by Penny Jordan
* * *
Naturally John’s marriage was the sole topic of conversation during the evening. Mrs Templeton was torn between excitement and dismay.
‘We shall miss your birthday,’ she said to Storm at one point. ‘And Christmas, unless we fly home right after the wedding.’
‘You’ll do no such thing,’ Storm told her firmly. ‘Although I shall expect an extra special present, for my forbearance!’
It was a pity that John’s promotion meant the wedding had to be arranged so hurriedly, she decided as she prepared for bed, but she wasn’t going to have her mother spoil the occasion for herself by worrying about her. She was twenty-two, after all, and more than capable of looking after herself for four weeks. Against her will her eyes were drawn to Jago’s house. A light shone in one of the upstairs rooms and she felt the heat rise on her skin as she thought of him in bed.
This was crazy, she told herself, feeling the increased thud of her heart and the ache that spread slowly upwards. Physical desire, that’s all it was, she told herself fiercely. She loved David, for God’s sake. Safe, protective David!
But when she fell asleep it was of Jago that she dreamed, small heated moans falling from her lips as she thrashed feverishly from side to side.
‘Are you sure you won’t mind being left on your own, Storm?’ her mother asked anxiously in the morning.
In the middle of her coffee Storm shook her head. She heard the powerful purr of Jago’s car outside and grabbed for her coat, putting her cup down.
‘Perhaps your father could have a word with Mr Marsh,’ she persisted. ‘If he explained Mr Marsh might…’
‘No, Mum,’ Storm said firmly. ‘Now stop worrying.’
‘I suppose it’s only natural that we should worry more about you than we did about the boys,’ Richard Templeton said from behind his paper. ‘Old-fashioned of us, I expect, in this day and age, but then parents are. This house can be very lonely in the winter. Your nearest neighbour is nearly half a mile away, after all.’
Storm’s heart started thumping erratically. Her nearest neighbour was Jago, and for some reason she found that she did not want him to know that she was going to be alone in the house. Fear that he might redouble his assault upon her defences?
‘Jago’s here,’ she said unnecessarily to her parents as his dark head passed the window. ‘I’d better go. At least travelling with the boss means that no one can bawl you out for being late!’
‘And gives me time to finish my breakfast,’ her father added. ‘Heard anything from David, by the way?’
‘He’s due back at the end of the week,’ Storm said, avoiding the question. ‘I expect I’ll see him then.’
The inside of Jago’s car smelled disturbingly masculine, and although she tried to relax she was unbearably aware of the man sitting next to her.
’Heard from David?’ he asked smoothly, unconsciously repeating her father’s question.
‘No. Not that it’s any business of yours,’ Storm told him.
His eyes left the road to rest coolly on her heated face. ‘Maybe there’s more to him than I thought,’ he drawled sardonically. ‘You’re showing all the signs of frustration this morning. Or isn’t David the cause?’
‘Don’t speak to me like that!’ Storm demanded, hating the way he seemed to get under her skin. ‘If you must know I’m feeling a little out of sorts because my brother’s getting married and I shan’t be able to attend the wedding.’ Now why had she told him that? She bit her lip and stared out of the car window.
‘Oh?’
His voice invited her to tell him more, but she refused, turning the conversation instead to the progress she was making with the Harmer advertisement.
‘I’ve got a dummy tape ready. Pete’s taking it over this morning.’
‘Pete? Can’t you go yourself?’
‘I could, but I’ve got an appointment at the local children’s home. We’re trying to set up a programme featuring some of the children—something for Christmas. Unless, of course, you have any objections.’
‘You might freeze David with that cool little voice, my dear,’ Jago told her lightly, ‘but it has no effect at all upon me. I’m surprised you aren’t following up the lead young Harmer gave you, though. He was definitely interested.’ He shot her a sideways look, but Storm stared rigidly ahead.
‘Well, I’m not,’ she told him. ‘Neither in him, nor you, nor anyone else, except David.’
