Secret Intentions

by Caitlyn Nicholas

“Yes, with de Villiers. Dad and I don’t approve, Zani, we don’t approve at all.” Paul’s expression had frozen. She could see him struggle to keep up the genial brotherly-best-friend facade.

  “It is none of your business,” she said bluntly.

  “Now that’s where you’re wrong. Dad and I are not going to stand by and let you throw yourself away on a nobody. He’s French, for God’s sake.”

  “A nobody?”

  “He doesn’t even have a title.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous. Do you mean to say I’d be better off with Sebastian, simply because he’s a count?”

  “We haven’t had a countess in the family for four generations.”

  “I can’t believe we’re having this conversation.”

  “Neither can I. I don’t believe you’d be so disloyal.”

  “Disloyal? And yet you want to sell Everwood, where the Bests have lived for the last two hundred years. Just for a quick cash injection.”

  “I said before, you just don’t understand. I need to be going, I have to go and see Dad.” He left his steaming mug on the table. Zani shrugged inwardly and got up to walk him to the door. If he wanted to run away, let him.

  “Look, tell Dad that Corbin and I are not an item. Seriously,” she said at the door. She couldn’t have her father believing the sleazy newspaper article.

  Paul turned to her. A calculating look crossed his face and he smiled. Best friends again.

  “I need a partner for Saturday night at the Black and Gold ball. Would you mind? Dad’ll be there as well.”

  “Of course, I’d be delighted,” she replied. It’d be churlish to refuse and she knew without doubt that her Saturday night was free.

  Fang, unused to a visit from Paul that didn’t include raised voices and slammed doors, looked at her mistress in bewilderment. “Tread carefully,” her expression seemed to say.

  Corbin folded the newspaper carefully and added it to the pile on the floor by his desk. It was not his day for newspapers.

  That morning he’d opened his letterbox to find a copy of the local rag, the Chichester Daily. He read it over breakfast. It always amused him. The shenanigans of the local council, the outrage over graffiti artists decorating the local library, the breathless reports of school plays and the victories and defeats of local sports teams.

  He hadn’t, for obvious reasons, expected to read Zani’s name in an article about local business women. He read it almost disinterestedly, noting her last name. Paul Best’s sister.

  Zani’s identity didn’t come as a surprise. Karl had called him early Monday to tell him all about Lady Best. Corbin, who’d expected her to be some sort of journalist, had experienced something of a shock. It’d taken over an hour on the treadmill in the gym for him to calm down, to burn away the anger, disappointment and faint sense of humiliation. But now he was calm. Completely so.

  The two newspaper articles merely strengthened his resolve against her. She may disturb his dreams, when he could sleep. The moment his head touched the pillow thoughts of her soft lips and those endless legs wrapped around him haunted him to distraction. But after his experiences with Pixie, there was no way he was going to get entangled with another deceitful female. Then he thought about being entangled with Zani, and another bad mood descended upon him.

  The all-knowing Karl had also tipped him off about the article in the tabloid newspaper. He’d sent his PA out to buy a copy. It was with a brief stomach-clenching shock that he’d opened it and seen a very bad photograph of the woman who’d been haunting him.

  What got to him the most was not that he’d landed in the gossip columns, but that someone in that restaurant knew her identity whilst he hadn’t a clue. Then he thought of Sarah and Roger Holmwood. Everyone at that place seemed to have known who she was, except for him. It stung.

  Zani’s drive to London to meet Vladimir Klebnikoff was long and stressful. The brief respite in the weather that followed the gale was over. A heavy mist punctuated by sleet covered the countryside. London itself was a nightmare. A new one-way system to account for the inner London toll way had been put in place since her last visit. She got hopelessly lost and arrived flustered and fifteen minutes late.

  “Zani, Lady Best. If only I’d know I’d be working with a peer.” Klebnikoff greeted her, unctuous and oozing charm like slime. Zani barely restrained herself from rolling her eyes in exasperation. He bowed and, for a terrible moment, she thought he was going to kiss her hand. She kept it firmly by her side, nails biting into her palm.

