by Penny Jordan
When he did get back one of the first things he did was get in touch with Mathieson and Hendry.
In response to his carefully casual enquiry he was told that the girl in question was no longer with the company and had returned to her parents in the country, without leaving any forwarding address.
He told himself that there was really no reason for him to make any further enquiries; she had obviously learned the lesson he had wanted to teach her. He had been gone for over a month, long enough for her to have realised that there were going to be no permanent consequences from their supposed night together.
About the effect on her when she eventually discovered that she had not, as she supposed, had a lover, but was, in fact, still a virgin, he preferred not to think; pursuing her into the country to enlighten her on that point was something he didn’t really think it would be wise to do, more for his own sake than for hers...
He winced a little, remembering how his body had reacted to her. It had been a long time since he had last had a serious relationship...perhaps too long. And as for the girl—Nicki—well, with a bit of luck she would have realised by now the dangers of the way she had behaved.
He smiled a little grimly to himself, reflecting wryly that, although she herself might not believe it, he had acted in her best interests.
He remembered the look on her face when he had kissed her...how she had felt—and then he stopped himself. There were, after all, some avenues in life which it was wiser not to go down...because they led nowhere...or because they led somewhere that was far, far too dangerous?
It was a question he preferred not to answer.
* * *
SOMEWHERE in the distance a dog barked, startling Nicola back into the present. She gave a small shiver, rubbing her upper arms with stiff fingers.
Even now, all these years later, she still could not shake off the cold horror of the moment when she had realised that she and Matt—Matthew Hunt—had been lovers, and that she could remember not one single thing about it. The shame, the anguish, the self-disgust of that knowledge would be with her for as long as she lived.
The make-up she had never used again, the dress had been thrown away, and eventually even the perm had grown out of her hair; but nothing had been able to eradicate her feeling of guilt and self-disgust.
And that was why she lived her life the way she did, keeping to the shadows, sticking firmly within the boundaries of the kind of behaviour she had set for herself, enjoying the company of her women friends, even though there were occasions when the conversation turned to sex, and they were making outspoken and sometimes rather outrageous if amusing comments about their partners, and she had to bite on her tongue and keep silent. That was why she dated someone like Gordon, who was thankfully uninterested in making sexual overtures to her.
If sometimes she woke in the night, mentally grieving for all that she was denying herself in living her life this way—the lover, the children—she only had to recall the way she had behaved with Matthew Hunt...the sick disgust and horror that had followed the realisation that they had shared the most intimate act two human beings could share, and that she had absolutely no memory of it...to remind her of how unfit she was to encourage and accept a man’s love.
It made no difference telling herself that she had only done what thousands of foolish girls did every year; others might be able to forgive her, but she could not forgive herself. Even though she knew also that her attitude, her self-denigration, was self-destructive and dangerous, and that the wisest, the most sensible course would be for her to undergo some kind of professional counselling to help her put what had happened in its proper perspective, she stubbornly refused to even consider letting go of her self-imposed punishment.
While she alone knew what had happened, she had felt reasonably safe. Now... She remembered the way Jonathon had taunted her when he had realised she had spent the night with Matthew Hunt...the insults he had thrown at her, the names he had called her...the way he had terrorised her once he’d realised that no amount of mental blackmail was going to make her allow him to have sex with her.
How bitterly she had realised then how very much more preferable it was to be considered dull, sexless and boring than to be subjected to the kind of pressure he was trying to exert. But by then it was too late...by then Jonathon had told just about everyone she worked with just what she had done.
She shivered again, and Honey, sensing her desolation, pushed a cold, wet nose into her hand, causing her to look down and give the dog a brief, painful smile.
‘Oh, Honey, what am I going to do?’ she whispered, kneeling down to fondle the dog’s silky ears.
‘If he suddenly recognises me—realises...’
She could feel the tension invading her body, the panic starting to claw at her stomach.
He wasn’t going to recognise her, she assured herself. If he hadn’t done so by now—and he hadn’t, that was obvious—then why should he ever?
After all, he had probably forgotten she even existed. But if he did remember...
She shuddered deeply. The only way she could ensure that that would not happen would be to give up her job and move out of the area, to run away as she had done once before; but, like all creatures who felt hunted, she had learnt long ago that to move...to run was to attract attention, and that her best chance of safety and protection lay in the camouflage of not drawing attention to herself.
If she gave in her notice, her friends, her family would start speculating...wondering. Her parents would be anxious, and want to know what was wrong.
She could, of course, always say that there was a clash of personalities—that she could not get on with their new boss—but jobs as interesting as hers were hard to come by in this rural area, and she had no wish to start a new career in the city, no wish at all...
No, she was safe enough for now. Just as long as she kept her head...just as long as she didn’t betray herself by doing something foolish.
Today, for instance, during this morning’s meeting, Matthew Hunt had glanced piercingly at her once or twice when Alan in his speech had praised her for her hard work, but it had been the hard, assessing look of an employer to an employee—not the look of a man to a woman.
