‘There’s one way to find out,’ remarked Jake, pushing open his door and swinging his long legs over the sill. He instantly felt the cold, and reached into the back to rescue his leather jacket. Then, pushing his arms into the sleeves, he got to his feet.
The front door opened as he buttoned the jacket, and a woman appeared, silhouetted by the glowing light from the hall behind her. She was tall and slim, that much he could see, with what appeared to be a rope of dark hair hanging over one shoulder.
Obviously not Cassandra’s mother, he realised, even as he heard Cassandra utter an impatient oath. The distant relative? he wondered. Surely she wasn’t old enough to be the housekeeper Cassandra had mentioned?
The protesting sound as the car door was thrust back on its hinges distracted him. Turning his head, he saw Cassandra pulling herself to her feet and, unlike the other woman’s, her face was clearly visible.
‘Eve,’ she said, unknowingly answering his question, her thin smile and tightly controlled features an indication that he hadn’t been mistaken about her hostility towards this woman. ‘Where’s my mother? I thought she’d have come to meet us.’
The girl—for he could see now that she was little more—came down the three shallow steps towards them. And as she moved into the light cast by the uncurtained windows Jake saw her pale olive-skinned features were much like his own. He guessed her eyes would be dark, too, though he couldn’t see them. She barely looked at him, however, her whole attention focussed on Cassandra, but he saw she had a warm, exotic kind of beauty, and he wondered why she was content to apparently spend her days looking after an old woman, distant relative or not.
Her mouth compressed for a moment before she spoke. Was it his imagination or was she as unenthusiastic to see Cassandra as she was to see her? ‘I’m afraid Ellie’s in bed,’ she said, without offering a greeting. ‘She had a fall yesterday evening and Dr McGuire thinks she might have broken one of the bones in her ankle.’
‘Might have?’ Cassandra fastened onto the words. ‘Why is there any doubt about it? Shouldn’t she have had her ankle X-rayed or something?’
‘She should,’ agreed Eve, and Jake noticed that she didn’t let Cassandra’s agitation get to her. ‘But she wanted to be here when you arrived, and if she’d had to go to the hospital in Newcastle…’ She shrugged. ‘I’ve arranged for an ambulance to take her in tomorrow—’
‘An ambulance!’ Cassandra snorted. ‘Why couldn’t you take her?’
Eve’s face was a cool mask. ‘I have a job to do,’ she replied flatly. And now she looked at Jake fully for the first time. ‘Would you—both—like to come in?’
AN HOUR later, Eve was able to escape to her room to change for supper.
She’d spent the time between the guests’ arrival and now escorting Cassie to see her mother, showing Jacob Romero to his room—Ellie had been adamant that Cassie shouldn’t sleep with her lover under her roof—and arranging with Mrs Blackwood for refreshments to be provided in the library.
Eve, herself, had done her best to keep out of Cassie’s way after she’d delivered her to her mother. Out of Jacob Romero’s way, too, with his deepset eyes and dark, attractive features. She didn’t know what she’d expected Cassie’s escort to be like. She only knew she couldn’t call him her boyfriend. There was nothing remotely boyish about Jacob Romero, and from the moment she’d seen him standing beside his car in the courtyard she’d felt a curious sense of foreboding that she couldn’t quite place.
She supposed she’d been expecting someone older. Cassie was forty-six, after all. But Romero was obviously much younger. Tall—he was easily six feet and more—with a well-muscled chest and a flat stomach tapering to narrow hips, he looked strong and virile. An impression increased by his hair, which was cut very close to his head.
He looked—dangerous, she thought. Dangerously attractive, at least. And sexy—a description that in his case wasn’t exaggerated. It was easy to understand what Cassie saw in him. What troubled Eve most was that she could see it, too.
She pulled a face at her reflection in the mirror of her dressing table. Then, shedding her shirt and jeans onto the floor, she went to take her shower. She was being fanciful, she thought. Ten years ago, feeling a man’s eyes upon her wouldn’t have bothered her so much. But she’d been harder then, wary and streetwise. In the years since she’d come to live with her grandmother she’d become softer. She’d let down the guard she’d had since she was old enough to understand.
Drying her hair later, she mentally ran through the contents of her wardrobe. Nothing very exciting there, she acknowledged. Skirts and blouses or sweaters for school; jeans and sweaters for home. For the rare occasions when she went out her grandmother had bought her a little black velvet dress, with long sleeves, a scoop neckline, and a skirt that skimmed her kneecaps. But this was not that kind of occasion, and she had no intention of attracting Cassie’s curiosity by wearing something totally unsuitable for the evening meal.
She was tempted to leave her hair loose, something she often did in the evenings after she’d washed it. But once again she decided against drawing attention to herself. She plaited the glossy black strands into the usual single braid, securing it with a narrow band of elasticated ribbon.
After far too much deliberation, she put on a V-necked top made of elasticised cotton. Bands of ivory ribbon hid the shaping both around her arms and above and below her breasts, contrasting with the rest of the garment, whose jade-green colour complemented her pale skin.
She almost took it off again when she saw how well it suited her. She’d bought the top on one of her infrequent trips to Newcastle, and had pushed it away in a drawer because she’d thought it was unsuitable for school. Now, looking at it again, she saw she’d been right. It was more in keeping with the teenage girl her grandmother had found subsisting in a draughty squat.
But it was too late to be having second thoughts now. Besides, she doubted she’d be eating with her grandmother’s guests. She had no intention of leaving the old lady to eat alone, or of playing gooseberry to Cassie’s tête-à-tête.
Zipping on a pair of black cords, she paused only long enough to stroke her lids with a dark brown shadow and run a peachy gloss over her mouth. Then, slipping her feet into heelless mules, she left her room before she could change her mind.
Watersmeet was a fairly large house, but over the years Eve had got used to it, and now she hardly noticed its high-ceilinged rooms and wide corridors. Some years before she’d come to live here central heating had been installed, but the boiler struggled to keep the place at an ambient temperature. Consequently, at this time of year, fires were lit in all the downstairs rooms that were used.
Eve went first to the kitchen, to see how Mrs Blackwood was coping. The elderly housekeeper wasn’t used to having guests, but very little fazed her. At present, she was rolling curls of homemade cream cheese in slices of ham, and an avocado dressing waited to be served in tiny ramekins to accompany each plate.
‘Her Ladyship won’t eat any of the dressing,’ Mrs Blackwood explained, when Eve commented on the arrangement. The woman meant Cassie, she knew. Her grandmother didn’t watch the calories these days. ‘Just hope she approves of the sea bass,’ she continued. ‘I asked Mr Goddard to deliver it specially. I know how fussy she is
