A Woman Accused

‘Does trying to intimidate me make you feel good?’ she asked quietly.

His mouth twisted. ‘You know damned well that isn’t what I was doing.’

‘Because if that’s how you get your kicks, Mr Archer...’

She caught her breath as his hands clasped her shoulders. His fingers were hard on her flesh; she felt their touch in the marrow of her bones. His eyes swept over her face and fastened on her mouth.

‘Have you thought about me?’ he asked.

‘No,’ she said quickly. Too quickly; even she knew that.

His hand rose and lightly encircled the nape of her neck, the fingers sifting into the loose knot of silken hair pinned at the back of her head. She felt strands of it fall free and drift to her shoulders.

‘I’ve been thinking about you, Olivia.’

His voice was soft, like the caress of his fingers against her skin. She felt herself sway a little, just a little, as if his stroking fingers were mesmerising her.

‘Actually,’ she said, ‘I have thought about you, Mr Archer. I’ve had nightmares that you might turn up in my life again and be even more rude than you were the last time.’

He smiled. ‘I think about you at night, when I lie in my bed.’ His voice grew soft and rough with promise. ‘I imagine you naked, in my arms, your hair spread like a dark cloud across my pillow.’

Her heart gave an unsteady thump as she tried to break away from him. ‘You have no right—’

‘I remember the smell of you, and I wonder what you taste like.’ She gasped as he drew her closer. ‘You wonder too, Olivia. I can see it in your eyes, feel it in the way your body heats under my hand.’

‘You’re crazy,’ she said. Her voice was cool, so cool. But her skin felt hot and flushed.

‘Sometimes I can almost hear you cry out my name as I touch you.’

A picture flashed into her mind. She saw herself in his arms, trembling under his caresses, straining towards him in the heat of desire, and an emotion she could not identify raced through her blood.

‘Never,’ she hissed, ‘not in the next million years. Not if you were the last...’

His hands fell away from her so suddenly that she fell back against the desk.

‘Be careful what you say, darling.’ His voice had gone as cold as his eyes. ‘You can never tell when you may just need the last man on earth.’

Olivia raised her hands to the back of her head. They shook as she tried to smooth back her hair and re-pin it.

‘I’d never need anything from you,’ she said in a shaky voice. ‘Not as long as I have—’

‘Sweet old Charlie.’ An ugly smile twisted across his mouth. ‘What a touching sentiment, Olivia.’

Not as long as I have two hands to work with, she’d been going to say. But why should she defend herself to Edward Archer? Her chin rose in defiance.

‘It is, isn’t it?’ she said evenly. ‘And now, Mr Archer, if you’ll get to the reason you came here—’

‘Sweet old Charlie is dead.’

The words were bluntly delivered. Olivia smiled uncertainly. ‘What did you say?’

His eyes fixed on her face. ‘You heard me, sweetheart. Charlie is dead. Kaput. He’s history.’

Olivia blinked. Dead? No, that was impossible. She had seen Charles just last night, only for a few minutes when he’d come to pick Ria up at the Plaza after they’d had their drinks, and he’d been fine, just fine.

He laughed unpleasantly. ‘Hell, at least old Charlie died a happy man.’

‘Charles Wright?’ she said stupidly.

Edward’s lip curled. ‘The late Charles Wright, my dear. How many other Charlies are there in your life? Maybe we ought to give ‘em numbers. Charlie One, Charlie Two—’

Dead. Charles was dead. Ria, she thought, oh, Ria...

‘Is he really dead?’ she whispered.

‘Dead as the dodo bird.’

Her eyes swept the hard, stony face before her. ‘How can you talk that way? Don’t you have any feelings?’

‘Why should I? Nobody will mourn the bastard.’

Ria’s face swam before her. ‘Somebody will,’ Olivia said softly, and she bent her head and put her hands to her eyes.

Edward Archer gave a muffled oath. ‘If I live to be a thousand, I’ll never understand what makes a woman cry!’ His arms went around her, drawing her into a hard, unyielding embrace.

The shock drove the colour back into her face. Olivia slapped her hands against his chest.

‘Let go of me!’

‘I suppose a Victorian swoon comes next,’ he said grimly as he stalked to the door.

‘Don’t be ridiculous. I—’

He threw the door open and stepped into the hall. Dulcie’s startled gasp was sharp as a gunshot.

‘Miss Harris isn’t feeling well,’ Edward said tightly. ‘Where can she lie down?’

‘Olivia? Olivia, what’s he done to you? Do you want me to call the police now? Or an ambulance? Do you need an ambulance? Oh, Olivia...’

