He bent again to open the cupboard and her eyes flicked round the kitchen in search of possible weapons. A glass rolling pin filled with dried flowers, from Greece, hung on the wall—how about that?
No, that was a souvenir of one of the best holidays she had ever had. She didn't want to break that. One of the saucepans? Not heavy enough. That copper casserole would make quite a dent, though, she thought, gazing at the highly polished dish hanging close to the oven.
The washing machine started and she looked back at him warily. He was now busy inspecting the contents of the fridge and the freezer, taking stuff out and checking the cooking instructions.
'There are plenty of soups,' she offered.
He was reading a pack of microwave chicken curry and shrugged. 'I'm too hungry for soup—this looks good. I see you've got a microwave. I'll have this. Do you want some of it?'
She shuddered at the very idea at this hour. 'No, thanks. I prefer not to eat rich food late at night, and, anyway, I've had some soup. Look, can I ring for a taxi for you now? You can eat your meal while you're waiting.'
He popped the chicken curry into the microwave and punched the numbers at the side. The turntable inside began revolving. 'I shall need my clothes before I leave. I see you've got a tumble dryer. When my things come out of the washing machine I'll put them straight into the dryer.'
Trying not to sound anxious she snapped, 'That will take hours—and you're not staying here after you've eaten your food. I want to ring for a taxi for you.'
He took no notice, opening cupboards again, getting more stuff out. He looked at the foil-wrapped coffee beans he found, making a face. 'Not brilliant, but I suppose they'll do.'
A little flag of red burnt her cheeks. 'Oh, sorry my coffee doesn't meet your standard. I'll make sure I've got something better next time you break down near my house.'
Her sarcasm was water off a duck's back. He shook some coffee into the electric grinder he had found. 'I like using the traditional, wooden French coffee-grinders,' he told her conversationally. 'You feel you're really getting coffee—nothing else gives you that fresh-ground coffee smell. Instant is a last resort for me!'
'This machine is much quicker and less trouble,' Zoe resentfully told him. 'Like the microwave and the tumble dryer, it does the job in half the time, and saving time is important to me. I'm a career woman, not a housewife.'
He gave her a sardonic smile as he began to fill the percolator with cold water. 'No cream in your fridge, I see! Dieting, I suppose?' Another of those cool, assessing glances that made her spine shiver. 'Well, I'm not! I'll make do with black coffee, but I hope you've got some sugar.'
'Mr Hillier, I did not invite you to this house, but you are my guest so stop knocking the way I live!' She was really furious now. Who did he think he was? 'There's sugar in the far cupboard on the right.' She looked at her watch. 'Look, I'm exhausted. I've had a tough day and I want to get some sleep before I have to get up again in the morning. Would you please eat your meal and leave? I'm sure the taxi driver won't care what you're wearing.' An idea hit her and she hurried out into the hall, to come back with a long brown drover's mac which she had bought in Australia a couple of years ago.
'You could wear this! Nobody will notice what you're wearing under it.'
He was putting a plate under the oven grill, which he had turned on. He glanced at the coat, came over to take it, held it up against him, nodding. 'Terrific, thanks. At least you've got good taste in clothes. I'll borrow it, but I'll still want to wear my own clothes under it.'
'I'll post them on to you tomorrow.'
Shaking his head, he went over to the microwave as it began to bleep. 'No, I'll wait for them.'
Zoe was almost desperate to get rid of him. Her voice high, she yelled, 'This is my house, and I want you to go!'
He opened the curry and inhaled. 'Smells wonderful.' Switching off the grill, he used a teatowel to get the plate out, tipped the golden chicken and sauce out on to the plate, surrounded it with the fluffy white rice which had also been in the packet, sat down at the table and began to eat with a fork. 'Could you pour the coffee?'
'What did your last slave die of?'
'Delight,' he said, sliding her a wicked glance from under his extraordinarily long black lashes.
Zoe's rage wasn't as strong as her sense of humour; she couldn't help laughing, much though she wished she could.
