‘That’s nice,’ she said non-committally. ‘Grandfather, would you—would you mind if I went to see Aunt Madge and Uncle Hector for a few days?’ Her expression was deliberately bland.
He bit into a slice of buttered toast. ‘After Quinn and Marni have gone, you mean,’ he nodded.
‘Well, actually,’ she avoided his gaze, ‘I thought I might go—tomorrow.’ Colour heated her cheeks.
He straightened slowly. ‘That wouldn’t be very polite, darling,’ he reproved.
She moistened her lips. ‘Perhaps not, but it might be more—prudent,’ she advised ruefully. ‘And you know Aunt Madge and Uncle Hector are always inviting me. I’m sure they would love to have me for a visit.’
‘I’m sure they would too, but—’ His eyes narrowed. ‘Did Quinn wait up for you last night? He said something about not being able to sleep, and so I told him to make free with the library…’
Her mouth twisted. ‘From what I could tell he made pretty free with your whisky too!’
Her grandfather frowned. ‘After the tension and exhaustion of the concert I’m sure he needed it,’ he dismissed. ‘He didn’t “make free” with anything else, though, did he?’
Her eyes flashed. ‘Really, Grandfather, your subtlety leaves a lot to be desired lately!’
‘Well?’
She carefully put down her cup in its saucer. ‘I do not spend the evening with one man and the night with another,’ she bit out in a controlled voice.
‘You haven’t spoken to Giles yet?’ He frowned his disapproval.
‘No,’ she snapped. ‘And I don’t intend to while your guest remains here! Really, Grandfather,’ she stood up agitatedly. ‘Can’t you see that I just don’t like the man, that it would have been better for all of us if you had just let him leave today as planned?’
‘I like him, Lissy,’ he sighed.
She felt guilty as he called her by the only shortened version of her name he had ever used, knowing how disturbed he must be to have used it at all. ‘Then let me go to Aunt Madge and Uncle Hector,’ she encouraged desperately.
‘If it’s what you want,’ he accepted heavily. ‘Although I don’t know what we’ll tell our guests.’
She gave a tight smile, utterly relieved that he had agreed to let her go. ‘Just leave that to me,’ she assured him.
‘Elizabeth—’
‘It will be all right.’ She patted his hand, her smile bright now that she was to be allowed to escape from this impossible situation. ‘We’ll just tell the Taylors that my plans to leave for Portugal tomorrow were made weeks ago,’ she dismissed. ‘They can’t possibly feel slighted by that.’
Her grandfather rubbed his hand consideringly across his chin. ‘I suppose not,’ he finally agreed. ‘But I can’t say I approve of your behaviour, darling.’
‘I—’
‘Good morning, everyone,’ Marni breezed lightly into the room. ‘Isn’t it a glorious day?’ she enthused as she helped herself to food from the platters. She grinned self-consciously as she sat down opposite Elizabeth’s grandfather, her plate piled high with bacon and sausages and mushrooms. ‘I don’t know why, the air is much fresher and cleaner where we live in the mountains, but I can’t seem to stop eating over here.’
‘Maybe it’s the way Cook prepares the food.’ Elizabeth smiled indulgently, knowing she was going to miss this endearing little imp. It was a pity Marni happened to be Quinn’s daughter; she would have liked to spend more time getting to know her. Her relationship to Quinn made that impossible.
‘Maybe.’ Marni tucked in with enjoyment. ‘Was that a swimming pool I could see out of my bedroom window this morning?’ she asked excitedly, once her initial hunger had been appeased. She was cool and pretty in the yellow sun-dress, her perfume light and elusive.
That perfume. Elizabeth would know it anywhere ; it was her own favourite daytime perfume. And Marni was wearing it. Quinn had bought the perfume for his daughter!
She should have known, should have guessed it wouldn’t suit any of the women he was reputed to date, all of them too sophisticated for the lightly elusive perfume. He had deliberately let her believe he had bought it for one of his women!
Or had she just presumed that, and he had chosen to let her go on believing it, deliberately teasing her!
‘Elizabeth?’
