Nicola Cornick Collection Read online

  ‘Not a philosophy I would expect to hear you supporting, Miss Bowes.’

  ‘Probably not,’ Sally said. She rubbed her fingers over the cool mossy stone of the terrace wall. ‘I care for Greg,’ she said. She wondered why she was even trying to explain to Jack Kestrel, who thought that her motivated by nothing but avarice. ‘I have known him a long time and he has never played me false. I owe it to him not to take his affection for me and use it badly or take advantage.’

  Again she expected Jack to make some kind of cynical reply, but he was silent, and in the darkness she could not read his expression.

  ‘Whilst you are engaged to me,’ he said, after a moment, ‘you will have nothing to do with him.’

  Sally shook her head. ‘You cannot tell me what to do, Mr Kestrel. We are not really betrothed and you have no claim on me.’

  She saw Jack make a sharp movement, full of repressed anger, and she backed a step away from him. ‘If you value Holt as you say you do,’ he said, ‘it would wise to agree.’

  ‘In case you decide to challenge him?’

  ‘Quite.’

  Sally tapped her fingers irritably on the balustrade. ‘You are both as bad as each other,’ she said. ‘I do not think that your aunt would appreciate your attempts to rid Stephen of his relatives.’

  ‘Probably not,’ Jack conceded. He looked at her thoughtfully. ‘I noticed you attempting to persuade her not to cut Bertie out of her will in my favour. Thank you for that.’

  ‘I am sure that you have enough money,’ Sally said.

  ‘And Bertie does not—particularly if he is to keep your sister in the style you are hoping for.’

  Sally shrugged. She might have known that he would interpret her intervention as an attempt to gain everything for Connie when all she was concerned about was that Lady Ottoline should not change her will on the basis of an engagement that was a sham.

  ‘Tomorrow,’ she said, ‘unless you have a better plan, we shall travel on to Gretna and then we shall see if it is too late to save your cousin from my sister.’

  ‘What was it that Aunt Otto said I would tell you about?’ Jack asked, as they started to walk along the terrace towards the lavender-scented beds of the parterre.

  ‘She said that I should not listen to any gossip about you,’ Sally said. She smiled. ‘I imagine she wished to reassure me, believing as she does that I am genuinely betrothed to you.’

  ‘And have you heard any gossip about me?’

  ‘Yes, of course,’ Sally said. ‘I have heard plenty relating to your elopement with Merle Jameson, but I do not require reassurance since I am only betrothed to you for the duration of this one night.’ She shivered in the breeze off the lake. No matter how much she professed not to care, she knew she was shamefully jealous of the other woman—the only one that Jack had ever loved.

  ‘Let’s go back inside,’ she said.

  Jack smiled. ‘A moment,’ he said. ‘If this night is all we have, we had better make it worth every moment.’ He put a hand out and caught her wrist, drawing her closer to the warmth of his body. He smelled of cologne and fresh night air and the longing caught at the back of Sally’s throat and made it ache.

  She put a hand against the crisp white of his shirtfront and held him off. ‘Mr Kestrel, it may have escaped your notice, but, as I said, I do not like you very much. Nor do you care for me. Only a man with supreme arrogance would assume that I would fall into his arms again after what has happened between us.’

  Jack put up a hand and brushed the strands of hair back from her face. His touch made her skin tingle. She turned her head aside in an attempt to deny the way he made her feel.

  ‘In a moment,’ he said, ‘we are going to go back through those doors into the drawing room. In order to persuade everyone that we are indeed betrothed, you must look like someone who has been thoroughly kissed in the moonlight, Miss Bowes, rather than someone indignant after an acrimonious discussion.’

  Panic caught at Sally’s heart. If he kissed her, she was not sure that she could resist the feelings that coursed through her. Once again she wondered, helplessly, how it was possible to dislike a man so much and yet hunger for his touch. It felt like a betrayal of her principles and yet she wanted him.

  ‘I could pretend—’ she started to say, but Jack slid a hand into her hair and turned her face up to his.

  ‘The reality,’ he said, as he leaned down very slowly to kiss her, ‘is far, far better than the pretence.’

