Stronger Than Yearning. PENNY JORDAN
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of colour stained her high cheekbones as she happened to glance at Lucy and saw that the younger girl was enjoying seeing her bested by James Allingham. Hard on the heels of her initial anger came pain. What had happened to her and Lucy? They had once been so close. But she knew what had happened. Lucy resented her refusal to discuss her father with her.
It was infuriating that James Allingham should so easily have got the better of her and in front of Lucy too, but what was more infuriating was that he was making it clear to her that he felt he had a greater right to the Hall than she did. Her chin went up, her eyes unknowingly flashing warning signs at him. ‘Well, it’s a most interesting story, Mr Allingham,’ she conceded graciously, ‘and I can quite understand why you should want to buy the old Hall.’
‘The auction is due to begin in half an hour,’ he commented briefly, glancing at what Jenna could easily recognise as an extremely expensive gold watch. What she could see of his wrist beneath the cuff of his woollen shirt was well muscled, covered in fine dark hairs and extremely masculine. For some reason the sight of it disturbed her, setting off tiny flurries of sensation in her stomach.
‘Why don’t I give you a lift down there?’
His arrogant assumption that she would want to travel with him infuriated Jenna, her fury fuelled by the unfamiliar sensations she had just experienced. Part of her realised, or at least suspected that he was deliberately trying to get her off balance, and yet even knowing this, another part of her still reacted to what she suspected was a deliberate encouragement of her anger. No doubt her red hair had already betrayed to him her quick temper, and perhaps he hoped to push her into some sort of hasty hot-headed reaction which would unnerve her before the auction. She had come across this sort of tactical manoeuvre before and thoroughly despised it. Her upper lip curled slightly. He was everything she most detested in the male sex, she thought furiously. Arrogant, an overweening belief in himself, a masculine air of superiority that she longed to challenge, but most of all, an amused and slightly taunting manner towards herself, as though she, like Lucy, was little more than a child. He could not be more than thirty-six or so: the seven-year age-gap between them was scarcely large enough to warrant his almost paternal mockery of her. It was on the tip of her tongue to refuse him when Nancy suddenly interrupted, ‘Oh, what an excellent idea. You know you said your car wasn’t behaving very well,’ she reminded Jenna.
‘Then it’s all settled.’ The smile James Allingham gave Nancy was pure sexual coercion, Jenna told herself distastefully, refusing to admit to the strange feeling she experienced when she saw the warmth in his eyes as they rested mischievously on the older woman’s plump face.
She had already noticed that Lucy seemed ready to hang on his every word and she was not very pleased when the girl burst out impulsively, ‘Oh, Mother, surely you aren’t going to go ahead and bid for the house now? Not when you can see how much James wants it. After all, it did once belong to his family.’
Jenna had to grit her teeth together to stop herself snapping at Lucy’s mock-virtuous tone. No doubt it would suit Lucy very well indeed if she were to back out of the auction, but she had no intention of doing so. And as for the house once belonging to James’s family … Anger and pain — both were there inside her. Oh, Lucy, if only you knew, she thought wryly. But Lucy did not and how could she tell her? Her smile for James Allingham was tight and slightly bitter. ‘Yes, I can quite see that Mr Allingham has a valid claim to the house, Lucy,’ she agreed, ‘but as I’m sure he is aware one can’t allow oneself to be clouded by emotion when it comes to business matters.’
As she swept towards the door, Jenna thought she heard Lucy mutter rebelliously, ‘Or when it comes to any matters …’ but even as she stiffened and was about to turn, she heard the inner door slam as Lucy walked into the hall.
‘A very attractive young lady, your daughter,’ James Allingham remarked a few seconds later as he settled her into his car — a Mercedes saloon, she noticed absently as she fastened her seat-belt.
‘I think so.’ Her cool voice was meant to warn him not to trespass any further, but James Allingham refused to take the hint.
‘There’s just the two of you, or so she tells me,’ he persisted. That he should ignore her warning and continue with his line of questioning angered Jenna even further.
‘That’s right,’ she agreed, knowing as she did so that her voice sounded brittle, defensive almost, and that angered her even more.
‘She also tells me that she doesn’t want to come back and live in Yorkshire.’
Impossible not to miss the amused, half-victorious sidelong glance he gave her as he put the car in motion.
‘You and Lucy seemed to have had an extremely enlightening conversation,’ Jenna said tartly. ‘At least, enlightening as far as you were concerned.’
He shrugged and met her cold glance with an easy smile. ‘I bumped into her as I came out of the Hall. We got chatting.’ He shrugged again. ‘She seemed to be in need of someone to confide in. Sometimes strangers make the best listeners. I take it you do still intend to bid?’ Another sideways glance.
Jenna was infuriated. ‘Why shouldn’t I? Because of that little sob-story you’ve just told us?’ She managed an arctic, derisive smile. ‘Oh, come on, Mr Allingham, I wasn’t born yesterday, even if Lucy was.’
‘Meaning?’ His voice was as cold as her own now, and somehow slightly intimidating, making Jenna uncomfortably aware of the fact that she was alone with him in his car. Wild thoughts of his kidnapping her … holding her captive somewhere until the auction was over, flooded into her mind, only to be dismissed as more rational reasoning took over.
It gave Jenna a brief sense of satisfaction to know that she had got under his skin and broken through that air of easy confidence at last.
‘Oh, it’s not that I don’t believe you’re telling the truth,’ she told him, her own confidence restored.
‘I’m relieved to hear it.’
The sardonic inflexion beneath the words momentarily rang warning bells but Jenna ignored them.
‘Then why the antagonism?’ he questioned, throwing her off balance by the unexpectedness of his question.
‘Surely I don’t need to spell out for you the fact that you used what you learned from my daughter in an effort to dissuade me from bidding for the house?’ Jenna said by way of explanation, hoping that he would not probe any further.
‘Meaning that you don’t give a damn whether your daughter wants to move up here or not?’
The injustice of his calmly delivered comment stung. That wasn’t what she had meant at all, but she was too honest to be able to refute completely what he had said. ‘Of course I do,’ she snapped, ‘but I happen to believe that at fifteen Lucy is not old enough to know where she does or does not want to live. I don’t consider that London is exactly an ideal environment for an impressionable teenager.’
‘She tells me you sent her to boarding school,’ he commented, changing tack.
Dark colour flamed in Jenna’s cheeks.
What else had Lucy told this threatening stranger? And he was threatening … every instinct Jenna possessed told her so.
‘That’s right.’ Her curt, clipped voice warned him against any further intrusion, but, as before, he ignored it.
‘Do you think that’s wise, for a mother to completely abandon the upbringing of her child to others?’
For a moment Jenna was so angry that she had to clench her hands tightly against the leather of the seat to stop herself from coming out with the first biting retort that sprang to her lips.
‘I am a single parent, Mr Allingham,’ she said at last, ‘and in common with other single parents I have to earn money to support myself and my daughter. Much as I would love to spend more time with Lucy it just hasn’t been possible.’ Inwardly she was shaking with temper. How dared