Her anger left her as suddenly as it had arrived, and she looked at him frowningly. ‘What on earth are you talking about?’
‘This house, and all the money you’ve made from your paintings——’
‘Adam, you aren’t making sense,’ she cut in nervously.
‘I found it necessary to go and see Lester. I had a few things I needed to talk to him about,’ he added grimly, his eyes narrowed. ‘He’s downstairs now, with your grandmother and Marina; I think we should go and join them.’
‘Paul and Marina are here?’ she repeated dazedly—but she didn’t fight it when Adam took hold of her arm and guided her down the stairs.
Her grandmother looked puzzled as she sat in one of the armchairs in the sitting-room, Marina stood tensely in front of one of the long windows that looked out over the garden—and whatever Adam had needed to discuss with Paul earlier it hadn’t been of a verbal nature; if Adam’s chin was still slightly discoloured from the other man’s blow, then Paul himself was now sporting a cut lip and bruised cheek!
He glared at the other man, his expression sullen and uncooperative.
‘Paul——’
‘Don’t waste your sympathy on him,’ Adam rasped harshly. ‘In the circumstances, he got let off lightly.’
‘You surely didn’t do this because you’re in love with Eve?’ Her grandmother frowned disbelievingly. ‘I may be getting old, Eve,’ she said impatiently as Eve turned to her in surprise, ‘but there’s nothing wrong with my eyesight!’
No, she acknowledged ruefully, her grandmother had known all the time of Adam’s feelings for her, despite pretending she didn’t. Just as she now knew of Eve’s feelings for him, she realised with affectionate incredulity.
She had always thought her grandmother the wisest woman she had ever known, and once again she had proved it was so.
‘The fact that I love Eve is all wrapped up in my actions of today, Evelyn,’ Adam assured the older woman, turning with contempt towards Paul. ‘This—this low-life——’
‘Adam!’ Eve gasped protestingly.
‘He’s being polite, in the circumstances,’ Marina assured her hardily.
‘What circumstances?’ she said exasperatedly.
‘I have a feeling Adam is about to tell us that, darling, if you will only let him,’ her grandmother gently rebuked.
‘Thanks, Evelyn.’ Adam nodded, still looking grim. ‘But I’m not about to do any explaining, Lester is.’ He looked at the other man with dangerously narrowed eyes.
Paul shot him a resentful glare. ‘The only person I have to talk to is Eve——’
‘And her family,’ Adam bit out tautly. ‘They’re involved too.’
‘I don’t accept that,’ Paul told him condescendingly.
‘Accept it,’ rasped Adam abruptly, his stance one of aggression.
Paul gave a shaky sigh. ‘Eve made me her business adviser with power of attorney.’
‘Adviser is the relevant word in that statement,’ the other man cut in harshly.
The bruise on Paul’s cheek stood out lividly against his pallor. ‘Eve is not business-minded——’
‘And you think you are?’ Adam derided scornfully.
Eve’s feelings of nervousness had turned to panic as the conversation developed; there was a sick feeling in the pit of her stomach, and she was dreading, but already able to guess, what was coming next.
Paul’s head was back challengingly. ‘I have merely invested Eve’s money for her.’
‘In one get-rich-quick scheme after another—and they have all failed,’ Adam cut in grimly. ‘Would you like to tell Eve how much of her fortune she has left?’
Eve sat down on the chair behind her, her legs suddenly too weak to support her, her eyes like huge turquoise in her pale face as she stared up at a Paul who was beginning to seem like a stranger to her.
His mouth tightened. ‘This latest venture I’m entering into with Dudley Graves should recoup——’
‘It should, but it won’t,’ Adam bit out. ‘You’re a loser at business, Lester, can’t you see that? You may want to be a big financier, but you don’t have what it takes. And you don’t have any of Eve’s hard-earned cash left, either!’
She swallowed hard. ‘None of it?’
‘Eve, I’ve been investing for our future,’ Paul turned to her pleadingly.
‘None of it?’ she repeated dully.
