Tender Assault. Anne Mather
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is a small island. People get—restless.’
‘Don’t you mean bored?’ suggested Nathan harshly, though he was evidently having some difficulty in coming to terms with what she had said. ‘So … Kittrick’s Hotel, Pelican Island—this was your baby?’
‘I didn’t say that.’ India was defensive now. ‘You know it was my mother’s idea to expand the resort——’
‘Because it wasn’t earning enough money to satisfy her as it was,’ put in Nathan caustically, but India chose to ignore him.
‘And Daddy—that is, your father—arranged the finance.’
‘You mean he put himself in hock to the bank?’ Nathan’s mouth curled. ‘Oh, yes, I know about that.’
India took a deep breath. ‘If you’re going to persist in making rude remarks, then I don’t think I want to go on with this,’ she declared stiffly. ‘I’m sure Mr Hastings must have given you all the details. If you need any more information, I suggest you ask him.’
‘Ah—damn!’
Nathan swore volubly and colourfully, and India squared her shoulders and started up the steps. She had no reason to tolerate his crudeness, she told herself. She didn’t have to defend herself to him, and she particularly didn’t have to defend her mother.
‘All right, all right, I’m sorry.’ His unexpected apology came from behind her left ear, and she realised he had followed her out of the bar. He was now standing on the step immediately below her, which accounted for the fact that his breath was fanning her neck and not the top of her head. ‘As far as Hastings is concerned,’ he went on, ‘he supplied all the necessary information, sure, but not the details. Dammit, I haven’t even met with the guy. As soon as I read his cable, I came right here.’
India turned towards him with some reluctance. And, because he was lower than she was, their eyes were almost on a level. It meant she had no chance of avoiding his defensive stare, and she crossed her arms across her midriff in an unconsciously protective gesture.
‘So,’ she said, moistening her lips with a wary tongue, ‘what more can I say?’
‘You can tell me how my father’s modest plans to build an extension to the original building turned into this place,’ he replied, spreading his arms. ‘When I left, he’d built the marina and was talking about putting in a swimming-pool and some tennis courts. Nothing like this.’
India lifted her head. ‘Well—it seemed like a good investment, that’s all.’
‘To whom?’
‘To—all of us,’ she replied, choosing her words with care.
‘But it must have cost the earth!’
‘It was worth it.’
‘Was it?’ He came up the final step so that he was standing beside her. ‘Your mother had big ideas, and my father would have done anything to please her.’
India stepped back. ‘Your father was proud of what he’d achieved!’
‘But it was a strain, right?’
‘If you’re implying that his heart attack had anything to do with money worries, you couldn’t be more wrong!’ she exclaimed angrily. ‘My God! This place is worth a small fortune! Well, not small. Quite a large fortune, actually. How dare you suggest that his illness was in any way to do with the hotel?’
Nathan’s face was unrelenting now. ‘Well, you have to admit the old man did die years sooner than anyone could have expected,’ he retorted, and India’s stomach hollowed at the realisation that in a matter of minutes he had lost all veneer of politeness. He was cold and arrogant, and every bit as aggressive as her mother had expected.
‘I don’t have to listen to this,’ she hissed, aware that the heat of their exchange was being monitored by at least two members of the staff. Paolo was obviously straining his ears to hear what was being said, and the young woman on the reception desk couldn’t help noticing that something was wrong. ‘If you have any complaints, I suggest you take them up with Mr Hastings when he gets here. I don’t want you upsetting my mother any more than she’s been upset already.’
Nathan scowled, but when he spoke it wasn’t Adele he was interested in. ‘Hastings?’ he said. ‘He’s coming here?’
‘In a couple of days, yes.’ India found it much easier to cope with this conversation with the cloak of hostility between them. ‘I asked him to delay his arrival, to give you time to familiarise yourself with the island again. Of course, I didn’t know then that you were going to start throwing accusations around as soon as you got here.’
Nathan’s jaw clamped. ‘I’m not throwing accusations around. Hell, India, I’m just trying to find out what’s been going on! Dammit, he was my father!’
‘I know.’ India squashed the feeling of sympathy that stirred inside her. ‘But that doesn’t give you the right to come here and impugn the reasons for his illness. You just might have played some part in that yourself!’
THE morning air was always cool, deliciously so, and one of Nathan’s favourite occupations had been to take a stroll along the beach before anyone else was about. He saw no reason not to do so now, even if he hadn’t slept in a bed. At this hour, the sand was clean and un-trampled, without the prints of other feet to deny his isolation.
Nevertheless, he was well aware that his actions were not wholly innocent. By delaying his return to the hotel, he was deliberately putting off the moment when he would have to deal with the situation his father’s will had created. Sooner or later, he would have to come to a decision about what he was going to do, but for the present he preferred to avoid a confrontation.
He had spent the night aboard the Wayfarer, more at home on the yacht on which his father had taught him to sail than in the absurdly opulent suite India and her mother had allotted him. In his more generous moments, he supposed it wasn’t really their fault. What did you do with someone who was, yet wasn’t, a member of the family? Particularly someone who was not welcome in the family apartments of the hotel.
Even so, he had guessed that Adele would be expecting to see him. How had she taken his father’s death? He couldn’t believe she was devastated by the tragedy. Only by what it had precipitated. The night before, he had actually anticipated the prospect of telling her to get out with some satisfaction. But that was before he had spoken to India, before he had discovered that she, and not Adele, had been running the hotel.
That was why he had taken himself off to the marina, guessing, accurately as it turned out, that no one would come looking for him there. He had needed time: time to consider the situation, time to think. He couldn’t get rid of Adele without getting rid of India as well, and, in spite of what had happened, he found he didn’t want to.
It was crazy. He knew that. Even thinking about keeping her on was going against every grain of intelligence he possessed. She had sided with her mother. She, like his father, had believed every word her mother had said. But, what the hell, she had only been thirteen! What kind of objectivity did a thirteen-year-old possess?
His father had left her future in his hands. That bugged him, too. Was the old man so sure he’d be magnanimous? Or didn’t he care what happened to either of them—Adele or her daughter? Hell, what did he know about India, come to that? He’d been away for eight years. She might be more like her mother than he thought.
Beyond the marina, the coastline scalloped in a series of rocky coves. The sand here was pink-tinged, untouched, too rigorous for the lotus-eaters at the hotel to reach. They were the coves where he had spent his childhood, shared with no one until India had invaded his life.
He grimaced.