Flirting With Danger. Kate Walker

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СКАЧАТЬ couldn’t believe her ears. Surely Evan didn’t actually intend to conduct a conversation about the weather?

      ‘And, of course, the light evenings are a real bonus.’

      ‘They certainly are.’ The darkly sardonic intonation in Evan’s voice grated on Catherine’s raw nerves.

      ‘Dad-’

      Belatedly she had caught on to the path Evan was following, the way his mind was working, and she tried to inject a note of warning into the single word, signalling to her father with her eyes as she did so. But Lloyd seemed oblivious to her concern.

      ‘Would you like a biscuit, Mr Lindsay?’ she asked, the words hissing from between clenched teeth as she turned a fulminating glare on him.

      ‘No thanks,’ he returned blithely. ‘But I would like an explanation.’

      ‘An explanation?’ Catherine’s father frowned his lack of comprehension.

      ‘Mr Lindsay seems to think that we’re hiding something, Dad. Either that or we’re quite unnatural simply because we happen to care about each other.’

      ‘But, Cathy, don’t you think—?’

      ‘No!’ With difficulty she stopped herself from screaming the word at him. ‘I don’t think we should give Mr Lindsay an explanation of anything—not that there is anything to explain…’ She covered herself hastily and clumsily in nervous response to the gleam of triumph that lit up in Evan’s eyes. ‘And even if there was, then it’s none of his business.’

      ‘Ah, but that’s where you’re wrong,’ Evan inserted blandly, setting down his coffee-cup and leaning forward to emphasise his point. ‘You see, I think your father made it my business when he invited me here on the pretext of discussing matters that could easily have waited until tomorrow.’

      ‘Made what your business?’ Catherine made one last attempt at pretending that nothing was wrong.

      ‘I don’t know yet, but I intend to find out. From the moment that I first set foot in this house, it’s been obvious that something is very wrong.’

      ‘Oh, come now, Mr Lindsay, surely you’re exaggerating? There’s nothing—’

      ‘Nothing?’

      One dark eyebrow lifted in an expression of mocking disbelief, and Catherine had the uncomfortable feeling that even though Evan hadn’t moved from his chair he had, mentally at least, backed her into a very tight corner indeed.

      ‘All right, we’ll take things logically,’ he said in a dangerously quiet voice. ‘One—your father’s been like a cat on hot bricks all afternoon—barely listening to a word I’ve said, and certainly not giving his work the concentration it deserved.

      ‘Two—’ he ticked off each point as he made it, using the outstretched fingers of his left hand ‘—he had to rush home to look after his daughter—at five p.m. A time when even a schoolgirl would be safe in the house— especially with the housekeeper there.

      ‘But three—this daughter isn’t a child, or even an adolescent—she’s twenty-six, and someone who, by her own admission, normally has a place of her own.’

      He didn’t miss a trick, Catherine thought despairingly. He’d even picked up on the fact that she had her own flat. It was no wonder that they hadn’t been able to hide anything from him. Oh, why had her father had to bring this particular man home?

      ‘Shall I go on?’

      When Catherine and her father could only stare at him, unable to find a word to say, Evan nodded silently, his mouth tightening ominously.

      ‘All right—so you have your own home, but for some reason you’re hiding out at your father’s—’

      ‘I’m not hiding!’

      ‘No?’

      Once more that raised eyebrow questioned the truth of her outburst.

      ‘Then why did your father feel it necessary to ring the bell—the bell to his own front door—when he arrived? And why did he call out as soon as he came in, if not to reassure you? Why do you jump like a scalded cat at the slightest sound, any unexpected movement?’

      Catherine began to feel as if the quickfire questions were in fact blows to her head, making her reel sickeningly.

      ‘Why did you turn on me as if I was an intruder from an alien planet when I came up behind you in the kitchen? And—last but not least—why, when it’s the hottest week we’ve had all summer, when the temperatures have finally reached into the twenties and the rest of the country is enjoying the long, warm evenings-gardening, having barbecues, or simply sitting outside soaking up the sun—do you have every single curtain in every damn room pulled so tightly closed that a beam of light couldn’t get through if it tried?

      ‘Either one of you is a vampire and will shrivel up in the heat of the sun, or there’s some other, more disturbing reason for this obsession with privacy.’

      He stopped at last, looking straight at both of them in much the same way that the counsel for the prosecution would survey the accused, Catherine reflected miserably, knowing that there was no way she could deny his assessment of events. His case was watertight—and he knew it.

      ‘So now,’ Evan continued more slowly, sea-green eyes fixed on her face in a way that made her feel worryingly certain that he could see right through her head and read everything that was in her mind, ‘are you going to stop playing silly games and tell me just what all this is about?’

       CHAPTER TWO

      ‘WELL?’

      The single, harsh syllable fell into the stunned silence that was the only response Catherine and her father could make to the clear and terrifyingly accurate assessment of the situation he had just given them. There really wasn’t any way they could possibly argue against it, she reflected unhappily.

      ‘Well?’ he repeated, more emphatically this time.

      ‘I—don’t know what you’re talking about.’

      Stubbornly Catherine clung to her determination not to reveal anything to him.

      ‘You must have a very vivid imagination,’ she went on, with a touch of airiness that didn’t quite come off, instead making her sound brittle and highly-strung instead of achieving the insouciance she had aimed for. ‘You seem to have cobbled together some sort of fantasy scenario out of a lot of perfectly ordinary facts…’

      Her voice failed her as Evan, not bothering to answer her verbally, turned on her the sort of cold, contemptuous look from those aquamarine eyes that made her quail fearfully inside, wanting to curl her arms round her to protect herself. Her earlier impression had been right, she told herself on a wave of unease. If provoked, Evan Lindsay could be a very dangerous character indeed.

      ‘It’s no good Cathy.’ Lloyd Davies pushed a hand through hair that was just a couple of shades СКАЧАТЬ