‘There wasn’t much call for it in the inner London Children’s home I was brought up in!’ she told him sharply.
The stark contrast between her own childhood and Jessica’s was apparent in that one blunt statement. There had never been too much spare cash at the home, certainly not enough to run to riding lessons. Even if she had wanted them. Which she hadn’t.
And after Jessica’s accident she wasn’t sure she ever wanted to sit on a horse again! Jessica had been riding most of her life, it seemed, and still she had been thrown.
‘So you meant it literally when you called yourself Orphan Annie?’ Rufus said.
‘Yes.’ She was on the defensive, unsure of the turn of the conversation. Again!
Rufus took his time, sitting down in the chair behind the desk, his face softening as he looked across its width at her. ‘In that case, I wouldn’t take the Diamond family as a typical example of the species,’ he drawled dryly. ‘It had some sense of normality before my father died six years ago; since then it’s deteriorated into anarchy,’ he said matter-of-factly. ‘A group of people who happen to share the same house but who can barely stand the sight of each other!’
‘Surely not?’ Annie gasped in dismay at the tragedy of such a thing. But hadn’t she seen it herself this evening, in the barely maintained civility over dinner? And at the time she had thought Rufus to be the catalyst; she couldn’t remember it having been quite as tense on other evenings when she and Jessica had joined in the evening meal.
‘Surely, yes,’ Rufus confirmed wryly. ‘And as no one else seems to have filled you in on the family history perhaps I should do so,’ he said wearily.
She wasn’t sure she wanted to know, already felt uncomfortable enough with the little she did know. ‘Is it relevant to Jessica that I know?’ She frowned.
His mouth tightened. ‘Before the weekend, I would have said no. Now I’m not so sure …’ He grimaced darkly, then shook off that mood as he smiled across at her. ‘Don’t look so worried,’ he chided, at her apprehensive expression. ‘As far as I’m aware, there is no history of axe murderers or serial killers in the family. At least, none that Celia would ever allow to be discussed! Appearances are everything to my dear stepmama,’ he told her wryly. ‘Although she wasn’t always so particular,’ he amended harshly, eyes cold with anger once again.
‘Stepmama’ … Celia was his stepmother.
His earlier comments made complete sense now. Although it meant a bit of readjusting in Annie’s own mind, she freely admitted. He and Anthony were half-brothers, which explained the stark contrast in their colouring, the fact that the two men shared so few characteristics. Oh, they were both handsome men, but in a completely different way. It also explained the lack of genuine affection between Rufus and Celia. Although Rufus could surely only have been a baby when Celia married his father …
Rufus was watching her with amusement. ‘Your arithmetic is perfectly in order. I was barely two when my own mother died. And Celia, my father’s secretary at the time, stepped in to help him over his loss. She did such a good job of it that Anthony was born exactly six months after their hurriedly arranged wedding!’ he scorned. ‘I’m not judging their morals, Annie,’ he explained as she frowned a little more. ‘Merely the lack of mourning accorded my own mother.’
She wasn’t frowning because she thought he was being judgemental where his father and Celia’s morals were concerned; it didn’t seem to matter nowadays when so many children were born into relationships that didn’t have a piece of paper to legalise them. No, she had been frowning at the speed of his father’s second marriage after his wife’s death, not the reason for it.
‘That doesn’t mean your father didn’t mourn,’ she told Rufus gently. ‘Sometimes, when you’ve loved someone very much, to lose them is to lose part of yourself, and to love someone new is the only way you can feel complete again.’
Rufus looked at her closely, shaking his head slightly, as if he was surprised at her astuteness. ‘You’re very wise for someone so young, Annie—and again, I wasn’t talking down to you,’ he added quickly. ‘My father said something along the same lines when I was old enough to question him on the subject. Unfortunately,’ he continued hardily, ‘by this time he had realised what a terrible mistake he had made in choosing Celia as his second love!’
It was often the case in rebound love, but in this instance they had produced a child. And the marriage had survived. Although, judging by Rufus’s bitterness on his father’s behalf towards Celia, not exactly happily.
