Robyn Donald - Dark Fire

‘How kind of you to bring Aura home, Flint. You must have a nightcap before you go,’ Natalie said sweetly, making expert play with her lashes as she ushered him into the cluttered little sitting-room. ‘Whisky, surely? You look like a whisky man. I think we’ve got some somewhere.’

His expression reminded Aura of the smile on the face of the tiger. ‘Not for me, thank you.’

Aura bit her lip. She should have been pleased at this unusual interest. Following Lionel’s death and the subsequent revelations of his shady, secret life, her mother had sunk into a dangerous apathy that developed into a fullblown nervous breakdown when she’d realised that the only assets she had left were a small annuity Lionel hadn’t been able to get his hands on. It provided barely enough money to keep her.

For the first time in her life, Aura had found herself needed by her mother. At first she hadn’t understood how ill Natalie was, but when she’d come home from a much-wanted job interview to find her unconscious from an overdose of sleeping pills and tranquillisers, she had realised that for the time being she was going to have to give up her ambitions to make a career in marketing.

Even then, she had hoped that she would have time to finish designing a market research programme she had begun at university. Unfortunately, Natalie had needed her constant attention, and as the tap of the computer’s keys seemed to drive her to a frenzy, Aura had given up on it for the time being.

It had been a miserable six months. The only thing that had sustained Aura was meeting Paul. It had helped Natalie, too. She was slowly returning to her normal spirits.

Witness, Aura thought grimly, her swift reaction to Flint Jansen.

It was difficult to see what was going on behind the clear, hard glitter of Flint’s eyes, but Aura was prepared to bet that it was appreciation. The clear skin and sultry green eyes Natalie had bequeathed to her daughter were almost unmarred by the years. Tiny lines of petulance and self-indulgence were beginning to etch into the ivory skin, drag the full, lush mouth down at the corners. Even so, Natalie was exquisitely beautiful.

‘No?’ she said now, with a knowing, flirtatious smile. ‘Well, then, a cup of coffee, and while it’s being made you must sit down and tell me how you come to be driving Aura home.’

‘Paul had to wait for a phone call from Britain,’ Aura interposed curtly, not caring whether he thought her rude, ‘so Flint very kindly offered to take his place.’

‘Only for the drive back,’ Flint said in a voice as smooth and bland as cream.

Flakes of colour heated Aura’s cheeks. ‘Naturally,’ she retorted too quickly.

‘I’m staying with Paul until the wedding,’ Flint told Natalie, ‘so if you want me to take a message to him, I’ll do it gladly.’

Aura’s brows drew together as she stared significantly at her mother, willing her to be silent. But Natalie had learned that the best way to get what she wanted was to use a mixture of cajolery and sexuality on the most powerful man within sight, and it was too late for her to study new tactics.

‘No, no,’ she said, smiling at Flint as though he was the most fascinating man she had ever met, ‘it’s just the new flat. I couldn’t work out what I didn’t like about it, and only a few minutes ago when I was sitting looking at this hideous affair here I realised that it was the carpet. Too middle class and tacky. We’ll have to get it changed, but don’t you worry about it, I’ll discuss it with Paul when I see him next. Now, do sit down and tell me all about yourself. Aura, aren’t you going to make us some coffee, darling?’

Sure that Flint was too astute to be taken in by her mother’s calculated seductiveness, she watched with astonishment when he gave her mother a slow, tantalising smile and sat down.

Natalie, who adored flirtations and knew just how to conduct one, eyed his hard, unhandsome face with an interest that had something of avidity in it, and proceeded to show how skilled she was in such sport.

Flint responded to her sophisticated coquettishness with a lazy, dangerous charm that had Natalie eating out of his hand in no time. Fuming, Aura had to make coffee and listen to her mother being questioned by an expert. Within five minutes Natalie had artlessly divulged that dear, kind, thoughtful Paul had not only bought a flat for his mother-in-law to be, but had also offered a car.

‘Only to have Aura throw it back in his face,’ Natalie sighed. ‘So middle class and boring and prissy of her! It would make life infinitely less stressful, especially now. As it is, unless friends are generous enough to put themselves out for us, we have to use public transport.’

Her voice registered the kind of horror most people reserved for crawling over oyster shells. Flint’s brows shot up.

Much encouraged by this, Natalie went on, ‘And what difference is there between moving before the wedding and moving after it? I’m not complaining, but it would have made life so much easier for us all if we’d had the new flat, which is four times the size of this dreary little place, to entertain. But no, Aura had some idea that it wasn’t the done thing. As though I’m no judge! Not that it really matters, it just means that I’ll be stuck here until they come home from their honeymoon. I’ve been ill, so I can’t cope with moving by myself.’

Whenever it seemed she might run down, Flint asked another seemingly innocuous question, and away she went again, spilling out things Aura would much rather he didn’t know. Cosseted and adored all her life, Natalie had been valued only for her looks, for her pleasing ways. She naturally gravitated towards men who looked as though they could protect her. Flint filled the bill perfectly.

If you liked that sort of overt, brash male forcefulness. Aura’s fingers trembled as she set the tray. She knew she was being unfair; Flint’s air of competence, of authority, that inbuilt assurance that here was a man who was master of himself and his world, was not assumed. It was as natural a part of him as his smile and the complex hints of danger that crackled around him.

Aura knew better than to display her anger and resentment, but when she appeared with the tray she very firmly took command of the conversation, steering it away from personal things to focus on the man who sat opposite, his lean, clever, formidable face hiding every thought but those he wanted them to see.

Fortunately, Natalie knew that men adored talking about themselves. She demanded the details of his life, so they learned that he was some kind of troubleshooter for his firm, that he travelled a lot overseas, that he had been born in the Wairarapa and still went back as often as he could, and that he was thirty-one, a year younger than Paul.

Which, Aura thought as she sipped her coffee, probably explained Paul’s protective attitude to him at school. He certainly didn’t need protecting now. A more confident, invulnerable man than Flint Jansen it would be hard to imagine. She could see him troubleshooting right across the globe, keen intelligence fortified by disciplined energy and confident control, the hard-edged masculine charisma warning all who came up against him that here was a man who had to be taken very seriously indeed.

He could tell a good story, too. In a very short time he had them both laughing, yet although he seemed perfectly open Aura realised that he was revealing very little of either his work or himself. What they were being treated to was a skilfully edited version of his life, one he’d clearly used before.

A quick, unremarked glance at her watch informed her that he had only been there thirty minutes. It seemed hours. Restlessly, she thought she’d never be able to look around the small, slightly squalid room, rendered even smaller by the furniture that her mother had managed to salvage from the wreck of her life, without remembering Flint in it. Somehow he had managed to stamp the dark fire of his personality on it as Paul never had.