his mouth had compressed with anger and mockery. There was an almost childish side to him that loathed being thwarted or denied anything he had set his heart on, and he had wanted her. Consequently he had used that skilful tongue of his mercilessly to destroy her defences, bringing her close to the edge of tears and total self-betrayal, but somehow she had managed to hang on to her self-control. A small, bitter smile twisted her mouth. She knew whom she had to thank for that self-control, for that hard-won ability to refuse to give in to her feelings. It seemed that she was doomed to be unlucky in the men in her life.
She had spent Christmas alone, refusing Meryl’s pleas to join them in their huge Wimbledon house, as she had done at other Christmases, and then, just when she had felt that her loneliness and misery might cause her to give way, she had received a telephone call from her father telling her of her mother’s collapse.
She hadn’t wasted a moment in racing home, and now that she was here she intended to stay. She felt calmer, safer, more secure than she had felt in a long time. Her mother was going to need careful looking after for at least a couple of months—plenty of time for her to think about what she was going to do with the rest of her life. She could even work for her father in his busy country solicitor’s practice if need be; his secretary of thirty years was on the point of retiring. She knew she had made the right decision; the only decision. If she had stayed in London, David might have found a way of persuading her to go to Hollywood with him after all, ostensibly as his personal assistant, of course… but she had known that her agreement to go would have been her agreement to their affair.
So, instead, she had ruthlessly cut all her links with London, giving up her flat and her few friends. It had been disturbing to realise how few friends she had to show for eight years in London, but then she had always been something of a loner, cautious about revealing or giving anything of herself, and even more so after that disastrous summer when she was seventeen.
Her mouth compressed again as she opened the back door and went into the warm kitchen.
Her parents’ home stood almost alone at the end of a narrow country lane, some ten miles outside the town where her father practised. They had come here shortly after their marriage, when her father had bought himself into the partnership. Now the other partners were either dead or retired, and her father ran the business alone with the help of a young articled clerk.
The house was solidly built of local stone, sheltered from the harsh winters that could affect the Borders by the small valley in which it stood. The village, with its school and church, was less than a mile away, and Christy could vividly remember the long winter trudges through the snow to the village bus stop, where as a teenager she had waited with the other children for the bus to take them to school. Those had been good days; life had been simple then, and she had been happy, if somewhat alone. The other children had often teased her, calling her ‘Carrots’ because of her red hair.
What was past was past, she reminded herself as she dished up the lunch. She had already been up to see her mother and supervise the very light meal that was all she was allowed at present.
‘I had a message from the surgery this morning to say that the doctor would be out to see Mother this afternoon. Do you still have Doctor Broughton?’ she asked her father as he sat down.
‘No. Didn’t your mother tell you? Alan Broughton retired early just before Christmas. Dominic Savage is our doctor now.’
Christy’s arm jerked and she spilled some carrots. She was glad that she was facing the Aga and that her father couldn’t see her expression.
‘Dominic? I thought he was in America?’
‘So he was, but he decided to come back. I suppose it’s only natural in a way. His grandfather was the only GP here for a long time, and he was responsible for starting up our present practice.’
‘But Dominic always seemed so … so ambitious …’
‘People change.’ Her father smiled, and there was a slight twinkle in his eye. ‘Look at you, for instance. I seem to remember a time when we couldn’t mention Dominic’s name without you colouring up like a sunset.’
She fought down the panic and pain clawing through her stomach and summoned a brief smile.
‘Yes, I was rather obvious in my adolescent adoration, wasn’t I? Thank goodness we all grow out of that sort of thing! I must have driven you all mad, especially Dominic…’
‘Oh, I don’t know. It always seemed to me that he had rather a soft spot for you.’
A soft spot! If only her father knew. The last thing she had expected or wanted when she came running for home and safety had been to meet up with Dominic Savage again—the very last thing. She doubted her ability to face him with equanimity and coolness even at her most self-composed, but having to face him like this, when she was feeling so vulnerable and torn … She shuddered slightly, remembering how his cold grey eyes could see through her defences, and how that deep incisive voice of his could shred through her puny arguments.
Her heart was pounding as she served the rest of the meal. If she could have, she would have got on the next train to London and stayed there, but it was too late, she had burned her bridges, and then there were her parents to consider. Her mother needed careful looking after—someone to watch over her and make sure that she didn’t do too much. Christy knew her mother; she had always led an active, busy life, and she wouldn’t take kindly to her restricted regime.
Dominic Savage back in Setondale; that was the last thing she had expected, or wanted.
While she cleared away after their meal, her father went upstairs to sit with her mother. Dominic was due at three o’clock, and Christy wondered cravenly if she could find some excuse not to be there when he called. Her face burned as she remembered their last horrific meeting.
It was true that at seventeen she had had a mammoth crush on him; but what her parents didn’t know was that it was Dominic who had been indirectly responsible for her decision to leave home and go to college, and ultimately to work in London. After that last traumatic meeting she had not been able to endure the thought of seeing him again, and so she had virtually run away. Quite needlessly, as it turned out, for Dominic himself had left Setondale that autumn to continue his medical studies in America.
Unable to stand the pressure of the old memories surging inside her, she paced the kitchen. She needed to get out, to breathe in the cool, calm air and gather her composure.
An old anorak from her college days was still hanging on its peg in the laundry-room, and she pulled it on with jerky, unco-ordinated movements.
Outside the sky had grown more leaden and menacing, the scent of snow stronger now. On the hills she could see a shepherd and his dog working the sheep, bringing them down to lower pastures. She started walking at a speed that set her hair bouncing on her shoulders, tension bracing her muscles, the cold air stinging her face. The path she took was a familiar one, climbing up towards the foothills, and gradually as she walked she felt her tension ease slightly. She passed the Vicarage, disturbing a dog that set up a clamorous barking. The house and its grounds had recently been sold, but she didn’t pause to wonder about the new inhabitants of the sturdy Georgian building.
Dominic back! Her body shook with renewed tension and she expelled her breath on a pent-up sigh.
Her father had said that Dominic had had a soft spot for her. How little he knew. Savage by name and savage by nature, that was Dominic, and God, how she had suffered from that savagery!
With words that even now were engraved on her soul he had torn apart her childish fantasies and destroyed her innocence, holding up to her his contemptuous awareness of her adolescent feelings, giving her a distorted mirror-image of them that had scorched her with shame and anguish that still lived on in her soul.
It had all been her own fault, of course. She should have been content with simply worshipping him from a distance, and blissfully cherishing their longstanding friendship. Their parents had been friends, and from an early age she had attached herself to him even though he was eight years older. Dominic had lived