Hunter's Moon

Cassandra gave him a sharp, frowning look. ‘No?’ she said warily.

‘No,’ he echoed tauntingly, straightening suddenly, even the mocking humour erased from his face now. ‘As you’re the other major shareholder in Hunter and Kyle, I thought you should know that I have just had an internal audit done of the company.’

Cassandra stared at him. ‘You didn’t mention this before…’

‘No,’ he acknowledged grimly. ‘I didn’t believe there was any need to; I ordered it as a matter of course now that I’ve been in charge of things for six months. I just wanted to be ready for the end of the tax year, although there didn’t appear to be any problems. I say “appear to be”——’ he met her gaze with steady intent ‘—because now I know differently.’

Cassandra swallowed hard, even as she felt all the colour drain from her face.

CHAPTER THREE (#uc1eee6d9-b7ce-545d-86fa-73dc3023da2e)

‘DID you hear me, Cassandra?’ Jonas rasped coldly. ‘I said——’

‘I heard you!’ She turned away, totally shaken by this. She had known it had to come, of course, had realised it had to, but with the mess her own company had become she hadn’t had the chance—or time! —to think about Hunter and Kyle. And she should have done, the dangerous intent in this man’s eyes warned her harshly, when she risked another glance at him. She gripped her hands tightly together in front of her to stop their trembling. ‘It was——’

‘Mummy, Uncle Jonas, don’t you want your coffee?’ Bethany protested as she came bounding into the room to frown up at them impatiently for their delay.

‘I would love some.’ Jonas was the one to answer her, glancing at the plain gold watch with its leather strap. ‘Unfortunately, I don’t have the time now,’ he refused with a disappointed grimace, his eyes narrowed as he glanced across at the still pale Cassandra. ‘Marguerite has invited me to dinner tonight too,’ he told her softly.

He thought she was going to be at her mother’s for dinner, Cassandra realised. Thank God she wasn’t; there was no way she could have given even a semblance of normality tonight at one of her mother’s dinner parties, not after what this man had just told her.

And Cassandra knew exactly why Jonas had been invited to dinner tonight. It wasn’t just that her mother wanted to ask Jonas to give Joy away at the wedding—although God knew that was bad enough. No, her mother was very much aware that Jonas was now head of Hunter and Kyle, and as such he was responsible for any profits the company might make, profits she and Joy had a share in. She wouldn’t put it past her mother and Joy to have plans for Joy’s fiancé Colin either—he was Jonas’s assistant, and neither Marguerite nor Joy would be happy with him remaining just that, Cassandra was sure.

The knowing look in Jonas’s eyes, when she looked up to make a reply, said he knew perfectly well of her mother and Joy’s ambitions for Colin—also that he would do what he damned well pleased about that situation!

‘That’s nice,’ Cassandra finally replied distractedly.

Jonas gave a taunting smile. ‘Is it?’

She was tempted to tell him she didn’t give a damn whether he went to her mother’s for dinner every night of the week—as long as she didn’t have to be there too! But Bethany clasped his hand at that moment, diverting his attention to her, and also putting an end to the conversation.

Bethany hung on to Jonas until the very last minute, making it impossible for Cassandra and Jonas to talk privately again. Cassandra was glad of the respite, and she knew Jonas wasn’t bothered by the delay, because he expected to be talking to her again later on this evening. Cassandra shivered, glad once again that she had made other plans.

Bethany turned away now from the door where she had been standing forlornly waving to her uncle until the tail-lights of his car had completely disappeared. ‘Can’t Uncle Jonas come and live with us?’ She looked up at Cassandra appealingly.

Cassandra had been deep in thought, but this brought her sharply back into the present. This was the second time tonight her young daughter had made such a statement, and the sooner she was firmly told it wasn’t even a possibility, the better! ‘I wanted to talk to you about that, darling,’ she told Bethany firmly as she sat her down in one of the armchairs.

It was still quite early when Cassandra arrived at her mother’s house—deliberately so on her part; she was determined she wouldn’t run into Jonas there now.

Her mother, she was informed, was still dressing for dinner, and so Cassandra sat down to wait for her. It was more imperative than ever that Jonas not be drawn any deeper into their personal lives than he already was; the man had the power—and the ruthlessness!—to destroy all of them, if he chose to do so.

Her mother was a good hostess; she had a fire burning brightly in the hearth to give the elegant lounge, with its pale cream and peach décor, a welcoming warmth, the family dining table, rather than the large formal one in a separate room, laid for dinner, the silver shining brightly, the crystal wine glasses sparkling in the firelight, the delicate posy of roses in the centre of the table perfectly matching the peach and cream in the rest of the room.

Cassandra stood up as her mother came into the room; she was much taller than her petite mother, and their colouring was completely different too, her mother’s auburn hair going graciously—and expertly!—grey now. Joy looked the most like their mother; both women were short and slim, with beautifully even features, eyes a deep blue. But her mother and Joy, her two closest relatives, had always seemed a little like an alien species to Cassandra.

