An All-Consuming Passion. Anne Mather

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СКАЧАТЬ his suitcase; and a leather-topped table by the window, which could serve a dual purpose as a desk. The floor was bare, just polished wooden boards, with a plain skin rug beside the bed to add a little colour.

      ‘The bathroom’s through there,’ said Holly indicating a door, ‘but I’m afraid you’ll have to share with me. As you’ll find out, the Fletchers and I only occupy a small part of the house. The rest is shuttered—closed off—to save unnecessary labour, you see.’

      Morgan inclined his head. ‘I understand.’

      ‘So …’ Holly lifted her slim shoulders and then let them fall again. ‘If you need anything else, just holler, as Samuel would say. Supper will be ready in about an hour. Unless you’d like it sooner.’

      ‘An hour will be just fine,’ Morgan assured her firmly, loosening the remaining buttons of his waistcoat and stripping it off. Then, without thinking, he pulled off his tie and started to unfasten his shirt, only realising she was still hovering in the doorway when he looked up and met her gaze.

      ‘I don’t suppose your wife wanted you to come, did she?’ Holly murmured, smoothing the edge of the door with her fingers, and the unexpectedly personal quality of her question caught him unprepared.

      ‘I—my wife and I are divorced,’ he said shortly, his hands stilling as he became aware of a disturbing change in their relationship. In the past he had always regarded her as a child, not much older than the twins in fact, and definitely not someone he would speak to as an equal. But now that was all changed. Now she was speaking to him as a woman. And, in spite of himself, Morgan felt his senses stir at the thinly veiled insolence of her regard.

      ‘I see,’ remarked Holly softly, apparently not at all dismayed by his shocked reaction. ‘I can’t say I’m surprised.’

      And, with a lazy smile, she withdrew, closing the door behind her and leaving Morgan to stare blankly at the worn cream panels.

       CHAPTER TWO

      THE sun had barely cleared the trees on the other side of the island when Holly slid out of bed. It wasn’t much after six, but she had been awake for hours, watching the curtains moving in the breeze from her balcony, and going over the previous evening’s events and her own reaction to them.

      Now, however, she could lie still no longer. Thrusting back the covers, she strode eagerly across the floor, halting only reluctantly when her slim naked form was reflected in the mirrors of her dressing-table. She could hardly step out on to the balcony without any clothes, however attractive that proposition might be, she reflected. With a sigh of resignation, she caught up a shred of pure white satin that resolved itself into a simple wrapper and, tying the cord about her waist, she followed her inclination.

      Outside the air was magic, a mixture of tangy salt and the blossoming bougainvillaea that rioted over the roof of the verandah below. The view, too, was matchless: an arc of blue-green water, caught in the arms of a verdant lover—twin headlands curving round to cradle the sheltered bay. Below the house, the beach was clean and untouched, the footprints left by her visitor washed away by the morning tide. Nearer at hand, bees already buzzed among the tangled mass of flowers, and Micah had set a sprinkler going to moisten the sun-scorched grass.

      Resting her arms on the balcony rail, Holly breathed deeply, allowing the beauty of the day to dispel the sense of anxiety that had disturbed her sleep since her father’s telegram had arrived. He could not force her to go back, she told herself fiercely, wondering if she really believed that by saying something often enough one could make it happen. He hadn’t even had the decency to come and ask her himself—albeit that her answer would still have been the same. He had sent Morgan Kane: his mentor, his alter ego; the man Holly hated most in the world.

      She breathed a little more quickly when she thought about what she was going to do to Morgan Kane. It was strange but, until two years ago, he had been the man she most admired. Not that he had been aware of it, of course. To him, she was just a child, Andrew Forsyth’s unwanted daughter, the metaphorical cross his employer had to bear. She had known that, and accepted it, too long used to being treated as a pariah in her father’s household to find anything unusual in being ignored.

      Yet there had been times when Morgan had not ignored her, times when she had thought he was doing his best to compensate for her father’s negligence. To begin with, she had not trusted his overtures of friendship, assuming her father had told him exactly what to say. But, gradually, as her love-starved young body began to mature, she had started to see Morgan in an entirely different light. She had actually begun to believe he cared about her.

      Her trust had been abruptly shattered one night, a little over two years ago. She had turned to Morgan for help, and he had not given it. Instead, he had taken her father’s part in humiliating her in front of her friends. He had not even tried to defend her actions. He had shown himself for the cipher he was, and she knew she had been a fool ever to have believed it could be otherwise.

      After that, for a spell, she had not cared what happened to her. Because of what had happened she lost touch with the group of young people she had been running around with, and she wasn’t exactly sorry. She had known they were a wild bunch, and that sooner or later they were going to get caught. But she missed their cheerful companionship, and the sometimes crazy things they used to do.

      The suggestion she had made of going to art school in Paris had seemed like a good idea at the time, but once again her father had denied it. No daughter of his was going to waste her time daubing colours on paper, he said, though they both knew it wasn’t just the occupation that appalled him. He didn’t want her to be happy. He had made that blatantly plain. He only wanted to be rid of her, and her suggestion of coming here had suited him very well.

      Pulpit Island. Holly sighed now, wondering rather bitterly whether Andrew Forsyth would have let her come here had he known she would not miss her life in England. She suspected he saw her confinement as a kind of punishment, but in fact they had been the happiest two years of her life.

      She had always been happy here. When she was a child, her dearest memories had been of holidays spent on Pulpit Island with her grandparents. It was the one place where she had been accepted for herself, and not as her father’s daughter, and her mother’s parents had never blamed her for being the cause of their daughter’s death. Their deaths, soon after one another, when she was in her early teens, had left a void in her life, a void, she now realised, she had imagined Morgan Kane might fill. But he hadn’t. He had abandoned her just when she needed him most, and for that she could never forgive him.

      It was not something she had brooded about over these past two years. Indeed, apart from the painful bitterness she had brought with her to the island, she had eventually succeeded in putting all thoughts of him out of her head. But when she got her father’s telegram, when she learned he was sending Morgan Kane to do his dirty work once again, her spirit had rebelled. She was a good-looking young woman, she knew that without any trace of conceit, and she also knew she was attractive to men. Even here, on Pulpit Island, where most of the men she met were either old or married, she was not unaware of her popularity, and it had come to her in a flash that she might be able to hurt both Morgan and her father. How furious Andrew Forsyth would be if his blameless personal assistant blotted his copy-book! Holly thought maliciously. And how delicious her revenge if she could make him forget his responsibilities.

      She frowned momentarily as reason reared its ugly head. She suspected she was being overly romantic in imagining she could persuade a man like Morgan Kane to actually fall in love with her. He was so much older, after all, and obviously more experienced. Besides which, he had СКАЧАТЬ