Hidden Love

Nick’s throaty chuckle showed he appreciated her humour, and she turned and waved to him before going into the house, leaning weakly back against the door. This morning, even this afternoon, she hadn’t even met him, and now she was looking forward to her date with him tomorrow.

As she went into the sitting-room she wondered what her parents would make of him. They were watching the late evening news as she came in, her mother plump and homely as she knitted a jumper for a neighbour’s child, her father intent on the world events of the day. They were nice ordinary people, and she loved them very much, but she was aware that Nick was anything but ordinary. He was like an electric charge to the system, full of forceful energy, with a lazy charm that captivated.

‘Boy or girl?’ her mother asked softly as she sat down beside her on the sofa.

Her father gave her a vague look, his affection evident in his smile. ‘Hello, love.’

‘Dad,’ she answered in a hushed voice, knowing she wasn’t to talk any louder until the news and weather had finished. ‘It was a girl, Mum,’ she answered the query. ‘I hadn’t realised newborn babies were so tiny.’ She had been awestruck at the miniature perfection of the baby’s hands and feet, her thick thatch of golden hair.

‘You were beautiful when you were born,’ her mother said dreamily. ‘You were premature, only five and a half pounds in weight, and premature babies are always prettier. Why, what are you smiling at, Rachel?’

Her humour deepened. ‘I was just thinking of the baby’s uncle’s reaction when he first saw her. She was all screwed up and wrinkled, and yet her mother was convinced she was beautiful.’ And to Nick’s credit he hadn’t shown by so much as a blink of an eyelid that he didn’t apprecite the baby’s looks.

‘The baby’s uncle, dear?’ her mother prompted.

‘Yes. Mrs Lennox’s husband was away, so I—Dad, what is this?’ she asked sharply, something, some-one on the television catching and holding her attention.

‘Hmm?’

‘What are they talking about?’ she repeated impatiently.

‘Why, the tennis, of course,’ he answered with equal impatience. It was obvious what they were talking about, with two men fiercely hitting the ball at each other, determination on each of their faces.

‘What tennis?’ she asked agitatedly, desperately trying to come to grips with something that was becoming more and more obvious by the second.

‘Wimbledon, dear,’ it was her mother who answered this time. ‘They played the quarter-finals today.’

And the man playing in one of them was none other than Kay Lennox’s brother Nick! No wonder he had seemed so familiar, she had actually watched him playing one of the qualifying matches earlier in the week, had sat and cheered him on.

He was Nicholas St Clare, world-famous tennis player, winner of numerous tournaments the last twelve years, since he had turned professional at the age of eighteen. And the court he had been talking about this evening hadn’t been a court of law but a tennis court, a tennis court at the world-renowned Wimbledon Championship!

CHAPTER TWO (#ulink_3348a1d1-f8e2-515a-9f67-3cbb89105029)

SHE had calmly agreed to go to dinner with a famous tennis player! Of course she hadn’t known who he was then, but she knew now! He was one of the hot-shot left-handed players to come out of America the last fifteen years, and at thirty years of age he was being compared with the stamina and skill of Australia’s Rod Laver, was still winning the titles, although it was a well-known fact that Bjorn Borg and John McEnroe had dominated the courts of Wimbledon for the past six or seven years. Apparently it was a championship Nicholas St Clare coveted, and this year he was determined to win.

The way he had played today, by the look of the television coverage, he could just do it too. In the white shorts and short-sleeved tee-shirt he looked handsomer than ever, his golden hair clinging damply to his forehead, his blue eyes steely as he concentrated completely on winning the match from his opponent.

‘Did he win?’ Rachel asked breathlessly.

‘I don’t know who you mean by he,’ her father told her. ‘But Nicholas St Clare won, quite easily as a matter of fact.’

Of course he had won, he would hardly have been in that lazily charming mood otherwise. But she had agreed to have dinner with a good-looking man named Nick, not with Nicholas St Clare. She couldn’t go out with a man as famous as that. And she couldn’t imagine why he had asked her!

