Her father stared, too, bolt-eyed and frowning. 'Wherever did you buy that?' he growled disapprovingly. She had expected his reaction; her father usually was conservative when it came to her clothes, and the neckline of the flame-coloured dress was much lower than her necklines usually were, revealing the pale curve where her breasts began. The clinging silky skirt was tight-fitting, but slit up one side, giving a glimpse of her thigh with every step she took. Caro had hesitated over buying the dress for ages; she had never been prepared to take risks where clothes were concerned, but tonight she had been feeling rebellious and her mirror told her the flame dress really did something for her.
'She bought it at Westbrooks,' drawled Gil, and she gave him a startled look. He intercepted it and grinned at her. 'Oh, yes, I recognise our stock! I don't just sit behind my desk and dictate memos, you know! I can even tell you how much it cost and which firm made it.'
'Good lad,' Fred approved, beaming. 'I like a man who keeps in touch with what he's selling, even when his store is as big as Westbrooks.'
Gil gave him a sardonic glance. 'But you'll still take my job away and hand the running of my store over to one of your own executives.'
'We haven't even begun to think about it!' Fred stoutly said, and Caro knew from the faint shift of his eyes that he was lying.
Gil was right, she realised. Her father had already decided to replace him with one of their own men. Her stomach turned over sickeningly and she paled. Gil was going to hate her when it happened. He would never forgive either her or her father.
CHAPTER SEVEN
The party was held in one of the leafy streets of St John's Wood, close to Caro's own district of London, and a very chic, elegant and expensive place to live. It had once been the fashionable place for married Victorian gentlemen to keep their expensive mistresses, which was why the houses were often imitations of overgrown country cottages set among pretty cottage gardens, with pink tiled roofs and little porches, and stained glass windows to give a spuriously pious air. The district had changed a great deal, of course. Today there were plenty of blocks of flats and ugly modern buildings, and the streets were choked by traffic, but the tree
s and gardens persisted and somehow that country feeling still clung on.
The party was in full swing by the time they arrived. Amy met them at the door, flushed with excitement and as graciously welcoming as if she was giving the party herself. She kissed Caro on her cheek, lightly, then stood back and eyed her up and down, lifting her eyebrows in laughing disbelief. 'Well, well, well! Darling, what's happened to you?'
Caro felt waves of heat flow up her face, especially with Gil smilingly observing her, but fortunately Amy didn't wait for a reply. She had already turned and kissed Gil, not quite so lightly, or so quickly. Her mouth lingered, and she smiled up into his eyes, tiny, childlike, oddly sexy Amy.
'Hello, again,' she cooed in her throatiest voice. 'I was afraid you wouldn't actually come. I'm so glad you have—it will give us a chance to get to know each other better.'
'I hope so,' Gil said softly, staring into her baby-blue eyes with unhidden amusement.
Caro watched, not sure whether she was more jealous or envious. Her teeth were tight and her throat smouldered with fury over the way Amy was flirting with him, but she knew, too, that she wished she could frankly react to a man the way Amy did. She was too shy, though, too self-conscious. Amy wasn't; she was never inhibited or nervous. She had a most enviable gift of self-assurance and enjoyment of life.
'You must come and say hello to some people who are dying to meet you,' Amy said to him, threading her arm through his. Casually, she tossed to Caro the remark that, 'Antony is over there, at the bar, handing out the drinks. He's been waiting for you with bated breath since the party began. Go and help him, there's a love!'
Caro glanced across the room to where a very tall, very skinny man with a rugged, raw-boned face and pale, fine hair was pouring drinks and offering bowls of peanuts. He wasn't at all bad-looking, she decided, but then even if she had hated him she wouldn't have admitted it in front of Gil. She forced a bright smile and said, 'Love to! See you!'
She felt Gil watching her, but didn't look his way to check on his expression. What difference did it make? Amy was going to monopolise him all evening, and anyway, Gil loathed and despised both her and her father. She was just torturing herself by thinking about him. They were enemies and would never be anything else.
When Fred had blandly claimed that he hadn't even begun to think about possible future changes at Westbrooks, Gil had known he was lying. He hadn't bothered to argue. Her face had tightened and hardened, but he had just said quietly to her, 'If you're ready, we'll be on our way.'
She normally kissed her father before she went out in the evenings, but tonight she had just walked out, without even looking at Fred Ramsgate. No doubt that would have surprised and puzzled her father, but she hadn't cared.
Gil had put her into the front passenger seat of the black Rolls and had driven away without speaking to her, scowling through the windscreen at the light traffic through which they had moved. Caro had known what he was thinking about—what else could make him look like that? She had wished she could come up with something to distract him, but her mind had been numb with guilt and unhappiness. This was the first time that she had actually begun to realise the human consequences of one of their takeover operations. Hitherto she had told herself that they would improve a department store; make money for everybody, including the staff and the shareholders. But then in the past she had never been emotionally involved with any of the management they were ousting.
She put a bright smile on her face as she went up to Antony. 'Hi! I'm a friend of Amy...'
'I remember,' he said vaguely, pouring her a drink and handing it to her with an automatic smile. 'You're Caro. We met when I operated on Amy, and she's always talking about you; schoolgirl chums, weren't you?' He let his pale blue eyes roam over the flame-red dress and his smile brightened. 'You look gorgeous, I love the dress. Have you come to help me behind the bar? Won't you come into my parlour, said the spider to the fly...?' He waved her round to his side of the polished wood counter. 'Tell you what, you deal with those who want wine and I'll deal with the rest, OK?'
'OK,' she said bleakly, her eyes on the other side of the room where Amy was twining herself all over Gil, like clinging ivy around a tall tree.
Antony followed her stare and grimaced. 'Sometimes I could kill her,' he said with grim frankness.
Caro looked at him. 'You're in love with her?'
'How did you guess?' he said drily.
'It wasn't difficult,' she said with sympathy, wondering if her own state of the heart was as obvious. She must stop looking at Gil; she had an uneasy suspicion that her feelings showed when she was looking at him.
'I made the mistake of caring more than she did,' Antony told her in a bright voice, pretending to find it all funny. 'Amy loves to be in love, but it wears off quickly and then she gets bored. I'm unfortunately the faithful type. Very silly of me, but there you are... I can't help it.'
Caro felt so sorry for him—and for herself. She could almost have cried. She leaned over and kissed him. 'I'm so sorry. Love's hell, isn't it?'
'You find it hell, too?' he guessed, and she wished she hadn't been so frank. She didn't want to talk about Gil, or about herself.