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‘I—’ Kelly started to protest but Dee cut her off.
‘It’s got to be finished and I can’t have any more; I’m driving.’
It was true. It had been Dee who had taken charge when Beth had virtually collapsed after Julian had callously told her that he no longer wanted her, just as it had been Dee who had come up with the suggestion that Beth travel to Prague on a buying trip that would also hopefully take her mind off Julian and her unhappiness. And it was Dee who had driven them all to the airport so that they could see Beth off on her journey, and now it seemed that Dee was still taking charge and making plans for them.
‘So, now that we’ve agreed that Julian has to be punished and exposed for what he is, what we need to decide is how we’re going to put our plans into action.’
She paused and then looked at Kelly before saying slowly, ‘What I think would be best would be for us to punish him through his greed. You mentioned the other week, Kelly, that almost right from the first time you met him Julian was coming on to you, making overtures to you, trying to encourage you to date him behind Beth’s back …’
‘Yes. It’s true, he was,’ Kelly agreed. ‘I didn’t tell Beth at the time because I didn’t want to hurt her and then, when it was too late, I wished I had …’ She paused and then added uncertainly, ‘Dee, it’s all very well to talk about us punishing Julian for the way he’s hurt her so badly, but realistically what can we do?’
Dee smiled grimly at her before turning to Anna.
‘Anna, you’ve told us how Julian approached you for a loan, claiming that he wanted the money to use as a deposit on a house he was planning to buy for Beth and himself …’
‘Yes …’ Anna agreed. ‘He called round out of the blue one afternoon. He said that all his cash was tied up in various investments, but that Beth had seen this house she was desperate for them to buy and he didn’t want to disappoint her. He said he’d only need the money for a few months—’
‘Yes, no doubt because he was expecting that by then Beth would have received her share of her grandfather’s estate,’ Kelly cut in angrily. ‘How could anyone be so despicable?’
‘We aren’t talking about anyone,’ Dee pointed out acidly. ‘We’re talking about Julian Cox, and Julian has a long record of very skilfully and deceitfully depriving the innocent and naive of their money—and not just their money,’ Dee concluded quietly.
There was a look in her eyes that made Kelly check and study her a little woozily. The wine Kelly had drunk was beginning to make her feel distinctly light-headed, no doubt due to the fact that she hadn’t had very much to eat, but she knew she was not imagining that unfamiliar combination of vulnerability and haunted pain in Dee’s distinctive tortoiseshell-coloured eyes. Even so, there was something she still felt bound to pursue.
‘If you knew just what kind of man Julian is, why didn’t you say something to Beth?’ she asked Dee for a second time.
‘I told you why—because quite simply, when she first became involved with him, if you remember, I was in Northumberland nursing my aunt. By the time I’d come back and realised what was going on, how deeply she was involved with him, it was too late; she was on the verge of announcing their engagement.’
‘Yes, I remember now,’ Kelly acknowledged. It was true—Dee had been away for several months earlier in the year, looking after an elderly relative who had undergone a serious operation.
‘It seems so unfair that Julian should get away with convincing everyone that poor Beth is some kind of compulsive liar as well as breaking her heart,’ Anna put in quietly. ‘I know her and I know she would never, could never behave in the way he’s trying to imply.’
‘He’s very adept at maintaining a whiter than white reputation for himself whilst destroying the reputations of those who are unfortunate enough to become innocently involved with him,’ Dee informed them bitterly.
Kelly was feeling far too muzzy with wine to take Dee up on what she had said, but she sensed that there was some kind of past history between Julian Cox and Dee, even if she knew that Dee would not welcome any probing into it on her part.
‘What we need to do,’ Dee was telling them both firmly, ‘is to use his own tactics against him and lure him into a position where his true nature can be exposed. It’s no secret now to any of us that the reason he dropped Beth is because he realised that there wasn’t going to be any financial benefit to him in marrying her.’
‘Since we do know that, I can’t help but agree with Kelly that we ought to do something to warn his new girlfriend and her family just what kind of man he is,’ Anna suggested gently.
