Persuade Me (12 page)

Chapter Twenty-Three

Fingers of sunlight crept into the room through tiny chinks above the heavy chintz curtains. Anna, already awake, watched them steal along the floral border at the top of the wall, then fade as clouds passed over. Rain was forecast for later – why not get up and enjoy the best of the day?

She’d slept soundly; no doubt the wine had helped. And the sight of Charles and Mona heading for their room last night, arm in arm, had reassured her that they were at least making an effort. As the evening wore on, James too had rallied; once he’d weaned himself off Leonard Cohen and allowed her to finish her sentences, he’d proved surprisingly good company.

She shut her mind to Rick’s behaviour. Time enough to analyse that when she’d got through this weekend.

A quick shower, then on with jeans, a jade-green, long-sleeved T-shirt and a black jacket, and she was ready to blow the cobwebs away. No one at Reception; but, after all, it was only quarter to eight on a sleepy Saturday in October. Outside, not a soul about; and in the distance the sea, a gunmetal gleam on the horizon. She went down the hill towards it and felt her spirits lift at the sight of the Cobb, shimmering mirage-like in the pastel sun. The breeze ruffled her hair and stung her lips with salt.

She remembered coming here as a child with her mother, usually on day trips; hunting for fossils, visiting the Philpot museum, watching the toings and froings on Victoria Pier. Once they’d stayed for a whole month, holidaying with Stephanie Elliot, the widow of one of Walter’s distant cousins, and her silent son, William. And now that Anna was here again, in the chill of an autumn morning, she felt the loss in her life all the more keenly. Her childhood, when fairy-tale endings were a given. Her mother, the woman she’d adored. And Rick …

Through the park, past the row of pretty painted cottages – sugar-almond pink, cream and blue – and the little harbour was in front of her. It was bustling even at this time of year, so she made for the Cobb, curving emptily into the sea under the screaming gulls. Now she had a choice: walk along the top level, exposed to the elements, or take the more sheltered lower path that hugged one side. She chose the top level, daunted at first by its sloping surface; as a child, hadn’t she skipped along here without a second thought? Smiling at the memory, she lifted her chin and stretched out her arms like a plane, feeling the full force of the wind.

And then, some yards in front, the lone figure of a man appeared at the top of the steps leading from the lower path. She studied him with mounting resentment as he walked ahead of her. What right had he to be here, spoiling her view and her solitude? Begrudgingly, she lowered her arms, tucked her hands into her pockets and followed him in a more sedate fashion to the furthest point.

When he turned, she was only a few steps away and ready with a brusque, Good morning. But the words died in her throat. This man – it was like looking at her father! Of course, he
wasn’t
her father; far too young, and with more interested eyes. She gave an embarrassed half-smile, averted her gaze and dodged past him to avoid speaking; then went as near to the end of the Cobb as she dared, keeping her back to him. When at last she risked a look round, she was relieved to see him walking briskly away.

Silly to let the stranger unsettle her; but she waited a good ten minutes before returning. This time she opted for the lower path, before skirting round the beach with its gaily coloured huts and neatly demarcated areas of gravel and sand. As she climbed the road up through the town, she felt the first spots of rain.

At the hotel, she went straight to the dining room – and immediately stopped in the doorway. The only person there – sitting in the deep bay of the window, reading a newspaper wedged between a portly silver teapot and an arc of pink orchids – was Rick.

She wondered briefly what sort of mood she’d find him in today; then squared her shoulders, and made for the vacant chair at his table for two.

Chapter Twenty-Four

Rick glanced up from his paper, thinking it was the waitress with his cooked breakfast. Saw instead a slim figure in tight-fitting jeans, hair tousled and face glowing from the morning breeze. Felt a jolt in his chest …

She slipped off her jacket and hung it on the back of the chair opposite him.

‘It would look odd if I sat somewhere else,’ she said, in that low, husky voice. ‘Odd to Mona and Charles, I mean – although somehow I don’t think they’ll be down for a while.’ A pause. ‘Is anything the matter?’

With an effort, he switched his stare from her to the window beside him; in the distance, sea and sky were one, a soft blur as grey as her eyes …

He made an attempt at normal conversation. ‘Didn’t you get wet out there?’

‘The rain’s only just started.’ Out of the corner of his eye, he watched the graceful turn of her neck as she followed his gaze. She went on, ‘No view now. An hour ago, it was spectacular.’

He cleared his throat. ‘They should change the name of this place, then. How about the Occasional Cobb View Hotel?’

