Stolen Summer

‘I think I can do it,’ murmured Shelley evenly, refusing to be drawn by the girl’s pertness. And, as Sarah tossed her head carelessly, and marched towards the door, Marsha herself put her head around it.

‘Oh, you are awake!’ she exclaimed, coming into the room as the maid departed, revealing she was still in her dressing gown. ‘I asked Mrs Carr to send you up some tea, just in case you were awake. But, as you are, perhaps you’d like breakfast as well.’

‘Oh, no.’ Shelley put the tray of tea aside and threaded long slim fingers through her hair. She refrained from mentioning that she hadn’t been awake until Sarah chose to disturb her. If it was half-past-eight, it was late enough. ‘Honestly, Marsha, I’m not an invalid. And I’m not going to spend my holiday lying in bed. I’ll come downstairs and have some coffee and toast, if I may. Just give me fifteen minutes to take a shower and put some clothes on.’

‘Don’t bother to dress!’ Marsha waved a dismissing hand. ‘My dear, there’s only the two of us, and I rarely put my clothes on before ten o’clock—unless I’m feeling very virtuous, which isn’t often.’ She smiled. ‘Mrs Carr sets the table in the morning room, and I usually spend an hour or so going over the papers. I get half a dozen delivered. It’s the only way to keep up to date with the news.’

‘All right.’ Shelley was not prepared to argue. As soon as Marsha had gone, she intended to take a couple of headache capsules, and it would be rather pleasant just to take things easy for once.

‘Good.’ Marsha was pleased. ‘Well, I’ll leave you to wash your hands.’ Her eyes twinkled. ‘See you downstairs in five minutes.’

After her friend had gone, Shelley slid out of bed and padded across to the window. She had left her bag on the window seat, and she perched there as she rummaged for the small carton that contained the paracetamol capsules. Swallowing two, she looked out of the window, thinking how ironic it was that even in these idyllic surroundings she was still a prey to her nerves. But it would pass, she told herself firmly. The psychiatrist had said that all she needed was a complete rest, away from the petty jealousies she had never really learned to live with, and away from Mike, whose emotional blackmail simply wasn’t going to work.

After rinsing her face and cleaning her teeth in the bathroom, Shelley picked up her kimono-style wrapper from the end of the bed, and slid her arms into the sleeves. Made of jade-green satin and appliquéd with white flowers around the wide sleeves and the hem, it was her favourite robe, not least because Marsha herself had bought it for her in Tokyo almost five years ago.

A brief appraisal of her appearance necessitated that she take a brush to her hair, and she grimaced at her reflection as the thick coarse strands resisted her efforts. She had often been tempted to have her hair cut, but although she had it trimmed from time to time, it still hung well below her shoulders. Usually, she wore it in a loose coil at the nape of her neck or occasionally, as the day before, she wound it into a knot on top of her head, which made her look even taller.

Abandoning the task, she pushed heelless mules on to her feet, and opened her door. Marsha had briefly explained the lay-out of the house to her the night before, and Shelley easily made her way to the head of the stairs, and descended slowly. The balustrade was smooth, after years of use and Mrs Carr’s polishing, and a warm red carpet underfoot gave colour to the panelled wall that mounted beside her. Some of Marsha’s paintings had been hung to provide their own illumination, and someone had filled a copper urn with armfuls of white and purple lilac, that scented the air with its perfume.

Downstairs, she found the morning room easily. The door was standing ajar, and she could see a round table spread with a white tablecloth and smell the delicious aroma of coffee. Marsha had evidently gone to tell Mrs Carr that her guest would not be requiring breakfast in bed, and Shelley entered the room without hesitation, halting abruptly at the sight of a man, lounging at the side of the table which had been hidden from the door. He had a newspaper propped in front of him, and all Shelley could initially see was one leg, encased in cream denim, the foot resting carelessly on the leg of the chair beside him, and one arm, which revealed he was wearing a matching denim shirt. The sleeve of his shirt was rolled back almost to his elbow, exposing a lean brown arm, and his wrist was encircled by a slim gold watch which, in spite of its leather strap, looked rather exclusive. It was the sort of present Marsha would buy, Shelley suspected, guessing who it must be. But she was unwilling to face anyone else in her present state of undress, and she would have withdrawn unseen had he not chosen that moment to lower the newspaper.

‘You!’

Shelley’s instinctive embarrassment at being caught out gave way to blank astonishment at the sight of the man, who was now withdrawing his foot from its resting place and getting to his feet. It was the man from the Land-Rover—Ben Seton—and for several seconds she forgot her appearance in the numbness of disbelief.