So Rufus had grown up with a stepmother he disliked, and a half-brother he despised …
For years Annie had wished her own mother hadn’t died when she was only a baby, had longed for a family of her own. But if the Diamond family were any example …!
‘I did warn you not to take us as a typical family,’ Rufus reminded her as he once more seemed to read her thoughts. ‘Still want to work with Jessica?’
‘Most definitely,’ she answered without hesitation. ‘And I’m really sorry about her accident. One moment she was in the saddle, the next the two of them were on the ground and Jessica was crying.’ She could still remember that awful moment when she’d realised Jessica had really hurt herself.
‘The two of them?’ He looked puzzled.
‘Jessica and the saddle.’ She nodded. ‘Didn’t she tell you it came off with her?’
‘No,’ he rasped. ‘Who the hell saddled the horse for her?’
‘James, I presume …’ Annie answered slowly, knowing by the darkening of Rufus’s expression that the knowledge boded ill for the man in charge of the Diamond stables, which were situated at the back of the large house.
Jessica was very fond of the taciturn old man, and always managed to bring a smile to his weather-lined face—which probably accounted for why Jessica hadn’t told her father about the saddle coming off with her when she fell … Oh, dear!
‘The strap that goes under the horse came undone. I’m sure there was nothing James could have done about it.’ She tried to make amends for her earlier gaffe.
Rufus drew in a deeply controlling breath, his jaw clenched. ‘Probably not,’ he muttered tightly.
But it was a subject he intended to pursue, the grimness of his expression told her.
Annie looked around for some way of diverting his attention, her sight resting with some relief on the chess-set that stood on a table in the corner of the wood-panelled room. ‘I had no idea Jessica could play chess.’ She referred to the challenge Rufus had issued to his daughter earlier for a match tomorrow. ‘She seems very young to have mastered such a complicated game.’
‘She asked me to teach her when she was five.’ This was obviously an achievement of his young daughter’s that he was proud of. ‘She’s quite good too,’ he added ruefully. ‘Although she hasn’t managed to beat me yet!’
Annie doubted that many people had bested this man at anything. ‘Yet,’ she echoed mischievously. ‘I know exactly how determined Jessica can be.’
He chuckled softly. ‘A trait she inherited from her father, do you think?’
Now it was Annie’s turn to give him an innocent look. ‘I wouldn’t know,’ she returned mildly, eyes glowing with fun, a slight curve to her lips as she held back her smile.
His laughter deepened. ‘I’ll just bet you wouldn’t! You—’ He looked up sharply as the study door opened behind Annie without warning. ‘What the hell do you want?’ Rufus barked over Annie’s shoulder at the intruder. ‘And isn’t it usual to knock before entering a room?’ he demanded of his brother.
Anthony was completely undaunted, Annie could see, now that she had half turned in her seat to look at the doorway. And as he looked at her accusingly she began to feel guilty about the laughter he must have heard between Rufus and herself as he’d approached the study. Then she rebuked herself for feeling guilty; Rufus was her employer, Anthony was the one engaged to another woman!
‘I was passing Jessica’s room just now,’ Anthony infor
med them disapprovingly, ‘and she said her ankle was too painful for her to sleep. I gave her one of the pills the doctor left for her, but I have a feeling she really just wanted you to go up and see her again.’
Annie had stood up to go to her charge the moment Anthony had said she was in pain, but she hesitated at his last remark, looked uncertainly at Rufus.
He stood up. ‘I’ll go up to her,’ he said decisively. ‘It seems our conversation is over anyway.’ He shot Anthony an impatient glance.
A gesture Anthony was completely impervious to. He grinned unconcernedly, his bad humour of moments ago seeming to have evaporated. ‘Can I help it if your daughter loves you?’ He shrugged, obviously having only recently left the dinner table, his hair looking blonder than ever against the dark material of the dinner jacket he still wore.
Rufus strode purposefully across the room, passing close to his brother as he did so, the differences between them at once noticeable, and it wasn’t only in their colouring. Anthony’s body kept trim and muscular from regular trips to the gym, whereas Rufus’s lifestyle seemed to keep him slim and powerful, his slightly scornful expression seeming to say he didn’t have time for such niceties as a gym, that the mere battle of life had hardened him physically as well as emotionally.