They lived their lives on such a superficial level, going to the beauty salon twice a week, lunching with friends, being seen in all the ‘right’ places, knowing all the ‘right’ people, likewise wearing all the ‘right’ clothes, both of them always immaculately dressed for the occasion. And both of them would recoil in horror at the mere suggestion that they should ever actually work a single day of their lives to pay for all that luxury they took so much for granted! Cassandra had always stood out like a duckling among such beautifully elegant swans…

She had never been able to understand how her mother and Joy could live such vacuous lives. But if she felt that way about them she knew her mother didn’t understand her way of life any better. Her mother had given up on Cassandra when, at the age of seventeen, she had insisted on going to art college rather than the exclusive finishing-school her parents had picked out in Switzerland for their two daughters. Even worse, when Cassandra had left college two years later, she had gone to work for a major London fashion house, not as a model or designer herself, but as assistant to a designer. Humble beginnings—much to her mother’s obvious disgust; there had never been anything humble about either Marguerite or Joy Kyle!

Even the relative success she had had as a designer herself hadn’t exactly redeemed her in her mother’s eyes: she still worked for a living. But at least Cassandra’s choice of husband, after years of having her actions looked on with dismay, had met with her mother’s approval—although even that new-found respectability had taken a knock in her mother’s eyes, she knew, when Charles had died so suddenly: it simply wasn’t the done thing to become a widow at only twenty-four years of age!

Her mother looked as graciously lovely as usual this evening, her auburn hair elegantly grey at the temples, her black below-the-knee dress perfect for this small family dinner-party—although she looked slightly disconcerted to see that Cassandra was also dressed for dinner, wearing the pale gold gown Bethany had requested.

Cassandra smiled, taking pity on her mother. ‘Don’t worry, I’m not gatecrashing your dinner party; I’m going on somewhere.’

Her mother couldn’t quite hide her relief. ‘You’re welcome to join us if you would like to,’ she said politely now that she knew Cassandra had no intention of staying.

Cassandra’s smile widened. ‘No, thanks. I’m meeting Simeon later——’

‘Oh, really, Cassandra.’ Her mother looked irritated now. ‘That dreadful young man!’

That ‘dreadful young man’, her own assistant at the salon she ran in town still, had helped get her through the last difficult months. But he wasn’t ‘top-drawer’ enough for her mother, coming from a working-class background; it didn’t matter that he was also kind and caring, and that Cassandra liked him very much.

‘Never mind Simeon,’ she dismissed lightly. ‘He isn’t the reason I’m here.’ She glanced across at the intimately laid dinner table. ‘Five places, Mother?’

Her mother looked disconcerted again. ‘Godfrey is joining us for dinner,’ she dismissed.

‘Us’ was obviously Joy, Colin, and Marguerite. Godfrey Chorley was an old family friend who had become very helpful to her mother as a partner for social evenings since the death of her husband a year ago. At almost sixty, Godfrey seemed a confirmed bachelor, and after only a few minutes spent it his company it was easy to see why: Godfrey, as fond as Cassandra was of him, was easily the most boring man she had ever met!

Cassandra arched black brows. ‘And the fifth?’

‘Jonas,’ her mother supplied offhandedly. ‘I do feel so sorry for the dear man; he seems to know so few people in England, and——’

‘Spare me that, please, Mother,’ Cassandra cut in impatiently. ‘If Jonas spends a lot of his time alone, it’s because he chooses to,’ she said knowingly; Jonas, for all his coldness with her, was an extremely attractive man, could have his pick of women to share his life.

‘Well, anyway, he’s coming to dinner this evening too,’ her mother announced almost challengingly—a challenge Cassandra was only too happy to meet!

‘Why?’ she prompted softly.

‘I’ve just——’

‘Why, Mother?’ she repeated firmly, easily meeting her mother’s searching gaze.

‘Bethany!’ her mother finally realised. ‘She was here earlier when we were discussing…! Joy has a perfect right to ask whom she wants to give her away,’ she said in defence of her youngest daughter.

‘It wasn’t so long ago Joy was chasing after Jonas for quite another reason,’ Cassandra reminded her drily, perfectly aware that when Jonas had first returned to England her sister had been very attracted to him indeed. But while Jonas hadn’t seemed averse to having Joy reacquaint him with London he hadn’t been interested in anything more than that from her, Joy had told her disappointedly one day. Cassandra had been most embarrassed by the whole incident; she had been sure Jonas was secretly laughing at them all for her sister’s obvious ambitions where he was concerned. Joy’s engagement to Colin was a relatively new thing, and Cassandra just hoped it was for the right reasons; Colin was nowhere near as ‘primitively exciting’ as Joy had claimed she thought Jonas was! Still, that was Joy’s problem, not hers. Her problems were much more pressing than that.

‘And if she had succeeded it might just have been the answer for all of us,’ her mother snapped angrily.

Cassandra looked at her mother closely. ‘And just what do you mean by that remark?’

‘Isn’t it obvious?’ her mother said with impatient dismissal—although she wasn’t quite meeting Cassandra’s gaze, she noticed with a frown. Did her mother know more than she was prepared to say…?

‘It would have been the perfect arrangement if we could have kept the company in the family,’ her mother continued briskly. ‘As it is, Jonas could eventually marry anybody, and then where will we all be?’ She frowned.

Exactly where they were now, Cassandra would have thought. Unless her mother did know something…

‘Don’t start being difficult about this, Cassandra,’ her mother told her shortly. ‘The decision has been made, and nothing you say will make any difference.’