Dee shook her head. ‘We know how blindly in love Beth was, and, although I hate to say this, we could all be done an untold amount of harm if Julian Cox started trying to tar us with the same brush he’s used against Beth to such good effect. The last thing any of us needs is to be publicly branded as hysterical, over-emotional women, obsessed by some imaginary sense of injustice.’
She was right, Kelly had to acknowledge.
‘Besides, if my plan works successfully, and it will, then he’ll drop his current victim just as swiftly as he dropped Beth, and for very much the same reason.’
‘Your plan? What plan?’ Kelly asked her uneasily.
‘This plan. Listen,’ Dee commanded. ‘We are going to mount a two-pronged attack against Julian where he’s most vulnerable.
‘I happen to know that one of Julian’s clever little ways of funding his expensive lifestyle is to persuade gullible people to invest in his apparently initially sound financial schemes. By the time they realise that they are anything but sound, it’s too late and their money has gone.’
‘But surely that’s fraud?’ Kelly protested. Dee shrugged her shoulders.
‘Technically, yes, but Julian relies on the fact that his victims feel too embarrassed or are too timid to complain. For that reason he tends to prey on the elderly and the vulnerable, the innocently naive, too trusting and honest themselves to see what he really is until it’s too late.’
‘The man’s a menace,’ Kelly complained sharply.
‘Yes, he is, and we’re going to expose him as he fully deserves to be exposed,’ Dee told her. ‘You, Kelly, are suddenly going to become an extremely rich young woman. You have a great-uncle, previously unknown and now deceased, who has left you a considerable amount of money. This inheritance isn’t something you yourself have made public, of course; in fact you refuse to talk about it—its existence is something you wish to keep a secret—but its existence has subtly filtered through the town’s grapevine, at least as far as Julian’s ears.
‘We already know that he finds you attractive; you’ve told us both that he made advances to you whilst he was pretending to Beth that he loved her … All you have to do is let him believe that you’re prepared to commit yourself, and, more importantly, your future to him. His own ego and greed will do the rest.’
‘But I can’t pretend that I’ve inherited money … I can’t lie about something like that,’ Kelly said. ‘What will people think when they know?’
‘Only Julian will ever know about your supposed inheritance,’ Dee assured her. ‘Just as only Julian will ever know that you are a wealthy widow and have money to spare for investment,’ she told Anna.
Anna looked at her uncertainly.
‘He has already tried to borrow money from me, Dee, it’s true, as I’ve just told you both, but I’m certainly not a wealthy woman and …’
‘Look, when it comes to convincing Julian that you both have financial assets that we all know simply don’t exist, you can leave everything to me. I promise you that Julian is the only person who will be made aware of these imaginary fortunes.’
‘But will he believe it? Surely he’ll …’
‘He’ll believe it,’ Dee assured Kelly. ‘He’ll believe it because he’ll want to believe it. He needs to believe it,’ she told them grimly. ‘From what I’ve learned, his own financial position is so perilous at the moment that he’ll grasp just about any straw he can to save himself.
‘Once he switches his allegiance from his current girlfriend to you, Kelly, and once he tries to draw you, Anna, into one of his financial scams, we’ll be able to publicly reveal him for the cheat and liar that he genuinely is …’
‘It sounds plausible,’ Kelly acknowledged. ‘And it would certainly exonerate Beth if we could pull it off.’
‘As well as preventing his current girlfriend from suffering a potential broken heart and losing her inheritance,’ Anna supplied protectively.
‘So it’s agreed,’ Dee slipped in quickly. ‘We don’t have any option but to go ahead and bring him to book.’
‘No, I suppose we don’t,’ Kelly acknowledged.
She still wasn’t totally convinced that she was going to be able to carry off the role Dee had apparently cast for her as a wealthy heiress, but her head felt too muzzy for her to protest properly.
There was one thing she had to say, though.
‘How can you be so sure that Julian will drop his current girlfriend for me?’
