Robyn stared at her sister frustratedly, and then caught Guy’s eye who was sitting at the side of Cassie at the kitchen table. He shrugged and then made a face that said eloquently, Leave it, Robyn. You aren’t going to win this one and you know it, before he got up and beat a hasty retreat.
‘Oh, Cass.’ Robyn didn’t know if she wanted to kiss her or hit her. ‘You know what I’m mad about, now then. I told you not to say a word to Clay and you couldn’t get to him fast enough. You put him in a difficult position as well as me.’
‘Nonsense.’ Cassie’s voice was brisk. ‘If Clay hadn’t wanted to get involved wild horses wouldn’t have dragged him to see you, I promise you. In all the time we’ve known Clay I’ve never known him to do anything he doesn’t want to.’
‘Cass, you blackmailed him with friendship,’ Robyn stated grimly.
‘Not at all. I merely mentioned a couple of relevant facts and then left it at that. There was no pressure from me for Clay to contact you,’ Cassie said firmly. ‘That was totally down to him.’
Guy had been right, she wasn’t going to be able to convince Cassie she had acted out of turn, Robyn thought resignedly. Her sister had always had an extra portion of self-assurance and faith in herself which was positively daunting at times, but when married to Cassie’s naturally warm heart and loving nature the end result was normally positive and healthy for those about her. Although this time Robyn wasn’t too sure…
‘Look, sis, if it makes you feel better I promise I won’t say a word to anyone about anything to do with you or your business in the future. How about that?’ Cassie beamed at her, and Robyn stifled an irritable sigh.
Cass knew full well she was shutting the stable door after the horse had bolted, but there was nothing she could do but accept the status quo and smile, Robyn acknowledged wearily. This was Cass—like it or lump it.
‘I shall hold you to that.’ Robyn’s voice was stern but her face was indulgent. Cass meant well and she knew her sister loved her all the world which was why she couldn’t resist meddling in her affairs. But it had to stop. She wasn’t a kid any more.
‘So…’ Cassie checked the children were still playing happily in their sandpit just outside the kitchen door—something that made for a constantly gritty floor—and took a sip of her coffee ‘…what’s been happening the last two weeks, then? You said on the phone Clay’s set up the deal. Is it all finalised? Everything gone through all right?’
‘Uh-huh.’ Her workload had meant she hadn’t visited her sister for a fortnight, and she couldn’t really afford to be here now with the amount of paperwork waiting for her at home, but it was a beautiful Sunday morning and the sun had been shining and she hadn’t been able to resist spending a couple of hours with her nephews who were at the stage where they seemed to grow every day. ‘But I’ve come to have a break from work, not to talk about it,’ she said with a smile to take the sting out of the words.
Cassie accepted the rebuke with her normal good humour. And after being persuaded to stay for lunch Robyn finally left mid afternoon for the short drive home. She had been coaxed into the sandpit by Jason and Luke, and now her hair was full of sand, her face was sticky from goodbye kisses from baby mouths smeared with ice-cream and lollipops, and her nose was sunburnt. But Robyn adored her small nephews and the hours with Cassie and her family had relaxed her.
So it was all the more of a shock when she drew up outside her house just as Clay’s Aston Martin purred down the street. Robyn watched the car approach in horror and then glanced in the mirror over the windscreen. A grubby, rosy face devoid of make-up stared back at her, her hair—which was looped high on her head in a riotous pony-tail—completing the picture of someone half her age. Someone very like the kid sister of bygone years.
She groaned softly. Clad in her armour of well-groomed, cool career wo
man she had only just managed to hold her own with Clay; now she felt like a bird with one wing down. But it was too late to hide and certainly too late to go anywhere. He had drawn alongside her and was now indicating for her to wind down her window. His, she thought sourly as she leant across the passenger seat to oblige, would be electric—unlike hers.
‘Are you going out or coming home?’ Clay asked as she struggled with the window which always got stuck halfway and needed a good push.
She left it at half-mast and straightened, flushed and dishevelled, and the caustic remark which had sprung to mind wasn’t delivered with quite as much acidity as she would have liked when she took in the full impact of the dark tanned face, silver eyes and jet-black hair.
He’s gorgeous. Her mind said it all by herself and in the circumstances it couldn’t have been more unwelcome. Here was she, looking like something the cat wouldn’t be seen dead dragging in, and here was Clay, the epitome of cool sophistication.
‘I don’t normally go out unwashed and filthy, funnily enough,’ she said tightly, wishing she had bothered to put on a touch of mascara at least. She looked such a mess.
‘Do I take it this is a bad moment?’ he drawled mildly.
Bad moment? It couldn’t be worse. ‘Not really,’ she lied with as much nonchalance as she could muster considering she could feel grains of sand in every crease and crevice of her body—some unmentionable—and was dying for a bath. ‘I’ve just been round Cass’s, that’s all, and we’ve been playing in the sandpit.’
The raised eyebrows made her add hastily, her cheeks aglow, ‘Me and the boys that is, Jason and Luke. Cass had a lie down after lunch and Guy had brought some work home, so I looked after the children for a bit. They—they like me to play with them.’
‘Who enjoyed it the most? You or your nephews?’ Clay asked softly, his eyes washing over the tumbled silky red-gold curls before coming to rest on her sun-tinted face.
At least it made her sound grown-up—the nephew bit—Robyn thought self-consciously, even if she didn’t look it. ‘We all did,’ she managed flusteredly. ‘They’re smashing kids.’ And then, when the silver gaze threatened to reduce her to babbling panic, she took a hold of herself and said steadily, ‘I thought you were in the States? You said you wouldn’t be back for a few weeks.’
‘Back for a couple of days.’ He made it sound as though he’d just popped down to the supermarket rather than come halfway across the world. ‘I leave again the day after tomorrow.’
She nodded in what she hoped was a cool, I’m-not-at-all-impressed sort of way. ‘Business?’ she asked offhandedly.
He shrugged dismissively. ‘Not exactly.’
She waited, but when he wasn’t more forthcoming, said carefully, ‘Were you just passing or was this an actual visit? There isn’t anything wrong with all the stuff I’ve given Mike, is there? He seemed to think everything was in order when we last spoke.’
‘It’s fine.’ He hesitated, and for a second—just a split second—Robyn thought he was edgy, even nervous, before she reminded herself this was Clay Lincoln and such words weren’t even in his vocabulary. Not Clay’s. ‘I was calling to see if I could drag you away from your desk on such a beautiful summer’s day.’
‘I’m not at my desk,’ she said quickly.