No More Lonely Nights (8 page)

‘Cass, I could kill her!’ she began before she saw them all. Then she stared, her jaw dropping, her lips parted on a gasp of furious incredulity.

She looked vaguely like her brother. Sian saw the family likeness—the black hair and pale eyes, the height, the pared bone structure and finely moulded features. Sian had never seen a photo of Magdalena, yet she felt at once that this was his sister.

‘We’d better talk in the hall, Magda,’ Cass said, confirming this, getting up and moving towards his sister.

‘What’s
she
doing here?’ his sister demanded, flushing to her hairline, as she stared at Annette. Sian admired the white dress she wore; it was very simple, very chic. Magdalena’s expression was in direct contrast; it was complicated and well-nigh barbaric. She was in a tearing temper, and scowled at Annette, who didn’t seem aware that she was there at all, and went on drinking her tea with a blank expression.

‘Out,’ Cass said, taking his sister’s arm, but she resisted him and stood her ground, glaring and getting angrier by the second.

‘How can you bear to have her in the same room after what she did to you? My God, when I think about it! I didn’t know where to look. I was so embarrassed, and last night people kept ringing up to sympathise… that’s a joke! What they really wanted to do was winkle all the details out of me, have a good laugh! She humiliated us, not just you, Cass—the whole family! Have you read these papers? All the money you spend on public relations, I’d have thought they could keep this out of the gutter press. What do you pay them for?’ She took a deep breath, but she hadn’t finished. ‘What’s she doing here, anyway? One of the papers said she’d run off to some man in London, stood you up for one of your own staff! So why is she back? You can’t be fool enough to consider giving her another chance? I won’t let you. I…’

‘Shut up,’ Cass snarled, and her eyes rounded in shock.

He gripped her elbow and hustled her out of the room. Sian heard their voices rising and falling in the hall. Annette had finished her breakfast; she looked at her watch and made a husky little noise, a half-sob.

‘Can’t we go?’

The front door banged violently; the angry voices no longer snapped at each other.

‘In a minute,’ soothed Sian, watching the door of the room.

Cass came through it, frowning heavily, his skin dark with angry colour, his eyes glittering.

‘Cass, we must go,’ Annette pleaded, getting up, and he looked at her blankly for a second, then smiled reassurance.

‘Yes, I’ll get the car. Wait for me outside.’

Sian followed him into the hall, and he looked down at her impatiently as she caught up with him. ‘Well, what now?’

‘Look, I can’t stay here much longer, you know. I do have my own life to lead. I’ve got to be back at work tomorrow, so I’ll have to be back in London tonight.’

‘Can’t you take a few days off?’ He ran a hand through his smoothly brushed hair until it all stood on end to match his distracted, irritated expression.

‘I just did. I’m not entitled to any more.’

‘Ring your paper and ask…’

‘Ask my editor if I can stay?’ Sian laughed shortly. ‘Oh, he would say yes. He’d jump at it! He would also expect a follow-up to my first scoop—the latest inside dope on Annette’s flight from the altar.’

Her dry tone made him scowl, staring. ‘You could refuse to write it, couldn’t you? If you really like Annette, you won’t put her through any more.’

‘Let me remind you, from tomorrow I am due back at work. If I stay I shall technically be working.’

His mouth indented. ‘Oh, very well. I’ll make other arrangements for- Annette, but can you hang on for a few hours to give me a chance to work something out?’

She felt small and mean under his accusing eyes but, however much he disapproved of her, she couldn’t bear to stay here. She had to get away, from him and from having to watch him with Annette. Was his sister right? Did he hope to get Annette back? It was none of Sian’s business, but she couldn’t believe those two were suited. Annette was right out of his league—couldn’t he see that? Annette herself had realised it, even if only at the last minute. Or had she always known it, but only found the courage to run away at the eleventh hour? Even then she probably wouldn’t have gone if Rick hadn’t rung her and galvanised her into flight.

‘OK,’ she said flatly, staring at him and bewildered by his blindness about Annette. They would have been a very ill-matched couple—why couldn’t he see that?

He turned and walked out of the house and she stared after him, that queer little pain nagging away inside her again. I’m jealous, she thought, wide-eyed with shock. How stupid! I’m jealous—but I hardly know the man, so why should I be?

She might not know him well, but one thing she was sure about it—she’d be more on his level than Annette had ever been.

Hot colour ran up to her hair. How ridiculous, she thought, angry with herself. What on earth made me think that? He wouldn’t give me a second look!

Oh, but he has, her mind reminded her; he’s looked more than twice, in fact. She stared at nothing, remembering the times when she had felt that powerful flare of attraction—or had she imagined it? Had she wanted to believe he was as aware of her as she was of him? It was so easy to deceive yourself—wasn’t that what Cass was doing over Annette? If he thought they could ever be happy together he was deceiving himself. If Sian hadn’t heard Annette’s side of it already she would have been just as sure that marriage between Cass and Annette would be a recipe for disaster. The two of them were worlds apart. Why couldn’t he see that?

