A Real Engagement

Josie choked on a piece of toast. She had begun to like this man, to think that he liked her, that they would be able to talk together rationally. But his tone and the way he had framed his question made it an insult.

‘I resent that. I certainly own Mon Abri. What right have you to question it?’ She spoke calmly, but danger signals flashed in the hazel-green eyes.

He frowned, puzzled. ‘How old are you, Josie?’

She kept her temper with an effort. ‘I really don’t see what my age has to do with the matter, but, if you must know, I’m twenty-three.’

He stared at her, dark brows raised. ‘Well, well, I was a long way out. When I first saw you, stretched out on the divan, I took you for about fifteen—one of a party of youngsters who were wandering about the world. I expected to see your friends joining you, setting up a squat in this pleasant place. Then, when you walked into my house and drank my tea, and smiled seductively at me—’

‘I didn’t smile seductively,’Josie broke in furiously.

‘And smiled seductively at me,’ he went on, as if she hadn’t spoken, ‘I upgraded you to a higher age group—say seventeen or eighteen at the most. Yes, yes—’ he held up a hand as she opened her mouth to speak again ‘—I’m aware that I was mistaken about your intentions. But I don’t think I can be blamed for that. I must say I thought again when you saved me from bleeding to death just now, but twenty-three! No, I shouldn’t have guessed that It makes a difference.’

Josie gritted her teeth. ‘I suppose I may be allowed to own a house at twenty-three?’

‘Certainly. But not the house next door. And in case you’re going to say why not, it’s because I shall own it myself in a few days. I plan to restore the villa to its former glory, to take down the dividing walls and re-plan the rooms.’

‘Really?’ Josie raised delicate brows. He was so confident, so disgustingly sure of himself, that it would be a pleasure to take him down a peg or two. But she mustn’t rush it. ‘More coffee?’

‘Please.’ He pushed his mug across the table. He was not looking at her now. He was staring out of the window. No doubt planning what he was going to do with her house when he obtained it. He had a surprise coming to him, Josie thought, grinning to herself.

He pushed back his chair jerkily and got to his feet. ‘Let’s go outside and talk this over. Open air clears the head.’

‘Are you implying that my head needs clearing?’ she demanded acidly.

‘Don’t be silly.’ He grasped her arm and yanked her to her feet unceremoniously. ‘Bring the coffee and we’ll sit on the terrace.’

Josie had already discovered that he was a man who got his own way, by superior strength if necessary, and that it was a waste of time to argue. She shook off his hand. The touch of his fingers on her bare arm disturbed her. Oh, dear, if she had to battle with a man in the way of business, why couldn’t he have been as lacking in sex appeal to her as were the other men who had appeared in her life from time to time. Except Roger Ward, of course, and he had been married. She filled the two mugs again and followed Leon outside.

There was a white-painted table and chairs at the end of the terrace, where tendrils of vine hung down, making a kind of arbour. Josie thought she must get a similar table for her own end of the terrace.

Leon held out a chair for her politely and took the other one himself. ‘This is better. Now, let’s get things straight. My name is Kent—Leon Kent, practising architect. You seem to think you own the house next door. I am convinced that I am on the verge of becoming owner myself.’ His expression changed. There was no amusement in the strange grey eyes now. His mouth was hard as he added, almost under his breath, ‘And I mean to have it.’

Josie stared at him, and a wriggle of fear twisted in her stomach. She was going to have a fight on her hands, for she certainly wasn’t going to be bullied into parting with her house, not on any terms.

‘Why do you want the house anyway?’ he went on. ‘What do you propose to do with it?’

‘Live in it.’

‘Just as it is?’

‘Of course not. I intend to refurbish it to my own designs.’

‘You’re an interior designer?’

‘That’s what I want to be.’

He looked back at her, and his tone was reasonable now as he said, ‘Will you explain your claim to the house?’

Stormy hazel-green eyes looked straight into his. ‘I don’t have to answer that question. But as it’s such a simple answer I’ll tell you. It was left to me in my mother’s will. If you don’t believe me you can have it confirmed by my solicitor, Sebastian Cross of Lincoln’s Inn Fields. I have his phone number. Satisfied?’ she added defiantly.

