Beaumont Brides Collection (92 page)

*****

‘Greg?’

‘What is it, Richard? I’m busy right now.’

‘Not too busy to hear this. I’ve had an extraordinary piece of luck.’

‘Really. Not too extraordinary I hope. I distrust luck that seems too fortuitous.’

‘Well, it wasn’t all luck. I had to work quite hard to get a result, but the thing is a girl I know is working for Jack Wolfe. Cleaning his apartment.’

‘Well, that is certainly interesting. Just how well do you know her?’

‘Well enough,’ he said, his voice laughing for the telephone, while his face remained totally impassive. ‘I just thought you’d like to know that if the need arises I’ll be able to get into Wolfe’s apartment.’

*****

A few mornings later Sharon took a detour on the way to their first job. ‘Where are we going?’ Melanie asked, surprised. Their time sheets were cut to the bone and even a quick stop to buy a bag of potatoes was asking for trouble.

‘We’re going to pick up Paddy’s kids from her mother-in-law.’ She said it aggressively, daring Melanie to make a fuss.

Paddy looked uncomfortable. ‘I’m sorry, Mel but she’s got a hospital appointment today and can’t take care of them.’

‘Don’t apologise to her,’ Sharon said, angrily. ‘She doesn’t know what day of the week it is.’

‘When I left home this morning it was Thursday,’ Melanie said, mildly before turning to Paddy. ‘What’s the matter with your mother-in-law?’

‘She needs a hip replacement. She’s been waiting months for an appointment to see the specialist. Heaven help me when she gets a date for the operation.’

‘Couldn’t you find a child-minder?’

‘What planet do you live on, girl?’ Sharon was clearly in no mood to take prisoners this morning.

‘Don’t tease her, Shar. She doesn’t understand.’

She? Girl? Whatever had happened to the two good-hearted women she worked with. ‘Hey, Paddy, Sharon I’m here. Talk to me, tell me what’s going on. Maybe I can help.’

‘You? What could you do?’

‘Unless I know the problem, nothing.’

‘Look, there’d be no point in working if we had to pay a child-minder,’ Sharon said. ‘We just don’t earn enough, okay?’

‘I was only-’

Paddy touched her arm. ‘Don’t worry about it, Mel. It’s not your problem.’

But it was clearly a problem for Paddy, a big problem. She was chewing her lower lip to shreds. ‘But if your mother-in-law is having a hip-replacement she’ll be out of action for weeks, months...’

‘I’ll sort something out. But today is difficult. It was short notice and there just wasn’t anybody I could ask. Just don’t say anything back in the office. All right?’

‘Why not? If Mrs Graham knew about your problems maybe she could do something to help. You can’t be the only one who has difficulties with child care.’

‘The only thing Mrs Graham would do,’ Sharon interjected, ‘is give Paddy the push. She’s already been warned once about bringing the children to work. And one warning is all you get.’

Mel was shocked. ‘You mean Mrs Graham has threatened to dismiss her?’

Sharon, realising that Melanie was so innocent it was almost painful, turned to Paddy with a grin. ‘Did Mrs Graham threaten to dismiss you, darling?’ she asked, in mocking mimicry of Mel’s perfectly rounded vowels.

Mel wasn’t offended; she knew she was out of her depth in this situation. ‘Is she crazy? You both work like heroes. She couldn’t afford to let you go.’

‘She hasn’t a clue, has she?’ Paddy said, indulgently.

‘Shouldn’t be allowed out by herself,’ Sharon agreed. Melanie looked from one to the other.

‘The girl before you had two children,’ Paddy continued, more gently. ‘One of them was taken ill at school and she had to leave a job and take her home. Her cards were waiting for her next morning.’

‘But that’s monstrous. You’ve got rights.’

‘Yeah, yeah. Sure,’ Sharon said. ‘Wash your mouth out with soap before you go back to the office, girl. Janet Graham can smell dirty words like “rights” on your breath.’