She expected him to be annoyed, but was not prepared for the inimical rage leaping to life in his eyes.
‘Oh yes, you are,’ he told her suavely, ‘and I could damn well prove it to you here and now, if I wanted to. Or is that what you’re hoping for? Tough luck, Storm,’ he drawled. ‘The next time you’re going to be making all the moves and doing all the asking.’
‘Never!’ Storm gritted at him as he slid the car into the car-park. ‘Never, never, never!’
His laughter floated after her and she hurried into the building, her body on fire as though with a fever, but her hands as cold as ice. He was deliberately trying to break her, she thought bitterly. Well, he wouldn’t succeed!
The children’s home was on the edge of the town, but as it was a pleasant day, with the sun shining pale lemon in a soft blue sky and the leaves lying crisp and autumnal on the ground, Storm elected to walk there instead of getting a taxi.
The house had been left to the council by an eccentric local landlord, whose own sons had been killed during the First World War. Large and rambling, the huge Victorian mansion took a large slice of the council’s rate income in upkeep, but the money was well spent, Storm thought appreciatively as she gave her name at the gatehouse and waited to be admitted.
With the house were several acres of land and also a small home farm which provided eggs and vegetables for the home as well as giving the children a grounding in animal care and gardening.
Even so, despite the generous bequest of its original owner and the undoubted care of the local authority, the house had an unmistakably ‘institutional’ air, Storm thought as she was shown into a small waiting room. In the distance she could hear the muted hum of children’s voices. Chipped paintwork and shabby furniture bore mute testimony to the fact that money was obviously desperately needed, and Storm wondered what it must be like to be brought up in a place like this, without the love of a mother or father—in fact, with no one to call one’s own. Of course the staff would do their best—this was no Dickensian ‘workhouse’, and yet weren’t the children who inhabited this house as deprived as Dicken’s Oliver Twist had been, albeit in a different fashion? Storm wondered. It was a sobering thought. She was conscience-stricken to realise how little thought she had ever given to the plight of these children. Of course they were well fed, well clothed and properly educated, but what about their emotional needs? What about every child’s occasional need to come first?
These were questions she put to the Matron, when, eventually she was shown into her office.
‘You’ve hit the nail well and truly on the head,’ she was told. ‘An orphanage, no matter how well run, or how excellently staffed, can never hope to take the place of a real home. This is why we’re always so keen to find foster-homes for our children. With the babies of course there’s never any problem, but it’s the others—the older children, the ones with difficult backgrounds; these are the ones my heart aches for.’
Storm listened sympathetically. Mary Simmonds reminded her of one of her own junior schoolteachers, scrupulously fair, a disciplinarian who nevertheless recognised the children’s need for love and affection.
‘So really, what you’re saying is that for the general public to simply send a teddy-bear at Christmas and fill a sack with their own kids’ cast-offs is not really what’s needed?’
An idea was beginning to take root, but before she could voice it Storm wanted to be sure she had not misunderstood. In answer to her question Mary Simmonds said quickly,
‘Don’t get me wrong, we
’re grateful for everything that people do already, but our real need is for the children to experience true family life, even if it’s only the odd weekend here and there.’ She broke off to scan Storm’s thoughtful face. ‘Why do you ask?’
‘I was just thinking that instead of encouraging people to donate to the home we could perhaps encourage them to sponsor individual children as adopted “aunties and uncles”. I realise it won’t be easy. Anyone who was interested would have to be thoroughly checked out, and then there’s the problem of ensuring that they won’t lose interest and leave the child feeling even more deprived than ever, but I think it could work…’
‘So do I,’ Mary Simmonds pronounced delightedly. ‘It’s a wonderful idea, Storm. Mr Marsh told me that I would find you very helpful, but this——! What will you do? Launch a public appeal?’
‘I was thinking of something along those lines,’ Storm admitted, ‘although I shall have to check with Mr Marsh first, to get his approval.’
