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www.millsandboon.co.uk
Former journalist SARA CRAVEN published her first novel ‘Garden of Dreams’ for Mills & Boon in 1975. Apart from her writing (naturally!) her passions include reading, bridge, Italian cities, Greek islands, the French language and countryside, and her rescue Jack Russell/cross Button. She has appeared on several TV quiz shows and in 1997 became UK TV Mastermind champion. She lives near her family in Warwickshire – Shakespeare country.
Table of Contents
Cover
Title Page
About the Author
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CHAPTER TWELVE
Endpage
Copyright
CHAPTER ONE
‘IT’S THE PERFECT SOLUTION. You can go in my place.’
Margot Trant’s airy remark was followed by a silence that could have been cut by a knife.
Meg Langtry cleared her throat. ‘Let me get this straight,’ she said slowly. ‘You want me to go to the south of France next month and stay at your godmother’s château, pretending to be you.’ She paused, giving her stepsister a long, steady look. ‘Those are the basic elements of the scenario?’
‘Well, what’s wrong with that?’ Margot demanded. ‘The old bag wants someone to keep her company for four weeks while her regular slave has a well-deserved break. As long as someone turns up claiming to be Margot Trant, what problem can there possibly be?’
‘Oh, none of course,’ Meg returned with terrible irony. ‘The fact that we don’t even look alike is quite immaterial.’
Margot shrugged. ‘I’m blonde—you’re brunette.’ She gave Meg’s simply styled fall of brown hair a disparaging look. ‘That can be easily fixed. As for the rest—Tante’s practically blind—that’s why she needs a companion. You’ll just be a blur.’
‘Always my ultimate ambition,’ Meg murmured.
Margot leaned forward. ‘Oh, come on, Meg.’ Her voice sharpened. ‘You could do it easily. You’ll have no job to worry about once that grotty second-hand bookshop you work for closes at the end of the week. And I can’t possibly get away. You must see that.’
‘Why not?’ Meg countered. ‘I thought Parliament “rose” in the summer. Surely Steven would give you leave.’
‘Probably, if I asked him.’ Margot’s pretty face was suddenly intense. ‘But he’s just on the point of asking Corinne for a divorce. I simply can’t afford to be away at this juncture.’
‘I see,’ Meg murmured drily. However distasteful she might personally find it, this was what her stepsister had been working towards, ever since she’d got the job as secretary to Steven Curtess MP, the young back-bencher who was being tipped for junior ministerial rank in the next government.
‘And Godmother has no right to summon me like this—right out of the blue,’ Margot went on petulantly. ‘Good God, I haven’t seen her since I was nine.’
‘I wondered why I’d never heard of her.’
Margot hunched a shoulder. ‘She’s my great-aunt, actually—Dad was her favourite nephew, and I was named for her. So we’re all three of us called Margaret,’ she added triumphantly. ‘Isn’t that convenient?’
‘Amazing.’ Meg shook her head. ‘But irrelevant. Wouldn’t it be simpler just to write and tell her that you can’t get away?’
‘No, it would be extremely stupid,’ Margot snapped. ‘She has no children, and no other living relative as far as I know. And a château in the Languedoc isn’t to be sneezed at as an inheritance. It’s imperative I keep on the right side of her.’ She gave Meg a suddenly limpid smile. ‘Or that you do, on my behalf.’
‘No way.’ Meg bit her lip. ‘Ethical considerations aside, we’d never get away with it.’
‘Of course we would. Margot Trant is sent for. Margot Trant, presumably, turns up on the appointed day. And you’re far better suited to running round after some dreary old lady than I’d ever be. Keep her sweet for me, and I’ll be eternally grateful.’
‘That’s just the incentive I need, of course,’ Meg said levelly. She pushed back her chair. ‘You’re the total limit, Margot. Do your own dirty work.’
‘Oh, are you going?’ Margot inspected a fleck on her fingernail. ‘I thought the bookshop closed on Wednesdays.’
‘It does. I’m spending the day with Nanny Turner, as I usually do.’
‘Of course, in that sweet little cottage of hers—or should I say ours?’
There was a pause. Meg’s eyes narrowed. ‘Brydons Cottage is Nanny’s for life,’ she said. ‘My father made that clear before he died.’
