‘Can we get back to the business in hand, please?’ She took the armchair opposite to him. ‘I suppose you want to know when you’ll see some tangible return on your investment.’
‘No,’ he said. ‘I’m prepared to bide my time on that. There are other far more pressing matters between Simon and myself.’ He reached into the inside pocket of his jacket and extracted a small sheaf of papers, held together by an elastic band. He tossed them on to the low oak coffee-table between them. ‘Do you know what these are?’
Her brows snapped together. ‘How could I?’
‘Then I suggest you take a look.’
Reluctantly she reached for the papers, and removed the band. As she studied them, her frown deepened.
‘I don’t understand.’
‘You’re not a fool, Joanna,’ he said quietly. ‘You know as well as I do that those are IOUs, and that the signature on them is Simon’s. They’re gambling debts that he ran up at the country club.’
Her mouth was dry suddenly. She’d been doing addition sums in her head as she riffled through them, and the total she’d reached was horrifying, and still incomplete.
She said, ‘Gambling? But Si doesn’t gamble.’
‘He certainly doesn’t gamble well. He’s lost consistently at poker, blackjack and roulette. He’s exceeded the house limit for credit more than once as well, and used my name to get more. I’ve had to bar him from the gaming-rooms.’ He saw the colour drain from her face, and smiled sardonically. ‘I presume this is news to you.’
She said thickly, ‘You know it is.’
‘Then I may as well add that he’s in hock to a bookie in Leeds for several thousand.’
She dropped the papers back on the table with an expression of distaste. ‘You’re very well informed.’
‘I find it pays to be.’
‘Yet it’s hardly ethical. Neither is your presence here this afternoon. These—debts should be a private matter between Simon and yourself, surely. You have no right to involve me.’
‘Sometimes private matters have a tiresome habit of becoming incredibly public.’ He seemed impervious to the ice in her tone. ‘And then you’d find yourself involved right up to the hilt, my dear Mrs Bentham. For instance, I could insist on having a spot audit made at the Craft Company.’
The words hung in the air between them, challenging her.
She swallowed. ‘And what would that prove, pray?’
‘Perhaps nothing. But I’m afraid—I’m very much afraid that there would be certain sums unaccounted for. Simon had to find his stake money from somewhere, after all.’
‘I don’t believe you. In fact, I don’t believe any of this.’ She flicked the IOUs with a contemptuous finger. ‘If Simon had known you were going to raise any of these matters this afternoon, he would have been here in person. He thought you were coming to discuss the Craft Company, and only that. Therefore he obviously has no guilty conscience …’
‘A true Chalfont! Your grandfather had no conscience either. It’s a pity Simon hasn’t inherited his strength as well.’
Joanna got to her feet. ‘I think you’d better leave.’
‘When I’m good and ready,’ he retorted, making no attempt to move. ‘Sit down, Joanna, and hear me out. Simon had good reason for failing to realise I was about to call in his markers.’
She didn’t want to hear any more. Her mind was reeling, blanking out with sheer incredulity. Simon gambling, she thought with horror. Losing thousands he didn’t possess and couldn’t repay. What in the world could possibly have started him on such a course to disaster?
As if, she thought, I didn’t know.
She lifted her head and stared at their enemy. Steadying her voice, she asked, ‘What good reason?’
‘I promised I’d give him time, so he assumed he was safe.’
‘And what made you change your mind?’
‘You did,’ he said softly. ‘You came home again, Joanna. And that altered everything.’
‘I fail to see why.’ Her tone was defiant, but alarm bells were sounding all over her nervous system.
He smiled at her. ‘Oh, no, beauty, you haven’t that poor a memory. You put yourself temporarily out of reach when you married Martin Bentham, but that’s all. And that’s over. You knew it the day of the poor bastard’s funeral. Was that why you fled to the States?’
She drew a sharp, painful breath. ‘How dare you?’
‘I dare quite easily,’ he said. ‘After all, I’ve waited longer for you than for anything else in my life, Joanna, and, frankly, I’m beginning to run out of patience.’
‘How unfortunate for you.’ She invested her voice with all the scorn she could muster. ‘But I’m afraid you’re destined to go on waiting for a very long time. For eternity, in fact.’
Cal shook his head. ‘No, sweetheart. You’re not thinking clearly.’ He pointed to the IOUs on the table between them. ‘As you so rightly said, these should have remained a private matter between Simon and myself. But in a war you use whatever weapons are available, if you want to win. And I intend nothing less than total victory.’
Joanna’s hands clenched into fists. ‘I’ll see you in hell—’
‘And we’ll both see your brother in the bankruptcy court,’ he interrupted harshly. ‘I’ll do it if I have to, Joanna, and there isn’t a soul in the world who would blame me. He’s behaved like a incompetent in his business life, and a reckless fool privately. He should be stopped sharply and permanently before he drags himself, and everyone involved with him, any deeper into the mire.’
He paused. ‘On the other hand, the threat of it may be enough to shock him to his senses, and impending fatherhood may keep him there.’
‘What do you care?’ she asked bitterly. ‘You helped push him into this mess. You’ve used him and manipulated him all along the line for your own disgusting purposes …’
His mouth twisted. ‘Have I? Then the more fool Simon for letting me, wouldn’t you say?’
‘He’s no match for you—he never was. He didn’t realise what he was getting into.’
Cal tutted. ‘You mean you didn’t try to warn him? How very remiss of you!’
‘Of course I tried,’ she said with angry weariness. ‘But he wouldn’t listen, and it was too late anyway. He’d already handed the Craft Company to you on a platter, the naïve, trusting idiot. He thought your offer of help meant that the feud between us was over.’
‘And so it will be soon,’ he said softly. ‘Every wrong righted, every debt paid in full. The wheel come full circle.
