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‘Carla, that’s the most ridiculous thing I ever heard…!’
‘Well, I’m not sure…I wasn’t what he thought he was getting. I expect he felt duped…’
‘I know it’s wrong to speak ill of the dead,’ Becky said flatly, ‘but Rufus didn’t want a wife and equal partner, he wanted a subservient little slave to indulge his every selfish whim. Frankly, Carla, Rufus was a waste of space, and you know it…’
‘Becky…!’
‘He spent most of his time subtly ridiculing you, to compensate for his own weak character! Undermining your confidence in your writing, your appearance, everything…while he wallowed in misery about the unfairness of his life, his failures in business, the injustice of that partnership that went sour, started drowning his bitterness in whisky…I mean, I’m sorry about his tragic accident, Carla, but the man ruined your self-confidence!’
‘Becky…’
‘The trouble with you,’ Becky drove home her point, ‘is that you’ve never had enough self-esteem! You’ve got this image of yourself as hopeless and inept—you’ve never shaken that off since your dad used to tell you how disappointed he was in you! Now here you are, a big success as a detective-writer, and you put yourself down still; you lock yourself away like a recluse…’
Carla laughed ruefully. ‘Have you quite finished? I do not lock myself away like a recluse. I enjoy my own company…’
‘But you don’t make any effort to socialise, Carla.’ Becky thrust an impatient hand through her short blonde hair, and sighed at the stubborn tilt to her friend’s chin. ‘I honestly think that husband of yours has put you off men for life,’ Becky added crisply.
Carla gazed back, her pale, heart-shaped face set determinedly within its frame of straight dark hair, steady resistance in the large, purplish-blue eyes.
‘Maybe he did.’ She shrugged carelessly. ‘I just wasn’t any good at being the meek, biddable wife. To top the lot, I wasn’t even any good in bed…’
Carla’s grin lightened the words, but behind her eyes was a pain she kept fiercely dampened down.
‘Huh!’ Becky’s snort was derisive. ‘You and your guilt complex! It never occurred to you that it could have been the other way round…?’
‘Oh, Becky…!’
A knock on the half-open stable-door to the kitchen made Carla swivel round abruptly. Daniel stood there, a quizzical look on his face.
‘Good morning. Sorry to interrupt,’ he said evenly, nodding and smiling briefly at Becky before glancing back to Carla. ‘Do you have some milk and eggs I could use?’
Carla caught a fleeting glimpse of Becky’s widened brown eyes as she took her first proper look at the stranger the whole village was gossiping about. Then she resolutely avoided her friend’s gaze.
‘Of course—but I was going to bring you some breakfast,’ she said hastily, standing up and darting to the fridge. ‘I’ve got bacon and tomatoes grilling at the moment…’
She felt hot all over. How long had he been standing there, listening? How much of her conversation with Becky had he overheard? Why did he have to creep up on her like that?
‘Maybe it was the delicious smell that lured me over.’ He grinned, raking a hand through his dark hair, and eyeing her flushed face. ‘But it’s all right, I can easily cook for myself. The problem is obtaining the ingredients!’
His rueful tone reminded her forcibly how dependent he was for support.
‘Whatever you’d rather do,’ she agreed. ‘But, since I’m already cooking for you this morning, maybe you’d like to join me here? This is my friend Becky Pascoe, from Carperrow Farm. Becky, this is…Daniel.’
‘Delighted to meet you.’ Daniel reached to shake Becky’s outstretched hand, his expression unreadable. Carla found the slight pinkness in her friend’s cheeks oddly reassuring. It wasn’t just her, then. Other females, even down-to-earth and happily married ones like Becky, were affected by this man’s subtle charisma…
With enviable composure, he sat down at the table. He was wearing a checked shirt, denim jeans, and a ribbed crew-neck jumper in dark forest-green which emphasised the colour of his eyes, not to mention the impressively lean width of his chest and shoulders. He’d discarded the sling the hospital had discharged him with yesterday. His left wrist was bandaged, but he seemed to be flexing the fingers deliberately, as though impatient for recovery.
‘How are you getting on?’ Becky was asking. ‘Do you have any idea yet why you came to Penuthna?’
‘I haven’t a clue.’ His expression was wry. ‘But the fact that no one seems to have missed me points to a holiday, maybe.’
‘True. But the police haven’t been able to trace where you could have been staying, have they?’
‘Not yet.’ He flexed his shoulders, as if easing hidden tension. Carla busied herself dishing up bacon, tomatoes and sausages, while Becky chatted vivaciously, an excited glitter in her eyes. Daniel’s replies were brief and humorous. As Carla brought the plates to the table, Becky jumped up and excused herself reluctantly.
‘That looks wonderful! I’d love to stay and eat with you, but Tom’s minding the baby so I’d better dash back. Come up and see us soon…’ She smiled from Carla to Daniel, adding quickly, ‘In fact, come and have dinner. Both of you. I’ll ring you, Carla…’
When her friend had gone, Carla met Daniel’s shuttered gaze with an inward groan of embarrassment. How could Becky be so…insensitive? Practically pairing them off together! It was ridiculous. One minute voicing concern for her safety with a stranger in the house, the next inviting them to dinner as if they were a long-established couple!