He had been frowning as he listened. Now his frown deepened. ‘I must get in touch with my own solicitor before I answer that question,’ he said. ‘There’s something very funny going on and I mean to get to the bottom of it.’

Josie thought of her conversation with Uncle Seb and remembered uncomfortably that she, too, had wondered if there had been some mistake. She said, ‘May I ask the name of the person who promised to sell the house to you? Was it by any chance Charles Dunn?’

Dark brows rose. ‘Yes, it was, although I can’t imagine how you could have guessed. He’s an old colleague; I’ve worked with him for some time. You’re not suggesting that he has been conning me to get a better price for the house?’

‘Certainly not,’ Josie said indignantly. ‘Charles would never knowingly let a friend down.’

There was a silence, and his eyes narrowed as they watched her face. Then he said, his eyes still on her face, ‘You seem to know him very well.’

‘I should,’ Josie said. ‘He’s my father.’

Leon’s dark brows shot up. His eyes opened wide. She saw that she had really amazed him. Then, with a hint of suspicion in his voice, he asked, ‘Why didn’t I know you before, then, when I visited Charles at his home?’

She was tempted to throw her coffee cup at him. ‘Are you accusing me of being a liar?’ She was shaking with rage.

‘Calm down, Josie. I was merely asking a reasonable question. You needn’t answer if you don’t want to.’

She drew in a long breath. The beastly man. He always won an argument. She said, in what she hoped was a dignified voice, ‘I seldom see my father these days, although we get along very well when one or other of my stepmothers is out of the way.’ Her lips curled expressively.

‘I see,’ Leon said slowly. ‘When you told me your mother had died recently, I thought...’ He left the words in the air.

Josie shook her head. ‘Oh, no, my parents were divorced years ago. Charles has married and divorced again twice since then.’ She smiled tolerantly. ‘One side of Charles is a born romantic, always seeking the right woman, although the other side is a keen business man.’

‘Well, I hope he was in his business mode when he sold me Mon Abri, but I’ll have to have some further information. There must have been some slipup somewhere.’ He got to his feet. ‘I’ll go and phone my solicitors now, and then we shall know for sure which of us is the owner of the house.’

As Josie began to stand up he said, ‘No, don’t go away. This concerns both of us.’

He went into the sitting-room through the open French window and Josie listened to him dialling, her hands clenched tightly together.

If he came back and insisted that he was right and she was wrong, she would—What would she do?

CHAPTER THREE

THE call to London seemed to take a long time, and Leon’s side of it consisted mainly of, ‘Yes,’ and, ‘No, I see,’ and ‘Yes, I understand.’ But finally he said goodbye, and Josie heard the click of the receiver being replaced. There was a long silence after that, until she felt like screaming. But at last he came back on to the terrace and sank into his chair.

‘Well?’ she asked impatiently.

‘Not very satisfactory,’ he said. ‘The three lots of solicitors are all trying to trace what happened about twenty years ago, and it seems that until Charles comes back there is no way they can finalise anything. He is not expected for several more days, and apparently he’s gone to ground in America and can’t be contacted. So,’ he said, summing up, ‘it seems that we have to wait until he arrives.’ He hesitated. ‘I’ve been thinking—how would you like to move to a hotel until things are straightened out? Mon Abri isn’t fit to live in at present.’

‘I shouldn’t like it at all,’ Josie said flatly.

He nodded. ‘Somehow I didn’t think you would. Well, here’s another idea. I took a fortnight off to come down here and get my builders started, but I’m happy to treat this next week as a holiday. How about you? Shall we call off the fight about Mon Abri for a week? I intend to make contingency plans for putting the two houses together again. You can help me with ideas, and you might also amuse yourself by thinking up schemes for interior decoration. It might be a waste of effort, if my plans come to nothing, but at least it would be good practice for you. What do you think?’

