A Bed of Broken Promises Read online

  “It was more than just a drink I was asking for…”

  Out of nowhere, he pictured Katie. What was she doing right now? Probably having dinner with Maxie, sitting in the kitchen that glowed with warmth on even the coldest nights. She’d be wearing jeans and a sweater, and her hair would be up in one of those messy pony tails. She wouldn’t be wearing a bra, and his palms tingled with the remembered sensation of what that felt like.

  “Let’s start with a drink,” he said grimly, resolutely pushing Katie out his mind. He had to get her out of his head. And Blonde with the Tits was a good place to start…

  CHAPTER NINE

  Five of the longest days of her life had stretched out and slowly slipped away. Five days without David Trent. Five days with no one for company. Maxie’s school days dragged, and she was half tempted to get him to play hooky one day just so she could be spared the endless thought-wheel she was relentlessly treading.

  She missed him so much it hurt.

  And she hated the way they’d ended it.

  They had such a great relationship and they’d ruined it with a stupid fight.

  And she didn’t want to be mad at him. She wanted to hug him, and tell him how sorry she was about his friend. And tell him that she understood he didn’t want to talk, but that if he ever did, she’d be there, ready to listen. She’d stuffed it up and he’d had every right to be pissed.

  She felt a sob bubble in her chest and she let out a small scream instead.

  Standing on top of a ladder, covered in dust from the ceiling she was painstakingly stripping of the swirly contact paper that her aunt had put up some time in the seventies, and all she could think about was him. What was he doing now? Teaching, probably. Was there a teacher at his school who thought he was fanciable? Undoubtedly. He was impossibly good looking, smart, funny, and just damaged enough to inspire that protective instinct. Hell, he was a catch, and someone else was probably busy catching him right now.

  Katie wasn’t sure why she was bothering carrying on with the renovations. She’d already decided to sell the house. She had the contracts, she just needed to sign them.

  But the sentimental idiot in her couldn’t bring herself to sell the place she’d met David. Not yet. It was too soon. Too raw. Besides, it was mid-term for Maxie. She was better, surely, to wait a few weeks until holidays came. Then, they could go to London together and talk some options over with Grandma Rose.

  A prick of anticipation ran through her as she thought of London. It would be so easy to surprise David. To apologize for their fight and explain that she wasn’t happy with how things had ended.

  She paused, scraper in hand, a frown on her face.

  That’s what she needed to do! She would be careful. She would make it obvious that she hadn’t come to get things going again, but simply to end things on the right note. Didn’t their fling deserve that?

  She groaned as she remembered the way he’d felt, with his arms wrapped around her. Immediately, her body gushed with warmth. And she knew she wouldn’t be able to wait for holidays.

  She’d go now. For the weekend.

  “Mum,” she spoke into her phone quickly, unable to keep the excitement out of her voice. “I need to speak to you about something. Maxie and I are going to come stay for the weekend, okay?”

  “Oh, darling, I’ve got golf tomorrow, but I suppose I can cancel…”

  “Thanks, mum. That would be great. I’ve actually got an appointment on in the morning, so if you could mind Maxie…”

  “Not a problem. Gives me some time with my beautiful grandbaby.”

  “Not such a baby now, mum. You won’t believe how much he’s grown.”

  “I’ll bet. When will you be here?”

  “Tonight. We’ll set off once he finishes school.”

  “Great. See you then, darling one. Oh, and Kit? Be careful on those roads, won’t you?”

  And Katie felt a swell of tenderness for this woman. Even after her husband had run off with some other woman, she’d still never spoken a bad word about him. And when he’d died in a violent car smash, she’d grieved as any wife would. She had loved him to the last, even though he was undeserving of it. “I will, mum. See you later tonight!”

  And she laughed! As she hung up the phone, she did a little dance on the spot, because finally, she was sure she would see him again, and it felt good.

  His address was on the registration paperwork that he’d emailed through when he’d initially made the booking, and she transcribed it into her iPhone maps now, marking it with a pin. “Tomorrow, I will see you, Mr. Trent, and we will sort all of this out.”

