by Jan Colley
From the determined gleam in his eye, she deduced the lesser of two evils would be her failed love affair, the incident that sparked the return of all the unwelcome publicity from years before. The most important thing was to keep the feud from him, for now at least.
Jasmine looked pointedly at his hand on her arm. “A broken heart, reasonably common when you’re twenty.”
Adam merely raised his brows.
She sighed. “Against my father’s wishes, I fell in love with the man who is tenth in line for the throne. It didn’t last. He preferred my best friend. They recently divorced, but the point is, for a few months, I was a lamb to the slaughter for the press. An engagement announcement—” she gave him a scathing look “—for our pretend engagement might bring it all up again.”
Adam’s face cleared. “Vincent de Burgh. That’s why you were in such a hurry to leave last night—and you didn’t want your photo taken.”
Jasmine nodded, not realizing he’d picked up on that.
His eyes searched her face for so long she began to fidget. Finally he nodded. “Okay. That wasn’t so hard, was it?”
“What?”
“To bring me up to speed. I’m beginning to think there are more secrets hoarded up in that lovely head—” he tapped her temple with his index finger “—than currently floating around the Secret service.”
Adam was enjoying himself. Despite Jasmine’s stuffy father, who seemed to regard her achievements and wishes as an afterthought, her stepmother was great and the house was out of this world.
The best part was making her squirm, because as he’d pointed out last night, she didn’t like it one bit. Playing her fiancé gave him carte blanche to touch, to be suggestive, to tease. He almost forgot why he was here. Oh, he wanted Jasmine—or Jane, as he had to keep reminding himself—more with each passing minute but his main goal was the opportunity to meet her uncle.
The touching, being suggestive and teasing just made it all the more enjoyable—for him.
The private apartments were bright and light, showcasing plenty of marble, plasterwork, windows and gilded furnishings. It was a different story “below stairs”, as the basement was known. This is where the twenty or so servants in the early nineteen-hundreds had worked, Jasmine explained. “And that doesn’t count the gardeners, farmhands, garage or stable hands. Or, would you believe, the night watchmen.”
History wasn’t his thing, but as they slowly wandered the areas open to the public, Adam was transported back to another time. She astounded him with her knowledge. It seemed she had a story about every nook and cranny, every priceless heirloom, every brick in the house! It was all so fascinating.
“The hall of summons,” she announced, pointing out the labels where forty bells hung high on faded plaster walls, some sporting the names of some of her ancestors. She showed him the cavernous kitchen, with its incredibly high ceiling, “to dissipate the heat and steam from the coal-powered range, which could eat up to a hundredweight of coal in a day.”
“How do you know all this stuff?” he marveled, declining her invitation to walk up the ninety stone stairs to the maids’ quarters in the attic.
“I grew up here.” She ran her hand over some ancient books in the butler’s rooms—Burke’s Peerage, Baronetage and Knightage was one tome that caught Adam’s eye. “And I have a degree in English history.”
He straightened, surprised. “You do?”
“Uh-huh. I got interested in history when we started a family tree at school,” she explained. “It took me years to finish, even though our family has only been here for a couple of hundred years.” They walked up the basement stairs into the entranceway, blinking at the strong light after the gloominess below. “I enjoyed it so much, I decided I wanted to work in a museum one day.”
“And yet now you reside in one of the youngest countries in the world and work as a personal assistant in a financial organization.”
Jasmine laughed. “Ironic, isn’t it? Maybe Te Papa would have me.”
She referred to New Zealand’s national museum in Wellington. Adam’s interest in Jasmine doubled. She was well-educated, cultured, elegant. She oozed class, spades of it—and it wasn’t something she’d learned. Rather, she was born to it, to this grand house with hundreds of years under its belt.
As she uncovered history for him, he so wanted to uncover her many layers, to know her secrets and desires and fears and dreams. Despite her culture and poise and obvious smarts, she was vulnerable, softer than the socialites or corporate sharks he normally dated.
But Adam had a feeling unraveling Jasmine’s mysteries would take a lifetime.
“Don’t you miss it here, all the history, the house and the countryside?”
“Sometimes.”
“Will you stay in New Zealand?” he asked.
“For now,” she said pensively, neither her tone nor the brief reply a confirmation.
“What do you like about it?”
She thought for a moment. “The laid-back, fair-dues character of it. The small population. A lot of things. It just seems a more open and fair society.”
Adam nodded. He missed his country often—when he wasn’t working fifteen-hour days or squiring some gorgeous woman around London—and was looking forward to returning, probably within the next year, and showing his brother and father that he’d risen to the top.
They’d eat his dust. So he was an irresponsible lightweight who could not sustain his incredible success. He’d show them and raise them some. And when he’d set up in Australia and expanded into the States, perhaps by the time he was forty, he’d choose a mate and start a family. And his family would come first. Adam would not emulate his parents, who had worked six days a week for most of his childhood.
Not that he was complaining. He liked his particular set of familial individuals. He’d just come out of the womb always wanting to do better…at everything. What was wrong with that?