He grinned at her. 'So you are human?'
'Human—and exhausted,' she told him, pouring coffee into the mugs. She might as well drink some herself—clearly she wasn't going to be able to get rid of him for quite a while, and she couldn't go to bed, leaving a total stranger in her house.
'How many hours did you work today?'
'I was up at five, at work by six,' she told him, sitting down opposite him at the table.
He studied her, brows lifted. 'Your eyes are red. They match your hair.'
Hushed, she crossly snapped, 'Thanks. That makes me feel really glamorous.'
He went on staring at her, his black lashes half down over his eyes. 'The jeans are pretty ancient, aren't they? But you still manage to make them look like high fashion. I'm not sure how. I suppose it's just that you're gorgeous, whatever you wear—even with red eyes! And I must be the millionth man to tell you so. I ought to get a prize for that.' He leaned over and kissed her mouth briefly, a mere brush of his lips, before she could draw back, and then went on coolly eating his chicken curry.
Zoe drew a shaken breath and was furious with herself. Anyone would think she had never been kissed before! That light touch of his mouth had lasted a second or two—she could almost believe she had imagined it except for this odd breathlessness. She rubbed her mouth, glaring. 'You take more liberties than any man I've ever met! What do you do for a living? D'you work in the media? Only reporters have that much gall.'
He laughed. 'No. I'm an explorer.'
She blinked, thinking she'd misheard. 'A what?' Maybe it was because she was so tired that she was feeling so disorientated, her ears and eyes playing tricks on her, her face flushed, as if she had a fever.
'Explorer.' He finished his meal and pushed it away. 'I'm just back from South America. I've been mapping the mountain ranges from Tierra del Fuego all along the coast to the Cord de Merida, right up in Venezuela. They run from one end of the continent to the other, just inland from the coast, over four thousand miles of mountains, many of them up to four thousand feet high. I've been out there for a year, climbing, filming, drawing.'
Open-mouthed, she asked, 'Alone?' and he laughed, white teeth showing against tanned skin.
'No, thank heavens. I was with an international ex—Europeans, a couple of dozen of us, all specialists: photographers, a couple of doctors, scientists, geologists, biologists. But we were all climbers; that was essential. In those mountains you need to know what you're doing and you need other people you can rely on. Lives could be lost otherwise.' He yawned, got up, went to the washing machine and bent to look at the contents. 'I'll click this through the cycle now and get it on rinse, then we can pop the clothes into the dryer.'
'You're not married, are you?' Zoe thoughtfully said, watching him deftly adjust the machine.
He turned, gave her a cynical look from those deep, dark eyes, shaking his head. 'No. Don't tell me you have scruples about getting involved with married men? Hal didn't tell me that.'
'Hal doesn't know me as well as he thinks he does!' she broke out angrily. 'He doesn't really know me at all. We've never been what you could call friends!'
'What does that mean? Translate for me. By "friends" do you actually mean lovers?'
'No! I mean what most people mean by the word "friends". Hal and I have worked together…'
'And he never made a pass?' Connel sounded disbelieving, and she could imagine why, knowing Hal Thaxford, who made a pass at any attractive woman he met.
'He made them, yes,' she said coldly.
'And got slapped down?'
'Hard.
I told him I wasn't interested, but he wouldn't take no for an answer until I slapped his face too. He isn't very bright, you know, or a very good actor. Too wooden. And typically he thinks he's God's gift. He has no idea he's second-rate. When he finally took on board that I would not get involved with him he started sulking.'
'Hmm.' Connel Hillier was eying her dryly. 'Hal's version of this story is somewhat different In fact, he says it was the other way round—he wasn't interested in you and you resented it.'
Zoe shrugged, unsurprised. 'Well, you can make your own mind up which of us you believe! And, by the way, I've no intention of getting involved with you, either, Mr Hillier. I asked if you were married because it's obvious you're used to looking after yourself—you know how a washing machine works, and you can do your own cooking. If you were married, your wife would probably do all that.'
