Hideaway Heart

by Roumelia Lane

  HIDEAWAY HEART

  Roumelia Lane

  Things were not going too well for Chris Dawnay's father, and when the business man Boyd Wyatt promised her that if she would play the femme fatale with Clive Huston, there would almost certainly be a contract for her father in it, Chris did not hesitate - especially as the task involved a visit to a romantic little Greek island. Chris was successful in her dealings with Clive, in so far as they became good friends; but she soon realized that Clive's feelings were all reserved for Paula Fry, the girl to whom he had been engaged. It was only when Chris discovered that Boyd himself was interested in Paula that she realized why her heart had never been involved with Clive at all. But what would happen to her father now?

  CHAPTER ONE

  Chris watched her father walk up the garden path. She knew by the droop of his shoulders it was bad news, just the same she put on her cheeriest smile.

  "Back already? How did it go?"

  Frank Dawnay shook his head, allowing his daughter to draw the thick overcoat from his shoulders.

  "Not good, Chris."

  "You didn't get the contract?"

  An answer wasn't necessary. She felt it in her father's sigh, the heaviness with which he sat in the chair. A hot cup of tea would disperse his gloom. She poured it, adding lots of cream and a good helping of sugar, just as he liked it.

  "Cheer up, Dad! There'll be others."

  She had never seen him push away his favourite beverage in quite that manner before. It stood in the middle of the kitchen table, a steaming island of rejection in a sea of chequered squares. Chris looked from it to her father's face with an anxious smile.

  "One contract isn't the world, you know!"

  "It is to us, Chris." As he raised his eyes she saw they were shadowed with worry. "I didn't want to tell you before, but... everything depended on it."

  Chris held on to her smile.

  "We've been in tight spots before. We can always cut down a little and..."

  "Wouldn't help this time." He put an elbow on the table and drew a finger across his brow. "It means the house, the business... everything."

  "I... don't think I'm quite with you, Dad."

  Chris felt in need of a chair. She" pulled one out noisily and dropped down. Mr. Dawnay went on rubbing his brow.

  "I've been trying to keep it from you, but things have been going steadily downhill for some time. I know we got some good jobs when we first started up, but the money from these went a long time ago. I'm sorry, Chris, but for the last few months we've been living on borrowed money ... and hope."

  "Hope?" Chris looked up. "You mean for the contract you didn't get today?"

  Mr. Dawnay nodded. "After five years I guess I'm finally convinced that airstrip survey is for the big fish."

  "But we give just as good a service as the big companies!" Chris replied indignantly.

  "Of course we do, but nobody wants to know. Wyatt was the same this afternoon. He wouldn't entertain the idea of a local team."

  "Arrant nonsense!" Chris was up again now, whipping the cold tea away with such a jerk it slopped over into the saucer. "Did you tell him about the airstrip we did in Arabia and the Iceland track?"

  "I didn't get the chance. He wouldn't see me. His secretary gave me the message.''

  "He wouldn't see you?"

  Her father smiled bleakly. "Why should he? He's a busy man. I'm just small-time."

  Chris went to where he was sitting and turned an arm round his shoulder.

  "You may be small-time to those hard-headed tycoons, but to me you're the greatest," she said defiantly.

  He hugged her back affectionately, a wistful look in his eyes.

  "If I had got that contract this afternoon I might have believed you. It's worth a bit. We wouldn't have been well off, but it would have pulled us out of the red."

  Chris stretched up and stared out of the window to where a clump of lupins swayed in the breeze.

  "What happens now?" she asked.

  Her father heaved a sigh. "Well, it's only a matter of time, I suppose. The men will have to be paid off. After that..." he shrugged, "we'll take things as they come."

  "Isn't there any chance at all?" Chris turned. "This Wyatt man... can't you demand to see him?"

  "Boyd Wyatt?" Mr. Dawnay reflected. "They say he's a hard man, Chris, as hard as they come."

  "That may be, but he still needs an airstrip survey team, and we've got one. Just because we're here on his doorstep it doesn't mean we're any less competent than the big London firms."

