No More Lonely Nights (6 page)

Or did he?

‘I’m dying to lie down and sleep my head off,’ he admitted with a self-deriding grin. ‘But I can’t do that until I’ve sorted this out. And that’s where you come in. Will you stay at my house with Annette tonight?’

Sian’s mouth dropped open. ‘At your house?’

‘If she’s urgently needed at the hospital she’ll have to have transport on hand and she doesn’t drive. If she stays at my house I can drive her to the hospital at once, without any delay in getting a taxi.’

Sian viewed him curiously. He was certainly clever. He had made that reasoning sound very plausible, but she suspected his motives all the same.

He met her eyes, his face darkly flushed, his jaw tensed. ‘Well? Will you? But if you do, I want your word that you won’t print a word about all this. Just for once in your life, act like a woman, not a reporter.’

‘I act like a woman most of the time,’ Sian threw back, herself flushing and resenting the way he’d talked.

‘Do you?’ He didn’t seem convinced, and his brows arched. ‘Well, act like one now. Forget that Annette is in the news. She needs your help. Don’t take advantage of that.’

‘I ought to slap you!’ Sian said, seething.

Suddenly he laughed, his face changing and a mocking amusement in his eyes. ‘I wouldn’t advise it. I’m bigger and tougher than you are.’

‘And less scrupulous, for all your talk about my lack of scruples!’ she accused him. He went on smiling down at her, but his eyes were narrowed and hard and watchful.

‘Will you stay, anyway?’ he asked, and she nodded, grimacing.

‘I suppose so. You can have it your way.’ She paused, eyeing him. ‘As usual,’ she added, and was furious when, instead of being angry, he grinned and looked pleased with himself.

‘No!’ Rick burst out, reddening, as soon as Cass suggested his plan. ‘Annette isn’t spending the night at your place. Over my dead body!’

Sian saw the look in Cass’s eye and interrupted before he could retort. ‘What does Annette think, though?’ she coolly asked, and they all looked at Annette, who seemed quite oblivious of what was going on, her face grey and drawn. She was standing there staring at nothing, but when Sian put an arm around her Annette started violently and looked at her in shock.

‘What?’

Sian gently repeated the suggestion that they should both spend the night at the Cassidy house. ‘It isn’t far from the hospital and if…if we had to get back here in a hurry…’

‘I could drive you,’ Cass said when Sian paused and looked at him.

Annette didn’t even glance at him. She just nodded. ‘Thank you.’

Rick frowned. ‘Annette, wouldn’t you rather go to a hotel or…’

‘Be practical,’ Cass interrupted curtly. ‘At this hour no hotel would take you in. You have no luggage and you look as if you’ve been dragged through a hedge backwards.’

Rick glared. ‘She could stay at her father’s house.’

‘If she needed to get back here in a hurry she would have to get a taxi, and it’s much further away, too. My house is six minutes from here—her father’s is at least twenty minutes away, and if she had to get a taxi that could treble the time involved.’

Annette didn’t seem to be listening to their heated argument; she stood there with hanging head, hands slack at her side, body trembling slightly. Sian was worried about her. She must be exhausted; emotionally and physically drained. She looked impatiently at the two men. They were supposed to care about the girl. Why were they fighting over her instead of looking after her?

‘Can we go?’ she broke in sharply. ‘Annette ought to be in bed.’

The men looked at Annette then, and Rick bit his lip and put his arm around her. Annette gave a sigh and leaned on him, closing her eyes. Cass turned away.

‘I’ll get the car and pick you up outside.’

He spun around and walked away rapidly. Sian stared after him, her brows together. Had it hurt to watch Annette cling to Rick? It must have done, of course, but William Cassidy was a strong man. He would handle his emotional scars, human beings did. Sian made a face, remembering her own pain not so long ago. It hadn’t been quite as deep or as agonising as this situation must be to William Cassidy, but it had been bad for a while and she had come through it. Not that William Cassidy would thank her for telling him that, at the moment. People hated you if you said something about time healing all wounds. You couldn’t blame them. Clichés were infuriating when you were hurting badly.

She almost fell asleep in the front seat of the limousine. It glided so smoothly, almost silently, through the warm night, and nobody spoke a word all the way to Cass’s house.

When they pulled up at the end of a winding drive, in front of a big house whose facade she could barely see in the darkness, Rick helped Annette out and Sian stood waiting while William Cassidy unlocked the front door.

‘If you want a room you’re welcome to stay,’ he told Rick, who reacted as if he had been stung.

‘No, thanks!’

He kissed Annette, who looked up at him helplessly. ‘You aren’t going?’

‘I’ll stay with an old friend. See you tomorrow.’ Rick turned and looked at Sian. ‘You will take care of her?’

She nodded. ‘I promise. She’ll be safe while I’m around.’

Rick turned on his heel and walked away, his feet crunching on the gravelled drive, his shape soon swallowed up in the shadows of the trees lining the drive.

‘I’ll take you straight upstairs,’ Cass said, switching on the hall light. Annette blinked and gave a stifled sigh, looking around the elegant place with hunted eyes. She had fled all this, but fate had dragged her back.