'These days most men can take care of themselves, married or not.'
'Some men can! Some men don't see why they should bother, once they're married!'
'A few, maybe. But my brother, for instance, is as capable of cooking a three-course meal as his wife, because Cherry is a high-powered executive who often doesn't get home until midnight, so Declan has to take care of himself when she's busy.'
'They don't have children, presumably?'
He shook his head. 'Cherry's on the fast track at work; she doesn't plan on having kids for years yet. But she's only twenty-six; she has plenty of time.'
'And your brother's happy with that?'
'He wants children one day, but he's in no hurry. He and Cherry only got married a few months ago; they lead a pretty hectic social life: dinner parties, first nights, clubbing. They're rarely at home in the evening unless they're giving a party.'
Zoe was listening intently, but her eyelids were drooping wearily and she couldn't stop yawning, hiding it behind her hand.
The washing machine was going into a spin now. Connel Hillier took the plastic washing basket down from the top of the machine, his back to her while he waited for the washing to come to a halt, but he went on talking about his brother, his voice low and soft. 'De-clan isn't ready for the responsibility of kids yet, anyway. He's far too keen on his social life. I sometimes wonder why he and Cherry got married at all. They're both so independent and busy, so involved with their own lives, they don't seem like a pair, more like flatmates. But then who knows what goes on inside a relationship? I often think…'
The quiet murmur of his voice was soothing. It blurred into the background, became soporific; Zoe yawned, listening to it, couldn't keep her eyes open any longer; she let them close, her head so heavy on her neck that she slowly bowed it on to her arms on the table in front of her.
She never knew when exactly she fell asleep.
The next she knew was when light flickered across her eyelids. Yawning, she stretched her arms above her head—then realised the light was sunlight. What time was it?
Usually when she woke up it was still dark, even in summer. Film-making began with first light and only ended when the light went. She should have been up hours ago. Sharply turning her head to look at her alarm clock, she saw it was eight o'clock.
Eight o'clock?
Horrified, she sat up—why hadn't the alarm gone off? Surely she couldn't have slept through it?
At the same instant her memory rushed in with images of what had happened last night, and she stiffened, her eyes flashing round the bedroom. How had she got here? For a second or two her head swam with bewilderment.
The last thing she remembered was sitting with her head on her arms, while behind her Connel Hillier talked about his brother.
She must have drifted off to sleep. Yes, but how had she got up here, into bed? Panic flooded her. Her heart beat like a steam hammer in her chest, behind her ribs. She couldn't breathe. What had happened last night? After she fell asleep? She couldn't remember coming upstairs; she hadn't set her alarm. How had she got here?
She had been fully dressed, wearing that old grey sweater and her shabbiest pair of jeans—she lifted the sheet and looked down at herself, turned scarlet. She wasn't wearing them now! All she had on was her bra and panties.
'Oh, my God,' she groaned aloud. He must have carried her up here, stripped her…and then…? What had happened then?
Heat burned in her face. She didn't want to think about it. She flung back the covers and jumped out of bed, grabbed a dressing gown from her wardrobe and put it on, then crept out on to the landing, listening for sounds.
Where was he?
The house was silent; the familiar sounds were all she could hear: a Victorian clock she had bought in a junk shop ticking sonorously from her sitting room, the hum of electricity from the kitchen, and from the trees in the garden a whispering of autumn leaves, the sound of birds.
On tiptoe she went from room to room upstairs, but there was no sign of him, so she stole downstairs and began to search there, but he was nowhere in the house, and nothing seemed to be missing. She didn't have anything very valuable in the way of antiques, of course, but her electrical equipment was all still in place—TV, video player, stereo equipment—none of it had gone.
The kitchen was spotless, the dishes he had used washed up and put away, the sink cleaned, the hob as clean as if he had never been there, and there was no sign of his clothes in the tumble dryer. He must have waited for them to dry properly, then put them on and gone.
