‘But who was he?’
‘Rod Bartlett,’ Kathy revealed with trembling reluctance.
‘The film star?’ she was astounded at the idea.
‘He wasn’t then, at least only in a small way. He was just starting out, the parts he was being given getting better all the time. He used to live here, Keilly, don’t you remember?’ She didn’t wait for an answer but continued tautly. ‘That was how I became friendly with him in London. We were introduced at a party, one of those parties where everyone just turns up whether they’re invited or not. Rod found it amusing that we came from the same town and had never really known each other. He may never have realised I existed when he lived in Selchurch,’ she remembered bitterly. ‘But I certainly knew him. All the girls did; he was popular even then. I thought I was in love with him, and I believed he felt the same way,’ she blinked back the tears.
‘Yes?’ Keilly prompted, never having seen her cousin like this before.
Kathy moved restlessly to her feet, moving to stare sightlessly out of the window. ‘Isn’t it obvious?’ she rasped shrilly. ‘He seduced me by telling me he loved me, by making me believe we would get married.’ She breathed a ragged sigh. ‘I didn’t see him again for a few weeks after that, and then I heard—then I heard he had moved in with Veronica King,’ she revealed brokenly. ‘I wanted to die! Thank God nothing—came of our making love,’ she trembled. ‘Or I think I would have died.’
‘You mean a baby?’ Keilly gasped, paling.
Kathy’s hand shook as she moved it to her hair. ‘Yes. He didn’t use anything, and I—I suppose he assumed I was on the pill.’ She gave a harsh, humourless laugh. ‘I’m sure he didn’t intentionally run the risk of a paternity suit being brought against him,’ she derided bitterly, her gaze suddenly clashing with Keilly’s stricken one. ‘I’m sorry, love, but now you know why I’m not entitled to wear that white gown Mum insisted I buy, why I’m not a suitable wife for Peter.’
Keilly didn’t know what to say, what words of comfort could help her cousin through this crisis in her life. Kathy had only confirmed to her what she had known all her young life, men were takers, thought nothing of deliberately lying to get a woman into bed with them. Rod Bartlett was the one who should have felt guilty, not Kathy!
‘Sleeping with one man, because you thought you loved him, doesn’t make you promiscuous, Kathy,’ she spoke softly. ‘I’m sure Peter is understanding enough, mature enough, to realise that.’
Dark brown eyes shadowed over. ‘You think I should tell him?’
She shrugged. ‘He’s going to know tonight anyway,’ she sighed.
‘But I would be married to him by then!’
‘And guilt-stricken, as you are now,’ Keilly reminded gently. ‘You have to tell him, Kathy, and now, before the wedding this afternoon.’
‘So that he has a chance to back out,’ Kathy groaned miserably.
‘I’m sure he won’t do that.’ Peter Carmichael was one of the kindest, most understanding men Keilly had ever known, and he loved Kathy enough to forgive her anything.
‘Are you?’ Kathy said bitterly.
‘Darling, you were deceived,’ she soothed, feeling the elder one at that moment. ‘Rod Bartlett lied to you just to get you into bed with him. You can’t be punished for that.’
‘Do you really think Peter will see it that way?’ she asked uncertainly. ‘I couldn’t bear it if I lost him now.’
‘Talk to him,’ she encouraged, completely confident of Peter’s reaction.
Kathy had telephoned Peter and arranged to meet him immediately, and when Keilly saw the adoration glowing in Peter’s eyes as his bride walked down the aisle towards him she knew she had been right to trust in him, that he had understood.
The young couple had shared a very happy marriage the last six years, had five-year-old Heather as living proof of their love. That Rod Bartlett should now upset the even tenor of Kathy’s life again ten years after treating her so callously was despicable.
‘He may not even remember you—’
‘Is that supposed to console me?’ Kathy snapped. ‘Oh I suppose you’re right,’ she sighed. ‘Why should a man like that remember one little virgin he seduced ten years ago? But I remember him, Keilly, if he should remember me…’ she trailed off worriedly. ‘He could make things very uncomfortable for me.’
‘I’m sure Peter would stand by you, after all, he knows there was someone in your past.’