  Mr. Dawnay sighed at his daughter. "I admire your fighting spirit, Chris, but I'm afraid we're going down for the third time."

  Chris sat down to face her father squarely. "Dad, just tell me how bad are things really... without the frills ?"

  He met her gaze. "Well, if we're lucky we might end up with enough to buy a small flat, and about half the furniture we've got here. I could try for a job at the aircraft factory ..."

  "No!" Chris looked horrified. "You're almost sixty. I wouldn't let you go out to work just like that."

  "There are men of seventy and over doing it, my love."

  "Maybe, but not with your ability, I bet." She thought hard. "I think you ought to have another try at this Mr. Wyatt."

  "What for? I know when I'm beaten."

  "You're just feeling dejected because you've been bottling things up." Chris hesitated and then blurted in one breath, "Let me go and see him."

  "You?" Frank Dawnay's head jerked up. "He'd eat you for breakfast!"

  Christ smiled wryly. "I'm not a little girl any more, Dad. I'm almost twenty, remember? And, we've worked together ever since you started up. I don't think we should let everything go without at least seeing this fire-eating monster."

  "All right, Chris. You're entitled to a try. If you can get to see him put forward our proposition - and that's all, remember."

  "Don't worry," the small mouth tightened, "I have no intention of going begging to Mr. Boyd Wyatt!"

  The next morning Chris took the address her father had written down and set off across town. She found Berkely Crescent, known locally as "Millionaire's Row", at the end of a tree-lined avenue, and eventually came upon the white block of flats with the imposing name of Galconda Mansions.

  Crimson carpet came out to the doorstep and several corridors and staircases branched off from the main hall. Chris found she needn't go any further than the ground floor, for a number in goldleaf scroll caught her eye. Twenty-two. She looked at the slip of paper. That was it . . . twenty-two, Galconda Mansions.

  Well... with a deep breath... here we go!

  A man jumped up from a desk as she entered. He was middle-aged and wore pin-striped trousers with a black jacket. Chris didn't feel too confident. She cleared her throat.

  "I'd like to see Mr. Wyatt, please . . . Mr. Boyd Wyatt."

  "Have you an appointment?"

  "Well, no, but my father came yesterday. My name is Chr— Miss Dawnay."

  "Dawnay?" He nodded abstractedly. "Just take a seat and I'll see if Mr. Wyatt is free,"

  To her surprise he came back, nodding. "Would you step this way, please?"

  Chris stood in a thick-carpeted room. She had half expected to find another office, but this was a private apartment with a desk. It looked as if Boyd Wyatt had long since climbed past the office and nine-to-five mark. No doubt all it needed nowadays was a word on the telephone, a nod to his secretary and the deals went through.

  She gazed round at the ivory walls and deep leather armchairs. Behind the desk, french windows opened out on to green felt lawns. A few stately flowers stood to attention. Intrigued, Chris peeped out on tiptoe, comparing the formal layout with the gay straggle of "Medway". Here there wasn't a weed to be seen, p
robably because an army of gardeners kept them at bay.

  Either that, Chris thought with an amused smile, or they just didn't dare show their heads. If only the weeds at the cottage were so well-behaved!

  "When you've finished admiring the view, you might like to state your business."

  Deep-pitched tones were no more than a rustle at her elbow, yet Chris had the uncanny feeling that an arctic wind had just whistled through the room. She jumped round to find a big, heavily-built man scowling down at a sheaf of papers in his hand. Something about him made her tremble slightly.

  "I... er... My name is..." she stammered.

  "Miss Dawnay. We've got that far." As he raised his head she saw a pair of eyes the light blue-grey of wood-smoke, but without the warmth. "Perhaps you would like to take a seat?"

  He went to sit behind the desk and pointed to an upright chair facing him. Rather the dentist's chair, Chris thought, drowningly forcing herself to move. He seemed preoccupied with the papers in his hand, sheafing through them again and then flinging them down on his desk. The slight thwack made Chris wince. She searched round wildly in her mind for an opening sentence.

