‘You——’
‘Don’t add obscene language to your list of faults,’ he bit out caustically. ‘You were enjoying yourself,’ he shrugged. ‘And so I thought, what the hell? That takes care of wilful and spoilt,’ he rasped. ‘And tonight when I arrived your father told me he and your mother were just having a small family dinner party in honour of their daughter’s wedding on Saturday. I thought he must have two daughters, but no, he told me there’s only his Caity!’ He looked at her disgustedly.
‘So?’ she challenged defiantly.
‘So,’ he was so close the warmth of his breath stirred the feathered fringe above her eyes, ‘where was your engagement ring last night?’
‘I’m not engaged,’ she snapped. ‘My family doesn’t believe in them.’ Mainly because they never knew their partners long enough to bother with them!
‘You didn’t act like a woman about to be married in five days!’
‘I didn’t act?’ she repeated incredulously. ‘You were the one who kissed me,’ she hissed.
‘And you kissed me right back!’
A guilty flush darkened her cheeks at the truth of that. ‘You took me by surprise——’
‘For fifteen minutes!’ he derided harshly.
‘Rogan, please,’ she looked about them awkwardly, very conscious of where they were, and of her family in the room, even if he wasn’t.
‘Take me outside to look at the garden. Or something,’ he instructed hardly, his eyes narrowed.
‘No, I——’
‘You would rather we continued with our conversation here?’ he mocked tautly.
Brian and Beth were still talking with her parents on the other side of the lounge, but it was only a matter of time before they became curious about the intensity of the conversation between two supposed strangers. ‘All right,’ she agreed irritably. ‘But Graham and his parents will be arriving in a few minutes.’ She hoped!
‘The man you’re going to marry?’ Rogan prompted.
‘Yes,’ she confirmed defensively.
‘I pity the poor bastard,’ Rogan rasped as he accompanied her out on to the terrace that overlooked the gardens. ‘God knows how you’re going to behave after the two of you are married!’
‘Will you keep your voice down?’ She turned on him as soon as he had closed the door behind them, the September evening was warm, the sun not having gone down yet. ‘Must I remind you that you were the one who kept following me last night,’ she snapped agitatedly.
‘All you had to do was calmly tell me you were getting married in five days’ time; why didn’t you?’
She had asked herself the same question all day, and not found a single answer. ‘I don’t know,’ she admitted heavily.
‘Caity——’
‘Please don’t.’ She moved away from him as he would have enfolded her in his arms. ‘I’m not proud of what happened last night, but I—I’ll learn to live with it.’
‘Why?’ His eyes were narrowed to emerald slits, his hair taking on a blue-black sheen in the sunlight.
‘Because I did respond to you,’ she acknowledged gruffly. ‘And I shouldn’t have done.’
‘Caity——’
‘Let’s go back inside.’ Once again she avoided his arms. ‘I heard a car just now; it must be Graham and his parents.’ She deliberately evaded looking at him as he politely held the door open for her to enter.
The Simond-Smiths were just being shown into the lounge as the two of them entered from the garden, and Caitlin’s eyes lit up as she saw Graham, reassured by his boyish smile, moving forward to receive his kiss before acknowledging his parents, Joanna and Peter, and his sister-in-law, Gayle.
Gayle kissed her on the cheek. ‘I really am so sorry about last night. I was helping Graham with some research for his book, and it completely slipped my mind that I’d arranged to meet you.’
The other woman had telephoned her first thing this morning to apologise for the oversight, and once she had heard the reason she had forgiven Gayle for the lapse; the book Graham was writing on the Vikings was absorbing stuff. An accountant by profession, in partnership with his father, Graham had a passion for Viking history.
‘Please don’t worry about it,’ she tucked her hand into the crook of Graham’s arm, ‘I know how carried away Graham can get over his book.’ She gave him an indulgent smile.
‘Aren’t you going to introduce us, Caity?’
She glared at Rogan as he used the term of affection deliberately. ‘Graham Simond-Smith, and his sister-in-law, Gayle,’ she bit out tautly. Graham’s parents were in conversation with her own and Brian and Beth, leaving them a curious quartet. ‘A business acquaintance of my father’s, Rogan McCord,’ she supplied pointedly.
His handshake with Graham was brief to say the least, Caitlin’s mouth tightening as Graham gave a perplexed frown at the other man’s coldness, looking completely baffled by his own treatment as Rogan gave Gayle a smile of lingering charm.
Caitlin wasn’t puzzled at all by his behaviour; she knew that he despised Graham as much as he pitied him, believing she treated the other man as a fool. And he couldn’t help turning his charm on Gayle, who, widowed for the last two years, was still very young and beautiful.
Gayle had been married to Graham’s older brother, and continued to live in the family home even after his death at the end of a long illness. Caitlin had never known Thomas Simond-Smith, but she knew Graham had admired his brother tremendously, and that Gayle hadn’t looked at another man since his death.
Until now! Gayle couldn’t help but look at Rogan McCord as he drew her away to talk quietly together in one of the bay windows fronting the house. Gayle was blushing prettily at what Rogan was saying to her, reminding Caitlin that the other woman was still only thirty years old, even though her widowhood occasionally made her seem much older.
‘Who is he?’ Graham frowned as he watched the other man across the room.
‘I told you, a business associate of my father’s,’ she dismissed, turning her back on the other couple. ‘How about a proper hello; I haven’t seen you for two days!’ she teased.
He grinned down at her, looking younger than his twenty-six years, his blond hair, kept cut short because of its tendency to curl, in need of the cut it was undoubtedly going to get on the morning before their wedding, falling untidily on to his forehead.
He was young and uncomplicated, and Caitlin had been attracted to him from the moment they met a year ago. Happily he had returned the attraction, and they had both looked forward to their wedding-day.
Had. Caitlin stole a glance at Rogan and Gayle as she and Graham strolled out into the garden; the other woman was totally engrossed in Rogan’s drawled words. Caitlin wondered what they were talking about.
‘Mmm.’ Graham drew his head back to gaze down at her with warm eyes, his hands linked at the base of her spine as he held her to him after their lingering kiss. ‘I’ve missed you.’
‘I’ve missed you too.’ This time she kised him with a fierceness that bordered on desperation.
‘Hey!’ Graham straightened, a flush to his cheeks. ‘Someone could come out to call us for dinner at any moment.’
‘Someone already has,’ rasped a harsh voice, Rogan’s gaze cold as it flickered over Caitlin’s dishevelled hair and slightly swollen lips. ‘Your mother