cleared his throat. ‘Will you be able to get into your—er—flat?’ he asked. He wasn’t sure where she was living now. He’d heard that she’d moved to London after they’d sold the family home in Cambridge, but other than that his information about her was a black hole. He’d deliberately kept it that way, needing to emotionally distance himself from her after what had happened between them.
He’d told himself he’d find out where she was once he’d had time to get settled in London but he’d had a lot on his plate up till now. His business back in the States still needed a close eye kept on it until the chap he’d chosen to take over the CEO role in his absence was up to speed and he was keenly aware of his new familial duties here.
‘My mother’s staying with me at the moment so she’ll be able to let me in,’ Emma replied with a smile that didn’t quite reach her eyes.
He nodded slowly, his brain whirring now. It occurred to him with a jolt of unease that he couldn’t let her just skip off home. If she disappeared on him he’d end up looking a fool if the press came to call and he said something about their relationship that she contradicted later when they caught up with her. Which they would eventually.
And after not having seen her for nearly six years he had a thousand and one questions he wanted to ask her, which would continue to haunt him if she vanished on him again.
No, he couldn’t let her leave.
‘Look, why don’t we go back to my house to talk? It’s only a couple of streets away,’ he said, wishing he hadn’t dismissed his driver for the night. He hadn’t intended to go out this evening but had been chivvied along at the last minute by an old friend from his university days who was a business acquaintance of Fitzherbert’s.
‘We need to figure out what we’re going to do about this,’ he said, registering her slight hesitation. ‘You know what the gutter press are like in this country. We need to be able to give them a plausible answer if they come calling. If they think there’s any kind of mystery about it they’ll hound us for ever. I don’t know about you, but I’m not prepared to have the red tops digging into my past.’
That seemed to get through to her and he saw a chink of acceptance in her expression. And trepidation.
He moved closer to her, then regretted it when he caught the sweet, intoxicating scent of her in the air. ‘All I’m asking is that you come back to my house for an hour so we can talk. It’s been a long time. I want to know how you are, Em.’
She looked at him steadily, her expression closed now, giving nothing away. He recognised it as a look she’d perfected after the news of her father’s sudden death. He’d been a victim of it before, right after the tragedy had struck, and then repeatedly in the time that had followed—the longest and most painful days of his life.
‘Okay,’ she said finally, letting out a rush of breath.
Nodding stiffly, he pointed in the direction they needed to go. ‘It’s this way,’ he said, steeling himself to endure the tense walk home with his wife at his side for the first time in six years.
IT WAS A blessing that Jack’s house was only two streets away because Emma didn’t think she’d be able to cope with wearing his heavy wool coat so close to her skin for much longer, having to breathe in the poignantly familiar scent of him and feel the residual warmth of his body against her own.
It had been a huge struggle to maintain her act of upbeat nonchalance in front of him outside Jolyon’s house and she knew she’d lost her fight the moment she’d seen the look in his eyes when he’d realised how cold she was. It was the same look he used to give her when they were younger—a kind of intense concern for her well-being, which reached right into the heart of her and twisted her insides into knots.
Gesturing for her to follow him, Jack led her up the stone steps of the elegant town house and in through a tall black front door that was so shiny she could see her reflection in it.
The house was incredible, of course, but with a dated, rather rundown interior, overfilled with old-fashioned antique furniture in looming, dark mahogany and with a dull, oppressively dark colour scheme covering the walls and floors.
Jack’s family had a huge amount of wealth behind them and owned a number of houses around the country, including the Cambridge town house overlooking Jesus Green and the River Cam that Jack and his sister, Clare, had grown up in. She’d never been to this property before though. They’d not been together long enough for her to see inside the entire portfolio of his life.
‘What a—er—lovely place,’ she said, cringing at the insincerity in her voice.
‘Thank you,’ he replied coolly, ignoring her accidental rudeness and walking straight through to the sitting room.
She followed him in, noticing that the décor was just as unpleasantly depressing in here.
‘Was this place your grandfather’s?’
‘Yes,’ he said. There was tension in his face, and a flash of sorrow. ‘He left me this house and Clare the one in Edinburgh.’
Emma recalled how Jack had loved spending time with his grandfather, a shrewd businessman and a greatly respected peer of the realm. He’d always had an easy smile and kind word for her—unlike Jack’s parents—and she’d got on well with him the few times she’d met him. Jack had notably inherited the man’s good looks, as well as his business acumen.
‘I was sorry to read about him passing, Jack,’ she said, wanting to try and soothe the glimmer of pain she saw there, but knowing there wasn’t any way to do that without overstepping the mark. He’d been very careful up until this point not to touch her and, judging by his tense body language, would probably reject any attempt she made to reach out to him.
She needed to keep her head here. This wasn’t going to be an easy ride for either of them, so rising above the emotion of it was probably the best thing they could do. In fact they really ought to treat this whole mess like a business transaction, nothing more, if they were going to get through it with their hearts intact.
The mere thought of what they had ahead of them made her spirits plummet and she dropped into the nearest heavily brocaded sofa, sinking back against the comforting softness of the cushions and pulling her legs up under her.
‘Have you seen Clare recently?’ she asked, for want of a topic to move them on from the tense atmosphere that now stretched between them.
‘Not since Grandfather’s funeral,’ he replied, his brow drawn into a frown. ‘She’s doing well though—settled in Edinburgh and happy.’ He looked at her directly now, locking his gaze with hers. ‘She misses you, you know.’
Sadness sank through her, right down to her toes. ‘I miss her too. It’s been a long time since we talked. I’ve been busy—’
She stopped herself from saying any more, embarrassed by how pathetic that weak justification sounded.
In truth, she’d deliberately let her friendship with Clare slip away from her.
A couple of months after Emma’s father had passed away, Clare had gone off to university in Edinburgh