That night, they said their good-nights to Gill and he followed Jasmine up the incredible silver stairway, which apparently took three men three days to polish in its day. They hadn’t discussed sleeping arrangements but she wasn’t at ease. The stiffness of her back as she showed him the way corroborated that. After several fruitless dates in New Zealand, he was conversant with her resolve.
His desire for her had only increased since their passionate encounter last month. Far from slaking his thirst, he was parched to the bone. She’d been very proper throughout the day, even when he pushed the boundaries a little, touching her, whispering in her ear, all the little nuances that hopefully had her father and stepmother believing they were a couple.
She hadn’t cracked. He admired her composure but it only made him more determined to break it. He thought back to some of the dark rooms “below stairs” and imagined there was a ghost or two clanking around this mausoleum—perhaps he could play the “afraid of the dark card”…
She opened a door and showed him into a bedroom that would fit most of his town house inside. The room and salon were tastefully decorated in sage green, overlooking an Italian fountain in the lily pond, and with the ubiquitous fire crackling in the antique fireplace. This house must be hellish cold, he thought, with the number of fireplaces throughout.
“Don’t tell me this was your actual room?” He touched the four-poster bed that looked the size of an Olympic swimming pool. He was amazed anyone could sleep here. The furniture and decor belonged in a palace.
“Mmm.” She walked over to their bags, which the housekeeper had brought up from the entrance. Watching her, it suddenly hit Adam that she’d grown up here, this was a slice of her life, with all its pomp and ceremony and tradition.
And yet it just didn’t mesh with the shy woman he knew in Wellington. Her home was comfortable, small, with a bright garden full of camellias and rhododendrons, but not luxurious by any means.
Adam blew out a long breath, it suddenly occurring to him that Jasmine was serious money. Not that he cared about hav
ing money half as much as the making of it. But with her obvious love of history, her family so ancient and well-connected, how could she turn her back on this and expect to find happiness in a country where only the odd tree dated back more than a couple of centuries?
She belonged here, couldn’t she see that?
Jasmine picked up her bag and headed for the door. Adam leaned on the fireplace, knowing she was too well-mannered to leave without saying good-night.
She turned at the door, gifting him a small smile. “Sleep well.”
“That’s a fine way to say good-night to your fiancé,” he said in a low, teasing voice.
She shifted the overnight bag into her other hand. Her eyes were wary but not hostile. “You’re enjoying this, I believe.”
Adam’s head went up, his smile ready. He always enjoyed the chase. She should know that! “I am, I admit it.”
And he wasn’t just teasing. He enjoyed seeing her in her natural environment. “It’s like a different world.”
“Good night, Adam,” she said quietly, looking into his face, and as always happened when they looked at each other, the overpowering attraction leaped to life between them, boosting his anticipation.
Then she blinked rapidly and began to back away toward the door. Adam spoke quickly. “And now you’re going to leave me to the mercy of the resident ghosts and go off to some crypt somewhere, because you don’t trust yourself in the same room with me.”
Yes, he was disappointed. The desire he felt for her was much too intense for a woman he had already slept with. What was this hold she had over him?
Jasmine smiled gently. “The ghosts are friendly and I’ll pass on the crypt, but I should be safe in the maids’ quarters in the attic.”
Adam nodded. “Ninety stairs should render you relatively safe, yes.”
Again she turned to go, then stopped. “Thank you for this.”
Simply said, classy. He really liked this woman—but he had to remember what his purpose here was. His whole life stretched out in front of him, time enough for distractions. But for now, he had a new business to contend with, people who depended on him.
He shrugged carelessly. “You want something. I want something.”
Often he’d thought Jasmine’s eyes looked sad. If not sad, then as if they were expecting something to make them sad in the very near future. Now she stood in the doorway, both hands grasping the strap on her holdall, her chin tucked into her chest, and her eyes almost silver in the firelight, filled with sadness and secrets.
“Of course,” she said, and left the room.
Four
A weak sun came out on Boxing Day, so Jasmine decided to show Adam the grounds of the estate. They took her father’s four-wheel drive and motored slowly around the two-thousand acres. There were a couple of hundred acres of woodland and grazing for fallow deer, the thoroughbred stud, stables and track and expansive but basically disused parklands, backed by rocky, heather-covered hills behind the house.
“Father always said he’d like to develop a golf course here. I don’t know why he hasn’t.”
“How many staff look after all this?” Adam asked. She told him that the estate retained only a small staff of a live-in housekeeper, part-time cleaners and kitchen hands, cook, tour guide and gardener. “Plus the stud manager,” Jasmine finished. “It’s not nearly enough. We need an agricultural specialist, first and foremost. Gill still handles most of the administrative tasks, but she hasn’t kept up with learning new techniques and technology.” She turned her face to the house in the distance. “And I doubt she’ll have time for the next few months.”
Jasmine had many ideas for improving the estate, although her personal choice would be to concentrate on the house and heirlooms first.
