the side of the glass as Guy took a sip at his own gin and tonic. Then, ‘OK, Marnie,’ he said briskly. ‘Let me have it. What’s that stupid brother of yours done now that could make you come to me for help?’
‘How do you know it’s Jamie who needs your help?’ she flashed indignantly, annoyed that he wasn’t even giving her a chance to work up to mentioning Jamie, and forgetting that she had already given him a clue in the car. ‘I could be here on my own behalf, you know, but typical of you: you immediately jump to your own conclusions and—’
‘Are you here for your own sake?’ he cut in smoothly.
‘No...’ Marnie wriggled uncomfortably where she sat. ‘But you could at least give me a chance to explain before you—’
‘Then it has to be for Jamie,’ he said, ignoring her indignation. ‘I warned you, Marnie,’ he inserted grimly, ignoring all the rest, ‘not to bring your brother’s troubles to me again, and I meant it.’
‘This time it’s different, though,’ she told him, her mouth thin and tight because, no matter how sure she was that she was doing the right thing, she didn’t have to like it, ‘or I wouldn’t have involved you at all, but this time it’s Clare I’m worried about, and...’
‘Clare?’ he repeated sharply. His eyes suddenly narrowed and went hard. ‘What’s he done to her?’ he demanded harshly.
‘Nothing!’ Marnie denied, resenting his condemning tone. ‘He worships the ground she walks on and you know it. Of course Jamie hasn’t done anything to hurt Clare—how could you even think such a thing?’
‘I worshipped the ground you walked on and look how badly I hurt you,’ he pointed out.
‘No, you didn’t,’ she denied that deridingly. ‘You worshipped my body, and when it wasn’t available for you you just went out and found a substitute for it. So don’t you dare try putting Jamie into the same selfish mould as you exist in! He loves Clare,’ she stated tightly, ‘loves as in lifelong caring and fidelity—something you’ve never felt for anyone in your whole life!’
‘Finished?’ he clipped.
‘Yes.’ She subsided at the angry glint now glowing in his narrowed eyes.
‘Then if Jamie is this—caring of Clare, why have you been forced to come to me to beg help for her?’
‘Because...’ She sucked in a deep breath, trying to get a grasp on her growling temper. He could always do it. One minute in his company and he could always rile her until she didn’t know what she was saying! ‘She’s pregnant,’ she said.
‘What—already?’ Guy made a sound of grinding impatience. ‘I don’t call that damned caring of your brother, Marnie,’ he muttered angrily. ‘I call it downright irresponsible!’
So do I, she thought, but held the words back. Guy didn’t need any help in finding faults with her brother. He had an unerring ability to just pluck them out of the air like rabbits from a magician’s hat!
‘What’s the matter with her?’ he went on grimly. ‘Is she ill—does she need money for medical care?’ Already he was fishing inside jacket pocket for his cheque-book, his glass discarded so he could write out a cheque for whatever amount Marnie wished to demand from him.
And she was tempted—oh, so severely tempted to just let it go at that and name a figure which would probably choke him at the size of it but would not stop him giving it to her because it was for little Clare, whom he’d always had a soft spot for and therefore would do anything for.
But that would not be right—nor fair, she acknowledged heavily. If he was going to help them out, then he had a right to know the truth.
‘Wait a mintue,’ she said, swallowing because the truth was going to be that much harder to tell now he’d all but convinced himself Clare was in dire need of his financial asistance. ‘You haven’t heard it all, and I would rather you did before you agreed to anything. Clare is pregnant, but not in any danger of losing this one just yet, though it is the fear that it may happen which made me come to you.’
‘Jamie,’ he said, sitting back, the cheque-book thrown contemptuously aside.
She nodded, deciding it was time to stop prevaricating. He deserved that after the way he had reacted to the thought of Clare’s needing his help. It even warmed her to know that Guy could be so generous to someone he barely knew.
‘He’s just completed the reconstruction of a 1955 Jaguar XK 140 Drophead,’ she began.
‘I have one of those!’ Guy’s mood instantly changed to one of glowing enthusiasm. ‘I wonder if he managed to solve the problem with the—?’
‘While he was delivering it to the owner yesterday...’ she interrupted him a trifle impatiently; it was typical of him to be so easily diverted by the name of a precious car ‘...a lorry coming in the other direction skidded on a patch of oil and ploughed straight into him. The Jaguar was written off.’
‘What—totally?’ He was horrifed.
‘It went up in flames,’ she informed him grimly.
‘Bloody stupid—anyone seriously hurt?’
‘In general, my brother lives a charmed life,’ Marnie sighed. ‘No, not seriously,’ she confirmed. ‘Jamie managed to climb out of the tangled mess just before it caught fire with nothing more than a bruised face and a broken arm for his trouble.’
‘That beaufiful car,’ Guy murmured in the mournful tone of the true car fanatic. ‘Jamie must be sick.’
‘You could say that,’ Marnie agreed. ‘The car wasn’t insured.’
That dragged Guy surely back on course. He stared at her in blank amazement, then looked appalled, then just downright disgusted. ‘How much?’ he snapped.
She told him, he swore loudly and she grimaced, entirely in sympathy with him.
‘And I suppose he’s hoping that good old Guy will come up with the readies to bail him out.’ His tone was scathing to say the least. ‘Well, you can just go back and tell him that it’s no go this time, Marnie! I have just about had enough of that reckless brother of yours and his stupid—’
‘You’ve missed the point,’ she put in quietly, catching his attention before his Italian temperament ran away with him.
‘What point?’ he demanded.
‘Clare,’ she reminded him.
‘Clare?’ Guy looked blank for a moment, then went as pale as a ghost. ‘She wasn’t in the car with him, was she?’ he choked.
‘No!’ Marnie quickly assured him. ‘No—that wasn’t the point I was trying to make. But—Guy,’ she appealed to him for understanding, ‘she’s pregnant and she shouldn’t be! It was already a big enough shock for her to have Jamie come home with his face all bruised and his arm in a sling—how do you think she’s going to react when she finds out she forgot to renew his insurance policy and that they’ve now got to find upwards of fifty thousand pounds to compensate the owner of the car?’
Silence.
