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She busied herself with the breakfast, trying not to listen to the spontaneous bursts of laughter fro not to feel excluded from the charmed circle Slade seemed to have woven around the three of them

Kirsty and Lance tucked appreciatively into the heaped plates she set before them

‘Mood a cook as Muree to this weekend,’ she added, assuht a brief smile to Chelsea’s lips She kne easily Kirsty could bend both her parents round her little finger ‘It was only when Dad ca in the sae of heart Poor Muout of her It was absolutely hysterical really’ Kirsty’s brown eyes laughed as she darted a mischievous look from Chelsea to Slade ‘Cee, I would have just loved to have been there when she coaxed you into that fe at, wearing that fabulous dress and the new make-up’

She wanted to vanish, Chelsea thought with mild hysteria; dissolve into thin air disappear beneath the table, anything rather than face the look she knew must be in Slade’s eyes

Beneath the table Lance, more astute and observant than Kirsty, kicked her swiftly on the ankle She paused, staring from her aunt’s pale face to Slade’s coolly unreadable one, her eyes widening in surprise

‘Oh, Cee,’ she exclaietically, ‘have I put my foot in it? Haven’t you told him yet?’ She turned ily up at him with a confidence Chelsea envied

‘Slade, don’t be cross Knowinglike that You see, poor Muht that I was all poised for a heady affair with you I soon put her right, of course If only the silly thing had said so poor Cee and persuading her—–’

‘Tomy lustful intentions from you to herself,’ Slade supplied dryly for her

Corinned up at hih nothing had happened, longing all the tiet up and run as far and as fast as she could away fro disclosures

‘Look, Kirsty, I think it’s time we made a move,’ Lance murmured aardly,

‘Anyher coffee ‘She toldhome’

‘Soon’ For the life of her Chelsea couldn’t raise her head and look across the table Tension coiled up inside her like a wire If Slade had wanted retribution before what on earthhad been nothing but a shaht from the start? How he must despise her! She reached for her coffee, but her hand shook sowitnessed at first hand his manner towards Kirsty, her own suppositions were both crude and shabby, and she couldn’t understand how she had been stupid enough ever to believe them

Right fronised the fact that Slade possessed a powerful attraction to her sex, but instead of drawing the sensible conclusion that that being the case he was hardly likely to interest hiirl she had bulldozed over all the warnings of common sense and convinced herself instead that he was another Darren, intent only on seeking childish adoration

‘Cee, are you all right?’ She looked up fro her anxiously ‘You looked so pale Are you okay?’

‘She’s still getting over a bad dose of ‘flu,’ Slade explained calmly before she could speak

In the rush of goodbyes, there wasn’t time for Chelsea to speak privately with her niece, but all the ti presence and the knowledge that sooner or later she was going to have to face him

She delayed the inevitable as long as she could, but eventually the small, dilapidated car of which Lance was so proud was disappearing down the road and the er

Quite what she expected Slade to say, she didn’t know, but his speculative, ‘So you’re Kirsty’s aunt?’ and the look which accompanied it surprised her

‘Yes’ Her voice was betrayingly husky and uncertain as she turned away fro Kirsty and Lance leave from the study , and now Chelsea was acutely conscious of Slade’s presence behind her Her legs seeed to turn round and face hie

‘The one who got involved with some married man?’

Her hand crept to her throat as though it could still the hectic pulse throbbing there, every vestige of colour leaving her face

‘Kirsty told you about that?’ she asked incredulously

‘That and o to drama school and wanted me to intercede with her parents, but in fairness she wanted ; that she was not merely the victim of parental arbitrariness—so she told me about you’

It took less than a second for his words to sink in, and then bitterness welled up inside her,to escape

Without looking at Slade she moved towards the door, but he barred it with his body