Chapter Forty-Two

17 August, 8.30 p.m.

Excitement was spluttering in Lori’s throat. She swallowed, trying to concentrate on the food in front of her, but the splutter was hard to control.

He wants to see me. He wanted to take me to dinner. He’s taking me home. He’ll be waiting.

The thrilling litany was speeding up and up – sending waves of heat through her body.

It hit the ground again when another thought intruded.

What if he just wants to see you to remind you to keep your mouth shut?

Being found chained in a farm hut, by a woman and a child, would hardly be a high spot for a man who made his living writing action-packed adventure books. Who lived his action-packed adventure books.

He’d said they had to talk – and that usually meant …

Lori’s heart, which had been showing a tendency to burst out of her ribs and sing, plummeted again, curling into a small protective ball. Don’t give anything away. If he is warning you off, at least you have your self-respect.

Somehow she plodded through the food on her plate. She was sure it was completely delicious, but the ping-pong games going on in her head wiped everything else from her consciousness. No one looked at her in a strange way, so she must have kept up some semblance of conversation. She had very little idea what. At last it was over. Fending off the offers to call her a taxi, she took her jacket and walked out into the street.

Drew was skulking on the corner, like an assassin. Reaching him, she had the impression that he might actually have been pacing the pavement, like a caricature of an expectant father. He reached out and pulled her close, and everything inside her flew towards him, like a magnet. She wanted to plaster herself against him and drag his head down for a kiss. It took everything she had to hold herself back.

He was looking down at her, his face shadowy, only partly illuminated by the light from the street-lamps. Then he moved his hand. She felt his thumb run across the edge of her lip. The shiver went down to the very balls of her feet and possibly through her stupidly expensive shoes and into the pavement.

‘May I?’ His voice had a distinct tremor in it. He’s asking to kiss you. Before she could respond a burst of noise – applause and voices – came from behind them with a sudden glare of light as tent flaps were pulled back to let people spill into the square. The event in the marquee had ended.

Drew muttered something she could couldn’t quite catch but she suspected was a curse, and let her go, grabbing her hand again to pull her towards a big black car parked by the kerb. ‘Let’s go, before we get caught.’

Belted in and settling into the luxurious leather of the seat – she didn’t know what make or model this was, but it was a lot higher up the food chain than her Fiesta – she kept quiet as he piloted them out of the maze of residential streets around the square. She’d never seen him drive. His hands on the wheel looked sure and confident.

‘I looked for you.’ His voice in the dark was soft and husky. ‘You don’t have any of the usual stuff – Facebook, Twitter …’

‘I do.’ She was processing the fact that he had looked. ‘It’s in the name of Mallory Francis – PR for when I got my big break,’ she said shakily. He looked for you.

‘I sent cards. I went to the barn. There were strangers there. They said it was a holiday let.’

‘Oh, Drew.’ She didn’t know what to say, other than his name

‘I couldn’t find you. Why the hell, Lori? You just vanished.’ The car veered fractionally as he looked over at her. He corrected it immediately, eyes on the road again. ‘I even got a friend to hire a bloody detective. Then … I wondered if you didn’t want to be found.’

Anguish shot through her. All she could manage was a half-strangled whisper. ‘Ahhh.’ She swallowed and tried again. ‘I think it might be better if we talk when we can look at each other.’

‘Probably.’ There was warmth in his voice now. The turmoil inside her started to settle. ‘But you will have to give me a hint about where we’re going – or do I just head for the motorway?’

‘Inverness?’

‘If that’s what you want.’

She navigated them competently through the quickest route out of town.

At last they reached the gates of the house that Dan had rented for the summer. She dealt with the mechanics of the gates and then they were rolling up the drive, coming to a stop on the wide gravel sweep as the moon emerged from behind a cloud, spilling cool light on a perfect Georgian manor house.

‘Bloody hell!’ Drew was leaning forward to stare at the house, arm lax on the steering wheel. ‘Who the hell are you, Lori?’