‘A few thousand, that will be enough to recoup——’
‘I thought you loved me,’ she spoke over him as if she didn’t hear him. ‘I thought you were marrying me because you loved me——’
‘Of course I am,’ he told her dismissively, coming down on his haunches in front of her. ‘Those losses are only a temporary setback, Eve,’ he tried to take her hands in his, but she pulled back sharply. ‘Dudley assures me that——’
‘I don’t care what Dudley assures you,’ her voice rose shrilly, ‘you had no right to use my money. No right!’
He straightened indignantly. ‘As your lawyer, the man you were going to marry——’
‘You should have taken her instructions, not used her money where you pleased without even discussing it with her,’ Adam rasped.
Light blue eyes narrowed on him furiously. ‘I’ve done nothing wrong.’
‘Legally, no,’ Eve’s grandmother conceded harshly as she stood up to come to Eve’s side, Eve still too numbed to respond, ‘but morally you have done everything that is wrong.’
‘Evelyn, you don’t understand …’
‘Don’t talk to me as if I’m senile,’ she snapped, the termagant of Eve’s childhood back in full force. ‘I understand perfectly. You’re no better than a lying swindler; you took advantage of your privileged position as the family lawyer and Eve’s affection for you. I never was completely sure of you when you took over from your father two years ago,’ she murmured hardily. ‘I never thought you were the man he was.’
‘He was old-fashioned——’
‘He was a gentleman!’ Eve’s grandmother stormed. ‘A man to be trusted. Something you obviously are not. I don’t believe there’s any need, but I intend doing it anyway, to inform you that in future I will be taking my legal matters to a more trustworthy lawyer. And I believe you might find a few of your other clients doing the same when they hear how you conduct your affairs.’ Her hand still rested comfortingly on Eve’s shoulder, some of her strength passing down into her.
Paul looked furious at the statement. ‘I’ll have you in court on a libel charge.’
‘For telling the truth?’ she scorned, shaking her head. ‘Whichever way a case like that went, your reputation would never recover.’
‘Eve——’
‘Don’t touch me!’ she warned stiffly, feeling as if she were about to break into a thousand pieces, would do so if the appealing hand Paul had reached out to her should make contact. ‘Just tell me one thing,’ she bit out shakily. ‘Was it ever me you loved, or was it always the money and the prestige you thought it could give you?’
‘Of course I loved you.’
‘But having the money helped,’ Marina scorned him.
Paul shot her a furious glare. ‘What would you know about it—the daughter of a man who lost the family fortune in the first place?’
Marina’s face paled to a ghostly white. ‘I’m well aware of what my father did …’
‘I’ve never heard such nonsense in all my life,’ their grandmother cut in angrily. ‘Your father was a wonderful businessman,’ she assured Marina indignantly, ‘and would have withdrawn from that particular deal if he had had the time. Unfortunately, I lost all my children before that could happen,’ she added with emotion.
‘You lost your money, too,’ Paul derided contemptuously.
Blue eyes glittered furiously at him. ‘I never, ever blamed my son for that.’
‘Didn’t you?’ Marina looked at their grandmother hopefully. ‘Didn’t you really?’
‘Of course not.’ Evelyn sounded
shocked at the idea. ‘Your father made the family fortune in the first place by his astute investments. Surely you didn’t think I in any way blamed him for what happened?’ She frowned.
Marina shrugged. ‘I heard two women gossiping about what had happened——’
‘Gossip!’ Their grandmother’s tone told what she thought about that.
‘It was at a garden fěte you held here when I was fifteen,’ Marina explained. ‘These two women were saying what a shame it was your son had lost all the family money, what a pity it was the house had become so run-down.’
Those temper tantrums from Marina’s teens were starting to be explained now, Eve realised: the constant need her cousin had to prove herself, to be the centre of attention always. And she could see their grandmother was beginning to see the same thing, too.
‘None of that is true, darling,’ she told Marina gently. ‘We’ll talk together later, and then I’ll tell you what a wonderful man your father was.’
