Hostile engagement by Jessica Steele Read Free Book Online
Authors: Jessica Steele
greeting kept their association on the strictly formal basis she felt would help to get her through the next three months. He acknowledged her greeting with the merest inclination of his head. `I'll just take this into the kitchen,' she said, indicating the wicker laundry basket she had picked up automatically and brought with her as she came down the garden path.
Still unspeaking, he followed her inside the house, and when she thought he would have waited in the hall for her to deposit the basket before conducting him into the sitting room, she turned to find he had followed her into the kitchen.
`We'll talk in the sitting room, shall we?' Dislike him she certainly did, but good manners were part and parcel of her upbringing, and while-he was a guest in her home she would force herself to be polite to him.
`This room is as good as any,' he opined, and came further into the room, his very action saying he was again taking the lead.
Lucy tried to let nothing of how his arrogant attitude affected her show in her face. She liked the big old-fashioned kitchen herself, but would have preferred the more fitting surrounds of the sitting room in which to take her ring from him. The kitchen would give the whole pro-
cedure a -more friendly atmosphere than she would have liked, and since there was neither warmth nor friendship between them ...
`Can I get you a coffee?' she enquired after tense seconds, when he had said nothing. Well, she couldn't ask him outright for her ring and then ask him to go, she excused herself.
`No, thanks.'
His cool refusal left her wondering what she did now. The small act of making him a drink would have given her something to do while he got round to the reason for his visit.
`Er—you haven't changed your mind about—er—what we discussed yesterday?' She could have kicked herself as soon as the words left her lips. Why did she have to hesitate, for goodness' sake? It was purely a business transaction-why couldn't she see it in that light instead of stammering like a fourteen-year-old and getting embarrassed about the whole thing.
Jud Hemming, it was obvious, felt no embarrassment whatsoever, and had no difficulty at all in calling their arrangement by its proper name. 'Our engagement, you mean?' She'd been right about his eyes, she thought as she flicked him a hasty glance and away again. They were cold, icy cold. 'No, I haven't changed my mind. Are you saying that you have—that you've thought it over and have now decided your mother's ring doesn't have the value for you that you thought it had?' Not only was there ice in his eyes, it was there in his voice too, and she had a definite conviction that no one had ever gone back on a deal with him ever. 'If those sort of thoughts have been flitting through your mind, you can forget them,' he confirmed her suspicion that, the bargain struck, he had no intention of allowing her to back out. 'You agreed to be engaged to me for three months—you'll go through with it right up to the very last day.'
Had he said those words in anger, she might have been able to dismiss the ominous ring to them as something said in the heat of the moment, but with each word stated so coldly, so absolutely without heat, Lucy felt fear strike within her that she was now committed, and that whatever happened during the next three months, there would be no getting out of it.
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CHAPTER THREE
`WELL,' Jud Hemming demanded when Lucy felt too tense to bring herself to answer him, 'is it your intention to try and wriggle out of it?' His tone was contemptuous now as if he thought that any promise made by a member of her sex was worthless. ·
`As you've just stated,' Lucy replied bravely, the hostility in the room almost tangible, 'there would be very little point in my trying to "wriggle out of it". I meant what I said yesterday—I want my ring back, and if the only way that can be achieved is by temporarily wearing it as your fiancée, then I'll
Still unspeaking, he followed her inside the house, and when she thought he would have waited in the hall for her to deposit the basket before conducting him into the sitting room, she turned to find he had followed her into the kitchen.
`We'll talk in the sitting room, shall we?' Dislike him she certainly did, but good manners were part and parcel of her upbringing, and while-he was a guest in her home she would force herself to be polite to him.
`This room is as good as any,' he opined, and came further into the room, his very action saying he was again taking the lead.
Lucy tried to let nothing of how his arrogant attitude affected her show in her face. She liked the big old-fashioned kitchen herself, but would have preferred the more fitting surrounds of the sitting room in which to take her ring from him. The kitchen would give the whole pro-
cedure a -more friendly atmosphere than she would have liked, and since there was neither warmth nor friendship between them ...
`Can I get you a coffee?' she enquired after tense seconds, when he had said nothing. Well, she couldn't ask him outright for her ring and then ask him to go, she excused herself.
`No, thanks.'
His cool refusal left her wondering what she did now. The small act of making him a drink would have given her something to do while he got round to the reason for his visit.
`Er—you haven't changed your mind about—er—what we discussed yesterday?' She could have kicked herself as soon as the words left her lips. Why did she have to hesitate, for goodness' sake? It was purely a business transaction-why couldn't she see it in that light instead of stammering like a fourteen-year-old and getting embarrassed about the whole thing.
Jud Hemming, it was obvious, felt no embarrassment whatsoever, and had no difficulty at all in calling their arrangement by its proper name. 'Our engagement, you mean?' She'd been right about his eyes, she thought as she flicked him a hasty glance and away again. They were cold, icy cold. 'No, I haven't changed my mind. Are you saying that you have—that you've thought it over and have now decided your mother's ring doesn't have the value for you that you thought it had?' Not only was there ice in his eyes, it was there in his voice too, and she had a definite conviction that no one had ever gone back on a deal with him ever. 'If those sort of thoughts have been flitting through your mind, you can forget them,' he confirmed her suspicion that, the bargain struck, he had no intention of allowing her to back out. 'You agreed to be engaged to me for three months—you'll go through with it right up to the very last day.'
Had he said those words in anger, she might have been able to dismiss the ominous ring to them as something said in the heat of the moment, but with each word stated so coldly, so absolutely without heat, Lucy felt fear strike within her that she was now committed, and that whatever happened during the next three months, there would be no getting out of it.
----
----
CHAPTER THREE
`WELL,' Jud Hemming demanded when Lucy felt too tense to bring herself to answer him, 'is it your intention to try and wriggle out of it?' His tone was contemptuous now as if he thought that any promise made by a member of her sex was worthless. ·
`As you've just stated,' Lucy replied bravely, the hostility in the room almost tangible, 'there would be very little point in my trying to "wriggle out of it". I meant what I said yesterday—I want my ring back, and if the only way that can be achieved is by temporarily wearing it as your fiancée, then I'll
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