‘I’m fine, Dulcie. Dammit, Mr Archer—’

‘I asked you a question, girl!’ Edward’s voice was harsh. ‘Where can Miss Harris lie down?’

Dulcie pointed a trembling finger. ‘Upstairs,’ she said. ‘Olivia, shall I—?’

But he had already moved past Dulcie, shouldering her aside as he half carried Olivia up the narrow staircase that led to her flat.

‘Would you please let go of me?’ she demanded. ‘You’re making a fool of yourself, Mr Archer. I don’t need your help. I don’t want your help. Do you hear me?’

He ignored her protests, shouldered open the door, and stepped into her living-room.

‘Where is your bedroom?’ he demanded.

Not the bedroom. The last place she wanted this man was in her bedroom. Olivia’s head might still be spinning, but she hadn’t lost the power to think straight.

‘The sofa’s fine,’ she said quickly.

He crossed the tiny room in a few strides and deposited her on the velvet-covered Empire sofa, then stood back and stared down at her, his face grim.

‘Where do you keep your brandy?’

‘Look, I don’t need brandy.’

‘Where is it?’

She threw up her hands. ‘I don’t have any.’

‘Cognac, then. Whiskey. Where is it?’

‘There’s nothing in the house.’

‘Hell, woman, you must have something on hand. What did Wright drink when he visited you?’

Her eyes fixed on his. There was absolutely no expression on his face, but the contempt in his voice was like a slap.

‘He didn’t,’ she said coldly.

‘Didn’t drink?’ One dark brow angled upwards. ‘That’s hard to believe. Old Charlie liked his liquor—almost as much as he liked his women.’

‘He didn’t visit me. And I resent you—’

‘Don’t give me that. He was in and out of this place.’

Olivia folded her arms across her chest. ‘He visited the shop,’ she said, even more coldly. ‘Never my flat—not that it’s any of your business.’

Edward’s lips drew back from his teeth. ‘Yeah. Right. Why would he, when he’d set up that nice little love nest for you over on Sutton Place?’

‘What?’

‘Come on, sweetheart, don’t push your luck. You put on a pretty good act, I’ll grant you that. But the show’s over.’ He strode across the room and into the efficiency kitchen. She could hear cabinet doors slamming and the tinkle of glass. ‘Here,’ he said, coming back to her with a glass of something red in his outstretched hand. ‘Drink it down.’

‘What is it?’ Olivia’s nose wrinkled as he pushed the glass under her nose. ‘Ugh,’ she said, ‘I don’t want that. It’s—’

‘It’s cheap wine,’ he said. ‘Not Wright’s taste at all, but it’ll do the job. Go on, drink it.’

‘It’s cooking wine. And I told you, I don’t need—’

‘Drink,’ he growled. His eyes flashed at her. ‘Or must I hold your nose and pour it in?’

She stared at him, her eyes locking with his. Lord, how she despised this man! He would do it, she was certain, he’d hold her still and feed the noxious stuff into her unless she did as he demanded. He was strong. And intimidating. And very sure of himself, and she didn’t want to take him on again, not now. All she wanted right this minute was to get Edward Archer out of her home so she could contact Ria and comfort her.

She reached out, snatched the glass from him and tossed down the bitter liquid. Her shoulders lifted, her throat convulsed, and she coughed explosively.

‘There,’ she gasped, ‘are you satisfied now?’

He said nothing for a long moment, only watched her with that same empty expression on his face, his eyes hooded and unreadable. A little shudder went through her as she thought how he seemed to fill, even overwhelm, her small living-room.

He reached out and took the glass from her fingers. ‘Hell, it’s not every day you learn your benefactor’s dead.’

Olivia’s eyes narrowed. ‘Charles Wright was a good man,’ she said.

‘Especially to you, sweetheart.’ His teeth glinted in a quick grin. ‘Hey, I can understand getting hysterical when you’ve suffered such a terrible loss.’

‘I hate to spoil this moment of drama for you, Mr Archer,’ she said coldly, ‘but I was not hysterical.’

He shrugged lazily. ‘Whatever you say, sweetheart.’

She rose to her feet. ‘Goodbye, Mr Archer. I wish I could say it had been nice to see you again, but—’

He shook his head as he leaned back against the wall. ‘I’m not leaving yet, Miss Harris,’ he said, his formal tone mimicking hers.

‘Yes, you are. We’ve nothing more to discuss.’