‘Good morning, Miss Hoyt—or can I call you Shelley?’ he enquired, evidently deriving as much amusement from her reaction today as he had from her frustration the day before, and Shelley fought to regain her sense of balance. What was he doing here? she asked herself abstractedly. How had he found her? And how did he know her name, when she herself hadn’t told him. Marsha! she thought intuitively. Marsha must know he was here. And with that awareness, came another sickening realisation …

As if her sudden, dawning knowledge was written in her eyes for him to read, he put the newspaper aside, and came easily across the room to stand in front of her. Without her heels, he seemed much taller than he had done the day before, and she knew an ominous feeling of presentiment when he put his hands upon her shoulders.

‘I’m sorry,’ he said, and she knew now why his eyes had briefly seemed so familiar. ‘I know I should have told you yesterday, but when you didn’t recognise me, I decided you deserved all you got.’ His lips tilted, and his teeth were very white against his dark skin. ‘I was going to come over last evening for dinner, but I took pity on you, after all. I guessed—after the day you had had—you might not be able to stand any more shocks.’

Shelley didn’t know which emotion she felt strongest—anger, at his deliberate deception; resentment, that he should still be treating her with the same mixture of good humour and tolerance he had displayed the day before; or panic, at the fact he had come back into her life and overthrown her resolution not to think of him again.

‘Are you angry with me?’ he asked softly, and aware that Marsha could come upon them at any time, and she was in no state to deal with that, Shelley gave a helpless shake of her head.

‘I—why—you were only about seventeen, when I saw you last,’ she stammered, looking up at him and then wishing she hadn’t. He really had the most fantastic eyes, dark grey at the moment, and fringed with thick silvery lashes, that accentuated their beauty. A person could drown in those eyes, she thought unwillingly, unable to drag her gaze away, until his tightening fingers on her shoulders brought her quickly to her senses. ‘W-where is your mother?’

‘In the kitchen,’ said Marsha’s son flatly, allowing her to step back from his hands, and Shelley, reminded of her unwelcome state of undress, wrapped the folds of her kimono closer about her. Even so, she was intensely conscious of the revealing thinness of her garments, and of the fact that her nipples were standing taut against the material.

‘I should get dressed,’ she said distractedly, half turning towards the door, but his hand about her wrist prevented her from leaving.

‘Don’t,’ he said, his thumb moving insistently over the vulnerable inner veins, and although she knew he was probably unaware of what he was doing, her breath caught painfully in her throat.

The sound of footsteps crossing the hall outside made Shelley put some distance between them. By the time Marsha appeared in the doorway, she had taken a seat at the table, and the older woman looked at them delightedly, evidently sensing nothing amiss.

‘Isn’t this a surprise, Shelley?’ she exclaimed, bustling into the room to set a third place at the table. ‘I see you two have renewed your acquaintance. I’m surprised you recognised Dickon. It must be eight or nine years since you last met.’

‘Eight,’ said her son drily, returning to the chair he had occupied before Shelley’s intervention. ‘But Shelley hasn’t changed. I’d have recognised her anywhere.’

Shelley managed a tight smile, but the look she cast in his direction was apprehensive. ‘How gallant!’ she said, her elbows on the table protecting her body from his gaze. ‘Your son has inherited your flare for understatement, Marsha. It’s very kind, but it’s not the truth.’

Marsha laughed. ‘Oh, Dickon has always been able to charm his way out of any situation,’ she declared, not without a certain amount of motherly pride, and her son expelled an exasperated breath.

‘My name’s Benedict, Mother, not Dickon.’ His eyes moved briefly to Shelley’s averted head and then back again. ‘I doubt if your guest even knows my proper surname.’

‘Does it matter?’ Marsha pulled a face at him. ‘Shelley doesn’t care if you call yourself Benedict Manning or Benedict Seton, and I, for one, prefer the name Dickon to Ben.’ She shrugged. ‘Benedict was your father’s choice. I wanted to call you Richard.’

‘Well, I prefer Ben,’ he retorted, as the maid came into the room carrying a fresh pot of coffee and a rack of toast. ‘What do you think, Sarah? Do I look more like a Ben than a Dickon?’

‘Oh, Mr Benedict, I don’t know,’ the girl simpered girlishly, her eyes darting triumphantly in Shelley’s direction, almost as if she might be envying her his attention. ‘But Mrs Carr did say to ask you if you wanted sausages as well as bacon for breakfast. ‘Cos if you do, I’ve got to run down to the village and see if Mrs Peart’s is open.’