Kathy’s gaze was suddenly evasive. ‘Keilly, I—I never told him about Rod,’ she said in a rush. ‘He doesn’t know there was ever anyone else.’
‘But—’
‘I faked it,’ Kathy told her heavily.
‘F… faked it?’ she echoed dazedly.
Kathy’s beautiful face darkened with irritation. ‘It’s quite easy to do. And stop looking at me like that, Keilly,’ she flushed. ‘I couldn’t tell him. I met him that day, and the first thing he told me was how much he loved me, how proud he was that I was going to be his wife. I couldn’t tell him after that, I couldn’t lose his respect.’
‘But to pretend—! Kathy?’ She gave a pained frown.
‘I know, I know,’ her cousin sighed. ‘I’ve had to live with it for the last six years. Oh I didn’t think about it every day,’ she dismissed. ‘I’m not neurotic about it in that way. But I have had to live with my lie. It hasn’t always been easy. Peter is such a wonderful man, and I love him so much, but surely you can understand what it would do to our marriage if he knew I had surrendered myself to a man who probably doesn’t remember me among the hundreds of women who have shared his bed?’ She shuddered at the thought. ‘I won’t lose him or Heather because of one silly mistake in my past.’
‘Peter would never—’
‘No, he wouldn’t,’ Kathy agreed heavily. ‘But a scandal like that about his wife could force us apart. You know his family never really approved of him marrying the daughter of a local hotelier, and a lot of people in this town are just waiting for something like this to happen to our marriage.’
This was the real problem, of course. Peter’s family owned most of the town and surrounding land, and when Peter and Kathy had fallen in love nine years ago his family had far from approved of the match. Most of them now accepted the marriage, although as Kathy said, they were just waiting for her to make such a mistake. The fact that Kathy had once had an affair, no matter how briefly, with a ‘film star’ would certainly cause enough of a scandal to put severe strain on their marriage. Damn Rod Bartlett!
She shook her head. ‘I can’t say I approve of the fact that you lied to Peter,’ she said softly. ‘Although in a way I can understand it. But what are we going to do now?’ It was her turn for uncertainty. ‘What if Rod Bartlett does come back here?’
‘Maybe he won’t.’
‘But if he does?’
‘Couldn’t you ask this last reporter?’ Kathy frowned.
‘Rick?’ her mouth suddenly felt as dry as her throat, her voice coming out as a nasal rasp.
‘Mm,’ Kathy seemed unaware of Keilly’s unnatural pallor. ‘Maybe he’s heard something else since he’s been back in London. Why don’t you telephone him?’
Misery from the flu and the absence of Rick’s telephone call settled heavily on her shoulders. ‘I don’t have his number,’ she mumbled.
‘Oh,’ Kathy still seemed oblivious to Keilly’s feelings in her own disappointment. ‘Then I suppose we’ll just have to sit here and wait,’ she sighed.
‘Yes,’ she gave in to the urge to sneeze, burying her face in a fistful of tissues.
‘You poor love,’ her cousin sympathised, handing her the nasal spray. ‘I shouldn’t be bothering you with my problems when you’re like this. I’m sure it will all work itself out,’ she dismissed confidently.
But no matter how easily Kathy seemed to dismiss the subject of Rod Bartlett Keilly knew her cousin was more deeply affected than she cared to admit. And no wonder, with the admissions she had made! Kathy h
ad been very silly to deceive Peter the way she had, especially after deciding and intending to tell him the truth. For the last six years Keilly had thought the other woman had done exactly that, and it came as a shock to her after all this time to know that she hadn’t.
‘Why should he want to come here anyway?’ Kathy added crossly. ‘Selchurch is hardly teeming with the sort of excitement he’s used to,’ she derided.
She huddled down in the bed, beginning to feel ill again. ‘I think that’s his main reason; he’s taking a holiday, a quiet holiday, for the first time in five years. Let’s just hope he finds it boring and doesn’t stay long. Maybe you won’t even get to meet him! And the chances of him meeting Peter are highly unlikely, Peter’s always very busy on the estate.’