‘Yes, but not in writing, sweetie. There’s nothing legally binding. Oddly enough, Mummy was looking into it all the other day. Some friends of hers, the Nestors, are looking for a weekend place, and Brydons would be ideal.’
Meg stared at her. ‘You’re not serious? Nanny adores that cottage.’
‘I bet she does,’ Margot said acidly. ‘It’s a very desirable property.’
‘But she’d have nowhere else to go.’
Margot’s face was a mask of malice. ‘There’s always Sandstead House. Mummy has friends on the Social Services Committee. I’m sure they could pull a few strings.’
Meg drew a shaken breath. ‘It would kill her to be in a home. She’s terrific—firing on all cylinders. She can look after herself.’
‘Then the choice is yours.’ Margot spoke with cool finality. ‘Go to the Languedoc in my place, and I’ll persuade Mummy that it would be a betrayal of your father’s memory to turn Nanny out.’
‘That would make a difference?’ Meg asked wrily.
‘Oh, yes, she was awfully fond of him, even if she didn’t go a bundle on Nanny and her bossy ways,’ Margot said with insouciance. ‘Besides, I’m the blue-eyed girl at the moment, and I know I can talk her round if I want. Mummy’s dying to have a son-in-law in the government.’
And to hell with Corinne Curtess and the children, presumably, Meg thought grimly.
‘I’ll even get her to put something in writing about Nanny’s tenure if you get through the month with Godmother none the wiser,’ Margot wheedled. ‘I need your help, Meg. I’ve got to stay here and keep the pressure on Steven.’
‘If I do this,’ Meg said icily, ‘it will be for Nanny’s sake—not to further your affair with a married man.’
‘Oh, don’t be so bloody pompous.’ Margot stretched luxuriously. ‘You’ll be getting a whole month abroad in France, all expenses paid, at the height of the season. What more could you want?’ She sent Meg a complacent smile. ‘I’ll even lend you my car to drive over to Nanny’s. You’ll need to practise your driving for France.’
Meg set her teeth. ‘I haven’t said I’m going yet.’
Margot’s smile became almost cat-like. ‘But you will,’ she said. ‘Or poor old Nanny becomes homeless. It’s up to you.’
A fortnight later, Meg, much against her better judgement, was on her way.
She’d intended to stick to her guns, but seeing Nanny Turner bustling round her cosy home, happily oblivious to the threat posed by Iris Langtry’s friends, had made her rethink her position.
Iris herself was not too pleased with the bargain that had been struck, but accepted it grudgingly.
‘Margot deserves a chance of happiness,’ she sighed. ‘And Steven is such a fine man. His wife’s one of these very domestic women, I understand. He needs someone to work alongside him, and boost his political career.’
If that was how he saw Margot, it was little wonder the country was in such a hell of a state, Meg thought uncharitably, as she made her unwilling preparations for the trip. Certainly no one could ever have described her stepsister as ‘domestic’. She could barely boil water.
One unexpected bonus was the acquisition of some new clothes, which Iris insisted on paying for.
‘You’re supposed to be my daughter,’ she cut short Meg’s protests. ‘You can’t go looking as if you’ve dressed at War on Want.’
The new hair colour, too, had been an unexpected success. Meg’s own natural shade had been softened to a dark blonde, and subtly highlighted.
She was almost too busy to mourn properly over the closure of the bookshop where she’d worked for the past eighteen months, following the proprietor’s retirement, or to worry about where she’d work once her French escapade was safely behind her. For the moment, she had enough problems to contend with.
To her surprise, her employer, Mr Otway, had nodded approvingly over her trip. ‘Ah, the Languedoc. Land of the troubadours. And of the Cathars,’ he added.
‘Cathars?’ Meg questioned.
‘Religious sect in medieval times. Believed all life was basically evil, and a constant search for the light. Condemned, naturally, as heretics by the established church who launched the Albigensian Crusade against them.’
Mr Otway sniffed. ‘Not just a holy war, of course. The whole of the Languedoc was made up of rich states, independent of the King of France. He hated Raymond of Toulouse, the greatest of the southern lords, envied him his wealth, and the beauty and culture of southern life. Decided to use the Cathars as an excuse to move against him, and grab his possessions, all in the name of religion.