‘We’ve plenty to discuss.’ He cocked his head to the side and smiled again. ‘For instance, what did you do to old Charlie to kill him?’

The blood rushed from her face. ‘What?’

Edward laughed and held up his hand. ‘Let me rephrase that. What little tricks did you introduce him to last night, hmm?’ His smile faded. ‘It must have been something pretty cute to have done him in. Charlie was used to keeping fast company, but then I suppose a woman like you knows some things that can take a man as close to heaven as they do to hell.’

Olivia stared at him. ‘Are you suggesting—are you trying to insinuate that I—that Charles and I were—that we were...?’

‘I’m not insinuating anything.’ Edward moved quickly; he was across the narrow room and standing next to her before she had time to react. ‘I saw him, Olivia.’ His voice was soft, silken, and filled with menace. ‘I saw him in that big, silk-sheeted bed, I saw the imprint your head had left on the pillow beside his, I saw the bit of black lace you left tossed on the floor—’

‘I don’t have to listen to this nonsense,’ Olivia began as she started past him.

Edward’s hand closed tightly on her shoulder. ‘It’s too bad you weren’t with him when he breathed his last, Miss Harris. After all, your lover—’

‘Damn you!’ Angry tears rose in her eyes as she twisted unsuccessfully in his grasp. ‘He wasn’t my lover!’

He pulled her to him. ‘No?’

‘No! He was—’

He was Ria’s lover, she’d almost said. But no one knew that, and how could she name Ria without speaking to her first? Besides, neither she nor Ria owed this man any explanations. He was related to Charles’s wife, Ria had said, and his only interest in Charles was in finding a way to get his hands on the family fortune. Well, she could see that for herself now. Edward Archer didn’t give a damn about Charles’s death. Whatever he was angry about, it wasn’t because Charles Wright was no more.

‘I don’t owe you any explanations,’ she said stiffly.

He laughed. ‘No. I suppose you don’t.’ He stepped closer to her. ‘But you might want to be a little nicer to me, baby, considering that you’ve lost your bread and butter.’

Olivia twisted against his hand. ‘I don’t have to be anything to you! You’ve no right to—’

‘I have every right,’ he said in a silken whisper. ‘You’d better be a hell of a lot nicer to me.’ She cried out as his arms went around her and he pulled her against the hardness of his long, powerful body. ‘You’re going to have bills to pay, sweetheart, and I control the estate.’ He shifted her in his arms so that she was off balance; her weight fell against him and he smiled lazily at the feel of her body against his. ‘You’ll have to give up the flat in Sutton Place, of course.’

‘You’re insane! I don’t have a—’

‘But this place is pretty cosy. I might just let you keep it, and that pretty little design studio you play around in.’

‘Get out!’ she panted as she struggled to break free. ‘Damn you to hell, Edward Archer, get—’

‘Assuming you’re as nice to me as you were to old Charlie,’ he whispered, and then his mouth dropped to hers.

He was strong, as strong as she had known he would be. His arms imprisoned her, made her captive to the heat of his body. She cried out and tried to turn away from him.

‘I can be as generous as he was,’ he whispered against her mouth. He caught her head in his hands and held her so she couldn’t get away. ‘And I can make you happy in bed. We both know that.’

‘You bastard!’

‘Hell, we can make each other happy in bed,’ he said thickly, and he bent to her and kissed her again.

It was the same way he’d kissed her the first time, it was an angry, overpowering kiss meant to remind her of who was in charge and of what he thought of her, and it sent rage rocketing through her.

‘I hate you,’ she whispered fiercely.

Edward went very still. ‘Do you?’ he whispered, and suddenly there was a subtle change in the way he was holding her. His arms were just as hard, his embrace as unyielding. His body burned against hers with the same urgency. But there was a strange kind of longing in the way he held her. His kiss changed, too. It gentled, asked instead of demanded, gave instead of took.

‘Olivia,’ he whispered, and with a little sob of defeat she lifted her arms and wound them tightly around his neck. She pressed herself to him, wanting the feel of him imprinted on her breasts, on her belly, wanting to feel the silken darkness of his hair under her caressing hand, to feel the heat of his mouth on hers.

He thrust her from him so suddenly that she almost fell. Her lashes lifted; she stared into his face, watching as his eyes went from sea-dark to ice.

‘You see?’ he said. ‘It would be terrific.’ His mouth twisted. ‘But I’m not really sure I want to take another man’s leavings.’

She didn’t hesitate. Her hand came up and she hit him, hard, across the cheek. The crack of flesh against flesh was like the crack of lightning, and echoed through the small room. The look that flashed across Edward’s face was ominous, but Olivia was past caring.