  “You’ve seen the paper, then? I don’t usually tell people. It gets in the way most of the time. I’m sorry I’m late…”

  “No problem, my dear. I’m just glad you made it. Tell me, have you ever had tea made the Russian way? I know this charming tea house down on Regent Street, if you’d care to join me?”

  A little flummoxed, Zani nevertheless agreed. She had little choice.

  The tea house was, as advertised, charming. Done up in carved wood, painted in bright colours, it smelt strongly of tea and had that faintly expectant air that empty restaurants always have. The owners clearly held Klebnikoff in high regard. They spoke quickly in what Zani assumed to be Russian, but she knew bowing and scraping when she saw it.

  Klebnikoff selected a table and ushered Zani into a chair.

  “Careful, it’s hot.” He gestured to the samovar that sat on the table. It looked like an over-decorated hot water urn. The owner appeared and put another tea pot on the table as well as a selection of pastries, the sight of which made Zani’s eyes light up. Some women go weak at the knees over flowers, jewelry, or fur coats, but for Zani it’d always been pastries and cream cakes.

  Klebnikoff began to talk. “I suspect like most English you don’t have a clue about tea.” He twinkled avuncularly at her. “There are three simple rules about tea. The first, and most important is that tea is only ever made of tea. Yes?”

  “Yes,” replied Zani, a little confused and still coming to terms with the tea-ignorance of the English.

  “No!”

  “Oh.”

  “You see, hot water and tea leaves don’t always make good tea. Take America. Making bad tea seems to be a matter of patriotism since that famous incident in Boston.”

  “Ah,” said Zani, wondering if the moment had arrived to produce her boat designs. But Klebnikoff swept along.

  “Secondly, you must forget all about those little paper bags that you English so adore. I have it on good authority that they are filled with the dust swept from the floor at tea factories. My mother always called it ‘the postman’s tea’, because it comes in envelopes.”

  Zani instantly resolved to banish all tea bags.

  “Now. The third and most important rule. Never stew the tea leaves. The first contact of the tea leaves with water should happen right after it is boiled. If you stew the tea leaves, you will obtain a liquid fit for leather tanning, but certainly not drinking.”

  “I see,” said Zani, but she needn’t have. Klebnikoff didn’t pause for breath.

  “So. If you follow these rules, you make tea.” He gave her a piercing look to make sure she kept up.

  He picked up the teapot the tea house owner had put on the table. “This is the zavarka or tea concentrate, and is what makes Russian tea Russian. We take this…” He waved the pot and then poured a little into the cup that sat in front of Zani. “Then we water it down with kipyatok, or hot, boiled water.” With a flourish, he picked up the cup and filled it to the brim from the samovar.

  “Lemon?” He dropped a slice into the cup.

  And so he continued, talking on and on about tea. Its history, its economic impacts on various countries, things Zani had never imagined about tea. Boats, or designs for boats, didn’t even enter the conversation. If it could’ve been described as a conversation. Perhaps monologue would have been more appropriate. All of Zani’s carefully thought out reasons for not bringing a signed copy of the contract with her were for naught. The nights she’d
spent slaving over the preliminary boat sketches were in vain.

  Two hours later, completely bamboozled, Zani bid Klebnikoff farewell in the street outside the tea house. Stunned, she reeled to her car and drove back to Apuldram wondering what the hell the man had been on about.

  The house was quiet when she opened the door, but instantly her senses were on alert. Something didn’t feel quite right. She’d picked up Fang on her way past Karen’s and instead of making her usual beeline for her food bowl, the little dog stopped dead at Zani’s feet and began to growl.

  “Shush, Fang,” said Zani. “Is anyone there?” she called. Her voice sounded thin and wavery, and she immediately felt stupid. The house was silent; there was nobody there.

  “There’s nobody here, Fang,” she said. The dog gave her a disbelieving look, but then seemed to relax a little and sniffed about. Leaving the front door ajar behind her, Zani checked. Bathrooms, bedroom, sitting room, behind every door. The house was as neat and cozy as when she’d left it that morning. Blaming her exhausted and overactive imagination for the feeling that things weren’t quite as she’d left them, she found a Lean Cuisine in the freezer and read through the television guide as it defrosted in the microwave.