Marina’s head went back in proud challenge as she turned once more to Paul. ‘Whatever my father did he did by mistake, and not with deliberate intent as you did. I knew from the moment you tried to get me to go out with you a couple of years ago, because you thought I had come into money on my twenty-first birthday too, that you were no good,’ she scorned. ‘Oh, yes, you didn’t always so heartily disapprove of me, did you?’ she mocked with distaste as a ruddy hue coloured Paul’s cheeks. ‘A couple of years ago, before you took over from your father and were privy to our personal affairs, you would have been quite happy to settle for me and my legacy, if I had been interested—which I certainly wasn’t. Good lord, even after you found out I hadn’t received any money, you weren’t averse to suggesting an affair between us might be fun!’
‘Shut up,’ Paul rasped, his jaw clenched. ‘Just shut up.’
She shook her head. ‘Eve’s entitled to know the truth, all of it, now that I’m sure she no longer loves you. I’ve only kept quiet until now because she seemed to love you so much, and I thought perhaps ignorance was bliss,’ Marina scorned.
‘Eve still loves me,’ Paul claimed angrily. ‘She always has, she always will.’
What a fool she had been! So gullible, so ripe for the picking, so obviously in love with him. If it hadn’t been for Adam and Marina—she hated to think what her life would have been like without the two of them!
‘I wouldn’t willingly breathe the same air you breathe now,’ Eve told him coldly.
His mouth turned back. ‘You always were a romantic little fool.’
Not any more, never any more.
‘And you’re a selfish swine,’ Marina defended her like a lioness over one of her cubs. ‘What a blow it must have been to your plans when you realised Eve had spent the majority of her money on restoring this house. Although even then I don’t suppose all was completely lost; after all, the house might belong to my grandmother, but—forgive me, Grandmother,’ she hugged her affectionately, ‘Eve and I were sure to inherit it one day. And with the added knowledge now of Eve’s earnings from her paintings, she must have seemed worth pursuing, after all.’
‘I didn’t need much pursuing,’ Eve said self-disgustedly. ‘I’d been in love with Paul, or thought I had, since I was a teenager!’
‘In love with love, darling,’ her grandmother put in gently. ‘And that sort of love is usually the hardest to overcome. But as soon as you met Adam, your heart knew what it really wanted.’
‘Another couple of months and it would have been too late,’ Paul muttered angrily.
Another couple of months and she would have been married to this man, Eve realised with a shudder.
How blind she had been to what he was really like, while everyone around her could see him for exactly what he was!
Adam was watching her closely. ‘Leave, Lester, while you’re still able to do so,’ he advised harshly.
Paul’s mouth turned back contemptuously. ‘So that you can take over my place in Eve’s life?’ he scorned. ‘Maybe I’m a shark, Gardener, but you’re a barracuda!’
‘How unpleasant.’ Eve’s grandmother shuddered once he had swept arrogantly out of the room.
‘But necessary,’ Adam assured grimly.
‘Oh, goodness, yes,’ she agreed, giving him a warm smile. ‘What a horrible young man he really is.’
More horrible and more devious than Eve could ever have imagined. She had trusted him with her power of attorney in good faith, had listened to his advice that it was the best thing to do. Naïveté, and believing herself in love with love—she could surely never have loved Paul if she had ever really known him!—had made her blind and stupid.
She didn’t particularly care about the money, and, as Marina said, despite Adam’s earlier misgivings, Ashton House belonged to their grandmother and couldn’t be touched.
But it really was time she grew up.
CHAPTER TEN
‘BEAUTIFUL. Just beautiful.’
‘Perfectly lovely,’ agreed another man.
‘I’m glad we came,’ said his companion.
Eve smiled at Sophy. ‘Once again you’ve been proved right. The exhibition is a wonderful success.’
Sophy smiled mischievously. ‘I have news for you, those two men aren’t talking about your paintings, they’re talking about you!’ she confided with relish.