‘You bastard,’ she said in a choked whisper. ‘You can’t come into my home and treat me like this! Just who in hell do you think you are?’

His smile was slow and lazy, as if she’d finally asked him the only question worth an answer, and he seemed to take an eternity before he answered.

‘I thought you knew,’ he said softly. ‘I’m Charles Wright’s stepson.’

She stared at him in disbelief. ‘You’re not. You’re a relative of his w...’

‘I’m his stepson, Miss Harris. And I’m here to see to it that you don’t keep one cent of what rightly belongs to my mother.’

‘Your—your mother? But Charles was divorcing her.’

He laughed. ‘Did he tell you that, too? Hell, it must have been his favourite bedtime tale.’ The laughter fled his face. ‘Listen and listen well, baby, because I’m only going to say this once before I let my attorneys do the talking.’ One arm swept out in a gesture that took in everything: the flat, the floors beneath, and, Olivia knew, her very existence. ‘You’re not going to keep any of it. Not this place, not the apartment leased in your name on Sutton Place—’

‘What apartment?’

‘You’re going to lose it all, Miss Harris. My lawyers and I will see to that. So maybe you’d better shine up your shoes and go for a stroll. Pick a good spot, baby, and with any luck you might be able to find another sucker to replace good old Charlie.’

Olivia wrapped her arms around herself. ‘Get out,’ she whispered, ‘you—you...’

His teeth glinted in a quick smile. ‘The lady’s finally at a loss for words.’ Turning, he reached for the doorknob. ‘Not to worry, darling. Talk isn’t what you’re best at anyway.’

She took a step towards him. ‘Get out of my house!’

‘Enjoy it while you can.’ He laughed softly. ‘It won’t be yours much longer.’

The door opened, then slammed shut, and Olivia was finally, mercifully, alone.

CHAPTER THREE

OLIVIA sat at her desk, her dark head illuminated by the light from the brass gooseneck lamp beside her. It was late, almost eight o’clock on a Wednesday evening, and the studio was quiet, the silence broken only by the whisper of paper as she leafed through the documents that had been contained in the file folder that now lay on the floor beside her.

She read slowly, carefully, scanning the words with intensity, until they began to dance before her eyes, and then she sat back, put her hands to her temples, and sighed deeply.

The papers proved what she’d known, all along. Edward Archer’s threats had been just that—threats, nothing more. Olivia’s Dream was hers, lock, stock and drapery rods. So long as she made her loan payments and mortgage payments on time, she had nothing to fear from anybody.

Why had she let him intimidate her so? She wasn’t the sort of woman who could be driven into a corner—you couldn’t be, not if you were going to get ahead in business. As for the rest...

Olivia got to her feet. She didn’t even want to think about the rest, about how she’d let him force a response from her when he’d kissed her, so that she’d behaved exactly like the woman of low morals he’d accused her of being. All she could do was hope that he, even in his incredible arrogance, understood that she’d acted that way because she’d been distraught and confused, that her momentary weakness in his arms hadn’t had a damned thing to do with him.

Not that it mattered. She would never have to face him again. He’d made threats, and that was it. He’d known, all along, that he didn’t have a leg to stand on. The money Charles had lent to her was hers, so long as she kept up her end of the repayment agreement, and nobody, not even Archer, could do a thing about it.

As for the ugly things he believed about her relationship with his stepfather—well, that didn’t surprise her. The Edward Archers of this world were only too ready to believe the worst. They were men of privilege and money who thought girls—and women—of a different class were toys that could be bought for a price.

Once he found out that it was Ria who’d been involved with his stepfather and not she, there would be the satisfaction of rubbing his patrician nose in the information.

Olivia sighed as she tucked the legal papers into their folder. Well, that would have to wait for later. She couldn’t say anything about Ria, not until she’d talked with her—and Ria wasn’t talking to anybody just yet. The only communication she’d had from her was a short note delivered by messenger the day after Edward Archer’s explosive visit.

‘Oh, Livvie, it’s awful!’ the note had said in Ria’s spidery hand. ‘We’ll talk soon, but right now I need to be alone. I know you’ll understand. Bless you.’

There was nothing to do but dig in and wait for Ria to surface, Olivia thought as she put the folder in the wall safe and closed the door. Until that happened, she’d keep a stiff upper lip and go on about her business, which was making Olivia’s Dream succeed. And Edward Archer could just take all his angry threats and—

‘Olivia?’