‘Sorry about that,’ she said lightly. ‘I don’t think Becky knows quite how to treat you…’
‘How do you think I should be treated?’ he queried calmly. ‘Like a circus freak or like a normal human being?’
‘There’s no need to be so…touchy,’ she felt compelled to retort. ‘I didn’t mean that…I mean, I just don’t want anyone getting the wrong idea.’
‘And what idea would that be?’ He sounded amused.
‘Oh, for heaven’s sake, do I have to spell it out?’
‘I’m afraid you do.’ There was a silky trace of mockery beneath the light tone.
Furious, she sat down, watched him begin to eat and forced herself to do likewise. ‘This is a very small village. Gossip is one of the few pastimes available to people…’
‘It’s bound to happen,’ he pointed out easily. ‘A woman on her own offers accommodation to a strange man—tongues wag. You should have thought of that before you issued your invitation.’
She froze in the act of slicing her grilled tomato, large mauve-blue eyes simmering with annoyance.
‘You know, I could almost get the idea that you’re enjoying this!’
He shrugged slightly. ‘Having a blank slate for a memory is no joke. But watching you tiptoeing around your own conscience, juggling with your guilt complexes, is reasonably entertaining.’
‘Oh, is it?’
‘Perhaps the word “entertaining” is too offensive, Carla. Sorry. Maybe “intriguing” is a better word.’ He didn’t sound particularly sorry. The sea-green gaze was amused, and irritatingly aloof. Carla pushed her plate away, and regarded him balefully. What kind of viper had she opened her doors to?
‘Tea or coffee? And what guilt complexes would these be?’ she enquired at last, adopting her sweetest tone.
‘Coffee, please. Black, no sugar.’ He grinned remorselessly. ‘What guilt complexes? At a guess, they’re all to do with your marriage…’
So he had been eavesdropping! There was a hot wash of colour in her cheeks. She was glad to hide behind her dark swath of hair as she poured boiling water into two white china mugs. Tipping milk into hers, she carried both back to the table, and clicked Daniel’s down with scant grace in front of him.
‘My marriage is none of your business,’ she pointed out, ‘and I think your time would be best spent delving into your psyche, prying into your past, don’t you? Not snooping around overhearing conversations and poking your nose into my life!’
‘Ouch. Firmly put in my place.’ Daniel laughed shortly. The wry twist of his lips as he eyed her furious expression struck an answering chord somewhere inside her. Despite her fury, she found herself attempting a weak smile back.
‘All these arguments, and we hardly know each other.’ She raised her eyebrows mockingly.
‘Yeah,’ he agreed, deadpan, ‘just think what hell we’d be if we were a couple.’
‘Quite.’ Carla found that she couldn’t hold the cool, expressionless gaze. With a jerk, she switched her eyes to the view from the window. The silence intensified to the point where she could feel it clamping down on her, like an invisible vice. Then Daniel said easily, ‘How long were you married?’
She sighed, then managed a slight laugh.
‘Three years. You don’t give up, do you? I think I’ve guessed your identity for you. Your interrogation skills have given you away. You’re the real-life incarnation of my Detective Inspector Jack Tresawna!’
‘Anything’s possible. That’s what’s so unnerving.’
‘What’s so unnerving about being my fictional character come to life?’
Daniel grinned, but looked thoughtful.
‘You’re not suggesting I’m a myth? A psychic disturbance created by your overheated imagination, Carla?’
‘You never know,’ she said flippantly. ‘Stranger stories have been recorded in this part of the world. Cornwall is full of myths…’
‘But I’m flesh and blood,’ he confirmed coolly, catching hold of her wrist across the table. ‘Feel me…’
The physical contact jolted her. Sitting quite still, she stared down at the lean brown fingers circling her arm. She was trembling, she realised dimly. Surely something as simple as a hand on her arm couldn’t make her feel like this? She stared at Daniel’s hand, registering the well-shaped, strong-looking fingers, short, clean nails, the scattering of black hair at the wrist. His palm was warm, clasping the pulse-point in her wrist. Could he feel the faster rhythm? Feel her tension?
‘Yes, I believe you,’ she said hurriedly. She twisted away, pulled her wrist away, and stood up, before he could see the confusion in her eyes.
Just the touch of his hand on her arm had triggered a buried warmth in her stomach. Shivers of response in her thighs. A tingling in her breasts, thankfully well-protected from view beneath her voluminous blue jumper. But even more confusing was this unnerving sense of déjà vu. As if she’d met him before, somewhere, somehow, without remembering where or when. He seemed alien but familiar…
‘The hint of strange, other-worldly happenings,’ he was teasing calmly. ‘Isn’t that the style that made your Carl Julyan books well-known? Detective novels with a suggestion of the supernatural?’
‘Yes. I suppose it is…’ Dragging her frayed emotions together, she caught her breath, forced her thoughts back on to a logical course, furious with her own idiocy. She managed a commendably direct look. ‘You seem remarkably alert and well-informed for a man suffering from memory-loss, you know.’