‘I should think you’ll find him extremely sympathetic and helpful,’ Mary Simmonds surprised her by saying. ‘When I spoke to him he was most emphatic that the station wanted to do all it could to help us. I suppose it’s a reflection on his own childhood, and from what he told me the children’s home where he was brought up was nothing like as pleasant as this one.’
Storm stared at her. She knew that Jago had been in touch with the orphanage concerning the programmes they were planning to do, but she had had no idea that he himself had been brought up in a children’s home. His air of moneyed ease was so much a part of him that she had somehow taken it for granted that he had been born with the proverbial silver spoon clenched firmly between his teeth. She was a fool, she told herself scornfully, suppressing a momentary pang. Jago Marsh had no need of her sympathy and would probably ridicule her were she ever stupid enough to proffer it.
Mary Simmonds gave her a worried glance. ‘You didn’t know about Mr Marsh, did you? I wish I hadn’t said anything, but…’
‘Don’t worry about it,’ Storm told her. ‘I shan’t repeat it to anyone.’
Plainly relieved, the Matron allowed herself to be sidetracked into questions about the children’s routine, while Storm made notes which she hoped would be useful when she came to organise how best to launch their appeal. Finding suitable foster families for the children promised to be a time-consuming task, but there was no doubt in her mind that the end result—even if that was only one child provided with a ‘family’—would more than outweigh the hard work. Storm only had to think of her own comparatively privileged childhood to harden her determination to do all she could for these less fortunate children.
By the time she was ready to leave, they had drafted out an outline which Storm intended to put before Jago. If he agreed, the disc jockeys could spend a few minutes at the beginning of each session talking about the home and its needs, without making any attempt to glamorise the foster-families’ role in the lives of the children. Mentally making a note to ask Jago about taking photographs of some of the children to pin up in their foyer and to check with the local social services departments to get their reaction, Storm collected her notebook and bag.
‘You can’t know what it would mean to all of us here if we could provide the older children especially with some form of family support. They have to leave here when they’re sixteen, often without any proper training for a job or anywhere to stay. It’s hard enough for any youngster these days, never mind these children!’
Storm agreed with her, and yet as she walked back to the studio, scuffing her feet in the dry leaves, she couldn’t help reflecting that Jago had somehow managed to overcome all the obstacles and achieve the patina of success. But what lay beneath that patina? As a child he had known rejection and as an adult adulation, but had he ever experienced the range of emotions that lay in between?
The thought held her, returning at odd moments when her mind should have been on other things. Jago was a determined adversary, that she already knew, and she would be a fool to let sympathy for the child he had once been come between her and her desire to keep him at arms’ length.
CHAPTER SEVEN
STORM’s parents were flying to Sydney at the weekend, and she was pleased when David rang her on Thursday to suggest that they went out for a meal on Saturday evening. The build-up to her parents’ departure would leave her with a sense of anticlimax once they had gone, and although she had plenty of work to occupy her mind she felt that she would prefer to be out of the house.
On Friday morning Jago arrived while she was finishing her breakfast, and Mrs Templeton invited him inside and offered him a cup of coffee.
‘Sorry I’m late,’ Storm apologised, gulping hers down, surprised when he gave her a lazy smile and told her there was no rush.
‘Actually I think I’m early,’ he told her. ‘I’ve got to go to London this morning, so I thought I’d get an early start.’
London? Storm’s heart thudded against her ribs. Had he changed his mind and perhaps decided that he had had enough of Radio Wyechester and its problems?
‘Looks like someone else is off somewhere,’ he added, eyeing the luggage stacked up in the hall.
‘My parents are off to Australia. My brother is getting married,’ Storm told him curtly, as he accepted the cup of coffee her mother had poured for him. She could smell the clean sharp scent of his after-shave, and the dark hair was faintly damp as though he had recently showered. The thought made her stomach lurch betrayingly, the hand holding her coffee cup shaking at the disturbing images projected by her mind. She had never fantasised about the male body before in her life, and that it should be Jago Marsh who should cause her to do so made her tremble with nervous fear. He had turned her neatly ordered world upside down, but she was damned if she would let him find out.