Josie was torn between making an angry refusal and a sneaking feeling that what he suggested would be rather wonderful. And he was right. It would be good practice for her to have the opportunity of watching a top architect at work. She smiled to herself. It was funny how you could always find arguments for doing what you wanted to do.

‘Well?’ Leon was watching her from lowered lids.

She sighed. ‘I suppose if I don’t want to be awkward I’d better agree. But it doesn’t mean that I give up my claim to Mon Abri,’ she added.

He said piously, ‘Oh, I’m sure it doesn’t. Neither do I give up the expectation that it will soon be mine.’

She looked at him curiously. ‘Why are you so keen to get it? Are you going to lose a fat fee from a rich client if you don’t?’ Perhaps he wanted to bring his wife and family here. Surely he would tell her if that were so.

He shook his head. ‘No, no rich client involved.’

‘You want it for yourself, then, not professionally?’ She looked away, holding her breath.

She was remembering a time at college, when she had fallen passionately in love with Roger Ward, one of the lecturers. It had never amounted to much on his side—merely an occasional lunch and a kiss that thrilled her when he gave her a lift home in his car—but when he told her he was leaving at the end of term—the next week—she had had wild hopes that he would write to her and ask her to meet him. Then she had heard on the grapevine that he was married, and she had suffered all the agony of heartbreak, although she had had to realise in the end that she had built it all up from her own dreams. But the pain had been real enough, and she wouldn’t like to repeat the experience. And now she had to commit herself to spending the next week in the company of a man who had already stirred feelings that were certainly not made up from foolish dreams.

Leon answered her question. ‘Well, for my family.’

His family! No explicit mention of a wife. But she had to know. ‘Are you married?’ she said.

‘Married! Good Lord, no. My numerous family is quite enough to cope with, without a wife to complicate things.’

She felt a curious lightness, and a laugh bubbled up as she said, ‘I see. So that’s why you want a large house?’

‘Exactly,’ he said, but there was no answering laugh, not even a smile. He wasn’t going to talk about his family but that didn’t matter. Her most important fear had been laid to rest.

‘As a matter of fact, I know both houses quite well. I stayed here some years ago. There was an English family living here then. Delightful people called Martin. I sprained my ankle walking up in the hills near Gorbio, just the other side of Menton. They found me and very kindly brought me back here and looked after me for a couple of weeks. They had a small daughter of about eight or nine, and a married son living in Mon Abri. I saw them often during my holidays here, but we lost touch about eight years ago. I must try to find out where they are and if they are still in France.

‘So you see,’ Leon went on, ‘when Charles told me he was selling the two houses I knew it was just what I’d been looking for and began to plan how I would put them together. Perhaps you may forgive me for greeting you with—er—rather less than courtesy at our first meeting.’ He gave Josie a hopeful smile.

She made no response and turned her head away from him. She hadn’t forgiven him yet; it was something she needed to remember as a sort of armour against him now he was choosing to show her a dif- ferent side of his character.

‘No? Well, never mind, we’ll put all that behind us and be friends for just one week. Friends for a week, Josie?’

His grip was strong, and he held her hand much longer than was necessary. ‘Good,’ he said warmly. She wished she could believe that he liked her, which was what his smile told her. But she had to be careful. She looked into his grey eyes and reminded herself that they could change to narrow steel blades that could cut with sarcasm or bitter contempt.

Leon stood up. ‘If you’re going to stay in Mon Abri it will need some attention,’ he said. ‘Let’s go and have a look at it.’ He took her hand and they walked across the terrace together. Inside the sitting-room, he stared at the crack in the ceiling. ‘It might merely be a faulty joint,’ he said. ‘If so, I could probably fix it myself. There’s a ladder in the outhouse next door; I’ll go and fetch it.’

Josie’s heart missed a beat as she had a horrible vision of Leon falling and lying senseless beside her. She put a restraining hand on his arm. ‘Oh, no, you won’t,’ she said firmly. ‘I refuse to let you climb a ladder and open up that wound in your hand again. It’s “enlightened self-interest”, to use your own words. What would happen if you “came over all peculiar” at the top of the ladder? I can deal with a cut hand but not a broken leg.’

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