  It was not like his kisses earlier, when he had been asserting his possession and his mastery over her. Now he courted a response from her, the kiss gentle and persuasive, teasing her, tempting her to open her lips beneath his and return the kiss. Sally relaxed, feeling the warmth in her veins turn her body soft and willing. It was so seductive that she let her hands slide over Jack’s shoulders, drew him closer to her and kissed him back. Immediately Jack slid his arms about her, deepened the kiss, and the feeling flared between them like wildfire. They were both breathing hard when he let her go.

  ‘Jack …’ Charley’s voice floated across the terrace to them ‘… Aunt Otto says that you have been out there quite long enough and that Sally promised to play bezique with her.’

  Jack swore under his breath. ‘It’s like having a nursemaid again. You had best go in and humour her.’

  ‘Gladly,’ Sally said, smoothing her gown. ‘I enjoy her company very much.’ She took a deep breath to steady herself. Her hands were still trembling slightly from the residual excitement tingling in her blood.

  ‘Try not to take too much money off her,’ Jack said. ‘I know you will be tempted to fleece her but I will make up any shortfall.’

  His words touched Sally on the raw. It seemed that every time she permitted herself to forget he thought her a money-grabbing charlatan, he would remind her.

  ‘I’ll take her for every penny I can,’ she said recklessly, seared by his scorn. ‘What else would you expect from me, Mr Kestrel?’

  ‘Nothing, I suppose,’ Jack said.

  Sally paused with her hand on the door. ‘Incidentally, Mr Kestrel,’ she added, ‘I have requested a room as far distant from your own as possible. I shall be removing my name from the panel by the door. And anyone creeping in there in the dead of night will be met with a chamber pot to the head, two hundred pounds or not. Do I make myself clear?’

  ‘As crystal,’ Jack said. ‘Good night, Miss Bowes.’

  Chapter Seven

  Jack was up early the following morning. He had slept poorly, tantalised by the knowledge that Sally’s room was just down the corridor from his own, so near and yet so far. More disturbing than his sexual frustration was the fact that he actually missed sleeping with her; he missed her warmth and her scent and the confiding way that her body curled closely with his, bringing a deep sense of peace and comfort to him. It was not a feeling that was familiar to him and it irritated him profoundly.

  He wished he had not provoked her when they had parted the previous night. She had spoken so convincingly about her reasons for refusing Gregory Holt that he had almost believed her. Then he had kissed her and once again he had been swept by the need to have her, to hold her, to keep her close. He wanted to believe in her. He was hesitating on the edge of a precipice and it infuriated him that Sally could get under his skin like this because he knew he was losing control; after Merle, he had no wish to let a woman get that close to him ever again. It was impossible. He would not permit it. He would keep Sally with him on his own terms, but keep his heart locked against her. She had to be the corrupt and venal adventuress Churchward had shown him.

  He took one of Stephen’s specially ironed newspapers and made his way to the library. It was quiet and the early morning sunshine dappled the carpet. One of the Labradors was dozing in a patch of warmth and raised its head when he walked past only to sink back down with a grunt again as Jack sat down. In the parlour the servants were laying out a gargantuan breakfast, but no one could eat until Lady Ottoline
decided to put in an appearance and she was probably still in bed enjoying hot chocolate and toast. Jack wondered how anyone could eat as much as his great-aunt and still remain stick thin. She had an appetite like a Labrador and he was beginning to think that her much-vaunted frailty was merely a cunning trick to get her own way. It worked, he thought ruefully. He could imagine Sally being like that in fifty years’ time, still as beautiful, still as strong-willed and busy terrorising a younger generation. He realised he was smiling indulgently at the thought and stopped abruptly. His wits were definitely going begging that morning. He had never thought of any relationship in terms of such longevity before, not even his affair with Merle.

  He paused. When had he started to think of his hastily arranged false engagement to Sally in terms of something more enduring? He had almost forgotten that it was meant to be a short-lived ruse. Even more disturbing was the fact that his family had warmed to Sally and taken her to their hearts, even Aunt Otto, who was notoriously hard to please. Sally had Gregory Holt’s loyalty too—Jack gritted his teeth—no, she had Holt’s love to the point he was prepared to stand as her brother to protect her when he clearly wanted a very different relationship with her. Yet she refused to take advantage of Holt’s devotion. But perhaps she was after a better catch, someone who would one day inherit a dukedom. The test would come if she sued Jack for breach of promise when they broke the false engagement. Then she would reveal her true colours.

