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Phoebe had forgotten all about the damn clasp in her hair. It was the only piece of jewellery she had kept, and now she wished she had not. She blushed…
Jed knew enough about women to know Phoebe had lashed out at him not because she was disgusted but because she was scared by her own response. ‘So you can still blush, Phoebe.’ And, lifting her chin with his finger, he looked deep into her eyes. ‘I’m glad you kept something I gave you, Phoebe, though we both know it was not what you really wanted, and for that I am truly sorry,’ he said sincerely.
Her reaction astounded him. She gasped and twisted her head away, but not before he caught the flash of panic laced with fear in her eyes. He reached for her arm, but she shrugged him off and walked swiftly back to Julian without a word in response.
Phoebe’s reaction intrigued him. In his own way he had been trying to be compassionate by alluding to their shared past and her tragic miscarriage, not throw her into a panic, and he had to wonder why.
Seated in the back seat of Julian’s chauffeur-driven Bentley, Phoebe asked him how far it was to his apartment.
‘We are not going to my apartment, Phoebe, you can relax. I’ve instructed Max to take us back to Dorset. Much as I fancy you, I don’t want to be a stand in for another man. The journey will take an hour or so—plenty of time for you to tell me all about Jed Sabbides. You did know him, didn’t you?’ he asked softly.
‘Yes, I met him when I was at university.’ And she told Julian everything.
It was cathartic in way, and it put her reaction to Jed in perspective again.
‘The man did not strike me as that shallow, but it his loss,’ Julian said, and put an arm around her. ‘Forget about the rat.’
And she almost did…
Especially when on arriving home Julian smilingly warned her, “I’m not giving up totally, Phoebe. I’ll be away for a couple of weeks or so and I’ll call when I get back.’ Then he kissed her lightly on the lips and left.
Chapter Four (#ulink_f8b62fc3-6ff4-5251-815f-b9ddf4da50eb)
IN THE Athens head office of the Sabbides Corporation a brooding Jed lounged back in a black leather chair, his dark gaze fixed on the folder on the desk in front of him. Leo Takis, a friend and the head of a security firm he often used, had delivered it personally fifteen minutes ago, with the comment that according to his English operative Sid there was not much to get excited about. Jed had been staring at the damn thing ever since…
Did he really want to open it? He had a busy day ahead of him, and a host of more important things to attend too. But in the two weeks since the embassy ball in London the smooth flow of his life had been shot to hell—all because of Phoebe Brown.
He could not concentrate on work.
He had not proposed to Sophia. Quite the reverse. He had told her it was not going to work and returned to Greece the next morning. One of the reasons being that since meeting Phoebe at the party Jed had found it impossible to get her out of his head. Sophia and her father would probably never speak to him again.
The more he thought about the way Phoebe had behaved that night, the more he had a gut feeling he was missing something. He was a good poker player, though nowadays he only played the occasional private big money game with a few like-minded friends. And in poker parlance he was great at reading ‘tells’—and something was telling him Phoebe was trying to bluff him…
Her coldness, the way she had continued with the pretence that she had never met him before, the sensual response she had tried so hard to deny when he held her in his arms, and the odd look of fear and panic he had seen in her eyes as the music ended and they left the dance floor…
She had avoided so much as glancing at him again for the rest of the night—he knew because he had been watching her—and it had set his astute mind to wondering why.
Well—that was his excuse for hiring Leo’s discreet security agency…
But in reality seeing Phoebe again had aroused a host of memories he had thought successfully banished from his mind years ago—the foremost of which was being buried deep inside her hot, sleek body, with her fabulous legs locked around him.
Jed grimaced. He had pretty much been in a constant state of arousal ever since—except unfortunately after the ball, when he had followed Sophia into her bedroom and taken her in his arms, nothing had happened!
It had crossed his mind to persist, to fantasise about Phoebe…But in that moment the uncomfortable truth had hit him. He had lied to himself for years. He had never had better sex than he’d had with Phoebe—in fact for two years after their parting he hadn’t had sex at all! As for the couple of women since, he could not truthfully say whether or not what he had shared with Phoebe had been in some way responsible for his lacklustre and short-lived relationships with them.
