Please do excuse me now.’
And she stalked away with a hip-swinging walk that contrived to be provocative even though it was so angry.
Rhiannon found Lee Richardson in the library.
She looked longingly at the book-lined walls for a moment then advanced across the red Turkish rug towards the desk. French windows opened on to a side-veranda and the perfume of jasmine wafted in. One end of the room held a comfortable settee and armchair covered in mint-green crushed velvet, as well as a writing table.
The desk at the other end of the room, where Lee was working, was much bigger and held some impressive computer equipment.
She stopped in front of it and sniffed. There was another perfume on the air and overlaying the jasmine. A perfume she knew because she had used to wear it herself. The same perfume Andrea Richardson had been wearing, now she came to think of it.
So, putting two and two together, had an angry confrontation between Lee and Andrea Richardson just taken place in the library? One could be forgiven for thinking so, Rhiannon reasoned and suddenly remembered Sharon’s comments about the shenanigans of yesterday, not to mention this morning.
She decided the matter in the affirmative when Lee looked up.
He did not look to be in a good mood. His eyes were hard, his face was set in uncompromising lines.
‘Mr Richardson, I’m sorry to disturb you—’
‘Call me Lee, Rhiannon, and have a seat. You look like the bearer of ill-tidings. Don’t tell me your confidence of yesterday at the airport was misplaced?’
It had happened to her before and it happened to her again. One moment she found herself feeling—how to put it?—in charity with this man, the next, he said or did something that made her feel as if she’d had a door slammed in her face. But that was ridiculous she assured herself angrily, and sat down.
‘I’ve just been given to understand that a conflict of interest may have arisen,’ she said precisely
He frowned. ‘What on earth are you talking about?’
‘I’ve just met your—stepmother. She led me to believe she might be the one to be in charge.’
She saw his teeth clench and a look of supreme irritation chase through his eyes but he only said one word, a lethally cold one, all the same. ‘No.’
‘But—’
‘Rhiannon,’ he overrode her, ‘what I say goes and that’s all there is to it.’
‘But if she lives here it could make things awkward for me, I mean—’
‘She does not live here.’
‘Well, if you’re sure—’ She broke off and bit her lip as he swore softly. ‘OK. Um—what you obviously believed was going to be a … refined buffet dinner for thirty people may not be that at all and not only number-wise.’ And she passed on Sharon’s news, including the DJ.
‘Bloody hell!’ Lee Richardson swore quite audibly this time.
‘That may not be such a bad idea,’ Rhiannon murmured. ‘To keep them entertained.’
He stared at her broodingly.
‘I believe she’s only twenty-two, your sister-in-law,’ Rhiannon said.
‘That’s—what? A whole four years younger than you?’
Rhiannon shrugged. ‘She can’t help it if she hasn’t had some tough times yet. She also,’ she hesitated, ‘well, apparently she doesn’t like it up here.’ She stopped awkwardly.
‘Go on.’
‘No, it’s nothing to do with me. Look, I’ve really got an awful lot to—’
‘You wondered what she’s doing stuck up here?’
‘Well, yes,’ Rhiannon confessed.
‘It suits me to have someone legitimate in residence,’ he said thoughtfully. ‘And, since you’re bound to work this out for yourself, Mary and my brother need something real to settle them into marriage rather than the erratic course Mary had in mind.’
‘Erratic?’ Rhiannon stared at him.
‘She wanted to live in Brisbane or on the coast and continue her career.’
‘I hesitate to say this but most women have that ambition in regard to their careers these days.’
They exchanged glances, hers combative, his amused.
He said, ‘Before you label me a male chauvinist, I agree that’s the way it is these days but—’
‘You don’t have to approve, you were going to say?’ she interrupted tartly. ‘That’s almost the same thing.’
‘Don’t put words into my mouth, Rhiannon,’ he advised coolly. ‘I was going to say that, if Mary had wanted to continue her career and her particular lifestyle, she should have at least taken into consideration Matt’s side of the story before she married him.’
‘Which is?’ Rhiannon raised a cool eyebrow at him.
‘A lot of responsibility and a heavy workload.’
‘Could he not handle that from a milieu she’s more at home in, though?’ Rhiannon queried.
‘Yes, possibly he could, but after he’s taken six months off to take her around the world on an extended, expensive honeymoon by anyone’s standards, wouldn’t you consider that some time spent living where he wants to live and showing some interest in the Richardson side of things would be appropriate?’
Rhiannon rubbed the bridge of her nose.
‘She is also pregnant,’ he murmured.
Rhiannon heaved a sigh. ‘Maybe you’re right—in theory. But theories don’t always work with living, breathing people and I’m just relieved—’ she smiled ruefully ‘—it’s not my problem.’ She gestured a little helplessly.
‘You wouldn’t have that problem yourself?’
She frowned. ‘What problem?’
‘You wouldn’t find living at Southall a penance?’
‘A penance?’ She looked at him as if he were mad. ‘The opposite, if anything.’ She stood up. ‘Be that as it may, about the party.’
He sat up. ‘Yes. About the party. I’m sure your thoughts on the subject are invaluable, Rhiannon.’
She grimaced, then reminded herself she had a job to do, and do it to the best of her ability she would.
‘Well, I’ve got the food under control. Most of it can be prepared this afternoon, so it only needs heating up tomorrow. But rather than using the dining
