by Penny Jordan
‘Mmm... You and Harry both. He’s been singing her praises to me ever since the night of the ball. When are you seeing Brough again, by the way?’
‘I don’t know. He’s going to London on business in the morning, but he said he’d get in touch just as soon as he could.’
‘Goodnight, then,’ Dee told her as she opened the flat door and stepped out into the fresh air.
* * *
DEE HAD PARKED her car quite close to the shop, but instead of going directly to it she chose, instead, to walk in the opposite direction through the town and down towards the river.
The walk along the river path had been one of her favourites as a girl. It had been her route home from school and, later on when she had gone to university, it had been one of the first places she had headed for on her return home.
Her family had lived in the area for many generations; her mother had died shortly after Dee’s birth and her father, older than her mother by some eighteen years, had died just before Dee was about to take her degree.
She had returned home to sort out his affairs and to discover that she was an extremely wealthy young woman.
One of the first things she had done with her money had been to make a large, interest-free loan to her uncle in order to enable him to modernise the family farm and buy more land.
Her own father, his brother, had sold his share of the family farmland as a young man, preferring to deal and speculate in the commodities market rather than follow the custom of his forebears, and it had seemed to Dee to be a good memorial to him that she should help her uncle to buy back the land he had sold away from the family. The two brothers had never quarrelled over his decision, and had always got on amicably for two such very, very different people, but Dee, who had inherited her father’s intelligence, knew that it was becoming increasingly difficult for small farmers to make a decent living and she had seen that there could come a time when her uncle, for financial reasons, would either have to sell up or rent out his lands.
With the rest of the money she had made several donations to local charities, and then amused herself by finding out if she had inherited her father’s gift for making the right investment.
It had turned out that she had.
But, at twenty-one, a girl wanted far more from life than a healthy bank balance, and Dee had had all the normal urges and needs of her sex and age—a man to love and love her, the prospect of a relationship that would last a lifetime and one which included commitment, children...love...
And, for all too brief a space of time, while she had been at university, she had thought she had that relationship...that love...had thought...but had thought wrongly. Had made the worst, the most disastrous decision of her life, had prejudiced everything she had, everything she was, because of someone who had proved to be so false, so cruelly betraying that even now she still bore the scars.
She stopped walking, shoving her hands deep into the pockets of her lightweight jacket, and stared angrily up towards the stars.
She had waited a long time for this opportunity to turn the tables on Julian Cox, to get him in a position where he was vulnerable and unable to protect himself...as she had once been. Oh, yes, she had been vulnerable...
Fiercely she bit down hard on her bottom lip. She wasn’t being vindictive, she was simply exercising her right to have justice, avenging the wrong which had been done to her, and neither were her motives totally selfish. She had been concerned for Beth’s pain and heartbreak and, despite what Kelly seemed to think, she was aware of the difficult position she had potentially put her in, and of the heartache that Eve could suffer if no one warned her what Julian was.
She had, of course, assumed that Eve would immediately refuse to have anything further to do with Julian once his involvement with Kelly became public knowledge; Brough would have surely insisted on that for his sister’s own sake and, from what she knew of him, Brough was certainly a strong enough character to be able to achieve that end.
It was a pity that Kelly had changed her mind, but the game wasn’t over yet, not by a long chalk. One way or another, Dee was determined that Julian Cox was going to make full recompense for the debt he owed her. Full recompense...with interest, the interest at the punitively high rate caused by the sheer extent and weight of the emotional anguish and despair she had suffered.
There was no despair like that of suffering a broken heart, destroyed dreams, the complete desolation of a once promising future.
Determinedly, Dee started to head back towards the town centre. It was time for her to go home. Yes, Kelly’s decision was going to cause her a problem, but no problem was insurmountable unless you allowed it to be and she, Dee, was certainly not going to do that.
* * *
WHERE WAS BROUGH now? Kelly wondered dreamily as she said goodbye to the customer she had just served. In another five minutes she was going to close the shop for the day and then she was going to go upstairs and indulge in the delicious pleasure of curling up in a chair whilst she relived every second of yesterday, and most especially what had happened after Brough had insisted on seeing her safely inside the flat.
Even now she felt as though it couldn’t be real, as though she had to keep mentally pinching herself to make sure she wasn’t imagining everything.
She had felt guilty telling Dee that she couldn’t go on with their plans, but wisely Kelly knew that even without the discovery of her love for Brough she would have found it extremely difficult to continue to practise the deceit her role had called for.
Where was Brough? Still in London? On his way back? When would she hear from him...see him...hold him?
She caught her breath as she heard the shop doorbell ring behind her, and out of the corner of her eye she caught the male outline of the person walking in.
‘Brough!’
She turned round eagerly, his name on her lips, only to be swept by a surge of disappointment as she recognised that her visitor wasn’t Brough but Julian.
‘What happened to you last night?’ Julian demanded without preamble. ‘We had a date...at the wine bar...remember?’
