Love's Duel

by Carole Mortimer

  ‘As you were?’ he scorned.

  ‘As I was. There’s no point in this conversation, Mr Noble. I can’t prove my innocence, if I could I would have done so four years ago. Your friend Jeremy is much more believable. It’s easier to believe a Harley Street doctor than the young girl who imagined herself in love with him.’

  ‘You didn’t love him at all,’ Giles said tautly. ‘You and your brother used his infatuation with you to try and obtain money from him. How did you feel about seeing Philip Trent this weekend? Did you find you still love him?’

  ‘I’ve always loved Phil, but not in the way you mean,’ she told him resentfully. ‘Take me back, Mr Noble. I shall pack my belongings and leave immediately.’ Damn the contract, she wouldn’t live through this agony again, not again. ‘You can explain the reasons for my departure to your aunt.’

  ‘I don’t intend telling my aunt anything,’ he surprised her by saying.

  Leonie gave him a sharp, suspicious glance. ‘Why?’

  ‘I never discuss my cases with her. I never discuss them with anyone.’

  ‘But surely this is different? Surely—You don’t want to tell her because you still plan to have an affair with me!’ she accused heatedly. ‘You’re hoping to use my past to force me into an affair with you. My God, you’re worse than any criminal you’ll ever meet in the courtroom!’

  His mouth twisted. ‘You know damn well that isn’t how it’s supposed to happen, Leonie.’

  ‘Yes!’ she insisted. ‘But I won’t be forced. No man will ever use me again, not in any way.’

  ‘Not even Trent?’ he taunted harshly. ‘Didn’t you and he discuss using the same method on me that you used on Jeremy?’

  ‘You?’ Leonie’s eyes were wide, deep blue eyes the colour of pansies.

  ‘Yes, me,’ he confirmed tautly. ‘Last night I was just trying to make things easy for you, see how far you were prepared to go at our first meeting. You’re an even better actress now than you were four years ago, your outrage seems quite genuine.’

  ‘Maybe that’s because it is genuine! You mean you came to my room last night hoping to trap me, trying to make me attempt to blackmail you?’ She was incredulous at the deviousness of this man’s mind.

  Giles gave her a sideways glance. ‘Don’t tell me it never crossed your mind.’

  ‘But it didn’t!’

  ‘If you had agreed to my suggestion last night I would have been disappointed,’ he drawled insultingly. ‘I have you marked down as much cleverer than that. I was supposed to be really desperate for you before you agreed to come to me.’

  ‘Come to you…?’

  He shrugged. ‘I’m a prominent barrister, third generation. I would want to protect my reputation and family name at all costs. And it would be a fitting revenge, wouldn’t it, Leonie?’

  She swallowed hard. ‘Revenge…?’

  ‘Don’t tell me you never thought of revenge.’ His mouth twisted.

  ‘Yes, I thought of it!’ Her eyes sparkled with hatred. She had thought of revenge many times, until Tom had reasoned that John Noble was just doing his job, that if it hadn’t been him it would have been someone else. But he hadn’t had to enjoy it, hadn’t had to be quite so cruelly sadistic!

  Giles gave a mocking smile. ‘I knew you would. Those huge blue eyes of yours can be so candid on occasion. I saw the hate in them every time I looked at you, saw the anger burning there. You may have changed outwardly, Leonie, assumed a sophisticated veneer, but those eyes are unmistakable. I would have recognised them anywhere.’

  ‘There’s no reason why you shouldn’t,’ she said tightly, trying to take in all that he was saying.

  ‘But you didn’t think I would.’

  ‘I didn’t?’ She wasn’t even listening to him any more, her head was aching, her temples throbbing. She would leave here today, would get as far away from him as possible, and would try to build a life for herself—once again.

  ‘You said so yourself last night,’ he reminded her. ‘Different name, different look—oh no, my recognising you wasn’t part of the plan at all. I could see the shock in your face when I showed straight away that I knew you were Leonora Gordon.’

  ‘I was shocked at seeing you, not at being recognised!’

  ‘Oh yes?’ he scorned.

  ‘Yes,’ she insisted heatedly. ‘I had no idea you were Emily’s nephew.’

  ‘You’re saying she never spoke to you about me?’ he derided. ‘Even though I know she takes great pride in telling every new acquaintance of how proud she is of me.’