‘Yes,’ her cousin’s mouth quirked with taut humour. ‘I’ve had two lovers in my life, one a sex-symbol, the other a hard-working landowner,’ her voice broke emotionally. ‘God, what a mess,’ she groaned. ‘I just never imagined there was any possibility of Rod returning to Selchurch.’
‘Maybe my letter to the magazine had something to do with it,’ she grimaced.
‘Don’t be silly, love,’ Kathy laughed. ‘He wouldn’t be affected by one damning letter.’
‘I don’t think he gets many of them,’ she said dryly.
‘Probably not,’ Kathy pulled a face. ‘He’s a handsome devil with the charm of an angel. I know,’ she sighed, ‘that sounds contradictory, but not once you’ve met him, then you will understand.’
‘I have no interest in meeting a man like him,’ she replied indignantly. ‘His sort nauseate me.’
‘Oh, Keilly,’ her cousin gave a shake of her head. ‘I know you had a bad experience in your life, but if you ever met Rod…’
‘I told you I don’t want to meet him!’ her voice rose sharply. ‘And I hope you aren’t getting any silly ideas in your head either,’ she added tautly as she saw the faintly reminiscent look in Kathy’s eyes.
Kathy’s blush was almost one of guilt. ‘Of course not,’ she snapped, her unusually brittle behaviour not at all reassuring. ‘Oh for goodness’ sake, Keilly,’ she bit out as Keilly continued to look at her with suspicion. ‘You think I would risk my marriage for a man like that?’
‘No,’ she breathed her relief, Kathy’s almost dreamy expression of a few minutes ago having her worried for a while. But she wasn’t deceived by the other woman’s light dismissal of Rod Bartlett either; her cousin still had fond memories of the man, no matter how callously he may have treated her.
Just as she had fond memories of Rick Richards, and he had treated her just as casually. The fact that he hadn’t actually made love to her down on the beach was beside the point, they both knew she wouldn’t have refused him if he had pressed for her surrender, and although Rick couldn’t know it, for her to have done that would have broken a lifetime determination never to be any man’s playting. The fact that Rick had been gone now for three days without any word from him more than convinced her that she had been a fool about him.
As the days, and then weeks passed, with it came the conviction that she would never see him again, and then the suspicion that perhaps Barbie hadn’t just been the woman who occasionally found him work. Rick had tensed the moment he knew of the other woman’s telephone call, as if he hadn’t expected her to know where he was. And he had left as soon as he had spoken to the other woman, so perhaps Barbie was his wife?
The more Keilly thought about it the more she realised how he had changed when he knew about the call from the other woman, becoming almost—almost guilty in his actions. Surely only married men reacted that way when contacted by another woman like that, men with something to hide? She decided that the other woman had to be his wife, that she had only been a light diversion for him while he was away from London and his wife’s watchful eye.
It was hard to accept that, but after nine weeks went by without a single word from him, not even a Christmas card, she had to believe it. And it hurt. One day she had known him, one evening really, and yet he had made an impression on her previously untouched heart.
She mentally reprimanded herself for being so vulnerable, well aware, with her own fatherless background, ofthe fickleness of men. So she forced herself to settle down to the routine of her life before Rick came, her days spent behind the desk at the hotel, early evenings down at the beach, late evening spent reading a book or watching television. The thought of dating any of the local men didn’t interest her at the moment, none of them firing her imagination as Rick had.
The sea became her friend during those nine weeks, reminding her of Rick and the short time they had spent together, the challenge she made of the surging sea now, banishing Rick from her heart each time she battled the water that refused to be beaten. Maybe to Rick their meeting had all been a practised—and well-used—line, but he had been right to liken her to the untamed sea, and during those long lonely weeks since his departure her moods had become as erratic, calm and tranquil one moment, raging furiously the next. She knew she was impossible to live with, that the family treated her warily, and yet she couldn’t shake off her black moods of depression, knew that her anger was directed mainly at herself for falling for the seduction of such a man. She may have thought she had found someone special, but all she had found was a lonely husband away from home and looking for a little fun.
‘If you promise I won’t freeze to death I’ll join you.’
