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‘It isn’t easy getting the right kind of staff to work somewhere as isolated as this, so we have to provide a few inducements and of course they always come in handy when we’re entertaining potential customers. I’ve got some due any day now as it happens, Americans to whom I’m hoping to sell the new computer we’re working on.’
‘Where will Simon and I be staying?’ Philippa asked him as he walked towards the entrance. Sunlight splashed in through it, blinding her for a moment and she would have stumbled if Scott hadn’t reached out to steady her. His fingers burned the bare flesh of her arm beneath the cuff of her short-sleeved t-shirt and she snatched it away from him, flushing furiously as his mouth compressed. ‘You’re both staying in the house with me. This way.’
The entrance hall was much as she remembered it, although now the parquet floor was properly polished as was the round table adorned with an attractive display of flowers. The doors to the right and left of the hall led to the drawing room and library respectively as Philippa already knew. To the rear of the hall a pair of matching doors led to the dining room and a small sitting room with the kitchen to the rear. ‘I did away with all those small rooms and had the kitchen modernised. It made it much easier to get staff for one thing.’
‘You say your mother is living with you?’
‘Yes. I needed someone to take charge of the domestic side of things for me, although mother says I ought to get married. She complains that it’s too much for her, even though she has Claire, her companion, to help her.’
‘She had her operation then?’
‘Yes.’ His voice was terse as he added, ‘Much you would care. Was that why you ran to Rivers, Philippa? Did the thought of being burdened with an invalid mother-in-law as well as an out-of-work husband frighten you too much?’
‘It’s over, Scott.’ Philippa tried to sound calm and in control. ‘I wish you could accept that, for your own sake.’
‘For your sake, don’t you mean? How does it feel, knowing that you’re completely within my power, and knowing how you destroyed me? Doesn’t it frighten you, Philippa, thinking what I might do?’
‘I can’t help it if you have a chip on your shoulder, Scott.’
‘I can’t help it,’ he mimicked savagely, grasping her shoulders and swinging her round to face him. His eyes were dark and burning, just as she remembered them from the day she told him that she couldn’t marry him and why. ‘Don’t give me that, you two-faced little bitch. Whose fault do you think it is that I’m carrying this “chip” as you call it? Well?’ He was shaking her almost violently, letting her go so suddenly that Philippa staggered back against the panelling, jolting her shoulder so painfully that she had to suppress a cry of pain.
‘Hurt, did it?’ Scott asked succinctly, ‘Don’t try deceiving yourself, Philippa, I’m not the soft-hearted fool you tricked so easily with your soft voice and hands, I’ll enjoy inflicting pain on you. I ache to see you hurting… ache.…’
‘This will be your room.’ They were upstairs, and Philippa quelled a feeling of stepping back in time as Scott flung open a door. Nothing had changed, the room was exactly as she remembered it, his room. Her eyes were glued to the bed. Scott’s bed, an ancient fourposter. She shivered, as memories swept back over her. Scott kissing her, Scott undressing her, Scott making love to her, worshipping her shy body with his tender mouth and hands, just as she had worshipped his.
‘But this is your room.’ She hadn’t realised she had said the words until she saw the bitter contempt in Scott’s eyes.
‘So you remember it then? I thought you would have been in so many since you might not recognise it. It was my room, Philippa; after what you did to me I couldn’t bear to sleep here any longer. It made me sick to remember taking you here, feeling your body’s response to me whilst all the time it was all a meaningless lie from a little slut who thought she was exchanging her virginity for a wealthy secured future, and who ran out on me the minute she discovered the truth. My grandfather told me, you see,’ he said quietly, unleashing the savagery of his anger as she turned towards him, mystified by what he was saying. ‘He told me that he sent for you and told you he would disinherit me, and he told me how you demanded money from him, how you told him that you would find another lover, someone rich enough to support you in the style your greedy, amoral little heart craved. He laughed at me when I said I didn’t believe him. Here in this room he took my pride and broke it, after you’d confirmed to me what I’d told him were malicious lies. Can you wonder that I couldn’t sleep in here any longer?
‘But you will, Philippa, and when you do I’ll be praying that you’ll be visited by the ghosts of the people we once were, because if there was nothing else there was pleasure between us, and I bet I could take your beautiful, faithless body now and pleasure it until you were ready to promise me anything. You see it wasn’t only computers I learned about in the States.’
She wasn’t going to respond as he expected her to. She wouldn’t cry, or lose her temper, she wasn’t going to pander to the need to draw blood she could sense building up inside him, and he would never know what it cost her to walk over to the window and say calmly, ‘If this is my room, where is Simon’s?’
‘On the next floor.’ He saw her glancing at the secondary door set into the wall and smiled mirthlessly. ‘Ah yes, that door leads to my room. You see I didn’t move very far away.’ He saw her eyes go to the lock and laughed softly, ‘And yes, I do have the key. Like I said, whilst you’re here you’ll perform whatever duties I might require of you.’
‘I won’t sleep with you, Scott.’ She said it positively, not giving in to the terror she could feel stalking her, invading the room, cloaking her in ice-chilled fear.
‘You won’t be asked to,’ he assured her as he turned towards the door. ‘I’m going to my office. You can have the rest of the day off to get settled in. Dinner is at eight, you needn’t bother to dress.’
‘Is it all right if I use the phone?’
‘Why?’ Something flickered in the back of his eyes, something hot and dangerous. ‘Who do you want to ring? One of your lovers?’
‘Simon’s school.’ She was struggling to hold on to her self-control to beat off the miasma of apprehension she could feel enshrouding her.
‘Very well. I’ve already spoken to Dr Philipps and he’s agreed to take Simon on as a pupil. No doubt it won’t be long before his fellow pupils know of his illustrious paternity. You can’t hide a thing like that in a village this size.’
Something in his bitterness destroyed her hard-won self-control. Without being aware of it Philippa took a step towards him, her body tense, her fingers curled tightly into her palms. ‘If you do anything to hurt my son, I swear I will kill you, even if I have to do it with my bare hands. You can try to punish me as much as you like, but if you hurt Simon.…’
‘What’s the matter? You’ve said he knows who his father is?’
‘Yes.’
‘Well then what are you worrying about? If he knows Rivers’ identity, presumably he knows he’s illegitimate and that Rivers has married and has two other children beside him. Not that he spends much time with them. The boy’s at prep school and the girl has a nanny. And Philippa.’ She was still standing close to him and she recoiled as his fingers slid down her arms, circling her wrists, biting into her slender bones. ‘If you ever dare to threaten me again,’ he said silkily, his breath brushing the soft tendrils of hair at her nape, ‘you’d better be prepared for the consequences.…’
She was just about to demand ‘what consequences’ when she realised what he intended to do. Panic coiled and exploded inside her as he pinned her arms behind her back with one hand, the other sliding up into her hair and tightening into it, pulling her head back, until the slightest movement tugged painfully on her scalp.
He took his time, lowering his head towards her slowly, mercilessly scrutinising her face for the signs of fear she refused to show. ‘Well, well,’ he breathed softly, only inches away, ‘I did make a misjudgement, didn’t I? Perhaps this is what you really liked all along… sex spiced with violence, is that it Philippa? Then you should like this.’