  ‘She wouldn’t if she knew what a bastard you are!’

  He shrugged. ‘She knows, she just chooses to ignore it. You may have noticed, she sees no wrong in anyone.’

  ‘I’ve noticed,’ Leonie muttered. ‘But I had no way of knowing that Emily’s nephew Giles, and John Noble, were one and the same man. They certainly didn’t sound like the same man.’ Emily’s glowing accounts of her nephew had no bearing on the man Leonie had met in that court four years ago.

  ‘It won’t work, Leonie,’ Giles drawled mockingly. ‘I would never get caught in a trap like that.’

  ‘Too intelligent, I suppose,’ she said sarcastically.

  ‘You could say that. Of course, I could have let this charming little charade take its course, and then told you the truth, but that would just be a waste of your time and mine. I’ll take you back to the cottage now, I’ll even drive you back to London if you still want to go.’

  ‘I don’t.’ She suddenly came to a decision. She liked it at Rose Cottage, enjoyed her work, and she loved Emily’s company, so she wasn’t going to be driven away. Tom had taught her to stand firm when she believed in something, and she believed in her right to live her life without interference from Giles Noble.

  He raised dark eyebrows. ‘Do I take that to mean you’ve changed your mind about leaving?’

  ‘You can take it how you like, Mr Noble,’ she said with saccharine sweetness. ‘But I am contracted to work with Emily, and that’s exactly what I intend doing.’ She looked at him challengingly.

  ‘And if I tell her about you?’

  Leonie faced him unflinchingly, suddenly very calm and in control. This man couldn’t hurt her any more, and she intended showing him that. ‘I’m sure that in her usual fashion she’ll skip over the more unpleasant parts and see me only as a girl caught in the force of circumstances. Yes, you go ahead and tell her, Mr Noble. I really couldn’t give a damn any more what you do.’

  ‘Couldn’t you?’

  ‘No! If I have to leave this job I’ll just get another one. You can’t touch me any more.’

  ‘We’ll see, shall we?’ he smiled, a smile without humour, like a cobra about to strike its victim. ‘Yes, we’ll see,’ he repeated softly.

  CHAPTER THREE

  ‘ARE you telling me you’re still there?’ Phil was incredulous when she visited him in London a couple of weeks later.

  Leonie gave a light laugh. ‘Yes, I’m still there.’

  ‘And you’ve seen nothing of Noble since you parted on that Monday morning?’

  ‘Nothing,’ she shook her head.

  Leonie had been surprised by that herself, expecting Giles Noble to keep badgering her until she left. Every time the telephone rang she jumped, every time someone knocked on the front door she tensed, but so far there had been no sign of Giles Noble. And he hadn’t told Emily a thing about them having met before. This uncertainty was worse than anything, but then he probably knew that. At the moment they were having a war of wills, it was all a question of who broke first. Well, it wasn’t going to be her!

  Phil raised his eyebrows. ‘That’s rather strange, isn’t it?’

  ‘I think he’s hoping I’ll just leave.’

  ‘And you aren’t going to?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘Oh, I thought about it, very seriously, in fact. But I’m through running, Phil. If he wants me out then he’ll have to throw me out,
literally.’

  ‘And you think he won’t?’

  She gave a half smile. ‘I’m sure of it. He would have done it by now if he was going to.’

  Phil shook his head. ‘I’ve a good mind to try something on him just to see what would happen.’

  ‘Phil!’ Leonie gasped.

  He relaxed back on the sofa that he converted into his bed at night. The bed-sitter was infinitely tidier than it had been the last time she had called on him here. And Wanda was noticeably absent too! ‘I wouldn’t really,’ he grinned. ‘Although the way it looks you can’t really blame him for expecting it.’

  ‘I know that,’ she sighed. ‘And I don’t blame him for that. I just hate the way he tried to trap me into it. The merest suggestion of blackmailing him and he would have had you in prison before you could deny all knowledge of it.’

  Phil became serious. ‘I’m never going back to prison. Never!’

  Leonie bit her lip. ‘How’s the job going?’ she changed the subject to something less sensitive.

  He shrugged. ‘It’s okay. But I’m not going to get very far as a delivery boy.’

  ‘I thought you always wanted to open up your own restaurant,’ she frowned.

