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He said gently, ‘Viola, I’m out on my feet. This is no time to talk if you want me to make sense.’
She nestled into his shirt-front. ‘Then don’t let’s talk,’ she murmured.
Haydon looked at her incredulously.
She caught herself at once and smiled appealingly. ‘Oh, it’s good to have you back. I’ve thought about you so much.’
Now why didn’t that ring true? Haydon thought. He looked at her: expensively disarranged hair, long, shapely legs, a skirt that professional women’s fashion decreed should be three inches above the knee, black suit with red facings. The facings, he noted with his usual precision, were exactly the same colour as her crimson nails. And lips. For her own private reasons she might have chosen to start behaving like a Labrador puppy. But she was still turning herself out like the successful career woman she was. Even on a Saturday morning, meeting the man she professed to be in love with.
He let go of her wrists. ‘Have you?’ he said drily.
Viola’s eyes fell away from his. ‘I was beginning to think I’d missed you—you’re so late. Was it a terrible flight? I’ve been here for ages.’
Haydon said coolly, ‘There was no need. Bates is collecting me.’
The luxury of the beautifully maintained Rolls Royce had never seemed more desirable. Nor had Bates’ unemotional welcome.
Viola laughed up at him. ‘Oh, no, he isn’t. I gave him the day off.’
Haydon went very still.
‘You did what?’ he said softly.
His subordinates would have recognised danger signs. Viola seemed oblivious.
She repeated it blithely. ‘I thought it was time you and I had a good talk. This looked like the ideal chance.’
Haydon stared at her in disbelief. Viola ignored it. Now she had made her announcement, she stopped being puppyish. She disengaged herself briskly and made for the exit. Her high heels tapped like hailstones on the shiny floor.
‘Come along,’ she flung over her shoulder.
Haydon picked up his case and followed. But if she had looked she would have seen his expression was unpromising in the extreme.
She had brought her car, a red sports job that matched her nails. It was three months old. Haydon knew that because Viola had not been able to talk about anything else for weeks. It had taken him some time, but eventually light had dawned. She had wanted him to make her a present of the racy new car.
It was then that Haydon had got really suspicious. He’d stopped their occasional dates and began to detach himself at once. And now Viola wanted a good talk.
Haydon was torn. His every instinct told him to tell Viola to get lost. He could take a taxi home easily enough. But conscience stirred uncomfortably. If he had not spent that night with her, she would never have started this.
He said quietly, ‘Do you think now is such a good time to talk? I haven’t been to bed for three days. I could be less than my flexible best.’
Viola waved his objections aside. ‘This is the rest of our lives we’re talking about,’ she said in reproof.
He looked at her gravely for a moment.
‘You’re talking about,’ he corrected.
But she was sliding behind the steering wheel and did not hear him. Or pretended not to. Haydon shrugged. If that was the way she wanted to play it, fine.
So he flung his case into the back and inserted his long frame into the passenger seat. He clipped his seat belt and, stretching, tipped his head back against the headrest.
New York time, it was around four o’clock in the morning. Haydon closed his eyes.
Viola started to talk at once. She was in full flood before she had even negotiated the short-term car park. By the time they were on the motorway for London she was well into the middle of a carefully rehearsed speech.
Haydon let it wash over him. He was regretting Bates’ absence more by the minute. Why did women always want to make a drama out of everything? At the craziest times, too.
‘It’s just stupid to let things drift,’ Viola said with energy. ‘We’re both adults. We both know what we want.’
For the first time an answer was clearly required. Haydon opened his eyes.
‘We do,’ he agreed drily.
It was the right answer. Superficially, at least. And Viola Lennox was not one for hearing the subtext, he thought.
She gave an indulgent laugh. ‘The trouble with you, Haydon, is you’re just scared to commit. You got burned once, so you think it will happen again.’
‘No. It won’t happen again,’ he said quietly.
So quietly, it seemed, that Viola did not hear that either.
‘You channel all your feelings into work so you don’t have to take any emotional risks. The world is full of men like you.’
Haydon sighed. ‘Would you say full?’
‘My therapist says all successful men are out of touch with their inner child. The trouble is. . .’
Haydon switched off. There was only so far conscience would carry him. When Viola started talking about her therapist, it gave out. Oh, Bates, Bates, where are you? he mourned inwardly.
Viola continued to analyse his character for the next ten miles. Traffic lights did not give her pause. Roadworks did not deflect her. The monologue took them over Westminster Bridge, through the Saturday-morning shopping traffic and into the quiet Georgian square where Haydon had his house.
All the time he looked out of the window, neither contradicting nor encouraging. Eventually Viola stopped the car outside his door. She swung round to face him.
‘Well?’ she said.
Haydon brought his attention back. ‘Well, what?’ he said wearily.
‘What are you going to do about it?’
He looked bored. ‘Your therapist, thank God, is no concern of mine.’
She was disconcerted. ‘What?’
‘This taradiddle. Didn’t you say it was your therapist’s idea?’
Viola bit her lip. ‘Of course not.’
Haydon raised his eyebrows. They were startlingly dark. When raised they soared upwards until they nearly touched his hairline. One besotted girlfriend had said they made him look like a samurai warrior.
