A Pretend Engagement. Jessica Steele

was already sitting up. And, by the look of his naked chest and hip as the bedcovers started to go back, he was as stark naked as she!

      ‘H…? Wh…? Oh!’ she gasped, frozen to the spot, her brain totally seized up as she stared, her sea-green eyes saucer-wide, at the dark-haired man about to leave the bed.

      Her shaken rigid expression, her scarlet face, must have got through to the man. However, she was sure it was not to spare her blushes that he halted briefly and remarked, a shade toughly, she felt, ‘I don’t believe we’ve been introduced,’ adding, much in the same tone, ‘Want to shake hands?’

      And, not a bit abashed by his own nakedness, he looked about to get out of bed—though not before he took a slow inventory of her—assets. His eyes—grey, she noticed, quite ridiculously, she afterwards felt—travelled meticulously from the top of her tousled long blonde hair, down over her face and, resting perhaps a fraction longer than necessary over her pink-tipped breasts, down over her belly and slender hips, past her beautifully shaped long, long legs.

      But by the time he reached her toes Varnie was released from the shock that had kept her frozen still and was suddenly galvanised into action. Without a word or another glance at him, as one of his legs came from beneath the covers and it seemed he was going to stand up and shake hands anyway, Varnie got out of there. Had she had space, time, and had her head not been alive with horror she would have attempted to cover her fleeing naked buttocks with the towel, but she was much more concerned with doing a quick disappearing act.

      She reached her room and slammed the door hard shut, to find she was breathing hard and shaking from head to foot. Johnny! Johnny Metcalfe, her brother—stepbrother, if you must. She’d stepbrother him! If he wasn’t in Australia, if she could get her hands on her, she’d kill him.

      How could he? And it had to be him! He had invited a perfect stranger to sleep overnight at what was now, she started to accept, her place.

      Johnny knew who he was, of course. The man was no stranger to him. And not totally a stranger to her either, not since she had seen that picture of him in the paper yesterday. There was absolutely no need for the man to introduce himself. She already knew who he was.

      But what in blazes was Leon Beaumont doing here? And, more worrying than that, he—the first man ever to do so—had just seen her completely stark naked—stitchless. Oh, heavens above, how on earth was she ever to face him again?

      CHAPTER TWO

      HASTILY, flicking nervous glances to her slammed shut bedroom door from time to time, just in case Leon Beaumont should take it into his head to follow her, Varnie wrapped the large towel around her shape and searched her flight bag for the key to her case. With fumbling, agitated fingers she unlocked her case and extracted underwear, trousers and a shirt.

      She heard plumbing noises and hated Leon Beaumont that he, when she was too panic-stricken to think of taking a shower in case he walked in, as nice as you please, was showering, quite unconcerned.

      Varnie broke another unwritten rule. She rinsed her face and then dressed without first showering. After running a comb through her hair she left her room, went down the stairs and went into the kitchen—to wait.

      He was in no particular hurry, it seemed, and still hadn’t appeared five minutes later. But, while still not looking forward to seeing him again—she went red just thinking of how she had stood, positively starkers, in front of him—she was beginning to feel much calmer than she had.

      The longer he kept her waiting, though, and she was starting to think that perhaps there was no need for her to face the embarrassment of seeing him again. Johnny would have told him that his sister owned the house and…Or would he? There was no knowing with Johnny. At times that clever brother of hers could be totally feather-brained. It could be, she realised, that Leon Beaumont had not the smallest clue who she was. So why didn’t she just open that door, take a fast walk to her car, and get out of there? She could be back home in Gloucestershire by…

      Hang on a minute, this was her house! Not his! And anyway, she wasn’t ready to go home yet. Soon the pain of Martin Walker’s perfidiousness would start, and she would prefer to be alone here rather than at home with her parents when that happened. She wanted to leave them in peace, blissfully believing she was abroad enjoying the ski slopes.

      And on the thought that she had come here to be alone Varnie decided that it was time she got her act together. Time she took charge of the situation. She had no idea what Leon Beaumont was doing here, but she wasn’t leaving—he was!

      Feeling in a sudden determined frame of mind, Varnie marched from the kitchen and along the hall to the bottom of the stairs. There she listened for sounds of the electric motor that would tell her that Beaumont was making the most of his shower. She could hear nothing, so knew he was out of the shower.

      Preferring not to see him in any stage of undress, she decided against going up the stairs to give him his marching orders. He might be her brother’s boss, but he wasn’t hers. She was about to go back to the kitchen when she spotted a whole pile of junk mail on the floor by the front door. There was masses of it, and since she had cleared away anything that had come through the letter flap on her last visit…

      Thinking to occupy herself while waiting for his lordship—what on earth had Johnny been thinking to give him his key?—she went and collected up the mound of clear plastic covered unsolicited mail. Then she found that one was a plain white envelope.

      Taking the mail with her back to the kitchen, she knew that the only explanation for Beaumont being inside her property must be because Johnny had handed over his key. Now, why would he do that?

      She had a sudden flashback of standing with not a stitch on in front of the man her brother thought so highly of, and knew she was red about the ears. She swiftly busied herself opening up the unaddressed white envelope—and very quickly learned why, or part of why, her brother had parted with his key.

      The letter was from Mrs Lloyd, the lady who had come to clean and cook for Grandfather Sutton, and was in response to a telephone call that Johnny had made to her. For all his name was not on the envelope, it began, ‘Dear Mr Metcalfe’.

      I am sorry I wasn’t in when you rang yesterday. And I am sorry too that I am not able to come and look after your guest.

      Apparently Mrs Lloyd was now retired but, if Mr Metcalfe was really stuck for someone, she had written the phone number of a Mrs Roberts who might be willing, if he could call daily and collect Mrs Roberts, who had no transport.

      Her breath caught as it hit Varnie that this was not intended to be just a one-night stopover, as she’d thought! So, she fumed, cross with Johnny and fuming against his employer, that was it. Leon Beaumont obviously fancied a bit of a break—away from outraged husbands, no doubt—and Johnny, doubtless mentioning Aldwyn House, had decided it would be an ideal spot for a hideaway. And, without doubt too, would not have needed much coercion to hand over his key. Naturally enough Johnny, being Johnny and aware that she wouldn’t be around for at least two weeks because she was flying off to Switzerland, had seen no need to inform her of what was happening. She felt fairly certain then that Johnny, as ever Johnny, just hadn’t thought to tell his womanising employer that the property didn’t actually belong to him.

      The sound of footsteps interrupted her angry thoughts. She looked to the door. Leon Beaumont stood in the doorway. He was tall, as she had known he was. And, just as she had known she would, she went crimson.

      He came further into the kitchen, but did not comment on her embarrassed colour; there wasn’t so much as a hint of embarrassment about him, she noticed. But then, he was probably used to seeing the female form unclad, she fumed sniffily. Though before she could tell him that now that he was dressed she was throwing him out, he demanded, ‘What’s your name?’

      As if it had anything to do with him! ‘Varnie Sutton,’ she answered snappily, and watched to see if her name meant anything to him. Clearly it didn’t, so obviously Johnny had not thought to mention her. Not that he should in the