  ‘I did.’

  ‘If it’s a question of money…’

  ‘Of course it’s a question of money,’ he said irritably. ‘I’m not exactly a safe bet for a bank loan.’

  ‘Tom didn’t leave me destitute, Phil. I could—’

  ‘No!’ He stood up to pace the room. ‘I won’t accept anything from you.’

  She looked bewildered. ‘But I—’

  ‘Don’t you understand, I’ve taken enough from you already! If I hadn’t interfered you would have had your fling with Lindsay, eventually found out what he was really like, and the affair would then have blown itself out. Instead of which the whole thing was made embarrassingly public, and Noble crucified you.’

  She touched his arm as he walked past her. ‘I’m glad I found out about Jeremy.’

  ‘But I could have just told you about him, you didn’t have to find out that way!’

  ‘No more recriminations, Phil, please. Now, about this restaurant—’

  ‘I can’t take money from you, Leonie,’ he told her firmly.

  ‘But—’

  ‘I said no!’

  ‘All right,’ she sighed in the face of his obstinacy. ‘I have to go now, Phil, Emily hasn’t been too well lately, so I told her I would be back early.’

  ‘What’s wrong with her?’ he seemed genuinely concerned.

  ‘She’s had rheumatism for years. It gives her a lot of pain, but this week has been worse than most. I’ve had the doctor out, but there’s really not a lot he can do except give her something to help her sleep at night.’

  ‘Does Noble know?’

  Leonie shook her head. ‘She wouldn’t have him bothered.’ Her mouth twisted. ‘She says he’s too busy to be worried with something like this.’

  Phil shrugged. ‘No doubt he is.’

  ‘No doubt,’ she agreed bitterly. ‘Anyway, I must go.’

  ‘But you’ll come again?’

  She smiled. ‘Of course I will. By the way, how’s Wanda?’

  ‘Very well,’ he grinned back. ‘I’ll have to introduce the two of you some time.’

  ‘I’d like that.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘Really,’ she nodded. ‘Maybe the next time I come down.’

  ‘Okay, I’ll arrange it.’

  Leonie drove back through the early evening sunlight, feeling more relaxed, the beauty of the evening soothing her. Until this move to Rose Cottage she had lived in town, in Tom’s house, and now she had found that she liked living in the country most of all, enjoyed the slowness of life, the clean fresh air.

  Dorothy, Emily’s housekeeper, came rushing into the hallway as soon as Leonie entered the house. ‘Oh, Mrs Carter, thank goodness you’re back!’

  ‘What is it?’ She was at once concerned. ‘Is Emily all right?’

  ‘She’s resting. She had a fall, Mrs Carter, just after you left this morning. I told her to stay in bed today, and she said she would, and then the next thing I knew she’d fallen part way down the stairs.’

  ‘Oh, my God!’ Leonie was very pale, instantly blaming herself for going out and leaving Emily on her own. ‘Is she upstairs?’

  Dorothy nodded. ‘In her bed. The doctor said she has a very badly bruised hip, and that he’ll be here again tomorrow to see how she is.’

  Leonie was already part way up the stairs. ‘He should have taken her to hospital. At Emily’s age you can’t take risks.’

  Dorothy wheezed up the stairs behind her, almost as old as Emily herself. ‘Oh, she’s had X-rays and things. She was at the hospital for hours, but once she knew there were no bones broken she insisted on coming straight home.’

  ‘Have you let Mr Noble know?’ Leonie lowered her voice as they reached Emily’s bedroom door.

  ‘She wouldn’t have him told,’ Dorothy whispered back.

  Leonie’s eyes widened. ‘You mean he doesn’t know?’

  ‘No.’

  She sighed. ‘I’ll call him when I’ve spoken to Emily. You have Mr Noble’s telephone number?’

  Dorothy nodded. ‘On the pad downstairs. But Miss Emily won’t like it.’

  Leonie smiled. ‘I won’t tell her.’ She turned and let herself quietly into the bedroom, not wanting to disturb the elderly woman if she was sleeping.

  The pink and white room was almost in complete darkness, with only a single sidelight to alleviate the gloom. Emily lay back against the elevated pillows, her eyes closed, her even breathing evidence of her sleeping state. For the first time in their acquaintance Leonie saw the other woman looking all of her sixty-two years, her face bare of the powder and lipstick she usually wore, her grey hair slightly ruffled.

