by Penny Jordan
Or an ex-husband.
‘I’m just hot and tired, that’s all.’ Lucy could barely think straight, never mind speak, because of her own panic and fear. Nick knew Andrew Walker. Nick had told Andrew Walker about her and Prêt a Party. Nick and Andrew Walker were responsible for those photographs, that video. Andrew Walker had wanted to stop Marcus marrying her because he wanted Prêt a Party.
She hadn’t said a word about seeing Blayne. Had he told her that he was free again? Was she wishing that she were too? Had they made arrangements to meet up somewhere—in London, for instance? They had certainly had time.
‘That’s our flight they’ve just called,’ Marcus announced.
‘Marcus…’ Lucy desperately wanted to tell him what had happened, to appeal to him for help.
‘Yes.’
She bit her lip. ‘Nothing.’ How could she involve him? How could she tell him what a fool she had been? How could she tell him about the seedy and immoral nature of what she had so nearly become involved in? And what if, because of her foolishness, those dark forces and everything that went with them should seep into their own lives? Into Marcus’s business life? Marcus was a man of honour and probity—Marcus was the total opposite of the Andrew Walkers of this world.
She felt sick and shaky, and so very, very afraid.
‘Lucy. What a naughty girl you’ve been, not returning my calls.’
Lucy tried to stand up, but Andrew Walker had placed a hard hand on her shoulder, pushing her back into her chair. How had he got into the office? She had locked the door. She always locked the door when she had to be here now.
He waved a key under her nose, as though he had guessed what she was thinking.
‘How fortunate that Nick remembered he had a spare key to the office here. He’s back in London, by the way. Has he been in touch with you yet?’
Lucy didn’t speak. She didn’t trust herself to do so.
‘Nick very much wants to see you,’ he continued. ‘In fact he has told me in confidence how much he regrets the break-up of your marriage. I must say that it is a pity he is no longer involved in Prêt a Party.’
He released her shoulder and pulled up a chair, straddling it to sit in front of her, blocking her pathway to the door—which she suspected he had probably locked anyway.
‘Now, about Prêt a Party, Lucy.’
‘I’m closing Prêt a Party down,’ Lucy told him immediately. All she had been able to think about since their return from honeymoon had been how to solve the problem she had unwittingly brought on herself. In the end she had decided that the best way was simply to make sure that Prêt a Party no longer existed. ‘You’ll have to look for something else.’
‘Oh, no. I’m afraid we can’t allow you to do that. You see, Prêt a Party is just so perfect for our needs. It really was very foolish of Nick to give up his involvement in it, and of course he knows that himself now. Indeed, it strikes me that he may very well have a claim on re-establishing his role in Prêt a Party—after all, there was never any formal cessation of the contract between you, was there?’
‘Nick left me.’
‘A mistake he now regrets,’ Andrew Walker told her smoothly.
‘I won’t be dragged into what you’re doing, and I shall—’
He was shaking his head.
‘Lucy, I don’t think you properly understand. We want Prêt a Party, and we want you as well. After all, without you it isn’t very much use to us, you know. It’s your name that makes it what it is.’
‘No. I won’t agree—and you can’t make me.’
‘Oh, dear. I’m afraid I am going to have to disillusion you there. We very much can make you. How do you feel about your husband, Lucy? Do you love him? You wouldn’t want to see him hurt, would you? And he could be hurt—very badly hurt, too—if you don’t do what we want.’
‘You’re just saying that,’ Lucy protested. ‘You’re just trying to frighten me and threaten me—’
‘Where is Marcus at the moment, Lucy? Do you know?’
Stubbornly she refused to answer him. Andrew Walker sighed gently.
‘He’s in Leeds, isn’t he? Why don’t you telephone him? You know his mobile number, don’t you?’
‘He’s gone to see a client,’ Lucy told him stiffly. ‘I don’t want to disturb him.’
‘He may have gone to Leeds to see a client, but unfortunately he didn’t make the appointment. He’s had a small…accident, you see.’
He saw her expression and laughed.