With brutal honesty he had known then that his sensible plan to marry Sophia was never going to work. She was a friend, and deserved better than a husband who had no passion for her. Hence the break-up…
Jed picked up the folder. Inside was the details of Phoebe Brown’s life from the week she had left the London apartment. He had given Leo that date specifically, as he knew all too well what had happened before…He weighed the file in his hand, and it felt light.
Good sign or bad? He didn’t know, but what he did know was that he needed Phoebe back in his bed, to sate himself in her body and get rid of this lingering fascination for her once and for all…
Slowly he opened the file and began to read.
Five minutes later, he barely glanced at the photo of mother and child at the back of the brief report before dropping the lot on the desk. Then, swivelling in his chair, he stared out through the glass wall of his office into the bright light of the October sun. His broad brow creased in a thunderous frown and his dark eyes narrowed against the natural glare and the blaze of anger burning inside him.
A month after graduating from university Phoebe Brown had been back home, living with her aunt in a small village in Dorset—where Jed had guessed she had gone when he’d found the apartment empty. It was no surprise. She had spent a further year qualifying as a teacher, and was now employed in that capacity at a private girls’ school in Dorset. She had bought a rundown cottage attached to her aunt’s, and between them they had converted the property into one detached cottage. There she led a quiet, uneventful life with her family and was a well-respected member of the community and liked by everyone who knew her.
But what was a surprise, and what had caused Jed’s unexpected flash of rage, was in the detail of that family…
Phoebe was a single mother of a boy of four years old. Not unusual in this day and age. But what he had instantly realized, and what was anathema to Jed, was that the baby had been born only seven months and one week after the miscarriage of their child, and there was no father listed on the registration of its birth.
He couldn’t believe it. Deep down he didn’t want to, but he had too. It was there on the copy of the birth certificate. The baby had been born at Bowesmartin Cottage Hospital in the county of Dorset. The baby must have been premature—that was the obvious conclusion.
Well, the sweet, innocent Phoebe he had thought he had known was nothing to him. She was the past, and he should have left it at that. For all her beauty, she was beneath contempt in his eyes.
For years he had carried a lingering sense of guilt over what had happened between them, but not any more…So much for her constant avowals of love. It simply reinforced what Jed had always believed: there was no such thing as love, and women always had an agenda…
Phoebe could not have taken more than a week before falling into bed with another man and getting pregnant again. Maybe she was type of women who wanted a child more than she wanted a man? But in his experience it was older career woman who fell into that category—biological clock ticking syndrome, which certainly had not applied to Phoebe at the time.
What did he care? His brief flight of fancy in considering resuming their affair was just that…a momentary blip in his razor-sharp brain. Their relationship had finished long ago. What Phoebe Brown did with her life was nothing to him…
Turning back to his desk, determined to dismiss her from his thoughts once and for all and get some work done, he reached for the folder to put it away and hesitated.
Something about Phoebe and her son did not add up…With his vast experience in business and finance he knew that after analysing all known facts and the people involved if the figures were too incredible to be believed they were invariably false.
He picked up the photograph and looked at it again more closely. It had obviously been taken from a distance—not that surprising, as taking unauthorised pictures of young school children was a risky business in this day and age—and there were other women and children in the background. The features of the mother and child in the foreground were clear enough, though the color of the eyes was indecipherable, but it was definitely Phoebe standing by the school gates, smiling down at the small, sturdy dark-haired child holding her hand.
As he studied the image on the paper he had a sense of recognition that built and built the longer he examined the photograph.
He got to his feet, a steely and pitiless light gleaming in his dark eyes. If his suspicions were correct, Phoebe Brown had to be the greatest actress and the most devious, contemptible woman he had ever had the misfortune to meet.
With a face like thunder he walked into his secretary’s office and told her to cancel all his appointments in Athens until further notice. He was going to visit the London office. She must order the company jet to take him to England as soon as possible. He didn’t need Leo’s agency for what he had in mind. He was going to conduct his own very personal investigation, and if what he suspected was true he vowed he would make Phoebe pay every minute of every day for the rest of her life for her despicable lie…
‘Has he been any trouble?’ Phoebe asked her friend Kay, tightening her grip on Ben’s hand as he tried to pull her down the drive to the village street.
