Mistress on Loan

Sara Craven

Mistress on Loan

CHAPTER ONE

It was the time of day that Adrien loved best—those quiet, early-morning hours when she had the house completely to herself. Before the painters arrived, and the joiners and plasterers, and work began again to restore Wildhurst Grange to its former glory. She liked to move slowly from room to room, opening shutters and flinging back the drapes from the newly curtained windows to admit the pale late-summer sun. Letting herself move forward in her imagination to the time when she and Piers would be married, and living here, and she would no longer be simply the interior designer but the mistress of the house. And Piers's wife.

That was the best part of all, and the thought always made her slightly breathless—as if she could hardly believe her own luck, the way her life had fallen so sweetly into place.

Because there was a wonderful symmetry about it all. About the way they'd met at Wildhurst all those years before, when he'd come to her rescue when she was in trouble, and then how the house had brought them back together, when Piers had inherited the neglected property from his late uncle, Angus Stretton, and needed a designer to help plan the restoration.

And soon, she thought, it would be finished, and theirs to share as man and wife. Bringing the chain of events full circle.

Her only regret was that Piers wasn't there to watch the regeneration of his future home, but was working in Portugal.

'I'm sorry too, my darling,' he'd murmured as he held her on their last evening together. 'But it has to be done. Quite apart from all the work it needs, the Grange won't be a cheap proposition to run, and I have to make sure the money's there, that we don't have to scrimp and make do with second best. I want you to have everything.'

'But I don't need everything,' Adrien had protested, slightly troubled. 'And we could start slowly—just doing up the rooms we're going to use.'

But Piers wouldn't hear of that. He wanted the whole house finished—'so that we're not living with workmen and out of boxes for the next ten years, my sweet.'

He had a point, Adrien supposed, with a sigh. And she wrote to him every week, sending a concise progress report, including colour charts and fabric samples, while he telephoned and sent e-mails and faxes.

But it wasn't the same as having him there.

'Once the company's established, I won't leave you again, I promise,' he'd whispered. 'And just think what a marvellous showcase the Grange will make for your talents,' he'd added cajolingly. 'Business will boom when we start entertaining.'

Adrien had laughed and hugged him, but inwardly she was determined that the Grange would be first and foremost their home—their private sanctuary. In any case, she wasn't sure she could cope with a boom, she thought wryly. Before she'd met Piers again, and fallen in love, and become involved with the restoration project, her business had already been thriving.

It was basically a two-woman operation—herself, as designer, and Zelda March, who was a local girl and a brilliant seamstress. A to Z Design hadn't lacked for work since it had opened its doors. Although it certainly wasn't what she'd had in mind when she'd completed her training, she admitted. Coming back to the quiet country town where she'd been brought up hadn't been part of the plan at all. But her mother's sudden death three years ago had caused her to rethink her future completely. Adrien, rushing down from London, had had to face the fact that she was now alone in the world. But she'd also inherited Listow Cottage, and some money from her mother's life insurance, which had given her a measure of independence for the first time.

Her life, she had realised bleakly, could change. But she hadn't seen how until she'd run into Zelda at the funeral.

It had been a long time since they'd seen each other. They'd been in the same year at school, but not on the same track. Zelda had been the local wild child, always in trouble with the authorities for smoking, under-age drinking and hanging round with boys. In her final year she'd amazed everyone by winning the Home Economics prize with a baby's wooden cradle, which she'd trimmed with handmade curtains and a beautiful embroidered quilt, as well as making a complete set of baby clothes.

Before she was seventeen she was pregnant by a local garage mechanic, and their hasty marriage had been followed by an even speedier divorce. Adrien had been surprised to see her in the congregation at the church, and, on impulse, had invited her back to the cottage.

'I thought the world of your mum,' Zelda confided, when the other mourners had departed. She looked sadly round the sitting room. 'It was only a couple of months ago that I made these loose covers and curtains for her.'

On the surface, Zelda didn't seem to have changed much. The dark spiky hair was still much in evidence, and so was the nose stud. But as they talked Adrien sensed a new, quiet maturity about her. A strength to the set of her thin shoulders that impressed Adrien. And the workmanship on the soft furnishings was superb.

