‘Is that correct?’
‘Yes.’
‘Why?’
Her heart began thudding. ‘We split up.’
‘Why?’ he insisted on knowing.
She was about to make some feeble excuse when something—some indefinably rebellious surge—made her say, ‘I met someone else.’
Her father’s face showed astonishment. ‘You did? Who?’
Audrey gulped. Now she had done it. ‘You...you don’t know him.’
‘Well, what’s his name? Where did you meet him? What does he do?’
‘I—er—his name is Elliot Knight. He lives at Avalon Beach and he’s a man of independent means.’ She wisely decided not to answer the question about where she’d met him. She didn’t think her father would appreciate her saying Elliot had picked her up in a coffee-lounge.
‘He’s rich, you mean.’
‘Yes, I guess so.’
‘And he’s still interested in you.’
Audrey’s dismay was intense. So her father had known Russell was only interested in her money. And yet he had allowed the liaison to continue, knowing this all the time. Her sense of self-worth began to shrivel again. No man had ever been interested in her for herself alone. The only real emotion she’d managed to inspire in a man was pity. It was pity that had made Elliot come to her rescue, take her home, kiss her. Pity...
She wanted to cry with despair but her father was staring at her and some new strength—born of her recent bitter experience perhaps—kept her chin up, her eyes steady, forced her to say, ‘He’s very interested.’
‘Then why don’t you invite him to your party?’
‘Invite who?’ Lavinia asked as she swanned in in her favourite black satin négligé. Tall and voluptuous, with long wavy black hair flowing out over her shoulders, she was a striking and sensuous figure.
‘Morning, darling.’ She bent to kiss her husband’s forehead before drifting over to pour herself some coffee from the percolator on the sideboard.
Audrey stared after her with undeniable envy. Oh, to be so elegant, so sure of oneself, so darned sexy!
‘Audrey has a new boyfriend,’ her father announced with a mixture of surprise and fatherly pride. ‘She says he’s very interested in her.’
Audrey winced. Now she was well and truly in the soup.
Lavinia whirled to stare disbelievingly at her. ‘Really? Anyone we know?’
‘I’ve already asked that. She says not. A wealthy young playboy from the sound of things.’
‘But how would Audrey meet someone like that?’ Lavinia scoffed. ‘She never mixes in the social set around Sydney. Not that she shouldn’t. She just never bothers with that scene. Are you sure she’s telling the truth about all this? It all seems very odd.’
Audrey detested it when her father and Lavinia started talking around her. Normally, she either stayed unhappily silent or drifted away. But not this morning. ‘Why on earth would I lie, Lavinia?’ she challenged.
‘Why, indeed?’ the woman murmured.
‘I’m only too happy to tell you about Elliot. You only have to ask.’
Lavinia lifted her finely arched dark brows and walked indolently back to sit down with her coffee. ‘Well?’ she prompted. ‘Tell us, then. Where did you meet?’
Audrey swallowed, her newly discovered courage faltering. ‘I—er—I...’
The sardonic light in Lavinia’s black eyes forced Audrey to gather every available resource she owned. ‘We met at a party last Saturday night,’ she said, using Elliot’s own white lie to Russell. ‘Not the one just past. The weekend before.’
‘But you didn’t go out that night,’ Lavinia pointed out.
Audrey’s memory did a frantic data-search. Her father and Lavinia had gone out to a club that night. They hadn’t come home till after midnight and certainly wouldn’t have checked her room to see if she were in. Elsie was the only live-in servant and she always went to bed early.
Despite a pounding heart she managed a passably nonchalant shrug. ‘I wasn’t going to, but after you both went out an old schoolfriend of mine rang out of the blue and asked me to a flat-warming party. I’m certainly glad I went. Elliot’s a fascinating man.’
Lavinia was not about to let up. ‘If this Elliot’s so interested in you, why did he let you spend the whole of this last weekend moping in your room? Why didn’t he take you out?’
Audrey’s stomach was beginning to churn. ‘He went skiing. I...I didn’t want to go. I hate skiing.’
‘Looks like Audrey’s come up trumps at last,’ her father said, undeniably impressed. ‘Are we to hope for an announcement in the near future?’
Audrey blushed. ‘Really, Father. We’ve only just met.’
‘Fair enough. So when will he be back from skiing, this Elliot of yours?’
‘Today,’ she answered with astonishing glibness. There was no doubt lying came easier with practice. ‘Late this afternoon.’
‘Then you’ll be able to ring him tonight,’ Lavinia inserted smoothly, ‘and ask him to your party.’
‘Oh, but I...but surely...’
‘Come now, Audrey!’ Her father’s tone showed exasperation. ‘It’s quite permissable for a girl to ring a boy these days. And after all, it is your coming of age. I’m sure this young man won’t think you’re chasing him, asking him to a twenty-first.’
Audrey groaned silently. Next thing they’d both stand over her while she actually made the call.
‘Of course, if you don’t think this Elliot will come,’ Lavinia drawled.
Audrey stared at her stepmother. Strange, she’d always thought Lavinia liked her. But it was impossible to ignore the malicious gleam in those black eyes, or the smug sarcasm in her voice. It sparked a fierce determination Audrey hadn’t known was in her.
‘He’ll come,’ she bit out. ‘Don’t you worry about that.’
Lavinia’s smugness wavered and Audrey felt an uncustomary thrill of satisfaction. She’d get Elliot to come if it was the last thing she did. She’d beg. She’d bribe. And if all that failed she’d lie her teeth out.
It was amazing how ten hours’ delay could undermine one’s resolve. By the time Audrey reached for her bedside phone early that evening her hand was literally shaking. Snatching it back, she sank down on her quilt and stared once again at the open telephone directory on her pillow, at the circled name.
KNIGHT
