Marcus everything—something she had no intention of doing unless forced—there was no way she could explain away her knowledge of the older woman. She would just have to keep hoping—and praying!—that Catherine never guessed the truth.
If only she could avoid so much as talking to Catherine for the brief time they were here!
Something she didn’t look like doing when the first person she saw as she came down the stairs twenty minutes later was—Catherine Grainger, who was standing in the entrance hall talking on her mobile telephone.
Kit had knocked on the adjoining door between Marcus’s room and her own a few minutes earlier, only to find that he had just come out of the shower, wearing nothing but a towel wrapped about his waist.
After a first glance Kit’s eyes had remained fixed on the picture on the wall behind him, wings of colour burning in her cheeks. ‘And they say women take a long time to get ready!’ she joked weakly.
‘I was delayed by a telephone call,’ he came back swiftly.
Kit glanced at him. ‘Andrea?’
He gave an acknowledging inclination of his head. ‘How very astute of you!’
‘Not really,’ she assured him; Marcus might have calmly dismissed Andrea’s presence here as being none of his business, but it was a certainty that Andrea, having had time to think about the abrupt end of her relationship with him, wasn’t going to do the same where he was concerned. ‘I’ll wait for you downstairs, shall I?’
‘Unless you want to sit down and wait while I get dressed?’ he taunted, dark brows raised in invitation.
‘No, thank you,’ Kit came back stiffly, already turning towards the door as she heard him chuckle under his breath.
Which accounted for why she was completely on her own now as she descended the stairs to meet Catherine Grainger, the only other person in the huge entrance hall…
CHAPTER SIX
‘I DON’T believe we were introduced earlier…?’
Kit froze two steps from the bottom of the staircase as Catherine spoke to her. No, they hadn’t been introduced, deliberately so, as far as Kit was concerned; she was determined to avoid Catherine Grainger as much as was possible.
‘Have the two of us met before…?’ Puzzlement edged the older woman’s clipped tones as she spoke again.
Kit’s chin rose and she looked down at the other woman, schooling her features into polite disinterest. ‘I’m sure not,’ she replied, only the whitening of her knuckles as she tightly gripped the banister beside her demonstrating that she wasn’t quite as composed as she might appear.
There had been a time in her life when she had imagined a moment like this, when she and Catherine Grainger would come face to face. But that had been when she was still young enough to believe in fairness and justice. Reality was something else entirely.
Catherine was so tall and slim that she looked elegant in whatever she wore, tonight a dress of sparkling midnight blue. Her silver hair lightly touched her bare shoulders, and her throat sported a simple necklace of sapphire and diamonds—her only jewellery.
One of those diamond necklaces that Marcus had wanted to strangle her with only yesterday!
But despite the elegance of her dress, the understated simplicity of the jewellery, everything about this woman spoke of wealth and power.
‘You seem familiar somehow,’ Catherine persisted, her silver-grey gaze focused assessingly on Kit now.
Kit’s own black dress was nowhere near as expensively tailored as Catherine’s, and her only jewellery was a small gold locket suspended between her breasts by a delicate gold chain.
What would Catherine Grainger have to say if she could see the two people photographed inside that locket?
Not a lot, Kit sadly hazarded a guess.
‘Doubtful,’ she answered Catherine, finishing her descent of the stairs, standing only feet away from her now.
Catherine’s gaze remained on her. ‘You arrived with Marcus Maitland, didn’t you?’ she probed.
Kit smiled slightly at the slight edge in Catherine’s voice. ‘I did,’ she confirmed, inwardly pleased to be able to make that claim; the obvious dislike between this lady and Marcus was one sure way to keep her, and her curiosity, at bay!
Catherine’s mouth curved derisively. ‘No accounting for taste, I suppose,’ she drawled scathingly.
Kit stiffened. ‘Please don’t let me keep you from the other guests,’ she replied, hearing the distinctive murmur of voices coming from a double-doored room to their right.
‘You aren’t,’ the other woman countered. ‘In fact—’
‘There you are, Kit!’ Marcus greeted from the top of the stairs, both women turning to look at him as he descended.
Marcus looked devastatingly attractive in a black dinner suit and snowy white shirt, more so than Kit had ever seen him before.
Catherine Grainger’s expression remained impassive, confirming that there was no love lost between the two of them.
‘Catherine,’ Marcus greeted smoothly as he reached the hallway, his hand moving possessively on the slenderness of Kit’s waist.
Kit turned to him, groaning inwardly as she saw the hard glitter in his eyes.
‘Marcus,’ Catherine returned dryly. ‘Your—young friend, and I were just keeping each other company while she waited for you to come downstairs.’
‘Really?’ he drawled sceptically. ‘Well, I’m obviously here now, so please don’t let us delay you any further.’ He looked at the older woman challengingly.
A challenge she was only too pleased to meet, mocking humour to her smile now. ‘I’m in no hurry.’ She shrugged her elegant shoulders. ‘Perhaps the three of us could go to the library and have a quiet drink togeth—’
‘I wondered what was keeping you, Catherine,’ Desmond Hayes called out reprovingly after flinging open the double doors to the sitting-room to find the three of them standing there. ‘Now I see that it was Marcus—’ he strolled over to join them ‘—and his charming companion, Kit,’ he added with obvious intent, his eyes flirting shamelessly as he took in her appearance.
Kit winced as Marcus’s grip on her waist tightened; was she going to do anything right at all this evening?
She knew from Marcus’s response to finding her downstairs with Catherine that he wasn’t pleased to see them together—well, he could join the club, because Kit wasn’t pleased about it either! But he had no right at all to be annoyed with her because Desmond Hayes kept flirting with her—she certainly wasn’t encouraging the man!
‘Kit…’ Catherine repeated consideringly, once again eyeing Kit speculatively. ‘Would that be short for—?’
‘It would be short for nothing,’ Kit cut in firmly.
