Dirty Aristocrat (24 page)

Tawny Greystoke

A
s soon as our eyes locked, everyone else and everything else in the room melted away, my mouth opened and I started howling like some demented animal. I seemed to have no control over my actions. My whole body was shaking uncontrollably. In an instant he was there next to me. He wrapped his strong arms around me and held me like he had never done since Robert gave me to him.

‘You conspired with them,’ I sobbed loudly. ‘You made me hate you.’

He stroked my hair, his face pained. ‘I know. I know, darling. I’m so sorry, but there was no other way to do it.’

I looked at him with accusing eyes. ‘I was so frightened. I thought they were going to kill me, but what hurt even more was that you betrayed me.’

‘I’m sorry, sweetheart. I really am. Please try to understand. I had no choice,’ he murmured in my ear.

‘You could have told me,’ I whimpered.

‘You are the worst actress I’ve ever met in my life, Tawny Greystoke. You’d have given the game away straight away. It was too important. I couldn’t take the chance, my darling.’

‘They could have hurt me, and then what would you have done,’ I said.

His jaw hardened suddenly and his eyes were like chips of slate. ‘You were never in any danger. Not for one tiny second.’

I sniffed pitifully, and he took an army knife from his leather jacket and started to cut through the Clingfilm.

‘I was always there, sweet Tawny. I had to do it this way. I had to flush them out. I can’t be looking over my shoulder for the rest of our lives. That bunch of airheads would never give up, and they are stupid enough for me to actually fear them.’

As soon as I felt my limbs become free, the dam I had been holding back broke, I hid my face in his chest and sobbed my eyes out. He held me and let me stay there. He knew it was just pent up emotion and it was better out than in.

When the tears subsided and I raised my head, Dr. Spencer was standing in front of us. The whole world was upside down. Dr. Spencer who I’d always thought hated me was working behind the scenes to save me.

‘I’m sorry I frightened you,’ he said softly.

I shook my head to signify that it didn’t matter. ‘What about James?’ I asked.

He shook his head.

‘Right,’ I said sadly. How blind I had been. Everyone had managed to fool me. ‘Does he have a sick wife?’

‘I believe he has a wife, but she is not sick.’

‘Well. Never mind.’

He leaned forward and gently patted my shoulder. ‘You’ll be all right, Lady Greystoke.’

‘Please call me Tawny.’

‘Then you must call me Harry,’ he said with a smile.

‘I will. I always wanted to be close to you because Robert loved you so much, but you were always so cold and horrible to me.’

‘I’m sorry. It was necessary.’ He put his hand into his jacket and held out an envelope.

‘For me?’ I whispered.

He nodded.

‘What is it?’ I asked looking at it.

‘It’s from Robert.’

‘Robert?’ I repeated with a frown.

‘Yes. He knew this day would come. He planned very carefully, Tawny. He loved you so much. You changed him. He said until you came into his life, he was a cold, unfeeling creature. He always thought of you as the golden child that changed Silas Marner’s life.’

I took the envelope in my hand. It had my name across the front in Robert’s scrawly handwriting. I looked up at Harry, confused and disturbed. ‘But he never left you anything in the will?’

‘No, if he had then Rosalind would not have trusted me.’

‘But you lost out,’ I said.

He smiled. ‘Everything I wanted I already received while Robert was alive.’

‘No,’ I decided firmly. ‘I’m going to give you the inheritance you deserve. I’m going to see that you’re all right, Harry. I’m going to make you rich.’

He smiled sadly.

‘Why does that make you sad?’ I asked, surprised by his reaction.

‘I was just thinking of Robert. How well he knew us all.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘He told me that the day I gave you this envelope you would give me more than anything he would have. He used the exact words you used. “She’ll make you rich,” he said.’ He sighed. ‘Anyway, I should be going.’

‘Goodbye Harry and thank you so much for everything you have done. You’ll be hearing from my solicitor very soon.’

He smiled. ‘Thank you.’

As he walked away Ivan turned to me. ‘Come on,’ he said. ‘I’ll take you somewhere you can sit and read that letter.’

There were still some policemen loitering about but almost everybody was gone. Carefully, Ivan lifted me up and carried me as if I was a baby to Robert’s study. He took me to Robert’s favorite chair and lowered me on to the dustsheet. ‘Read your letter and we’ll talk when I come back. There is so much I want to tell you,’ he said.

I grabbed his hand. ‘No, we’ll read it together. No more secrets.’

He smiled. ‘No more secrets,’ he echoed. Hauling me out of the chair, he sat down and pulled me onto his lap.

I stroked the letter and suddenly felt like crying all over again.’

‘It’s OK, my darling,’ Ivan said. Circling my wrist, he brought my hand to his lips and kissed my fingertips.

With great care I opened the envelope and was shocked by the faint fragrance of Robert’s aftershave. I brought it to my nose and inhaled it before it was gone forever.

‘I wanted to call him Daddy,’ I told Ivan.

‘I know. I know you loved him.’

I nodded. ‘Yes, I did.’

My throat closed over and my eyes were blurred with tears. I pulled the letter out. It was only a short letter. Just like Robert. Writing me a letter from the grave and keeping it short.

I cleared my throat and read it aloud. ‘My darling daughter, if you are reading this letter then everything has worked exactly as I planned. You have tipped your hat to the right angle and allowed the right man to seduce you. He’s wonderful, my stepson, is he not? Have the wonderful life you so richly deserve, my sweet darling. I’ll see you before you see me. Kiss the baby turtles for me. Love, Daddy. xx’

Tears were pouring down my face.

