Hostile engagement (6 page)

Jud Hemming, it was obvious, felt no embarrassment whatsoever, and had no difficulty at all in calling their arrangement by its proper name. 'Our engagement, you mean?' She'd been right about his eyes, she thought as she flicked him a hasty glance and away again. They were cold, icy cold. 'No, I haven't changed my mind. Are you saying that you have—that you've thought it over and have now decided your mother's ring doesn't have the value for you that you thought it had?' Not only was there ice in his eyes, it was there in his voice too, and she had a definite conviction that no one had ever gone back on a deal with him ever. 'If those sort of thoughts have been flitting through your mind, you can forget them,' he confirmed her suspicion that, the bargain struck, he had no intention of allowing her to back out. 'You agreed to be engaged to me for three months—you'll go through with it right up to the very last day.'

Had he said those words in anger, she might have been able to dismiss the ominous ring to them as something said in the heat of the moment, but with each word stated so coldly, so absolutely without heat, Lucy felt fear strike within her that she was now committed, and that whatever happened during the next three months, there would be no getting out of it.

`WELL,' Jud Hemming demanded when Lucy felt too tense to bring herself to answer him, 'is it your intention to try and wriggle out of it?' His tone was contemptuous now as if he thought that any promise made by a member of her sex was worthless. ·

`As you've just stated,' Lucy replied bravely, the hostility in the room almost tangible, 'there would be very little point in my trying to "wriggle out of it". I meant what I said yesterday—I want my ring back, and if the only way that can be achieved is by temporarily wearing it as your fiancée, then I'll do it.' Her voice was almost as cold as his as she flung the words at him. 'I've never gone back on my word in my life.'

`See that you don't,' he said sharply, and putting his hand in his pocket, he withdrew the well remembered small square box and placed it on the kitchen table in front of her. 'That seals our bargain, I think,' he told her, and turned to go.

But even wanting him out of her sight as quickly as possible, Lucy wasn't avaricious, so wanting to take up the ring box, to open it, to gaze once more upon her mother's most cherished possession, she found herself asking :

`How is Carol?' and Could have bitten her tongue out when Jud Hemming turned round and fixed her with a cool stare. 'I ... I mean—was she very upset?' Her voice trailed off to a whisper as the look on his face showed her he thought her question in very poor taste.

`Why should you care? You've got what you wanted, haven't you?'

Lucy bit her lip. Yes, she'd got what she wanted, but un-

like him, she was human enough to feel regret that by her doing so someone else must be terribly upset, even though in her view Carol had had a lucky escape. She tried to imagine anyone actually being married to this cold emotionless man, and only just managed to suppress a shudder at the thought.

`Yes, I've got what I wanted,' she was forced to agree, an
d lifted her head to tell him. B
ut I can't say that being the cause of causing someone else pain fills me with any great pleasure.'

`It upsets you to think of Carol weeping her heart out?'

Poor Carol, Lucy thought, squirming inwardly at the picture that came to mind of the girl who had been so friendly to her actually breaking down in front of this man who Would in all probability have been unmoved by her tears. She turned away from him so he shouldn't see the remorse in her face—he'd said it was too late to back out now, but ...

`If it's any comfort to you, Carol has known from the outset that there was never any likelihood of our ending up as marriage partners.'

But she was still upset when you asked for the return of the ring.'

Not at all,' he assured her, his tones none the warmer for all he was making her feel a little bit better for her part in all of this. 'It was never my intention to give the ring to her—she knew that, and only wore it because she liked it.'

While Lucy believed what he was saying—he was much too sure of himself to ever need lie about anything-she couldn't help wondering at his leaving a ring he had paid three thousand pounds for lying around for Carol to calmly pick up and place on her finger. Then again, the hought entered her mind, three thousand pounds meant nothing to him.

`Does anyone else have to know-about us, I mean?' She had been chewing this over on and off before his visit,

and while he might not be the most forthcoming man in the world at least he had unbent sufficiently to tell her that Carol had known she would never be walking down the aisle with him

`You want to keep our engagement a secret?'

Lucy winced at the word engagement. 'Well, apart from Carol, there'll be no need for anyone else to know, will there? I mean, it doesn't affect anyone else but the three of us, does it?' -

Lucy liked people who looked at you when they were talking to you, but could have wished he wouldn't fix her with that hard steady stare so often. It made her feel uncomfortable, made her feel as though he was looking into the very heart of her as if he was intrigued to know what went on inside of her, what made her tick.

`No, it doesn't affect anyone but us,' he said quietly, and on that enigmatic note, without fully answering her question, he turned and left her.

He really was the strangest of men, she reflected as she waited some minutes to be sure he had gone before she picked up the ring box. A law unto himself, she considered, he did exactly what he wanted to do regardless of how other people might feel, answered only those questions he thought in need of an answer, and had now left her not knowing whether or not she had his word that he would keep their engagement a secret, or if he had plans to announce it to anyone who might be interested.

On thinking about it, Lucy decided he wouldn't tell anyone else. Why should he? All he was concerned with was getting rid of Carol-no, he wouldn't be telling anyone because in three months' time he would only have to make it known that the engagement was off. Lucy took the ring box up from the table and opened it, then took the ring from its velvet couch, handling it lovingly. A wave of emotion gripped her as she gazed at the exquisite setting of the knot of emeralds and diamonds, and Jud Hemming

was forgotten as bittersweet memories of her mother took all other thoughts from her mind.

Sometime
during the afternoon Lucy answered the phone to hear her brother telling her he would not be home that night. To ask him where he was going and with whom would get her nowhere, she was beginning to learn, and she longed for the days before her parents had died when Rupert's life had been an open book.

