Charade in Winter

by Anne Mather

  ‘For a walk,’ he replied coldly, ‘if you’ve no objections.’

  Lady Morgan bit her lip. ‘It’s snowing,’ she said uneasily. ‘Seth’s just been in to tell me. He says it will be inches deep by the morning.’

  ‘Is that intended as a warning?’ asked Oliver bitterly.

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘I mean I intend to go to London tomorrow, whatever the weather,’ he told her harshly, and slammed out of the room.

  * * *

  Alix was cold. She had shouted until she was hoarse, and hammered on the doors of the garage until her hands were numb, but nobody seemed to hear her. Eventually she had to return to the comparative warmth of the car, huddling in a corner at the back, grateful that at least whoever had put the car away had not locked it. But now even the car was chilled and cheerless, and without even a blanket to cover her, Alix began to shiver with the frightening realisation that she might well be there till morning.

  She had given up wondering what Oliver might think about her disappearance. After all, she had planned to run away, she had packed her suitcases. Anyone seeing them would assume she had gone, and who could blame them? If it had been Giles who had driven Willie and Linsey to their destination, the gates of the Hall were unattended, and Oliver might easily think she had slipped away meanwhile. What he would say when her whereabouts were discovered was another matter, and one which she hadn’t the stomach to face right now.

  Some time later, she observed a curious lightening of the darkness that filtered between the cracks of the garage doors, and kneeling on the seat of the car she saw the flakes of snow being drifted under the doors by the wind that whistled eerily through the nearby trees. It was snowing, she thought despairingly, and in spite of the fact that she knew the garages were near the stables and therefore surely she would be able to attract the stable boy’s attention in the morning when he came to feed the horses, she couldn’t help a sense of panic that the car might not be used for days.

  Then, even as she knelt there, her chin resting on her icy hands, a sudden thud hit the doors, making the head ring with the metallic echo they made. Shock kept her motionless for a moment, and it was only when she heard the dogs barking that she realised the wolfhounds had sensed her presence.

  Not caring that they might be unfriendly, she scrambled quickly out of the car and ran to the doors again, shouting and banging until the animals outside went nearly wild with excitement. If only she could make sufficient noise, she might attract someone’s attention, she thought desperately, although the trees and the falling blanket of snow would provide a soundproofing barrier.

  Then, when her strength was giving out, and she was on the point of dropping to her knees with exhaustion, she heard a man’s voice, calling the dogs. And not just any voice—Oliver’s voice!

  Trembling, she summoned up enough energy to call his name, but her voice was harsh after so much shouting, and had no penetration. She sank against the doors, sobbing her frustration, and fell forward into a mound of snow as Oliver wrenched them open.

  ‘My God! Alix!’ he exclaimed, pushing the dogs away and dropping on to his knees beside her. ‘Oh, Alix! Alix! I thought you’d gone!’

  She looked up at him helplessly, her heart in her eyes, and with a muffled groan he hauled her into his arms, burying his face in the hollow of her neck.

  For several seconds they remained like that, and then Oliver rose abruptly to his feet, lifting her with him into his arms, unwilling to let her go even for a moment. The falling snow was covering them in a cloak of white, and without waiting for explanations, Oliver strode with her back to the house.

  In the hall, Lady Morgan came hurrying to meet them, staring in amazement at the girl in her nephew’s arms. ‘Alix!’ she exclaimed. ‘But, Oliver, you said—’

  ‘Not now, Grizelda!’ he told her abruptly. ‘Alix is frozen. She needs a hot bath and something warm to drink—preferably brandy. Can you see to that?’

  His aunt nodded, and Alix, feeling obliged to say something, croaked: ‘I—I got locked in the garage, Lady Morgan. I’m sorry if I’ve been a nuisance.’

  Lady Morgan shook her head helplessly. Then, seeing her nephew’s impatience, she nodded and hurried away towards the kitchen. Oliver, ignoring Alix’s plea to be put down, continued on his way up the stairs, turning left along the landing, taking her to his rooms and not her own. He eventually set her on her feet in his sitting room, and Alix swayed dazedly as the warmth flooded back into her chilled limbs.

  Oliver left her to go into his bathroom, and moments later she heard the sound of water gushing into the bath. He came back to her, gesturing behind him.

