Sylvie looked away as she spoke, knowing quite well that she was lying, that she would have the most important reason there could be for not forgetting it, for not being able to forget it, but that wasn’t a piece of information she had any intention of sharing with Ran.
‘I...I should like to go back to my own room to get dressed before Mrs Elliott arrives,’ she told him with formal dignity, adding, when he continued to look at her, ‘I want you to turn your back, Ran, so that I can get out of this bed...’
The look he gave her made her face burn.
‘Yes, I know that you’ve already seen...that... But that was last night,’ she snapped self-consciously. ‘That was then...this...this is now; this is different...’
‘Yes, it is, isn’t it?’ Ran agreed heavily, and then, to her relief, he turned away so that she could slip out of the bed and snatch up her nightdress which she pulled on before heading for the door, opening it without pausing to look back because she knew that if she did look back—
Last night had been the most perfect, the most wonderful night of her life, but now it was over and soon, too, with Lloyd’s agreement, her time here would be over, and only she would know that when she left Haverton Hall, when she left Ran, she would be carrying a small and very precious piece of him with her.
CHAPTER 10
‘I’M SORRY to disturb you but Ran said that he thought you might like coffee.’
Forcing a welcoming smile to her lips, Sylvie took the tray from Ran’s housekeeper.
She had been working in the library all morning, painstakingly going through the accounts and costings for the work she had already commissioned for Haverton Hall.
But now, even though she hadn’t eaten any breakfast and she knew that she ought to be hungry, the only hunger she had was the never-ending hunger for Ran’s love. And, as he had made more than plain to her, that was something she could never have.
Half an hour later she was just on her way downstairs, intending to drive over to Haverton, when her mobile rang. Answering it, she was surprised to hear Lloyd’s voice on the other end of the line.
‘Lloyd. I wasn’t expecting to hear from you today. I thought you’d be...otherwise engaged,’ Sylvie told him tactfully.
‘Well, I guess I thought I would be too,’ she heard Lloyd responding with a rueful note in his voice. ‘Like they say, though, there’s no fool like an old fool. Still, it was fun while it lasted, and I guess I had my money’s worth.’
From the tone of his voice Sylvie immediately recognised that Lloyd had quickly become disillusioned with Vicky.
‘I’m going to miss you, hon, when I’m back in New York,’ Lloyd told her with the warm affection that was so much a part of his personality.
‘I’ll miss you as well,’ Sylvie told him gravely, and meant it. ‘Lloyd, I need to talk to you,’ she added quietly. ‘There’s...there’s... I can’t stay here... I...I want to come back to New York...’
Biting down hard on her bottom lip, Sylvie willed herself not to lose control. Lloyd would wonder what on earth was the matter with her. She hadn’t intended to blurt it all out like that. She had told herself that she would wait, assemble all her arguments and then talk to him calmly and quietly, and yet here she was, letting her emotions run away with her, giving in to the urgent need she felt to protect herself from the pain that being so physically close to Ran was causing her.
‘Say, honey, you sound upset. What’s wrong?’ she heard Lloyd asking her anxiously.
‘I can’t discuss it over the phone,’ Sylvie told him. ‘I need to see you... Oh, Lloyd, I’m so sorry...’ She gulped as she heard her voice thickening with tears.
‘Don’t be,’ she heard Lloyd telling her gently, and then, to her relief, he said, ‘I’ll be there with you just as soon as I can fix up everything down here and then we can talk.’
‘Oh, Lloyd,’ Sylvie wept.
How typical it was of Lloyd that he should put everything else on hold to come and see her, Sylvie acknowledged after their call had ended. He would understand, she knew he would, but she still felt guilty about letting him down.
The door to Ran’s study was open and Ran himself entered the hallway just as she was about to cross it. As he glanced at the mobile she was still holding in her hand, Sylvie realised that he must have overheard her talking to Lloyd.
‘Lloyd’s coming back,’ she told him huskily.
‘Yes, so I gathered,’ she heard him responding flatly, with something that almost sounded like anger hardening his voice. Sylvie couldn’t bring herself to look at him. Already the tenderness they had shared last night felt as though it was all something she herself had imagined, created out of her own need; it had gone.
‘I...I have to go to Haverton,’ she told him shakily as she made to walk past him.
Ran watched her go. It tore him apart to see the pain she was in. Last night she had turned to him in need, in simple human need, driven by her longing, her love for another man, a man who had left her to be with another woman.
Did Lloyd have any conception of what he had done, of what he was doing, or did he simply think that his wealth gave him the right to ignore other people’s feelings? Did he think that the damage he had done to Sylvie, the hurt he had caused her, simply didn’t matter?
Yesterday he had left her to be with someone else and now, today, he was coming back.