‘It’s as well someone does,’ he muttered now in reply to Anthony’s baiting comment, turning briefly back to Annie before going through the doorway he now stood before. ‘Tell me, Annie,’ he said. ‘Do you play chess?’
She was taken aback at his return to the conversation Anthony had interrupted. But then, most of their discussion had been fragmented! ‘Yes,’ she answered huskily, not altogether sure why he was asking.
‘I thought you might.’ He nodded his satisfaction with her answer. ‘We’ll have a game together one evening. Although I should warn you, I never deliberately let anyone else win!’
She had a feeling that was true of him in most aspects of his life; he was a man who would give no quarter, to himself or anyone else! ‘I never for a moment believed you would,’ she acknowledged ruefully.
‘Good.’ He stepped out into the hallway, before once again pausing, turning back to her. ‘Oh, and Annie …?’
What now? ‘Yes?’
‘You do look lovely in that black dress,’ he told her throatily, a glitter of triumph in his eyes as he saw the blush on her cheeks before he turned and walked away, a quiet whistle floating in the air behind him.
Annie stared after him in dismay, knowing he had made that last comment to cause mischief; Jessica hadn’t said she looked lovely earlier, only older! But she knew, as Anthony’s mouth tightened in irritation, that Rufus’s jibe had hit the target it was meant for.
She shook her head disbelievingly; these two men were like two little boys trying to score points off each other. For men aged thirty-nine and thirty-six, it was incredibly destructive …!
Anthony looked at her scowlingly. ‘You and Rufus seem to be getting on well together.’ It was more of an accusation than an observation!
‘He seems happy enough that I continue to work with Jessica.’ She deliberately didn’t rise to the bait, having no intention of becoming yet another bone of contention between these two: they already shared enough ill feeling, without adding her to it! Besides, Rufus had meant to cause mischief …
Anthony cheered up at the statement. ‘Well, that’s good, isn’t it? For us, I mean,’ he said happily, moving closer to her. ‘It means we’ll have more time to get to know each other.’
Annie looked up at him, once again dazzled by his charming good looks, his normally pleasant disposition having returned. ‘I suppose so,’ she said slowly.
Anthony’s arms moved smoothly about the smallness of her waist as he pulled her close against him.
‘Someone might see us,’ she protested.
‘Who cares?’ he dismissed. ‘Besides, my mother and Davina are deep in discussion about some boring subject or other. I’d much rather be here with you.’
But Davina was his fiancée. This couldn’t be right; Annie knew it couldn’t. She tried to move gently but firmly out of his arms. ‘Anthony—’
‘Oh, for goodness’ sake!’ He thrust her away from him as he felt her struggle against him, a flush to his cheeks as he looked down at her. ‘You weren’t so damned particular on Sunday when I kissed you.’ His eyes narrowed suspiciously. ‘Or is it that, having met my older brother, you think he might be a better prospect?’
She gasped at the injustice of that accusation. She hadn’t meant for that kiss to happen between them, had been racked with guilt about it ever since, very conscious of his engagement, no matter how disastrous that might appear to be. She certainly had no romantic interest in Rufus Diamond …! That would be pure madness on her part, even more so than her attraction to Anthony.
‘I’m sorry, Annie.’ Anthony was instantly contrite as he saw the tears sparkling in her eyes, once again holding her close to him. ‘I shouldn’t take my jealousy out on you.’ He shook his head in self-disgust. ‘Do you forgive me?’ he encouraged softly, his forehead resting lightly on hers as he easily held her gaze.
How could she resist him when he looked exactly like a little boy, no older than some of the children she had looked after?
‘Of course I forgive you,’ she told him huskily. ‘But Rufus is my employer, nothing else.’ She pushed firmly from her mind her complete awareness of the older man.
‘I’m glad you said that.’ Anthony nodded his satisfaction. ‘Because I would hate for Rufus to hurt you simply because he has an old score to settle with me.’