Eve spun around, and sure enough the two men in question weren’t looking at any of the paintings on the walls, but at Eve herself.
Once she would have blushed at such openly appreciative stares, but the last five months she had attended so many interviews, been photographed from every angle possible, received such effusive flattery for both her work and herself, that she merely smiled at the two men, nodding acknowledgement of their compliments.
She took a glass of champagne off the silver tray as a waiter passed, sipping it appreciatively, Sophy following suit as she looked around the crowded gallery.
The exhibition in London had gone ahead amid a blaze of publicity concerning the revealed identity of The Unicorn. And while a certain amount of people, like the two admiring men across the room, had come here out of pure curiosity, the majority were seriously interested in her work and what it had to say.
‘Is Adam coming tonight?’ Sophy was watching her with narrowed eyes as she turned towards her.
‘I’ve sent him an invitation.’ She nodded, the calmness of her reply in no way revealing the aching loneliness of the last five months without him.
But it had been a loneliness of her own choosing. It would have been too easy, loving Adam as she did, to allow him to ‘take over Paul’s place in her life’, as the other man had accused so scornfully, but she had needed the time alone, to grow, to learn about herself as a person without someone constantly there for her to lean on, to become emotionally independent for once in her life.
It had been a difficult thing to do, more difficult than she could ever have imagined, for it would have been so easy to turn to Adam for loving support. But five months later she knew the painful process of becoming completely independent had been worth it.
The question was, would Adam feel the same way about his own enforced loneliness?
When she had first told him what she intended to do, he had been adamant about not leaving her, especially when she had admitted to loving him; but she had finally persuaded him into believing she had to have this time, needed it desperately.
But five months without a single word of communication other than her invitation for tonight was a long time. Would he even bother to make an appearance? she wondered with inward concern.
She got her answer to that as he stood tall and handsome in the entrance to the gallery, his gaze moving slowly about the room until it came to rest on her. Eve felt her heart lurch with the gladness of seeing him again, but his expression revealed none of his emotions as he turned briefly to the couple who stood directly behind him, the elegantly beautiful woman, and arrogantly handsome man, instantly recognisable as his
parents.
Eve turned to Sophy as she too watched Adam across the room. ‘Sophy——’
‘Leave them to me,’ the other woman assured her firmly, putting down her own empty glass to pick up two full ones on her way to Adam’s parents, pausing briefly in the middle of the gallery to greet Adam as he strode forcefully by.
Eve’s hand tightening about the stem of her champagne glass was her only outward sign of tension.
Adam stopped mere inches in front of her, so dearly familiar in the black evening suit and snowy white shirt, his hair that glorious deep golden blond, his eyes dark and unfathomable.
‘You’re looking wonderful,’ he finally said gruffly.
‘So are you,’ she returned softly, dismissing the beauty of the black and gold dress she had chosen with such care for just this meeting. ‘You brought your parents with you.’ She stated the obvious for something to say, suddenly shy with him.
‘Yes,’ he acknowledged, not even bothering to glance across the room in their direction, completely confident in Sophy’s ability to take care of them. ‘I thought it best if they came over with me.’
‘Oh,’ she answered non-committally.
‘I got your invitation,’ he told her, his eyes narrowed.
‘Yes,’ she agreed, the tension building between them.
Oh, God, let him still love her, she prayed. Because one thing the last months had shown her, she loved Adam more than anything else on earth, and wanted to spend the rest of her life with him if he would have her.
‘A Christmas wedding might be nice, don’t you think?’ he remarked conversationally, just as if he were discussing the weather!
Eve felt the gladness in her heart, felt it burst and explode into bright, shattering light. It was going to be all right, after all. Adam still loved her and wanted her!
‘I don’t know if I can wait that long,’ she admitted shakily, swaying towards him. ‘I’ve missed you so much.’
His eyes glowed like warm honey. ‘I didn’t say we had to wait until then, only that it seemed a good time to get married. Oh, I love you, Eve,’ he added with a groan.
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