‘He wants you, we already know that,’ Dee told her forthrightly, ‘and besides, you’re on your own, unprotected … It’s your money … yours to do with as you please … His current girlfriend isn’t; she’s got a brother who stands between Julian and her inheritance. Julian is running out of credit and credibility. He won’t be able to resist the bait you’re dangling, Kelly. He can’t afford to resist it.’
‘The bait …’ Kelly swallowed shakily. The bait Dee was referring to, as she knew only too well, wasn’t just her imagined fortune, it was Kelly herself, and since she personally thought that Julian Cox was the most loathsome, obnoxious, revolting and undesirable man she had ever met …
‘But if Kelly’s going to pose as a wealthy heiress, then surely Julian won’t be interested in my money as well,’ Anna protested.
‘Don’t you believe it,’ Dee corrected her. ‘Julian is greedy and avaricious; he won’t pass up any opportunity to get his hands on some extra cash.’
‘But I’ve already refused to help him once,’ Anna pointed out.
‘You’re a woman; you can change your mind,’ Dee told her mock-sweetly. ‘Look, you can both leave all the details of putting our plans into action to me. All I want from you is your agreement, your commitment, to help Beth, and I know I can rely on both of you completely for that … Can’t I?’
Kelly and Anna exchanged uncertain looks.
‘Beth is very dear to us,’ Dee reminded them, looking first at Kelly and then at Anna.
‘Yes. Of course … of course you can,’ Anna agreed immediately.
‘Yes. Of course you can,’ Kelly agreed a little less confidently. Something warned her that, foolproof though Dee’s plan sounded, things might not fall into place just as easily as she assumed, but her brain felt too clouded by the wine she had drunk for her to be able to formulate any determined assault on Dee’s confident arguments and besides, Dee was right about one thing—she did feel that Julian deserved to be exposed for what he was …
For the next few minutes they continued their discussion, and as they did so Kelly’s doubts as to the feasibility of Dee’s plan resurfaced.
‘I’ve got an early start in the morning, so if you don’t mind we really ought to make a move,’ Dee announced finally, checking her watch.
As she stood up Kelly realised dizzily just how strong the red wine she had been drinking actually was. To her relief Anna seemed equally affected by it. Of the three of them, Dee was the only one who seemed to have a properly clear head, which was just as well since she was the one doing the driving.
As she shepherded her two slightly inebriated charges out into the car park and to her car, Dee acknowledged ruefully that she would thoroughly deserve it if both of them blamed her in the morning for their thick heads—she, after all, had been the one who had kept on refilling their glasses—but she comforted herself with the knowledge that what she was doing was right; she owed it to—Her eyes closed. She must not think of the past, only the future—a future in which Julian Cox would meet the fate he so richly deserved!
She hadn’t been able to believe it when she had discovered that Julian was up to his old tricks, but this time he wasn’t going to get away with it. This time … this time he was going to discover to his cost just how strong and powerful a woman’s desire for justice could be.
With an almost maternal concern she helped her two friends and fellow conspirators into her car. She intended to take very good care of them from now on, very good care … As they settled a little woozily into the rear seat Dee reflected that it was just as well that they couldn’t read her mind and that they didn’t know the truth. There had been one or two decidedly awkward moments back in the restaurant when Kelly had tried to question her, to dig a little deeper into the past, but fortunately she had managed to sidetrack her.
‘Poor Beth …’ Anna hiccuped mournfully as Dee started the car engine.
‘Poor Beth,’ Kelly agreed, blinking as she tried to clear her increasingly blurry vision.
‘No, not poor Beth,’ Dee corrected them sternly. ‘Lucky Beth. Just think how much more unhappy he could have made her if he’d waited until after they were engaged, or, even worse, until after they were married before betraying her,’ Dee pointed out to them.
‘It’s going to be easier for her this way. If she had married him …’
Instinctively she glanced down at her own wedding ring finger. It was slightly thinner than its fellows as if once …? Then determinedly she looked away.