She looked up sharply from her sitting position on the sand, in the process of taking off her towelling robe ready for her evening swim. Rick stood several feet away, very like he had on the first and only other night they had ever met, although this time he wasn’t wearing the thick sheepskin jacket but a beach-robe similar to her own, his bare legs strong and tanned, covered with a fine sprinkling of dark hair. His beard was still neatly trimmed, although his hair had grown longer, giving him a more rakish air than ever. Lastly she looked at his face, blue eyes twinkling warmly, affecting her in spite of the logical warnings of her brain.
Although it seemed to her as if she had been staring at him for hours she knew her appraisal could only have taken a matter of seconds at the most, schooling her features to remain coolly uninterested. ‘I couldn’t promise you that,’ she returned distantly. ‘I haven’t been in myself yet.’
‘I could hardly believe it when your aunt told me you swim on evenings like this too!’
‘If it’s warm enough, yes,’ she said flatly.
Rick turned narrowed eyes out to the blue-grey sea. ‘It looks stormy tonight,’ he murmured, almost as if they had only spoken the previous evening and not weeks ago, feeling no awkwardness with her.
‘Yes,’ she agreed abruptly, although she knew from experience that didn’t necessarily mean the water would be icy cold.
The searching gaze returned to her composed features. ‘Like you,’ he added softly.
Her brows rose. ‘I’m perfectly calm,’ she replied coolly. ‘It’s so nice of you to pay us another visit, Mr Richards,’ she added politely. ‘When did you arrive?’
‘About ten minutes ago, I wanted to surprise you.’
Oh he had done that all right! She had begun to accept his absence from her life, not particularly willingly, but she had accepted it had all been a game to him. He had no right to come back here after all this time and act as if he had never been away!
‘Did you bring your wife with you this time?’ she enquired with sarcastic sweetness.
He looked startled, frowning his puzzlement. ‘Wife—? You think a wife is what kept me away from you all these weeks?’ He laughed triumphantly, moving forward to swing her up into his arms. ‘I don’t have a wife, Keilly. Only a woman who reminds me of the sea I love.’ He lifted her up against his body until her lips were on a level with his own, holding her effortlessly as he claimed her mouth with a sweet tenderness.
A familiar, and longed for, flood of emotions surged through her body, her arms going about his neck as her fingers bec
ame enmeshed in the dark thickness of his hair, its clean silky softness sensuous to the touch. Everything about this man was sensuous, the lean strength of his chest and arms, the stirring arousal of his thighs, the roughess of his bared legs as hers became entwined with his, but most of all the moistly firm lips devouring hers as if he never wanted to stop.
‘I missed you, Keilly,’ his gaze held hers as he breathed raggedly. ‘You frightened the hell out of me just now when you were so cold.’ He shook his head. ‘I’ve thought about you all the time I’ve been away; it’s been hell.’
‘Then you should have come back sooner.’ Sanity was returning slowly, and she struggled to be put down, feeling like a doll that had been picked up to be played with. Reluctantly Rick released her, although he didn’t move away, their legs still touching. Keilly stepped back awkwardly. ‘Shouldn’t you?’ her voice was brittle.
His gaze was gentle on her flushed face. ‘I was working, Keilly.’
‘Oh?’ She moved away from him completely, picking up her towel, more for something to do than any real need of it. ‘Where did you go?’ she mocked. ‘A steamy jungle somewhere? The North Pole? Deepest Africa?’ her voice had deepened with sarcasm. ‘It was somewhere where they didn’t have telephones, right?’ She scorned his omission to call her as he had said he would.
‘No,’ he answered quietly.
‘I know that,’ she said bitterly, her face averted. ‘So what are you doing back in Selchurch, Mr Richards? Are you on the trail of yet another story?’ she derided.
‘You know why I came back, Keilly.’
She feigned surprise. ‘I haven’t the faintest idea,’ she dismissed coolly.
A look of pain flickered in his eyes. ‘I’ve hurt you,’ he murmured regretfully.
‘Hurt me?’ Her eyes flashed, the colour of a storm-tossed sea. ‘Don’t be ridiculous, Mr Richards. I barely know you,’ her mouth twisted with scorn.
Still he didn’t move. ‘I didn’t telephone you because I thought it would just make things worse, for both of us.’
‘I don’t know what—’
Taming The Notorious Billionaire (HQR Presents) Page 4