  He could imagine that happening. It would be another logical step in the Bowes sisters’ financial plan.

  Yet still his doubts persisted.

  Jack unfolded the paper and tried to distract himself with the news.

  His business acquaintance Robert Pelterie had made a mile-long flight in a monoplane. Jack, who had financed some of Pelterie’s work in aviation, was impressed. There was much news on the last-minute preparations for the Olympic Games, which were opening at the White City stadium in London the following month. And at the bottom of the third page there was a not particularly sympathetic account of the miseries experienced by the suffragette campaigners in Holloway jail:

  ‘All the hours seem very long in prison. The sun can never get in … and every day so changeless and uninteresting. One grows almost too tired to go through to the exercise yard and yet one has a yearning for the open air …’ There was also a list of other suffragists who had been arrested trying to enter the House of Commons by concealing themselves in a furniture van. Jack perused the list casually, his interest sharpening when he saw the name of Petronella Bowes. He remembered Sally mentioning her other sister when they had taken dinner together and saying that Nell’s life was made miserable by lack of money for food and medicines and how the constant threat of imprisonment and the need to pay fines seemed sometimes to overwhelm her.

  The breakfast gong sounded. Jack finished the article he was reading before casting the newspaper aside and striding out of the library. The others were already in the breakfast room; as he approached he could hear the sound of voices and his great-aunt’s cut-glass tones as she requested kedgeree and lamented the lack of properly brewed coffee.

  ‘Good morning, nephew,’ she said sharply, as Jack appeared in the doorway. ‘Late again, I see.’ Her gaze swept from him to Sally’s demurely bent head. ‘I trust that you slept well?’

  ‘Never better,’ Jack said untruthfully. He smiled a greeting at Charley and Stephen, managed a civil nod for Gregory Holt, then went to Sally and took her hand, pressing a kiss on the back of it. He was rewarded with a slight blush and a flicker of her eyelashes as she cast one, quick look at his face. Astonishingly, she seemed shy. It made Jack feel protective. He reached for his customary cynicism. She must be no more than an extremely accomplished actress, as he had always suspected.

  ‘Good morning, my love,’ he said, and saw Lady Ottoline, if not Sally, smile with approval.

  Sally was dressed very plainly today in a blue blouse and panelled skirt, and if she had slept as badly as he it certainly did not show. She looked fresh and, to Jack’s eyes, exceedingly pretty.

  ‘Miss Bowes tells me that you are both to leave today for a pressing engagement,’ Lady Ottoline said, her smile fading into a look of disagreement. ‘That does not suit me at all. In fact, I absolutely forbid it, nephew. Tonight is my birthday dinner and if my own nephew and his fiancée cannot be present, then it is a sad day for the family. As it is, neither your papa nor Buffy can join us, which I consider shows a deplorable lack of respect. That boy does not deserve to be a duke.’

  Jack was saved from replying by a sudden rapping at the main door. Patterson, the butler, who had been overseeing the breakfast arrangements, hurried out, adjusting his livery as he went and wearing a faintly disapproving expression. Visitors were not expected to have the bad manners to arrive at ten when the family was still at table. It was the height of discourtesy.

  There was a commotion in the hallway with the butler’s voice raised in surprised greeting and then a cacophony of voices. Jack looked at Charley and raised his brows. She got to her feet and hurried out, closely followed by Stephen.

  ‘You had better run along too, Jack,’ Lady Ottoline said, digging her knife bad-temperedly into the lime marmalade. ‘I would hate any of you to preserve good manners and remain at table with me.’

  ‘That sounds like Connie’s voice,’ Sally said. She sounded suddenly nervous. She put down her napkin. ‘Excuse me, Lady Ottoline.’

  Jack followed her out into the hall. The familiar dapper figure of his cousin Bertie Basset was crossing the marble floor towards him. There was a blonde woman with him, achingly fashionable in a suit of cerise with a wide-brimmed hat framing her china-doll face. She was speaking in a light, drawling voice to one of the hapless footmen who was attempting to bring in what looked like vast quantities of luggage.