  With another laugh, she ran upstairs, packed for herself and Maxie and changed into clothes that didn’t scream ‘Bob the Builder’. This felt right, and so how could it be wrong?

  * * *

  His house wasn’t like she’d expected, she thought with a small frown, staring up at the run-down council house in east London. It looked like sheets were strung up instead of curtains, and the garden had become overrun by grass and tin cans. She frowned again. David had seemed so neat and well put together. He had left his room impeccable every morning, and insisted on doing the dishes each night.

  With a small shrug, she brought her hand up and knocked on the door. It was a cool, yet crisp, morning, and she’d dressed in bright colors to reflect her hope for the future. A bright tangerine coat, and an emerald scarf, with her hair pulled up into a ballet style bun, and dangly yellow earrings. She heard a kerfuffle inside and froze, forcing her mouth into the shape of a smile. Her heart jack hammered against her rib cage so loudly that she brought her left hand up to her chest in an attempt to muffle it.

  A young man wrenched the door open, his skin pale, his hair styled in a crew cut, his clothes almost as unkempt as the house.

  “Morning,” he said curiously, his pale eyes flicking over her with interest.

  “Oh. Hello. I’m here … for David? Do I have the right address? David Trent?”

  “Yeah, he’s here. You want to come in?”

  She pressed her lips together. “I’m fine to wait here.”

  “Suit yerself. Freezing cold though, innit?”

  She nodded fascinated to imagine David living with anyone, let alone a young man like this.

  “Dave-o!” He called up the stairwell. “Some chick here to see ya.”

  She almost laughed at the ludicrous description of her. She bit into her lip nervously, listening, every nerve ending of her body attuned to the sound of creaking stairs which reminded her now painfully of Wadeford House.

  She saw his legs first. Jean clad, and barefoot. Then his torso. Then, she frowned. Blonde hair. Dark tan. A pierced ear with a diamond stud. Rings on both hands.

  “Hullo,” the man said with a smile that was genuine and helpful. “Can I help you?”

  “I’m… just waiting for David Trent.”

  “I’m David Trent.”

  Katie snaked a hand out and grabbed the stair railing for support. She felt like a block of ice had shattered into pieces in her stomach and was sharding through her blood stream. Her face tingled with pins and needles. “No… not you. That’s… that can’t be right.”

  “You all right, love? You look like you’re about to pass out.”

  She breathed out slowly, wrapping her arms around her waist. “No, I mean David Trent. He’s a biology teacher?”

  “Guilty as charged.”

  And the bottom fell out of her whole world.

  “Look, why don’t you come in and sit down.”

  “No, no. You don’t understand. David was a guest of mine. I run Wadeford House, down in Cornwall…”

  “Oh, darn it.” He slumped his shoulders forward. “I meant to call you about that. I got an offer to go up to a mate’s place in Scotland and I totally forgot to cancel my booking.”

  The next few minutes were a blur to Katie. Polite noises, all the right things said at the right times. But once she was in the car, she drove around the
corner and cut the engine, so that she could filter through this information in silence.

  David Trent – this David Trent – had booked to stay with her. And when he got a better offer, he had taken it up, only he’d failed to let her know. Meaning that when… whoever he was… had arrived, she had just filled in the gaps and guessed that he was the guest she was waiting for.

  “Oh, God,” she moaned into the freezing cold car. She slammed her palm against her steering wheel. “Who the hell did I bring into my home?”

  She felt hot and cold at the same time, and out of nowhere, ill, too. She pushed open her car door and lost her entire breakfast on the middle of the road.

  She was amazed at how she managed to get through the weekend. Somehow, despite feeling like she was having a weird out of body experience, she managed to do it. Saturday afternoon was spent walking along the river, stopping whenever Maxie wanted to examine rocks or sticks or stones or leaves that caught his eye. He put them all in his backpack to analyze properly later. And while he scampered ahead like a busy little river rat, Rose caught up with her daughter, and made a point of not asking whatever it was that had made her face look pinched and her eyes seem heated.

