Cruel Legacy by Penny Jordan Read Free Book Online

grandeur with some of London's more famous squares, it was nevertheless very obviously an exclusive and expensive address.
    'Toby must be doing well if they can afford somewhere like this,' she added as they left the car. 'Emma said he'd recently bought into an accountancy practice. Quite an upmarket one too, apparently.'
    'Well, that should please her,' Mark commented sourly. 'She always was a bit of a social climber.'
    Deborah eyed him in surprise. 'She's ambitious, that's all—she wants Toby to succeed.'
    'Of course she does, she wants him to succeed so that she can boast about how well he's done to her friends. What happened to her career, by the way? As I remember it, she'd got it all planned that she was going to make a big name for herself in the media.'
    'Well, she was doing very well until the TV station she was with lost its franchise. It was a case of last in first out. Since then she's been doing some part-time PR work for a friend.'
    'Part-time PR work—well, they certainly haven't bought this place with what she's earning from that,' Mark announced as he eyed the elegant facade of the building in front of them.
    Deborah watched him thoughtfully as she pressed the intercom buzzer. He had been so scratchy and grouchy lately, so unlike his normal placid, calm self.
    Emma came down herself to let them in. Small and vivacious, her tiny frame and delicate features hid a personality that was extremely strong-willed and tenacious. She was not a woman's woman, and unlike Deborah she had made few friends at university. Deborah had found her competitiveness more amusing than threatening and had often teased her about the streak of conventionality which had made her insist almost as soon as they had left university that she and Toby marry instead of opting to live together as Deborah and Mark had chosen to do.
    She and Mark had been invited to the wedding. A lavish affair held at a small, carefully chosen village where Emma just happened to have an ancient relative living. It bad been a fairy-tale occasion, and a tribute to Emma's talents as a master tactician and planner.
    'Mmm... this is really something,' Deborah enthused generously as Emma ushered them into the apartment. 'You could virtually fit the whole of our place into your living-room and have space to spare, couldn't you, Mark?' she commented as she admired the expensive silk curtains and the specially woven off-white carpet that covered the floor. 'You must be doing very well, Toby,' she added when Emma's husband brought her her drink.
    'Oh, it's nothing to do with me,' he told her without smiling. 'Emma bought this place herself—with her own money.'
    Deborah felt her scalp prickle slightly as she picked up on the highly charged atmosphere which had suddenly developed. She looked helplessly at Mark, who was standing looking out of one of the long Georgian sash windows.
    'Don't pay any attention to Toby,' Emma advised brittly as she flashed her husband a quelling look. 'I've already told him, if he wants to make a fool of himself by behaving like a spoilt child then that's his choice.'
    Despite the elegant comfort of the antique-furnished traditional dining-room and the excellence of the meal Emma served, Deborah was relieved when it was finally over. Emma and Toby had barely talked to one another all evening other than to make sniping remarks at one another. Toby made constant references to Emma's money, in between sneeringly putting her down and being irritatingly sorry for himself.
    After dinner, while Toby took Mark off to his study to show him his new state-of-the-art computerised set-up, Deborah helped Emma to clear the table and wash the expensive antique dinner service she had used for the meal.
    'This is lovely,' she commented appreciatively as she carefully dried one of the plates.
    'It's Sevres,' Emma told her. 'I only bought it a month ago and Toby's already broken one of the plates—deliberately, of course. I never imagined he would ever behave