‘No, he was great. He played with Emma as good as gold.’
Phoebe lived on the outskirts of the village of Martinstead, and taught at a private girls’ school in the nearby town of Bowesmartin. Kay, her friend and house-mate from student days, had visited her when Ben was born and ended up married to the local vet. Her daughter was eighteen months younger than Ben, and Kay picked him up from the village infant school where Emma was attending the nursery section and kept him until Phoebe got back about an hour later and collected him.
‘Thanks. You have no idea how much I appreciate your taking care of him. Next week is half term, thank goodness. So it will only be another six weeks after that before Aunt Jemma returns from her holiday—if that is okay with you?’
‘Stop worrying, Phoebe. It’s not a problem. Now go, it is cold out here.’
‘Okay.’ Phoebe laughed, and with a wave strolled down the drive to the pavement, Ben skipping along at her side.
Her aunt had gone on holiday to Australia, and in the four days since she’d left Phoebe had come to realise just how much she had depended on her aunt to help with Ben over the years. She had been there for Phoebe when she gave birth, and later looked after Benjamin while Phoebe qualified as a teacher and then worked.
When Ben had started school in September Phoebe had encouraged her aunt to finally take the two-month holiday she had been planning for ages, to visit her oldest friend in Australia. Her Aunt Jemma deserved the break. She had always loved Phoebe and been there for her, and in the last few years for Ben as well, of course.
Phoebe glanced down at her son. He was lucky and so was she.
Being a teacher was an advantage for a single mum, she thought contentedly. She had the same holidays as the infant school, and next week she could relax with Ben. They were going to redecorate his bedroom. She had never got around to removing the baby blue décor, and Ben now wanted either racing car or dinosaur-printed wallpaper, but he had not decided yet.
‘Mum! Mum!’ he yelled, and stopped, forcing her to stop as well.
‘Yes, darling, what is it?’ she asked.
‘Can I have a car like that one over there on my wall?’ He was pointing at a car parked on the opposite side street of the street.
She chuckled. It was a low-slung lethal-looking black monster, with huge wheels, illegally parked in front of the post office—just the sort to appeal to young boys or old, she thought dryly.
‘Mum, Mum—can we go and see what kind of car it is…?’
But Phoebe barely heard Ben’s excited request as the car door opened and a man stepped out.
Long and lean, he wore black hip-hugging jeans and a heavy black rollneck sweater, and he looked as dark and dangerous as the car…
Jed Sabbides…
She watched in stunned amazement as in a few lithe strides he was over the road and standing in front of her.
‘Phoebe, this is a surprise. I thought it was you, but the child threw me when I heard him call you Mum.’
His deeply voiced greeting set every nerve in her body on edge, and she could do nothing about the sudden leap in her pulse. Steeling herself to remain calm, she glanced up at him and politely said, ‘Hello, Jed,’ conscious of her son at her side.
‘I wasn’t aware you had a child. Nobody told me.’ Jed’s piercing black gaze sliced through her like a knife, and she had never seen such rage—quickly controlled as he turned his attention to her son.
‘Hello, young man. I heard you telling your mum you liked my car.’ He smiled down at Ben. ‘It is the latest model Bentley convertible.’
‘Wow! Does that mean the roof comes off?’ Ben asked with eyes like saucers.
‘Yes, at the press of a button. Would you like to see inside? Or I have a better idea—let’s go for a drive.’
‘No,’ Phoebe snapped, tugging Ben closer to her side. ‘He knows he must never get into a stranger’s car.’ And she wished he had not yelled ‘Mum!’ quite so loud—not that it would have made much difference.
Jed turned his head and stared down at her, and the look in his eyes made her blood freeze.
‘Admirable. But you and I are not strangers, Phoebe, so there is no harm in introducing me to your son, is there?’ he queried silkily.
He knew…That was her first thought, then common sense prevailed. Jed might have his suspicions, but he could not possibly know for certain—and she was not about to tell him.
She stood very still and moistened her suddenly dry lips with the tip of her tongue as she considered her options. She could walk off with Ben and ignore Jed, or to allay any suspicion he might have she could be polite. Good manners won.