  Leonie sat with her for several minutes before going back downstairs. She had to let Giles Noble know, no matter what Emily said. Her hands were clammy as she dialled his number, her heartbeat sounding very loud in the silence of the hallway.

  ‘Mr Noble’s residence,’ answered a stiff formal voice.

  Leonie’s breath released in a hiss as she realised she wasn’t talking to the man himself. At least she had a few moments’ respite, enough to try and calm herself before she spoke to Giles Noble. ‘Is Mr Noble at home?’ she asked breathlessly.

  ‘I’m afraid not,’ replied the uncommunicative voice.

  Damn. ‘Do you have any idea when he will be?’

  ‘Tomorrow evening, madam. Mr Noble is away for the weekend.’

  Oh yes—with whom? ‘Could you give me a number where I could reach him?’

  ‘I’m afraid not, madam.’ The voice was even more stilted, as if the man was surprised at her effrontery in thinking he would reveal his employer’s plans to her, a mere voice on the telephone.

  Leonie sighed. This obviously wasn’t going to be easy. ‘But you do know where to reach him?’

  ‘Of course,’ the man sounded indignant now.

  ‘I have to know where he is,’ she told him firmly. ‘His aunt has had a fall, and—’

  ‘Mrs Dryer has?’ At least that voice had some emotion to it now.

  ‘Yes.’ At least she was getting somewhere. Giles Noble’s manservant was more like a watchdog, protecting his employer’s privacy at all costs. ‘Could you give me his telephone number?’ she repeated.

  Within seconds she had a number she could call him on, although on trying it she received no answer. She felt totally dissatisfied when she joined Dorothy in the kitchen a few minutes later.

  ‘Try again later,’ the housekeeper advised when told of Giles’s unavailability. ‘Would you care for some dinner now?’

  ‘Why not?’ Leonie shrugged.

  She tried the telephone number several more times, again receiving no reply. When Emily woke up she went up to keep her company.

  ‘I’m just fine,’ Emily assured her. ‘A little
tired, but then that’s only to be expected when I’ve been pumped full of drugs.’

  ‘Dorothy is getting you something light to eat,’ Leonie smiled at her. ‘And you must try and eat it.’

  ‘I’ll try,’ Emily grimaced. ‘Although I’m not really hungry.’

  ‘Dorothy will be upset.’

  ‘I know, that’s why I’m going to try. I sometimes wonder who runs this household, me or her.’

  ‘Her, I think,’ Leonie laughed lightly, relieved to see Emily hadn’t lost her sense of humour. Seeing the other woman ill like this had brought home just how fond of her she was, even fonder than she had realised. Not that she thought Emily would be down for long, she was too active for that.

  ‘Now you haven’t contacted Giles, have you?’ Emily said sternly.

  ‘No,’ Leonie replied truthfully. After all, she hadn’t actually spoken to him yet.

  ‘Good,’ Emily said with satisfaction. ‘Because it was only a little fall, certainly nothing to worry him with.’

  Emily might not think so, but Leonie had no doubts who Giles would blame for the omission if he wasn’t told. She watched over Emily as she ate some of the chicken soup, hiding a smile as Dorothy scolded her for not eating it all. Emily and Dorothy went back a long way, a relationship more like sisters than employer and employee.

  Leonie went downstairs once Emily had drifted off to sleep again, taking her sketchbook with her into the lounge so that she could do some work. She was getting behind on her illustrations, had fallen way behind Emily, and mainly because she couldn’t concentrate. This battle of wills with Giles Noble was bothering her more than she cared to admit, and no matter how she tried to banish him from her thoughts he was always at the back of her mind, like a dark shadow over her life.

  It was after eleven when she heard the voices in the hallway and the slamming of the front door. She stood up slowly, watching as the lounge door was flung open and Giles Noble walked in, resplendent in evening clothes, a raven-haired beauty following him into the room, her dress also pointing to their having been out for the evening.

  ‘How is she?’ he demanded without preamble.

  ‘Sleeping.’ She couldn’t take her eyes off how magnificent he looked in the dark suit and snowy white shirt, almost human in fact. ‘How did you know to come?’ she asked dazedly.