  "Mr. Wyatt, about the airstrip survey team you'll be requiring..."

  "Yes?" As his head jerked up she saw the blue-grey eyes were shot with steely lights.

  "I understand you turned my father down?"

  "Rather than keep him hanging about, yes." He returned to the papers.

  "But I don't think you realize...."

  "I don't see any point in this conversation."

  "My father ... he employs some of the top men. Why, he..."

  "Miss Dawnay" - this time Chris came under the full glare of spangled steel - "I'm not in the habit of discussing business with children."

  "And I'm not a child!" A flame of anger gave her the courage to retaliate. It flared and died quickly and she finished lamely, "I mean... I help my father a lot, and... well, I think you should give us the job."

  He didn't lower his head this time. Chris saw a longish face, lean and berry-brown. Dark eyebrows were wedged at a moody slant above a straight line of a nose. Beneath was a mouth not taken to smiling, for the edges had a tendency to droop. Chris didn't look at the face out of interest so much as a desire to find perhaps a kindly line, but apart from a deep-cleft chin and another dent between the eyebrows, there was nothing at all to relieve a bleak, austere countenance.

  "Give you the job? Just like that?"

  She realized that the dark head was nodding imperceptively. He had drawn clasped hands under the craggy chin.

  "You'll find, Miss Dawnay, that in business, plums don't just drop into one's lap. There's a certain amount of work."

  The flame of anger kindled again within Chris. She jumped up.

  "My father and I have never had anything dropped into our laps. We have had to work for everything we've got!"

  Which seems to be precious little, his eyes said, raking her shabby suit and well-worn shoes. Though Chris had only been in the room a matter of minutes she was beginning to feel mentally exhausted. With a grab at her fast-retreating composure she stammered,

  "If we're not going to . . . get the job, at least give us the reasons..."

  After a slight pause he got to his feet, the dark eyebrows taking a deeper slant than ever.

  "Do you think you're the only one with problems, Miss Dawnay?"

  To her amazement he took her arm and led her quite roughly across the room. On a square table a map was spread out. He jabbed at a speck in the Aegean Sea.

  "See that? Doesn't look big enough to cause trouble, does it? But there's enough there to stop me getting my airstrip and your father the contract." He turned his head abruptly. "You've heard of Hideaway Holidays?"

  Chris nodded. Who hadn't here in Fernsea where the first Hideaway Hotel had been established ... a fabulous pink block set in a private cove with its own adjoining airstrip and miles away from the nearest road. Now it was becoming the fashion for people who could afford it to plump for the "away from it all" seclusion that Hideaway's offered. She remembered the wording of a brochure she had seen in the library: no traffic, no noise, no civilization for miles. just sun and sea and your hideaway haven.

  Vivid coloured pictures had shown separate suites and individual sun terraces. For those who wanted it, it was isolated luxury on verdant green islands and deserted archipelagos. So Boyd Wyatt was behind this idea too. She looked at him with renewed interest. He was pointing to the black speck again.

  "This is Cyrecano, one of the lesser known Greek islands. It's been left untouched and unspoilt partly because it's off the beaten track of the usual holiday steamers, but mainly because Clive Huston prefers it that way."

  "Clive Huston?" she queried.

  "He lives alone on Cyrecano."

  "Sounds heaven," Chris murmured abstractedly, gazing at the blue-black dot in a turquoise sea.

  "I want someone to persuade him it's hell."

  Chris looked up with a start.

  "Is it your island?" she asked.

  "No, but I've got permission to develop. Just so long as I don't molest Huston I'm okay. There's a condition that if he leaves it must be of his own accord. And there's the problem ..." He frowned down at the offending speck. "His house is slap in the middle of my airstrip."

  "What's wrong with sailing to the island?" she asked, more out of curiosity than anything else.

  "It's impractical. Anchorage is tricky. In any case Hideaway customers like to fly in quick and clean." The frown promised to be a glare. "I don't need your bright suggestions, Miss Dawnay. What I want is someone to charm him into leaving."

