Seductive Stranger

'I'd like to!' she insisted, 'I'll take a look through the freezer and the larder, shall I, and see what I can find?'

'Aye, lass,' James Allardyce said reluctantly. 'If you've a mind! But after that, why don't you lie down for a couple of hours? I'll be back as soon as I've finished my work, and we can cook the dinner together!'

She smiled, nodding. 'OK, Dad. We'll do it together. It will be more fun that way.'

He went off looking very cheerful, and she looked at the larder and worked out what to cook for dinner, then she went upstairs and lay down on her bed, intending only to rest for half an hour. Instead she fell asleep almost at once, utterly exhausted by the day out in the fresh, windy Yorkshire air.

A sound awoke her; a click which, even half-asleep, she recognised as the click of her bedroom door. Someone had come into her room.

Prue surfaced drowsily, but before she opened her eyes the door softly closed again. The stairs creaked arid she slowly sat up, yawning.

'Dad?' she called. The creaking stopped; nobody answered, yet she felt someone out there, listening, breathing quietly, and her sleepiness vanished.

'Dad, is that you?' she called again, but still there was no answer. She began to be frightened, especially when the creaking began again. It was quieter this time, though; someone was moving very carefully, trying not to mice a sound. She felt the emptiness of the house all around her, pressing down on her like a great weight. If that wasn't her father, who was it, and why didn't he answer?

She swung her legs off the bed and stood up, the hair on the back of her neck prickling with atavistic dread.. Tiptoeing to the door, she suddenly pulled it open. The stairs were shadowy; it was late afternoon and the autumn dusk was falling fast, but she still saw the dark shape half-way down the stairs, a man whose elongated, black shadow ran up the wall until it touched the ceding like something out of a silent horror film.

Prue froze, staring downwards, her heart beating suffocatingly fast.

CHAPTER THREE

THEN he turned his head to look back at her, the menace of his shadow fled, she recognised his face and the spell broke, but Prue did not merely feel a wave of relief! As her fear subsided, rage welled up inside her.

'What the hell do you think you're doing, creeping about the house like that?' she yelled, and Josh Killane swung round and began to come back upstairs again.

'I wasn't creeping about! I was moving quietly, that's all, trying not to wake you up!'

'How considerate,' she muttered. 'A pity you already had, creeping into my room, isn't it? And while we're on that subject, what were you after in my bedroom?'

'I wasn't after you, anyway, so you needn't have palpitations!' he said drily, and she got angrier, although in the beginning she had been more angry with herself—for imagining night-time terrors, conjuring them out of such small things—a creak on the stair, a shadow on a wall. She had been an idiot and she could kick herself, but she wasn't going to let Josh Killane make fun of her.

'You really fancy yourself, don't you?'

'Me, fancy myself?' He laughed without amusement. 'I'd say it was the other way round. This is the second time you've accused me of making a pass. Well, 1 wasn't making a pass the first time and I'm not now! You obviously think you're irresistible to the opposite sex, but I've got news for you—not to me, you're not. I can resist you without any trouble whatever.'

Prue showed him her teeth, dying to smack his face, but deciding that she wouldn't give him the satisfaction of hitting her back—as he undoubtedly would. He was the type.

'1 notice you still haven't told me what you were, doing in my room.'

'I was looking-for your father, not you!'

Prue looked coldly incredulous. 'Looking for him in my bedroom?'

she queried with icy sweetness.

'I called from the hall, but nobody answered, then 1 saw Meg lying on the landing outside the door,' he said with angry insistence. 'And I thought your father must be up here. I came up and looked into the room—and saw you on the bed, asleep, so I left as quietly as I could.'

Prue looked down at the dog which was still there; no longer lying down, though. Meg was standing close to her, conscious of the tension in the air, her dark eyes intent.

'I didn't know she was there! My father must have left her to take care of me!' She was touched by the idea; had her father come back to the house, seen that she was asleep and decided to leave her in Meg's protection?

'She's a good guard dog,' said Josh, watching her ran a hand over the dog's black and white head. Meg looked up at her enquiringly, ears alert, as if waiting for a command.

'Good girl,' Prue murmured, patting her, but frowned. 'Why didn't she bark when you arrived, though? Isn't that what she was supposed to do?'

'She's known me all her life, she knows I'm always here—but if you told her to attack me, she would,' josh said with bland amusement.

'Would she?' Prue considered the liquid eyes and adoring stance of the dog. is she trained to attack?'