Seductive Stranger

by Charlotte Lamb

  'Well?' Josh insisted, his eyes fixed on her face, and she pulled herself together and looked coolly at him. He was the very last person in the world she would confide in; she wasn't telling him what she was thinking, he could ask until he was blue in the face.

  'Mind your own business,' she said, and got a long, searing stare before Josh turned on his heel and walked out of the kitchen into the garden. If he had slammed the door she might have felt some sort of angry triumph, but he didn't. He closed the door behind him with a quiet finality which left her feeling very cold and tired.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  PRUE was too shocked to be capable of thinking clearly. When Josh had gone, she went upstairs like an automaton to pack, before her father got back. She had the hire car; she could be miles away in a few hours, and then she wouldn't have to put up with pity or sympathy from her father, she could leave all this muddle behind.

  But she couldn't make up her mind, she switched plans every five minutes as she sat in her bedroom in the farmhouse, her suitcases open and her clothes strewn all over the bed. What should she do?

  She must decide!

  Think! she told herself angrily. What should I do? Do I stay on here—or leave? And then, if she left Yorkshire, should she go off on that long-planned trip around Europe, visiting all the places she and David had dreamt about and talked about for months, but which she would be seeing all by herself now? Or should she fly straight back to Australia?

  She looked at her suitcases, biting her lip. How could she go back to Sydney and her job with her old firm, see her old friends again, after David had walked out on her? It would be humiliating; they might be sympathetic to her face, but some of them would giggle behind her back, or, at the very least, whisper and gossip, seething with curiosity.

  She didn't know which she would hate most—the pity or the secret glee.

  There was another reason why she was reluctant to go back to Australia. David would probably take Lynsey back to Sydney after they were married. Where else would they go? David's parents were there, and she and David had always planned to go back after their lengthy tour of Europe. It was quite the thing among their friends to see the world and then come home to settle down and start a family; they had never intended to stay in Europe.

  She had looked forward to living close to David's parents; she was very fond of them, and that would be another bitter loss to her. She would probably never see them again. When they heard the news, they would be very upset, they would be deeply sorry for her, and angry with David for jilting her. Knowing them, she wouldn't be surprised if they chose to side with her against their own son, and she didn't want that!

  She wasn't sure yet how she felt about David himself. She ought to hate him, but she couldn't. She loved David too much to hate him; nothing he did would ever alter that. She couldn't even blame him. In fact, she had a sneaking fellow feeling for him. He was another victim of the Killanes and their insidious glamour; like her father and her mother ... and herself.

  The slam of a door downstairs made her sit up; face pale and alert.

  Was that her father? She hadn't been expecting him home for ages yet.

  Hello? Anyone at home?'

  It was a woman's voice. Lucy Killane, thought Prue, frowning, and not answering, hoping that the older woman would go away. Josh must have told her. She must be worried about her daughter, but why had she come here? What did she want?

  She wants something, you can bet on that! Prue thought cynically.

  Maybe she has come to soft-soap me, get me to forgive her daughter and promise not to make a scandal, cause trouble for the Killane family?

  'Prue, are you there?'

  Footsteps creaked on the stairs; Mrs Killane was coming up and Prue got off the bed, closed her suitcase, flung them with her clothes back into the wardrobe and shut the doors on them. She acted instinctively.

  She didn't want Lucy Killane to see that she had started packing, that she was thinking of leaving.

  Not just leaving, she thought grimly. Running away! Wasn't that what she would be doing if she left now? Her mother had run away, as far as she possibly could, right across to the other side of the world—but what good had it done her? She had wasted years of her life in bitterness. Prue didn't want to do that. She had seen the consequences of brooding over a wrong done to you—you ended up doing far more damage to yourself than the original injury.

  She wasn't going back to Australia, she decided then, in a flash of self-knowledge. She wasn't going to let this overshadow her whole life. Damn the Killanes! Who were they, anyway? It was time somebody taught them that they couldn't just reach out and take what they wanted, wreck other people's lives for a whim!

  She had left her bedroom door slightly ajar. Lucy Killane tapped on it before pushing it wide open and looking across the room at her.