  ‘Can you undress yourself?’ he demanded, his voice full of some suppressed emotion, and she nodded quickly.

  ‘I—thank you for—for finding me,’ she began, but he silenced her with a look.

  ‘The dogs found you,’ he said. ‘Get into the bath!’ and turning, he strode out of the room, leaving her alone in his suite.

  Alix looked after him uncertainly. What now? What did he mean by that embrace in the snow? Where had he thought she had gone? And why had he brought her here, to his rooms? She didn’t think she could face another scene, not now, and the weakness in her bones that she felt every time she was near him might not sustain her determination to refuse what he might ask of her.

  She was shivering uncontrollably, and deciding that no good could come of developing pneumonia, she took off her coat and scarf and went into the bathroom. The water was still running, filling the bath with some pine-scented fragrance, and she quickly turned off the taps before taking off the rest of her clothes.

  Never had water felt so good, lapping all about her like a soothing balm. Oliver’s soap was pine-scented, too, and as she smoothed it over her skin, she couldn’t help the intoxicating realisation that it had soaped Oliver’s skin, too.

  ‘Have you nearly finished?’

  Oliver’s voice made her reach blindly for the sponge, holding it defensively to her breasts. But it was a futile effort, and he took no notice of her embarrassment as he came to stand beside the bath, looking down at her with undeniable enjoyment.

  ‘Please…’ she exclaimed, her face flushing to match the rest of her. ‘Oliver—go away!’

  ‘Why?’ He came down on his haunches beside her, lean and disturbing in his tight-fitting jeans and navy shirt. ‘Shall I join you?’

  Alix’s pulses raced at his nearness. ‘Oh, Oliver,’ she breathed huskily, and putting out his hand he cupped the back of her neck, tipping her face up to his.

  ‘I love you,’ he told her unsteadily, and covered her parting lips with his.

  She felt his free hand tug the sponge away from her unresisting fingers before moulding the swelling fullness of her breasts. Then, with an exclamation, he lifted her bodily out of the bath and into his arms, uncaring that she was soaking him to the skin.

  ‘Do you love me?’ he urged, reaching for a towel and wrapping it round them both, and his answer was in the way she wound her arms about his neck and pressed herself against him. ‘So why did you try to run away?’ he demanded savagely.

  Alix trembled and pulled herself out of his arms, noticing inconsequently that his shirt and pants reflected the outline of her wet body. Then she wrapped the towel about herself, and began to dry herself self-consciously.

  ‘Well?’ he probed, unbuttoning his shirt. ‘Are you going to tell me?’

  ‘Oliver…’ She pressed her lips together helplessly. ‘I’m sorry about—about deceiving you.’

  ‘So you should be. But that doesn’t explain why you ran away.’

  ‘Doesn’t it?’ She sighed. ‘But surely—you said yourself you could—you could break every bone in my body.’

  ‘For pretending you were married, yes, I could.’

  ‘For pretending I was married?’ Alix stared at him uncomprehendingly.

  ‘Yes. Do you realise I nearly—’ He broke off abruptly, pulling his shirt off his s
houlders to reveal the tanned muscular hardness of his chest. ‘Alix, I thought you were experienced!’

  She frowned. ‘That makes a difference?’

  His lips twisted. ‘Slightly.’

  ‘You mean—to your feelings?’

  ‘No!’ he snapped impatiently. ‘To the way I’d have made love to you.’

  ‘Oh!’ She coloured again, and he swore.

  ‘Alix, have you ever slept with a man?’

  ‘No!’

  ‘All right. So take my word, there is a difference.’

  She bent her head. ‘I’ve never—I’ve never let any man touch me as—as you’ve touched me.’

  He took a step towards her, and then abruptly turned away, as if he couldn’t trust himself. ‘Go on!’ he muttered, and she noticed the thickening in his tone.

  ‘Well…’ She licked her lips. ‘I thought—with Willie coming here…’

  ‘Faulkner?’

  ‘Yes. I thought—I thought you’d want me to go.’

  ‘Is that all?’ He glanced at her over his shoulder.

  Alix tucked the ends of the towel toga-wise about her. ‘Not—not entirely,’ she admitted.

  ‘What else?’