Guiltily Kelly frowned. She had completely forgotten about that, but even if she hadn’t... The last person she
really wanted to see was Julian Cox, but since he was here she could at least make it abundantly clear to him just where she stood, and, turning away from him so that he couldn’t see her face, she managed a dismissive shrug.
‘I changed my mind,’ she told him carelessly. ‘In fact...’
Summoning all her courage, she turned round and announced crisply, ‘In fact, Julian, I think it would be best if you didn’t try to get in touch with me any more.’
‘What are you trying to say?’ Julian demanded furiously, his mouth tightening as he stepped in front of her, blocking her exit. She couldn’t do this to him. He had got it all planned—Kelly, with her substantial fortune, unfettered by any access restrictions, was a much better proposition than Eve with her trust fund and her brother, and besides, he wanted Kelly. She excited him in a way that the Beths and Eves of this world could never do.
‘I’m trying to say that I think we’ve both made a mistake,’ Kelly informed him as diplomatically as she could. ‘You are dating someone else...’
‘So?’ Julian demanded. ‘You didn’t seem to consider that much of a problem the other night at the ball, nor when I rang you up...’
‘Maybe not,’ Kelly allowed. ‘But since then I’ve had time to think things through... Eve loves you, Julian,’ she told him directly.
To her disbelief, instead of looking embarrassed, he smiled triumphantly.
‘You’re jealous, aren’t you?’ he challenged her. ‘Well, you needn’t be. Eve’s a child, Kelly, but you’re a woman... The things you and I could do...’ he promised her thickly. ‘You know what I mean. You want them too. I
’ve seen it in your eyes... Eve is a mistake. It’s you I want, Kelly.’
Thoroughly revolted, Kelly tried to step back from him, but the hard edge of the counter was behind her, jarring her back. She looked anxiously towards the door, wishing a customer would walk in and put an end to their unwanted privacy. Unwanted on her part, that was. Julian, far from accepting what she had told him, seemed to be trying to be deliberately obtuse, Kelly recognised. Was he really so vain that he didn’t realise how much she loathed him? If so, she would simply have to take a stronger line with him.
‘Julian, I meant what I said,’ she told him firmly. ‘I don’t want to see you. If I gave you the wrong idea—’
‘If?’ he broke in, his face changing as he understood the forcefulness of her determination. No way could he afford to let her go, he acknowledged inwardly. When he had first met Eve he had not realised just how much control her brother had over her financial affairs. There was no love lost between him and Brough at all.
‘You were giving me the green light, Kelly, all the way to your bedroom door. I want you, Kelly, and I intend to have you.’
‘No!’ Kelly protested, shocked.
‘Oh, come on,’ he overrode her. ‘You want me too; I can see it in your eyes...your mouth...’ As he spoke he reached out and pressed his thumb hard against her bottom lip. ‘There’s no way I’m going to let you go.’
Taken off guard, Kelly immediately tried to push him away, making a sharp sound of distress.
He actually made her feel physically sick, and not just sick but afraid as well, she recognised as she saw the ugly look in his eyes.
‘I want you to leave, Julian,’ she told him shakily. ‘Now...’
‘Oh, you do, do you?’ he responded aggressively. ‘And what if I choose not to? What if I choose to make you come good on all those sexy promises you’ve been giving me, Kelly? What are you going to do about it? How are you going to stop me?’
‘What you’re talking about is sexual harassment,’ Kelly told him bravely. ‘If you don’t stop threatening me and leave straight away, Julian, I shall report you to the police.’
To her dismay, instead of responding as she’d hoped, he threw back his head and laughed.
‘Do you think they’d believe you...after the way you’ve been coming on to me? Get real, Kelly. You’re just being hysterical.’
Hysterical—wasn’t that what he had accused Beth of being?
Outrage and panic paralysed Kelly, rooting her feet to the floor as she stood trapped in the maniacal beam of his almost colourless, cold eyes.
Julian was a desperate man, she recognised numbly. He was also enjoying her fear, feeding off it, not just emotionally, she sensed with increasing, horrified disgust and fear, but physically as well. Oh, please God, let someone come into the shop and save her, she prayed mentally as she fought not to succumb to the awful, fearful heaviness filling her body. To say that she was afraid in no way came even close to describing what she felt. Her whole body had gone icy cold. She knew, she just knew, that Julian meant every word he said, that nothing, nothing she could do or say would persuade him to leave. Now, when it was almost too late, she recognised how much she had underestimated how dangerous he really was.
* * *
Brough had been delayed in London longer than he had planned. There had been a couple of time-consuming delays in the finalisation of the transaction with Hong Kong. He had been tempted to ring Kelly just as he left the city, but he had wanted to clear his mind of everything to do with his work before he spoke to her again. And besides, when he told her he loved her he wanted to see the look in her eyes, to hear that wonderful female adorable catch in her breath as she looked at him, to know that she felt the same way that he did.
Impossible now to think that he had imagined that first time he had held her in his arms that he was immune to the risk of falling in love—and besides, what risk? Loving her was heaven...paradise...the fulfilment of his every previously unacknowledged dream.
He would go home, shower and then drive round and see her...surprise her...