  But by Sunday afternoon, even tactful Rose couldn’t let her daughter go without saying something. She waited until Maxie was safely stowed in the car, his head in a book, before pulling her daughter into a hug.

  “Darling girl, whatever it is that’s bothering you, why don’t you tell me? I might be able to help.”

  Katie’s eyes flew to her mum’s, full of surprise. “It’s nothing, mum.”

  “Don’t fib,” she chastised gently. “Dear girl, I can tell something’s wrong. Is it money?”

  “Money! No.” She denied hotly. They were actually doing okay at that point. And if she went through with the sale of the house… Oh, God, she’d told him everything, including that! She’d opened up completely to a man who she really knew nothing about! Not even his name. One of the things she’d admired most about him was his devotion to the truth, and it had all been a spectacularly well enacted lie.

  She needed a fresh start, and going through with the sale of Wadeford House was the only way to achieve it.

  The whole, long drive South, she thought about it, and with each mile, she became more and more convinced that she was doing the right thing. Maxie loved Grandma Rose, and wherever they lived, they could make sure it was closer to her. She was their only family, and Katie missed her, too.

  Maxie fell asleep somewhere on the drive, and Katie carried him upstairs, marveling at the grown up little face in repose. Her baby boy was a thing of the past now, and he looked so very mature all of a sudden. She snuggled him in his bed, pressing a kiss against his forehead, and then crept downstairs.

  Her mobile began to ring almost as soon as she’d filled the kettle, and her pulse skittered in the stupid hope that it was David. Or whatever his name was. Only it wasn’t. Ryan Macaulay’s voice came through to her. “Hey, Katie, how you doing?”

  “Fine thanks, Ryan. And you?”

  “Yeah, good. Good weekend?”

  Katie leaned against the bench, her eyes shut. Before she’d met David, she’d actually thought about going out with Ryan. But now, the idea was anathema to her. The idea of kissing another man, making love to someone else, it filled her with a physical sickness. Nonetheless, she’d known Ryan for years, and she went through the motions of polite chit chat before disconnecting the call on the flimsiest of pretences. If they moved, she doubted she’d ever hear from him again.

  Tea in hand, she made her way to the office and pulled the contract of sale up on her computer. It had been sent through the lawyer who had initially approached her. She scanned the documents and pressed print, waiting for the pages to spit out of her not-long-for-this-world inkjet. It was as simple as signing her name on the dotted line, and she’d be able to move on, find somewhere new to hang her hat, so to speak. Or in this case, her pervasive anger and sadness.

  For the hundredth time, she scanned the contracts. Only this time, the buyer’s name sounded vaguely familiar. Brycus Inc. Surely just because she’d read the same name a hundred times now.

  Then, with a start, she refocused her attention on the computer screen. With fingers that weren’t completely steady, she typed in the login for her internet banking and waited, impatiently, for her statements to load. Only they didn’t! The damned computer froze and she had to suffer the excruciating delay as it restarted and slowly came back onto the internet.

  Her tea was ice cold by the time she finally got into her bank accounts and scrolled down to the recent transactions.

  Blinking at her in black and white was the very same name. Brycus Inc. The amount was clearly the largest in a while, because the man who’d paid it had stayed for a week.

  Whoever he was, he was connected with the company who wanted to buy her home.

  She let out a sound of surprise and clasped a hand to her mouth. She had thought she couldn’t feel any worse than she had yesterday, when she’d discovered that he’d lied about his identity. But now… she felt as though her head was about to explode.

  A ball of tension clawed at her gut as she typed B-R-Y-C-U-S I-N-C into a search engine, and waited for it to show the results. At the top of the page was the website for the company and she clicked on it desperately, hungry to know who the hell he was.

  It was the usual sort of page you’d expect from one of those slick multinational investment incorporations with far too much money. All savvy design and boasting about their humanitarian work to assuage their corporate consciences.