  He walked through to his bedroom, unbuttoning his wet pants as he went, and she hovered nervously in the bathroom, waiting for him to come back.

  ‘Well?’ He appeared in the doorway again, pulling on a silk dressing robe, and her mouth felt dry as she realised he was as naked as she was beneath the thin material.

  ‘Your—your mother-in-law…’ She used the term deliberately. ‘She told me about—about Melissa.’

  ‘So? That makes a difference?’

  ‘I think so.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  His brows descended grimly, and she hastened on: ‘I—I do love you, Oliver, you know that, but—but I can’t just—live with you. I—well, I’d want your children, and—and not illegitimately.’

  ‘What in hell are you talking about?’ he demanded violently, grasping her shoulders and jerking her towards him. ‘What do you mean? You can’t just—live—with me? Have I asked you to?’

  Alix trembled. ‘I—why, no, but I thought—’

  ‘Oh, Alix!’ He was not immune to the agony in her face, and hauling her towards him he buried his face in the silken softness of her hair, moulding her slender body against his. ‘Alix, you fool, I want to marry you! Whoever gave you the idea I wanted anything else?’

  Alix pulled her head back to stare at him. ‘But you can’t. Oliver, you can’t. I won’t let you.’

  He shook his head uncomprehendingly. ‘You won’t let me—what?’

  ‘Oliver, you can’t deprive Melissa—’

  ‘Who’s depriving Melissa of anything?’ he demanded, half angrily. ‘In God’s name, Alix, I’m a man. I love Melissa, but I need you!’

  She moved her head helplessly from side to side. ‘I—I can’t let you do it,’ she breathed. ‘Oh, God—all right, I’ll live with you. But if I get pregnant—’

  ‘Which you will,’ he told her huskily, and she gave him a despairing look. ‘Alix,’ he added gently, ‘so long as you love me, nothing can stop me from marrying you. Don’t you know that?’

  ‘But what about Melissa?’ she protested.

  ‘Melissa already knows how I feel,’ he stated grimly. ‘I cleared that little matter up some time ago.’

  ‘But the money…’

  ‘What money?’

  She swallowed convulsively, but she had to go on. ‘Your—your uncle’s will—he didn’t intend for you to marry again, did he?’

  ‘What are you talking about?’ Oliver took a backward step to gaze at her in a puzzled fashion. Then an idea seemed to occur to him. ‘Alix, what exactly did Grizelda tell you?’

  She put up a confused hand to her head. ‘About—about how your uncle left all his money to Joanne so long as you didn’t divorce her.’

  ‘What?’ He was incredulous.

  ‘And how it’s only yours if—if you don’t marry again.’

  ‘What utter rubbish!’ Oliver was half amused, half furious. ‘My God! No wonder she wanted to disappear before you came on the scene.’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Grizelda. Who else?’ He sighed, linking his arms loosely around her. ‘Alix, my darling, Uncle Andrew left his fortune to me—not to Joanne, I’m sorry to say. I didn’t want it, but he didn’t ask my permission. That was why, after he was dead, we stayed together. Because, God help me, I felt responsible for her.’

  ‘But—’ Alix tried to take this in, but only one thing was burning itself into her consciousness—if Joanne’s father had left his money to Oliver, Oliver had had no reason to dispose of his wife to get his hands on it, as people had suggested.

  ‘Alix,’ he was speaking again, more gently now, ‘I know what Grizelda was trying to do. You see, because of her, Joanne didn’t have the child aborted. It could have been mine, you see, and Grizelda was desperate for us to stay together.’

  ‘Oh, Oliver!’ Alix touched his cheek, and he pulled her more closely against him so that she could feel all the hardening angles of his body.

  ‘Alix,’ he groaned softly, ‘I have to tell you this, but right now there are other things I want to do.’

  Her lips parted tremulously. ‘Go on.’

  ‘You make it very difficult,’ he uttered, but resting his forehead against her, he continued: ‘All right. Joanne had a daughter. Melissa’s father, by the way, died in a plane crash before she was born.’ Alix nodded, and he went on, ‘So—Joanne’s daughter was kept a secret until Joanne decided to let me know. Contrary to her expectations, I wanted to see the child, and the rest you can guess. I wanted her brought back to England. Joanne didn’t. The outcome was a row from which Joanne emerged in a flaming temper, and—she had the crash.’

