A guilty heat stole into her face at the fib, but oh, how she wished it could be true. ‘He’s perfectly capable of looking after his own affairs.’
‘That’s a lie.’ Margaret leaned forward, her thin mouth pinched. ‘He’s been as good as a vegetable since they brought him here yesterday.’
Righteous anger roared through Chrissy at Margaret’s callous attitude. ‘If I’d started work for him just a few months earlier, I’d have stopped you ever getting your snares…’ She broke off. ‘You seem to think you know an awful lot about his condition, for someone who’s only just arrived.’
‘A nurse—’ Margaret clamped her lips shut, but Chrissy got the picture. Margaret had wasted no time in ensuring she had a spy in the place.
‘Mrs Montbank has rights,’ the lawyer announced. ‘You are attempting to stand in the way of her exercising those rights.’
‘Mr Montbank has rights, too.’ Forget the slimy legal eagle, she thought, and instead she turned to Margaret again. ‘I repeat, I won’t let you in. You just want to shove Henry into Assisted Care and go your merry way, spending all his money.’
‘How dare you?’ Air hissed through Margaret’s clenched teeth. The truth of Chrissy’s accusations filled her eyes. ‘What do you know? Who’s told you—?’
‘Mrs Montbank.’ The lawyer stepped forward. ‘Let me handle this.’
‘Don’t bother.’ Chrissy spread herself before the closed door. Feet apart. Arms out. In the most threatening manner she could manage, she waggled her head and deployed the only defence she had. ‘Observe the headgear. Those are real porcelain chopsticks in there. I’ll use them if I have to!’
Margaret almost laughed, then her eyes narrowed. ‘Are you threatening me?’
‘I simply know that Henry would never willingly give you control of anything more than your budgeted allowance, Margaret—not of his personal funds, and certainly not of his business dealings. I’ll testify to it if I have to.’
‘You little tramp.’ Fury radiated from Margaret. ‘You’re probably sleeping with him, hoping to take him from me.’ She raised a clawed hand.
Now, that was too much. How dared Margaret insult Henry that way? How dared she insult Chrissy’s relationship with her boss? Without conscious thought, Chrissy raised her arm toward the buried chopsticks.
‘Thanks for holding the fort while I got some air, sweetheart.’ A man strode toward the group. Tall. Compelling. Effortlessly confident.
His turbulent blue gaze locked with hers. ‘Showing off your hairstyling abilities again, huh?’
He gave an indulgent grin that didn’t reach his eyes. ‘You shouldn’t dislodge those valuable antique chopsticks though, babe. What if you dropped one and it shattered?’
Babe? Sweetheart? Antique chopsticks? Who was this man? He made absolutely no sense. Yet the tone of his voice, the slight caress in it, the height and breadth and strength of him, all swamped her senses.
Muted sounds of hospital, of metal trolleys on polished floors, of professionals conferring in lowered tones dimmed. She saw only the man before her. Heard only her heartbeat, drumming her confusion and awareness.
When the warning in his gaze gave way to sensual heat, she knew he felt the connection, too. Long moments of still, silent acknowledgement passed between them.
She didn’t know this man, yet everything within her screamed that she did. That she had always known him, and would always know him.
‘Missed me?’ He clasped her raised arm, drew it up and around until her fingers speared into the crisp black hair at his nape. His hand covered hers, held it there as her anger subsided and confusion and awareness rose.
‘Um, well—’
‘Indeed.’ One kiss on her forehead. Another pressed against the crease at the side of her mouth. A hint of lemon and ginger on his breath.
She tasted the flavour of it from the side of her mouth with her tongue.
His gaze followed the movement, darkened, then turned to warning as hot, firm lips moved to whisper into her ear. ‘Your name?’
‘Christianna. Chrissy. Gable. Chrissy Gable.’ Or should that be Chrissy Gabble? Her thoughts struggled through the veil of weariness and stress. Struggled to come to terms with him.
This knight errant. This rescuer who had scorched her with a look and the barest of touches. Only one identity made any sense, but it couldn’t be. No way would he have bothered to come back. When people left like that, they never returned. And she would never have this sort of feeling for—
‘Ah. Henry’s PA. I should have known.’ Lean fingers traced across her skin with an exploratory insistence that belied the businesslike tone of his words.
Chrissy’s eyelids drooped behind her glasses. Just when she thought she would give in to the call of her senses and tilt her face completely into his hand, he stopped and shifted away. Cleared his throat. Blanked his face into a mask of calm determination as he faced the tableau of lawyer and avaricious wife.
‘Get rid of the lawyer, Margaret, as Chrissy has suggested. Then you can see Henry. Otherwise, there’s nothing you can achieve here.’
Margaret puffed up angrily. ‘He’s my husband—’
‘Yes. And he’ll be watched over very carefully during every moment of his recovery. Do you understand?’
A look passed between him and Margaret. Burning anger on his part. Some other sort of burning on hers. Chrissy shivered at the impact of those clashing looks.
Margaret’s hard stare glanced off her, and turned back to the man at her side. Shifted subtly into something else. ‘You haven’t even been in the country. What is she to you?’
He looked at Chrissy, looked back to Margaret. ‘It’s none of your business.’
‘You didn’t think that way once.’
‘You’re delusional.’ He examined her face with a passionless look of his own.
Margaret looked as though she would like to say more, then clamped her mouth into an unflattering line. ‘This isn’t the end. I’ll see my husband with a thousand lawyers, if I want to.’ She spun and walked away, her companion silent at her side.
Chrissy reached for a businesslike approach to counteract the way this man had made her feel. Even now, she struggled to accept that he had brought out such reactions in her.
‘You’re Nate Barrett. Henry’s grandson.’ It was the only thing that made sense. No way would Margaret have given way to anyone else. Not even for a moment.
He inclined his head. ‘I’m afraid you had the advantage over me at first.’
Despite what Chrissy might have thought of Nate Barrett in past years, despite how he had made her feel just now, he had to be informed. ‘Margaret was trying to get Power of Attorney, or get Henry declared unfit. I’m not sure exactly which, but I doubt she would stop at much to get what she wants.’
The woman’s greed was legendary. ‘I discovered by accident that Henry put her on a budget twelve months ago, but her behaviour hasn’t changed much. Except to reveal her bitterness. I hate to think what could happen if she got control within the company, or of Henry’s personal funds.’
‘She won’t be allowed to try to get at him or his money again.’ He said it with absolute conviction.
Chrissy could see the similarities to Henry now. Nate shared the tall stature, the breadth of shoulders. The Montbank stamp had honed his features into a strong, to-die-for appeal.
He doesn’t hold a to-die-for appeal for me. He can’t, because I know what he’s really like.