by Liz Fielding
‘Since she was a little girl and you bought her a toy rabbit. I know; she told me.’ He looked up then. ‘She’s all grown up now. And she’s got me to look after her.’
From the far side of the beach Nyssa watched Matt and Gil as they stood by the barbecue. They were pretty much of a height, but Matt was leaner, darker. They looked so serious. Gil was undoubtedly grilling him about the meeting at Delvering and she wondered, anxiously, what Matt would say; she should have warned him not to tell anyone what had really happened.
Matt saw her looking, caught the question in her eyes and with the smallest shake of his head reassured her.
‘Where did you find him?’ Kitty asked, grinning as she followed her gaze.
‘I didn’t. He found me.’
‘Lucky you. He’s absolutely gorgeous. I can see why you can’t take your eyes off him.’
‘Gorgeous, but dangerous,’ her mother warned, watching the two men through narrowed eyes. ‘You’ll never know what he’s thinking until it’s too late to do anything about it.’
Nyssa had the uneasy feeling that Sophia was right, but, aware that Matt was watching her, she made a drinking motion with her hand behind the women’s backs. ‘You’re dead wrong. I can read his mind. Any minute now he’s going to come over here and ask if we want a drink.’ Right on cue, Matt handed the cooking fork to Gil and, extracting some cans of soda from the coldbox, headed in their direction.
‘You look hot, ladies.’ He handed around the drinks and ripped the tab from his own can, lifting an eyebrow in gentle query as he passed one to her. ‘Why don’t you take a rest while we make some sandcastles? What d’you say, Harry?’
‘I don’t know about Harry, but I think you’re a hero,’ Kitty said.
‘Not me. There’s too much competition around here. I just like making sandcastles. Nyssa? You want to give me a hand? You’ve had a lot more experience of entrenchment than me.’
‘Very funny,’ she said, but nevertheless picked up a small spade and began to fill a bucket. Kitty and her mother drifted away to settle in deckchairs. ‘Sophia thinks you’re dangerous,’ Nyssa said, after a while.
‘Oh? Did she say why?’
‘Only that I’d never know what you’re thinking until it was too late.’
‘Too late for what?’ he demanded.
Nyssa pushed back her bright fringe with her arm, leaving a smear of damp sand across her forehead. ‘I don’t know, but with that build-up, I’m relying on you not to disappoint me.’
‘I’ll try not to. But I’m leaving for London right after we’ve eaten. Are you coming with me or staying here?’
‘There are other alternatives.’
‘No, Nyssa, there aren’t. Not if you were serious about wanting me to watch your back. Not until we find out who was behind the incident at Delvering.’
‘I have to be in Delvering tomorrow for a planning meeting. I’ll follow you…’
‘I’d rather you came with me. Too many people know your car.’
He’d expected an argument, but she just nodded. ‘I’m going to stay there overnight. I need to get inside the cinema somehow.’ She waited for him to ask what ‘somehow’ meant. He didn’t bother. ‘Does that fit in with your plans?’
‘From now on your plans are my plans. Besides, I’d like to see what all the fuss is about.’
‘It’s boarded up,’ she warned him. ‘There’s a security guard.’
‘Are you telling me that’s a problem?’
‘Er, no,’ she said. Then grinned. ‘Oh, here come the rest of the family, now everything is finished. Lazy lot.’ But she was laughing as she said it.
‘You’ve missed one.’
‘Thanks, Matt.’ Nyssa’s mother looked up from the shoreline and took the shell he handed her and dropped it in the little plastic bucket she was carrying. He fell in beside her. ‘Harry wants shells to decorate the sandcastles but there don’t seem to be many. Have you had a good day?’
‘A good weekend, thanks. We’ll be leaving soon, though.’
Sophia stopped, looked at him. ‘You’ll look after her, won’t you, Matt?’
‘With my last breath,’ he promised. ‘But in the meantime there’s something you can do for her.’ And as they walked slowly along the edge of the sea, the water lapping around their feet, Matt told Sophia exactly who he was, what he was doing in Delvering. What had happened.