She grinned. ‘Or the Cobb View If You’re Lucky?’

He laughed, and their eyes met. In a sudden slip of time, he was back on the boat with her, off the coast of France. A rush of tenderness, the words on the tip of his tongue – Remember that view, the morning after our first night together? He took a deep breath, readied himself to speak–

But then his full English arrived and, sensing the need for self-preservation, he launched himself into a flurry of activity. Straightened his cutlery, removed the newspaper, almost sent the orchids flying. The waitress fussed over him, bringing extra marmalade that he didn’t want, before taking Anna’s order.

By the time they were alone again, the moment for intimate reminiscences had passed.

Instead, he asked another question – one of several that had been playing on his mind for the past six days. ‘I heard you went out with Charles at university – when exactly was that?’

She gave him a wary look. ‘Why do you want to know?’

He could hardly say, ‘I’m trying to piece together the sequence of events ten years ago – Charles, your email, my letter.’ Especially if he couldn’t face the answer …

Dark feelings tightened their grip. Having breakfast with this woman was never meant to be like this, as stiff and soulless as an early-morning business meeting. It was meant to be as it had been on the boat: food as foreplay, an interlude between the fevered intensity of their nights and the slow burn of their afternoons on the sun-drenched deck …

He twisted his mouth into a smile and answered her question. ‘Just look at the poor sod. He must have been your ex for almost as long as I have, but he still can’t handle it. Do you think I should give him lessons?’

Silence, taut as a wire between them, while the waitress returned with Anna’s tea and toast. When she’d gone, Anna poured her tea and sipped it, eyes cool and reproachful over the rim of her cup. Even without that, he felt a complete bastard; hardly the thoughtful, kind man she’d said she was looking for last night – but why the hell should he care?

Except he did care; he just wasn’t sure how much.

‘I’m sorry,’ he heard himself mutter, ‘I don’t know what got into me.’

She avoided his gaze and concentrated on cutting her toast into neat halves. ‘What’s important is – it’s been over between Charles and me for years, and he accepts where his responsibilities lie.’

‘I believe you,’ he said quietly, ‘although I have to admit …’

He was about to apologise for his previous suspicions and tell her how fiercely Lou had defended her, when a man came in and sat at the next table. Rick cursed him under his breath and managed to refrain from pointing out that there were twenty other sodding tables to choose from. But then this man looked as if he always did just as he pleased; well-heeled, judging from his clothes, with a face like an impossibly youthful Sir Walter Elliot, smug and smooth and goading you to wipe the smirk off it. Most of all, Rick didn’t care for the way the stranger edged his chair nearer to Anna, at an angle which gave him a better view of her, and stared at her face as if in divine contemplation.

Anna hadn’t even noticed him. She clattered her cup down on her saucer and glared across the table – eyes dark now, like a storm at sea. One false move and you’d be swept overboard …

‘You can “have to admit” whatever you like, but it’s really none of your business, is it?’ Her icy tone made him flinch; but that was nothing compared to what happened next.

The stranger leaned over, laid his hand reverently on her arm and said, ‘Is this man bothering you, Anna? Just say the word and I’ll have him removed.’

Anna looked across into concerned blue eyes and felt the colour drain from her face. It was the man from the Cobb – and how on earth did he know her name?

Forget breakfast – after that little exchange with Rick, she had to get some time to herself and calm down. With a tight-lipped smile, she jumped to her feet and moved out of touching distance. ‘Thanks, it’s fine. I’ve finished here anyway.’ She snatched up her jacket and headed for the door.

‘Men!’ she hissed as she crossed Reception, avoiding the beady gaze of Mr Pargeter at the desk. Idiots, most of them. Especially Rick Wentworth – laughing with her one minute, condemning her the next.

‘Anna – wait!’

The stranger again, close behind her.

She whirled round, made her voice cold and imperious. ‘Do I know you?’ Then groaned inwardly as she realised how like Lisa she sounded.

Undaunted, the man went on, ‘Don’t you recognise me?’

His face lit up in a boyish grin and she let out a gasp. It was William, Stephanie’s son! Not surprisingly, he’d changed – grown tall, filled out – since their holiday here in Lyme Regis. She cast her mind back to the boy she’d got to know as the days dawdled by. At first he’d hardly said a word; later, he’d broken his silence to confide in her – about his mother, his detested soon-to-be-stepfather, Jeremy Dunne, and their plans to send him to boarding school. In this confident, almost brash man, she could see no trace of that vulnerable fourteen-year-old, anxious to please the girl who listened and smiled and shared a little of her boundless optimism.

