After a brief hesitation, she walked across to his room, and knocked. There was a much longer pause, then the door was flung open and he confronted her unsmilingly, tying the belt of a dark blue silk robe around him.
‘Do you have some in-built radar that lets you know when I’ve just come out of the shower?’ he asked caustically.
‘I’m sorry.’ She wished to heaven she didn’t sound so flustered. Or that she didn’t remember the last occasion quite so clearly. Although this time he was at least wearing a covering of sorts, she told herself, furious to find that she was blushing. ‘I—I need to speak to you, but later will do.’
‘Say what you have to say now,’ Daniel directed crisply. ‘I’m going out later.’
And staying out all night again? The question was bitten back before she was betrayed into asking it aloud.
It seemed infinitely safer to look down at the floor instead, she thought, aware of the flurry of her pulses. ‘Actually—I have a favour to ask.’
‘Have you, indeed?’ In spite of everything, she was aware that he was looking her over sardonically, taking in the primly buttoned blouse and the discreet length of her black skirt. ‘Shouldn’t you be dressed rather more seductively, in that case? Or have I mistaken the kind of favour?’ He paused. ‘But then it would hardly be the first mistake I’ve made where you’re concerned—would it, sweetheart?’
‘Dan—please.’ She took a deep breath, still avoiding his gaze. ‘Can we not.? I mean—you—you’re not making this very easy for me.’
‘Easy—for you?’ His laugh was brief and harsh. ‘Is that supposed to be a consideration here? Do you think it was easy for me to go to my lawyers and tell them I’d been rejected by my bride after less than twenty-four hours of marriage?’
Laine heard the corrosively angry note in his voice, and flinched.
‘No,’ she said, swallowing. ‘No, I don’t think that. And I realise, of course, that I have no right to ask for your help, and I apologise.’
‘Wait,’ he said, as she turned away. ‘What is it you wanted?’
She lifted her chin. ‘I found a job today, but it involves working in people’s homes when they’re not there, so I need a character reference.’
He was frowning. ‘What kind of a job?’
‘With a company called Citi-Clean,’ she said, bracing herself. ‘They provide daily maid services to blocks of private flats.’
‘My God,’ he said softly. ‘The wheel comes full circle.’
It was the reaction she’d expected, and she accepted it without wincing. ‘But at least this time I’ll be paid the market rate,’ she said. ‘I even get a uniform.’ She paused. ‘But I do need a recommendation. Actually, I need two, but Fiona at the gallery where I used to work is supplying the other. I think she was just thankful I wasn’t there to ask for my old job back.’ She realised she was babbling and stopped, adding only, ‘So—could you?’
‘And what am I supposed to say?’ Dan asked softly. ‘To swear that you’re entirely to be trusted and give complete satisfaction at all times? But then I’d be committing a kind of perjury—wouldn’t I, darling?’
‘If that’s how it seems.’ Pain lashed out at her, but she forced herself to stand her ground. To speak steadily even though her face was warming helplessly again under his jibe. ‘But I think the company’s main concern is thieving, and you can’t say I’ve ever stolen anything from you. Maybe you could simply mention that? Give things a more positive spin, perhaps?’
‘Perhaps,’ he said. ‘For a moment there I wondered if you were expecting me to play the knight in shining armour again, and come to your rescue. Because that would be absurdly optimistic, even for you.’
She was turning to go, but she spun round to face him, her eyes blazing. ‘Let’s get something straight, shall we?’ she said, her voice husky. ‘Dispel this damned myth once and for all. I am not Elaine, the Lily Maid of Astolat, and I never thought of you as Sir bloody Lancelot—not even for a moment.’
‘I’m relieved to hear it,’ he said coolly. ‘According to the poem he was more than twice her age.’He allowed her to assimilate that for a moment, then added, ‘But I’m still capable of the occasional act of chivalry, so leave the address of this cleaning company where I can see it, and I’ll get my secretary to write to them.’
She bit her lip. ‘I—I’m very grateful.’
‘Thanks for the assurance,’ he said. ‘But I already know the limits you impose on your gratitude, along with all your other warmer emotions. So let’s leave this favour as the first and last—shall we, my sweet?’
And he stepped back into the room and closed the door, leaving her standing outside, staring at the closed panels, her arms folded almost protectively across her body.
As if, she thought with bitter self-mockery, she was still attempting some useless defence against a threat that clearly no longer existed. If indeed it ever had.
But as she went slowly back to her own room she found herself remembering that note of anger in his voice. Anger, she realised, mixed with something else much less easy to define. And she shivered.
CHAPTER SIX
THE wheel comes full circle …
Daniel’s words seemed to echo and re-echo in her mind as she lay on the bed staring up at the ceiling. And, as she reminded herself, she could hardly defend her decision, or deny its irony. Not to him, at any rate.
She wondered if he too was thinking of the day two years ago when, ten weeks after Si’s funeral, he’d walked into the drawing room at Abbotsbrook and found her standing on a rickety pair of steps, struggling to hang the new curtains that had arrived that morning.
‘What the hell are you doing up there?’
She hadn’t heard him enter the house, let alone the room, and the furious demand from behind her made her jump, and sent the steps into a further paroxysm of wobbles as a result.
‘Come down.’ The peremptory note brooked no argument, so he didn’t actually need to grasp her round the waist with strong hands and lift her bodily from the steps. Yet that was what he did, setting her down to face him, flushed and breathless.
‘Dan?’ She allowed herself to sound surprised, but braked hard on the instinctive overwhelming delight of seeing him again after all these endless weeks. Of noting almost wistfully how gorgeous he looked. The way the white shirt with the turned-back sleeves emphasised his tan, how the casual charcoal pants enhanced his lean hips and the length of his legs. How that random strand of dark hair always seemed to fall over his forehead, making her always long to smooth it back. Which was impossible.
And then she realised the danger of standing, gaping at him like this. Felt self-conscious too, in her working gear of ancient cut-offs and faded T-shirt, not to mention hot and grubby because she’d just washed down the high window frames.
And hurried into speech. ‘My—my mother never mentioned you were expected. Are you staying with us? Because I’ll need to see about your room—’
‘Your mother has no idea I’m here.’ He cut across her incisively. ‘I’m staying at a hotel a few miles away, and I’ve come, having failed to find you at Randalls. What’s going on, Laine?’
She shrugged, standing with yards of brocade trailing awkwardly over her arm. ‘I left. Didn’t Mrs Hallam tell you?’
‘Indeed she did, and at some length too,’ he said grimly. ‘What she couldn’t say was why?’