‘Enough to keep you in line, Marnie, never fear,’ he derided.
‘Oh, God.’ White-faced, she sank down on the sofa where Guy had just been sitting. ‘I had no idea,’ she whispered. ‘Jamie never uttered a single word that he’d been borrowing money from you of his own volition.’
His mouth tightened at her obvious distress. ‘Look,’ he sighed. ‘If it makes you feel any better about it, it was Jamie who suggested he come back to Oaklands to work for me. And it was he who offered his garage to me as collateral against the money he owes me. He’s learning, Marnie,’ he added grimly. ‘Learning to take responsibility for his own life at last. Let him be. Let him do it. He has used you and me and what we feel for each other for quite long enough.’
‘And Clare?’ she whispered thickly. ‘Is she to be cast out in the cold also?’
‘No one,’ Guy said heavily, ‘is being cast out! Only made to bear the brunt of their own actions. And if you think about it, Marnie,’ he added quietly, ‘Clare will be living a mere stone’s throw away from you from now on. Surely that makes it easier for you to cosset her, not less? Now,’ he said briskly ‘let’s get over to your flat. I want to be at Oaklands before sundown.’
He drove her to her flat in an atmosphere of grim silence, Marnie’s thoughts locked on the shocked discovery that her brother had even dared to approach Guy for money on his own! And Guy, she wondered frowningly. What had driven him to so much as give a penny to a man he liked to blame his broken marriage on?
You know the answer, a little voice said inside her head. He did it because of you.
He had never been inside her flat before. She went off to her bedroom to change into fresh underwear and a short straight apple-green silk skirt which had its own matching loosely cut jacket, and a white silk blouse before turning her attention to her packing.
She could hear Guy moving about in her studio-cum-sitting-room, arrogantly fishing around her private possessions as if he had the right. Her mouth tightened, resentment at his presumptuousness sending her stalking around her bedroom collecting and throwing her clothes into her open suitcases with scant regard to how they were going to look when she unpacked them again.
He was standing viewing her latest painting when she emerged, his dark head tilted to one side in interested study.
‘This is good,’ he said without turning to look at her. ‘Who is it?’
‘Amelia Sangster,’ she answered shortly. Then couldn’t help adding with a smile in her voice, ‘And the cat’s name is Dickens.’
‘Heavy name for such a sweet little cat,’ he mocked.
‘He doesn’t think so.’ Marnie walked over to stand beside him. ‘He sleeps every night curled up on Amelia’s leather-bound volumes of Dickens’ full works—Will I be allowed to deliver this?’ she asked shortly. ‘Or is poor Amelia to be disappointed like all my other expectant clients?’
Guy turned his head to look down at her, his expression telling her absolutely nothing as he searched her cool face. She had left her hair down this morning, and the waving tresses shimmered around her face and shoulders, lit by the sunlight seeping in through the window.
‘Is it finished?’ he asked.
‘Can’t you tell?’ she drawled sarcastically, refusing point-blank to admit that the picture was so close to being finished that probably only an expert eye would be able to tell it wasn’t. And Guy had never professed to being an art expert.
He ignored the sarcasm. ‘Do you want to finish it?’
‘Of course!’ she snapped, amazed that he should even have to ask such a stupid question.
He just shrugged. ‘Then I will have it picked up and delivered to Oaklands,’ he said. ‘But the rest—’ he lifted his right hand up so she could see the big black appointments book he was holding ‘—will have to stay disappointed.’
‘But—that’s my appointments book!’ she exclaimed. ‘What are you doing with it?’
‘Holding on to it for future reference,’ he drawled.
‘Future reference to what?’
‘To all those poor people we are going to disappoint,’ he answered with maddening calm. ‘I will have my secretary write them all a nice letter, letting them down gently.’
‘I can do that myself,’ she clipped, reaching out to take the book.
He moved it smoothly out of her way. ‘No, you won’t,’ he murmured, returning his attention back to Amelia and her cat. ‘I don’t trust you, Marnie,’ he informed her quite casually, ‘to do what is needed to be done. So I will pass the job on to my very reliable secretary.’
‘God, I despise you,’ she muttered, moving away from him.
He shrugged as if that didn’t matter to him either. ‘Packed everything you need?’ he enquired.
‘Yes.’ Suddenly she felt like weeping, coming to a standstill in the middle of the cluttered studio and gazing around her like a child about to lose everything that was comfortable and secure in its life.
She’d been happy here—if happiness could be gauged by the gentle waves of peace and contentment she had managed to surround herself with. Like an island, she realised. Living here alone for the last four years had been like living on a tranquil island, after spending a year in the ruthless jungle Guy existed in.