How much I had underestimated Robert. After his death I allowed myself to become convinced that his illness had made him careless. I believed he had miscalculated and misjudged, but he had not. He had laid his plans very carefully. He saw things far into the future that neither Ivan, or I had. I folded the letter and put it back into the envelope. Then I lifted my head and looked into Ivan’s eyes.

‘I can sell this house and you can have the money from the sale.’

To my shock his eyes filled with tears. ‘Oh my darling,’ he breathed. ‘I don’t need your money.’

‘I know about the bank. I went into your drawer. I saw the letters,’ I confessed.

He smiled. ‘Oh, Tawny. I left them there for you to find. I knew you’d have to go looking. Those letters are not real.’

I frowned and shook my head. ‘But they had letterheads and everything on them.’

‘Yeah, you can have those made for nothing these days. I think Theresa still has about ten floating about somewhere.’

‘Why did you do that?’

‘Because without motive you would never have believed I could be involved. If you had not found those letters would you have gone with James?’

‘Maybe not,’ I admitted truthfully.

‘When they made their move I needed you to be off balance and not the sharp little cookie you usually are. I needed you to follow them blindly because you were so confused. Even if you had called me to tell me where you were going it would have all fallen apart. I needed you to distrust me.’

So much thought had gone into his plan. My heart felt as if it was bursting with love for this man. I never truly understood him. There were still tears in my eyes, and he wiped them away tenderly.

‘Oh Ivan. I really believed you were with them.’

‘Shhh… I know. I wanted you to. It’s OK. All is fair in love and war. I knew you heard my phone call. Hell, I threw a phone book against the wall to make a noise loud enough to wake you up.’

‘But I suffered so. You don’t have a clue how much it hurt me.’

‘Not as much as me. It had to be done. There was no other way. It was agonizing to see your eyes turn wary. To see you look at me with such hurt that morning. I couldn’t even stay in the apartment. I went straight to the office and I was like … what’s that thing you say I am in the mornings?’

‘Madder than a wet hen?’

‘Not that one.’

‘When you fall out of the angry tree and hit every branch on the way down?’

‘That’s the one,’ he said with a gorgeous smile. ‘I could never betray you. I love you.’

‘What?’

‘I could never betray you.’

‘The other part,’ I prompted with a happy grin.

‘I love you.’

‘You really do?’

‘Can’t you tell? Fucking hell, for a smart cookie you sure are dumb. Don’t you know when a man acts cold and disinterested in the presence of a drop dead beauty he is crazy about her?’

‘This is so hard to take in. I really thought you didn’t want me.’

There is only one word that comes into my head when I think of you. Mine. You were the one thing I couldn’t walk away from, the one constant thing I desired more than anything else. No matter how hard I tried I couldn’t get you out of my mind or my fantasies.’ He winked. ‘You don’t know the things you’ve done in my fantasies. Besides I knew you secretly couldn’t keep your hands off me.’

‘You think the sun rises just to hear you crow, don’t you?’ I retorted.

‘Doesn’t it?’

I grinned. ‘Well, I suppose I will keep you then. You’ll be useful for picking up heavy stuff.’

‘And licking your pussy.’

I licked my lips. ‘By the way, I’ve got something to tell you.’

‘That you’re my stepsister?’

My mouth fell open. ‘You knew? How?’

‘It was the last piece of the puzzle for me. The moment I found out you were a virgin I knew. No matter how beautiful you are, Robert was not going to leave his entire inheritance to a random stranger he was not even fucking. The only thing I couldn’t figure out was how it all came about.’

‘All my life my mama never told me who my father was. I figure it was because he wounded her badly. I think he was the only one she ever loved and he left her after a month.’

I bent my head and looked at my fingers. They were twisted in my lap. It still hurt to think of that day my mama died.

‘Then on the day it was clear to her that she was passing she whispered Robert’s name in my ear and told me go and find him. She said he was a mean man, but I would melt his heart. I had no money at all. I went to the bank manger to beg for a little loan and he told me … I could have the money if I got on my fine knees and sucked him off.’

Ivan’s eyes flared and his large hands covered mine protectively.

‘I didn’t know what to do. I was in such a state. I sold a little chain my mama had given me to someone who gave me seventy dollars for it. Then I went into the café and did an Internet search for Robert Maxwell, the owner of Jetcorp. I made a long distance phone call to his office and told his secretary that my name was Tawny St. Clair who was the daughter of Tandy Sinclair and that I had something very, very important to tell him.’

Remembering that time still made a lump form in my throat and I swallowed it away. 

‘I said I would be calling again tomorrow at the same time and could she kindly tell him that. The next twenty-four hours were longest in my life. The next day I called and God answered my prayers. My palms were so sweaty the phone kept slipping out of my hand, but he only asked me two questions. Was mama still alive? When I said no, I heard him sigh, and there was so much regret in the sound I knew that somehow he was no longer the mean man that mama knew. Then he asked me when I could come. Straightaway, I said. So he sent me a ticket and I came to England.’

I smiled with the memory.

‘I can still remember the first day I arrived at his doorstep. He looked at me with a smile in his eyes and said, “Well, I never would have thought it possible, but you’re even more beautiful than your mama.” I told him I thought he talked funny and he said, “That, young lady, is because you can’t hear yourself.” I laughed and so did he. And that was the beginning.’

‘Why at that stage did he make you pretend that you were a nail technician he had hired?’

‘I think he was afraid of what his children would do to me even then.’

‘My poor darling. I’ve been so unfair to you.’

‘No you haven’t. I’ve had the best time in my life with you.’

‘God, I love you so much,’ he breathed.

‘So you really, really do love me,’ I asked, almost unable to believe that someone as grand as him could love me.

‘I really, really do.’

‘When did you find out though?’ I wheedled.