Peacock's Walk (20 page)

market. It was all I needed. At least it gave me a chance to see you again.'

At this point Jenny raised her eyes to his. 'You didn't act as if you wanted to see me again,' she said in a tender yet gently scolding manner. 'If I remember rightly, you were not very nice to me.'

He kissed her hard before defending himself with, 'I meant to be, but seeing you there, looking just as lovely as I remembered, made me forget all my good intentions. I wanted to sweep you into my arms and kiss the living daylights out of you. I wouldn't have left you enough breath to refuse whatever I wanted of you. So I had to do the next best thing, try and goad you into showing me that letter, if only to get your own back on me and show me what a heel I'd been in not believing you. Believe me, my love, if you had, we wouldn't be standing here now wasting precious time.' He kissed her again.

Jenny nestled against him after his lips had left hers. 'I'm so glad you decided not to go out to dinner tonight,' she murmured. 'I was going to destroy it, you know.'

'I'd worked that much out,' he growled as he held her tight. 'I knew you well enough to know that something had sparked off that panic-stricken look in your eyes, and it didn't take a master-mind to work out the connection between that and the incident of the safe.' He flicked a caressing finger under her chin. 'Never try to fool me, my love, I know your every mood. I also knew that whatever it was in that safe, it was important. It just had to be that damned letter.'

Jenny looked down at the crumpled envelope that now lay on the floor by her feet, and bent down swiftly to pick it up. Then with a slow but firm movement she drew the letter out of the envelope and handed it to Mark. 'Take it,' she said softly, 'and my heart with it.'

Later that evening, as she lay in Mark's arms on the old, comfortable settee in her sitting-room, she murmured softly, 'We've Dilys to thank for this, you know. If she hadn't forced the issue, I suppose we'd still be at loggerheads.'

'Want to bet on it?' growled Mark as his lips roamed over the nape of her neck. 'She only beat me to it by a short neck. I'd got to the end of my tether where you were concerned, and I think she knew it. I'd made plans to take you to Devil's Dyke the following day, and this time I wanted an answer from you, and it was going to be the right one, or else,' he added threateningly. 'I had to do something with Dilys breathing down my neck.' He frowned. 'I guess I was partly to blame for her actions later. I did come down hard on her, but I saw no other way. I was having enough trouble with you, without her complicating things. I didn't bother to wrap it up, I gave it her straight from the shoulder. I didn't enjoy doing it, but that was the only way to get through to her. I hadn't encouraged her, so I had no conscience about it. It was through my respect for Silas that I hadn't clamped down on her earlier. I always thought she'd grow out of it. She doesn't know it, but I think I represented the father figure complex to her. She adored her father, you know, and from
things I've heard from Silas, there was a similarity between him and me. It was the reason why she would never accept her stepfather, and won't forgive her mother for marrying again.'

Jenny sighed softly. 'Poor Dilys,' she said sadly. 'We can only hope that she finds someone else, and is as happy as we are.'

'I'll second that,' Mark replied lovingly, and kissed her.