‘Danny called,’ her mother interrupted her panicked thoughts.

‘He did?’ she frowned. She had forgotten all about Danny during the last few hours!

‘He seemed quite surprised you were still at the hospital.’

‘He was surprised I went at all,’ Rachel remembered angrily. ‘If he’d had his way Mrs Lennox would have been left to fend for herself!’

‘Oh dear!’ her mother frowned, having the same dark hair as Rachel, although it was kept short and curly. ‘Have the two of you argued?’

‘Not exactly,’ she avoided, her mind racing on as to how she could get in touch with Nick St Clare and tell him she couldn’t go out with him tomorrow or any other time. She could call him, she had his number, but unless she got that impersonal answering service she didn’t want to do that. She certainly didn’t want to talk to Nick himself!

‘How not exactly, Rachel?’ her mother was concerned. ‘I thought you were—fond of him?’

‘I was—I am. But he wasn’t very understanding about poor Mrs Lennox.’ The only thing to do seemed to have Nick’s sister pass on a message to him.

Her mother smiled. ‘Men never are, dear. They have no idea.’

Nick St Clare had had no idea, he had been visibly shaken by what his sister was going through to give birth to her daughter. Nick St Clare …! Oh, she should have recognised him, should have known who he was. She just hadn’t been expecting to see a famous tennis-player, and so she hadn’t; she had even thought he could be a lawyer!

She had made a mess of things, and first thing tomorrow she would get herself out of it. Nick had said he would be visiting his sister some time tomorrow and so she could be sure he would get the message.

As she lay in bed later that night she did her best to convince herself that she was doing the right thing, the only think, by not meeting Nick again. A man like that could turn her life so upside down it would never be the same again. And boring as it might appear to him, she liked her little world, was enjoying this two-year course at college, and she loved her parents very much, as their only child she felt cherished and loved in return, and she enjoyed going out on the occasional date with boys like Danny. Yes, her life was good, satisfying, and she didn’t need the sophistication of Nick St Clare to spoil it all.

But hadn’t he spoilt it already? Hadn’t meeting him at all made her long for something she could never have? Hadn’t it made her want Nick St Clare himself?

She buried her head beneath the pillow, pushing such tortuous thoughts from her mind. She couldn’t see Nick St Clare again, and that was that.

Kay Lennox was sleeping when she telephoned from college early next morning, so she left a message with the nurse for Kay to pass on to her brother.

She slipped quietly into her place for her first class before Mr Balfour walked in to give the lecture.

‘What happened to you yesterday afternoon?’ Hilary leant over to whisper.

Rachel and Hilary had become friends the previous September when they had turned out to be the only two girls in this male-orientated class, but she shook her head at her friend as Mr Balfour came into the room. ‘I’ll tell you later,’ she promised, feeling as if she would burst if she didn’t soon tell someone about her meeting with Nick St Clare.

Hilary was incredulous as they ate a doughnut and drank coffee during the morning break. ‘You’re joking!’ Her eyes were agog, laughing blue eyes, her hair kept short and boyish.

‘I wish I were,’ Rachel grimaced.

‘You don’t!’

‘Of course I do.’ She stared mournfully into her rapidly cooling coffee. ‘I spoke to him as if he were just like you and me. I was even cheeky to him a couple of times.’

‘Being a famous tennis player doesn’t make him different from the rest of us,’ her friend teased.

Rachel pulled a face. ‘You didn’t meet him. He—well, he’s magnetic, has this leashed power …’ She shrugged. ‘He is different, Hilary, believe me.’

‘I can see he is,’ her friend soothed. ‘But he can’t have minded the way you spoke to him, otherwise he wouldn’t have asked you out.’

‘I told you, that was just out of gratitude.’

‘Some gratitude!’ Hilary scorned. ‘Flowers or a box of chocolates would have sufficed as far as gratitude goes. No, Nick St Clare really wanted you to go out with him.’

‘That’s silly, Hilary—–’