Lost In Love

Jamie winced and she let out an impatient sigh. ‘The last time you got yourself in a mess, it was because you went over budget and omitted to warn your client that it was going to cost him several thousand more than you quoted!’

‘I don’t do half a job!’ he haughtily defended that particular criticism. ‘He wanted his car looking like new, so I rebuilt it to look like new.’

‘Then he refused to take delivery of it until you cut down the bill—which you refused to do. Which meant Guy had to step in and sort the mess out—yet again!’

‘You know as well as I do that Guy made on the deal in the end,’ Jamie derided that accusation. ‘The crafty devil bought the damned car from the man at less than it was worth, and put it into his own collection! It cost me fifteen thousand pounds to put that car back together, of which I saw only ten!’

‘And two thousand of that I lent to you and never saw again!’

‘OK—OK...’ Jamie sighed, making a weary retreat by getting up from the sofa to lope over to the window where a bright June sun was beginning to ruin what light she had left of the morning to paint by. ‘So, I’m a lousy businessman. You don’t have to rub it in.’

Marnie looked at him in impatient sympathy. He was quite right. He was a lousy businessman. He was like the proverbial absent-minded professor when he got his head beneath the bonnet of a new challenge. But she’d thought he’d got himself together in the business department over the last year since Clare had taken over that side of things for him.

She frowned at that last thought, wondering why Clare hadn’t made sure his insurance was up to date. It wasn’t like her sister-in-law to forget something as basic as that.

‘If you won’t help me, Marnie,’ Jamie murmured into the dull silence that was throbbing all around them, ‘I don’t know what I’m going to do. The guy is threatening nasty reprisals if I don’t come up with his money.’

‘Oh, Jamie!’ she sighed, leaning forward to rub her forehead with a hand.

‘But that’s not all...’

No? she wondered cynically. Could there be more?

‘It’s Clare,’ he said.

‘Clare?’ Her head shot away from her hand.

‘She’s—she’s pregnant again.’

‘What—already?’ Instant concern darkened his sister’s eyes, her face going pale as she stared at him. ‘Isn’t it a bit too soon?’ she whispered.

‘Yes,’ he sighed, turning to look at her, then, sighing again, he came back to throw himself down next to her. ‘Too damn soon for anyone’s peace of mind...’

Marnie swallowed, her anger with her brother evaporating with this new and far more worrying concern. Clare had gone through what could only be described as a woman’s worst nightmare, having lost her first baby right on the three-month borderline the experts liked to call safe. Safe. She scorned it bitterly. There was no such thing as safe during a nine-month-long confinement. Fate and Mother Nature saw to that.

The doctors had warned them not to rush straight into trying for another. ‘Give your body time to heal,’ they’d advised. ‘And your hearts time to grieve.’

‘How—how far is she?’ She could hardly speak for the hard lump which had formed in her throat.

‘Two months.’ Jamie glanced at her, his thin face strained. ‘Marnie... You have to understand now that this has all come at a bad time for me. I can’t afford to let Clare know about this.’ He dropped his head, giving his sandy hair a frustrated tug. ‘She’s worried half out of her mind as it is, wondering, frightened...’

She swallowed, nodding, unable to say a single word.

‘If you could just find it in yourself to help me out of this one—I swear to you, Marnie,’ he promised huskily, ‘I swear on the—’

‘Don’t say it!’ she rasped, her hand shaking as it snapped out to grip tightly at his wrist. ‘Don’t even think it!’

‘God, no!’ he groaned, shuddering when he realised just what he had been going to say. ‘Hell—I don’t know what’s happening to me,’ he choked. ‘I can’t think straight for worrying about Clare, never mind this mess with the Jag. I—’

‘Is this why you weren’t insured?’ she asked with sudden insight. ‘Has Clare stopped doing all the clerical work since she suspected she was pregnant?’

Jamie nodded. ‘God,’ he went on distractedly, ‘it was bad enough me having to walk into the flat with this arm in a sling, and my face in this kind of mess—she almost fainted in fright!’ A ragged sigh shot from him. ‘I didn’t dare tell her she’d forgotten to renew my insurance! She’d have...’ His voice trailed off, and they both sat, their hearts thumping heavily in their breasts.

‘All right,’ Marnie murmured huskily. ‘I’ll go and see Guy today.’

Jamie’s relief was so palpable that it was almost worth it—almost. Jamie had no idea—couldn’t know what this was going to cost her.