'Do you work freelance?' Adrien questioned. Zelda shook her head. 'I wish. I do customer orders for Beasley and Co in Enderton, but the pay's rock-bottom. I've tried doing some work at home, but I'm back living with Mum and Dad and the kids, and there just isn't room. Not with Smudge too.'

'Smudge?'

'That's what I call my son. His real name's Kevin, like his father, but I don't want to be reminded.'

'I suppose not.' Adrien bit her lip. 'It seems a shame that you can't work for yourself. You're really good.'

'There's no chance of that.' Zelda shrugged. 'Dad goes mad when the sewing machine comes out. And he's not too thrilled to have Smudge around anyway, so I try not to rock the boat.'

It was only a brief exchange, but it stuck in Adrien's mind.

During the days that followed, she set about working out a business plan. There was undoubtedly a gap in the market. Beasley's were no real competition, and there was no one else within miles who could offer a complete interior design service. She could pinpoint all the genuine craftsmen in the area to use as sub-contractors, and with Zelda to cover the soft furnishing side...

Premises might be a problem, she realised. Until she took a good look at the cottage. It wasn't large, and it needed modernisation, but around its rear courtyard there were old stables and outbuildings, unused for years and ripe for conversion. There was space for workrooms, an office, and a self-contained flat.

'Are you serious about this?' Zelda asked huskily when Adrien finally put the plan in front of her.

'Really serious? Because it sounds too good to be true.'

'I mean every word,' Adrien assured her. 'And the flat will have two bedrooms, so there'll be plenty of room for you and Smudge,' she added, knowing that they were currently sharing one small room with bunk beds.

'A place of our own,' Zelda whispered. 'It's like a dream. I keep waiting for someone to pinch me, and wake me up.'

The dream rapidly became a nightmare while the building work was being done. It threw up all kinds of unforeseen problems, and cost far more than anticipated. Adrien remortgaged the cottage, and raised a bank loan on the strength of her plan, while Zelda, overwhelmed at finding herself a partner, insisted on contributing the small settlement she'd received from her ex-husband. Their faith in themselves seemed justified, she had to admit. The enquiries came in steadily from day one, and they had to rent some temporary work-space to cope with the demand. Soon they'd been in their new premises for nearly two years, and were already employing extra help with the sewing.

'Maybe we shouldn't have downsized,' Adrien joked. 'Perhaps we should have looked to expand, and put in a bid for the Grange instead.'

'Except that the Grange isn't for sale,' Zelda said, frowning over some fabric catalogues. 'What a shame—a lovely house like that, just standing empty.'

'Yes,' Adrien sighed. 'When I was a child I used to go there all the time, while my father played chess with Mr. Stretton.'

'What did you do?'

Adrien shrugged. 'Oh—read books from his library, played in the garden.'

'AH by yourself?'

Adrien hesitated, hearing faint alarm bells ring in her mind. 'Not all the time,' she returned. 'Mr. Stretton's nephew, Piers, was there sometimes. His mother had married someone Mr. Stretton disapproved of—a Brazilian— and there'd been a big row. But I suppose Mr. Stretton had eventually to accept the fact that Piers was going to be his heir, and invite him to stay, although he'd still have nothing to do with his brother-in-law,' she added, frowning. 'My parents said he really hated him. Called him "a thoroughly bad lot".'

'Families.' Zelda wrinkled her nose. 'Do you think Mr. Stretton will ever come back?'

'I shouldn't think so. He moved to Spain for the climate, and seems settled there.' Adrien sighed again. 'I couldn't believe it. The Grange has been in his family for years. And he'd just got to know Piers properly, too.'

'Perhaps he thought he was a bad lot as well.'

'He couldn't have done.' Adrien drew a stormy breath. 'He's one of the kindest people I ever met. Saved me from pneumonia—or hypothermia, or worse.'

Zelda put the catalogue down. 'How?'

Adrien bit her lip. 'Oh, there was a treehouse in the wood at the back of the house. I climbed up there once when I was about nine and got stuck, and he found me. But I'd been there for hours, and I was frozen and sick with fright. I'm hopeless on ladders to this day.