She had been here before, she knew the house, but Sian didn’t, and in spite of her weariness she couldn’t help feeling curious and staring around her as they followed William Cassidy upstairs.

He opened a door and gestured. ‘I leave it up to you—you can either share this room, or one of you can sleep here and the other sleep in the room next door.’

Sian looked at Annette questioningly. ‘What do you want to do?’ The room had twin beds in it; it was spacious and beautifully furnished. She would have been quite happy sharing it with Annette, but the other girl shook her head in a tired, indifferent way.

‘I’d rather be alone for a while.’ She walked slowly into the room and shut the door on them. Sian frowned, and looked at Cass.

‘Should we leave her alone?’

‘It might be the best thing for her,’ he said, frowning too, his lean face shadowed by stubble and his eyes hooded by weary lids. ‘Come and see the other room.’

It was smaller, but charming: all gold and cream with brocade curtains and French period furniture, a deep-piled carpet, a bed which Sian looked at yearningly.

‘I hope you’ll be comfortable,’ William Cassidy said, and she pulled a face at him.

‘Tonight I could sleep on the floor.’

He laughed then. ‘You won’t have to—there’s a bathroom en suite, of course, through that door, and that opens out into Annette’s room, if you want to check on her during the night.’ He fingered his chin, staring down at her and smiling crookedly. ‘I think you may even find something to wear in the chest of drawers. This was my sister’s room. She got married last year, but she didn’t take all her things with her. Quite a few clothes still seem to be around. I’m pretty sure there’s a nightie in one of the drawers.’ He paused. ‘I’d better see if Annette needs anything, too.’

‘I’ll do that,’ Sian said quickly, and was given a slanted glance. His mouth was grim.

‘Very well. Goodnight.’

The door closed with a snap. He hadn’t liked it when she had insisted on dealing with Annette, she realised. Well, it had been his idea that she should come here; Rick trusted her to keep William Cassidy away from Annette, and she was going to protect the girl if she could. Annette had been through enough already today. Sian would never have acted the way Annette had; but she still felt sorry for her.

She felt a little odd, rummaging through drawers full of his sister’s belongings. From what Rick had said, Magdalena Cassidy would have been indignant if she knew that a stranger, and a common reporter at that, was fingering these delicate, delicious, dreamy concoctions of satin, silk and lace, which must have cost the earth.

Surely the girl hadn’t forgotten them? Or was she so wealthy that she didn’t miss them and had another room full of such things in her new home? Rick had said she had married a wealthy man. Sian drew a filmy nightie out and gazed at it enviously. Lucky Magdalena. Sian could only afford nylon.

She threw the nightie over her arm and went to see if Annette was still awake. The room was in darkness and there was no sound from the bed when Sian whispered, ‘Annette? Are you OK?’

Sian hesitated, though. She tiptoed over to check that Annette was actually there and saw the other girl’s white face; a blur in the shadows. Annette had her eyes shut. She must have lain down fully dressed under a quilt, and she was breathing so quietly that Sian thought she might already be asleep. Well, she had had so many shocks today; she might have keeled over and fallen into a weary sleep. Sian tiptoed back to the door and returned to her own room.

She washed in the en-suite bathroom and put on Magdalena Cassidy’s enchanting nightie, a floating creation of blue satin and lace by Janet Reger. She combed her hair and yawned, climbing into bed a moment later. She switched out the light and her eyes closed gratefully, only to open not long after-wards when she heard a creak on the landing outside the room.

Sian tensed, listening hard. Another creak, the rustle of someone’s clothes. Was that Annette? Or was William Cassidy creeping past her room, and, if so, where was he going?

In a flash, she was out of bed and across the room. It was dark on the landing outside, but she saw a shadowy movement outside Annette’s door. Sian did not want to wake the girl; she dared not make too much noise, so she hurried silently towards the shape she saw vanishing into the next room.

She caught up with him before he reached the bed, and grabbed his shoulder. He stiffened, spinning to face her.

‘Outside!’ Sian hissed, her eyes on the bed. Annette’s face was buried in her pillow now; only her hair was visible, a drift of darkness on the white sheet.

William Cassidy hesitated, his own eyes on the bed, and Sian tugged at him, glaring.

‘You shouldn’t be in here,’ she whispered. ‘What do you think you’re doing?’

At that he strode away, and she followed, softly closing the door behind her. He turned on her then, his face pale with temper.

‘Who the hell do you think you are, talking to me like that in my own house?’ His eyes flashed; she remembered Annette saying that he was like lightning ripping up the sky. That was how he looked now, those grey eyes violent, his tall body vibrating with a powerful tension.

‘Sorry, but you asked me to look after Annette, and that’s what I mean to do,’ Sian said, hoping she didn’t show how nervous he made her feel.

‘I was making sure she was sleeping,’ he said through his teeth.

‘Don’t you think I’ve checked? If she woke up and saw you by her bed she might have hysterics. She’s had enough for one day, leave her alone.’ She stood outside the room, her head thrown back, her eyes firmly meeting his. ‘Go back to bed or do I have to sit in there all night?’