‘But you’ll love the Languedoc,’ he went on more cheerfully. ‘It’s a passionate land—a place of extreme contrasts. Warm laughter, and bitter tears. Faithful love and implacable hatred.’ He paused. ‘Fierce sun and violent storms. The full force of nature unleashed.’ He grinned maliciously at the look of apprehension on Meg’s face. ‘It will do you good,’ he said with severity. ‘Shake you out of a rut you’re far too young to occupy.’
‘But I’ve been happy,’ Meg protested.
‘No, you’ve been content—a very different thing. But I guarantee, child, you won’t be the same person when you return from the Languedoc.’ He gave a dry chuckle. ‘No, not the same person at all.’ He patted her on the shoulder. ‘I predict you’ll never settle for mere contentment again. And drink “a beaker full of the warm south” for me,’ he added.
‘Warm south’ was putting it mildly, Meg thought, as she sat in a traffic jam outside Toulouse airport, feeling the perspiration trickling down between her breasts.
The car she’d hired was like an oven already, and she was only at the start of her journey to Haut Arignac. She’d arrived in France two days earlier than she was actually expected, with the intention of doing some sightseeing before joining the De Brissot household as Madame’s dame de compagnie.
It would also give her a chance to practise her French. She’d been the star pupil at school, and gone on to improve her fluency at evening classes. But there’d be no opportunity to try out her skill at the Château Haut Arignac, as Margaret de Brissot had been told during the preliminary correspondence that ‘Margot’ spoke no French.
‘Quite useful really,’ her stepsister had commented offhandedly when Meg protested at the arbitrary decision. ‘If anyone asks awkward questions, you can just play dumb.’
‘I don’t want to play anything,’ Meg said bitterly.
She felt wretchedly guilty about the charade she was undertaking. She was setting out to deceive an elderly, nearly blind woman, and for what? To further her stepsister’s ruthless determination to break up her lover’s marriage. And to hurt some unknown and presumably unsuspecting woman and her children along the way.
Even the knowledge that Nanny’s occupancy of Brydons Cottage would be secure couldn’t alleviate her profound misgivings about the whole affair, and her unwilling role in it. Damn Margot and her sordid affair, she thought, drumming her fingers on the steering-wheel.
Then, as if a drain had been unblocked somewhere, the traffic moved off, and Meg realised she was on her way. She proceeded with a certain amount of care, at first, accustoming herself to the unfamiliar road conditions, as well as the novelty of having a vehicle totally at her own disposal. But it didn’t take her long to realise she was on good roads, with far less volume of traffic to contend with than in England, and she began to relax.
The sky above her was brilliant blue, but as she drove east she could see clouds building over the high ground in the far distance, fluffy and unthreatening at first, but increasing in mass and density with alarming suddenness.
By the time she stopped to buy food for lunch, the skies were a lowering grey, and she cast an anxious glance upwards as she made her way back to the car from the alimentation, with her baguette, sliced ham, demi-kilo of peaches and sedate bottle of mineral water.
She’d planned to have a picnic in some quiet spot. She’d deliberately chosen a route away from the main thoroughfares, so that she could travel at her own pace—discover, she hoped, the real France.
Now it looked as if she might be about to discover some real French weather as well, although it was still very warm, if not downright clammy, and those threatening clouds might yet blow over.
But as a smattering of rain hit the windscreen she decided reluctantly to shelve her plans for an alfresco meal, and concentrate on finding somewhere to stay that night. A helpful girl at the syndicat d’initiative in the last town she’d passed through had recommended a small auberge at the head of the Gorge du Beron, and even marked it on Meg’s map.
She found herself following a winding road into a valley flanked by steep rocky banks which soon grew high enough to call themselves cliffs. The road ran alongside a river, relatively shallow, but flowing fast over its stony gravel bed. Presumably this was the Beron, at whose source she would find the auberge.
And the sooner the better, she thought with dismay, as more water arrived suddenly, descending like an impenetrable curtain from the sky, its arrival announced by a flash of lightning and a resoundingly ominous crack of thunder.