‘I don’t understand. Why didn’t Nyssa tell me about the kidnapping? Gil…’
‘She doesn’t want Gil involved. She doesn’t want you to worry.’
Sophia smiled. ‘Are you sure? That doesn’t sound much like my daughter.’
‘She doesn’t want you to worry you about this because it’s serious. I have no choice.’ And then he told her about the information he’d uncovered. And what Parker would do with it when he found out.
‘But Nyssa doesn’t know her father invested in those shares in that construction company.’
‘That won’t matter to the press, Sophia, and there isn’t much time. Parker is going to get impatient very quickly. And then he’ll get someone else to do his dirty work for him. You’re the one in control of the money—’
‘Is there anything you didn’t find out?’ He stopped and Sophia took his hand. ‘I’m sorry, go on.’
‘I hoped you’d be in a position to have the shares sold. And quickly.’
‘I’ll see to it first thing.’ She carried on walking. ‘I’m glad you told me. I knew who you were, of course. Someone at the party recognised you, had a word with James.’
There had been at least a dozen people at the party he’d recognised, had once been on at least nodding acquaintance with. None of them had felt inclined to acknowledge the fact.
‘So why wasn’t I thrown out on my ear?’
‘Because you’re Nyssa’s friend and she’s entitled to make her own mistakes.’ Then she stopped and turned to face him. ‘Not that I believe you’re a mistake. As James said, you can tell an awful lot about a man from the enemies he makes.’
CHAPTER SEVEN
‘YOU were getting very pally, shell-collecting with my mother,’ Nyssa said as he drove towards London. ‘What were you talking about?’
‘She worries about you.’ He glanced at her and, hoping to divert her, he said, ‘I imagine that’s the intention?’
‘That’s a rotten thing to say.’ But evidently near enough the truth for her to turn away, open the glove compartment and fish out the open packet of biscuits. ‘Rotten, but true.’
She offered him one, but he shook his head. ‘They’re supposed to be for emergencies.’
‘This is an emergency. I’m baring my soul here, and for that I need chocolate.’ She bit into one. ‘Ugh, these are soft.’
‘If it was an emergency you wouldn’t care.’
She pulled a face and ate it, like a little girl scolded for wasting food, but he wasn’t fooled for a moment. She was playing for time, trying to decide what to tell him and what she could leave out. Deciding what bits of her soul she preferred to keep from him. He didn’t hurry her, keeping his gaze fixed firmly on he road.
‘When my mother married James I was angry, really angry.’ He didn’t need to ask why; he could guess. ‘I idolised my father. He was a hero. He was decorated.’ She turned to see what effect this revelation had upon him. ‘Posthumously,’ she declared.
‘I know.’
‘Of course you do. You’re a journalist and you’ve done all the background research.’ Not him, but someone had. And they’d been very thorough. ‘I went to the palace with my mother to get his medal.’
‘I saw the picture,’ he murmured, recalling the pale-faced teenager staring into the camera as her mother paused politely for a photographer. She didn’t appear to hear him.
‘I mean, how dared she marry someone else?’
‘Maybe she was lonely?’ Matt suggested. Nyssa blinked, concentrated on licking the chocolate off her fingers. ‘There should be some tissues…’
>
She found them, wiped her fingers, lifted her shoulders in an awkward little shrug. ‘I suppose she was. What do children know about how adults hurt? They’re big and strong and shouldn’t ever need anyone.’
‘Nyssa—’
‘It gave me the biggest buzz ever to get arrested for causing a breach of the peace at a demonstration while they were on honeymoon. The most inordinate pleasure that they had to interrupt their idyll to bail me out.’
‘They should have left you to stew.’
She glanced across at him. ‘Is that what you’d have done? ‘
‘Let’s hope we never have to find out.’
‘No. Well. That was years ago—it’s not like that now. Not any more.’
He thought perhaps it was just a little bit like that still, but he didn’t want her angry at him so he said, ‘Well, I can see that you’re all grown up now. Family lunches, cricket on the beach, very civilised, very sweet.’ She said something very rude, but not with any serious intent, and he laughed, as he suspected he was meant to. ‘Perhaps not that grown up.’