“All those empty rooms could be put to such good use,” she mused, her mind clicking into second gear. “An antiques center, private exhibitions, niche weekends for small groups like writers and such, small conferences, weddings…” There were endless possibilities that excited her but not, sadly, her more conservative father. “Father doesn’t hold with the modern trend of opening up stately homes to the public. He’s had to, to some extent, to keep up with the maintenance costs, but it’s a struggle getting him to listen to any new ideas.”
“With you in charge,” Adam commented, “Pembleton could be a world-class venue.”
She smiled at him and gazed around at the snow-dusted landscape. Perhaps absence did make the heart fonder. Or the reality of her father’s mortality brought it all closer to home. She had loved the house and the land, would always love it, but the memories that remained at the edges of her mind were of distance, of being let down. She’d always been convinced that the events in her early life colored how her father saw her, ultimately as a burden and a disappointment. She had long accepted that they would never be close, and that that wasn’t her fault. But after Vincent, the place became a prison. And if she’d gone along with her father’s wishes to marry Ian, it would be her prison now.
They drove into the village and stopped for a pint at the local pub. She acknowledged the curious stares of the locals, a few of whom she remembered vaguely. Suddenly she was glad she lived in New Zealand. Just something so small as to be able to drink a coffee or a beer in public, without everyone speculating on your love life or your parents’ tragedy of a marriage, was worth the pangs of regret she sometimes suffered when thinking about home.
“Is that little Jane Cooper?” the barmaid asked.
Jasmine trawled her memory banks. “How are you, Mrs. Dainty?”
They chatted for a minute or two about the sad state of her father’s health. “Some families have their share of tragedy,” the pleasant woman said, shaking her head, “but yours has had more than most.”
“What did she mean?” Adam asked as they took a table by the fireplace.
Jasmine had spent a good part of the night, bedded down in a room four doors away from Adam, thinking about him. Wishing that she could separate sex from emotion, because her emotions were going haywire with him around.
She didn’t regret that she’d slept with him a few weeks ago, but involving him in her family affairs could turn out to be the biggest regret of all, because despite his arrogance and his teasing, he was dangerously likeable.
She looked at him over the rim of her beer, felt the kick in the pit of her stomach whenever their eyes met. If only she could accept, as he did, that sex was the only thing between them, the only thing that would ever be between them.
She remembered what he’d said the day before about her secrets. She was full of them and experience had taught her not to confide in people.
Since she’d been here, she’d had one fright on Christmas Eve with Vincent, and now faced the prospect of Adam hearing about her past tonight at the party. She didn’t think for a moment he would be unsympathetic about the rest of it, but the killer would be her non-contact with her uncle.
Jasmine decided he should know the details—with the exception of the insurmountable rift between her father and uncle. She crossed her fingers and hoped he’d feel so sorry for “poor little Jane Cooper” that he’d forget about Stewart Cooper.
Adam waved his hand in front of her face. “Are you still with me?” That wicked, expressive mouth curved. She warmed to the crinkles in the corners of his eyes.
It would be a relief to share, after so many years hiding it away as if it never happened. Even as her fingers tapped the side of her pint glass, as she inhaled in preparation of laying her life bare to a virtual stranger, she wondered, why take the risk when there was no future for them? What if he misused the information?
What if he didn’t and it brought them closer?
Jasmine swallowed and looked at him steadily. “My mother died when I was fourteen, after spending ten years in a psychiatric institution. She—she never got over the fact that she was driving when my brother was killed in a car accident, not long after I was born.”
Adam had been holding
his pint to his mouth. Now he set it down slowly, his eyes focusing intently on her face, and put his elbows on the table. She imagined this was what he looked like when chasing a financial deal.
Or a woman…She looked away.
“They said she was suffering from post-natal depression after having me.” Jasmine shrugged, her eyes flitting in an ordered way to each object on the wall behind his head, from the stag’s head to the rusty old scythe to an ancient photo of Pembleton, which she must remember to have a closer look at. “Anyway, she bore it for a few years but when I was three years old, while my father was away on business, she took me on the ferry to Paris and left me there.”
Adam exhaled carefully. “Left you where, exactly?”
“On the Montmartre carousel, actually.” Jasmine smiled ruefully. “Going around in circles.”
Thankfully, she’d been too young to remember. It hadn’t dimmed her love of the horses on the estate, and she had only nice thoughts of France the couple of times she’d visited. “She came home without me. Father came back to Britain two days later and saw the news, saw me—” she cleared her throat “—on the news, and called the police.”
Being only three, the media frenzy had gone over her head, but it must have been terrible for her parents. Every European country published pictures of the “poor abandoned soul” and in Britain, her parents—especially her mother—were vilified as monsters. Her father kept the details from her over the years but Jasmine picked up a fair amount from the playground at school. Her mother struggled on for another year after “the incident,” heavily medicated and supervised, but continued to deteriorate. Another furor in the papers erupted when she was finally committed to the psychiatric facility, and again when she died and Sir Nigel married Gill a few years later. Every time the Cooper family name came up, the whole sad story was rehashed, most spectacularly of all when her engagement to Vincent failed. “That was when I realized that I couldn’t escape my past and moved to New Zealand,” she finished matter-of-factly.