  “About us.” She clicked on the link and there, at the very top of the page, was David. Except he wasn’t David at all. His name, she read in disbelief, was Marcus Harris, and he was co-founder and now sole owner of the bloody thing.

  “It can’t be true,” she whispered to no one in particular, standing and pacing across the room. But it couldn’t be anything but, could it? There, undeniably, on the ancient computer screen, was his face. Not smiling, staring straight at the camera, with those eyes that always seemed a little sardonic. Eyes that had bored straight into her soul.

  Hating herself, she moved back and, not bothering to sit, leant forward to read the information.

  Marcus Harris has been fascinated by the corporate world for as long as he can remember. Here, she let out a snort of derision. Truly, who’s fascinated by the corporate world? What a pithy and boring remark. When he graduated from college and had the opportunity to take over his first company (What company and how?) he had no idea he’d be setting in motion a course of events that would lead to his becoming one of the visionaries in global development in five short years. With business partner Bryan Watson by his side, he quickly became head of a global empire that has constructed notable projects in Europe, America, Asia, Australia, as well as replacing important infrastructure in the Middle East.

  That was it. She itched to Google more, but she couldn’t. She wouldn’t let herself.

  She scrolled down further, and there was Bryan Watson. She skimmed his bio, guilt lancing through her at the smiling photograph of the man her lover had seen murdered. Beneath them both was a woman, a glamorous woman who was head of American operations, and beneath her, a man, Andrew Harris. He was a dead ringer for Marcus and she knew this must be the brother he’d referred to.

  With a snort of disgust, she shut the browser and returned to pacing.

  She’d been busy falling in love with him, believing every lie he’d fed her, and all the while he’d been talking her into selling Wadeford House. Jeez, what a gullible, naïve, stupid idiot she was!

  Why the hell did he want her house so badly that he’d been willing to sleep with her to get it? To lie to her about their relationship? It didn’t add up. But she was so furious that she swore to herself she was going to get the answers she needed. And rather than go straight to the source, she was going to start with this brother.

  CHAPTER TEN
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br />   Andrew had always liked London more than his brother.

  The weather didn’t bother him. The people he found delightfully proper. But he would have given his eye teeth not to be here today. Cecilia only had a few weeks to go and he was damned if he was going to risk missing their baby’s entrance to the world. He wanted this wrapped up, and fast.

  No word from Marcus for a week, and even Andrew was starting to worry. He placed his bag on the floor inside his five star hotel suite in Mayfair and picked up his mobile. He’d left messages for Marcus but the bastard was clearly dodging his calls. Which left only one thing. He had to ambush him.

  He opened his laptop, and began an email to Marcus’s hardworking assistant, to get a copy of his diary. He was just about to send it when his mobile rang. Crossing his fingers that his brother had finally had the decency to respond to his million and one messages, he swiped to answer before checking the caller ID.

  “Andrew Harris,” he said, as always.

  “Hello, Mr. Harris?” The polished, soft voice of a woman came through the phone and he almost groaned with impatience.

  “Yes, yes, how can I help you?”

  There was a pause and his annoyance stretched taut and thin. He looked out at the Mayfair streets below, waiting for her to speak, tempted to disconnect the call when she was silent for almost a minute. “Are you still there?” He said, finally.

  “Yes, sorry, it’s just, you sound so much like him.”

  Andrew frowned. “Like who?” But the hairs on the back of his neck were standing on end.

  “Marcus,” she hissed. Despite having been married for half a decade, he knew what a pissed off woman sounded like, and this woman was past that. She was livid. “He is your brother, I take it?”

  “Guilty as charged. And you are?”

  “Someone who very much needs to speak to him.”

  “That makes two of us,” he said quietly. “Do you know where he is?”

  He could almost hear her frowning. “No. That’s why I’m calling you.”

  “Sorry. ‘Fraid I just flew in myself, on a fact-finding mission. Perhaps you could help me fill in some blanks?”