‘I’m working on it. Really.’ And she gave him a look that fanned the embers of a fire he was doing his level best to keep damped down. It would be so easy to let nature take its course. Do what she wanted. Too easy. He’d never been able to settle for second best. He wanted her heart as well as her body. Given freely, with love.
When he held her in his arms and made a woman of her he wanted her to be thinking only of him. No ghosts. No regrets. Total commitment.
Nothing less would do.
Matt stooped to pick up the package lying on his doormat and pushed it into his pocket. It would keep. He preferred to watch Nyssa as she walked around the living room of his small rented flat, her fingertips brushing over the furniture as if reading the ambience of the place from the worn fibres of the sofa, the scarred surface of a table.
Her hair slid from her neck as she bent to turn on a lamp. Immediately the place seemed brighter, warmer. Or maybe that was just the glow imparted by her very presence. She was like a perfect piece of porcelain. Delicate, fragile, lovely, so vulnerable that he was afraid she might break.
It was an illusion, he knew, and yet he ached to reach out to her, protect her, cradle her in his arms and blot out the hideous flat. Blot out the world.
Or maybe he was fooling himself. Maybe he was the one in need of comfort, his ache simply self-pity for all that he had lost, like his huge loft apartment overlooking the river, with its acres of polished wood floor, fine rugs, pictures. It would have made a proper setting for such an extraordinary woman.
For the first time in as long as he could remember he found himself wanting to tell someone what had happened to his life. To say… What you’re seeing here, this isn’t me. I’m someone else entirely. But he held his tongue. He’d done what he had to do and paid for it, was still paying, but it had been his choice. No excuses.
She turned, lifted her hand to her hair, sliding her fingers through it as she pushed it back from her face. He knew the silky feel of it against his hand, his face. He knew the scent of her skin, the taste of her mouth, warm and salty from the damp sea air. He knew how her arms felt about his neck and the press of her body against his in the crush of the dance floor. He would never forget any of it.
She continued her exploration, opening the bedroom door, smiling back at him in a way that lit the place up. Lit him up.
‘Only one bed?’ she asked.
The ache deepened, intensified, altered, so it was something else entirely. ‘That’s usually enough,’ he managed, through a throat thick with desire. ‘I’ll take the sofa. Again.’
‘I’ll toss you for it?’ she offered, neatly dealing with any lingering regrets he might be having about turning her down. In the Delvering Arms. And on the beach. When they’d finally left the party to those who had nothing better to do than stay up all night, she’d pointed him in the direction of the sofa in her small top-floor flat, and closed the bedroom door without lingering to see if he’d had a change of heart. Well, no girl was going to offer a man more than two chances. Not unless he was on his knees, begging.
‘You’ll be sorry if you lose,’ he said.
‘No, I won’t. You’re a gentleman; you’d insist I have the bed anyway.’
‘Not that much of a gentleman.’ His shrug was a calculated masterpiece of understatement. ‘I’d offer to share, though.’
‘Have a care, Crosby. I might not refuse and then what would you do?’ she teased.
Suffer. But there was absolutely no way she was going to lose, he promised himself as he extracted a coin from his pocket. He tossed it in the air and clamped it against the back of his hand.
‘Your call,’ he said.
‘Heads.’
He raised his hand slightly to check the coin. ‘It must be your lucky day.’
‘Show me.’
‘What is this?’ he demanded. ‘You don’t trust me?’ He kept his hand over the coin and glanced up at her. ‘You’re only supposed to complain if you lose.’
‘Injured innocence doesn’t suit you, Matt,’ she said.
‘No? It’s only got one head, I promise you.’ He tossed the coin again, caught it and flipped it to her. ‘See for yourself.’ Whether it had landed face up was for him to know and her to live with, whether she believed him or not. And if she offered to share with him he’d say no. Right? ‘The bathroom’s through there. Coffee?’ he offered, turning away, needing to put some space between the bed, himself and her before the tempting juxtaposition gave him some seriously reckless ideas.
