the shortage of sleep; the hastily snatched meals; the ravages of junk food and alcohol, and too many late nights. But whatever it was, in any physical contest between them she would be loath not to choose Morgan as the victor; the simple result of any conflict between a sleekly fed tabby and an alley cat.
Ignoring the small voice inside her that probed her reasons for even contemplating such an eventuality, Holly walked firmly into the schoolroom and dropped her bag on the desk. ‘Good morning,’ she said, easing the straps off her aching shoulders, and Stephen looked up.
‘Hi,’ he said, surveying her somewhat windswept appearance with evident enjoyment. ‘You look ready for anything. What happened? Didn’t your visitor arrive?’
‘Oh, he arrived all right.’ Holly flopped down on to one of the children’s chairs and pulled a face. ‘How could you think otherwise? He is my father’s creature, after all.’
Stephen looked sympathetic. ‘And have you decided what you’re going to do?’ He frowned. ‘You’re not leaving, are you?’
Holly sighed. ‘I don’t know. It—depends.’
‘On what?’ Stephen put the sketches aside and straightened away from the desk. ‘Surely your father can’t make you do anything you don’t want to. You’re over eighteen, Holly.’
‘I know.’ She grimaced. ‘But it’s not that simple. I may be five thousand miles from England, but I’m still living in my father’s house.’
‘Mm.’ Stephen grunted. ‘That’s what’s so bloody unfair. I’m sure the Gantrys didn’t intend Andrew Forsyth to get control of their property.’
‘No.’ Holly shrugged. ‘Perhaps not. But they did give it to my mother before she died, never dreaming she would pre-decease them.’
‘And your father inherited,’ muttered Stephen grimly, shaking his head. ‘It’s barbaric!’
‘Yes—well—’ Holly made a dismissing gesture. ‘That’s all past history now. The house does belong to my father and there’s nothing I can do about it. Not to mention the fact that my salary here is hardly enough to live on.’
‘Money!’ Stephen’s jaw hardened. ‘It all comes down to money, doesn’t it? I bet that spineless pimp Forsyth has sent out to do his dirty work for him gets a damn sight more than you do!’
‘I—wouldn’t call Morgan Kane a spineless pimp,’ murmured Holly reluctantly. ‘Really. He’s quite—nice.’
The word almost stuck in her throat, but it occurred to her that she might need Stephen’s help to accomplish her purpose, and he would never agree to be a willing party to her subterfuge.
‘Nice!’ he echoed now, his lips twisting. ‘Holly, how can you say the man is nice? He’s a puppet! A yes-man! You said yourself he was your father’s creature.’
‘Well, yes, he is.’ Holly licked her lips. ‘But what else can he do, when all’s said and done? My father is his employer, and—he does have a family to support.’
‘You sound like you’re defending him,’ said Stephen coldly. ‘Are you saying integrity has a price?’
Holly lifted a hand, palm outward, and rose abruptly to her feet. ‘I’m only saying he has a job to do, and he’s doing it. Be reasonable, Steve. I don’t suppose you’re proud of everything you’ve done in the cause of the Great God Mammon. I seem to remember the case of a family your father had evicted, just to appease Horace Turner.’
Stephen hunched his shoulders. ‘That was different.’
‘How was it different?’
‘Turner was threatening to cut off our water supply, you know that. If he had, countless other families would have been affected.’
‘So you consider the end justified the means?’
‘In that case, yes.’
‘Oh, Steve!’ Holly gazed at him impatiently. ‘Can’t you see? Put Morgan’s family in the place of your employees, and what have you got? An identical situation!’
‘That was a long time ago, Holly.’
‘I know.’ Holly gave him a wry smile. ‘Since when, you’ve married Verity Turner, and secured your irrigation rights.’
Stephen turned red. ‘That wasn’t why I married Verity, and you know it.’
‘That’s not what you said two weeks ago, when you drove me home from your house,’ Holly reminded him flatly. Then, relenting, she ran her fingers lightly over the sun-bleached hairs on his arm. ‘Oh—I’m sorry,’ she said, realising she was being abominably cruel to someone who had always treated her with tenderness and affection. ‘I don’t mean to be bitchy, but you rubbed me up the wrong way. Just don’t judge Morgan so harshly. He’s only earning his salary.’
‘You sound as if you’re attracted to the man,’ muttered Stephen grudgingly, his eyes moving possessively over the honey-gold skin exposed by her button-through poplin tunic. ‘Since when did you call him by his first name? You always used to refer to him as Mr Kane.’
Holly had hardly been aware she had said Morgan, and now she found her own colour deepening. ‘I mean—Morgan Kane, of course,’ she said shortly, turning her attention to the contents of her holdall. ‘Look, I really ought to be getting these things sorted out. The children are starting to arrive.’
Sure enough, a handful of boys and girls had already gathered in the playground, and Stephen regarded their presence with some impatience. ‘All right,’ he said. ‘I realise we haven’t got time to talk now, but in spite of everything, I want you to know I meant what I said.’
Holly stacked a pile of exercise books on the desk. ‘Steve——’
‘I mean it.’ His hands clenched and she knew that, were their conversation not being monitored by a dozen pairs of dark eyes, he would have been more forceful. ‘No matter how amusing it might seem to you, I do care about you, Holly. I wasn’t just—making a pass, when I drove you home the other evening. All right, maybe my father did have something to do with my marrying Verity, but I did think I loved her then. It was only when you came back to the island—when I saw you again——’
‘What’s going on in here?’
To Holly’s relief, Stephen’s impassioned outburst was stemmed by the arrival of a third party. Paul Bergerac was another of the teachers at the school, an ex-pupil himself, who had continued his education in the United States and returned to the island a year ago to join the staff. He came into the room now, his dark face alight with curiosity, and Holly had the greatest difficulty in finding a suitable excuse.
‘Oh—Steve and I were just discussing the play,’ she tendered at last into the awkward silence that had fallen. ‘I—er—I’ve made some sketches of the costumes I think we’ll need, and we were wondering whether we’ll be able to find what we need in Charlottesv——’
‘Bullshit!’
Stephen’s angry protest interrupted the explanation she was giving and, while Holly looked aghast at Paul’s grinning face, the other man charged out of the room.
‘Oh, dear!’ Paul was the first to recover himself, and his teasing smile was reassuring. ‘Methinks, the game’s afoot!’ he misquoted, deliberately mixing his lines. ‘Our chief of men has been sent about with a flea in his ear!’
Holly shook her head. ‘It’s no joke, Paul. You don’t understand.’
‘I understand that he’s in love with you—or thinks he is,’ he retorted softly. ‘We all are, you shameless wench!’ He chuckled. ‘So, put us out of our misery: which of us are you going to choose?’
‘Oh, Paul!’ A reluctant smile lifted the anxious corners of her mouth. ‘What would I do