‘Are we going yet?’ Annette said huskily behind her, and Sian turned and hurriedly smiled reassurance.

‘Let’s wait outside the house.’

Cass drew up shortly after that, and they drove to the hospital to find it besieged by reporters and photographers who jostled each other to get pictures of them arriving.

Cass and Sian hurried Annette into the hospital, and the burly porters held the clamouring mob back while they escaped up to the heart unit. Annette was in tears by then; Cass had his arm around her and was murmuring gently, but his grey eyes acidly reminded Sian that the mob outside were her people, she was one of them. Sian looked away, wishing she could deny it. This was one of those times when silence was the only defence.

They found Rick in the waiting-room. He came to take Annette away from Cass, his face jealous, resentful. Annette cried harder at the sight of him and clung, her arms round his neck.

‘Oh, Rick, he isn’t worse? Why can’t I see him? I’m so scared. He isn’t going to die, is he? Outside there are… they all shouted and tried to grab me as if I was a criminal or something… what’s going on? When can I see my father?’

Rick had both arms round her, his chin on her soft hair. ‘The sister says you can take a look at him, but he’s under sedation, he won’t know you’re there. He’s OK, though, Annette. He’s going to be OK, in time. Whatever happens, you mustn’t upset yourself or he may pick it up. You’ve got to be very calm and quiet before you see him.’

She struggled with her tears, shaking. ‘I am, Rick. I’m calm and quiet.’

‘Come and see Sister,’ said Rick, leading her out, ignoring Sian and Cass. Sian sat down, grimacing, avoiding Cass’s eye. Did it wound him to see Annette with Rick, to be forced to relinquish her to the other man? She wished she could leave at once, get away from here.

Cass prowled up and down, his hands in his pockets, his head bent, his face dark. Rick came back and Cass looked sharply at him.

‘She’s in there with her father.’ Rick had a hospital mask tied round his neck, and had obviously just pushed it down from his mouth. He faced Cass belligerently. ‘There’s no need for you to stay. She doesn’t want you here; I can take care of her from now on. Tonight, I’ll take her to stay with my aunt. I’ve got a car, so that I can drive her back here in an emergency.’

Cass listened, his face a mask. He didn’t answer, just nodded, and Rick turned on his heel and went, pulling up the mask over his mouth again. Cass stared after him and then turned to look at Sian.

‘I’ll drive you back to London now,’ was all he said, in a quiet voice, but Sian would have given a great deal to know exactly what he was feeling.

Cass didn’t talk much on the drive back to London, and Sian was relieved about that because her thoughts were chaotic, and she needed to be quiet to sort them out into some sort of order. So much had happened in far too short a time, both around her, and inside her. She was bewildered, dazed, unsure—in fact, the only thing she was sure about at the moment was that she wasn’t sure precisely how she
did
feel.

And he was the cause: this frowning man sitting beside her! He had done this to her! She looked sideways, through her lashes, and watched him driving, his grey eyes hard and fixed, his profile unyielding. A queer little tremor ran through her; an electric shock along her nerves.

It was crazy. She barely knew the man. It wasn’t even twenty-four hours since he had first walked into her life, why should he have this devastating effect on her? Am I that impressionable? she asked herself, closing her eyes to shut out all sight of that lean, dark face in profile, the wind-blown hair giving him the look of some marauding barbarian, a dangerous invader coming unstoppably towards you while you stared, paralysed.

My imagination has run mad, she thought, laughter in her throat as she realised what she had been thinking. At that moment, Cass turned his head, still dark-browed, and snapped, ‘What’s funny?’

‘I am,’ she said, and he stopped scowling and looked surprised.

‘Why?’

‘Never mind, something I was thinking.’ She looked at the speedometer and winced. ‘Do we have to drive at this speed?’ The car was touching ninety although it ran so smoothly that she hadn’t realised it until then.

‘Yes,’ he said coolly.

‘Soothes the savage breast, does it?’

Her mockery made him laugh. ‘Something like that.’

‘It may be doing you a power of good, but it makes me feel sick,’ Sian said frankly, and he grimaced.

‘Sorry about that. I was miles away.’

Sian could guess where, but carefully said nothing. He took his foot off the accelerator, and the speed began to fall. Sian gave a faint sigh of relief and he grinned wryly at her.

‘That’s better, is it?’

‘Sixty-five is bearable,’ she said, leaning back in her seat and relaxing.

‘We’re only half an hour from London,’ he told her a moment later. ‘In time for lunch—will you let me give you lunch? I owe you a lunch at least, wouldn’t you say?’

‘That’s OK,’ she said, meaning that he didn’t owe her anything and there was no need to buy her lunch, but he misunderstood, either deliberately or because he really didn’t get what she meant.

‘Fine, why don’t we eat at a pretty little riverside pub I know? It’s a lovely day and the landlord is a friend of mine. The place will be packed out, but he keeps a couple of tables in his garden for friends on fine days. It’s quite an experience—Danny was a jazz musician—he can play anything you care to name—and while he was travelling up and down the country doing gigs he taught himself to cook like an angel. You won’t get better food in London.’