handle and pushing it open.
And Orlando’s friends were suddenly flocking around them, like vultures at a carcass, before Abigail had a chance to ask him exactly what he meant.
In Ireland the post-funeral party was known as a wake, though Abigail had often wondered why, since, judging from the facial expressions of most of the people here today, they looked about as unawake as she could imagine. In fact, a few of them looked just about ready to pass out.
She did what little mingling was necessary, but the effort it took must have shown on her face, for Nick soon came to stand beside her; he frowned, and then dipped his dark head to say in an undertone, ‘Why don’t you sit down? Take the weight off your feet.’
She didn’t know why she found it so difficult to follow suggestions when they were made by Nick—but she did. She always had done. And yet what he said made sense. Come on, Abby, she reasoned with herself, stop beating yourself up.
‘Okay.’ She nodded, and sat down stiffly in one of the high-backed chairs, forcing herself to sip from a glass of champagne, but pushing aside the untasted smoked salmon sandwiches on the place beside her, which were already curling up at the edges.
She drank the whole glass down, thinking that it might make her feel better, but by the end of it she felt resoundingly and head-achingly sober, though everyone else was well away, quaffing like mad at the vintage brand which Orlando had always preferred as though it were going out of fashion.
Nick had, in effect, she thought gratefully, now taken on the role of host. Abigail had barely been able to string two sentences together since they had returned—to find the party in full swing.
‘Do you want me to get rid of them?’ he asked her softly as they listened to one of Orlando’s buddies from drama school telling an outrageous story about her dead husband.
‘Soon,’ she answered.
Nick winced as the teller reached the predictably lewd and lascivious punchline, which was greeted with raucous laughter. ‘Doesn’t that kind of talk about your husband bother you?’ he asked her curiously.
Oh, what little he knew! Abigail shook her head. ‘Very little bothers me these days,’ she answered calmly, thanking a benevolent God that Orlando’s elderly parents, living in Spain because it was a kinder climate for people with chest problems, had been considered too frail and in too much shock to attend their son’s funeral.
‘Some of these people have come a long way to be here today, Nick,’ she explained quietly as she met his bemused stare. ‘Let them have their fill of food and drink. I need never see any of them again.’
He raised dark, quizzical eyebrows. ‘That bad, huh?’
She nodded her head reluctantly, the thick hair feeling hot and heavy against her neck. ‘That bad. So let them feel free.’
And they felt free, all right. The trouble was that they seemed like bottomless pits where the alcohol was concerned. Abigail was seriously concerned that, any minute now, someone would completely disgrace themselves. I really ought to go and ask the caterers to start serving coffee, she thought tiredly, unable to summon up the energy to move as she watched the guests group and regroup, dark dramatic figures, swaying more and more as each second passed.
Jemima, the dark, elfin-looking creature, with stray feathers from the feather boa sticking tantalisingly to her scarlet lips, was behaving quite outrageously—even for a member of Orlando’s entourage.
She made a beeline for Nick as soon as she spotted him, and then tried to drape herself all over him.
Abigail observed him with wry amusement as he politely attempted to keep her at arm’s length. His body language spoke volumes! Surely even Jemima must be able to sense that he was not in the least bit interested in her?
Apparently not. Jemima let a wing of raven hair fall provocatively over one half of her face, and looked up at Nick with huge dark eyes, blurred by alcohol. ‘Are you Abigail’s lover?’ she slurred.
Abigail held her breath as she waited for his reaction. There had been plenty of women in his life. He was a man of the world, and, naturally, she imagined that he must be terribly liberal and unshockable. Well, he certainly looked shocked now. Shocked and outraged! Abigail was amazed.
‘I beg your pardon?’ he queried icily.
Jemima clearly had a thick skin. ‘I just sh-shaid,’ she mumbled. ‘Are you getting it on? With Abigail?’
Suddenly the room went completely still. Curious, debauched-looking faces were turned with avid interest towards the tall man in the elegant dark suit.
Not a flicker of emotion stirred the breathtakingly handsome features, and yet his face was somehow all the more threatening for its complete lack of expression. Abigail thought that it was like looking at a cold, glittering mask of a man’s face.
‘Abigail buried her husband today,’ Nick told Jemima with frosty disdain. ‘And even if you don’t have a breath of decency in your body, then at least you might show her a little respect.’
His eyes became stormy, and Abigail saw that those strong, capable hands had clenched into fists beside the powerful shafts of his thighs. Quickly she looked away again.
‘Perhaps you would like to apologise to her before you leave?’ he suggested stonily.
‘Apologise?’ Jemima’s voice was shrill and she shot Abigail a malicious stare. ‘Apologise for what? For stating the truth? Come on, darling—everyone knows that Abigail and Orlando had a very open marriage. In the truest sense of the word,’ she finished, with a suggestive little pursing of her big, glossy lips.
For a moment Abigail met Nick’s appalled eyes over the top of Jemima’s head. She saw the bleak, disbelieving question written there, before his mouth thinned with distaste and he said, quite firmly, ‘The party’s over, folks, I’m afraid. And I’d like you all to leave.’
Jemima was still staring at Abigail, but the spite which was spitting from her eyes had now evolved into pure jealousy. ‘Sure we’ll leave,’ she drawled. ‘And we wish you all the luck in the world—you’ll need it! Orlando always said that going to bed with Abigail was like sleeping with an ice-cube!’
Abigail started as though she had been stung.
Like a child trying desperately not to cry, she crammed her fist into her mouth, as if to halt the bitter words of denial. She wanted to move, to run, to hide, to scream, but she felt powerless and heavy, as though the blood in her veins had turned to stone. She was trapped. Paralysed with fear. She made a tiny cry at the back of her throat, like that of a wounded animal, and she saw, from his look of fury, that Nick had heard the pitiful little sound.
‘Get out of here!’ he snarled, and the anger on his face subdued every person present. He took a slow, menacing step towards Jemima, who was staring up at him in horror, as if unused to the full brunt of a truly masculine rage.
‘Yes, you,’ he emphasised to Jemima in disgust, before turning to face the rest of them. ‘And all you others! You greedy, grasping pathetic bunch of parasites! You can take your nasty little stories and your freeloading ways and your sordid little lives and get out of here. Now!’
The strangely
