coming to the fore, Abigail. You aren’t your mother’s daughter for nothing. And if you had opted for a church wedding and all that it entailed, then it would have given me plenty of time to have changed your mind.’

Abigail gave a bitter laugh. ‘And you bother asking why I didn’t contact you after Orlando died? I can only wonder why you turned up today at all.’

‘Because I’m the closest thing to a relative you have,’ he pointed out coolly.

‘I know,’ Abigail’s voice was heavy with sarcasm. ‘And aren’t I the lucky one?’

‘Aren’t you just?’ he agreed mockingly, and stretched his long legs out in front of him.

She had been trying very hard not to look at him too closely, and she didn’t want to ask herself why. But that unconsciously graceful stretch made her acutely aware of his physical presence and she found herself unable to tear her eyes away from him.

Even among very good-looking men Nick had always stood out from the crowd. Over the years Abigail had tried to analyse his particular appeal, and once again she attempted to be objective as she watched him covertly from beneath the thick, dark sweep of her eyelashes.

No one could deny that he had a superb physique. He was lightly tanned and muscular, without an ounce of spare flesh lurking on that impressive frame.

But loads of men had good bodies, she reasoned. Orlando, her late husband, had possessed a magnificent physique, which he had shown off whenever possible by wearing the most clinging and revealing clothes he could get away with.

And that, supposed Abigail, was the difference. Nick didn’t emphasise his shape; he didn’t have to. It would have been glaringly obvious to even the most unobservant person that Nick had a body to die for—even if he’d been swathed in sackcloth. The loose-cut suit he wore now, for example, merely hinted at the flat, hard planes of his abdomen and the heavily muscled thighs which lay beneath, and Abigail felt an uncomfortable awareness of his proximity tickling away at her nerve-ends.

But it was his face which had always drawn women to Nick, and it wasn’t just the pure, clean lines of his classically even features which attracted them. Or the curiously sensual curve of his mouth, its softness so at odds with the hard, jutting jaw which lay beneath. No, it was something beyond mere beauty which had held so many women in thrall.

His eyes were as alive and as green as grass, framed by lashes so thick and black and lush that just looking at them felt sinful.