She blinked dazedly as she realised Marni was still waiting for her to answer her question, colour heating her cheeks as she saw her grandfather’s searching gaze on her.
‘Yes, we have a pool,’ she replied harshly in her agitation. ‘It’s rarely used, though,’ she frowned.
‘Oh.’ Marni looked disappointed.
She smiled at the younger girl’s expressive face. ‘Which isn’t to say it can’t be used,’ she added gently, rewarded by Marni’s excited smile.
‘Ooh, great.’ Marni began to eat with enthusiasm once again.
‘But you’ll have to wait until that breakfast has gone down, young lady,’ Elizabeth’s grandfather sternly warned the younger girl.
‘Wait for what?’
Elizabeth turned sharply at the mild query; she just couldn’t help herself, looking at Quinn with guarded eyes.
The last time she had seen him he had taunted her about wanting him, and as she witnesssed how ruggedly attractive he looked this morning she knew the accusation had been true. How could he still look so handsome to her when she knew the truth about him!
He oozed sexuality without even trying, dark and virile after the shower he seemed to have taken since his horse-ride, his hair brushed back damply, a light blue shirt and faded denims moulded to the hard muscles of his body. He might spend a lot of time in a recording studio working on the albums he put out half-yearly, might have cut down on the actual public appearances he did now, but he had certainly found some other way to keep fit.
But he looked tired today, evidence that he had spent what had been left of the night after they parted as restlessly as Elizabeth.
‘The estate has a pool, Daddy,’ Marni was the one to answer him exictedly. ‘We’re all going to have a swim once our breakfast has gone down.’
Elizabeth’s eyes widened in protest as she registered the statement. ‘Oh, but I—’
‘Sounds like a good idea,’ Quinn drawled as he strode lazily into the room. ‘I think I’ll join you two ladies,’ he murmured, his gaze fixed challengingly on Elizabeth.
What was he doing? They had nothing left to say to each other after last night, had said it all then, and yet the mockery in his eyes dared her to go swimming with him and Marni.
Last night she had told this man she hated him, had explained exactly why she felt that way; he couldn’t expect the two of them just to carry on today as if nothing had transpired between them to change their roles of polite hostess and guest!
But looking at him now, as he sat down beside his daughter to eat his breakfast, still looking up at her challengingly, she knew that was exactly what he intended doing!
CHAPTER EIGHT
‘SHE swims well, doesn’t she?’ Quinn gazed proudly at his daughter as she swam several laps of the pool. ‘She would like an outside pool at the house,’ he shrugged. ‘But it wouldn’t be all that practical when we’re surrounded by snow six months of the year.’
‘Quinn, what are you doing?’ she demanded harshly.
Against her better judgement she had been persuaded by Marni to join them at the pool, and had instantly found herself alone with Quinn as Marni dived smoothly into the clear warm water.
Quinn had calmly offered her a glass of the cooled lemonade that had been brought out for their enjoyment, and within seconds she found herself lying on the lounger beside his.
From his conversation he was determined to act as if nothing had changed between them, but she couldn’t be that sophisticated!
He turned to her with raised brows. ‘I thought I was talking about Marni,’ he drawled.
‘Why?’ she choked.
He shrugged. ‘If you
don’t agree with me about Marni’s swimming, then just say so,’ he said.
Just being here with him like this disturbed her. The blue bathing trunks he wore were almost indecent in their lack of material, and from the way his body seemed to be tanned all over he didn’t always bother with those! She didn’t want to be disturbed by his raw masculinity, but she couldn’t seem to help herself.
‘Why are you talking about Marni at all?’ she said agitatedly. ‘You have to realise that neither one of us is really interested in how well she swims!’
‘I’m sorry you feel that way,’ he murmured. ‘I thought you liked Marni.’
‘I do!’ she snapped impatiently. ‘But you and I have nothing left to say to each other!’
He calmly took a sip of his lemonade, the ice cubes clinking against the side of the frosted glass. ‘We have plenty left to say to one another,’ he told her softly, his gaze suddenly intent. ‘And when you’re prepared to listen, when you want to know, I’ll tell you,’ he said intently. ‘But in the meantime,’ he added briskly. ‘Isn’t the weather pleasant for this time of year?’