Annie looked up at him, troubled. Surely he wasn’t referring to his mother’s marriage to Rufus’s father, and his own birth soon afterwards? No matter what Rufus considered to be the sins of the mother, they wouldn’t have been passed on to an innocent child …
‘I met Joanna first, you see,’ he sighed, grimacing as Annie looked even more confused. ‘Rufus’s wife,’ he explained wistfully. ‘We met in London when I was at university there, had something of a—relationship,’ he admitted. ‘But it all ended when I came back here. At least, as far as I was concerned it did.’ He shrugged. ‘Unfortunately, Joanna hadn’t taken our affair as lightly as I had, and she followed me down here, got a job locally, and once I had convinced her I didn’t want our relationship to continue she set her sights on Rufus. Initially, I’m sure, to pique my interest. Which it didn’t.’ He grimaced again. ‘But that just seemed to make Joanna more determined where Rufus was concerned, and before I knew what was happening the two of them were married. As Joanna related to me afterwards, her wedding gift to Rufus was to tell him I had been her lover first!’
Annie gasped at the cruelty of such a thing, no longer surprised at the animosity between the two men. Rufus was a man who would hate knowing his brother had been his wife’s lover before their marriage!
‘I hadn’t mentioned my relationship with Joanna to Rufus because I really didn’t think he was serious about her.’ Anthony shook his head. ‘I don’t think he’s ever really forgiven me for that.’
But the marriage had survived, and the couple had had Jessica together. Otherwise Annie wouldn’t be here at all.
She had wanted to work with a family, had deliberately chosen to do so—but what a complicated family the Diamonds were turning out to be—the first Diamond bride dead, Celia becoming the wicked stepmother, Rufus’s own bride tainted in a way he would never have been happy with, and she a Diamond bride who had also died.
Could it possibly have been one of these two women who had committed suicide in that rocky cove below Clifftop House? And, if so, which one …?
CHAPTER FOUR
‘I TAKE it your interview last night with my stepson went well?’ Celia Diamond queried briskly as she sat forward to pour the coffee that had just been brought in to them in Celia’s private sitting-room.
Annie had answered the summons to join the other woman for morning coffee with some trepidation. But Jessica was i
n her father’s study playing the promised game of chess, so she didn’t really have a valid excuse not to join Celia.
She chose her words carefully, not really sure in her own mind of the success, or otherwise, of that meeting with Rufus. ‘He seemed satisfied with my references,’ she replied noncommittally.
Celia narrowed pale blue eyes. ‘So you’re to stay?’
Annie drew in a deep breath. ‘It would seem so,’ she said slowly.
‘Good.’ Celia sighed her satisfaction with this reply, then started sipping her coffee thoughtfully. ‘I doubt that Rufus will stay here very long, anyway,’ she said after a while. ‘He never does!’
Well, Annie sincerely hoped that this time, for Jessica’s sake he would. Although she could understand why he didn’t usually prolong his visits—the tension in the house, since his arrival yesterday, was so tangible you could almost reach out and touch it!
‘And I’m so glad you’re to stay,’ Celia continued evenly. ‘Davina and I were discussing the wedding last night after we all had dinner, and it will be much easier for everyone involved if we don’t have the added worry of Jessica’s care to think of.’
‘Wedding?’ Annie echoed numbly. She could think of only one wedding Davina would want to discuss—her own! Was this the ‘boring subject’ the two women had discussed, that Anthony had referred to when he’d sought Annie out last night? She had a feeling that it was …
‘The wedding has been brought forward to Christmas,’ Celia explained, seemingly unaware of Annie’s distress. ‘Which, as it’s to take place in London, means a lot of rearranging. The reception will be the problem, of course, because on such short notice we could end up with somewhere ghastly, and—But I’m sure all of this can’t be of any interest to you,’ she dismissed lightly. ‘I merely want to assure myself that you will be here to take care of Jessica.’
Did she? Was that really all Celia wanted to do? Annie wasn’t so sure. Or was it simply that she was looking for hidden meanings in everything now? Until yesterday she had taken all the Diamond family at face value; today she seemed to be looking for double meanings in every statement. It was Rufus’s doing, of course. There was no way Celia could possibly know of her attraction to Anthony, and his interest in her. Was there …?
Diamonds Are Forever: The Royal Marriage ArrangementThe Diamond BrideThe Diamond Dad Page 20