LITMIR.BIZ

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hers. ‘Shall I take you back to your fiancé? Or would you rather step out into the corridor for a few minutes?’

      Either seemed wholly unsuitable. How could she step outside with Jaime and run the risk of being spotted by scandal-hungry reporters? But equally, how could she go back to Mark like this, her legs unwilling to support her, and trembling like a leaf?

      ‘There’s an ante-room behind the dais,’ Jaime observed quietly. ‘The band use it in the interval. You could go in there for a few moments, if you’d rather not run the gauntlet of the press.’

      The ball was being held at the Fleece, the largest hotel in the town, and the ballroom was used for conferences on other occasions and there were several ante-rooms adjoining.

      The size of the hall and the press of people made it possible to slip unnoticed into the ante-room. Miranda stood there in the semi-darkness, unwilling to put on the light, and took several restoring gulps of air. She had expected Jaime would leave her, but he leaned against the wall just inside the doorway, watching her with dark inscrutable eyes.

      ‘Better now?’ he inquired, after she had expelled her breath on a shuddering sigh, and she looked at him uncertainly.

      ‘I suppose you’ll tell Mark,’ she said.

      ‘Tell Mark? Tell him what?’

      ‘About me. About this.’

      ‘What about this?’ He straightened away from the wall. ‘Why should you think he would be interested?’

      Miranda shook her head. ‘I—don’t know.’

      ‘Don’t you?’

      He didn’t sound wholly convinced, and she flinched when he put out a hand and touched the creamy pallor of her cheek, his thumb probing the quivering contours of her mouth. When her lips parted, the pad of his thumb rubbed against the vulnerable barrier of her teeth, and then withdrew with an abruptness that left her with an aching pang of regret.

      ‘Come!’ he said. ‘We will be missed. The band has stopped playing.’

      Humiliation such as she had never experienced before washed over her. With trembling fingers she smoothed her hair, checked the neckline of her dress and then swept past him out of the ante-room. But she didn’t get far before cruel fingers caught her wrist, and she was jerked round to face—her fiancé!

      ‘Mark—’ she began in surprise, and then checked at the thunderous expression contorting the normally pleasant features of his face. ‘Mark, what is it?’

      ‘Little tramp!’ he muttered against her ear. ‘What the hell have you been doing?’

      If Miranda had been pale before, she was bright scarlet now. She looked round desperately for Jaime, for once needing him, requiring him to explain.

      ‘I—we—Jaime—’

      ‘Jaime, is it?’ Mark sneered. ‘That didn’t take long, did it? My God, I should have listened to my mother when she warned me—’

      ‘Warned you!’ Miranda stared at him aghast, praying that no one could hear what they were saying above the sound of the beat number the band had started to play. ‘Mark, I don’t know what you mean!’

      ‘You bloody little fool! Don’t you understand? Haven’t you guessed? Mother asked Jaime to come, not me! She invited him to the Hall, she asked him to stay for the wedding. And not because she dotes on him, because she doesn’t. But because she knows what a sexy swine he is, and how a little tart like you wouldn’t be able to resist his flattery!’

      ‘No!’ Miranda put a shocked hand to her mouth. ‘No, that’s not true! Mark, I swear to you—’

      ‘What do you swear?’ he taunted, swaying a little as he spoke, and she realised to her dismay that already he had drunk more than was good for him. ‘That you weren’t attracted to him? That you didn’t spend the whole of the last dance gazing up at him, moon-faced? That you haven’t been missing for a quarter of an hour since the dance ended?’

      ‘I felt faint—’ she began desperately, and Mark nodded vigorously.

      ‘I bet you did,’ he muttered. ‘And to think I thought you were saving yourself for me!’

      Miranda looked about them despairingly. Reason told her that Mark didn’t mean all the things he was saying, but that didn’t make them any the less painful. Painful too was the realisation that he might be right about his cousin, and that hurt most of all. If she could only get him out of here, away from all these people, she might to able to convince him he was wrong.

      ‘Mark, we have to talk,’ she said, in a low forceful tone. ‘Now—do you want it to be here, where everyone can see us? Hear us?’

      Mark looked at her suspiciously. ‘What do you mean?’

      ‘Oh, Mark!’ She stared at him appealingly. ‘Can’t you see? You’re reacting exactly how they want you to react! I’ve done nothing to be ashamed of. Don’t you believe me?’

      Even as she said the words, she wondered if she was being strictly honest. But this was a dirty game she was involved in, and she had to use the cards as they were played to her. Her own reactions to Jaime Knevett she would take out and examine at some other time, but right now she had to make Mark understand how he was being manipulated.

      Mark was breathing heavily, the amount of alcohol he had consumed befuddling his brain, making it difficult for him to think clearly. He wanted to believe her. He had never cared for any girl the way he cared for her. In fact, girls had never figured too prominently in his life until she came along. He had much preferred fast cars and horse racing, and the company of his friends. But he was tired of those pursuits, and it had been a novelty taking out someone of whom he knew his mother disapproved. She had always chosen his friends for him, but he was sick and tired of that arrangement. Miranda had been a heaven-sent opportunity, a chance to escape from his mother’s cloying possessiveness.

      ‘All right,’ he said heavily. ‘Let’s go to the car. We can talk there.’

      Miranda would have chosen anywhere but there, but she had no choice in the matter. So long as Mark was prepared to talk, there was a chance she could persuade him he was wrong. And unless she wanted the break-up of their engagement, and the subsequent gossip that would arouse, she had to go along with him.

      It was cold outside. Avoiding the main corridors of the hotel meant leaving her cloak behind, and Miranda was shivering when they climbed into the sports car. She had seen Mark’s mother watching them as they left the ballroom, and the look on her face had confirmed Miranda’s worst fears. Lady Sanders would not give up while there was still a chance she might be able to split them up.

      Mark put his keys in the ignition and started the car, and Miranda looked at him in consternation. ‘What are you doing?’

      ‘Car’s cold,’ he said. ‘We’ll warm up the engine, then we’ll talk.’

      ‘But Mark …’

      She bit into her lower lip anxiously, and he gave her a derisive stare. ‘What’s the matter? Think I’m too drunk to drive or something?’

      She sighed. ‘Frankly, yes.’

      Mark shook his head. ‘You worry too much. I know exactly what I’m doing.’

      Miranda wished she could be sure. Staring out of the frosted window, she wondered where Lady Sanders thought they had gone. Perhaps she would send Jaime to look for them. Jaime! Miranda’s lips tightened. How she would like to see him humiliated just once in his life!

      Mark had stopped at the traffic lights and was looking at her in the light cast by the street lamps. ‘You’re beautiful,’ he said, as if he had just realised the fact, and she forced a faint smile although her lips felt stiff and unresponsive.

      Then the lights changed and they were moving again, faster now as the outskirts

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