`I'm going to the races with Archie,' Rupert volunteered when Lucy had shown only mild interest in his comings and goings. Her heart dipped-Archie Proctor again ! `Archie has a nag running—if it wins, and Arch
ie.
is sure it's going to, we'll be - celebrating afterwards, so we've booked rooms at one of the hotels just in case.'

Well, it was a weight off her mind to know Rupert wasn't going to drive home after celebrating, Lucy thought, as she put down the phone. And as the afternoon wore on she wished for the umpteenth time that Rupert had never taken up with Archie Proctor. Their father had gambled away most of Rupert's heritage; she just prayed that as well as inheriting Brook House from his father, Rupert had not inherited his gambling streak as well. She shook the thought away, but it came back to haunt her again and again as afternoon gave way to early evening, she couldn't quite see Rupert at the races, and with Archie Proctor, and not having a bet on one of the horses.

She set about making herself a salad with the long evening stretching before her. There were plenty of people she knew in Priors Channing, but she had no wish to call any of them, though she knew most of the evening would be spent in worrying what Rupert, with Archie Proctor as ringleader, would be up to.

In the act of giving a lettuce close scrutiny as she washed it, Lucy turned off the kitchen tap to hear the sound of a vehicle coming up the drive. Hastily she dried her hands and hurried into the hall. Rupert had decided not to stay

away overnight after all, was her first heartening thought as she reached the front door and flung it open. But it was not Rupert's two-seater sports car that came to a standstill in front of the house. It was a sports car, admitted, but a larger, more expensive model than the one Rupert owned, and the man who was now swinging himself on to the shingled drive was not Rupert at all, but none other than her mock-fiancé-Jud Hemming. What he could want she had no idea, but as she waited for him to join her at the front door, the smile of welcome that had been for Rupert disappeared.

`I wondered if you'd be in,' said Jud, as he came up to her. 'I meant to mention this morning that I would prefer it if you didn't date anybody while you're engaged to me.'

The problem of whether to accept invitations from any of the men of her acquaintance hadn't struck her before, and now that he mentioned it she could see it was certainly something she would have to think about, but for him to call at her home and calmly announce that part of their bargain was that she declined any invitations from the opposite sex during the next three months had small sparks of anger spitting within her.

"That's what you've come to tell me, is it?' she asked, her voice becoming heated. 'Well, let me tell you, Mr Hemming

`Jud,' he broke in. 'The name's Jud, remember?' he repeated, resting his gaze on the smooth creaminess of her skin, his eyes not missing the fire she was struggling to hold down. 'That isn't the only reason I came to see you,' he added coolly, and looked quietly at her, not saying another word until Lucy was forced, by his unspoken message that he had no intention of discussing anything with her on the doorstep, to invite him in.

She led the way into the sitting room, seeing the room as he no doubt would view it. It was a large room, a room large enough to take far more furniture than it housed. The

three-piece suit
looked lost in it, Lucy thought, but he couldn't know having never been in the room before that it hadn't always been this sparsely furnished, she comforted herself, though he would know the few ornaments dotted about were of not much value. He couldn't know, sharp as he undoubtedly was, that the more valuable pieces of porcelain had been sold, she thought, and she knew his first glance had catalogued the room.

Jud Hemming didn't comment on the room, in fact he looked as though it didn't matter much to him in which room he said what he had come to say-it flashed through her mind he had been equally at home in the kitchen that morning. 'May I?' he asked, indicating one of the chairs.

`Yes, of course,' Lucy replied, having been so taken up with what he might be thinking about the room that she had for the moment forgotten her manners. He waited until she too was seated before taking the chair nearest to him, and she was struck to think she liked this common courtesy. She ousted the thought that she liked anything about him as it came to her that by being seated it looked as though this wasn't going to be a brief 'Call.

`Your brother not in?' he enquired, looking relaxed as he sat back in his chair.

`No,' Lucy answered, sitting on the edge of hers. Then because that short answer had him looking at her questioningly, 'He won't be back tonight. Did you want to see him?'

`Does he often stay away overnight?'

It wasn't anything to do with him what Rupert did, and that was another question he hadn't deigned to answer, not that she could think of any good reason why he should want to see her brother.

`He's twenty-five, he can make his own decision whether he comes home or not.' She felt aggression rising on her brother's behalf.

`And how old are you, Lucy?' he asked smoothly, ignoring her aggression.

`Twenty-two.' She hadn't wanted to answer but couldn't see any good reason why he shouldn't know how old she was. 'How old are you?' She didn't see why he should be the one to ask all the questions.

`Thirty-five,' he supplied. 'You don't mind that your brother goes off and leaves you here on your own-you're quite isolated here and you don't have any live-in staff, do you?'

`We don't have any staff at all,' she said shortly before it came to her that he knew anyway, and that his reference to `live-in staff' had been his tactful way of saying she was there completely on her own. She had never associated him with such sensitivity, and it had her rising out of her chair and asking him merely for something to say to get off the subject, 'Would you care for a drink?'

She subsided into her chair again as with, 'No, thanks,' he refused, then looking at her steadily, he said quietly, `Since you appear to be all on your own this evening, perhaps you would like to come back with me and have dinner

`Up at the Hall?' The question was out when she had no intention of going any further than the front door with him. `At the Hall,' he confirmed.

`No, thanks.' It was a pleasure to turn down his invitation even though she had no idea what had motivated his issuing it—it wasn't from any desire to have her company, of that she was positive. Was it, she wondered, his way of ensuring she didn't date anybody else while she was engaged to him? If he thought ...