  ‘So that was why…’

  ‘… why she drove so recklessly? I’m afraid so. I didn’t want it to happen, but Melissa deserved better than to be hidden away in Japan. She is a Morgan, after all.’

  ‘But why did Lady Morgan…’

  ‘… pretend things were different? Well, she knew I’d agreed to adopt Melissa. I guessed she thought if I fell in love with someone else and had children of my own, that might put Melissa’s future in jeopardy.’

  ‘Oh, Oliver!’

  ‘Oh, Oliver!’ he mimicked her gently. ‘And how do you think I felt when I discovered you’d disappeared without even giving me a chance to tell you how I felt?’

  ‘But Willie—’

  ‘Faulkner was never a threat.’

  ‘I worked for him,’ she insisted.

  ‘Did you? How much copy did you send him?’

  ‘I—none.’

  Oliver half smiled. ‘You got under my skin from the first day you came here. I tried to tell myself I was a fool, that you were married even if you were separated from your husband, but nothing worked. So I tried to keep away from you. And you know what happened.’

  Her lips quivered. ‘But Melissa—’

  ‘Yes, Melissa. She didn’t like it much at first, but after I had a talk with her, I think she began to understand the situation.’ He paused. ‘Now tell me how you got into the garage.’

  ‘Can’t you guess?’ she whispered, burying her face in the parting between the lapels of his gown.

  ‘You tried to leave with Faulkner and his assistant?’

  ‘Hmm.’ She shivered with the memory of it, and his arms tightened.

  ‘So you were in the car when I put it away in the garage.’

  ‘You put it away?’ she exclaimed. ‘Yes, I was in the boot.’

  He shook his head. ‘Who did you think it was? Giles took our unwelcome visitors to Newcastle.’

  ‘But what did Willie say? Didn’t he want to speak to me?’

  ‘Oh, yes. But I told him you were my fiancée, and that was why you hadn’t anything to say to him.’

  ‘But he saw Melissa!’

  ‘I know that. And he’
ll probably tell the world that she’s my daughter. I’ve told him if he does, I’ll sue.’

  ‘Oh, Oliver, can you?’

  ‘Of course. I have proof that she’s not, and unless Faulkner does a lot more ferreting, he’ll never find out she’s really Joanne’s child.’

  ‘I—I can hardly believe it’s over,’ she breathed, ‘that this is actually happening.’

  ‘Can’t you?’ he inquired mockingly, and feeling the penetrating hardness of his body Alix coloured anew.

  ‘Well—perhaps,’ she conceded, and for a few moments he was intent on proving to her that his hunger for her was very real.

  Then he said softly: ‘Do you realise if it hadn’t been for the dogs, you could have spent the night in the garage? You could have died of exposure!’

  ‘You really thought I’d gone, then?’ she asked.

  ‘Makoto told me she had seen you climbing into the back of the Landrover.’

  ‘What?’

  He nodded grimly. ‘What she actually saw was you climbing into the back of the car, but she wanted to punish you for telling tales on her. She never thought—or so she says—that there was any danger of you freezing to death!’

  ‘Oh, Oliver!’ Alix stared at him.

  ‘I’ve just had a few well chosen words with that lady, and I’ve told her she’ll be on her way back to Hokkaido if she attempts to hurt you again.’

  ‘Poor Makoto.’ Alix had it in her heart to feel sorry for the little Japanese woman now. ‘What about—what about your aunt?’

  Oliver bent his head to caress her shoulder with his lips. ‘Grizelda knows exactly how I feel. Now…’ Determinedly he drew away from her, and indicated a tray on the table beside the bed. ‘Some brandy, I think. Are you hungry?’

  Watching him go and pour her drink, Alix thought she had never felt so ecstatically happy. With a little exclamation she went after him, and when he turned she was close beside him.

  ‘I love you, Oliver,’ she whispered softly, and he was not proof against her overwhelming attraction.

  ‘The brandy…’ he murmured as she reached up to kiss him, but she shook her head.

  ‘Later,’ she said, winding her arms about him, unfastening the cord of his robe, wanting to feel his skin against hers. As he pressed her close against him she thought that tonight Myra might well be right. Her bed would not be slept in.