In the rear of the car her two fellow conspirators were succumbing to the effects of the extremely potent red wine she had deliberately fed them, their eyes closing.
She knew she ought to feel guilty about what she was doing—they were both so innocent and unaware, so unsuspicious …
CHAPTER TWO
KELLY woke up with an aching head and a dry mouth. Groaning, she rolled over and looked at the alarm clock on the bedside table.
Ten o’clock. She must have slept right through the alarm. Thank heavens it was Sunday and the shop didn’t open until later than usual.
Swinging her legs out of bed, she winced as the ache in her head became a thunderous nausea-induced pounding.
It was all Dee’s fault, insisting that they finish that bottle of red wine.
Dee …
Kelly froze in mid-step and then collapsed back onto the bed, groaning. What on earth had she done? She would have to telephone Dee straight away and tell her that she had changed her mind, that there was totally, absolutely, completely and utterly no way she could go through with the ludicrous plan she had agreed to last night.
Tottering towards the phone, still clasping her head, Kelly saw the answering machine light was flashing. Obediently she pressed the reply button.
‘Kelly,’ she heard. ‘This is Dee. I’m just calling to confirm the plans we made last night. I’ve discovered that Julian and his new girlfriend will be attending a charity bash at Ulston House this evening. I’ve managed to get you a ticket and an escort—just as a bit of extra insurance. Julian is going to find you even more of an irresistible challenge if he thinks you’re with someone else. Remember, all you have to do is egg him on whilst playing just that little bit hard to get. I know how close you and Beth are and I know that you wouldn’t dream of reneging on our plan or letting her down.
‘Harry, your escort, will call for you at seven-thirty. He’s my cousin, by the way, and completely to be trusted, although, of course, he knows nothing of our special plan. He thinks you just need a date for the evening because you’re attending the do for business reasons. That could be the truth, incidentally—an awful lot of influential local people will be attending the dinner and the ball afterwards. Bye for now …’
What on earth did Dee think she was doing? Kelly wondered as she stared at the phone like someone in shock. And how on earth had she managed to get two tickets for that ball at such short notice? Kelly knew all about it. Those tickets were like gold dust. Not that she intended for one minute to go. Dee was taking far too much for granted and Kelly intended to tell her so. Where on earth had they put her telephone number?
Kelly winced as pain throbbed through her head. Last night’s red wine had an awful lot to answer for—oh, an awful, awful lot!
Dee’s number had to be somewhere and she certainly had to speak with her. Ah, there it was; she had missed it the first time in the address book. Breathing out noisily in relief, Kelly punched in Dee’s telephone number.
The tell-tale delay before the call was answered warned her what was going to happen even before she heard the familiar sound of Dee’s voice on the answering machine message.
‘I’m sorry, I shan’t be able to take your call today. Please leave your number and I’ll call you back tomorrow,’ Dee was announcing. Thoroughly exasperated, Kelly hung up.
Perhaps she could drive over to Dee’s and persuade her that they ought to change their minds and their plans. What had seemed a reasonable plan last night, this morning seemed more like a totally implausible, not to say highly dangerous thing to do. For one thing, it went totally against all her own principles and, for another, how on earth was she supposed to give Julian Cox the impression that she found him attractive and desirable enough to want to break up his relationship with someone else when the truth was that she found him loathsome, reptilian and repulsive?
Yes, physically he was an attractive enough looking man, if you went for his boyish brand of fair-haired good looks, but looks alone had never been enough to attract Kelly, and there had been something about him, something about his attitude not just towards Beth but towards her as well, which had set alarm bells ringing in Kelly’s head virtually from the first moment she had seen him. She had made a point of keeping out of the way whenever he was around and when they had had to meet she had kept a very cool and formal distance from him.
So how on earth was she supposed to convince him now that she suddenly found him the epitome of male sexiness?
She couldn’t. She wasn’t going to try. She had been a fool even to think of agreeing to Dee’s outrageous plan, but she had agreed and something warned her that it wasn’t going to be easy to convince Dee that she wanted to change her mind.
