‘I see.’ Maggie shook her head, trying to picture it. ‘Neil rides too?’
‘Oh, sure.’ Luke’s pale, still boyish features were a little ruddy now with embarrassment. ‘Things have changed around here since Miss Cavendish died. No offence to you, Mags, but I think Neil’s beginning to enjoy life again.’
Maggie managed a smile, but it took an effort. Yet it was what she wanted, wasn’t it? she asked herself. The past— well, the past was water under the bridge now, as they say, and whatever resentments Neil might still be nurturing towards her she was glad that she apparently hadn’t ruined his life.
‘That’s good,’ she said, albeit a little tensely, and determinedly turned her attention to the beautifully appointed room.
However doubtful she might have been about Neil’s decision to move into the house, it was obvious that someone with taste had done the renovations. She refused to speculate how much money Neil must have spent, or why he had felt the need to buy a larger property. Nevertheless, it crossed her mind that the rug alone must have cost a small fortune, and what use she could have made of such a sum when her business had started to Hag.
She drew a breath. How things had changed. When she’d first met Neil, he’d regarded her parents’ modest semi with some admiration. He’d been brought up in a terraced house near the docks. Abandoned by his mother, he’d been raised by elderly grandparents, and he freely admitted he’d run wild when he was a teenager. But a spell in the army, and the opportunity to learn a musical instrument, had been the making of him, and pretty soon his ability both to write and perform his own music had been noticed.
Neil himself had always been essentially modest about his own achievements, which was another reason why he had become so successful. He could communicate with young people, and they could identify with him, and his pop career had gone from.strength to strength...
‘How’s Lindsey?’
There it was. That question again, and this time no reason not to answer Luke. ‘Oh—she’s OK,’ she replied, smooth- ing the fabric of her skirt along the thigh. She glanced towards the door. ‘Where’s Neil gone?’
‘To arrange for some tea, I should think,’ declared Luke, leaning towards the fire and jabbing at a precariously balanced log with his boot. ‘Unless you’d prefer something stronger.’ He gestured towards the cabinet behind him. ‘Scotch, perhaps? Or a sherry?’
‘Tea will be fine.’
Her response was less than enthusiastic, but she hadn’t bargained on this long tête-à-tête with Luke. But it was typical of Neil to attempt to turn the tables on her. He must know she wouldn’t have come all this way unless it was something serious. Just because she’d refused to discuss her problems in the car, he was choosing to keep her waiting.
‘Did you have a good journey?’
Luke was speaking again, and, realising that she couldn’t blame him for Neil’s shortcomings, Maggie nodded. ‘It was quite a novelty,’ she said. ‘It’s ages since I’ve travelled on a train.’
‘You could have flown up,’ Luke pointed out, inadvertently putting his finger on something she preferred not to discuss. How could she explain that she’d needed the time the train took to cover the miles to gather her composure? A flight would have been too quick. It was important that she maintain the fiction that there was a huge physical distance between them.
‘I—’
‘Maggie doesn’t really like planes. Don’t you remember?’
While she had been struggling to come up with a suitable answer, Neil had entered the room behind them. He had shed his jacket, and now he walked across to prop one foot on the fender. It enabled her to take her first real look at him, and despite all her fine resolutions her stomach clenched.
It wasn’t fair, she thought. She had changed. She knew she had. She had lines where she had never had lines before, and although she wasn’t fat her waistline was a couple of inches thicker than it used to be. But Neil had barely changed at all. He was still tall, still lean, still moved with the unconscious grace of an athlete, and his raw-boned, angular features still possessed their addictive charm.
He was not a handsome man, but then, Maggie had never been attracted to men who were simply good-looking. The smooth-chested hunks she’d come into contact with in the course of her work had usually proved to have brawn, but no brains, whereas, for all his chequered upbringing, Neil’s wit was as sharp as a knife.
Which was why, when he draped his elbow on the black marble mantel and looked down at her with dark, mocking eyes, she found herself incapable of parrying his remarks as she should. Dear God, she thought, looking down at her hands in sudden horrified confusion, he shouldn’t still be able to disconcert her, but he did. She had been apprehensive of seeing him again, it was true, but she hadn’t imagined the emotional upheaval it would cause her.
‘Oh, yeah.’ To her relief, Luke was answering him, giving her a few moments to collect herself. ‘I’d forgotten,’ he was saying. ‘But it is some time since I’ve seen her. In any case, she overcame it. Isn’t that right, Mags?’
Mags!
Maggie steeled herself against the urge to scream at him—at both of them—that that was not her name, but she knew it was just a reaction to the way she was feeling. She had to come to terms with the fact that the way Neil looked should not concern her. She wasn’t an impressionable girl any more, and Neil wasn’t interested in her body.
The reappearance of the housekeeper came as a welcome relief. The woman came bustling in, carrying a tray containing tea, shortbread biscuits and thickly buttered scones. She set the tray on the square lacquered table that stood between the sofa Maggie and Luke were occupying and its twin which stood opposite, and then straightened to give her employer a beaming smile.
‘Will you be wanting anything else, Mr Jordan?’ she asked, and Neil shook his head.
‘This is fine, Mrs Fenwick,’ he said. ‘And by the way, this is Miss—I beg your pardon—Ms Freeman. As I said before, she’ll be staying until tomorrow, and I know you’ll make her welcome.’
‘I’m very pleased to meet you, Ms Freeman,’ declared the housekeeper cheerfully, and Maggie was forced to give her an answering smile.
‘And I you, Mrs Fenwick,’ she said, flushing with indignation at Neil’s introduction. And, although it wasn’t a question she would normally have asked, she added, ‘Have you been at Haversham long?’
‘About two years, Ms Freeman,’ Mrs Fenwick replied, apparently seeing nothing wrong with the enquiry. ‘I came to work for Mr Jordan when he moved here from the old dower house.’
‘Did you?’
Maggie’s eyes Hicked over her ex-husband’s face, registering the irritation he was feeling at her curiosity. But at least she knew how long Neil had lived in this house now, which was something she’d have been loath to ask him.
‘Well...’ As if sensing that her employer didn’t approve of her chattering with his guest, Mrs Fenwick smiled again and made for the door. ‘I’ll let you get your tea. Supper’s at eight o’clock, Ms Freeman. But I expect Mr Jordan will tell you about that.’
‘Thank