  Prue stared back, sitting there immovably on her bed, her hands clasped together in her lap to stop them shaking.

  'Oh, Prue,' Lucy said huskily. 'I ... I don't know what to say to you!'

  She was as pale as Prue herself; her eyes had reddened lids, she had been crying. She looked drawn and haggard, and Prue couldn't help a twinge of compassion for her, because, after all, Lynsey was her daughter and only eighteen, but Prue didn't soften or show any sympathy, it would have made it harder to hang on to her self-control, so she put up a pretence of icy composure, using it as a shield.

  'There's nothing useful you can say,' she told Mrs Killane. 'And 1

  would rather you didn't say anything at all.'

  'I know how you feel. . .' Mrs Killane came further into the room, and Prue frowned.

  'I don't think you do, Mrs Killane! Please go, there's no point in talking about it.'

  'Oh, Prue, I'm sorry, so very sorry . . .' Mrs Killane put out her hands to Prue, her lovely eyes glistening with tears, her mouth quivering,

  'I'm no good with words, I don't know the right thing to say, but I feel so badly..about this . . . it's terrible. How could Lynsey . . .?' Her voice was shaky and thin, it kept dying away, and then another little burst of words would burst out. 'I don't know how she could . .. We had no idea, Prue, I promise you that! Josh didn't suspect, neither did I. I couldn't believe when he told me. He asked if I'd known, but if 1 had, I'd have done something to stop it, and so would Josh!'

  She had seized Prue's hands and Prue couldn't quite bring herself to push her away or free herself forcibly; she had to sit there while the other woman clasped her hands, tears running freely now, down her pale, haggard, yet still hauntingly lovely face.

  'She's just a child,' she sobbed. 'Just eighteen . . . she doesn't know what she's doing.'

  Prue's face tightened. Oh, no? she thought, and Lucy Killane read the angry cynicism in her green eyes and flinched as if Prue had hit her.

  'She's in love with love, that's all,' she whispered, as if begging Prue to agree with her. it can't be the real thing, she barely knows him.'

  Prue laughed angrily. 'The real thing? Of course it isn't!'

  Lucy looked at her with pity and anxiety, and Prue's hackles rose. She didn't want either emotion from the woman who had ruined her mother's life.

  'It's just a crush, isn't it?' said Lucy, nodding. 'She's too young to know what real love is! This is because he was a stranger, from the other side of the .world, and in hospital—it seemed romantic and exciting, and she mistook what she was feeling for something else!

  Having to keep her visits a secret probably made it twice as romantic.

  But I'm ashamed of her, she should have realised what it would do to you!'

  'She doesn't care what she does to me!' Prue said savagely, her green eyes flashing. She pulled, her hands free and walked to the window, fighting her temper, but in the end she couldn't hold back her real feelings, they burst out of her. 'You know very well . . . she only wanted David because he belonged to me. If he had been unattached she probably wouldn't have looked twice at him, but she's your daughter, and she prefers to take h
er men from other women.'

  Lucy Killane stood there in a frozen silence, staring at her.

  'Oh, don't pretend to look bewildered,' Prue snapped. 'You don't fool me, any more than you fooled my mother!'

  'She told you . . .' Lucy began, then took a deep breath. 'What? What did she tell you?'

  'The truth! She thought I was old enough to know what had ruined my parents' marriage ... or rather, who had!'

  Lucy put a hand to her mouth, whitening, then a wave of red flowed up to her hairline. 'Oh, so that's why ... why you were so offhand with me when you first arrived?'

  'Until I was stupid enough to let you charm me into forgetting everything my mother had told me! But that's what you're good at—you and your daughter, and your . . . your whole damn family!

  You have a genius for charming people into forgetting things . . .

  little, unimportant things, . . like loyalty and decency and common sense!'

  'But it wasn't true!' Lucy said huskily, still very flushed. 'My husband meant everything to me; I loved him very much, I never once looked at any other man. Your father and I were friends, just as he was my husband's friends You ought to know your father better than to believe he would betray one of his oldest friends; he'd known my husband far longer than I had.'