  ‘Be careful with that bandbox, you oaf! No, don’t hold it like that—you will squash my hat! And mind little Herman the Dachshund. He does not care for motorcar journeys and may well be sick on you …’

  ‘Connie!’ Sally said, in failing tones. ‘What are you doing here? Where have you been?’ She flashed Jack a look. ‘We thought—’

  ‘Sally darling!’ Connie wafted towards her sister on a cloud of expensive perfume. ‘What fun to find you here! We looked for you at the club yesterday, but Matty said that you had gone with Mr Kestrel.’ Her perfectly arched eyebrows rose in a look of wide enquiry. ‘I thought it most odd since I understood that you barely know one another.’ She pouted. ‘Indeed, it was most thoughtless of you not to be there to greet us when we were newly wed and simply aching to share the good news with you!’

  ‘I am sorry that I missed you,’ Sally said politely.

  Connie waved a dismissive hand. ‘No matter. We saw Nell instead, and she was very happy for us.’ She frowned. ‘She was at the club. Apparently she had come to find you to thank you for the money you sent her.’

  Jack’s stomach dropped. He looked sharply at Sally. She met his eyes for a brief, guilty moment and then looked away with a studiously feigned lack of interest, fidgeting with the cuff of her blouse before glancing quickly back at him again. Jack raised his brows and smiled at her and she blushed. She looked the picture of guilt. Some of the tight, angry feeling inside Jack eased. He knew now where his two hundred pounds had gone the previous morning. He knew what Sally had wanted the money for. He knew that his original instincts about her had very probably been sound. He felt an overpowering urge to confront her there and then, but unfortunately his new cousin was still holding the floor.

  ‘I thought Nell looked quite frightful,’ Connie was saying, blithely ignoring everyone else as she gossiped to her embarrassed sister. ‘She was all ragged and thin, but perhaps now that I am Mrs Basset I may be able to help her. It is good to be in a position where one can be charitable … Yes, what is it, Bertie?’ She spoke to her husband in tones of extreme irritation.

  ‘Sorry to interrupt you, darling,’ Bertie said uncomfortably
, ‘but I wanted to introduce my cousin Charlotte Harrington and her husband Stephen, and also my cousin Jack Kestrel—’

  ‘Mr Kestrel!’ Connie ignored Charley and Stephen completely, but held out a hand to Jack upon which glittered the largest diamond he had ever seen. She was smiling winsomely at him, but it left Jack singularly unmoved. Looking from her little painted face to Sally’s, seeing them together for the first time, he was struck by how very different the two of them appeared. Connie, with her vapid airs and sharp tongue, was exactly how he had imagined her. He thought his cousin an even bigger fool than previously.

  ‘How do you do, Mrs Basset,’ he said, and Connie preened herself.

  ‘Connie,’ Sally intervened, ‘what are you doing here? This is Mrs Harrington’s home, you know, and everyone is here for a family party.’

  ‘Great-Aunt Ottoline’s birthday,’ Jack said helpfully, turning to Bertie. ‘You will have remembered that it is her party, of course, Bertie? She will be delighted to meet your new bride, I am sure.’ He had the pleasure of seeing his cousin turn a gratifying colour of white.

  ‘I had no notion Aunt Ottoline would be here,’ Bertie choked. ‘Came to see Charley, to ask that she might help smooth our way into the family, don’t you know.’ He looked askance at Jack. ‘Didn’t know you would be here either, Jack, for that matter.’

  ‘No,’ Jack said. ‘I dare say that if you had you would have thought twice about coming. I have been looking for you on your father’s behalf for the past week.’

  Bertie gulped. ‘Deed’s done now,’ he said, ‘signed and sealed. We were married yesterday.’

  Connie skipped up to Sally and thrust her hand under her nose. ‘Look at my diamond! Is it not tremendous!’

  ‘It is extraordinary,’ Sally said. ‘We thought that you might have headed for Gretna Green for your runaway match, Connie.’

  ‘Gracious, no!’ Connie wrinkled up her nose. ‘I could not possibly get married in such a hole-in-the-corner way! We had a special licence. Bertie bought it weeks ago.’ She caught Sally’s arm, smiling beguilingly. ‘I am sorry to have deceived you about my intentions, Sal, but it was the only way to keep the whole matter secret. I know you would have tried to dissuade me with your tiresome scruples.’