‘Bacon is fine,’ Ben assured her firmly, and his mother pursed her lips.

‘Honestly, that girl is impossible sometimes,’ she exclaimed, after Sarah had left the room. ‘And you encourage her, Dickon. You know perfectly well she was not supposed to add that rider about having to run down to the village! If you wanted sausages, you should have asked for them. It wouldn’t have taken her more than five minutes to ride down to the stores on her bicycle!’

‘But I didn’t want sausages, Mother,’ Ben responded patiently. ‘I’m only having bacon because you insisted. Where is it, by the way? I don’t have all day.’

‘Oh—I’d better go and speak to Mrs Carr,’ declared Marsha, pushing back her chair, and before Shelley could prevent her, she had left the room once again.

‘You didn’t tell my mother about me giving you a lift yesterday, did you?’ Ben asked, as soon as Marsha was out of earshot, and Shelley made an involuntary gesture.

‘How could I? I didn’t know who you were,’ she reminded him, deliberately keeping her tone light. But her stomach was churning and she suspected he was not deceived.

‘Why not tell her just now?’ he persisted, watching the delicate colour invade her throat. ‘I assume she does know you snapped a fanbelt. She was very concerned about your whereabouts when I rang last night.’

‘I told her what happened,’ Shelley countered defensively. ‘And that I’d been given a lift into Low Burton.’ She tilted her head. ‘Why didn’t you tell her last night?’

‘Touché.’ Ben acknowledged her offensive with a wry smile. ‘For the same reasons you didn’t, I suppose,’ he replied softly. ‘I didn’t want to talk about it. Not then, anyway.’

Shelley felt as if she was losing her grip on the conversation, and forcing a careless smile, she said: ‘I suppose we both took the easy way out.’ Dismissing the subject, she cupped her chin in her hands: ‘Marsha tells me you’re engaged to be married. How exciting! When am I going to meet your fiancée?’

‘Don’t patronise me, Shelley!’

The sudden anger in his voice was unmistakable, and she pressed her hand to her throat in an effort to control the erratic racing of her heart. It was crazy to allow this situation to develop any further, and her mouth was dry as she reached for the pot of coffee.

‘Do you want some?’ she asked, hoping she would not spill it, but with a shake of his head, he got abruptly to his feet.

‘I’ll tell my mother I can’t wait any longer,’ he said, subjecting her to a devastating appraisal. He strode towards the door. ‘Oh—and Shelley——’This, with his fingers on the handle and his temple pressed against the jamb: ‘You’re nothing like my mother, so don’t act like her. And you haven’t changed. You’re still the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen!’

CHAPTER THREE (#ulink_c0442f83-90d1-5550-aa0d-d0f1c50263e5)

THE following evening, Shelley examined her reflection with some misgivings. Was what she was wearing suitable for a simple family dinner, she wondered. The dark blue Dior silk was very plain, but it was also very flattering, and the last thing she wanted to do was look as if she was trying too hard. The dress was cut with style and elegance, moulding the seductive fullness of her breasts and flaring over her slim hips. It had seemed the most appropriate choice in her wardrobe, but now she was not so sure. Marsha had said any old thing would do, but Shelley didn’t have ‘any old thing’. Most of her clothes were expensive, bought with her position in mind. She could hardly appear in a shirt and jeans when she was going to meet Ben’s fiancée.

Turning away from the mirror, Shelley cast an abstracted look about the bedroom. Where had she put her shoes? And thank goodness she had done her make-up earlier. Right now, she knew her hands were shaking, and any attempt to apply the dusky amber eyeshadow and burnt coral lip-gloss would have surely ended in disaster. Her hair, too, had benefited from the wax conditioning she had given it before her shower. Now, knotted securely on top of her head, it gave her height and confidence, even its colour muted by the severe style. She looked her age, she thought reassuringly, glancing at her reflection once again. She was completely unaware that by twisting back her hair, she had exposed the porcelain-like purity of her profile.

The sound of a car outside brought her swiftly to the window, but she concealed herself behind the curtain when a dark red Porsche drew round in a circle and came to a halt on the forecourt. Feeling horribly like one of those women who live their lives through observing others, Shelley would have turned away then, if Marsha’s son had not immediately emerged from the vehicle. In beige corded pants and a matching jacket, he looked every bit as disturbing as she remembered, the breeze lifting the thick swathe of sun-bleached hair and depositing several strands across his forehead.

Oh, dear! she thought unsteadily, feeling the bones of her shoulders digging into the wall behind her. This was madness! But she could not tear her eyes away as he walked round the car and opened the door for the girl at the other side.