CHAPTER FIVE

JACK Wolfe stirred at the sound of a key in the lock. Caroline. He stifled a groan. Jetlagged and bone-weary from crossing the Atlantic three times in ten days, the idea of entertaining Caroline did nothing to revive him.

If she had been the kind of woman content to slip quietly into bed beside him, a warm, comforting body against his while he drifted in and out of sleep, he would have welcomed her presence. Just how unwelcome her presence was right now would have shocked her. It came as something of a surprise to him.

Beautiful, sophisticated, emotionally cool, Caroline had seemed until recently, his ideal lover. She had no use for meaningless declarations of love. She would much rather have a simple diamond pendant. And diamonds were so simple to give.

However he preferred a time and place of his own choosing, especially when, as on this occasion, he hadn’t had the time for an expedition to a jewellery store. He hoped the consolation of a week in the Caribbean would be sufficient recompense.

He rolled over and waited for her to bound up the stairs. Bound? Not quite the right word to describe the way Caro moved. Except perhaps when there was the prospect of some little treasure.

Well, she was beautiful and a man had to pay for his pleasures, one way or another.

But she didn’t bound, or even glide gracefully up the stairs. Instead she went into the kitchen and drew some water. He frowned. Miss Caroline Hickey made a virtue out of her lack of domesticity, a virtue he tended to encourage.

There were small noises from the living room as if she were moving about. He drew his brows together trying to work out what they could be. Then the strains of the Mozart Clarinet Concerto filled the room.

Caroline? Playing classical music?

Curiouser and curiouser. Wide awake now, he eased himself off the bed, wrapped a dressing gown about him and leaned against the polished rail, wondering what else she might do that was totally out of character.

Pour herself a large glass of Scotch, perhaps? Make a cheese and pickle sandwich?

No. Nor had she been making coffee. The water had been used to fill a tall jug with a bunch of bright yellow daisies which now stood on a low table behind the sofa. They looked perfect, a vivid splash of colour against the dark, heavy wood, the stark whiteness of the walls. Well, anything Caro did would make a perfect statement. But somehow he didn’t associate her with a flower as simple as the daisy.

A single spray of black orchids was more her style. And if he was any judge of human nature, she would expect to be the one on the receiving end.

Somewhat unnerved by this apparent shift in her values, he leaned over the rail to see what else she might be doing to surprise him and suddenly the yellow daisies made perfect sense. It was Wednesday. And it wasn’t Caro, but his very own Cinderella who had disturbed him, wandering around his apartment totally unaware that she was being observed.

He watched as she twitched the curtains into place, gathered up the things he had abandoned when everything had gone ballistic in Chicago and he’d had to chase across the Atlantic at a moment’s notice. A heavy glass, the brandy evaporated and sticky in the bottom, a book face down on the table where he had left it when the phone had rung late on Monday night.

She had her back to him, yet he knew she had turned the book over, was reading the blurb on the back. Then she flicked it open. Her spiky brown hair was tucked up into her cap and as she lowered her head to read, he was suddenly intimately acquainted with the smooth line of her neck as it curved into her nape.

The skin was smooth and white and his hand seemed to tingle with anticipation as, in his mind, his fingers stroked its sweet length before cupping it and turning her towards him so that her head fell back and thick dark lashes drifted down over her eyes as she offered her soft mouth to him.

His body stirred at the picture his mind was offering.

Dark lashes? Soft mouth? Where on earth had those images come from? His jet-lag must be worse than he thought.

Unaware that she was observed, or the effect she was having on her observer, she continued to read, so deeply engrossed in his book that for a moment he wondered if she might decide to stretch out on the sofa, put her feet up and settle down for the afternoon. The possibility of catching her out made him smile.

But no, after a moment she gave a little sigh, closed the book with obvious regret and put it away on the bookshelf. Then she saw the newspaper, folded back to the article featuring his latest corporate clean-up and thrown down on the sofa with his overnight bag.