‘I’m going to be very generous to you, Lucy. I’m going now, and I’m going to give you twenty-four hours to think things over. You’re a sensible woman, and I’m sure you’re going to realise very quickly that it’s in your own interests to accept what we’re offering you. See you tomorrow—same place, same time.’
Andrew Walker had gone, leaving only the smell of his aftershave behind to mingle with the scent of her own fear.
CHAPTER TEN
LUCY felt sick. She was struggling to breathe properly. Her fingers trembled so much as she reached for the telephone to ring Marcus that it took her several attempts to do so.
When the call rang out unanswered she panicked, and then tried to reassure herself that he had simply put his calls on divert. But then, shockingly, she heard a strange male voice demanding, ‘Who is it?’
Automatically she checked the number she had dialled, just in case it was wrong. It wasn’t.
‘I want to speak to Marcus—my husband.’
‘Ai want to speak to Marcus—mai ‘usband.’ The man mimicked her cruelly. ‘Well, there ain’t no Marcus ’ere.’
‘But you’ve got his mobile! How—? Where—?’
To her dismay the line went dead—and remained dead even though she tried over and over again to get her call answered.
Marcus’s mobile had obviously been stolen—but that didn’t mean anything had happened to Marcus himself, she tried to reassure herself. Mobile phones went missing all the time.
Even so…Frantically she rang the bank and asked to be put through to Marcus’s PA, demanding to know who exactly Marcus had been going to see and how she could get in touch with her husband.
‘Have you tried his mobile?’ Jerome asked her.
‘Yes, but…but a stranger answered. Jerome, I think it may have been stolen, and I’m worried about Marcus.’
‘Calm down.’ He immediately soothed her. ‘I’m sure there’s a perfectly reasonable explanation. I’ll get in touch with the client and then I’ll ring you back.’
Five minutes crawled by, agonisingly slowly, and then another five. And then Lucy couldn’t bear to wait any more.
This time she dialled Jerome’s number direct, only to find that his line was busy. Because he was trying to get in touch with her? Immediately Lucy hung up, and curled herself into a small tight ball of anguished fear. If anything had happened to Marcus then it was her fault. Because of her and Prêt a Party…because of her marriage to Nick…
Her telephone started to ring. She stared at it for several seconds, almost too afraid to answer it, then frantically reached for the receiver, clutching it when she heard Jerome’s voice saying sharply, ‘Lucy?’
‘Yes, it’s me. Have you spoken to Marcus?’
‘Yes…’
There was a note in his voice that immediately set alarm bells ringing in her head.
‘What is it? Where is he?’ she demanded fiercely.
‘There’s been a bit of an incident, but he’s all right, Lucy—’
‘What do you mean? What kind of incident? Jerome, where is he?’
‘Leeds General Hospital.’
‘What? Why? What’s happened to him? I’m going to see him. I—’
‘Lucy, calm down. Marcus is fine. He told me to tell you that he’ll be home tomorrow, as planned.’
‘I want to speak to him! I want to see him…’
She could hear Jerome exhaling.
‘I’m afraid that you can’t, Lucy. Not righ
t now. Marcus is in Casualty—no, it’s all right, there’s nothing seriously wrong with him—just a few bruises and scratches. Although from the sound of it, it could have been much worse if the crew of a cruising police car hadn’t spotted what was happening and scared off the young thugs who had set about him. However, the medics want to check him over—just to be on the safe side.’
‘Jerome, please…I want to know now exactly what happened,’ Lucy demanded, as she fought back the fear his words had caused her and tried to think and speak coherently.
‘Marcus was mugged by a group of youths—Eastern Europeans, he thinks. According to the police they might be illegal immigrants, but since they weren’t able to apprehend any of them they can’t confirm that. They were obviously after his wallet and his mobile—both of which they took, along with his watch. And of course Marcus, being Marcus, didn’t make it easy for them. Fortunately the police arrived before things got too out of hand. Marcus said explicitly that I was to tell you not to worry and that he will ring you as soon as he can. Like I said, he’s in Casualty at the moment, being patched up.’
