His Baby!

‘But—’

‘Now!’ she ordered firmly as she gave him a gentle shove out of the door, before turning to stare indignantly up at Matt.

‘Do you think that you can suddenly arrive back here and start playing the heavy?’ she demanded furiously. ‘Or does it just do your ego good to have Mick kowtowing to you as if you were the village squire?’

The grey eyes glittered. ‘I really don’t see what you’re so uptight about, Daisy. I would have thought it was perfectly normal to enquire when we might expect you home. It’s a question I would have asked if it had been my mother he was driving. The roads are particularly icy at this time of year, as I’m sure you know.’

Oh, how great to be compared to his mother! ‘Mick’s a perfectly good driver!’ defended Daisy, who had never been in a car with him in her life.

‘I’m delighted to hear it,’ answered Matt urbanely, but his eyes were hard as they flicked intently and tellingly at the amount of leg she was showing. ‘And is that all he’s good at, I wonder?’

Daisy’s cheeks flamed at the implication and at the sudden fizzing of excitement which his cool scrutiny of her legs could provoke. ‘That was a cheap remark!’

He shrugged. ‘Only if you choose to interpret it that way. I could have been talking about his ability to handle a—tractor.’

‘Oh, sure!’

‘And you still haven’t told me what time you’ll be home.’

‘The dance finishes at eleven,’ said Daisy reluctantly, because she knew that determined glint in Matt’s eyes of old.

‘Good. I’ll expect you back by eleven-thirty. I’ll wait up,’ he added, his eyes glittering with a spark of humour as he registered the set line of her mouth.

Something about his confident self-assurance and that arrogant grace sent her blood-pressure soaring. ‘You’ve been away for years!’ Daisy, who knew it down to practically the very second, cried exasperatedly. ‘So how do you think I’ve managed to survive without your bully-boy tactics up until now?’

There was something very like a warning glint in those narrow grey eyes. ‘I don’t know, Daisy,’ he murmured softly. ‘But I intend finding out. You certainly aren’t the same girl I remember.’

‘Of course I’m not! I’m eighteen years old now!’

‘Positively ancient,’ he mocked.

‘And I’m not a girl any more—I’m a ...’ She flushed but still stared at him defiantly, just daring him to make fun of her. ‘Woman,’ she finished, but reluctantly.

The blazing grey gaze was very steady, no trace of mockery there now. ‘So you are,’ he said quietly, and then, on a different, indefinable note which made Daisy’s heart lurch, he added, ‘Somehow I wasn’t expecting it. And now I must go and check on Sophie. Goodnight, Daisy.’ But just before he turned to walk up the stairs he gave her a long, hard look, and she remembered just how for midable he could be. ‘And don’t be late,’ he added softly.

Daisy gulped as she watched his dark, retreating frame, her eyes unwillingly drawn to the long, long legs in the black denim, the broad shoulders in the soft grey shirt. Don’t be late! She’d be as late as she liked! She certainly wasn’t afraid of Matt.

She wasn’t!

Well, maybe she was. Just a little bit. And wasn’t it best to humour him? Because there was no way she wanted him to discover that she’d opted out of doing her exams and didn’t have a clue what she wanted to do in the future. Daisy shuddered as she tried to imagine Matt’s reaction to that. No way. She couldn’t face his anger—certainly not at Christmas.

But there was no reason why he should find out, she told herself reassuringly as she pulled on her thick black coat and buttoned it up to her neck. Mrs Hamilton had promised faithfully that she wouldn’t breathe a word to Matt. And she wouldn’t go back on a promise. And, she thought, if he was only here for a short while, he’d be busy with the baby and catching up with his old friends for most of the time.

Especially friends of the female variety, thought Daisy gloomily. No doubt every woman within miles would soon be flocking to the house, like ants crawling over a jam-pot, once news got round that he was back. There was something very appealing and romantic about a man looking after a baby on his own at the very best of times, but if that man happened to possess over six feet of dark, devastating charm, with a mind like a steel trap, and a self-made fortune which would rival Rockefeller’s—then he’d probably have to fight them off in droves.

Daisy was filled with a stubbornly persistent air of dejection as she swung her long legs into Mick’s battered old car, taking care to keep her knees tightly pressed together, the way they showed you in the magazines. And her mood wasn’t exactly lightened by the truculent scowl which was putting unaccustomed furrows on Mick’s normally smooth, tanned forehead.

‘You didn’t tell me that he was home!’ he muttered darkly as the ignition spluttered then fired on the third attempt and the car pulled away up the curving drive.

Daisy turned to him in surprise. ‘Why on earth should I?’

‘You know,’ he mumbled awkwardly.

‘No, I don’t know. What possible difference should Matt being home make to me? He’s not my guardian. He’s just the son of my mother’s employer.’