She gave a heavy sigh. ‘It isn’t going to work, Quinn.’
He raised his brows. ‘What isn’t?’ he enquired mildly.
‘This,’ she sat forward. ‘Why on earth did you accept my grandfather’s invitation when you know how much I want you gone from here?’
He shrugged. ‘Although you may not believe this right now,’ he murmured, ‘I don’t plan my life around tormenting you!’
‘I don’t believe it,’ she rasped.
Quinn sighed. ‘Lise, I had no way of knowing who you were when I arranged to come here.’ He ignored the way she flinched at the use of Fergus’s name for her. ‘God, I still didn’t recogise you completely when I first met Elizabeth Farnham. All I knew was that you struck a chord in my memory. A pleasant chord,’ he added softly.
‘What a pity I can’t remember the incident the same way,’ she snapped scornfully.
His expression was gentle. ‘You enjoyed the kiss we shared as much as I did,’ he chided.
‘I barely remember the kiss,’ she lied. ‘It’s completely overshadowed by what came later.’
‘By what you think came later,’ he corrected.
‘I heard what came later,’ she reminded him harshly. ‘I suppose it must hint at some sign of decency on your part that you arranged to leave the next day rather than continue your sordid little affair under my aunt and uncle’s roof,’ she scorned. ‘It might have been a little difficult for Terri to claim I prevented her going to Fergus’s every night of your stay with us by being such a pest as to stay awake!’
‘You did have your ear pressed against the door that night, didn’t you,’ Quinn derided.
‘In her haste to get into bed with you Terri didn’t close the door properly behind her!’ she defended.
‘And I left the next day because my wife of the last ten years had filed the divorce papers while I was conveniently out of the country,’ he revealed bleakly. ‘She threatened to take my daughter away from me unless I gave her everything she asked for in the settlement.’
Elizabeth looked at him without sympathy. ‘And what did she ask for in the settlement?’
He gave a harsh laugh. ‘Everything but the clothes I stood up in!’
‘"A woman scorned”,’ Elizabeth mocked.
His eyes flared with anger. ‘I told you I was always faithful to my wife.’
‘Then why did she leave you?’ she asked.
‘She didn’t leave me,’ he ground out. ‘I left her. I—’
‘Hi, you two,’ Marni leant her arms on the edge of the pool as she gazed up at them, her hair slicked back darkly as water fell in rivulets down her face and body. ‘Aren’t you coming in?’
‘Soon,’ her father answered her. ‘Li—Elizabeth and I are just talking.’
She gave them a speculative look. ‘Oh, sure!’ She gave a mischievous grin before turning back into the water, moving off with powerful strokes.
Quinn drew in a ragged breath as he watched her. ‘She isn’t mine.’
Elizabeth’s eyes widened at the painfully made statement, meeting his gaze frowningly. He couldn’t really have just said—it wasn’t possible that—Marni obviously adored her father! He couldn’t have meant what she had thought he had!
He turned to her with dark eyes. ‘She isn’t mine, Lise,’ he repeated raspingly. ‘I was with Maggie all through the pregnancy, watched Marni being born, changed her diapers as often as Maggie did,’ he remembered ruefully. ‘It was me she walked to when she took her first steps; “Daddy” was the first word she spoke. I loved her so much, was so proud when people commented that they could see this or that likeness between us.’ He shook his head emotionally. ‘How Maggie must have secretly laughed every time someone said something like that,’ he rasped. ‘Marni isn’t a damned bit like me—because she isn’t my daughter!’
Elizabeth just looked at him, not knowing what to say, realising there was nothing she could say.
‘Nearly seven years ago,’ he spoke flatly now, ‘Marni was involved in an accident, she needed a blood-transfusion. I—I offered them my blood,’ his face was bleak as he relived the memory. ‘Do you know what they said?’ he rasped, his eyes full of pain. ‘They said that my blood wasn’t compatible with Marni’s, but that it wasn’t surprising as I wasn’t her real father. Marni was growing weaker by the moment and there wasn’t a damned thing I, the man who couldn’t possibly have fathered her, could do about it!’ he groaned. ‘They took the blood from the supplies they already had, and Maggie explained to me that the man who had been my bass guitarist when I first started out had fathered Marni. I remembered him then, a silver-haired kid who believed the world could be his if he wanted it! Well he certainly had my wife,’ he stated bitterly. ‘Although, apparently, he wasn’t unique in that!’