  'But you knew what I was talking about at once!' Prue said coldly, and Lucy sighed.

  'Oh, your mother accused us ... one day she came to the house and made a very unpleasant scene,, shouting and crying. I was very upset, I tried to tell her the truth, but I knew that she wasn't very stable, I didn't take her seriously. Jim told me to forget it, he said she hadn't really believed the things she said, she was pathologically jealous and given to these outbursts. He said she was even jealous of his dog.'

  Lucy paused, face hesitant, worried, then plunged on, 'She was jealous of you, too, Prue. It drove her crazy if she thought your father loved you more than her.'

  Prue's green eyes opened wide, her pupils very black. That was true; although she had forgotten it until now, she had always known her mother was jealous whenever she and her father were together. What else had she forgotten about those childhood years? she wondered, and oddly remembered Josh teasing her by saying that he had kissed her years ago. Had he lied? Ever since he had said it, some faint memory had been trying to surface; she felt it almost within reach for a second . . . then it was gone again on dragonfly wings.

  Lucy was unaware of her reverie. 'And after she went away, and took you with her, Jim said she had taken you to make sure you grew up hating him,' Lucy went on, and that was true, too. Her mother had wanted her to hate her father; that was why she had told her so much about the past, blackening his name. That was something Prue had worked out for herself years ago, but her mother's jealous nature and instability didn't mean that there was no truth to all her wild accusations, did it? There must be some fire behind all that smoke.

  'Your two children must have got it from somewhere, though!' Prue said bitingly, and Lucy Killane looked dumbfounded.

  'My two…'

  'Lynsey . . . and Josh! Yes! They're as bad as each other!'

  'Josh?' repeated his mother with incredulity.

  'Yes, Josh,' Prue snapped. 'I know how Lynsey managed to seduce David, because her brother tried the same game with me, flirting with me every time I saw him, trying to kiss me and... only he didn't take me in the way your daughter fooled poor David.'

  Lucy Killane stared at her. 'Josh has been flirting with you?' Her voice was slow, almost dazed, but there was a thoughtful look in her face.

  'Don't pretend to be shocked! I can't stand hypocrisy!' Prue said with contempt. 'He's your son, we both know where he got it from!'

  They had been so absorbed that they hadn't heard the creak on the stairs, and weren't aware of the man in the doorway until he spoke, making them jump.

  'Prue!' he said sharply, and they both looked round, startled and shaken.

  Lucy Killane flushed up at the sight of him; she turned hurriedly away, her face distressed. By contrast, James Allardyce was white-faced and his eyes were appalled.

  'Don't talk to Mrs Killane like that!' he said, an Prue laughed angrily.

  'Mrs Killane? It's a bit late to be so formal, Dad. I know about you two, I've always known. Mum told me.'

  Hot blood rose up in his face and he glanced quickly at Lucy Killane, who begged him, "Tell her it isn't true, Jim!' but she couldn't look at him, all the same, and Prue read guilt in her averted eyes.

  'Yes, lie to me, Dad,' Prue said. 'Tell me you don't love her!'

  He looked grim, his head bent, a frown pulling his brows together.

  'Your mother was sick, she invented grievances to give herself a reason for hurting me, she lied to you, Prue. There was nothing going on between me and Lucy, we were just friends. I give you my word of honour that that's the truth.' His eyes lifted and she looked into them and believed the level stare, believed even more the unhappiness, the distress, because the truth he was telling was not quite the whole truth and he knew it. She knew it, too, and was suddenly very sorry for him.

  She didn't know exactly how it had been, of course. His face had a dignity which made her believe he half spoke the truth. Perhaps he hadn't been in love with Lucy Killane at first? Maybe he had simply no longer been in love with her mother and unable to counterfeit a feeling which had died? Prue knew just how difficult her mother had been; how hard to love or convince you loved her!

  But, however it had come about, James Allardyce had fallen in love with Lucy Killane in the end. Perhaps when her mother accused him, she had unknowingly put the idea into his head? If he hadn't taken that sort of interest in Lucy Killane before, it would have made him see her in a new light after his wife became jealous.

