‘I’m sorry,’ she apologised, ‘I was thinking about my work.’
‘I was just asking you what you thought of the leaflet.’
He was holding it in his hand and Kate took it from him, forcing herself to concentrate her attention on it.
It was gone ten o’clock when he eventually left. He had been disposed to stay and chat, and eventually she had been forced to make an outright claim to being tired to get him to go.
At the front door he had paused to ask her out for dinner, but Kate had refused. She was too exhausted emotionally to even think of going out with anyone else.
CHAPTER EIGHT
TRYING to appear normal in front of Sue when she arrived the following afternoon was one of the hardest things Kate had ever had to do. Sue was obviously eager to regale her with all the details of the scene between Dominic and herself, but Kate forestalled her, causing her to frown slightly.
‘Kate, surely you don’t still feel so strongly about him that you can’t even bear to hear his name mentioned?’
She did, but not in the way that Sue meant.
‘It’s not that,’ she lied, ‘it’s just that I’ve got so much on my mind already, what with this commission from Vera and Ian, and then selling the house.’
‘Of course.’ Sue’s ready sympathy only increased her sense of guilt. ‘You must be feeling really down about having to part with this place. Has anyone been round to view it yet?’
‘No.’
Having been distracted away from the subject of Dominic, Sue continued to chat blithely for another half an hour before announcing that she had to go to collect the children from school.
‘You need a holiday, Kate,’ she chided her friend as she left. ‘You’re looking far too tired. You need to get away.’
Sue was right, Kate reflected when her friend had gone. She did need to get away—from Dominic. Perhaps if she went to stay with Harry and Liz for a few days? She had a standing invitation to visit them…
She would see how she felt tomorrow, she told herself as she walked out into the garden. Some weeding might help to take her mind off Dominic. She was still outside when the phone rang.
It was the receptionist from the estate agent’s office calling to ask if it would be convenient to send someone round to view the property that afternoon.
‘Unfortunately all the partners have appointments,’ she told Kate. ‘Would you be able to show the people round yourself?’
Confirming that she would, Kate made a note of the time they were expected and replaced the receiver.
It was just after half-past two when Kate heard the doorbell. She was in the kitchen, arranging some flowers she had brought in from the garden, and she wiped her hands on a towel before hurrying to the door, cursing herself as she realised she had neglected to ask the receptionist the name of the prospective purchasers.
She opened the door with what she hoped was a cool smile, her facial muscles stiffening as she saw Dominic standing outside.
‘I told you I didn’t want to see you again!’ The words sounded more like a cry of anguish than the cold remonstrance she had intended them to be.
Mouth grim, Dominic stepped past her, cold topaz eyes meeting her own with derisory mockery as he told her, ‘It isn’t you I’ve come to see. It’s the house.’
It took a few seconds for his meaning to seep in. Mouth agape, Kate stared at him.
‘You mean you’ve come to view the house?’
‘Full marks, you’ve got it in one.’
The taunt was cold and hostile, but Kate ignored it as anger boiled up inside her.
‘I don’t know what you think you’re doing, Dominic,’ she raged at him. ‘But if you think that by pretending you want to buy this house—’
‘Who says I’m pretending?’ He had been studying the gallery and swung round now, to look at her coolly. ‘I need a base in England now that I’m going into partnership with Ian, and where better to live than in the same locality?’ His mouth twisted and he added softly, ‘Or were you flattering yourself that the house was just a pretext—an excuse to come and see you?’
Her face burned with humiliated embarrassment, her voice and movements stiff as she ignored his question to ask curtly instead, ‘Where would you like to start? Upstairs or down?’