So why, having made that decision, did he suddenly, when he was within a hundred yards of his own driveway, suddenly succumb to an almost overpowering sense of urgency, so strong a need, so immediate and intense, that he drove through a set of traffic lights on amber and broke the speed limit just to get to her. He drew up several yards away from the flat and got out, forgetting to lock his car as he strode quickly towards the shop.
As he approached the door he could see two people inside. Kelly was standing with her back half turned towards him so that he could only partially see her face, her head submissively bent towards the man who was wrapping his arms around her. To anyone else their pose might have seemed to be that of lovers, but Brough knew immediately and incontrovertibly that it wasn’t love that was keeping Kelly immobile in Julian Cox’s embrace, but fear. Just how he knew it he didn’t stop to question as he pushed open the door and rushed to Kelly’s side, forcibly thrusting Julian away from her. As he did so he could see not just the relief and shock in her eyes, but also an anguished pain that cut right to his heart. His love, his darling, felt shamed by the fact that she was being attacked by...
He could quite happily have slowly roasted Julian Cox over a very, very hot fire, just for that act of violation alone—he, a man of peace and logic. Brough could see the fury and the fear in the other man’s eyes, and the urge to punish him, hurt and frighten him, as well as release his own fury against him, was so strong that for a second Brough was almost tempted to give in to it.
But over Julian’s shoulder he could see where Kelly was standing, white-faced, her eyes blank with shock, and instead he released Julian and told him in disgust, ‘Get out of here before I give in to the temptation to forget that non-violence is the making of a truly intelligent man.’
‘You’ve got it all wrong...’ Julian started to whine as he backed towards the door. ‘She’s the one who’s to blame, not me. She’s the one who’s been leading me on, coming on to me,’ he started to protest, but Brough had heard enough. Grabbing hold of his collar, he virtually marched him to the door and opened it, pushing him through it.
‘If I find out you’ve so much as even tried to speak to her again, I promise you you’re going to regret it,’ he told Julian in a steely voice.
As Brough locked the door he turned towards Kelly. She was still standing motionless, her face grey-white, her eyes huge and unfocused. She was his prime concern now. He could talk to her later, find out later just what had been going on and why Cox had been terrorising her.
At the back of his mind as he walked towards Kelly lay the knowledge that he was now going to have to take very firm action over Julian’s relationship with his sister, but right now Kelly was his only priority.
‘Kelly... It’s all right, my darling, he’s gone, you’re safe...’
As she heard Brough’s familiar, warm voice, Kelly turned her head and looked towards him, towards him but not at him. How could she? How could she ever come to terms with the pain, the humiliation, the defilement of what she had just experienced? Julian’s verbal attack on her, his threatened assault on her, had left her feeling totally physically shocked and degraded. The thought passed through her mind that if this was how she felt how on earth did rape victims feel? How did they cope? Julian’s abuse of her had come nowhere close to anything like that...
‘Come on...I’m taking you upstairs...’ she heard Brough telling her. Desperately she struggled to get back to normality, her always keen sense of responsibility reminding her of her duties.
‘I can’t—the shop,’ she began to protest, but Brough overruled her.
‘The shop is closed,’ he told her firmly, adding more gently, ‘You’re in shock, my love; there’s no way you can work. You need...’ He paused and started to frown. ‘Who is your GP? I think per
haps that...’
Immediately Kelly shook her head.
‘No, no, I’m fine...’ Her bottom lip started to tremble. ‘Honestly, Brough, I will be fine,’ she told him in a thready voice. ‘I don’t need... I don’t want... It was my own fault,’ she told him huskily, dropping her head so that he couldn’t look into her eyes and see the truth she felt must be clear there. ‘I shouldn’t have—’
‘You shouldn’t have what?’ Brough interrupted her immediately and fiercely. ‘You shouldn’t have let him in? No way was it your fault, Kelly. I saw what was going on... There was no way you were inviting or enjoying what was going to happen.’
The sureness in his voice, the conviction, the trust and the love were too much for Kelly’s fragile composure. Hot tears filled her eyes and started to roll down her face as she shook her head.
‘Oh, no, please, my love, don’t cry,’ Brough begged her with a small groan. ‘I shouldn’t have let him walk away from this... The police...’
‘No...no, please. I don’t want anything like that,’ Kelly protested sharply. ‘I just want to forget about it, Brough... I just want...’
She started to tremble violently, reaction setting in as the realisation of what had happened swamped her.
‘Come on, I’m taking you up to your flat,’ Brough told her masterfully, holding her gently by the arm and leading her towards the door.
Five minutes later she was standing in her own small kitchen drinking the fortifying mug of coffee Brough had just made her, liberally laced with brandy. She could feel the strong spirit going straight to her head, relaxing her both physically and emotionally, releasing her from the rigid self control she had been exercising ever since Julian Cox had walked into the shop.
‘Brough, Julian wanted...’ she began huskily, suddenly desperately anxious to tell him everything, to explain to him what she had been doing and why, but before she could finish what she had been about to say she suddenly became very dizzy.