Meg swore under her breath, turning her windscreen-wipers full on, but it was wasted effort. They couldn’t cope with the sheer force of the rain flinging itself at the car. And she dared not drive blind on such a tortuous road, she thought, applying her brakes and easing the car as close as possible to the side of the road where the rocky overhang seemed to offer a degree of shelter.
Who could have expected such a change in the weather? she wondered dispiritedly, although Mr Otway had warned her that these orages were common in the Languedoc, and it was safer to stay in one’s vehicle than risk being struck by lightning.
She felt cold suddenly, and reached for a jacket from the rear seat, pulling it round her shoulders with a slight grimace. A glance at the river sent another chill through her. It was rising alarmingly rapidly, the gravel banks almost covered now, and the water lapping greedily at the side of the road itself, already awash in several places.
Not a good place to have stopped, after all, she realised in dismay. But she had to stay where she was now, until the rain eased a little at least. The storm was directly overhead now, thunder and lightning occurring almost simultaneously. Meg felt as if she was peering through a wall of water. Maybe it would have been better to have arrived on the appointed day, and been met at the airport as Madame de Brissot had originally suggested.
Or would it? That was the straightforward—the sensible course of action she’d been following for most of her life.
Don’t be so boring, she chastised herself mentally. Where’s your spirit of adventure? The car rocked suddenly as if caught in a violent gust of wind, and Meg shivered in spite of herself, then cried out in fear as her driver’s door was wrenched open, filling the car with cold, sodden air.
For a dazed instant she thought the storm itself was responsible, then she saw the dark, caped figure framed in the doorway, staring in at her, and shrank back in her seat. She wanted to scream, but her vocal cords seemed paralysed with fright.
‘Are you quite mad?’ His voice was low-pitched, vibrant, and almost molten with rage. ‘Do you want to be killed? Move this car now—at once.’
No spirit conjured up by the storm, but an all too human and angry male. He spoke in French and Meg replied automatically in the same language, her heart thumping violently in mingled alarm and relief.
‘What gives you the right to order me about?’
‘The right of someone who obviously knows this country better than you,’ was the crushing retort. ‘It isn’t safe to park under a rockface in conditions like this, you little fool. There are often landslips. Your car could be buried, and you with it. So move. Quickly.’
However unpleasant he might be, he seemed to know what he was talking about, Meg realised uneasily. Perhaps she’d do well to accept his arrogant and unwelcome advice.
‘Where do you suggest I park, then?’ she asked, coldly.
‘There is a safer place two hundred metres further on. Follow my car, and I will show you. And hurry,’ he added grimly.
Her door slammed shut again, and he disappeared. A moment later, Meg saw the dim shape of a car overtake hers and halt some distance ahead of her, hazard lights blinking. Reluctantly, she turned the key in the ignition, but instead of the usual reassuring purr into life from the engine she was greeted with a profound and ominous silence.
Oh, no, Meg groaned inwardly, and tried again. And again. But the wretched engine stubbornly refused to fire.
‘What’s the matter now?’ Her caped crusader, his temper apparently operating perfectly on all cylinders, reappeared beside her.
‘What does it look like, you prat? The blasted car won’t start,’ Meg flung back at him in a savage undertone, while she searched for the appropriate and slightly more diplomatic phraseology in French.
‘So you are English?’ he remarked, switching effortlessly to her language. ‘I should have guessed.’
His tone bit with contempt, and Meg stiffened in annoyance. Of course, he would have to be bilingual, she thought, feeling faint colour rise in her cheeks at the memory of her schoolgirl rudeness.
‘What’s the problem with the car?’ he continued. ‘Has it given trouble before?’
‘It’s hardly had the chance,’ she said wearily. ‘I only rented it today. But now the engine’s dead. I suppose some water’s got into the plugs, or the carburettor.’
He muttered something under his breath which Meg chose not to hear.
‘Leave it here, then,’ he ordered peremptorily, raising his voice above the crashing of the rain, ‘and come with me.’
‘I can’t just abandon the thing,’ Meg protested. ‘It doesn’t belong to me. And besides…’ she hesitated ‘… I don’t know you from Adam.’