And she couldn’t forget that this was also the man who’d left her sister high and dry a few years ago. They’d met through work – investment banking – and moved in together within a week. Anna, up against her PhD deadline and still smarting from a spectacular falling-out with Lisa, had never visited the happy couple in their ludicrously expensive Kensington apartment. Walter, on the other hand, had gone to London for frequent fawning sessions combined with mysterious appointments at a Harley Street clinic; while Mona – complaining bitterly about being trapped at Uppercross Manor with an unruly toddler – waited for an invitation that never came.

Around the same time, Cousin Archie dropped dead and Walter’s joy knew no bounds. He wasted no time in consulting
Burke’s Peerage & Baronetage
and announced triumphantly to anyone who would listen that William was now his nearest living male relative. Barring the inconceivable – Walter having a son and passing the title on through his direct male line – William would become the 9th Baronet; which meant that the future mistress of Kellynch would be none other than his favourite daughter, Lisa.

But William ruined all his plans by running off with a rich Texan divorcee. Lawyers were called in – at great expense – but could find no grounds for any charges. A stony-faced, stony-broke Lisa returned to Kellynch and Walter vowed he would stop William inheriting the title if it killed him. Anna had felt obliged to remind him that dying would simply hand William the baronetcy on a plate.

So it was very strange that William Elliot-Dunne should turn up again, apparently eager to renew a distant summer friendship with another member of the Elliot family. Anna didn’t know whether to smile back at him – or slap his face because of how he’d treated Lisa, however much she might have deserved it.

In the end she did neither, just gave him an appraising look. ‘What on earth are you doing here? Last I heard, you had a better offer and went to Texas.’

Under his tan she detected a faint flush, but his voice was calm and composed. ‘As you can see, I’ve come back to England – only last week, in fact. Spent a few days up on the Isle of Skye with my mother, until her bastard of a husband returned unexpectedly early from his business trip. Then I drove down here.’ He smiled – a smile of such brilliance that she blinked, momentarily dazzled. ‘I’ve been reliving that holiday we had, visiting old haunts, but I certainly didn’t expect to find
you
here, looking the very image of your beautiful mother.’

Her face grew warm under his gaze, and warmer still as she registered the compliment. But she wasn’t in the mood for flirtatious banter, however gratifying she might find the comparison with her mother.

She was edging away, anxious to get back to her room, when she heard Mr Pargeter call out in his unctuous way, ‘Good morning once again, Sir William. Anything else I can do for you?’

Sir
William? She turned swiftly to William and raised her eyebrows; but he simply grinned and tucked her arm through his.

‘Breakfast for two in my suite, Pargeter,’ he drawled. ‘Miss Elliot will be joining me.’ And he steered Anna firmly up the stairs.

She let her irritation show in her voice. ‘No thank you, I’ve had all the breakfast I want.’

But he just laughed. ‘Nonsense, all that sea air earlier must have made you ravenous. And we’ve got lots of catching up to do.’

‘Including how you’ve suddenly become a Sir.’

He put his finger to his lips. ‘Shh, don’t blow my cover, it works like a dream on people like Pargeter, every time.’

She couldn’t think what to say. She was struggling to make sense of this transformation from stuttering schoolboy to smooth operator. When they reached her landing she stopped, still undecided about breakfast. ‘Did you know who I was, when we met on the Cobb?’

He fixed those eyes on her and a shiver ran down her back. It really was as if her father was looking at her, with a degree of warmth that she hadn’t seen since her mother died. Then he shook his head. ‘I was struck by your likeness to Irina, but I didn’t want to say anything until I was sure – I’m not the sort that rushes into things. When I got back just now, I had Pargeter check the guest register. And there you were, the one and only Anna Elliot.’ He gave her arm a gentle tug. ‘Come on, let’s see who remembers the most about that holiday.’

She allowed him to guide her up a further staircase, past a sign saying ‘Presidential Suite Only’. To another landing, smaller but more opulent than the previous one; gold leaf in the wallpaper, crystal in the light fittings. Into a sitting room three times the size of her bedroom, with several doors off it, and tall windows looking out over the Jurassic Coast where they’d once hunted for fossils …

She was only sharing memories over breakfast, wasn’t she? And afterwards she’d probably never see him again.

So she shrugged off her doubts along with her jacket. Sank into the squashy embrace of a white leather sofa. And defied Walter’s lifetime ban on any further communication with William Elliot-Dunne.