His Delicious Revenge: The Price of Retribution / Count Valieri's Prisoner / The Highest Stakes of All

Nor could she allow herself to forget that, in the end, she’d been saved, not by her own strength of will, but by an amateur weather forecaster with a Jack Russell terrier.

And how shameful was that? she thought bitterly.

Della had once asked how she might have reacted to Caz if they’d simply met as strangers without Evie’s involvement, and she’d replied dismissively, defensively.

If she asked me the same question now, she thought, I don’t know what I’d say.

When they eventually reached her flat, Caz left the engine running as he turned and gave her a long, steady look. ‘I’m not going to ask if I can come up with you,’ he said quietly. ‘Because I know damned well that I’d try a different kind of persuasion—in bed. And that wouldn’t be right or fair.’

She bit her lip. ‘Thank you. I want you to know that, whatever happens, you’ve given me the loveliest day.’ She reached for the door handle, and hesitated. ‘Oh—your sweater…’

‘Keep it,’ he said. His smile was faintly crooked. ‘It looks far better on you than it ever did on me.’ He paused. ‘When you’ve made up your mind, whichever way it goes, call me.’

‘Yes.’

‘And I don’t trust myself to kiss you either, in case you’re wondering.’

Her own attempt to smile was a failure. ‘You’re—very strong-minded.’

‘No,’ he said. ‘It’s just that I feel I’ve put quite enough pressure on you already.’ He ran a finger down the curve of her cheek. Touched it briefly to her mouth. ‘Promise me we’ll talk soon?’

She nodded, dry-mouthed, and left the car.

She didn’t watch him drive away. She walked upstairs, aware that her legs were shaking. Fumbled the key into the lock. Closed the door behind her and leaned against it, staring blind-eyed into space, aware of little but the deep, rapid thud of her heart.

She was thankful that she was alone. That she could keep the day’s events to herself, without having to offer excuses or explanations, because she could imagine what Della’s reaction would be to this latest development.

Eventually, she forced herself to move. To walk to the kitchen and put on a pot of strong coffee to brew, while she took a shower. All sensible measures to dispel the ice which had apparently settled inside her.

But while the shower warmed her, it failed to make her feel any cleaner, so its comfort was, at best, limited, she thought wearily as she dried herself.

Wrapped in her dressing gown, she curled into a corner of the sofa, sipped her scalding coffee and tried to force her teeming brain to focus. She caught sight of her bare feet, and, realising that she was shivering voluptuously at the memories they evoked, hastily tucked them away under the skirts of her robe.

How was it possible, she wondered dazedly, for all that apparent tenderness, all that caring to be only an illusion?

She wished she still had the diary, which might give her some clue as to what to expect next. After all, didn’t they say that forewarned was forearmed?

Unless his proposal was simply a ploy to get her into bed. A form of deception Caz hadn’t needed with poor Evie, she thought bitterly. But if he thought she was merely playing hard to get, he would soon discover his mistake.

But just suppose that he means it, said a small sly voice in her brain. That, no matter what has happened in the past, you’re the one that he truly wants. How do you deal with that?

I tell myself that it doesn’t change a thing, she whispered under her breath. And I keep saying it.

Because if he was genuine, why didn’t he tell me about Evie? Express some remorse for the way he treated her. Why didn’t he say, ‘Darling, I have something to confess. I was engaged once before to a sweet girl, but it didn’t work out, and, although it’s over, I know I hurt her terribly, and I shall always regret that.’

But he’d said nothing. Instead he’s simply airbrushed her out of his life, she thought. And he could do the same to me. I must not ever let myself forget that.

She tried to divert herself by watching television. One of her favourite films was showing, something so familiar that she could almost repeat the dialogue by heart, but this evening it totally failed to engage her.

The scene on the beach unfolded, frame by frame, over and over again in her mind, eclipsing anything on the screen.

‘Oh, to hell with it,’ she muttered eventually. ‘I’m going to bed.’

Her clothes were still lying on the bedroom floor, and she bent to retrieve them, tossing each item into the basket for laundering. Wondering, as she did so, whether she could ever bear to wear any of them again.

Until, at the bottom of the pile, she came upon Caz’s sweater.

For a moment, she stared down at it, then, obeying some incomprehensible primal instinct, she gathered up its soft weight with both hands and held it against her breasts, her throat, her mouth, breathing in the scent of his skin, and drawing it deep into her lungs as if, by this means, she could somehow capture the essence of him and hold it within her forever.

A long, quivering sigh convulsed her body. A sigh of yearning, bewildering her with its strength. A sigh of loss and regret, and she felt her throat muscles tighten painfully as she tasted the first bitterness of tears. A low, animal sound rose from deep inside her and was torn from her parted lips.

And with it came chaos.

She sank down on to the carpet, still clutching the bundle of cashmere and pressing it to her face as if she hoped it could somehow staunch the tears that were pouring down her face, or silence the harsh, gasping sobs that were suddenly ripping her apart.

She seemed incapable of movement or even coherent thought as she crouched there, her body shaking uncontrollably.

I want him. I love him. Oh, God forgive me, I love him so much…

The words, unbelievable, unutterable, ran crazily through her head, piercing her with their shame.

When at long last there were no tears left, and her throat was aching with dry sobs, she got clumsily to her feet. She shed her robe and climbed naked into bed, spreading the damp sweater across her pillow and pressing her cheek against it. Knowing that it might be all she would ever have of him.

‘From that first moment…’

His words, and she could see now that they were as true for her as he’d claimed they were for him. That she’d gone to the reception looking only to avenge Evie and come away with her mind in turmoil, no matter how much she might have tried to deny it.

She could recognise now that she’d been in one form of denial or another ever since.

Something which had to stop right here. Because there were choices to be made, and she would need a clear head to make them, she thought as she closed her eyes and allowed herself to sink down into the mattress. Aware that very soon her physical and emotional exhaustion would take her over the edge into temporary oblivion, and let sleep work its magic.

She woke the next morning feeling calm and strangely empty, but knowing exactly what she had to do.

She would visit Evie at The Refuge that afternoon, no matter what obstacles were put in her way, and break the news to her that she had changed her mind and abandoned the planned revenge. At the same time, she would also tell her that she was leaving Britain, probably for good, and returning to her own life.

Because Della had been completely right, of course, she told herself. She had no obligation to drop everything and run to their aid whenever Aunt Hazel or Evie sent out an SOS. As it was, her intervention, however well-meant, had led to her own heartbreak, and she would need time and distance for the healing process to begin.

Evie, too, was receiving the best treatment and would also recover. And both she and her mother would eventually learn to stand on their own feet too.

I’ve done them no favours by encouraging their dependency, she thought.

Ironically, it was Caz himself who had shown her the only solution to this maze of lies and unhappiness she was embroiled in. After all, he’d said yesterday that she’d come out of nowhere and might vanish in the same way.

And that was precisely her intention. To depart without trace. To find somewhere else to live and sink back into her work. To start over, a chameleon, invisible in her surroundings.

A clean break, she resolved, removing the necessity for any tortuous and impossible explanations which would not reflect credit on either Caz or herself. ‘Least said, soonest mended,’ she thought wryly, and all the other comforting clichés, which were no comfort at all.

And if, at the moment, the break felt more like an amputation, she knew that once the numbness had worn off, the pain would start in earnest.