A Vengeful Deception. Lee Wilkinson
offered, ‘If you like, I’ll drive you home.’
‘I couldn’t possibly put you to so much trouble.’
She shook her head. ‘It’s the very least I can do. Where do you live?’
‘On the Old Castle Road.’
Off hand she couldn’t recall any houses on that quiet, country road, apart from the Manor. But it was a while since she’d been that way, and new estates were springing up everywhere.
‘Then it really is no trouble,’ she said briskly. ‘That’s the way I’m going.’
It was true that Cleo and her family lived in that general direction, but not nearly so far out of town.
‘If that’s so, I’ll accept your kind offer… Perhaps you’ll be good enough to take this while I collect the rest of my provisions?’
As Anna relieved him of the carrier and put it in the back of her own car, he crossed to a dark-coloured Laguna parked close by.
Through the falling snow she watched him fish in his pocket for the keys, open the boot, and with one hand begin to manoeuvre a box of groceries.
It seemed he’d been shopping for his wife.
‘Let me.’ As soon as the box had joined the other things on the back seat, she invited, ‘Jump in.’
As she took her place behind the wheel, he slid in beside her and turned his head to look at her.
He saw a face of enchanting beauty. Long-lashed almond eyes set wide apart—eyes that were the colour of wood-smoke—high cheekbones, a straight nose, and a lovely mouth above a softly rounded chin. Her smooth dark hair, which was taken up in a knot, was spangled with snowflakes.
In the glare of the overhead light she saw him properly for the first time, and what she saw threw her completely.
For a long moment a sense of shock held her rigid. His sidelong glance, the shape of his head and that cleft chin, reminded her of David.
But he wasn’t really like David.
His eyes were green, flecked with gold.
David’s had been blue.
His hair, when dry, would have the bleached paleness of ripe corn, while in fascinating contrast his brows and lashes were dark.
David’s brows and lashes had been as fair as his hair.
His tanned, good-looking face was hard-boned and tough.
David’s had been boyishly handsome.
Added to that, this man must be in the region of thirty, where David had been just twenty-two at that time. A year younger than herself.
No, he wasn’t like David at all.
Yet his effect on her was just as immediate, just as intense, abruptly destroying her composure and robbing her of any self-assurance.
‘Something wrong?’ he asked.
‘No.’ Her voice shook betrayingly as she added, ‘Just for a second you reminded me of someone I used to know.’
Turning hastily away, she started the car, and, driving with care, made her way out of the car park.
The town centre was aglow with fairy lights and decorations, the shop windows bright with Christmas cheer. Around the tall tree set up in the Old Market Square, a group from the local church were singing carols and collecting for charity.
There were plenty of people still about, spilling from the shops and stores, laden down with last-minute purchases of gifts and goodies.
The falling snow, which at any other time would have been condemned as an inconvenience, added the final festive touch.
‘A picture-postcard scene.’
Her passenger’s comment echoed Anna’s own thoughts.
‘Yes,’ she agreed, and because he affected her so strongly found herself talking too much. ‘The weather has been very changeable lately. First it was unseasonably mild, then just a couple of days ago we had a severe storm with gale-force winds that did a lot of damage locally. Now this looks like being the first white Christmas we’ve had for a long time.’
‘I ordered it especially,’ he told her. ‘I love snow, and it’s been years since I saw any.’
‘Then you don’t live in England?’
‘I do now. The wanderer has finally returned.’
‘Have you been back long?’
‘A day or two.’
‘From where?’
‘The States. After I left college I spent some time travelling the world before settling on America’s Western Seaboard. Eventually, having got into computer software, I bought a house on the coast and adopted the Californian lifestyle.’
‘Sun, sea, and sand?’ Anna murmured.
‘In a nutshell.’
‘Lucky you.’
‘After a while that kind of life can pall. I found I was longing for rural England and the changing seasons. Daffodils and April showers, the smell of summer and new-mown hay, October frosts and decaying leaves, November fogs and log fires… There was nothing particular to keep me in California—my business interests had diversified and become international—so when circumstances gave me the opportunity, I decided to come home.’
He hadn’t mentioned a wife, but such an attractive man was almost certain to be married, or at least in some long-term relationship…
Collecting her straying thoughts, she asked, ‘And you regard Rymington as home?’
‘I was born and bred here.’ With deliberation, he added, ‘At Hartington Manor, to be exact.’
While keeping her eyes on the road, Anna was aware that he was watching her intently, as though he expected some reaction.
‘Hartington Manor? Isn’t that where Sir Ian Strange used to live?’
‘That’s right. I’m Gideon Strange, his son.’
Sir Gideon Strange, and presumably living at the Manor now.
His continued regard made her even more self-conscious, and her voice was jerky as she said, ‘I was sorry to hear of your father’s death last year.’
‘Did you know him?’ The question was casual.
‘No, not personally. But he’s always been well known and highly respected in the town. He did a great deal for charity and local good causes.’
‘Yes, he liked to be regarded as a philanthropist.’
There was a suggestion of bitterness in the words.
‘I’d half expected him to leave his entire estate to some deserving charity. I could picture the Manor being turned into a home for abused women or stray cats and dogs.’
Then with a quick, sidelong, mocking smile, ‘No, I’ve nothing against either abused women or dumb animals. But though it’s too small to count as a stately home, the Manor is a beautiful old place. It would have been a pity to let it go out of the family. There’s been a Strange there since Elizabethan times.’
So why on earth would Sir Ian have left it to a charity, rather than his own son?
As though in answer to Anna’s unspoken question, Gideon Strange went on, ‘I’m afraid my father and I never quite saw eye to eye…’
The judicious wording convinced her that that was an understatement.
‘His carefully nurtured public image was somewhat different from the private reality, and I’m afraid he could never forgive me for pointing that out.’
Not