Tiger Eyes

She looked at Rick’s bent brown head and said angrily, ‘Surely he doesn’t expect you to be a clone of him, and if he is so insensitive, you’re better off without him!’

‘He’s not like that,’ he said simply. ‘Just don’t tell him where I am, OK? I hate asking you, because Leo’s a master of applying pressure and you’ve been so good to me.’

Tansy laughed. ‘If he finds me, which I doubt, he can’t do anything more than ask. He’s got no leverage.’

Rick eyed her with a grimness she now understood. ‘You don’t know Leo. He’ll find something to threaten you with. But please, promise me.’

She’d promised. So, she thought, shaking her head at the offer of coffee, she would make sure that, whatever tactics Leo Dacre tried, she wouldn’t give Rick away. He’d convinced himself that this was his last chance, and he deserved his opportunity.

A strange, fierce exhilaration flooded her. She would show Leo Dacre that she wasn’t easily intimidated.

‘Let’s go,’ he said, getting to his feet.

Apparently one of the tricks in his armoury was to take it for granted that she was going to fall in with whatever he suggested. Tonight she’d do that, for her own good reasons. Outside the bitter wind was now driving rain before it, and if she walked she’d be drenched by the time she got halfway home.

He didn’t ask where she lived. She didn’t tell him, but he drove straight there.

At the door of her flat he said, ‘Are you going to ask me in?’

‘No,’ she said abruptly, bracing herself for an argument. Huddling a little further into her coat, she said coolly, ‘It’s no use, you know.’

Of course she’d known she wouldn’t put him off so easily, but she was unprepared for his low laughter.

‘I enjoy a good fight,’ he said, a note of mockery giving emphasis to the words. ‘Open your door.’

‘I don’t want—’

Ignoring her struggles, he picked up the hand that held her key and, with his warm one around it, forced the key into the lock and turned it. His other hand came up and switched the light on.

‘All right?’ He looked around her cramped domain with eyes that took in everything.

‘Of course it’s all right,’ she said, her voice rising jaggedly. That swift, comprehensive glance was like a violation. Defensively trying to block his view, she stepped inside and swung around to face him.

‘Right. See you tomorrow.’

He closed the door behind him with a loud click of the lock. Automatically, Tansy put the chain across, her eyes narrowed beneath her fine, straight brows as she tried to work out what that had been.

Macho display? No, he had to know that men were stronger than women. Was he proving that he could make her do whatever he wanted to? Hardly. He was subtle, not brutal and as lacking in finesse as a battle-axe.

He knew Rick wasn’t there so it hadn’t been that, either, unless he thought his brother might have come back that very day.

Was he concerned about her safety, for heaven’s sake?

It gave her an odd little warmth, a warmth she instantly doused. She had lived on her own since a year after she had run away, but even before that she had to some extent always been on her own. Her foster-parents’ decision that she leave school and work in the local supermarket had merely made obvious what she had always sensed. So she had run away as far as she could, determined to follow her dream and compose beautiful, exciting music, music that would touch the hearts of generations unborn.

And she had managed, with help, to survive. Chin tilted, she looked around the small room, trying to see it with Leo Dacre’s eyes. OK, so she didn’t live in particularly salubrious surroundings, but they were hers. If she never produced anything more than the pretty little songs she sang on the streets, she had made a life on her own terms.

But she would make music. It was a kind of rage in her, a need that was more important than anything else, more necessary than food, more vital than affection, more intensely satisfying than the most ardent love-affair.

It was her future and her present. She didn’t regret jettisoning her relationship with her foster-family, and she’d not regret it if she never found anyone to love, because love could only ever take second place. There might come a time when she’d want marriage, and children, but at the moment she couldn’t imagine it.

CHAPTER TWO

COLLAPSING bonelessly into the chair, Tansy sighed and pulled off her beret, tossing it on to the bed. Her hair sprang out around her narrow face like wildfire. It was, she thought gloomily, about the only thing about her that actually had any life to it. Too much life: completely uncontrollable and far too obvious, she kept it covered as much as possible. It contrasted brashly with the pale, scrawny, unobtrusive rest of her.

Suddenly weary, she got ready for bed, where she lay awake for too long, wondering how Rick was getting on in his self-imposed exile. And exactly what effect his mother’s illness was going to have on his life.

* * *

On her way to Lambton Quay the next morning she tried to ring the camp, but was rebuffed by the very unforthcoming man who answered. He informed her he was the cook and that everyone else was out for the day, and as she opened her mouth, hung up.

‘Damn,’ she muttered, seething with frustration. That was several dollars down the drain. Hastily she rang the university, hoping to be able to talk to Professor Paxton about grants, but he wasn’t there, and wasn’t expected in that day.

Altogether an exercise in futility.

* * *

Just before lunch she watched a limousine pull up outside a very upmarket hotel and disgorge three men. One she recognised as an important industralist, one was a quintessential yes-man, dark-suited and eager, and the third was Leo Dacre. He saw her, but apart from a quizzical lift of his brows gave no sign of recognition.

Ignoring him, she hurried on her way, but the incident dramatised the difference between them. King Cophetua and the beggar maid, she thought ironically. Except that the beggar maid had been beautiful, and the king had fallen in love with her. Young as Tansy had been when she’d read the story, she’d always wondered whether the beggar maid had really enjoyed being queen.

It wasn’t a good day; the weather was still unseasonable so there were few shoppers about, and those who had to brave the wind weren’t wanting to stop and listen. At three-thirty she let herself think wistfully of Auckland summers that started in November and went on sometimes until June.

Remember the sticky, airless humidity, too, she told herself, slipping into a rollicking Caribbean folksong with forced enthusiasm. A few people tossed coins into her guitar case. They were going to be the last; as she finished the song with a flourish she realised that the street was almost empty of people.

Lord, she hoped things picked up. Perhaps she should go north to Auckland. There were more people there. Or Queenstown...there were always tourists visiting the South Island’s lovely lakes and mountains. And where there were holidaymakers, there was a delightfully casual attitude about money.

Unfortunately it cost money to get there. Of course, she could hitch hike.

No, it wasn’t worth the risk.

She packed up and set off, telling herself that the odd sensation under her breastbone was just hunger, not disappointment nor foreboding. The guitar dragged heavily on her arm.

A moment later she decided that she might be psychic after all. A car drew up beside her and Leo Dacre said, ‘Hop in and I’ll take you for a drink somewhere.’

‘I’m on my way home.’ She was astounded at the treacherous warmth spreading through her.

‘Get in,’ he said calmly.

She shook her head.

‘I want to talk about Rick.’ He got out and opened the rear door, holding out his hand for the guitar. ‘Come on, we’ll have afternoon tea and then I’ll take you straight home.’

And even as she wondered why he had such an effect on her, she found herself handing over the instrument and getting in.

‘How long have you been busking?’ he asked as he set the car in motion.

‘Why ask me questions you already know the answers to?’ she retorted.