‘Ben,’ she said, looking down into her son’s upturned face, ‘this is Jed.’ She swallowed hard, forcing a smile to her stiff lips. ‘We used to know each other.’ She would not lie and call the man a friend. ‘Say hello.’
Ben looked at her with a hint of puzzlement in his eyes, then shifted his gaze to stare solemnly up at Jed. ‘Hello, Jed. I am Benjamin Brown. I live at Peartree Cottage, Manor House Lane in Martinstead.’
Phoebe wanted to scream. Last year she had spent weeks teaching Ben to say his name and address, in case he ever got lost, and now he reeled it off to the last man she would ever want to know it.
Then her traitorous son looked back at her, a big grin on his face. ‘So now can I have a ride in the man’s car, Mum?’
She shook her head helplessly—her son was as sharp as a tack—and before she could answer Jed cut in.
‘Yes, of course you can, Ben. I’ll give you and your mum a lift home.’
How dared Jed presume to answer Ben for her? He had no right, and her maternal instincts were aroused along with her temper. She told him straight.
‘No, you won’t. Apart from anything else—’ like deciding in his high-handed manner what they would do, she thought scathingly ‘—it is illegal for a child to travel in a car unless a child seat is fitted, and I doubt you have one or that this model is equipped to have one fitted.’ She cast a disparaging glance at the black monster. ‘We will walk home.’
‘But, Mum—’
‘Sorry, son. Your mother is right.’
Jed glanced at her, and she saw the cynical twist to his lips. Her heart sank to her boots at his casual use of the word son. She suspected it was not casual at all…
Somehow he knew. But how he had found out she had no idea—and, given the one memorable occasion Jed had clearly told her he didn’t want a child, saying having a child was not on his agenda, why he was getting involved surprised her…
‘Yes, but there is a seat in Mum’s car you can use if you come home with us. Can he, Mum?’
‘What?’ She stared at Ben, the bright, clever child she was so proud of, and wished just for once he was not so smart. He had an answer for everything and was usually right—just like his father, she thought despairingly, and heard Jed laugh.
‘Good idea, Ben, if your mother will agree.’
Two sets of identical brown eyes fixed on her, anticipating her answer. The boy’s pleading, the man’s hard and mocking.
The last thing she needed was for Jed to know she still had the car he had given her—the hairclip at the ball had been enough of an embarrassment—and she wanted to say no. Instead she prevaricated.
‘I don’t think that is a good idea. It is quite difficult, taking the child seat in and out of my car. Plus it is getting late, and you have to have your tea—and remember, Ben, your bedtime is seven-thirty.’ She listed every excuse she could think of. ‘And I am sure Mr Sabbides is a very busy man. Maybe some other time.’
‘Not so busy. But I take your point about the seat, Phoebe.’ His tone mocked her. ‘I have an idea.’ Glancing at his watch, he smiled down at Ben. ‘While you and your mum go home for tea I have a few calls to make. But I’ll be back by six, with a car seat, and we can go for a spin then—how does that sound?’
Horrendous, Phoebe thought bitterly. But, seeing the beaming smile on her son’s face as he asked her if that was okay, she hadn’t the heart to disappoint him again.
‘If Mr Sabbides is sure, that is fine with me,’ she lied.
‘I’m sure.’
He gave her a cold, hard glance, and she had the sinking sensation he was not just talking about a car ride. But with a bit of luck, she thought, clutching at straws, even Jed might not find it so easy to procure a car seat in the rural depths of Dorset at four thirty on a Friday evening. Weymouth on the coast was the nearest town with shops that sold such things, and he might give up, or get lost…
The last would be her preference.
‘I will be back, Phoebe. You can count on it.’
His voice was deep and menacing, and it made her want to grab her son and run. But instead she met his dark eyes with her own icy blue, her lips twisting in a bitter smile as a memory of another time and place replayed in her mind. ‘So you say.’
Jed had said the exact same words to her when he had left to go to Greece for his father’s birthday and he had lied then. Remembering the past gave her the determination to stand up to him. He had not wanted a child five years ago, and he sure as hell was not getting hers now…
‘Believe it,’ he declared, and ruffling Ben’s hair with his hand added, ‘See you at six, Ben.’ He strode back to his car and drove off.