‘Listen, tell Guy I’ve found a brilliant MG K3 Magnette!’ he said urgently, trying his best to make up for putting her in this position. ‘Tell—tell him he can have it for his collection when it’s finished,’ he offered. ‘It isn’t as good as the one he’s already got, and it won’t cover the debt I’ll owe him, but...’ he swallowed, emotion thickening his voice ‘...I’ll pay him back every penny this time, Marnie. That’s a promise. And thank you—thank you for doing this for me this one last time.’

‘I’m doing it for Clare, not for you.’ Why she’d said that Marnie wasn’t about to analyse, but the way her brother’s face paled she knew the remark had cut—as, perhaps, it had meant to. But at this moment Marnie found she hated every single one of the male race.

‘I know that,’ he said, getting up. ‘I know both you and Guy don’t think my neck worth saving.’

‘That’s not true, and you know it,’ Marnie sighed, softening her manner slightly. ‘But I do think it’s about time you took care of your own affairs properly, Jamie—and by that I mean yourself, and not leaving it all to Clare.’

‘I mean to from now on.’ He sounded so determined that Marnie was surprised into believing him. ‘After all, she’s going to have enough on her plate with—everything else.’

He was by the door, eager to leave now he’d got that promise from Marnie. ‘Will—will you give me a call as soon as you’ve spoken to Guy?’ It was tentatively said, but insistent all the same, and Marine glanced sharply at him.

‘That urgent, huh?’ she drawled.

He nodded and flushed. ‘The man is riding on my back,’ he admitted.

Just as you are riding on mine, Marnie thought as she watched him go. Then took back that thought with a bitter twist to her tensely held mouth. It was unworthy. She loved her brother, and for once the mess he was in was not of his own making but poor Clare’s.

Clare...her eyes clouded over as she thought of her pretty little sister-in-law and the minefield of anxieties she must be negotiating right now. And Jamie was right; Clare was not in any fit condition to take any more stress.

Even if it meant Marnie placing herself in the hands of the enemy!

A shiver rippled through her, leaving her cold even though the sun was warm in the room, the unwanted memories managing to crawl through the thick protective casing she wore around herself, sending her blue eyes bleak as the artist in her began to construct his image in front of her.

Guy, she thought achingly, unable to stop the picture from building. A big man, but lean and muscular, with the kind of naturally tanned skin that enhanced his dark good looks. His chocolate-brown eyes always made exciting promises, and that lazy, sexy smile he used to save for her alone could... She gave an inner sigh that stayed just this side of pain. Her dark Italian love, she remembered wistfully. The only man who had ever managed to get her soul to leave her body and soar on an eddying wave of pure exquisite feeling.

Guy was a man of the earth and air, with banked-down fires inside him that would flare and turn the blood to sizzling, spitting flames.

He was the kind of man whose charismatic power over the opposite sex had given him an arrogance few would deny him. His huge ego was well deserved—along with his colourful reputation. Guy was a man’s idea of a man—the kind of man who walked right out of a woman’s foolish dreams. And a selfish, cruel and faithless swine! she reminded herself bitterly. He saw what he wanted, and took it with all the fire and passion in his hot Latin nature—just as he had seen and taken her! In his arrogance, he’d made her fall in love with him, then ruthlessly and callously thrown that love right back in her face! She would never forgive him for that. Never.

Four years ago, Guy had hurt her so deeply that she had prayed never to set eyes on him again. But with his usual arrogance he had refused to allow her that one small relief. And, four years on, they now shared a different kind of relationship, one which had them tiptoeing around each other like wary adversaries, using their tongues instead of their bodies to strike sparks off each other. Hostile yet close—oddly close. In the four long years since she and Guy had split up in a blaze of pain and anger, he had not allowed her to cut him out of her life. Guy possessed a tenacity which surprised her somewhat. For a man who was able to get whatever he wished at the simple click of his fingers, it seemed odd to her that he should still want her. She was, after all, one of his few failures in life, and his ego did not usually like being reminded of those.

Now, and for the first time in a long time, she sensed her own vulnerability, and another smile touched her mouth—one full of rueful whimsy this time. Guy had always predicted that Jamie would be the source of her inevitable downfall.

It seemed that his years of patience were about to bear fruit.

She glanced across the mad clutter of her busy studio room to where the telephone sat innocent and inert on the small table by the door, and slowly, carefully she steadied her emotions, settled her features into their normal cool, calm mask, and readied herself for what was to come. For Jamie might be placing her on a plate for Guy, but it did not mean she was going to sit still on it!

With these defiant thoughts to accompany her across the room, Marnie lifted the receiver off its rest and began to dial the never-to-be-forgotten number of il signor Guy Frabosa’s London home.

CHAPTER TWO