Part 13 (2/2)

'I can't work, I can't sleep! That's rich, isn't it?' he demanded, his lips twisting. I guess you could say that was why I resented what you did to me all those years ago. Maybe even then I knew I was fighting a losing battle.'

'Oh, Jared!' She was incredulous. 'Jared, I don't know what to say.' But her pulses were racing, and it was not just the aftermath of her illness that was making the blood thunder in her head.

'You could say-you're not entirely indifferent to me,' he muttered harshly, and her heart almost stopped beating when his hand slid possessively down her thigh to her knee. She put both her hands over his, and with an uncharacteristic disregard for other drivers, he stood on his brakes and, turning, pulled her into his arms.

She barely had time to say his name before his mouth covered hers, and the probing intimacy of his touch drove all coherent thought from her head.

'Oh, G.o.d!' he muttered at last, lifting his head to the sound of car horns and hooters, the well-meaning laughter of some road-users, and the not-so-well-meaning impatience of others. 'I want you all to myself, and instead we're stuck in this public place, providing free entertainment for the ma.s.ses!'

Catherine smoothed her hair back behind her ears. 'Let's go down to the beach,' she breathed huskily, but with a grim shake of his head, he released the clutch and drove on.

'There's something I have to do first,' he said flatly.

'What?' Catherine bent her head. 'Is-is it Laura? Are we meeting her at the airport?'

He glanced at her strangely. 'I wish to G.o.d it were,' he ground out savagely, and she moved her shoulders in bewilderment.

'What is it? Jared, you're not still thinking-'

'I'm trying not to think,' he told her through clenched teeth. 'I never thought I could do it, but I realise I'll have to.'

'Have to what?' She knelt on the seat beside him. 'Jared- -darling, what is it?'

His eyes darkened at the involuntary endearment, but then they were entering the airport complex and he had to give all his attention to his driving. Catherine swung her legs to the floor again, staring out at the incoming Boeing that was making its final run. No matter what Jared had said, there was an awful feeling of apprehension invading her system, and his determination to get to the airport had a.s.sumed the proportions of an obsession. What did he want here? What was it he had to do? And why should she feel so sure it had something to do with her?

He parked the convertible, and Catherine looked at him doubtfully. 'Do you want me to stay here?'

'No.' Jared got out of the car, and walked round to open her door. 'Come with me.'

'But where are we going?' she exclaimed, as they crossed to the airport buildings. 'Jared, what are we doing here?'

'You'll see.' Jared had become curiously remote, and there was a tautness about his features which had not been there earlier.

'Come on, it looks like the flight's landed.'

Catherine was asking: 'What flight?' as they entered the reception hall, but Jared strode ahead, looking about him, obviously searching for whoever it was they had come to meet. Catherine followed him slowly. She didn't understand what was going on, and the anxiety inside her was strengthening all the time.

Although that was something else she didn't understand either.

'Cat! Cat, old love! Here I am! Turning up again like the veritable bad penny!'

Catherine swung round. Surely she hadn't mistaken that voice?

'Tony!' she gasped, and hearing her involuntary exclamation, Jared turned, too. 'Tony, for heaven's sake,' she cried. 'What are you doing here?'

Jared was walking back towards them, and Catherine could see how pale he was beneath his tan. 'You are Tony Bainbridge?' he said, in a strange uneven voice. Then he looked at Catherine.

'This is-Tony?'

'Didn't he tell you I was coming, old love?' Tony looked at her, too, and Catherine, dry-mouthed, shook her head.

'I wanted to-' Jared broke off, his face so grim it was frightening. 'I didn't realise that-that you-'

'That I was a cripple?' asked Tony cheerfully, from the austerity of his wheelchair. 'Didn't Cat tell you? No, I can see she didn't.

Well, I'm afraid I am. Useless from the waist down, I'm sorry to say.' He winked in his usual good-humoured fas.h.i.+on. 'That's why Manners always goes everywhere with me, don't you, Manners?'

A tall thin man appeared from behind a rack of magazines and approached them. He was a middle-aged man, balding and bespectacled, but with his employer's sense of humour.

He smiled at Catherine and nodded at Jared, 'Good afternoon,' he remarked. 'Nice to see you again, Miss Fulton. Wasn't it kind of-of Mr Royal to invite us out here?'

CHAPTER NINE.

'I appear to have put my foot in it, don't I, old love?

Metaphorically speaking, of course.'

Tony spoke from the bed, but his words didn't stop Catherine's pacing.

'Why did you come out here, Tony?' she exclaimed helplessly, spreading her hands. 'You know you don't like leaving London!'

'That's some line in welcomes,' observed Tony dryly. 'I received an invitation. From your lord and master.'

'He's not my lord and master!'

'Isn't he? He acts like he is.'

'Yes--well, what he acts like and what he is, are two entirely different things.'

'You know him that well, huh?'

'I don't know him well at all.'

Tony shrugged. How was I to know you weren't behind his invitation? Why the h.e.l.l didn't he tell you?'

Catherine sighed, and came to stand at the end of the bed, holding the post with both hands. 'What did he tell you, Tony?

What was his reason for asking you out here?'

Tony grimaced. 'I forget his exact words. Something about you being-ill? Have you been ill?'

'A little. Just a touch of the sun, that's all.'

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