'But that's not all,' she added. 'When I was eighteen, Mr. Stretton gave a party for me at the Grange, and he presented me with a garnet pendant, very old and very pretty. During the party it was stolen, and Piers—found it. But it was dreadful. It ruined my birthday. And he was so sweet and understanding.'

'Well, let's hear it for Piers—the hero of the hour,'

Zelda said drily. 'What happened to him?'

'Oh, it was shortly afterwards that Mr. Stretton closed up the house and went to live in Spain. I guess Piers went back to Brazil.'

'Shame,' said Zelda. 'By the way, who pinched the pendant?'

'One of the servants,' Adrien said shortly. 'No one important.'

Piers would be thirty-two now, she found herself thinking. And so would the other one. The one whose name she wouldn't speak. The one who'd caused all the nightmares...

Well, all that was in the past, and the past couldn't hurt her. Firmly, she slammed the gate of memory shut again, regretting that she'd allowed it to open even fractionally.

It was only ten days later that news came that Angus Stretton had died at his villa in Spain, and would be buried out there.

The vicar, however, decided to hold a memorial service at the parish church, and, to Adrien's astonishment, Piers arrived to attend it. It was assumed locally that, having done his duty, he'd simply put the place on the market and get on with his life elsewhere.

But how wrong we were, Adrien thought—smiling to herself as she walked down the long corridor which led to the master suite.

He came—we saw each other again—and suddenly everything was different and wonderful. She opened the door and stepped into the main bedroom. It was a large room, with doors leading to its own dressing room and a bathroom, both of them completely remodelled.

There was no furniture yet in the bedroom, which smelled of fresh paint and newly papered walls, now the colour of thick cream. The floor had been sanded and polished, and a square of deep green carpet laid.

Adrien couldn't help wishing that Piers had kept some of his uncle's furniture. Much of it was old, and she suspected valuable, and it had suited its surroundings.

But he'd insisted on a clean sweep. And since then, of course, she'd found the bed.

She'd discovered it at a country sale, lying in pieces in an outbuilding. A genuine four-poster bed, needing a lot of restoration work, admittedly, but she'd got it cheaply and handed it over to Fred Derwent, who specialised in such things and who'd received it with a delight bordering on reverence. Soon, Adrien thought dreamily, it would be installed— the centrepiece of the room—and of their marriage.

And Zelda had unearthed some fabulous fabric, incorporating a heavily stylised pattern in blue, green and gold, from which she was making the hangings for the bed and the windows.

Three months from now, she thought, I'll be sleeping in that bed with Piers.

Happy colour rose to her face, and she laughed softly to herself.

She would still keep this morning tryst with the house, however. Only she'd wear the peignoir in ivory silk and lace that she'd bought on her last trip to London instead of the jade towelling robe which had seen better days, she thought, giving it a disparaging look. And her dark auburn hair would be cascading over her shoulders instead of hauled up into an untidy topknot. She would save this room until last, as she'd always done. Keeping it special. And once the new window curtains were pulled back, and she'd looked out over the wide lawns at the rear of the house, she'd go over to the bed and kiss Piers awake. And he would draw her down into the shadowed softness, back into his arms. So far it was only a fantasy that stirred her blood and brought her senses to trembling life. But very soon now it would be reality.

She walked slowly to the window and looked out at the view she'd come to love.

And stopped, gasping, her hand flying to her mouth.

A man was standing in the middle of the expanse of grass, looking up at the house. A man dressed all in black, with an overcoat hanging from his shoulders like a cloak and early mist coiling round his legs, giving him an air of unreality, as if he'd come from another age and been caught in a time slip.

He was so still that for a moment she thought he wasn't human at all, but a statue that someone had placed there during the night as some kind of bizarre joke. But then she saw the breeze lift the skirts of the coat and ruffle the dark blond hair, and realised that, whatever else, she was confronted by flesh and blood.

She thought, But not Piers, and her heart plummeted, shock replaced by disappointment. Piers wasn't quite as tall as the figure below, and his hair was raven-dark. And yet— just for a second—she'd experienced this curious sense of familiarity. Who is he? She asked herself. And what is he doing here?