Her car! she thought, hurrying to open the front door, but it still stood there, on the drive, where she had left it; the rain was drying on the glossy surface now, the chrome flashing in the sunlight.
She shut the front door again. He had gone, leaving no trace. She might almost have imagined the whole incident. She wished she could believe she had.
But the phone was still unplugged; she hadn't invented him pulling it out of the wall! She bent to plug it back in, men went back upstairs and showered, got dressed, like a zombie, moving automatically in her usual routine before leaving for work, but with brow furrowed, eyes blank in deep thought.
He had carried her upstairs, taken her clothes off and put her into her bed. Was that all he had done?
Had he got in bed with her? Had he…?
No! she told herself fiercely. She would have woken up if he had tried to have sex with her. Of course she would!
She hadn't woken up while he was carrying her upstairs, or taking off her jeans, though. It couldn't have been easy to get her jeans off without disturbing her, could it?
Maybe he had woken her up, though? Maybe she had stirred, becoming aware, woken up? But…if she had, she would remember, wouldn't she? And she didn't recall a thing after she'd put her head on her arms and drifted off to sleep.
She didn't want to think about it. Angrily she ran downstairs, made herself black coffee but didn't eat anything. Her appetite had gone. In fact, she felt sick.
She stood by the window, drinking her hot coffee, staring out at the bright, autumn morning, making herself observe what she saw instead of thinking about last night. In her job that was vital, the act of observing, seeing, far more important than words, and it helped her to forget herself.
After all that torrential rain the sky was blue and cloudless; the sun shone as brilliantly as if it was summer again. Leaves blew across the damp grass of her lawns; orange, bronze, gold, dark brown, they heaped up behind her garden wall. She must get out there and rake them up on her next day off. There were few flowers around now: a bush of dark blood-red fuchsia, the bells drooping, still heavy with yesterday's rain, pale blue and pink lace-capped hydrangeas, a few white winter roses. But autumn had other pleasures; she stared at spiders' webs glittering on bushes, delicate, complex patterns filmed with dew, as bright as diamonds in this sunlight, and fluttering in the wind like ancient flags.
But however hard she tried to think about other things she kept coming back to last night. How was she going to work today? How could she concentrate when somewhere at the edge of her mind was a vague memory, like a dr
eam, half remembered. Warm hands touching her, softly caressing…
Groaning again, she shook her head. No, she didn't remember that. She didn't remember anything.
Her nerves jumped as the telephone began to ring. She slowly went to pick it up, her fingers slippery with perspiration.
'Hello?' She couldn't quite make her voice steady. It wouldn't be him—why should he ring her? Yet somehow she didn't feel she had seen the last of him. He had left her off balance, nervous, with this worrying feeling that something had happened last night that wasn't going to be easy to forget.
'Zoe?' The voice at the other end was uncertain, but very familiar, and she relaxed. 'Is that you? Are you okay?' It was her production runner, Barbara, a lively, eager, hard-working girl in her early twenties, who was normally full of bounce, but this morning sounded faintly anxious.
Pulling herself together, Zoe huskily reassured her. 'Of course I am—what do you mean?'
'You sounded breathless. Did I wake you up? Had you forgotten you called an early start, for five-thirty? Or did you oversleep?'
'Yes, sorry, my alarm didn't go off.' They must all be cursing her, getting them there so early and then not turning up, and she couldn't blame them; she would feel just the same in their shoes. 'I'm just leaving, Barbara. I should be there in half an hour. Has Will started work? Is he setting up the cameras?'
'Yes, he's more or less ready, I think. He just broke to have some breakfast, and there's a crowd of extras milling around eating sausage baps.'
'Okay. I'll get there as soon as I can.'
Zoe hung up, locked the cottage, got behind the wheel of her car and started the engine, pushing away the memory of what had—or hadn't—happened last night.
She would think about that some other time. She couldn't afford to be distracted by anything, or anyone, until this film was finished.
With any luck she would never set eyes on Connel Hillier again, anyway.
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