‘I’m going to Leeds right now to see him,’ Lucy told the PA.
‘No, Lucy,’ Jerome said firmly. ‘Marcus anticipated that you would say that, and he told me to tell you there’s no need. He’ll be back tomorrow evening, as planned.’
Please let this not be happening, Lucy prayed after she had replaced the telephone receiver. Please let it all be only a horrible nightmare that isn’t really happening at all.
But it was happening—and it was happening because of her. Marcus had been attacked and robbed simply because he was married to her.
She was too distraught to cry, too filled with fear for Marcus to do anything other than stay where she was, unable to so much as move, as she focused on waiting to hear his voice.
Not even the familiar dull ache that told her she had again not conceived his child could break through that anxiety.
The seconds and then the minutes ticked by—half an hour—an hour—an hour and a quarter—and then the phone rang.
Lucy snatched up the receiver. ‘Marcus?’
‘Yes, it’s me.’
The relief of hearing his voice totally overwhelmed her. She was shaking so much with reaction she could hardly speak.
‘What happened? Are you all right? I want to come to Leeds.’
‘I was mugged, I’m fine, and there’s no point in you coming to Leeds. I’ll be back tomorrow evening.’
‘Where are you? The hospital?’
‘I’m in a taxi on the way to see my client. The hospital have given me a clean bill of health, and apart from a bit of bruising I’m okay. Stop worrying, Lucy. Things like this happen all the time, so let’s not make an unnecessary drama out of it, shall we?’
She could hear the impatience in his voice. She tried to breathe deeply, and gulped in air on a shuddering intake of breath that almost choked her.
‘Look, I’ve got to go,’ she could hear Marcus saying. ‘I’m using a temporary pay-as-you-go mobile—all I’ve had time to get. I’ll ring you tonight.’
‘Promise me that you really are all right,’ Lucy demanded emotionally.
‘I really am all right,’ Marcus assured her calmly.
This time it wasn’t shock with which she reacted to Andrew Walker’s appearance in her office, but instead a blend of sick despair and exhaustion.
She had been awake all night, worrying and thinking, and it showed in Lucy’s face as she turned to face her tormentor.
‘I do hope you’ve given some serious thought to what I said to you yesterday, Lucy,’ he told her smoothly. ‘But just in case you didn’t take me seriously, I’ve brought along a few photographs for you to look at.’
Lucy flinched as he leaned over her and laid them out neatly on her desk. They were slightly out of focus, as though they had been taken in a hurry and not by an expert, but they were still plain enough to send a shock of sick recoil hammering through her body.
Marcus being punched and then kicked as he lay on the ground surrounded by his four assailants.
Lucy only just managed not to cry out as she saw from one photograph a boot being aimed at his face, and then in another the murderous gleam of sunlight on a sharp knife.
‘This time Marcus was lucky. The police arrived in time to stop him from suffering anything more than a few cuts and bruises. Next time he won’t be so lucky, Lucy. And there will be a next time.’
Very deliberately he reached into his pocket and withdrew a mobile phone—Marcus’s phone, Lucy realised, as a sick, sweating trembling took hold of her.
‘This time all I asked for was his telephone as proof that my orders had been carried out, but next time—’
‘Stop it,’ Lucy implored him. ‘You can’t get away with this. The police will catch the men responsible…’
Andrew Walker laughed.
‘No way. Those gutter vermin know exactly how to slink away into their sewers, and they know what will happen to them if they dare to betray me. One word to the authorities and they’ll be deported—if they live that long.’
Lucy shuddered. She couldn’t doubt any more that his threats were real—and enforceable. She had to do something to protect Marcus, and she knew there was only one thing she could do. Tears filled her eyes. The only thing she could do was the one thing she most wanted not to have to. But she had no choice. Marcus’s safety was more important to her than her own happiness.