Olivia clapped her hand to her heart and swung around. Dulcie was standing in the open doorway, her shoulder-bag on her arm, a steaming mug in her outstretched hand.

‘Dulcie!’ She gave a nervous laugh. ‘You scared me half to death. I thought you’d left an eternity ago.’

‘Coffee? You look as if you could use some.’

‘Thanks.’ Olivia took the mug, blew lightly on the black liquid, then took a sip. ‘Perfect. You’re right, this is exactly what I needed.’ She took another mouthful, then put the mug on her desk. ‘What are you doing here?’

Dulcie walked into the room and leaned back against the desk. ‘There’s no easy way to tell you this,’ she said. ‘But—there’s something you should see in today’s Chatterbox.’

‘That rag?’ Olivia made a face. ‘What could possibly be of interest to us in—?’

‘It’s—it’s about Charles.’

‘About Charles? But...’ Olivia went very still. Why was Dulcie looking at her that way? ‘Maybe you’d better tell me what the article was about,’ she said softly.

‘I hate these tabloids,’ the girl said with sudden ferocity. ‘They’re just—just so sleazy. I mean, hey, the guy was your partner, that’s all, he—’

‘My backer. Charles Wright was my backer. He loaned me the start-up money to open this shop.’ Olivia fought against the faint notes of panic in her voice. ‘You know that.’

Her assistant’s shoulders lifted and fell in an eloquent shrug. ‘Sure. That’s what I meant. And if he was anything else—’

‘Dammit, Dulcie, what are you saying?’

‘Listen, whose business is it if he—if you and he...?’ Dulcie’s face turned pink. ‘I would never say anything, Olivia, not even if that guy from the Chatterbox came sniffing around. I’d just tell him I think he’s a slimeball to have printed that stuff about you.’

Olivia felt the blood drain from her face. She reached out and grasped the back of the chair for support.

‘About—about me?’

‘Yeah.’ Dulcie nodded unhappily. ‘About—about you and Wright.’

‘What kind of stuff?’ Olivia touched the tip of her tongue to her lips. ‘That he lent me the money to buy this place? Is that what you mean?’

Dulcie shook her head as she dug into her holdall and pulled out a folded newspaper.

‘Here,’ she mumbled. ‘It’s probably best if you read it yourself.’

Wordlessly, Olivia took the paper and looked at it. The bold print leaped at her accusingly.

‘MILLIONAIRE FINANCIER FEATHERED A SECRET LOVE NEST‘, it said, and below, in slightly smaller letters, ‘Sutton Place Home to Charles Wright and Dark-haired Mystery Woman’.

The paper shook in Olivia’s hands as her eyes travelled down the page to a grainy black and white photo of a tall, slender woman, her back to the camera, her shoulder-length dark hair flying as she stepped from a low-slung sports car. ‘Do You Know this Gorgeous Bird?’ the caption asked.

Olivia caught her breath. Yes, she thought, I know her. Of course I know her.

It was Ria.

‘You don’t have to worry.’

Olivia blinked and looked up. Dulcie was watching her closely. ‘Worry about what?’ she said slowly.

Dulcie lifted her chin. ‘I wouldn’t tell a soul, not a single soul.’

‘Good,’ Olivia said absently, as she stared at the photo again. ‘I wouldn’t want anyone to know. It would be upsetting, with all the publicity and—’

‘Oh, I understand.’ Dulcie put her hand on Olivia’s arm. ‘Mr Wright would never have wanted to drag your name through the mud. Why, he always treated you so—so politely. No one would’ve guessed that you and he were—that you were...’

Olivia looked up in horror as the girl’s voice faded. ‘But this isn’t me,’ she said quickly. ‘It’s...’

It’s Ria, she almost blurted. But Dulcie and Ria had never met—Ria had not been by since the shop had opened.

Besides, how could she say that without telling Dulcie everything?

She looked down at the photo again. Yes, it was Ria. But if you didn’t know any better, you might easily have thought it was Olivia. Olivia, with her dark hair flying. Olivia, getting out of Charles Wright’s little black Mercedes...

‘It’s not me,’ she said again.

‘Of course it isn’t,’ Dulcie said compassionately, but what she was really saying, what Olivia could clearly hear her saying, was, We both know it’s you, Olivia, but if you don’t want to admit it, I understand.

‘I’d never judge you, and neither would anybody else with half a brain. If it were you they were talking about.’ Dulcie touched her tongue to her lips. ‘Which, of course, it isn’t.’

Olivia looked up.