King of Swords
Sara Craven
Former journalist SARA CRAVEN published her first novel ‘Garden of Dreams’ for Mills & Boon in 1975. Apart from her writing (naturally!) her passions include reading, bridge, Italian cities, Greek islands, the French language and countryside, and her rescue Jack Russell/cross Button. She has appeared on several TV quiz shows and in 1997 became UK TV Mastermind champion. She lives near her family in Warwickshire – Shakespeare country.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
IN THE glowing light of a June afternoon, Ambermere had never looked more beautiful.
Julia brought her car to a halt at the side of the road and slid out from behind the wheel. The faint breeze lifted a few tendrils of waving copper hair and she pushed them back impatiently as she leaned on the wall and stared across the lush green of the lower paddock to the house.
It all looked amazingly peaceful, even deserted, but she knew that apparent tranquillity was only a façade. Inside, there would be a frantic buzz of activity as her mother and the staff applied the finishing touches to the décor for tonight’s Midsummer party.
And I should be there, helping, Julia thought, half guiltily, half in amusement. The Ambermere party was one of the most anticipated local events in the year—a pleasant tradition established over generations.
She felt a small sigh of satisfaction rise within her at the thought. That was what houses like Ambermere were all about—custom and continuity. And that was what she would continue to provide, even if she was the only daughter, instead of the once longed-for son.
A month, she decided with sudden restlessness, was far too long to be away, even though she had enjoyed herself. Aunt Miriam was a wonderful diplomat’s wife and there had been parties and dinners nearly every night. In addition there had been tennis, and swimming and polo matches, as well as visits to concerts and theatres with a succession of attractive and attentive young men.
‘But no one worthy of Ambermere,’ Julia would tell her father presently, with mock regret. It was a joke which had begun in the days of a much younger Julia who had been very much affronted to learn that the family name would die out when she married.
‘Then I won’t get married,’ she had declared to her amused parents. ‘Unless I can find a man with the same name as ours.’
‘But you might fall in love with someone called Smith,’ Lydia Kendrick had pointed out, stroking the small, determined face.
‘Then he’ll have to change his name to Kendrick,’ Julia had retorted. ‘If he won’t do that, then he’s not worthy of Ambermere.’
They had all three laughed about it since, but Julia had come to recognise that she’d been more than half in earnest. She wanted to go on living at Ambermere, and see her children brought up there, bearing her own loved family name. But the man who would fit docilely in with these plans, and father those children, remained a shadowy and amorphous figure. None of the boyfriends who wined and dined her so assiduously, and tried, without any luck, to get her into bed, seemed even remotely to be suitable candidates.
Perhaps I won’t get married at all, she thought. Maybe I’ll just run the estate and become known as an eccentric spinster. She grimaced slightly, straightening as she prepared to get back in the car, and it was then she saw him.
A man, a perfect stranger, walking across the lower paddock, where he had no right to be.
Julia’s lips tightened as she watched him. He was tall, with glossy black hair, and a swarthy skin, and she didn’t have to guess where he’d come from. Her easy-going father had always permitted gipsies to camp beyond the copse, on the understanding that they kept the site tidy, and didn’t encroach in any way on the rest of the estate.
And now here was one of them strolling about as if he owned the place. Well, he would soon know differently! Julia decided grimly.
She swung herself up on to the wall, put two fingers to her lips and whistled.
The man’s head came round sharply, and he looked at her, but he made no effort to approach. Usually the same travelling people came back year after year, but Julia had never set eyes on this one before. He was darker even then Loy Pascoe, who was the head of the family, and had conducted the negotiations with her father. Julia was aware of unsmiling dark eyes beneath level brows, a beak of a nose, and a firmly emphasised mouth and chin. Not good-looking exactly, she found herself thinking to her own surprise, but with a definite air—seignorial and irritatingly arrogant—about him. Maybe he was some distant relation of the Pascoe clan and just passing through, but that was no reason why he shouldn’t obey the same rules as everyone else.
She said clearly and coldly, ‘Do you know you’re trespassing?’
He stood surveying her silently, hands resting on his hips, but he made no reply. He was wearing well-cut cream denim pants and an elegant knitted shirt, open at the neck to reveal the strong column of his throat, and a shadowing of body hair on his chest. His clothes had obviously cost a great deal of money.
The scrap metal business must be booming, Julia thought cynically. No poor relation, this one.
Her tone glacial, she said, ‘I suppose you do speak English?’
There was a slight pause, then he nodded, his face expressionless.
‘Well that’s something.’ Julia’s eyes narrowed. ‘Then you understand what I mean by trespass?’
Another nod. They were actually making progress.
‘My father permits your people to camp on his land on certain conditions. I suggest you go back where you came from and find out what they are. And don’t let me find you wandering about here again.’
She climbed lithely down from the wall and got into her car, angrily aware that he hadn’t budged an inch. The nerve of him! she thought. She risked a glance in her mirror as she drove off, and realised furiously that he was smiling—laughing at her.
I’ll call at the camp and give Loy a piece of my mind, she raged inwardly. Give these tinkers an inch, and they take a mile!