Elizabeth swallowed hard. It was nothing like her own situation; there had been no loving father, even one that wasn’t really her own, in her life. And yet she suddenly felt a deep affinity with Marni. She tried not to feel anything at all for Quinn, knowing she couldn’t even afford to give him pity.
‘Does Marni know?’ she prompted.
He shook his head. ‘She’s never going to, either,’ he bit out. ‘In every way that matters I am her father; I just no longer have a wife. Hell, I might even have been able to forgive Maggie if she had come and told me the truth when she first discovered she was pregnant. But I could never forgive all those years she let me go on believing a lie. And I guess she showed what was really important to her when she exchanged her daughter for money and property.’
Elizabeth moistened her lips. ‘If even Marni doesn’t know the truth, why—why did you tell me?’
He sighed. ‘Maybe I’m trying to explain to you what frame of mind I was in when I came to London six years ago, trying to make you realise how I—’
‘You expect me to excuse your behaviour with Terri because your marriage had broken down and you didn’t give a damn who you hurt?’ she said incredulously.
‘I’m not talking about Terri at all!’ he dismissed harshly. ‘Forget about Terri. I want—’
‘I can’t forget about Terri,’ she shook her head. ‘I could never forget about you and her.’
‘There never was any me and her.’ His voice rose angrily. ‘I’m talking about you and me here!’
‘You and me?’ she echoed disbelievingly. ‘Come on, Quinn, a birthday kiss for an impressionable seventeen-year-old doesn’t add up to any you and me!’
‘It was the kiss that came after the birthday kiss that’s important,’ Quinn rasped. ‘I was disgusted by my behaviour with a kid that didn’t look much older than my own daughter—’
‘And so you took up Terri’s offer—once again,’ she scorned, standing up. ‘Thanks for telling me all this, Quinn—and your relationship to Marni will go no further than me—but none of this changes how I feel about you,’ she dismissed. ‘You’re a sel
fish, egotistical swine who helped force Fergus to his death.’
‘No!’
‘Yes.’ She didn’t back away from him as he stood up to tower over her. ‘Thankfully, after tomorrow, I don’t have to see you again,’ she added with satisfaction.
His brows rose. ‘But I accepted your grandfather’s invitation to stay on,’ he reminded softly.
‘And I’m going to stay with my aunt and uncle,’ she announced triumphantly, feeling immensely satisfied as he frowned darkly.
‘No!’ he finally rasped.
‘Oh, yes,’ she nodded firmly. ‘And I won’t be returning until after you have left. Would you like me to say hello to my aunt and uncle for you?’ she added harshly. ‘They still think you’re Mr Wonderful!’
‘I expected to see them while I was here,’ he sighed wearily. ‘My lawyer never mentioned that they had moved.’
‘Maybe he didn’t think you were interested,’ she said.
Quinn’s mouth tightened. ‘Oh, I was interested, I just didn’t want to bring back any painful memories by— Your running away won’t solve anything,’ he warned harshly.
‘I’m not running, Quinn,’ she bit out coldly. ‘This time I am walking.’
She didn’t expect him to try and stop her as she left the pool area, and he didn’t. They had finally said all that needed to be said.
She did feel for him over the shock he must have received when he learnt of Marni’s true paternity, knew her own situation had been slightly reversed, but the shock of finding out who her father was at that late stage in her life couldn’t have been so different from Quinn learning he wasn’t Marni’s father after all.
But none of that excused his behaviour with Terri!
‘It’s a bit sudden, isn’t it, darling?’ Giles complained.
She had driven over after lunch to tell him about her planned visit to her aunt and uncle, deciding not to wait until tonight to see him after all. ‘Not really,’ she dismissed. ‘I’ve been meaning to go for some time.’
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