Mick shrugged. ‘I suppose I’ll have to get you home on time now, won’t I?’

Daisy frowned. ‘Why? Weren’t you going to?’

His perfect white teeth gleamed like tombstones in the darkness. ‘Thought we’d take the old Delaware road on the way home. They say there’s a great view from there.’ He leered suggestively. ‘Maybe another time. How long’s he staying?’

Absolutely ages,’ lied Daisy sharply, annoyed at herself for feeling so relieved that Matt’s intervention had obviously tempered the ardent desires of Mick Farlow.

Or so she thought.

What she hadn’t expected was for Mick to have the memory span of a gnat, and to forget about not drinking and getting her home on time. His eyes nearly popped out of his head when she took off her coat and he saw what she was wearing, and he immediately took her over to join a group of his friends she’d never met or even seen before. One or two of them looked distinctly shady and she didn’t like the way they were eyeing her up and down, their eyes frequently drawn to her high bust and long legs. She fervently began to wish that she hadn’t worn the dress after all. Oh, why the hell hadn’t she listened to Matt?

She watched uneasily as Mick drank three pints of beer in quick succession, but immediately agreed to his suggestion of a dance. At least if he was dancing he wouldn’t be drinking.

Which was pretty dumb of her. If she’d stopped to think about it, she would have expected him suddenly to develop the dexterity of a feeding octopus once he got her onto the dance floor.

As the dance progressed, Daisy grew more and more uneasy, and then she heard a ribald chuckle and loud whistles from his friends as he slid his hand down to rest proprietorially on her bottom. She felt quite ill.

‘Get your hands off,’ she hissed.

The fingers splayed out over one buttock. ‘Come on, baby—you know you love it really.’

Repelled and beginning to feel frightened, Daisy tried to wriggle out of his arms, but he was a strong farm worker, his burly arms bearing testimony to the physical work he did all day, and his grip was too tight for her to release herself.

‘Yeah, that’s nice.’ He leered. ‘Do it some more. Move that beautiful body against me, baby.’

Really scared now, Daisy was nonetheless determined to keep her head, recognising with disgust that the struggle was exciting him, and that he was making damned sure that she knew about it. ‘Will you let go of me?’ she demanded with icy authority.

‘Oh, come on . . .’ His words sounded slurred. ‘Sexy little thing like you—’

‘Please?’ she appealed.

‘Just begging for it—’

‘Or I’ll scream—’

‘Yeah, scream,’ he mumbled into her hair. ‘A little resistance makes it a lot more fun. And I’ll sure have you screaming later. Screaming for more—’

Daisy brought her foot down hard on his, but since she didn’t weigh a lot and her shoe was completely flat it made no impact whatsoever.

She bent her mouth close to his ear and spoke very slowly and deliberately. ‘If you don’t let go of me right now, then I shall use my knee to hit you in a part of your anatomy which I am assured is painful beyond belief—’

To her astonishment, he let her go at once, and Daisy searched around wildly before grabbing her coat and bag. Blindly, she ran out of the hall and into the cold night air of the December evening, every instinct in her body telling her to put as much distance between them as possible.

Her heart was pounding and her breath was coming in short, painful bursts which looked like smoke against the blackness of the night. At least the snow of earlier hadn’t settled, she thought fleetingly as she stumbled along. She tried to reason with herself that she was probably overreacting, that Mick had just been a little drunk and over-amorous, and that he wouldn’t actually have tried anything.

But there had been something so determinedly sinister about the way he had been holding her against her will that nothing she told herself gave her any comfort. For the first time in her life Daisy felt vulnerable and weak and abused. She had come up against a superior masculine strength which had been cruelly manipulative and had threatened her, and she didn’t like it one little bit.

Haring down the road and scarcely able to keep her balance on the icy silver surface of the glittering hoar-frost, she almost fell into the public telephone box and scrabbled around in her bag for change. It seemed to take for ever to find a fifty-pence piece and with a shaky finger she dialled the number, momentarily disconcerted and then hopelessly relieved when she heard the curt, clipped tones of Matt.

‘Yes?’

‘Matt—’ And Daisy burst into tears.

‘Daisy?’

She made a gulping sound, waiting for his terse interrogation, but it didn’t come. All he said, in an urgent and yet tightly controlled voice, was, ‘Where are you?’

‘In ...’ She gulped.

‘Daisy—for God’s sake just pull yourself together and tell me where you’re phoning from.’

‘The—call box.’

‘Go into the pub—’

‘But—’

‘Now,’ he ordered. ‘And wait for me there.’

She heard the click as the line was disconnected, and she replaced the receiver as though it were a very heavy weight.

The pub, she thought, and looked just yards down the road to where the Red Lion was festooned with blazing fairy lights for Christmas. Dazedly, she could see the sense of Matt’s logic—it was a far better idea to wait in the warmth and security of the pub than to stand alone in an isolated phone box—but the last thing in the world she felt like doing was having to face all the local revellers in the state she was in.