But then, he was hardly likely to give her that kind of look, was he? she derided herself. After all, the real her was so very different from the Nicola—the ‘Nicki’—he had known so briefly.
At her feet Honey whined and pawed at her jeans-clad leg, indicating that she had had enough of sitting waiting for something to happen, and that it was time to turn around and go home.
* * *
‘HAVE A NICE WALK?’ her mother asked her cheerfully when she opened the kitchen door. ‘Your father’s just come in, so I’d better serve supper. Oh, and by the way, Christine rang. She asked me to remind you that you’re having dinner with them next week...’
Nicola nodded her head. Christine was one of her oldest friends. Her husband, Mike, was a solicitor, just starting up in his own local practice. They had two small children, and, as well as looking after them, running the house, taking care of their large garden, Chrissie also helped Mike out with his paperwork at home.
They were a well-matched, happy couple, and Nicola always enjoyed the time she spent with them, even though sometimes their very evident contentment and love for one another made her feel a little envious.
Over supper her father asked her what she had thought of her new boss.
Her heart started to beat frantically fast as she looked down at her plate, knowing that if she looked up her real feelings would show far too plainly in her eyes.
Already it was beginning...the deceit...the anxiety...
‘He seems very well-informed...very efficient,’ she answered unevenly.
‘Mm. From what I’ve heard he’s got a nose for a good opportunity. With him behind it, the firm should really start to pick up. Will he be running it himself or—?’
‘No, he’s putting in a man
ager—someone from one of his other companies. We haven’t heard who yet.’
‘And this manager, you’ll be directly responsible to him, I imagine?’ her mother interrupted.
Nicola nodded her head. That was the one bright gleam in the whole sorry mess—the fact that Matthew Hunt would be spending a limited amount of time with them.
‘I wonder how old he’ll be, and if he’s married...’
Nicola put down her knife and fork. She was on familiar and much safer ground here.
‘Mother...’ she warned.
‘I’m sorry, Nicki. When you were in your teens, I promised myself I wasn’t going to turn into the kind of mother who was always on the look-out for a potential father for her grandchildren, but when I look at Gordon...’ She gave a small shudder and said forthrightly, ‘What on earth do you see in him? And as for that mother of his—’
‘Gordon is a friend, Mother...nothing more,’ Nicola told her firmly.
‘Mm. Still, this new manager... I wonder what he’ll be like,’ her mother continued, undeterred.
CHAPTER FOUR
HER mother wasn’t the only one to be curious about the new manager, as Nicola discovered in the morning when she got to work.
The brief visit Matthew Hunt had paid them the previous day was not going to be repeated until towards the end of the week, she had been relieved to learn. Until then, Alan would, nominally at least, remain in charge.
Nicola had got the impression the previous day that Matthew Hunt’s decision to take over the firm had been a rather impulsive one, and that he was having to shuffle around his existing staff in order to find someone responsible and whom he could trust to take charge of his new acquisition.
The knowledge of the take-over seemed to add a new zest to the work-force. There was talk of better rates of pay and working conditions, now that they were part of a much larger organisation—of bonus schemes and other perks.
Alan had opted not to have a formal retirement party and, knowing how what was happening must be reactivating the trauma of losing his son, Nicola didn’t blame him. Even so, she thought it was very sad that after a lifetime of owning the firm he should simply opt to walk out of his office on Friday afternoon without any acknowledgement on the part of those who worked for him.
All day Tuesday there was an atmosphere of excited tension in the air. They already knew that on Wednesday morning Matthew Hunt would be introducing them to their new boss, the new manager.
Nicola, unlike everyone else, was frantically busy on the Tuesday, gently prodding Alan into going through all their current files so that she could prepare status reports on each of their current contracts, giving details of work in progress.
She loved her job, and the more responsibility Alan gave her the more she thrived on it. She had a talent for administrative work and, although few people knew it, it was mainly thanks to her ability to keep tabs on the various clients that the firm had not lost several of its major contracts.
Naturally enough, Nicola wanted to make a good impression on the man who was going to be her new boss, and not just for her own sake, but for Alan’s as well. Out of loyalty to him, she was determined to make sure that he was presented with an efficient and up-to-date, as well as comprehensive run-down of exactly what was going on.
Every time she walked into his office, Alan seemed to have amassed even more paper from the filing cabinets. The shredder was going to be working overtime, she decided ruefully, looking at the dates on some of the files. Alan was something of a squirrel when it came to his files. She reminded him gently that he would have to make arrangements to have his large partner’s desk removed from the office.
It was a very good antique piece of furniture, which he had bought in a sale when he had first started the firm, and she suspected it was now worth a considerable sum of money.
He gave her a wan smile.
‘There won’t be room for it in the bungalow; and besides...’ he touched the wood gently ‘...where’s the point?’
Nicola felt close to tears, and decided privately that, if Alan didn’t do anything about it himself, she would ask her father if it was possible for them to store the desk in one of their outbuildings, because she was sure that, given time, Alan would regret abandoning it.
