When the Devil Drives (5 page)

Simon's personal obligations to me, and his bookie friend.'

Joanna stood rigidly, feeling the colour drain out of her face. It was

like standing in the dock, she thought dazedly, knowing you were

innocent, but hearing a life sentence pronounced just the same. She

wanted to scream aloud, to hit out in anger and revulsion, but a small,

cold inner voice warned her to keep cool—keep talking—keep

bargaining.

She lifted her chin. 'What about this house—our home? Do you

intend to take that too?'

'Originally,

yes,'

he

said.

'But

if

you

behave

with

sufficient—er—generosity to me, I might be prepared to match it,

and leave it in Chalfont hands for your father's lifetime at least.' He

smiled at her sardonically. 'Its fate rests entirely with you, beauty.'

She bit her lip, her whole being cringing from the implications in his

words. 'And the Craft Company? Will you leave that alone too?'

'I think you're beginning to overestimate the price of your charms,'

Cal Blackstone said drily. 'No, my investment in the Craft Company

stays—as insurance, if you like, for your continuing good behaviour.'

Joanna closed her eyes for a moment. She said evenly, 'I suppose

there's no point in appealing to your better nature. Reminding you

that there are normal standards of decency.'

'Tell me about it,' he said laconically. He glanced up at the portrait

over the fireplace and his expression hardened. 'At least I'm not

evicting you without notice, throwing you on to the street.'

'And if I tell you that I do have standards—that I have my pride and

my self-respect? And that I'd rather starve in the gutter than accept

any part of your revolting terms?'

He shrugged again. 'Then that can be quite easily arranged,' he

returned. 'The choice is yours. But I strongly advise you to think my

offer over. You've got twenty-four hours.'

'I don't need twenty-four seconds,' she said bitingly. 'You can do your

worst, Mr Blackstone, and go to hell!'

'I shall probably end there, Mrs Bentham,' he said too courteously.

'But first I mean to order that independent audit I mentioned into the

Craft Company's accounts.' He paused. 'Simon may well find himself

facing more than a bankruptcy court. How will the Chalfont pride

cope with that, I wonder?'

'I don't believe you. He wouldn't do such a thing.' Her voice shook

with the force of her conviction.

'Ask him,' he said. 'Some time' during the next twenty-four hours.

Then call me with your final answer.'

'You've had all the answer you're getting, you bastard!' she said. 'I'll

see you damned before I do what you want!'

He gave her a sardonic look, as he retrieved the papers from the

coffee-table and slipped them back into his pocket. 'Don't count on it,

beauty. I promise one thing—when you do call, I won't say that I told

you so.'

Knuckles pressed to her mouth, Joanna stood like a statue as he made

his way across the room to the door. As it closed behind him, she bent

and snatched up a cut glass posy bowl, hurling it with all the force of

her arm at the solid panels.

'The swine!' she sobbed, as it shattered. 'Oh, God, the unutterable

bloody swine!'

She was like a cat on hot bricks for the rest of the day waiting for

Simon to return. It took all her self- control not to drive over to the

nursing home and confront him there. She was sorely tempted, too, to

drive over to the Craft Company and do her own spot check of the

books.

But she discarded the idea. Such action would be bound to provoke

just the kind of comment she wanted to avoid. And if, by the remotest

chance, there was something even slightly amiss... She caught at

herself. That was the kind of poisonous reptile Cal Blackstone was,

she raged inwardly. Sowing discord and distrust wherever he went.

She couldn't deny that Simon had been all kinds of a fool, but she

couldn't believe he was also a thief. She wouldn't believe it.

'There's got to be some way out of this mess,' she said aloud, through

gritted teeth, as she paced the length and breadth of the

drawing-room. 'There's got to be. Together we'll think of something.

We have to!'

She swallowed convulsively as that same small voice in her head

reminded her of the sheer magnitude of what was threatening them

all. The loss of their home, the destruction of their remaining business

venture, and personal disgrace for Simon—and all at the worst

possible time, if there was ever a good time for such things to happen,

she acknowledged wryly.

It was no good telling herself that it was all Simon's own fault, and

he'd have to find some remedy himself. She couldn't leave him to sink

if she could help him to swim. But she couldn't sacrifice herself

either.

Cal Blackstone's words rang like hammer blows inside her brain. 'I

want you. Come to me...'

He's just offered me the ultimate insult, she told herself, by

presuming I'd even consider such a degrading suggestion. He's

misjudged me completely.

Yet he'd summed up some of her past reactions with disturbing

accuracy, she recalled unwillingly. His comments about her marriage

to Martin had been too close to the mark for comfort.

She shivered. What was she saying? She'd loved Martin, of course

she had. He'd been sweet and safe and
there,
and she'd thought that

was enough. She'd convinced herself that it was.

Only it wasn't, she thought wretchedly. How could it be? And it was

disaster for both of us.

On the day of his funeral, she'd stood in the small bleak churchyard in

the conventional black dress of the widow, feeling drained of

emotion, totally objective, as if all this tragedy were happening to

some other person. She could even remember being thankful that the

demure veiling on her equally conventional hat concealed the fact

that she was completely tearless.

Then she'd looked up and seen Cal Blackstone staring at her. He'd

been standing on the edge of thesmall crowd of mourners, but his

head wasn't bent in grief or common respect. There had been

bitterness i'a the look he sent her, and condemnation, and overlying

all a kind of grim triumph.

