The Reluctant Groom. Emma Richmond

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СКАЧАТЬ an indifference that was maddening.

      ‘I beg your pardon?’

      Taking his time, taking milk from the fridge and adding it to the coffee, he replaced the milk before he answered. ‘I merely wondered which one you were. It’s of no consequence.’

      Assuming he was talking about daughters, she said shortly, ‘The youngest. Thank you,’ she added as he handed her her coffee.

      ‘You’re welcome. Like to grind men beneath your high heels, don’t you?’

      ‘Always,’ she agreed without pause. ‘Do you wish to be ground, Mr Turner?’ she was horrified to hear herself asking.

      He merely smiled, and mockery rode his features like a horse on a fairground ride.

      Trying to get control back into her own hands, she asked abruptly, ‘Where do you come from?’

      ‘Not far,’ he answered unhelpfully as he leaned back against the sink to sip his coffee.

      Eyes on his face, refusing, utterly refusing, to look away, she borrowed some of his own mockery. ‘And you work with this Professor Wayne at Oxford?’

      ‘You didn’t ask him?’ he mocked.

      ‘No.’

      ‘Tsk, tsk.’

      Eyes like flint, she warned, ‘Be very careful, Mr Turner. The decision to let you work here can easily be revoked.’

      He looked as though he couldn’t care less one way or the other. At ease, unruffled as he continued to survey her. She had an almost overwhelming desire to throw her coffee at him.

      ‘How long had your father been collecting war memorabilia,’ he asked casually.

      ‘Since he was a young man, I believe.’

      ‘It’s a very extensive collection.’

      ‘It’s also very valuable.’

      She badly wanted to sit, but that would put her at a disadvantage, and that she didn’t want. ‘How did you meet? He never mentioned you before he—died.’

      He lowered his lashes, stared down into his coffee, and said quietly, ‘We didn’t.’

      ‘But you wanted to?’

      ‘Yes. Your mother said he died six months ago?’

      ‘Yes, heart attack,’ she said dismissively, because it was something she didn’t even want to think about, let alone talk about. And maybe he was more sensitive than she gave him credit for, because he didn’t—thankfully—pursue it.

      ‘How long were they married?’

      ‘My, my,’ she murmured, ‘we are nosy, aren’t we? And yet I wouldn’t have said you were a man for idle chat, Mr Turner.’

      He slowly raised his lids, stared at her once more. His mouth was smooth, entirely persuasive. ‘What would you have said?’

      Off balance for a moment, she quickly rallied. ‘I wouldn’t,’ she denied. ‘You hold no interest for me at all. But let’s see...Helen and Laura arrived here when they were six. They’re thirty-four now, which means...’

      “‘Arrived here”?’

      ‘Which would make it twenty-eight years ago,’ she continued, as though there had been no interruption. ‘And my parents were married two years before that . . .’

      ‘Arrived here?’

      ‘We were all adopted, Mr Turner.’

      He still continued to stare at her, but she was fascinated to see that his eyes now seemed veiled.

      ‘Does that answer your question?’ she asked with slight impatience.

      ‘Yes,’ he agreed. Straightening almost abruptly, he added, ‘I’d better get on.’

      ‘With?’ she asked. ‘Which particular aspect?’ she persisted when he didn’t answer.

      ‘Nothing specific.’ Taking his coffee, and the tension, with him, he walked out.

      Curious. In her experience, people were always specific. People with a passion for whatever—history, warfare, cigarette cards—usually bored on about their chosen subject, or became animated, enthused, so why not Mr Turner? And why the sudden change from mockery to tension?

      Forcibly dismissing him from her mind, because she had other more pressing problems than Sam Turner, she walked over to the sink and poured the over-strong coffee away. Going out to her car, she collected her case and took it up to her room to unpack.

      Removing her jacket, she took the engagement ring from her pocket and sat on the bed to examine it. It was a beautiful ring, expensive, but not given with love. Peter had become engaged to her for the same reason she’d become engaged to him. Expediency. She would have graced his home, been able to talk intelligently to his clients, guests, whatever, and he would have made a fitting escort for herself. Both families had thought it an excellent match. And maybe it was, but she wanted something more than expediency. More than being sensible.

      It’s a start, Abby, she assured herself. It was definitely a start. Opening her bag, she zipped the ring inside, with the letter her father had left—and that she really must do something about. She couldn’t keep putting it off with the excuse that she didn’t have time.

      Irritated, unsettled, she walked to the window, stared down at the grounds. Late October, and yet the sun was as warm as a summer’s day. The house must be sold. Must. But how to persuade her mother? She didn’t want to hurt her more. She wasn’t an unkind girl, despite the impression she continued to give. Especially to Sam Turner, who thought she was into heel-grinding. Maybe she was. Not that it mattered what he thought. Sam Turner was an irrelevance.

      So why did he persist in staying in her mind?

      

      The next morning she dressed in elegant tailored trousers and a short-sleeved shirt. It was not, she insisted to herself, because she was trying to impress Sam Turner. She simply didn’t have casual clothes. The image she presented to the world didn’t permit it, and that, she thought, as she let him in, was one of the most absurd aspects of the whole charade. You took it too far, Abby. Way, way, too far.

      ‘Is something wrong?’ he asked quietly as he entered the house.

      ‘No,’ she denied automatically, and then paused, because it would have been nice to have laughed at her absurdities with him, told him what she had been thinking, but the moment was lost as he strolled into the study.

      ‘Coffee?’ she asked him.

      He turned, raised an eyebrow in mocking surprise, and she thought she could have cried for his disbelief at her common courtesy. A courtesy that would not have been extended last week. Would she only be able to change with people who did not yet know her? People she had not yet met?

      ‘Well, do you or don’t you?’ СКАЧАТЬ