  The following Saturday night Zani lifted the full skirt of her gold ball gown and trod carefully up the stairs of a beautiful, stately home. Paul waited for her just inside the entrance hall. “Zani, darling, you look spectacular.” She barely acknowledged the compliment, still having serious difficulty reconciling herself to the new, friendly Paul. A niggling feeling told her it wasn’t going to last.

  “Dad around?”

  “In there somewhere.” He gestured impatiently to the huge room before them, crowded with the beautiful people. “Went in search of cronies with cards and cigars.”

  “I’ll go and find him.” She made to dive into the crowds.

  “Zani, I wouldn’t.” Paul stopped her, grabbing her upper arm just hard enough that it hurt. He hadn’t done that since they were children, when he used to be able to grip just tight enough so as not to bruise, but to hurt. She barely resisted the urge to wrench herself free. Only the knowledge that eyes were watching prevented her. She didn’t want to create a scene.

  “Why ever not?” She stayed still and Paul relaxed his grip.

  “We heard this afternoon, the newspapers have found out about the Sunberri game. It’s going to wreak merry hell with the company share price come Monday. He’s going to lose a lot of money and right now he’s looking for someone, anyone, to take it out on.”

  “Well, it’s hardly my fault.”

  “Isn’t it?”

  She wasn’t surprised to see a glimpse of the usual Paul, and felt the twist of guilt that the comment had meant to produce. “Anyway, I’d have thought you’d be more upset. After all, didn’t he invest on your say so?”

  Paul looked away uncomfortably and didn’t answer the question.

  “Oh, Paul,” she said quietly, a suspicion settling like lead in the pit of her stomach. “What have you done?”

  “Nothing he didn’t deserve. Anyway it’s all going to be mine one day. Why shouldn’t he use it to help me out? It’s not as if it’s my fault. Oh look, there’s Priscilla Cavendish-Whapshott…” He disappeared into the crowd without a backward glance. Zani dithered for a moment. Should she continue after Paul or go in search of her father?

  She scanned the crowd with a deep sense of foreboding.

  “Good evening.” A voice sounded softly in her ear, and Zani grimaced, instantly recognising the oily rounded tones of Count Sebastian of Ledenfeld.

  “Sebastian.” She turned without enthusiasm.

  “Oh, come now, kitten, not happy to see me?” He huffed alcoholic fumes over her.

  “Sebastian, you’re drunk, go and sober up somewhere.” Suddenly she couldn’t bear to be in his presence. Nauseating memories of his hands sliding intrusively up her leg on their last date crowded her mind, and she felt physically sick.

  “Good grief, my little cat has claws.” He leered at her then leant forward and whispered in her ear. “Been doing it with Frenchmen? I’m surprised. I always thought you were a frigid mouse.”

  Horrified, she wanted only to get away from him. Rigid with disgust she slipped into the circulating crowds. He didn’t follow.

  Glancing behind to check that he’d tottered off somewhere else, she ran smack into a broad chest. “Ouf,” it said with a distinct French accent. Overbalancing, she trod heavily on a toe. She knew that voice. Not sure whether to be entertained or mortified, Zani slowly raised her head and looked into the unamused blue eyes of Corbin de Villiers.

  He looked fantastic. Unlike some overly adventurous fellows, Sebastian included, Corbin had not elected to wear a gold suit. Instead he looked disgustingly handsome dressed entirely in black. It made his crystal blue eyes even more forbidding.

  “It’s good to see you,” she said, stepping back but placing a hand on his arm. “I didn’t know you’d be here, but I’m glad. We need to talk. I want to explain…” She searched his face for any hint of softness.

  He carefully removed her hand from his arm.

  “I can assure you that the feeling is not mutual.”

  Zani blinked and stepped back, almost as if he’d slapped her. He looked so remote, sneering down at her.

  “But…” she said, thinking wildly that he couldn’t treat her like this. Not after their night at Everwood. But then she realised that of course he could, and if he’d seen the tabloid newspaper, then he’d every reason to be furious with her.

  “I know everything, Zani, who you are, who your brother is, what you were doing at Sunberri. I saw the paper.”

