Diana Hamilton - Threat From The Past

She flicked her eyes to his and then quickly away again as her heart tightened and shifted inside her. There was a dark magic in the way he looked and moved and spoke, something indefinable that reached right out to her. And she didn’t want it to be that way so she fixed her eyes on a point somewhere just above his left shoulder as she took two concessionary paces back into the room and said as coldly as she knew how, ‘You’re magnifying your own importance.’ Her small chin lifted as, against every self-preserving instinct, her eyes were drawn to his wicked green gaze. And although she felt the heat of betraying colour cover her creamy skin she refused to look away, to back down in front of this opportunistic devil. ‘My aunt and uncle are away from home and Dominic’s tied up in London on the firm’s business.’

‘Oh, I just bet he is!’ Adam drawled, his mouth curling cynically. ‘I don’t give a damn about him or Vanessa. But it’s vitally important I see my father.’

Selina stared at him. What kind of fool did he think she was? And she drawled right back at him, ‘Vitally important to whom? Or to what? Your bank balance, most likely! The type of clothes you wear, for a start, don’t come off the bargain rail in a chain-store basement.’

The way he looked at her sent a stab of apprehension through her stomach but he did no more than shrug very slightly before he told her, ‘If that’s what you want to believe, go ahead.’

And strangely, despite what she’d been told about him, the hard facts that all added up to his utter detriment, she didn’t want to believe it. But charm, allied to his fantastic looks, was part of his stock-in-trade, and she wasn’t going to fall for it, was she? Besides, if what he wanted of Martin was above-board, then there would be nothing to stop him telling her what it was.

‘Tell me why it’s so vitally important that you see him, and if I agree I’ll tell you how to contact him.’ Her voice had emerged rustily as she’d issued the challenge, and she knew by the frantic flutter of her heartbeats that she actually wanted to hear that what he had to say to her uncle was innocent of the threat both Dominic and Vanessa had implied.

She dragged in a breath, the tip of her tongue nervously moistening her parched lips, and felt the quick hot stab of something nameless as she watched his half-hooded eyes lazily follow that give-away movement.

His soft smile was tinged with regret but the wicked green glints in his eyes cancelled out the spurious remorse as he told her, ‘I’m afraid it’s between me and Martin,’ and the disappointment was keen, sharp as a knife just for one moment before she thrust it out of existence, because all along she had known—hadn’t she just?—how rotten he was. Dominic had called him his father’s enemy and never again would she even begin to question that.

‘Then we’ve reached an impasse. And I’m afraid I can’t help you, Mr Tudor.’ No way was she about to tell this devious swine how to contact Martin, where he was. She would defend the beloved elderly man any way she could. He had been warned to avoid stress and anxiety and Adam Tudor meant just that—stress and anxiety in its most undiluted form!

‘Why so formal, Selina? We’re capable of being on very friendly terms indeed—I think we’ve proved that much, to our mutual satisfaction, don’t you?’ He had started to move towards her and the look in his memorable eyes made his intentions quite plain. He was about to do something she wouldn’t like. Or rather, she corrected herself with panicky honesty, something she might like too damn much!

‘I’ll hurry Meg along with the coffee. You might as well have a cup before you leave.’ The words came out on a husky rush and she left the room with more haste than dignity. Then, overcoming the impulse to lean back against the smooth wood of the door, to get herself back together and give herself time to work out just how to ask Meg to stay glued to her side after she’d brought in that coffee, instruct her not to leave her until that devil was safely out of the house, she strode rapidly down the corridor to the kitchen.

But maybe enlisting Meg’s help wasn’t such a good idea, Selina decided as the housekeeper said stiffly, ‘Finished that lot already?’ meaning the minor banquet she’d martyred herself preparing and of which Selina herself had hardly tasted a mouthful.

‘We’re ready for coffee; I’ll take it through.’ She could ask Adam Tudor to leave the premises all by herself, she told herself staunchly. She didn’t have to panic when he looked as if kissing her again was the only thing on his mind. For pity’s sake, she had deflected many an amorous male in the past without calling in the troops, and to ask for Meg’s support would call for explanations she had no intention of making. Far better to say nothing and endure the older woman’s huffy mood.

‘You do that.’ Meg banged a few saucepans around. ‘And I’ll go and make up a bed in one of the guest rooms for your man friend. Whether he uses it or not is up to you. But I dare say it will look better if I go through the motions.’

‘What the hell are you talking about?’ Selina put the filter-coffee jug down on a tray with a crash. Meg was what was politely known as a ‘character’ and had ruled the family with a heavy hand and sharp tongue for many years, everyone putting up with her moods, ignoring them because they knew she would die for any one of them if she had to. But this was carrying the sharp-tongued-old-retainer bit much too far and Selina growled, ‘If you’re implying what I think you’re—’

‘If the cap fits.’ Meg’s long nose was high in the air. ‘It’s not seemly—entertaining men friends when your poor uncle’s fighting for his life and your aunt’s worried half to death and Dominic’s working all hours to keep things going.’

‘And I’m taking the heaven-sent opportunity to indulge in a bit of sneaky bacchanalia!’ Selina supplied sarcastically, fuming at the housekeeper’s exaggeration, her gross distortion of the facts. ‘It’s business. I told you.’

And Meg pushed her chin in the air, her mouth turning down as she snorted, ‘I’m not that daft. And I’ve got eyes in my head, haven’t I?’ Meaning she’d taken in that torrid embrace, and, that being so, Selina could find nothing to say in her own defence because she had reacted shamefully to his kisses and Meg had walked in on them just as she’d been about to go completely over the top!

Trying to forget the slow burn of colour that crept over her skin, she informed Meg crossly, ‘There is no question of Mr Tudor staying the night. He will be leaving just as soon as he’s had coffee.’ She added cream and sugar to the tray, her hands shaking with temper. One day someone would have to remind Meg of who paid her wages!

‘Well, if he doesn’t sleep here I don’t know where he will sleep,’ Meg grumbled, beginning to back down, as she always did, if she sensed she’d gone too far. ‘I did tell you about the snow. He could have got out then. Not now. Look for yourself.’

Selina stared at the housekeeper in appalled disbelief, her feet seemingly rooted to the kitchen floor, and, giving her a withering look, Meg clicked her tongue impatiently and marched to one of the windows, dragging back the curtains. ‘Well?’

No need to say a thing. What could she say when the outside security lights danced back from drifts and heaps of glittering whiteness, mockingly magnifying the swirling, sticky flakes that were still pouring out of the cold night sky?

‘I’ll put him in the oak room,’ Meg said grimly. ‘That should cool his ardour.’

If that remark had been meant to shake Selina out of her trance-like stillness, it failed. Something akin to shock kept her where she was, and speechless. The immense disquiet filling her right now had more to do with her insane reaction to him as a man than the very real knowledge of how bitterly angry both Dom and Vanessa would be when they found out that Martin’s son and enemy had been offered refuge for the night. Suddenly she began to shiver.