‘It’s up to you, Lucy,’ Andrew Walker was telling her, with horrible fake affability. ‘A partnership with you and Prêt a Party and Carring remains perfectly safe…’
Lucy managed a small uncaring shrug. She had gone over and over this so many times last night. She knew exactly what she had to do to save Marcus. She could save Marcus—but she couldn’t save her marriage as well. Hot tears burned her throat raw, but she refused to think about her own despair.
‘You can’t blackmail me through Marcus,’ she told him dismissively. ‘I don’t want him hurt, naturally, but frankly I wish I’d never married him. I knew it was a mistake the moment I saw Nick again.’
Well, that much was true. But not in the way she was implying to Andrew Walker.
The reason she had known her marriage to Marcus was a mistake was because Nick had revealed to her the danger she had put Marcus in—and Andrew Walker was underlining that right now.
She could see Andrew Walker was frowning, and sensed that he did not believe her. Panic twisted her insides. Very well, then, she would just have to make sure that she convinced him.
‘I realised when I saw Nick at the airport that it was him I loved,’ she lied. ‘I’ve told Marcus that, and I’ve told him I want a separation.’
Andrew Walker still wore a frown.
‘Well, this is a surprise. And one that I am sure will delight Nick…if it is true.’
‘It is true. But I doubt that it will delight Nick. Why should it? He doesn’t love me,’ Lucy told him.
That much was true. Nick wasn’t capable of loving anyone other than himself.
‘Nonsense. He adores you.’
‘I don’t want to talk about Nick,’ Lucy told him. ‘Ultimately, of course, I shall divorce Marcus, but in the meantime I shall probably leave the country and go and live somewhere else.’
‘Isn’t that all very hasty and unnecessary?’ Andrew Walker cautioned her. ‘I must admit that you have surprised me—if you’re telling me the truth.’
‘Why should I lie?’ Lucy challenged him, hoping it wasn’t as obvious to him as it was to her. ‘I don’t love Marcus. I don’t want him hurt, particularly, but I don’t want to be involved in what you’re planning for Prêt a Party—and nothing you do to Marcus will change that,’ she told Andrew Walker shakily. ‘Because I won’t be.’
‘Why don’t you wait until you’ve spoken to Nick before you come to a decision about that, Lucy?’
Andrew Walker was smiling almost paternally at her now.
Speak to Nick? She’d rather die! Maybe she would even die…But Andrew Walker had already told her that they needed her name for Prêt a Party, which meant they needed her alive. But not Marcus. They didn’t need Marcus to be alive. Marcus…
‘McVicar rang me this afternoon, whilst I was on my way back from Leeds. He told me that you’ve been in touch with him to ask if Blayne could still be considered an employee in Prêt a Party since he did not sign a termination agreement,’ Marcus announced coolly.
Were you hoping that he was still involved, Lucy? When I saw you with him at the airport, was that a chance meeting or a planned one? Do you want him as a partner in your bed? Instead of me?
No, that was nonsense. Okay, so after the fuss she had made over the telephone he was surprised that Lucy was behaving so distantly to him now that he was home, but he wasn’t really going to let himself think he was actually disappointed by her lack of reaction to his return, was he? And he certainly wasn’t going to allow himself to think that her coolness towards him hurt.
Coffee spilled from the mug Lucy was holding onto the new limestone kitchen floor. Her heart was jerking in uncomfortable, uncoordinated, irregular beats that were making her feel nauseous.
‘I simply wanted to know what the situation was,’ she defended herself.
‘Why didn’t you ask me?’
‘You’re my husband, not my solicitor.’ She couldn’t bear the sight of the bruises on Marcus’s face, and was terrified of breaking down in front of him and telling him what was going on.
Mr McVicar had assured her that there was no way Nick could claim to have any ongoing involvement in Prêt a Party, but she still felt desperately afraid and worried. For herself, but most of all for Marcus.
‘Has it been decided what we’re doing for Christmas yet?’ he asked, deliberately changing the subject.
‘I spoke to my mother yesterday morning. She’s spoken to your mother, and to Beatrice, and Beatrice has suggested that we all get together.’
‘Where—not in this wretched castle she wants to hire for George’s birthday, I trust?’