Viola thought he just looked like a devil, a mocking, indifferent devil. She began to wonder whether her careful strategy had been so clever after all.
But she was an intelligent woman and she had been in the world of negotiations for a long time. If there was one thing she knew, it was how not to be discouraged by the first setback. She had always known that getting Haydon Tremayne to the altar would not be easy.
She pulled herself together and said quietly, ‘I told you what Madame Piroska said because that’s what I think too. She put everything in perspective for me.’
‘Then I’m glad for you,’ Haydon said politely.
He undid his seat belt and got out of the car. Viola sat watching him as he tipped the seat forward. For all its compactness, his case was not easy to get past the obstacle of designer seats and headrests. The sports car was not really intended to carry anything in the back except the odd makeup bag, he thought drily. Viola frowned.
‘Haydon, you can’t run away from this.’
He finally extracted the case. He did not reply. But he closed the car door with a finality that was an answer all on its own. Viola discarded her seat belt and whipped out of the car. She faced him across the roof.
‘Look,’ she said rapidly, ‘we’ve had some fun. But we’re not kids. We both need some stability in our lives. And we get on well—very well.’
It was hard to sound sexy at ten o’clock on a brilliant summer morning, with a car in between you and the object of your attentions. Especially when the man in question was not trying to hide his derision. But Viola gave it her best shot. She even lowered her lashes to give him a long, smouldering look. It was supposed to remind him of exactly how well they had got on.
It did not have the desired effect. Derision became outright amusement. Viola abandoned the tactic.
She said sharply, ‘You can’t keep me on a string for ever.’
The amusement was wiped away on the instant. His eyes hardened. ‘Is that what I’m doing?’
‘You know it is.’ She leaned forward, one fist on top of the car roof. ‘I never know where I am. You—’ She broke off.
A ramshackle van had drawn up behind them with a squeal of unoiled brakes. Viola glared at it impatiently.
‘Oh, this is impossible,’ she exclaimed. ‘Let’s go indoors and get some coffee, for heaven’s sake.’
She turned towards the front door.
Haydon said without expression, ‘I think not.’
Viola swung round. She looked as if she didn’t believe her ears. Haydon gave her a faint, weary smile and the angry protest died on her lips.
He picked up his case and came round the front of the car.
‘It was good of you to meet me,’ he said. He did not even try to sound as if he meant it.
Behind them two girls in tattered jeans started unloading the van. They did not do it quietly. Haydon winced.
‘But now I’m going to crash out. If I can.’
Viola did not like that. ‘Haydon—’
‘No coffee,’ he said with finality. ‘Look,’ he said, struggling to be honest, ‘I’m sorry if anything I’ve done has misled you. The truth is, marriage is not for me. No amount of talking will change that.’
Viola swallowed. Two spots of colour burned high in her cheekbones. She did not say anything.
There was a loud crash, followed by peals of girlish laughter. It was the last straw. Furious, Haydon swung round.
A collapsed artist’s easel lay drunkenly against the privet hedge next door. The two girls caught sight of his expression and their laughter died.
‘This is a residential square,’ he flung at them in icy tones.
They got their breath back.
‘Well, excuse us for breathing,’ one of them said.
She was a short girl with wild frizzy hair and a pugnacious expression. Her companion murmured something conciliatory. The companion had long legs and a swirl of auburn hair but Haydon was immune. His eyes skated over both equally with glacial indifference.
He was curt. ‘Then breathe quietly.’
The companion became rapidly less conciliating. She took a step forward.
‘I have a right to move my stuff.’ Her voice was shaky but she looked him straight in the eye.
No one had ever looked at Haydon like that, especially not a woman. Even before he made his first million women had been intrigued by him. These days they either fawned on him or—occasionally—tried to pretend to ignore his tall, distinguished attraction. Even now, the frizzy-haired girl had a distinctly speculative look.
But the other one—Haydon could not remember any girl looking at him with dislike before. Particularly not when she was shaking with anger and nerves at the time. For a moment he was taken aback.
Her hands clenched into fists. ‘I’m sorry if we disturbed you.’ She did not sound as if she meant it. ‘Moving isn’t a quiet business.’
Haydon was blank. ‘Moving? You mean—?’ He gestured at the articles on the pavement with disbelief. They looked as if they had been salvaged from a junk yard. ‘You’re moving that? In here?’
The girl flushed but her chin came up. It was a particularly pretty pointed chin, he noticed irrelevantly.
‘And why not?’
Viola said pleadingly, ‘Darling—’
Haydon ignored that. He stared at the girl, his eyes hard. ‘Are you squatters?’
‘Of course not. I’m house-sitting for the Mackenzies.’ Her voice wobbled all over the place. This time though it was due to pure fury, Haydon thought.
He found he liked the light of battle in the girl’s eyes. It infuriated him.
‘Prove it,’ he snapped.
‘Darling—’
‘Mrs Harding interviewed me.’ The girl flung it at him like a javelin.
‘Oh.’ Lisa Harding was Bob Mackenzie’s sister. Haydon knew her slightly.
The girl could see she had scored a winning point. She allowed herself a smile which bordered on gloating. ‘Would you like to see my references?’ she taunted.
Haydon’s eyes narrowed to slits. Light of battle was one thing. Triumph he did not like.