‘I’d rather have tea.’ She followed him into the cramped kitchen, watched as he opened a battered tea caddy. There were half a dozen leaves in the bottom. ‘Is that a problem?’
The problem was that she was standing way too close, her arm pressed against his as she leaned over to peer in the empty caddy. ‘I don’t get many visitors, but, no, it’s not a problem. There’s a place on the corner that never seems to close,’ he said, retreating from the intimacy, pulling on his jacket. ‘I won’t be long. Is there anything else I should get? For breakfast?’ he added quickly, before she thought he was suggesting something else entirely.
‘Bread.’ She opened his fridge, took out a carton of milk and sniffed at it gingerly. She pulled a face and put it on the draining board. ‘Milk, butter, eggs. What were you planning for supper?’ she asked, turning to him.
‘Pizza? It has all the major food groups,’ he said, when she looked doubtful. ‘And the advantage of requiring no more effort than a phone call.’
‘That’s no fun.’
‘It makes me happy.’
‘Oh, come on…’ She glanced around. ‘I mean, we’ve got to do something to fill the time, and since you don’t appear to have a television—’ he’d never felt the need before ‘—how are we going to entertain ourselves?’
‘You could tell me how you got involved in the campaign to save the Gaumont.’
She pulled a face. ‘As if you’re interested.’ Then, ‘You could tell me your life story?’ she countered hopefully.
‘I just remembered that I love to cook.’
She gave him a disbelieving look. ‘And here was me thinking that the yearning to bake came ready packaged only with the female chromosomes. You learn something new every day.’ She gave his cupboards a cursory glance, found some pasta that was past its sell-by date and dropped it in the bin, making her point before dusting off her hands. ‘Of course you could be lying. I think I’d better come shopping with you.’
‘I’d prefer you to stay here. You might be recognised.’ Might was understating the situation. Nyssa Blake was a woman once seen, never forgotten.
‘You’re not suggesting my would-be kidnappers will be staking out your corner shop on the off-chance I’ll stop by for a packet of tea?’ She didn’t come right out and say she thought he was crazy, but the inflection of the voice, her expression, implied it. ‘How would they know who you are?’
Okay, it was unlikely they’d be waiting at the corner of the street. But then the whole thing seemed unlikely. If he’d hadn’t been at Delvering, been in the thick of it, he’d have been very sceptical about the whole incident. Maybe he was a cynic, but he’d have assumed it was all just an elaborate publicity stunt, stacking the odds on front-page coverage for what, in the global scheme of things, was a very minor cause.
That was still a possibility, Matt reminded himself. Cynically. Then, recalling the way Nyssa had lashed out at him while she believed him to be one of the kidnappers, the way she had dissolved in his arms as reality had hit home, he pushed the thought away. He didn’t want that to have been an act.
If it had been, why would she be with him, in his flat?
‘Trust me,’ he said. ‘If you make a personal appearance it’ll be around the neighbourhood in half an hour flat. Then the press will find out where you are. And then everyone will know.’
‘I can’t imagine “everyone” will be that interested.’
‘Not everyone. But someone will be.’
She tried to outstare him, but failed. ‘You’re forgetting that I’m a master of disguise,’ she said, as her gaze faltered.
‘Just make a list, Nyssa. And if you want to do something useful—’ This was a memo to himself, as much as to her. It was time to put all thought of her naked in his arms on hold and get on with the job of keeping her safe. ‘If you want to do something really useful, get in touch with Sky—you’ve got your laptop with you. She made a note of everyone arriving at the Assembly Rooms the other night and I’d like a look at that list.’
She shrugged. ‘Okay, I’ll have her e-mail it to me. Or maybe she could bring it over and we could all—’
‘No. I’d prefer to keep this address just between the two of us.’ She lifted her brows at his sharp tone. ‘It’s comforting to have a bolthole. Somewhere no one knows about.’ Before she could object, he dug around in his jacket pocket and produced two cellphones. One his own, the other the one he’d bought with the spare change from Parker’s money. That was the one he gave her. ‘Use this. It’s new and the number can’t be traced back to either of us.’