It was a distorted view of what had happened to the company, dwelling on the pain rather than emphasising the gain. Typical of Greg Tamblin’s sneering style.

He was used to it and normally he didn’t care, or at least not enough to do anything about it. But as Melanie picked it up and saw the headline, his smile faded. He didn’t want her reading a piece of scurrilous journalism and taking it at face value.

‘I like the daisies, Miss Devlin,’ he said. ‘Where did they come from? Your garden?’

Melanie, believing herself to be quite alone and deep in contemplation of the article about Jack Wolfe, jumped spectacularly.

The paper flew out of her hands and landed in a mess at her feet and her heart, always in a bit of a dither when she let herself into Jack Wolfe’s apartment - desperately hoping that he wouldn’t be there, then disappointed when she got her wish - made up it’s mind and behaved like a high speed lift in a hurry to reach the penthouse.

Jack Wolfe, leaning against the polished chrome rail of the mezzanine, all black silk dressing gown and bare legs, was enough to make any girl break out in a dither.

‘I’m sorry, did I startle you?’ he enquired, with just a touch of malicious humour.

‘Startle me?’ she exclaimed. ‘You could have given me a heart attack.’

He gave her a cool, provoking look. It conveyed, without words, that in his opinion that such an event was unlikely this side of a thousand years. ‘I thought I heard the kettle,’ he said. ‘Is there any chance of a cup of tea?’

‘Well, you thought wrong,’ she declared, indignantly. ‘But if you’d like to make that an order?’

‘Consider it done,’ he snapped, irritated that she was always on the defensive, always hiding herself from him. Even now, the baseball cap shadowed her face.

Why on earth did she have to wear the ghastly thing the whole time? But as she crossed the living room, she suddenly stopped and looked up and he thought he saw a flicker of concern cross her features.

‘Are you sick?’ she asked.

‘Sick?’

She gestured vaguely at the rare disorder and said, ‘You’re not usually in bed at this time of day.’

‘Not usually,’ he agreed. ‘At least, not during working hours.’ And he discovered that he enjoyed the pink flush that darkened her cheeks as it suddenly occurred to her that there might be a quite different reason why he was in bed in the middle of the afternoon.

‘Is that one cup of tea?’ she enquired, tartly.

‘Unless you’d care to join me? It wouldn’t be the first time you’ve tested my bed springs in the line of work, would it?’

Christ! What on earth had made him say that?

Her lips parted on a little gasp of outrage and he waited for the torrent of abuse he had almost certainly provoked. Certainly deserved.

Her self-control was impressive although why she should bother when he deserved everything she might throw at him, verbal and physical, intrigued him. Impressive, but not easy.

Her fingers were curled up into tight little fists while she struggled to keep her tongue between her teeth. But he was right about the mouth. Soft, full lips. When had he noticed them? His memory, as if it had been waiting for just such a query, immediately supplied the moment. He had been showing her how the alarm worked and she had looked up at him...

‘How is your brother?’ she asked, so sweetly that she could have been trickled out of a spoon.

‘You haven’t seen him since the party?’ She didn’t bother to dignify that with an answer. ‘It was Tom who suggested I should employ you on a regular basis, you know. You made quite an impression on him.’

‘It wasn’t me. It was the hangover cure I gave him.’ She moved towards the hi-fi.

‘Don’t turn it off.’

‘It disturbed you.’

‘No, Melanie. You disturbed me.’ Rather more than she realized, although why, he couldn’t have said.

If she had gone out of her way to look unattractive she couldn’t have made a better job of it. Even the possibility of a decent figure was muffled by the awful uniform she wore. Only her eyes danced and shimmered, promising more. Much more.

And she had the kind of mouth that could give a man seriously sinful ideas.

But since she didn’t use so much as a trace of lipstick that clearly wasn’t her intent. Which begged the question - if he reacted like that when she wasn’t trying...

He stopped. Some questions were better left unasked. Some answers a man was better off not knowing.