Trail Of Love

He wasn’t impressed. ‘As I told you he would. I also, if you recall, told you not to see him,’ he added unnecessarily as far as Kay was concerned. She remembered everything about that day far too clearly for comfort.

Instinctively she defended herself. ‘I saw no harm in it.’

Ben Radford laughed drily, as if he had just won a bet with himself. ‘Why should you? As far as you were concerned you had nothing to lose and everything to gain.’

He was nothing if not persistent. ‘Except you’re deliberately missing the point. I’m not after gain of any sort.’

‘So you say,’ he agreed sceptically, and Kay saw red again.

‘I’m not in the habit of lying, or of having my veracity called into question, Mr Radford. Did you ask Sir Charles why he wanted to see me?’ she challenged, and watched his lips thin.

‘He told me to mind my own business,’ he said shortly, and Kay could no more stop herself from grinning than she could live without breathing.

‘And you didn’t like that, did you?’ she murmured with a certain amount of satisfied glee. It was nice to know he didn’t get his own way all the time.

His fascinating blue eyes narrowed to mere slits. ‘You’re a dangerous woman, Kay Napier,’ he pronounced tautly, and her eyes widened.

She was dangerous? The only one posing a threat was him, and not along the lines he meant, either. A line of reasoning she must keep him from at all costs. ‘Oh, come on! This is ridiculous. You’re tilting at windmills!’ she gibed, and couldn’t withhold a shiver at the look he gave her.

‘I’m glad you find it amusing. Perhaps you’ll also find it amusing to be out of a job,’ he drawled icily.

Kay froze, all humour dying rapidly. ‘What do you mean?’ she asked sharply.

Having caught her attention, he didn’t leave her dangling for long. ‘It just so happens that Matthew Winterbourne and my father were in the army together. A word in his ear and I doubt that you’d be employed there for very much longer. No financial institution would want their name connected with that of an attempted extortionist.’

Without looking in the mirror, Kay knew her colour had vanished. ‘You wouldn’t dare!’

‘Try me and see. All you have to do is continue to defy me.’

It was unbelievable, and she absolutely refused to kowtow. ‘Of all the hypocrites! I don’t know how you have the nerve! What you’re threatening is as bad as what you’re accusing me of!’

Ben Radford remained unperturbed. ‘I did warn you you wouldn’t like it if you crossed me.’

She slapped a hand helplessly against her thigh. ‘I don’t believe this! I’ve done nothing wrong. Nothing,’ she denied with total disbelief. She knew he could do what he said, or he wouldn’t have said it, and the implications this would have on her life. The reverberations of such a dismissal would spread like ripples on a pond. It was blatant manipulation and she despised him for it. ‘I won’t let you do this. I won’t let you run my life because of your own misconceptions. I’ll say it again, and I’ll keep on saying it. I’ve done nothing wrong.’

She was batting her head against a brick wall, for his expression didn’t soften one iota. ‘Obviously we see things differently. However, I’m hoping that from today we can begin to see eye to eye. All you have to do is sign this document, agreeing never to see Charles again, and renouncing all claim to being Kimberley Endacott.’ From his shirt pocket he produced a folded sheet of paper which he held out to her.

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