be proved wrong. She had nothing against the breed per se.
A sense of adventure, long dormant inside her, made her lips curl in a slow smile, a feeling of light-heartedness, so alien after the miseries of the past months that it felt like champagne in her veins, and impelled her to study her diary. If she had nothing on on the day stipulated in the letter than she would go, she decided rashly, unaware that she had been holding her breath like an excited child until she turned over the pages and found the date completely free of other engagements.
Telling herself that it was completely ridiculous to decide what could be the whole of her future on such a simple whim, it nevertheless pleased her to find the date free. Guiltily she acknowledged that she had been playing a silly game of pretending she was not responsible for her own fate, and that somehow it lay in other, more powerful hands, thus also avoiding taking any responsibility for what might happen. Sometimes it was decidedly uncomfortable being a psychologist, she decided wryly. There were odd occasions when she might have preferred to remain in ignorance of her own motives.
Admittedly it was a little disconcerting to realise that on Friday she was going to have to face a stranger who might ultimately end up as her husband—and Friday was only two days away, but what was there to be gained by delaying? Daily Andrea grew more demanding, more frighteningly hysterical and emotional.
The scarlet Mercedes 380SL which had been her one extravagance on the fruits of her commercial success made light of the seventy miles from her home to Sutton Parva. The car was a childish indulgence which she knew she ought to have resisted, but which one part of her was stubbornly glad she had not. For one thing, it was extremely impractical having only two full seats and a very small back one, for another it guzzled petrol. But on a sunny day like today, with the soft top down and the scents of the countryside, not to mention the exhausts of other vehicles, freely available to her, she was unable totally to banish the faint thrill of pride that owning the vehicle gave her.
Having found the village she drove out of it again and stopped the car on a quiet country road to study her instructions and the map more carefully.
She didn’t want to be seen stopping in the village, where she would no doubt be remembered and perhaps gossiped about later, especially if … Illogically her mind shied away from the potential outcome of today’s meeting, and it was while she was mentally taking herself to task for this that the impatient blare of a car-horn reached her. Frowning, she swivelled round in her seat to see a tall dark man bearing angrily down on her from the ancient estate-car, parked only yards behind her.
A face which might otherwise have been described as handsome was screwed up in an expression of furious impatience, overlong thick black hair brushing the collar of a cotton checked shirt.
‘Sorry to interrupt Madam’s daydream,’ a harsh male voice gritted scornfully, ‘but you’re blocking the road, and have been for the last five minutes.’
Guiltily Jessica was aware of having been so engrossed in her own thoughts that she had been deaf to his arrival, but even so his impatient manner irritated her.
Coolly she let her eyes drift over his hard-boned face, noting the aggressive thrust of his jaw, and the dangerous flash of fire in his eyes.
He was breathing heavily, or rather almost snorting like an enraged bull, she thought in some amusement, noting the rapid rise and fall of his chest, and the strain his rage was putting on the four out of half a dozen or so buttons that enclosed it.
‘Finished the inventory?’
The scorn in his voice should have embarrassed her, especially since she was not in the habit of staring so openly at any man, stranger or no. Lean hips tapered down to long legs, and aware that it was annoying him, she deliberately let her glance linger before saying demurely, ‘Er … it seems that your zip’s gone.’
There was a moment’s stunned pause, compounded of astounded silence on his part and unholy glee on her own. She wasn’t quite sure why, but it amused her intensely to see such an arrogantly male man so utterly confounded.
He looked down, swore briefly and then turned his back on her, while she fought against the bubbles of laughter threatening to escape from her throat. By the look of him if she dared to laugh he was quite capable of murdering her.
When he turned back to her, he was still furiously angry although he was obviously trying to control it.
‘My apologies,’ he said between gritted teeth. Very nice white teeth, Jessica noticed absently. ‘But I am in something of a rush, so if you could bring yourself to shift your car.’
A rush? Why? Had he been on the point of being discovered by some angry husband? She looked at him and saw two things reflected in his eyes. The first was that he had guessed what she was thinking and the second that he was absolutely furious about it.
Almost she was tempted to dither, just to see what effect it had on him, but wisdom persuaded her otherwise, and so neatly reversing the Mercedes right to the side of the road, she made room for him to pass, which he did crashing his gears awfully and sending up a cloud of dust, which descended on the Mercedes’ immaculate paintwork in tiny gritty particles.
She spent another five minutes studying her map and then realised guiltily that she was going to be late for the appointment. Luckily she found the house on her first attempt, momentarily appalled by the uncontrolled wilderness that passed as a garden, as she drove slowly up the drive and parked outside the front door. The drive continued round the side of the house and presumably to the back, but Jessica had no intention of trusting her precious car to the gaping holes she could see in the fragmented drive that lay beyond the front door.
She climbed out of the car without bothering to look in her mirror. Her hair was slightly tangled from the drive, and she had put make-up on before setting out, but apart from that she had made no other feminine concessions to what lay ahead. After all if this man wanted to marry her it would be for reasons other than her looks. Indeed it would have to be because one thing she intended to make very clear indeed was that this would be a marriage in name only.
A noticed pinned to the front door announced that the waiting room and surgery lay to the left of the door, and that all other callers were to press the bell.
Dutifully she did as instructed, and had to wait so long for her summons to be answered that she turned her back on the front door and instead surveyed the wild tangle of rhododendrons that lined the driveway, some of them dead, allowing a glimpse at the awesomely neglected lawns that lay beyond. It would take an army of devoted gardeners armed with scythes to cut down that lot, Jessica thought drily, looking in vain for the point where the lawn ended and what she imaged must be the herbaceous border began. Lupins gone frantically to seed and almost uniformly blue were the only flower she could actually recognise and she shuddered faintly when she contrasted the overgrown wilderness in front of her with the neatly ordered gardens surrounding her flat.
‘Yes?’
The harsh voice was uncomfortably familiar and decidedly unwelcoming, the shock in the blue eyes as she turned to face him hardly flattering.
‘God, it’s you!’
Shock gave way to amusement as she recognised the man who had accosted her so angrily earlier.
‘I suppose you’d better come in then.’
He was scowling horribly at her, close to, even taller than she had first thought.
She followed him inside, grimacing faintly to herself
