‘We know each other very well.’ Even as she spoke she was aware that wasn’t the truth. Richard only knew the cool, collected, rather reserved woman she had become.
All her warmth and passion, her easy gaiety and generosity of spirit, her joie de vivre, were dead and gone, buried beneath the tombstone of the past.
‘When did you two meet?’ The question seemed to be an idle one.
‘When I started to work for Lady Beaumont.’
‘And when was that?’
Elizabeth wondered whether he was genuinely interested or just making polite conversation. But either way it seemed better to talk than sit in silence.
‘Last February,’ she answered. And, feeling on relatively safe ground, she went on, ‘The writer I had been working for was going abroad. I needed to find another job, so I joined an agency who sent me as a temp, after Miss Williams, Lady Beaumont’s secretary, went down with flu.
‘Then in April, when Miss Williams left to get married, I was offered the position permanently.’
‘So you spend your days dealing with a flood of social correspondence? That must be fascinating.’ The sarcasm was blatant.
There was a great deal more to it than that, but admitting that she was helping Lady Beaumont to research and write the Beaumont family history would be a dead giveaway.
Quinn slanted her a glance. ‘No comment?’
‘The salary’s good,’ she informed him tartly.
Saluting her spirit, he pursued, ‘So you and Beaumont have known each other since February… Have you been engaged long?’
‘You asked that before.’
‘As I recall, I didn’t get an answer.’
When she said nothing, he went on, ‘At a guess I should say not very long at all.’
‘What makes you think that?’
‘You looked startled when Beaumont introduced you as his fiancée—as if you hadn’t had time to get used to the idea.’
Quinn had always been a formidable opponent, she thought bitterly. He missed nothing, and his keen brain drew fast and accurate conclusions.
‘In my opinion,’ he went on, ‘Beaumont’s the conservative type, the sort to go down on one knee with a background of soft lights and sweet music and a ring ready to slip onto his chosen one’s finger…’
Vexed by the open mockery, Elizabeth bit her lip.
‘Yet you had no ring. Which suggested a spur-of-the-moment proposal, with the Van Hamel as a carrot. Possibly because he was unsure of you…’
The summing-up was so precise that he could almost have been there.
‘Or maybe for some other reason.’
‘Some other reason?’
‘Either to persuade you into his bed, or to keep you there, if you were getting restive.’
If the past five years had taught Elizabeth anything, it was how to hide her feelings and exercise self-control. Slowly she began to count up to ten.
She had reached four when he invited, ‘Go ahead, say it.’
‘Say what?’ Her voice was husky with suppressed anger.
‘If you can’t think of anything better, try, “How dare you?”’
‘It sounds as though I’m not the only one who reads Victorian melodramas.’
He laughed as if genuinely amused. ‘Touché.’ Then, like a terrier worrying at a bone, he said, ‘I gather no wedding date has yet been set?’
‘No. But Richard has suggested spring.’ She made her answer as offhand as possible.
‘Will Lady Beaumont approve of her son’s choice of future wife, do you think?’ There was a bite to the question.
Elizabeth rather doubted it. Though pleasant and friendly up to a point, Lady Beaumont would almost certainly have preferred a society girl, rather than a secretary, for a daughter-in-law.
‘I’m afraid I don’t know,’ she answered shortly. ‘You’d have to ask her.’
‘Suppose she doesn’t?’
Wondering if he was trying to rattle her, Elizabeth said, ‘I’d rather suppose she does.’ Adding calmly, ‘But, whether she does or not, Richard isn’t a man to allow himself to be influenced.’
‘So you’re satisfied that he really does want to marry you?’
‘He said he did.’
‘And you want to marry him?’
‘Of course I want to marry him.’
Quinn lifted a dark brow, and instantly she wished that rather than being so emphatic she’d simply said yes.
‘Why?’ he asked softly. ‘Or is that a silly question?’
‘You mean am I marrying him for his money?’
‘Are you?’
‘No.’
‘Then why?’
Rattled by his persistence, she spoke the exact truth. ‘I want a real home and a family.’ Noting the wry twist to his lips, she added, ‘Isn’t that what the majority of women want?’
‘So you don’t love him?’
‘Of course I love him.’ Damn! There she was, doing it again.
‘In that case I would have expected you to mention love first. The majority of women would have done.’
He was a hard man to fool.
Trying not to sound defensive, she said, ‘I wouldn’t have agreed to marry Richard if I didn’t love him.’
Quinn laughed harshly. ‘If he really loves you, the poor devil has all my sympathy.’
‘I don’t know what you mean,’ she denied sharply.
‘Oh, I think you do.’
‘You’re mistaken.’
He shrugged. ‘I thought I detected a distinct lack of passion on your part.’
The last thing she wanted to feel was passion. Like a fire that blazed out of control, it ended up destroying everything it touched.
She fought back. ‘What makes you think there’s any lack of passion? In any case there’s nothing wrong with a marriage that doesn’t send both partners up in flames.’
‘There’s not much right with it.’
Stung, she cried, ‘I suppose you consider you’re an expert?’
‘Hardly. However, if my wife—’
‘But you’re not married,’ she burst out. Then, beset by a veritable tumult of emotion, she asked, ‘Are you?’
‘Yes, I’m married. What made you so sure I wasn’t?’
‘I-I wasn’t sure… I just thought… I mean I presumed you…’ The words tailed off helplessly.
He was a virile, red-blooded man and she hadn’t expected him to stay celibate. Indeed she’d tortured herself with the thought of him taking a string of mistresses, and been bitterly jealous of all those unknown women. But somehow she hadn’t expected him to be married.
Yet why shouldn’t he be? Five years was a long time, and he’d once said he wanted children. He might even have a family by now… The thought was like a knife twisting in her heart.
But