have the papers…’
With a wave of his hand he indicated the folders that Simeon had placed on the big leather-topped desk.
‘You’d better explain everything. Tell Miss Marshall the position she’s in.’
Tell Miss Marshall the position she’s in…
Jessica had no idea just why those words hit home to her as hard as they did. There was nothing in Angelos’s tone to upset her. The way he spoke was as casual and conversational as if he was simply passing the time of day with a couple of friends. Nothing to worry her in that.
No—it was the fact that there seemed to be nothing to worry her in his tone that set all her mental alarm bells ringing, bringing her warning nerves to red alert in the space of a single heartbeat. From being an intruder—a stranger who had turned up unannounced and uninvited to her stepfather’s funeral—he had slowly but surely morphed into someone who was far too much at ease, far too much in control for her peace of mind. From the moment that he had walked into the house he had gone his own way, no matter what she said or did. He had been a dark, watchful presence at the graveside, a silent, black-eyed observer at the reception afterwards. He looked almost…
The word slithered away from her as Simeon seated himself at the desk and shuffled through the files, picking one up and tapping it straight on the desktop, then clearing his throat carefully.
‘About Marty—your stepfather’s will…’ he said.
‘There can’t be any problem with that.’
In spite of her determination not to, Jessica found herself a chair and sank down into it. Something in the way that Simeon spoke, the way he looked at her over his reading glasses, suddenly took the strength from her legs. It was either sit down—fast—or risk them giving way beneath her and with Angelos’s cold dark eyes fixed so closely on her face, she was determined not to let that happen. At a time like this dignity was important, and if keeping her dignity meant conceding just a little then she was fine with that.
‘Marty had everything sorted out. He arranged everything just as he wanted it.’
Why wasn’t Simeon nodding? He should be nodding, surely? Smiling and nodding and saying that yes, that was right.
‘We came to see you two years ago—when I turned twenty-three—and he said that he wanted to leave everything to me. Wasn’t that legal, then?’
The shock in her voice was as much from the memory of how she had felt that day, made worse now by the worry and uncertainty about just what was going on.
She had never actually believed that Marty would leave her everything. They had always been close—her mother’s second husband, the only father she had ever known—and the warmth between them had grown as they’d clung together after Andrea’s death in a train crash. And of course he’d been there for her seven years ago, moving in to take action, rescuing her from the repercussions of her foolishness, dealing with things…Jessica’s eyes slid to the dark, silent man in the other chair and she shivered, just remembering when she’d come up against Angelos Rousakis all those years ago.
But she had always believed that there must be someone else who had a far better right to, a far greater demand on the Robbins estate—distant relatives, friends, charities—to whom he would bequeath his fortune rather than to her.
Marty had assured her there was no one else. He had been an only child of only children; any cousins, once twice or even three times removed, had died long ago and he had no descendants of his own.
‘Marie could never have children,’ he’d told her in a sorrowful recollection of his first marriage to a woman who had died of cancer at the early age of thirty-five. ‘And by the time I met your mother we were both past that. But you’ve been the daughter I always wanted. The only family I need.’
He had known how much she loved the house, and the land that went with it, he’d said. And he knew that she would care for it, look after it in just the way he’d wanted. She would keep the farms running, be a fair landlady to the tenants, and of course she had always adored the horses.
‘I can’t think of anyone else I’d rather leave it to.’
She’d been overwhelmed, overjoyed, and, knowing she could never thank him, she had set herself instead to learn everything she could about the estate, working with Marty so that she would know how to handle everything when the time came. She had hoped to have so much longer to do so. Jessica had dreamed of maybe taking over the estate when Marty retired, and neither of them had ever thought that the end would come so soon.
The thought that she would be able to carry things on as her stepfather had wished had been the only consolation she had had when the sudden heart attack had taken him when she had least expected it.
‘Yes, that was quite legal,’ Simeon assured her. ‘Then.’
‘Then?’
The single word, hastily added, snagged on a raw nerve and tugged. It made her sit up straighter, a frown drawing her brows together, all her attention focused on the man at the desk.
‘Did something happen? Did Marty change his will?’
Simeon shook his head. ‘He left everything just as it was. That was the problem.’
‘The problem…Simeon, you’re going to have to explain this to me—it’s not making any sense. Marty left everything to me—so what’s the problem?’
‘The problem is that by the time he died Marty didn’t have anything to leave—to you or to anyone else.’
‘He didn’t?’
Jessica was having to struggle to try to understand just what Simeon actually meant. His words sounded as if they were coming to her down a long, echoing tunnel so that they rang distortedly in her head. And the problem was desperately aggravated by her painful awareness of the way that Angelos was sitting silently still, observing everything.
It was as if he had a sharp wire attached to her, one that kept up a constant, steady tug on every nerve, drawing her attention to him. It was a tug she fought to resist. She was having a hard enough time coping with just what Simeon was telling her. If she looked into Angelos’s face, read what he was thinking there, then she would go to pieces at once. She just knew it.
And so she forced herself to keep her face turned towards the lawyer, praying that Angelos could read nothing of her mood, or her fears, from the profile she presented to him.
‘Just what are you saying?’
‘That over the last year—eighteen months—Marty started to gamble.’
‘He always liked a flutter on the horses!’ Jessica exclaimed. ‘It was the only hobby he had. He…’
Her voice failed her as she met Simeon’s eyes, saw the expression on his face.
‘This wasn’t any sort of hobby, Jessica,’ the lawyer told her sombrely and a cold hand squeezed her heart, stilling her completely. ‘And it wasn’t anything like the way he’d been betting before. He started betting more money than he’d ever done—more than was wise. At first he won, so I suppose that made him bet more