  “But Corbin…” she interrupted, sure that if he just gave her a chance she’d be able to explain herself. She hadn’t meant to deceive him, she’d done it all for the right reasons. For her father. But he wasn’t prepared to listen.

  “It is clear that you and your brother are somehow involved in selling the Sunberri game. When I find out what you’ve done, I will not hesitate to prosecute you to the full extent of the law. So I think it’s best if we don’t speak to each other. Ever again.”

  He wouldn’t meet her eyes, instead staring in the vague region of her left shoulder. There was no gentleness in him. His derisive stare flicked away from her, and he smiled warmly at someone over her shoulder, as if she didn’t even exist. Zani turned to see a lovely willowy blonde wearing the most stunning black dress. Tall and tanned she made Zani, in her beautiful gold gown, feel small and frumpy.

  “Shelly.” The word sounded like a caress. He held an arm out to the blonde, and together they departed without a backward glance, turning heads as they went.

  Suddenly the crowd became too much for Zani. The roar and the heat were overwhelming. Each way she turned strangers pressed in on her, laughing and shrieking over the noise of people and music. She needed quiet, time to recoup, to think. Her head ached and she wished she’d never accepted Paul’s invitation. She was sure now he’d only invited her because Corbin would be there.

  “Zani.” Sebastian loomed beside her grabbing her hand.

  “Leave me alone.” She wrenched herself free, and as fast as she could pushed her way through the crowd. She saw a waiter with an empty tray duck through heavy drapes. Hoping to find a few moments peace, she followed, finding herself in a narrow corridor.

  The drapes fell shut behind her, abruptly cutting off the sound of the ball. Zani could hear the distant clatter of the kitchen in full swing, but that was all. Sighing in relief, she moved over to the lead-lined windows that ran along one side of the corridor, rested her head against the cool panes and stared blindly out onto a small graveled courtyard below. The sound of the kitchen got louder for a moment and two waiters hurried past, expertly balancing trays of drinks on one hand. They didn’t notice her.

  The hits were coming thick and fast. Paul, unsurprisingly, had reverted to type. Sebastian was just plain disgusting. The fact that she
’d ever had anything to do with him was bad enough. But that she’d even considered marrying him made her hate herself with more than her usual vehemence. Then there was Corbin. Just thinking of him brought an ache in the pit of her stomach, as if he’d hit her there.

  Startled, she glanced up when the curtain covering the end of the corridor was wrenched open. Against the glare from the ballroom Zani saw the outline of two men.

  “Here she is,” said Sebastian to a portly man. There was a menacing note to his tone that had her reassuring herself it was a busy corridor and no doubt a staff member would be along at any moment.

  “Look, Sebastian. Please. I’m sorry, but leave me alone.”

  “Oh, I will,” he said ominously, and grabbed her in an unwanted embrace. She clamped her mouth shut as his lips descended on hers, and shrieked as loudly as she could, stiffening in outrage as Sebastian’s hand slid across her chest. Several flashes went off, and abruptly Zani was released. She all but fell against the window, grasping the sill to balance herself.

  “Got them?” Sebastian asked the stout man.

  “Perfect,” he said, waving a large camera then ducking out of the corridor and disappearing into the glittering crowd beyond.

  “What the fuck was that about?” spat Zani, scrubbing her mouth with the back of her hand. “Why can’t you just leave me alone, you loathsome toad?”

  “Don’t worry, kitten. I’ll leave you alone all right,” replied Sebastian. “But I just wanted to let you know that nobody humiliates Count Sebastian of Ledenfeld. I’m going to sell these to the tabloids and everyone will think we’ve all had you.” He stormed from the corridor, leaving Zani feeling weak, vulnerable and violated.

  Could the evening get any worse? Self-pity overwhelmed her, and tears burnt at the back of her throat. How could this have happened? And why to her? Just a couple of weeks ago her life pottered along, calm, uneventful and happy. Well, she conceded, pottered along unhappily. But now slime-buckets were ambushing her in corridors with the paparazzi.

  Determined to leave, she emerged from the corridor into the dazzling crowd. Her head began to throb and she fruitlessly looked for Paul. For all his failings, family honour would have him finding Sebastian and stopping the paparazzi. Sebastian’s father would have a fit if he found out.