  Whether or not it had been true then, it was the truth now! Her father did love Lucy Killane; the silent admission was in his troubled glance, whatever he might be saying aloud, but Prue could see more than that in his eyes. Lucy did not love him and he had no hope that she ever would, except as a friend. Did Lucy know how he felt? Had she guessed long ago, or had he somehow managed to hide it from her? That Prue couldn't guess, but his eyes had a melancholy resignation; a sadness which had accepted the way things Were.

  Prue ran a shaking hand over her ruffled red hair, trying to think of something to say, but she couldn't get a word out except a whispered,

  'Sorry, Dad.'

  He knew she meant more than a simple apology for having upset Mrs Killane, but all he said, rather gruffly, was, 'Don't say that to me—say it to Mrs Killane!'

  Prue turned, the words on her lips, but Lucy Killane shook her head, smiling at her wistfully.

  'It's all right, Prue, no need to say it, I understand . . . she was your mother, of course you were upset. In your place, I'd have felt the same, and I'm not angry, although it wasn't true, any of it! I'm just sad for her, and for you, too. It can't have been easy for you, coping with all that while you were so young, but don't forget how sick she was. I don't suppose she knew what she was saying half the time.'

  Prue gave a long sigh and nodded.

  It had been a relief to her when Harry appeared and her mother married him; Harry had taken some of the weight off her own shoulders and she had been grateful to him, but her mother had never really been a happy woman and she hadn't put her bitterness behind her. She had lived with the bad memories every day, and made Prue and Harry live with them, too.

  'She was sick,' Prue said, in wry forgiveness for her now, recognising how wrong she had been and yet how sad her life had been.

  'I was horrified when your mother accused me,' Lucy said, 'it wasn't true, not a word of it, but when she talked about me flirting with Jim, I found myself wondering if I unwittingly ever had ... if you smile at a man it can be misunderstood, can't it?' She gave Prue a rueful smile.

  'Well, you know that, Prue! Every woman does! We all know how easy it is to give a man the wrong impression.'

  Was she talking about Josh?
thought Prue, high colour rushing up to her face, but Lucy went on talking in a voice which held no double meanings.

  'Try to be friendly and some men will jump to the craziest conclusions, and I had a bad time for a while, wondering if I'd missed something. But Jim reassured me, he told me if was all in your mother's head, not his!' She smiled at him warmly as she added, 'That was a big relief!'

  'Well, thank you!' Jim Allardyce said cheerfully and Lucy laughed.

  'You know what I mean, Jim!'

  'Of course I do—I was only teasing,' he said, and Lucy smiled back at him, then her face sobered again.

  'With all this, I'd forgotten . . . Oh, Jim, have you heard? Such terrible hews . . . Prue's fiancé . . .'

  'Yes, Josh met me, he told me,' Jim Allardyce said, looking at his daughter anxiously. 'Prue darling, I'm sorry…'

  She had herself under control now; she felt oddly lighter, as though discovering the truth about her parents had lifted a weight from her.

  'Well, better that he should walk away now than after we were married,' she said lightly, her head held high, and her father's eyes searched her face for clues to what she was really feeling. Prue smiled at him defiantly.

  'That's my girl!' Jim Allardyce said with the gentleness she remembered from her childhood.

  'If only we knew where they had gone!' said Lucy, face bleak. 'You can't just walk in off the street and get married, even today. They would have to get a licence, make arrangements. Do you think they can be in London? Josh seems to think that's where they'd go. What do you think, Prue?'

  'Maybe,' Prue said wearily, wishing they would go because she didn't want to talk about it. 'David likes London; he's a big city boy, grew up in Sydney, lived there all his life. He loves the sea; he swims like a fish and surfs whenever he can, but apart from the beach he never cared for much for the countryside; I could see he wasn't much struck by Yorkshire while we were driving up here. It was too isolated for him. He prefers bright lights and having a good time, so I wouldn't be surprised if he hasn't headed back down south to London.'