‘Sit here much longer, mademoiselle, and you may make the acquaintance of the original Adam—in Paradise.’ His tone was caustic. ‘You have more to fear, I promise, by remaining where you are than from accepting my assistance, such as it is.’
He paused. ‘And rape, be assured, is the last thing on my mind in these conditions. Now get out of the car before we both drown.’
Meg obeyed unwillingly, flinching as the water soaked up through the thin soles of her sandals. Reaching his car was going to be like fording the river itself. She’d be drenched before she’d gone a couple of metres. She wondered glumly what Madame de Brissot’s reaction would be if her new companion arrived at Haut Arignac with double pneumonia.
There was a swift impatient sigh beside her, and she found herself suddenly enveloped in his cape, held with disturbing force against his body under its voluminous folds, as she was half led, half carried to the other vehicle. Her nostrils were assailed by a tingling aroma of warm, clean wool, coupled with the individual and very masculine scent of his skin. She was aware too of the tang of some expensive cologne.
‘Thank you,’ she gasped with irony, as she was thrust without particular ceremony into the passenger seat.
‘Pas du tout,’ he returned. ‘Now let’s get out of here. It’s always been a danger spot.’
Even as he spoke, Meg heard a sound like a low groan, followed by a strange rushing noise. She craned her neck, staring back down the gorge, and saw, with horrified disbelief, a tree come sliding down, roots first, from the heights above, and land with a sickening crash on the roof of her little Renault. It was followed by a deluge of earth and stones, bouncing off the bodywork on to the road, like a series of miniature explosions. A few even reached the other car, where they both sat stunned and immobile.
The silence which followed was deafening by comparison. And, as if finally satisfied with its efforts, the rain began to ease off.
CHAPTER TWO
MEG’S COMPANION WAS the first to move, to break the profound hush.
He said quietly, ‘Et voilà,’ and shrugged.
‘Oh, God,’ Meg breathed almost inaudibly. ‘Oh, dear God.’
The driver’s side had sustained the most damage, she realised numbly. The crumpled roof was practically resting on the seat, and the windscreen had been shattered by a large branch.
And up to a moment ago she’d been sitting there—right there. If he hadn’t come along when he did—made her get out… Her mind closed off in shock, refusing to contemplate the undoubted consequences. She tried to speak—to thank him properly this time, and instead, to her shame, burst into tears.
He muttered something else under his breath, then swung into the seat beside her, flinging the discarded cape into the back of the car, before reaching into the glove compartment for a packet of tissues and a silver flask.
‘Here,’ he said curtly, unscrewing the flask’s stopper. ‘Drink this.’
It was cognac. She gasped, and choked, feeling the spirit spread like fire through her cold and shaking body. She dabbed at her face with a tissue. ‘My car,’ she whispered. ‘My car.’
‘You insured the car when you hired it,’ he reminded her. ‘It can easily be replaced. But not so your life.’
‘No.’ She shuddered uncontrollably, then lifted the flask again, taking a fierce, searing swallow, fighting back the remaining tears, and feeling the trembling dissipate slowly.
‘I think you have had enough.’ There was a faint smile in his voice as he gently detached the flask from her grasp.
When she was sure she was in control of her voice, she said, ‘All—all my things were in the boot. I—I know it’s silly to mind…’
‘I’ll get them.’ He took the Renault’s keys from her unresisting fingers.
‘No.’ Meg grabbed at his arm. ‘Leave them, please. Don’t risk it…’
‘It’s all right.’ His voice was gentler. He pointed back towards the wreck. ‘See, the boot was hardly touched.’
‘But there might be another landslide.’ There were still lightning flashes in the overcast sky, and thunder was grumbling around in the distance like some outraged but unseen giant. Meg could visualise more rocks, raining down on him, crushing him like the Renault.
She found she was looking at him, seeing him properly for the first time in the sullen light which penetrated the car. She knew that he was tall, and she’d had first-hand experience of the whipcord strength of his body during that headlong dash from the Renault, but that was the extent of it. Now she saw that he was quite young—not more than the early thirties at a guess, although she was no judge of such things. She assimilated a mass of unruly black hair, and a thin olive-skinned face, the lines of nose, mouth and chin strongly, even arrogantly marked. And dark fathomless eyes under heavy lids.