And if she backed out and Anna didn’t, how was it going to look? She was, after all, Beth’s best friend and, indeed, perhaps the best way of convincing Dee that her plan wouldn’t work would be for her, Kelly, to show her how impossible it was going to be, by going to tonight’s ball. She would be safe enough. There was no way that Julian Cox was going to repeat his attempt to come on to her, not after the way she had put him down the first time. And once she had failed to re-attract his notice Dee would surely accept that she had done her best and allow the subject to drop.
Yes, far better to do things that way than to risk offending Dee, who was, after all, only acting out of kindness and affection for Beth.
Where on earth were those wretched headache tablets? She had pulled everything out of their small medicine cabinet without finding them, and she knew she had bought some. And then she remembered she had given them to Beth, after the terrible crying jags she had had after her break-up with Julian had left her with a splitting headache. Glumly Kelly made her way to their small kitchen and filled the kettle.
The flat above the shop was on two floors; on the upper storey were hers and Beth’s bedrooms and their shared bathroom, and on the lower floor was their comfortably sized living room, a small dining room and an equally small kitchen.
Outside at the rear of the property was a pretty little garden, and at the bottom of it was the workshop which Kelly had made her own territory. That was where she worked on her new designs and painted the china she had accepted as private commissions. Painting pretty porcelain pieces and enamel boxes was her speciality.
Before joining forces with Beth, Kelly had worked as a freelance from her parents’ home in Scotland, supplying her pretty hand-decorated enamel boxes to an exclusive London store.
At three o’clock, with the shop still busy with both browsers and buyers, Kelly acknowledged that she was not going to be able to make time to snatch so much as a quick sandwich lunch, never mind drive over to Dee’s.
Ironically this Sunday had been one of their busiest since they had opened the shop, and she had not only sold several of her more expensive pieces, she had also taken orders for seven special commissions from a Japanese visitor who had particularly liked her enamel-ware boxes.
At four o’clock, when she was gently showing the last browser out of the shop so that she could lock up, she was beginning to panic, not just about the fact that it was becoming increasingly obvious that she was going to have to go through with Dee’s plans for the evening but, femalely, because she knew that she simply did not have in her wardrobe a dress suitable for such an occasion. She and Beth had ploughed every spare bit of cash they had into their business—both of them had been helped with additional loans from their bank, their parents and Beth’s grandfather. Anna, too, had insisted on making them a cash gift, to, as she’d put it, ‘cover any extras’. They were beginning to show a small profit, but they certainly weren’t making anything like enough to warrant the purchase of expensive evening dresses.
Ordinarily, knowing she was attending such an occasion, Kelly would have done as she had done for her graduation ball and trawled the antiques shops and markets to find something she could adapt, but on this occasion there simply wasn’t time, and the smartest thing she had in her wardrobe right now was the elegant dress and coat she had originally bought for her brother’s wedding and which, though smart, was hardly the kind of outfit she could wear to a charity ball.
After she’d checked that she had securely locked the shop and that the alarm was switched on she made her way up to the flat. She was still finding it hard to understand what on earth had possessed her to agree to Dee’s outrageous scheme last night. She was normally so careful and cautious, so in control of her life. Beth was the gentle, easily manipulated one of the two of them; she was far more stubborn and self-assured. Too stubborn, her brother often affectionately told her.
Certainly she knew her own mind; she was, after all, a woman of twenty-four, adult, mature, educated and motivated, a woman who, whilst she would ultimately want to have a loving partner and children, was certainly in no rush to commit herself to a relationship. The man with whom she eventually settled down would have to accept and understand that she would expect to be treated as an equal partner in their relationship, that she would expect in him the same qualities she looked for in a best friend: loyalty, honesty, a good sense of fun, someone who would share her interests and her enthusiasms, someone who would enhance her life and not, as she had seen so often happen in so many other relationships, make the kind of demands on her that would prevent her from living her life as she really wanted to live it.