‘Yes. We’re leaving tomorrow,’ Mrs Templeton chipped in excitedly. ‘I’m looking forward to the wedding, of course, but I do worry about leaving Storm here alone. This house is so remote, and we’ll be gone at least six weeks.’
‘Mother!’ Storm protested warningly, not daring to look at Jago’s face, but it was already too late.
‘Don’t worry about it any more,’ Jago assured Mrs Templeton. ‘I’ll make sure I check the house every night when I drop Storm off. I’m only ten minutes away if she needs me.’
He looked at Storm, and her legs went terribly weak, a feeling like nothing she had known before sweeping over her.
‘I’m sure I shan’t,’ she told him coolly. ‘After all, David is coming back today and…’
‘Storm!’ her mother reproached, turning back to Jago. ‘Don’t listen to her, Mr Marsh,’ she smiled. ‘It would put my mind at rest if you would keep an eye on her. David is a dear, but he does live five miles away. I’ll feel much happier knowing that she isn’t completely alone.’
As she followed Jago out to the car five minutes later Storm was seething with resentment at the way her mother had manipulated the conversation, but under the resentment lurked fear, and she knew it was this that made her move restlessly in her seat, trying not to look at the determined thrust of Jago’s shoulders beneath the immaculate dark suit.
‘I could have made my own way to Wyechester if you’d told me you wanted to go to London,’ she said to him as he negotiated the drive.
He stopped at the bottom, casting her a brief, amused glance, then frowned suddenly as he switched off the engine and leaned across to her.
She shrank back, her eyes widening nervously, fear trembling through her as she felt his fingers brush her blouse.
Her eyes closed automatically. There was a faint click and when she opened them again Jago was starting the car.
‘You forgot your seat belt,’ he said urbanely, and as the hot colour flooded her cheeks, Storm cursed herself for her betraying reaction. He must have known she thought he was going to kiss her! She bit her lower lip, willing the colour to fade from her face.
‘You must be disappointed at mi
ssing your brother’s wedding,’ Jago remarked when they had joined the main stream of traffic.
Storm would have preferred to remain silent; the intimacy of the car was oppressive and she wondered if Jago was as aware of her as she was of him. Hardly, she thought bitterly. To him it was all a game that he was intent on winning and making her subtly aware of him at every turn was just another tactic.
‘Yes, I am,’ she admitted, forcing a cool smile. ‘But of course I couldn’t ask for the time off.’
‘Couldn’t, or wouldn’t?’ Jago asked softly. ‘You wouldn’t like to be in debt to me, would you, Storm? If dear David had still been Controller, I’m sure you’d have asked him. So he’s back, is he? Seeing him tonight, are you?’
‘No,’ Storm said shortly, ruffled despite her struggle to remain cool and unaffected by his taunts.
‘No? Have dinner with me, then,’ Jago said silkily.
Thrown completely off guard, Storm stared at him. ‘But you’ll be in London.’
‘Only for a few hours.’
‘I can’t come with you,’ she told him firmly. ‘Tonight is my parents’ last evening at home. They’ll want me to stay with them.’
‘Convenient. What about Saturday, then?’
Storm took a deep breath. He was deliberately trying to needle her, she thought. ‘On Saturday I’m having dinner with David.’
‘Somewhere romantic and secluded,’ Jago mocked, ‘and then home to an empty house where you can be alone…’
‘David isn’t like you,’ Storm said unwisely. ‘He has other things on his mind besides sex…’
‘More fool him,’ Jago said crudely. ‘And more fool you. Have you really never questioned his lack of desire for you, or yours for him?’
They were turning into the car-park and Storm refused to answer, wrenching the door open the moment Jago stopped and hurrying away from him.
He caught up with her just as she reached the building, his fingers tightening on her wrist like an iron band. She looked upwards and saw anger, intermingled with another emotion that made her mouth go dry with dread.