Penny Jordan - Passionate Nights

‘He isn’t going to fall for any ‘‘helpless little me’ act from me, Dee,’ Kelly informed her.

‘You don’t know until you try it,’ Dee told her persuasively. ‘There’s no saying what helpful information we could pick up about Julian’s business affairs via him if he—’

‘I don’t know, because there’s no way I am going to try it.’ Kelly cut across her comment swiftly. ‘Tricking Julian into believing I find him attractive is one thing, lying to Brough is quite another …’

‘It is? Why?’ Dee asked her interestedly.

‘Because I don’t like lying to anyone,’ Kelly told her sharply. ‘The only reason I’ve agreed to deceive Julian is because of what he did to Beth and to stop him from doing it to anyone else. Persuading Brough to believe that I’m some kind of helpless little creature who needs protecting and rescuing from her own emotions, who can’t take responsibility for her own life or her own actions, is just so gross that there’s no way I would even contemplate it. Besides, he wouldn’t believe me. He’d see through what I was trying to do immediately.’

‘He knows you that well after spending … how long … a few hours or so with you, does he?’ Dee mused. ‘Amazing …’

‘He believes that I’m intent on trying to take Julian away from his sister. Let’s just leave it at that whilst we’re ahead of the game, shall we?’ Kelly told her curtly, ignoring her gentle jibe.

‘Okay,’ Dee soothed her, adding, ‘Look, I need to have a word with Anna about her making contact with Julian to offer to lend him the money he needs for this new venture. Now that Brough has turned him down he’s going to be too urgently in need of financial backing to question Anna’s motivation too deeply, which suits us very nicely. Brough has unwittingly done us a very big favour in turning Julian down.’

‘I’m sure he’d be delighted to hear that,’ Kelly told her sotto voce .

‘Oh, by the way, Harry sends his best love,’ Dee told her teasingly. Kelly grimaced into the receiver.

‘He does?’ she questioned, unable to resist the temptation to tell Dee dryly, ‘That’s odd; he seemed far more interested in Eve at the ball than he was in me. Now there’s a match. The pair of them are so well suited they might have been made for one another.’

‘Eve loves Julian,’ Dee pointed out to her.

‘No, what she loves is the man she believes that Julian is,’ Kelly corrected her soberly. ‘Poor girl, he’s going to break her heart.’

‘Well, if you’re right, Harry will be more than willing to help her to mend it,’ Dee told her practically. ‘Remember, Kelly, you’ve got to convince Julian that you want him; that way when you drop him as publicly as he dropped Beth he’ll never even guess what’s going to happen until it does and …’

‘I’m not sure that he’ll leave Eve for me,’ Kelly warned her. ‘Eve believes that he’s going to marry her …’

‘So did Beth and look what happened to her,’ Dee pointed out. ‘He’s going to be furious when he finds out how we’ve tricked him, furious and totally and completely humiliated,’ she said cheerfully. ‘And it couldn’t happen to a more deserving man.’

‘You really hate him, don’t you?’ Kelly recognised.

‘Yes. I really hate him,’ Dee agreed, and she put the receiver down. Kelly thought she heard her saying, But nowhere near as much as I hate myself, but she couldn’t be sure, and anyway it was too late to question Dee any further since she had hung up.

Wednesday morning came round too soon. Kelly was awake early—too early, she decided as she watched the sun rise.

It still wasn’t too late to refuse to go to Staffordshire but what excuse could she realistically give?

Impossible to tell Brough the truth—that she was afraid of going with him, afraid of what she might say, of what he might guess … of what she might feel … But if she didn’t go …

Julian had rung her again last night. Reluctantly she had agreed to meet him for a drink at a local wine bar this evening.

‘Julian, you’re dating someone else,’ she had reminded him coldly, ‘and so am I …’

‘Harry,’ he had scoffed. ‘He’s no match, no man for a woman like you, Kelly.’

‘And I suppose that you are,’ she had taunted him, holding her breath at the recklessness of what she was doing.

‘Try me,’ he had told her, sniggering suggestively. ‘I promise you, you won’t be disappointed.’

Kelly had been glad that the telephone meant he couldn’t see the shudder of revulsion she gave.

‘You and I are two of a kind, Kelly,’ he had told her thickly. ‘We take what we want from life. We’re both adventurers, exciting … passionate … I knew that the first time I saw you. I knew then how good we’d be together …’

‘When you were dating Beth, you mean,’ Kelly had reminded him coldly.

‘Beth is history,’ he’d told her dismissively. ‘But you and I … you and I are now , Kelly …’

‘You and I are nothing ,’ she had told him.

‘Tomorrow night,’ Julian had countered. ‘Be there, Kelly … You know you want me and I sure as hell want you …’

Want him? Completely revolted both by his conversation and his tone of voice, Kelly had replaced the receiver.

She could just imagine what Brough would have to say.

Brough.

Now why on earth was she thinking about him? she asked herself pointedly as her alarm started to ring. He was almost as bad as Julian Cox, although in a completely different way, of course. He had, after all, misjudged her just as badly.

Eve smiled tentatively at Kelly as Kelly opened the door to her and Brough and they stepped into the shop.

‘I’ll just run through a few things with you before we leave,’ Kelly told her reassuringly. ‘Wednesday isn’t normally a very busy day so you should be okay, but if you do have any problems—’

‘You’ve got my mobile number, haven’t you, Eve?’ Brough interrupted Kelly. ‘Any problems and you can get in touch with Kelly on that.’

‘Thank you, but I have my own mobile, Brough,’ Kelly told him frostily.

‘What I was going to say, Eve, is that I’ve left you the number of our landlady, Dee. She knows that you’ll be working here and she may very well call in to check if everything’s okay. She can be a bit daunting, but she’s really very kind … She’s Harry’s cousin,’ she added, and then stopped as Eve suddenly went bright red.

‘I … I saw him—Harry—the other day when I was walking along the river,’ Eve blurted out. ‘I … I don’t know if he mentioned it, but …’

‘No. No, he didn’t,’ Kelly told her, before adding gently, ‘But then, there’s really no reason why he should …’

‘No. No, of course not,’ Eve told her quickly. ‘I just meant … Well, I just thought …’

‘We really ought to leave,’ Brough informed Kelly, frowning slightly as he glanced at his watch. ‘The motorway is bound to be busy.’

‘I think it’s wonderful what you’re doing,’ Eve told Kelly admiringly. ‘I’d love to have that kind of talent,’ she added wistfully.

‘It’s more of a learned skill than a natural talent,’ Kelly told her wryly. ‘I was just lucky enough to be in the right place to learn it at the right time, and besides, I haven’t actually done anything yet.’

‘No, but Brough says …’ Eve stopped and glanced anxiously at her brother.

What had Brough said? Kelly wondered curiously ten minutes later as he opened the passenger door of his car for her and helped her inside.

She could always ask him, of course. Perhaps later on she would.

The Potteries where the factory was based wasn’t too far up the motorway, but Kelly was still feeling extremely apprehensive about the journey. What if Brough used it as an opportunity to take her to task about her relationship with Julian? If he did, then she would just have to remind him—again—that it was none of his business, she told herself firmly as she leaned back in her seat and very deliberately closed her eyes, hoping that he would correctly interpret this as a sign that she didn’t wish to talk.