yes. I remember. They only tried that once!’ she reminded her brother wryly. ‘What an awful fight broke out! István in full attack was frightening to behold!’
‘He’s got a temper on him like a mad dog with gout.’ John grimaced. ‘Hell, why do we always discuss the bastard? What about you? How’s business?’
The extravagant bow of her mouth extended to form a rueful smile. ‘Rough,’ she admitted. ‘Everyone’s hanging on to whatever money they’ve got—and riding holidays in France don’t figure in their budgets. But I’m hopeful about this possible deal with the boss of your hotel. If I can get my prices low enough—and you say the cost of living is relatively cheap here—then I’m in with a fighting chance.’
‘You wouldn’t need to be struggling and I wouldn’t have had to borrow from you if István hadn’t bled Mother dry,’ grumbled John. He hurled her luggage in the boot of his hire car. ‘I don’t ever want to see him for the rest of my life. If he ever comes near Lisa, I swear I’ll kill him!’ He slid into the driver’s seat and settled her in. ‘I’m scared, hon,’ he muttered, staring blankly ahead.
She felt the chill of premonition spread down her spine. So was she. ‘Marriage isn’t that bad!’ she said, giving him a diversionary punch.
‘I mean I’m scared of István. You know how he and Lisa went around together.’ John cleared his throat, fighting for the words while his fingers drummed a tattoo on the steering-wheel and then stilled. ‘I’m afraid of comparisons…afraid that…that Lisa will——’
‘No!’ Tanya said forcibly, with a conviction she didn’t feel. ‘Don’t be a dimbo! Good grief, Lisa’s letters were filled with tedious descriptions,’ she cried, forcing a sisterly teasing, ‘of you two wandering the streets of Budapest and standing on the Chain Bridge holding hands in the moonlight. She loves you, John! Only a woman in love could write that stuff!’
But, thought Tanya, as the reassured John beamed and launched into an enthusiastic description of how happy he felt, how wonderful, how beautiful, how unique Lisa was, what would happen if Lisa did have the opportunity to match steady, stolid John against the devastatingly handsome, devil-may-care István?
Lisa had loved him once so deeply that she…
Tanya bit her lip while John rambled on. She was being crazy. Lisa and John had been engaged for nine months, long enough for any doubts to have crept in by now.
Beyond the Budapest ring road, the arrow-straight motorway took them through lush countryside and Tanya did her best to unwind and enjoy the glorious autumn colours. Eventually they left the motorway and travelled on country lanes. The sharp smell of woodsmoke focused her attention on a village they were now passing through where a stork’s nest graced the top of a telegraph pole, flower borders edged the wide street and the water pumps had been painted a bright sky-blue.
‘Kastély Huszár,’ said John proudly, naming the hotel where he worked as manager.
Ahead, instead of the castle with turrets she’d expected, she saw a grand, eighteenth-century mansion, its steep roof and small turrets set picturesquely against a backdrop of butter-yellow beech woods.
‘Wow! Impressive!’ she said admiringly, and leant forward as John drove through a pair of fancy wroughtiron gates. ‘Pretty classy! They trust you to manage this?’ she teased.
‘I was a bit amazed when I got the job,’ he grinned. ‘Oh, look, Tan, there’s Lisa——’
The car screeched to a stop as John’s foot slammed on the brakes. Tanya’s body jerked painfully against the seatbelt but she hardly noticed. Shock, hatred—she wasn’t sure which—had already slammed the breath from her lungs.
Beside the diminutive, blonde-headed Lisa on the stone stairway that swept to the drive, for all the world as if he were the lord of the manor, stood the unmistakable saturnine figure of their elder brother István. Tanya felt her muscles tighten and suddenly she had the extraordinary urge to jump out of the car and run as far as she could in the opposite direction.
But, ‘Drive on,’ she grated through her teeth. ‘Drive on!’
‘Oh, God! What’s he been doing with Lisa?’ John shakily put the car in gear and it shuddered forwards.
Dreading the answer to that question, she flicked an anxious glance at his cold, pale face. It mirrored her own fears but she wouldn’t help the situation if she let on how worried she was.
‘Finding out how deliriously happy she is about marrying you, I expect,’ she said firmly. ‘Nothing to worry about. Keep calm.’ Her aim was to convince herself as much as her younger brother. ‘He’s history. You and Lisa love one another. He can’t touch that.’ She prayed that were true. And quailed at the havoc István could wreak. Chaos followed in his tracks as sure as night followed day.
‘He’d better not! Do me a favour: keep him occupied while I talk to Lisa and see what’s going on,’ muttered John.
‘Me?’ Her mouth opened in dismay. She’d sworn never to speak to István again. She hated him. Yet John’s face was so stricken that she knew she had to agree. ‘OK,’ she said quietly. ‘Leave him to me.’
‘Look at her! I’ve never seen her so excited!’ hissed John.
‘Why shouldn’t she be? She is getting married to you tomorrow!’ Tanya said huskily. Her explanation sounded hollow. Lisa was dancing about, her eyes shining with…happiness? Exhilaration?
She pressed her icy fingers to the bridge of her nose where a headachy pulse was beginning to throb. István looked so contained, so impregnable as he waited motionless beside the gleefully bouncing Lisa that the prospect of spending any time with him at all was utterly daunting. But she’d do it for John, for the sake of his marriage and for the sake of her dear friend’s happiness.
Her legs trembled and she paused to steady herself before she left the car. She’d taken too long, however. The door was opened and István was hauling her out bodily as though she were still his kid sister, paying no attention to the fact that she was now a woman of twenty-four and perfectly capable of manoeuvring her aged body out of a car on her own.
‘Welcome,’ he murmured, hands of iron firmly under her armpits as he lifted her into the air till she hovered helplessly above his cynical dark face. ‘You’re quite a woman! he declared admiringly.
Seething at the insult to her dignity, she kept her expression blank and tried not to let his piercing black eyes unsettle her as he slowly, insolently, assessed the changes that the four years had brought to her appearance.
‘Please,’ she protested, slanting her eyes anxiously to where John and Lisa were greeting each other like wary acquaintances. She groaned and looked back to István. ‘Put me down!’ she said sharply.
Annoyingly, her shoe fell off her dangling foot and for a brief moment her eyes blazed with an unguarded fury at the way he’d deliberately put her at a disadvantage and rattled her composure. He had no right to handle her with such familiarity!
‘Temper’s still simmering away under the haughty exterior, I see,’ he observed in an infuriatingly sardonic drawl.
‘It’s not surprising!’ she grated. ‘Do you honestly imagine