On Tuesday evening when she arrived home dusty and tired, her mother commented, ‘You’re very late.’
‘Mm. We’ve been cleaning out Alan’s office—getting ready for the new man... Has Gordon telephoned?’ she asked.
She and Gordon were supposed to be attending a concert in the city, and she had half expected him to telephone to confirm what time he was picking her up.
‘Not while I’ve been in,’ her mother told her.
After she had showered off the dust and dirt and changed into a pair of jeans and a casual top, Nicola dialled the number of Gordon’s mother’s house.
She sometimes thought that she and Gordon were an anomaly in these modern times, in that both of them still lived at home, but then she had read several articles indicating that, because of the exorbitant cost of property, adult children were remaining in the parental home for much, much longer than had once been the norm.
Certainly Gordon, at thirty-four, might be supposed to be able to afford his own house. He had a good job with an insurance company but, as he had once carefully explained to Nicola, his mother was widowed and not very strong, and he felt he owed it to her to live with her.
She, too, could perhaps have afforded to buy her own small property, but she liked living with her parents, enjoying their company and their conversation, even though her friends sometimes teased her about the fact that she was still living at home.
Gordon’s mother answered the telephone, her faint, helpless whisper hardening a little when she recognised Nicola’s voice.
‘Gordon is just about to eat,’ she told Nicola disapprovingly, ‘so I hope you won’t keep him for too long.’
Sighing faintly, Nicola gritted her teeth.
Gordon, when he came to the phone, sounded tense and hesitant. When she reminded him about the concert, he paused for a moment, and then told her quickly, ‘I’m sorry, but I won’t be able to go... You see, Mother hasn’t been feeling very well and I really feel I should stay here with her...’
In point of fact Nicola hadn’t particularly wanted to attend the concert. It had been Gordon who had suggested they go and not her, but nevertheless when she replaced the receiver she was seething. Why on earth hadn’t Gordon telephoned her to say that the evening was off? Why had he left it to her to get in touch with him? And as for his mother’s supposed ill health...
It wasn’t so much that she minded missing the concert, as she explained later to Christine when she drove round on impulse to see her friend. It was the fact that he hadn’t even thought to let her know earlier that their evening was to be cancelled.
‘Why on earth do you bother with him?’ Christine asked her forthrightly. ‘I mean, come on, Nicki, don’t try telling me that he makes your heart beat faster, or that you fancy him to death—I’ve seen you with him.’
Nicola had to laugh. ‘No, maybe not,’ she agreed.
‘So then, why...?’ Christine began, but Nicola very firmly changed the subject and started to ask her instead how young Paul was getting on at school.
It was quite late when she got home, but she knew the evening with her friend had done her good. However, as she hovered on the point of falling asleep, her strongest feeling was one of anxiety as she worried about the morning. Not so much because of meeting her new boss, but because of Matthew Hunt.
Please God, don’t let him recognise me, she prayed desperately. Anything, anything but that...
* * *
‘MATTHEW HUNT’S here, but he’s on his own,’ Evie announced excitedly, as she came hurrying into Nicola’s office.
Nicola had already seen Matthew’s arrival for herself. Today he wasn’t driving the ancient Land Rover, but a sleek and very expensive-looking Jaguar.<
br />
‘Isn’t he just the sexiest man you’ve ever seen?’ Evie drooled as she watched him walk towards the office-block. ‘I mean, just look at him...even in that stuffy suit he still looks wonderful.’
Nicola hid a small smile. The stuffy suit in question might not appeal to Evie as much as the jeans Matthew had worn on his previous visit, but it did give him an aura of power and control that made Nicola herself suddenly conscious of the frisson of tension that flashed hotly over her skin.
She turned away from the window, appalled by her reaction to him, only half listening to Evie’s excited chatter. Evie had heard on the grapevine that Matthew’s take-over would mean an updating of their office systems to include the very latest state-of-the-art technology, and she was just asking Nicola if they were likely to be using new, streamlined word processors instead of their existing electronic typewriters, when the door opened and Matthew walked in.
He smiled at Evie, causing her to blush and simper, and then gave Nicola a much sharper, considering look.
She was wearing what she considered to be her working uniform of a Prince of Wales check suit with a fine overstripe in crimson, a white shirt, and a wide crimson belt which brought out the colour of her suit.
As Evie had remarked innocently this morning, to colour-co-ordinate the outfit she should perhaps have been wearing red lipstick, but the mere thought of doing so had made Nicola feel physically sick... It had been red lipstick she had been wearing that night...
These days she stuck to a dull, work-a-day soft pink which did little more than enhance the natural colour of her mouth, and which certainly did not emphasise its soft, full contours.
So there was really no reason why Matthew Hunt’s gaze should linger thoughtfully on her mouth for what to Nicola seemed like a lifetime, but which she knew could only be a handful of seconds. As he studied her, fear ripped through her. He had recognised her. He had—