been waiting for an extremely important business telephone call her father had been unable to attend, but had said he would be home when they got there. And that had annoyed Nathan because it had meant he would have to go back with her to her home to exchange their marriage certificate for the cheque that would save Mallory and Mallory from losing everything.
‘I’m s-sorry,’ she’d stammered, half believing from Nathan’s tough look that he would change his mind about going through with it.
But apart from muttering, ‘What sort of a father is he?’ Nathan had kept to his part of the bargain—even to the extent of holding her hand as they came away from the register office.
‘Is that it?’ she’d asked nervously.
‘That’s it,’ he had confirmed. ‘I expect there’ll be a few more formalities to deal with to undo the knot…’
But the knot had never been undone. It should have been. They had originally planned it should be so. But, as matters had turned out, their marriage had never been annulled.
‘Where did you leave your car?’ Nathan had asked.
‘I—um—don’t drive,’ she’d answered, newly married and starting to dislike the wimp of a creature she, through force of circumstance, had become. As soon as she had that ten percent she was going to have driving lessons, despite what her father said. She would buy a car…
‘We’ll go in mine,’ Nathan had clipped, and had escorted her to the car park.
Her home was large, imposing and, despite Grace Roberts’ attempts to brighten it up with a few flowers, cheerless. Grace had had no idea that the daughter of the house had that day married the handsome man by her side, and had been her usual pleasant self to Phelix.
‘Your father had to go out urgently,’ she said. ‘But he left a message for you to leave the document in his study and said he’ll attend to it.’
Hot, embarrassed colour flared to Phelix’s face, a horrible dread starting to take her that her father might be intending to renege on the part of the deal he had made with Nathan Mallory. That Nathan, his competitor, having kept his part of the bargain, had been hung out to dry!
‘Thank you, Grace,’ she managed. ‘Er—this is Mr Mallory…er…’
‘Shall I get you some tea?’ Grace asked, seeming to realise she was struggling.
‘That would be nice,’ Phelix answered and, as Grace went kitchenwards, ‘My father must have left an envelope for you in his study,’ Phelix suggested. Hoping against hope that her fears were groundless, and that there would be an envelope on the desk with Nathan’s name on it, she led the way to the study.
But there was no envelope. Scarlet colour scorched her cheeks again, and she felt she would die of the humiliation of it. ‘I’m s-sorry,’ she whispered to the suddenly cold-eyed man by her side. ‘I’m sure my father will be home soon,’ she went on, more in hope than belief. ‘Shall we have tea while we wait?’
Apart from Henry Scott, who had occasionally in the past called at the house with important papers for her father to sign, Phelix was unused to entertaining anyone. If her father had been delayed, her mother had always offered Henry refreshment of some kind.
So copying her mother’s graceful ways, even if she was feeling awkward, Phelix gave her new and promised to be temporary husband tea.
It was Grace Roberts’ evening off—she was going to the theatre and would be staying with a friend overnight. ‘You’ve everything you need?’ she enquired, with a professional look around.
‘Everything’s fine, thank you, Grace. Enjoy the theatre,’ Phelix bade her.
‘Grace has been with you for some while?’ Nathan, with better manners than her father, stayed civilly polite to ask a question he could have no particular interest in knowing the answer to.
‘About six years—she adored my mother.’
‘Your mother died recently in a road accident, I believe?’
Phelix did not want to talk about it. Never would she forget the horror of that night. The day had been a day similar to today. Warm, sticky, and with thunder in the air.
‘I’m truly very sorry,’ she said abruptly. ‘I can’t think what’s keeping my father.’ And, feeling sure that Nathan did not want to spend a minute longer with her than he had to, ‘Look, if you’ve somewhere you’ve got to be, I can give you a ring the moment my father comes in.’
Nathan Mallory stared at her long and hard then, and she could not help but wonder if he suspected she was giving him the same run-around that her father seemed to be giving him.
But, deciding to give her the benefit of the doubt, ‘I’ll wait,’ he clipped. ‘That cheque is my last remaining option.’
And Phelix knew then from the set of this man’s jaw that, in order to save his firm for him and his father, Nathan Mallory was having to bite on a very unpleasant bullet. Having completed his side of the bargain, he now had to wait for the man who had offered him the deal to complete his part. Yet Phelix just knew, as she looked numbly into Nathan Mallory’s stern grey eyes, that everything in him was urging him to leave. That if there was any other way he would have taken it. She felt humiliated, but that must be nothing to what this proud man must be feeling. And yet for his business, for his father, it was, as he said, his last remaining option.
‘D-does your father know about today?’ she asked tentatively.
‘I thought I’d prefer to have that cheque in my hand before I told him.’
That made her feel worse. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said quietly. ‘I truly am.’
He looked at her again, and his expression softened slightly. ‘I know,’ he replied.
And the next two hours had ticked by with still no sign of her father.
‘Will you excuse me?’ she said at one point, and went to her father’s study to make a call to her father’s PA. But Anna Fry said she had no idea where he was. ‘Is Mr Scott free?’ Phelix asked. And, when she was put through, ‘Henry? Phelix. Do you know where my father is? I need to contact him rather urgently.’
Henry did not know where he was either. But, alarmed at her anxious tone, he was ready to come over at once to help with her problem, whatever it was. Phelix thanked him, but said it was nothing that important.
So she went back to Nathan, gave him the evening paper to read—and started to grow anxious on another front. The sky had darkened to almost black when she heard the first rumble of thunder. Thunderstorms and their violence terrified her.
She tried to think of something else, but at the first fork of lightning she was again reliving that night—the night her mother had died. There had been one horrendous storm that night. She had been in bed asleep when the first crack of thunder had awakened her. She had sat up in bed, half expecting that her mother would come and keep her company—her mother did not like storms either.
It was with that in mind that as the storm had become more fearsome, Phelix had shot along to her mother’s room to check that she was all right. Only as she had quickly opened the door a fork