  "You haven't been able to do that, then?" she returned with pointed coolness.

  "No, I haven't, but then..." He studied her as though she had just walked into the room. The mouth tightened as if an idea was forming and then another glance dropped down the length of her despairingly. She heard him sigh and then with the suggestion of a sneer in his voice he muttered, "I suppose it was too much to expect a femme fatale."

  Chris was blazingly conscious of hair hurriedly caught up into grips before she had set out, the dam in the sleeve of her suit...

  Abruptly he turned and walked to the centre of the room.

  "Come over here. Get those pins or whatever they are out of your hair, and I'll take this."

  With an impersonal sweep he removed her suit jacket and draped it over a chair. Chris felt rather like a shop window model being prepared for display as he spread her hair, tweaked the collar of her grey shirt blouse.

  He stepped back and bent a little to take in the slender well-proportioned figure, the sherry-coloured eyes and brown hair, fair at the temples and at the tips now where it caught the sun.

  He continued to rub his chin thoughtfully. The dark brows knit as his eyes lingered on her mouth. She heard him inhale deeply.

  "Well, I've tried everything else. Why not a girl?"

  Chris clutched at her jacket and made a weak effort to re-pin her hair.

  "I don't know what all this is about, but..."

  "Don't you, Miss Dawnay?" The drooping mouth twisted slightly. "I'm making you a proposition. Your services in return for the contract."

  "My services ?'' she echoed.

  "I need an airstrip, your father needs the work. It's only an idea, but... Huston may need a little feminine inducement. I want you to supply it."

  "But how can I?"

  He shrugged irritably.

  "How do I know how women go about these things?" She felt him staring at her. "How old are you anyway?"

  "Nineteen."

  "Well, you look about twelve with that bird's nest. If you're working for me it stays down."

  Chris's hand flew to her hair again.

  "But I always wear it like this, and," the brown eyes flared, "I can assure you I have no intention of..."

  "What's the matter? Disappointed because it's not easy money with no strings attached?"

  Chris wasn't easil
y aroused, but this man's caustic comments kept her temper simmering. She heard herself returning hotly,

  "This is not just strings, Mr. Wyatt, it's a web of deceit!" and then because the woodsmoke eyes snapped fire she ended lamely, "even if it is strictly business."

  "Strictly business, Miss Dawnay? - and you were telling me how you've had to work for everything you've got. Now's your chance to prove it."

  "I don't have to prove anything to you," Chris retorted.

  "No, but I wouldn't be in too big a hurry to wave goodbye to the contract."

  Chris digested this soberly. He was more right than he knew. As long as there was a chance to save her father from disaster she couldn't afford to turn her back on it. She slipped on the jacket and buttoned it with slightly trembling fingers.

  "Just what exactly are you proposing?" she asked.

  "That you go to Cyrecano and somehow convince Huston that life on a deserted island can have its drawbacks. I believe there are some men who will do anything at the crook of a woman's finger."

  But not you. Chris put the words in her eyes and trained her gaze on the blue-grey sneer. He picked up a photograph from the desk and tossed it across to her side.

  "You might even find he's your type."

  Chris saw a thin-faced, good-looking young man with smooth fair hair and a wary smile. She raised her eyes and commented coldly,

  "Can't you just offer him money to leave?"

  "Do you think I would be going to these bizarre lengths if it were as easy as that?" He started to pace. "The damnable part of it is Huston was all set to make a home in England. Something went wrong. He and his fiancée split up and he returned to the island. Catching him on the rebound might be one way of preventing him from digging his heels in for another three or four years. The fact that he got as far as getting engaged shows he's not entirely averse to the sex."

  "As you are."

  This time it slipped out before Chris could hold it, but she needn't have worried. He merely swung his eyes down to hers and replied dispassionately,

  "It's Huston who's in the middle of the airstrip. Once you've got him out you can make the necessary excuses for any cooling affections."