‘Do you think I’m faking?’ The cool challenge held a gleam of mockery. She shook her head.
‘I didn’t say that. What possible motive could you have for faking amnesia?’
‘What indeed? I imagine that I’d have better methods of occupying my time.’
There was a pause. Carla collected the coffee-cups and began stacking dirty crockery into the dishwasher. Daniel’s presence was like an invisible electric charge in the air behind her.
‘What made you choose a male pseudonym?’ He spoke calmly, breaking the silence. ‘Does this have any connection with your habit of dressing like a boy?’
She paused as she stacked the last breakfast plate. Froze into stillness. Don’t get angry, she urged herself silently. He obviously gets his kicks out of baiting people. Straightening up, she turned a cool, expressionless smile towards him.
‘As a matter of fact, it probably does. I should have been a boy. Or so my parents always said.’
‘Meaning that you always acted like one? Or that they would have preferred to have one?’
Carla gazed at him, her throat abruptly constricting. How often had she heard her father bemoan the fact that his longed-for son had turned out to be an unwanted daughter? Worse still, an unwanted daughter who didn’t even grace the family snapshots with beauty and talent? She had a brief mental vision of herself growing up. Plump, plain, spotty, teeth in a brace until she was seventeen, hair stick-straight, that flat, uninteresting shade of dark brown which no amount of waving or styling seemed to transform.
‘A bit of both,’ she said aloud, with a casual shrug. ‘And I’m sorry if you don’t approve of my clothes.’ She glanced down at her baggy denims, and equally baggy jumper. So what if their bulk and lack of cut did hide her figure? She hadn’t the least interest in her figure. Catching a glimpse of her face, pale and devoid of make-up, in the mirror over the sink, she looked quickly away. Dressed like a boy? Did this horrible man have to be so intensely personal all the time? Couldn’t he just make polite conversation and mind his manners?
‘One thing you’re certainly not is a diplomat!’ She grinned, determinedly retrieving her poise. ‘But whatever your profession you’re definitely an amateur psychologist!’
‘It doesn’t take a psychologist to detect that you’re unhappy with your femininity, Carla.’ It was drawled softly. Suppressing the urge to throw something at him, she shrugged again, fighting an annoying heat in her cheeks.
‘I’m a full-time writer, not a…a photographic model. And you’re wrong. Whatever I am, I’m perfectly happy with it, thanks. Now, can I get you some more coffee?’
He shook his head, and then winced as if he wished he hadn’t.
‘Do I gather this place used to be a farm? Before your husband died?’
‘Yes…this was one of several places my father owned and rented out. He gave it to us as a wedding present. Silver was mined here once.’ She was so relieved to have the spotlight temporarily off herself, she was gabbling nervously. ‘Then it was a dairy farm. Then beef and vegetables. We had a few horses until…until my husband died…’
‘So your husband ran the farm, while you wrote books?’
‘Yes. Although he didn’t really enjoy being a farmer…’ In fact, he’d run the farm right down, she reflected.
‘What did he want to do?’
‘He wanted to own his own company, be the successful businessman. He bought into a business once, before we married. But he had a bad experience with a back-stabbing friend, and lost out…Look, would you please stop?’
‘Stop what?’
‘Grilling me about my life!’
‘There’s very little point in your grilling me about mine,’ he pointed out, ‘since I can’t remember a damned thing about it.’
‘True…’ Despite her irritation, she felt a pang of sympathy.
‘What are you so defensive about, anyway?’ he wanted to know, his eyes cool on her hesitant expression.
‘Nothing. I’ll complete my entire life story if it amuses you,’ she went on calmly. ‘I went to an all-girls’ boarding-school in Somerset, followed by an English degree at Exeter. I then couldn’t find a job, but, since I’d already decided all I wanted to do was write novels, it was probably a blessing in disguise. My father was chairman of a big international farm machinery company and he and my mother were abroad a lot. My late husband’s parents were friends of my parents, through the farming connection. That’s how he and I knew each other…’
‘And you fell in love and got married.’
She turned her back on him, and stared out of the window. The spell of fine weather was continuing. The pale sun shone on the wide sweep of bay. The sea shimmered with a million tiny reflections.
‘Of course. What else?’
‘People have various reasons for marrying,’ Daniel said calmly. ‘I just wondered what yours was.’
Carla felt as if that X-ray vision was somehow penetrating the back of her head, sorting mercilessly through her jumbled thoughts. She swung round and faced him. She felt tense as a reed under the searching appraisal, and now she was angry. Really angry.
‘OK. I realise you were listening in on my conversation with Becky…’
‘I couldn’t help overhearing the tail-end of it. It sounded to me as if you were putting yourself down.’
Carla drew a deep breath, and glared at her tormentor.
‘I realise you’ve time on your hands, and apparently nothing better to do than amuse yourself at my expense…’ Her heart was thudding. Two angry flags of colour darkened her cheeks. She was painfully aware of his eyes searching her face, moving slowly and consideringly over her from head to toe.
‘Hey…I’m sorry.’ His voice was cool. ‘You’re right. I was going to say that your husband sounded like an insensitive bastard. But maybe I’m one too.’
