Four Christmas Treats. Jessica Hart
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CHAPTER EIGHT
‘SILAS, someone must have stolen the car,’ Tilly exclaimed, shocked.
‘I doubt that.’ There was a grimness in his voice that made Tilly look uncertainly at him. His mobile had started to ring and he removed it from his pocket, flicking it on, while Tilly moved discreetly out of earshot so as not to seem as though she were listening in.
‘That was Cissie-Rose,’ Silas announced, coming over to her. ‘Apparently she’d had enough of Segovia, and the boys were cold and tired, so she decided to take the car and drive back without us.’
Tilly’s face revealed her shocked disbelief.
‘You mean she’s left us here with no way of getting back to the castle?’
‘I mean exactly that,’ Silas agreed curtly.
‘But why on earth would she do that?’
Silas suspected that he knew the answer. Cissie-Rose had made it plain that she was offended because he hadn’t responded to her sexual overtures on the drive to Segovia, and this, he suspected, was her way of paying him back for his refusal to play along. This development was a complication he hadn’t allowed for, he admitted. From the point of view of achieving his purpose in coming to Spain, it made sense to cool things down with Tilly. He could continue to play the role of her fiancé while at the same time discreetly making use of Cissie-Rose’s none-too-subtle hint that she was open to a flirtation with him, since Cissie-Rose would undoubtedly provide him with a more direct route to Art’s confidences than Tilly. With his research at stake he wasn’t in a position to allow himself the luxury of moral scruples. He had a duty to reveal the truth.
But no duty to live it?
If he had to choose between vindicating those who had worked to reveal the truth about Jay Byerly and sacrificing Tilly’s good opinion of him, he had to choose the greater need. And what about Tilly herself. What about her need and her feelings?
Silas could feel anger with himself boiling up inside him. He was dragging issues into the equation that did not need to be there. He and Tilly were sexually attracted to one another. There was no logical or moral reason why, as two consenting adults, they shouldn’t be free to explore that mutual sexual attraction, and no reason either why they should not enjoy a shared relationship. It didn’t need to affect his original purpose in coming here.
And it could be over as quickly as it had started. Was that what he hoped for and wanted? Because he didn’t want to have to see the look in Tilly’s eyes if she discovered the truth?
There was no point in telling her. His original decision had been made before he had met her, and had nothing whatsoever to do with her. Semantics, Silas warned himself. And they weren’t enough to take away the acid sour taste of growing dislike of his dishonesty.
Tilly looked up at the sky, from which snow was falling increasingly heavily and fast. Icy prickles of anxiety skidded down her spine. She was pretty sure that Cissie-Rose had acted out of spite and selfishness, but she didn’t want to run her down in front of Silas and end up sounding catty and judgemental. Besides, she had more important things to worry about than complaining about what Cissie-Rose had done. Like worrying about how on earth they were now going to get back to the castle.
‘Perhaps we should ring the castle and ask if someone could come and collect us?’ she suggested to Silas.
He shook his head. ‘It will be much simpler if we try and organise a car from this end. I noticed a car-hire place earlier.’
Half an hour later, there was a grim look on Silas’s face as he was told that the earliest anyone could provide them with a car would be the following day.
The snow was now falling thick and fast.
‘There’s nothing else for it, I’m afraid,’ he told Tilly. ‘We’re going to have to spend the night here in town. I noticed a couple of hotels when we were walking round.’
What Silas said made good sense, but Tilly’s heart had sunk further with every word. She too had noticed the hotels as they’d walked past them. Both of them had looked very exclusive, and would therefore be expensive. Knowing she was on a limited budget, she had deliberately left her credit card at the castle, in case she was tempted to use it, and all she had in her bag was a small amount of currency that would be nowhere near enough to pay for even one hotel room, never mind two and the cost of a hire car.
‘It does make sense to stay here,’ she agreed. ‘But I’m afraid we’re going to have to find somewhere inexpensive, Silas. You see, I didn’t bring my credit card with me…’
Silas could see how uncomfortable and worried she was. ‘It’s my fault we’ve been stranded here,’ he told her calmly. ‘I suppose I should have guessed that Cissie-Rose might play this kind of trick on us. Don’t worry about the cost of the hotel and the car hire. I’ll pay for them.’
‘You can’t do that,’Tilly objected. ‘Both those hotels looked dreadfully expensive. It wouldn’t be fair. They could cost you more than I’ve paid the agency…’
‘It’s okay. Calm down. The agency always give us emergency cover money. I daresay they’ll reclaim it from you once we get back home,’ he fibbed, adding briskly, ‘Look, we either book in somewhere or we hang around for hours in the hope that Martin can be called in from his half-day off to come and collect us.’
His reference to Martin being on his half-day off had the effect on Tilly’s conscience he had known it would. Immediately she shook her head and protested, ‘Oh, no, we can’t do that. It wouldn’t be fair.’
‘And it won’t be fair to us either, if we stand here and freeze to death—will it?’ he said, taking hold of her arm and firmly turning her round in the direction of the town.
‘It’s going to look very odd if we book in without any luggage,’ Tilly warned him.
‘Not in these weather conditions. They’re probably used to travellers getting stranded.’
Ten minutes later they were standing in the snow outside one of the hotels Tilly had noticed. It looked even more exclusive close up than she had thought when she’d seen it earlier.
‘We can’t book in here,’ she protested to Silas.
‘Of course we can,’he said, ignoring her inclination to hang back and nodding his head in acknowledgement of the uniformed doorman holding open the door for them.
Although he had a relatively well-paid job, Silas wasn’t dependent on it financially. His maternal grandparents had been wealthy, and Silas, as their only grandchild, had inherited the bulk of it. Ordinarily he chose to live on what he earned, but he was perfectly comfortable in the kind of moneyed surroundings they were now entering—as Tilly noted when she stood back while he approached the reception desk.
Within five minutes he had returned to her side, explaining, ‘They’re pretty fully booked, because of the time of year, but they can give us a suite and they’ll sort out a hire car for us for the morning.’
‘A suite? But that will cost the earth!’Tilly protested.
‘It’s all they had left,’ Silas told her grimly. ‘We’d better go up and make sure it’s okay. Then, since we won’t be returning to the castle until tomorrow morning, I think that we might as well find somewhere to have a late lunch and explore the rest of the town.’
He didn’t want to admit even in his most private thoughts how torn he was between the sheer urgency of his physical desire for Tilly and the cautionary voice inside him that was warning him that if he had any sense he would keep Tilly at arm’s length, instead of increasing the intimacy between them—for her sake as well as his. Her sake? When exactly had he started to care about wanting to protect her?
Tilly nodded her head in approval of Silas’s plan. The lift had arrived, and