But in the event she didn’t have to, because as soon as she pushed the door open the landlord’s wife came bustling out from behind the bar and laid a plump, comforting arm around her shoulders.

‘Come with me, dear,’ she said firmly, and propelled Daisy behind the bar and through the connecting door which led to the landlord’s private apartments.

Dazedly, Daisy allowed herself to be seated on an over-stuffed sofa, and obediently sipped at the disgustingly sweet cup of tea which was placed in her hands, while the landlady kept up a running commentary.

‘Are you all right, dear?’

Daisy nodded numbly.

‘Mr Hamilton just phoned. Said as you had a nasty shock, and that you were on your way over. Said that you was to wait in here until he came to pick you up.’ The landlady sighed. ‘Didn’t talk for long. Seemed in a hurry. He’s got such a way with him, Mr Hamilton, hasn’t he?’

Yes, you could say that, thought Daisy.

‘And wicked handsome.’

‘Yes,’ mumbled Daisy automatically.

‘Always has been. Even when he was a little boy, I remember he had a way of looking at you with them big grey eyes and that bit of dark hair falling into them—Well, that look could have melted butter.’ She took the empty teacup from Daisy’s unprotesting fingers and put it on the sideboard. ‘Terrible shame about his wife, wasn’t it? Real beauty, wasn’t she?’

‘Yes,’ agreed Daisy, again automatically.

‘And him left with a young baby to bring up on his own. Imagine. Still, shouldn’t imagine he’ll be on his own for very long, not someone like Mr Hamilton. Oh!’ She cocked her head to one side to listen. ‘That sounds like him now.’

Dimly, Daisy heard the approaching throaty roar of a powerful engine which must definitely have been exceeding the speed limit, then the scorching sound of tyres braking dramatically outside. Then came the slamming of a door and hurried footsteps and there stood Matt in the doorway, big and powerful and commanding, a frown knitting his dark brows together and his grey eyes narrowed as his gaze swiftly swept over her, like a policeman assessing the scene of a crime.

And then he was with her, crouched down in front of her, holding her two cold hands in the warm comfort of his.

‘Are you OK?’ he said quietly, but she sensed the urgency behind his question and dumbly she nodded.

‘Sure?’

Her teeth started to chatter, and he picked up her black coat and helped her into it, buttoning it all the way up for her, and then helped her to her feet. ‘Come on,’ he said, and his voice sounded almost gentle. ‘I’ll take you home.’

Home. It sounded like heaven. Like dreams she’d had for years. Home with Matt. Daisy registered that his arm was resting on her shoulder, supporting her, and the temptation to lean even closer against him was overwhelming. He was thanking the landlady now, and Daisy falteringly did the same, and then he led her out of the pub with such a forbidding look on his face that all the interested pairs of eyes which had been watching them dropped self-consciously to survey their pints of beer. Outside, he strapped her into the big, dark green Bentley and got in beside her.

He waited until the car had purred away before he barked out a question. ‘What happened?’ he demanded. ‘The truth, Daisy.’

Daisy swallowed. ‘Mick had too much to drink, too quickly. He was showing off in front of his friends. He asked me to dance, and he ... he ...’

‘He what, Daisy?’ His voice sounded very urgent. ‘What exactly did he do?’

‘Touched me up a bit on the dance floor.’ It all sounded so tame in the telling. ‘It was nothing—really.’

‘Nothing?’ he demanded incredulously. ‘Nothing?’ His hands tightened on the steering wheel and he swore softly and extremely eloquently beneath his breath and Daisy was quite shocked; she’d never heard Matt swear before.

He didn’t say another word to her all the way home, and when she risked a peep at his set profile it was hard, almost cruel, and unbelievably angry. She’d never seen him look so angry, either.

Daisy felt like a complete fool. He had warned her, and she had ignored him, gone and worn something thoroughly unsuitable to a small village dance. She had dressed provocatively, but the provocation had all been for one man, and one man alone, she realised. The man who was sitting beside her. ‘Matt?’ she whispered tentatively, but he shook his head emphatically.

‘Not now, Daisy.’

She bit her lip, praying that the journey would soon be over so that she could crawl away to bed like a beaten dog.

As they crunched their way up the drive towards Hamilton Hall, she risked one more question. ‘Where’s Sophie?’

His voice softened by a fraction. ‘Asleep. My mother promised to look in on her.’ The car drew up to a smooth halt and he came round to help her out. ‘Let’s go in by the back entrance,’ he said quietly. ‘My mother will only spend the night worrying if she sees you’ve been crying.’ He gave a bitter kind of smile. ‘I’ve never known you to cry before. It isn’t something you normally do, is it, Daisy?’

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