Don't think I've given up, his glance had told her. This marriage of

yours was just an obstacle which has now been removed. And now

I'm coming after you again.

The knowledge of it had been like a blow, knocking all the breath out

of her body. Involuntarily, instinctively, she'd taken a step backwards

in instant negation, her foot stumbling on a tussock of earth.

'Be careful, my dear!' Her father had insisted on attending the

ceremony with her, standing bareheaded at her side in the windswept

graveyard, and she'd snatched at his arm for comfort and support as

she'd done when she was a small girl, and a crowd of jeering boys had

thrown earth and stones at their car.

Oh, I will, she'd promised herself silently. I'll take more care than I've

ever done in my whole life.

Aunt Vinnie's letter offering her sanctuary had been, like Martin's

proposal of marriage, a godsend, a lifeline, and she'd snatched at that

too, telling herself that Cal Blackstone would eventually resign

himself to the fact that she was gone, and abandon his crazy obsession

about her.

He wasn't really serious about it, she'd assured herself over and over

again. For heaven's sake, he was never short of female

companionship, so he wasn't exactly single-minded about his pursuit

of her, if she could call it that. He didn't chase her, yet he always

seemed to be there, like a dark shadow on the edge of her world, a

winter storm threatening the brightness of her horizon.

If she went away, and stayed away, with luck he'd forget her, and get

safely married to one of the many willing ladies he escorted. Time

and distance would solve everything. That was what she'd thought.

That was how she'd reassured herself.

But how wrong was it possible to be? Joanna thought broodingly, as

she paced restlessly up and down. Cal Blackstone hadn't just been

making mischief and trying to alarm her, as she'd secretly hoped and

prayed. He'd meant every word, and that warning look he'd sent her at

Martin's funeral had been nothing less than a stark declaration of

intent.

And typical of his appallingly tasteless behaviour, she thought with a

fastidious shudder, then paused, a hysterical bubble of laughter

welling up inside her.

Why the hell was she worrying about something as trivial as the way

he'd treated her as a widow in mourning, when he was now

threatening her and her entire family with total humiliation and ruin?

While she'd thought herself safe in the States, Cal Blackstone had

been busy ensnaring Simon in a web of financial dependency, both

personal and professional. Then he'd sat back and waited, like the

spider, for the unsuspecting fly to return...

But that was defeatist talk, she told herself in self- reproach. After all,

if the fly struggled hard enough, even the strongest web could be

broken.

She was halfway through a dinner she had no interest in eating when

Simon eventually came in. He looked tired and anxious, and for a

moment she was tempted to leave him in the peace he so clearly

needed at least until the morning.

She let him talk for a while about Fiona and the labour pains which

had so unaccountably subsided while he ate his meal.

Then she said quietly, 'Don't you want to know what happened this

afternoon?'

He shrugged, his face adopting a faintly martyred expression. 'I

suppose so. To be honest, Jo, although his letter threw me when it

arrived, I've been thinking about it while I've been hanging around at

the nursing home, and, frankly, I don't know what all the fuss is

about. Things at work are picking up slowly. He'll get his money

back, and he'll just have to be patient, that's all. I hope you told him

so.'

She picked up the coffee-pot and filled two cups with infinite care.

'I didn't actually get the chance,' she said. 'He didn't come here to talk

about work. It was your other debts he was concerned with. The ones

you ran up at the casino, and the race-track.'

She watched him go white. There was a long, painful silence. Then he

said very rapidly, 'He told you that, but he had no right. He said there

was no hurry. He knew I'd pay it all off if he just gave me time.'

'How?' She looked at Simon's guilty, miserable face and knew that

the question was unanswerable.

She nerved herself to go on. 'He—he did mention the Craft Company

in one context. He talked about the books—the accounts…'

'What about them?' Simon's gaze was fixed on the polished dining

table.

'He said something about an independent audit,' Joanna said, and

stopped appalled as Simon's cup dropped from his hand, spilling

coffee everywhere.

'Can he do that?' The blue eyes were scared, imploring. 'Can he, Jo?'

'Is there some reason why he shouldn't?' She tried to speak evenly, but

her voice trembled as she realised she had to face, to come to terms

with the unthinkable.

He didn't reply, just picked up his table napkin and began blotting up

the coffee as if it were the most important thing in the world.

She said, 'It's true, then. There's money missing, and you're

responsible.'

'Whose bloody company is it anyway?' he said, his tone mutinous,

defensive.

'Not yours to that extent. Simon, are you crazy?'

'I had to do something. Fiona was miserable, and needed a break. She

had her heart set on St Lucia. She's never known what it is to be short

of cash—she doesn't understand.'

Joanna closed her eyes for a moment, trying to visualise Fiona's

reaction to the news that her husband had made them bankrupt and

homeless. But her imagination balked at the very idea.

'Go on,' she said, with infinite weariness. 'So you embezzled money

from the Craft Company to take Fiona on an expensive holiday.'

'I did not embezzle it!' Simon's face was flushed now with anger. 'I

borrowed it.'

'With Philip's knowledge and permission?'

'I didn't think it was necessary to mention it to him. After all, it was

only a couple of thousand or so on temporary loan. I fully intended to

pay it back. One damned good win at blackjack was all I needed.'

'But you didn't win.'

'No, I started losing really badly. I kept telling myself my luck would

change, but it didn't. It just kept getting worse.'