The Devils Price. Carole Mortimer

to him. They had parted at her bedroom door, and from the tight-lipped disappointment on Zack’s face she had known there would be no late night trip to her bedroom tonight as there had been in the past when they stayed with his parents, that Zack had been too hurt to want her tonight.

      She had been right, sleeping badly as she knew things were over between the two of them. He wouldn’t settle for less than marriage now, and she would never marry him.

      ‘My son has gone out riding,’ Nicholas Buchanan had informed her when she had joined him at the breakfast table. ‘He seemed a little—distraught.’

      ‘Really?’ She had sipped her reviving coffee, wishing Alice Buchanan were there to counteract the harsh disapproval Nicholas Buchanan had never hesitated in showing her whenever they were alone. But Alice always breakfasted in her bedroom, and so Cynara knew she would get no help from that direction.

      ‘Have the two of you argued?’ Nicholas had probed mercilessly.

      Not as tall or well-built as his son, Nicholas Buchanan had, nevertheless, exuded power of a different kind. Cynara hadn’t felt comfortable under his blue-eyed stare from the moment they had met.

      ‘We’ve—er—had a slight disagreement,’ she had conceded warily.

      ‘I’m glad to have this time alone with you.’ He had spoken softly, with all the charm of a snake. ‘I want to talk to you, about something personal.’

      ‘Yes?’ She had eyed him guardedly.

      ‘In my study,’ he had told her. ‘Where we can’t be disturbed.’

      Not ‘wont’ be, but ‘can’t’ be! Cynara had felt her tension rise as she had followed him from the room. Nicholas Buchanan had never gone out of his way to talk to her before; this meeting seemed ominous.

      ‘Sit down,’ he had invited, moving to stand behind the imposing desk. ‘I have something I want to show you.’

      ‘Yes?’ She had sat down demurely, wariness in every bone of her body. Nicholas Buchanan had the look of a snake about to fatally strike his victim—and she was it!

      He had moved the picture on the wall behind him to one side to reveal a safe, deftly unlocking it to take out a folder. ‘Do you know what this is?’ He had turned to her Cynara had frowned. ‘Should I?’

      ‘Perhaps, if you had come to know me a little better.’ He had smiled without humour, sitting down behind the desk. ‘When my only son and heir brings home a cheap little singer like you and introduces her to his mother and me then I feel I have reason to try and protect him from making a fool of himself.’

      Cynara had tensed at his emotionless insult, knowing there was worse to come. There was, much worse!

      ‘So I had you investigated—–’

      ‘No!’ she had gasped.

      ‘Yes,’ he had stated coldly. ‘This file tells me everything I need to know about Cynara Williams. You see, I believe my son intends to ask you to marry him—–’