Out of Control Read online

  Liza was afraid to refuse to speak to them, in case that gave them carte blanche to invent what they chose. She had to tell them it wasn't true and she did with curt insistence, but they brushed her denials aside and fired impertinent questions at her without seeming at all aware of their own rudeness.

  'Are you in love with Bruno?' one even asked her.

  'I just told you…'

  'How long have you known him?'

  'What has that to do with ...?'

  'What do his family think?'

  'I have no idea.' Liza's voice was brusque.

  'You haven't met them?' asked the reporter eagerly.

  'No,' she said without expression, deciding to hang up.

  'They won't meet you? How do you feel about being cold-shouldered by the Giffords?'

  'I didn't say that!' Liza was beginning to panic.

  'Have they tried to stop you and Bruno meeting?'

  'This is ridiculous, listen to me ...'

  'We've tried to get in touch with Bruno at his London flat in Hyde Park Gate, but he isn't answering his phone. Can you tell us where he is?'

  'Down at Hartwell,' Liza said coldly, and with faint malice because that would transfer the baying hounds to the Gifford family's end of this muddle. Let G. K. Gifford face their persistence and their shameless curiosity!

  She put down the phone without saying goodbye, in the end, because every time she tried to get away the reporter thought of a new question. Liza had a strong suspicion that the girl on the switchboard in the outer office was listening to every call and retailing what was said to the rest of the girls, because as the day wore on the excitement in the office seemed to mount with every call.

  Even the models who came in for interviews seemed to know more about it than Liza did. Tawny Holt asked outright, big-eyed with coy interest.

  'Are we going to hear wedding bells soon?'

  Freezing, Liza said, 'Are we?' without commenting, and Tawny batted her long, false lashes, giggling.

  'He's so rich too, but sexy with it! My boyfriend plays squash with him, you know; he says Bruno is all muscle.'

  'Your boyfriend?' Liza stared and Tawny gave a naughty grin, one hand twining a bright red-gold curl .mil pulling it to her mouth to nibble it.

  'Don't tell anyone, it's a deadly secret. I'm dating Jeremy Bell, but all hell would break loose if his wife found out.'

  'The Earl?' Liza was amazed as she remembered the lovely face of the Countess, a famous model herself some ten years ago. 'But, Tawny, she's pregnant, isn't she? I read somewhere that this is her third try—she lost the other two.'

  'That's why she has to stay in bed the whole nine months!' Tawny said indifferently. 'And no sex! How do you think poor old Jerry feels? She can't go to parties or the races or dancing—I mean, nine months of utter boredom, poor darling. He couldn't stand it—could anyone?'

  Liza eyed her coldly. 'His wife doesn't seem to have much choice, does she?'

  'Oh, well, it's different for women,' Tawny said, tossing her vivid head and looking impatient.

  'Sometimes I feel like giving you a good slap,' Liza said to herself and Tawny looked amazed.

  'Why? What did I do?'

  'Oh, get out!' Liza said.

  'What about that perfume ad? No news yet?'

  'None,' Liza said, although she had heard that Tawny was the front runner among the girls being considered for the job. She was too annoyed with Tawny to tell her. Let her eat her heart out over it for a little while longer. The only thing that did have any real impact on Tawny was success. She wanted fame and money, she wanted to get to the top and she might well do it because she had a thick skin. She didn't care what she had to do to get up there and, of course, she was lovely. Liza looked at her coldly, admitting that much. Tawny was beautiful in a gypsyish way, but she was not someone Liza liked, or approved of, especially today.

  'I hope it never happens to you, Tawny,' she said as the other girl swayed to the door, and Tawny looked back blankly.

  'What?'

  'What you're doing to Jeremy's wife,' Liza said. 'It's indecent. It's mean. One day you may realise that, if it happens to you in turn.'

  Tawny wasn't shaken. 'Oh, come off it!' she said tartly. 'She's done OK for herself—little Cathy Black from Hoxton, going to school without socks when she's seven according to the gossip columns and a Countess with a stately home and a private plane when she's twenty-three ? Don't ask me to cry for her, because I wasn't born with easy tear-ducts. I'm from Hoxton too, or near enough. I know where she comes from and I know where she landed up— and so do you, don't you, Liza? You're not from a silk-lined drawer, either. We both had to fight our way up and we know it's a jungle out there, and if you want to survive you have to fight tooth and nail.'

  'I didn't,' Liza said flatly. 'And I didn't marry to get where I am. I worked and I used my head, not my body.'

  'How moral, darling.' Tawny said viciously, showing her teeth and looking ugly. 'Haven't you forgotten Bruno? Don't tell me it's purely platonic, because I wouldn't believe you if you swore it on a stack of Bibles.

  He's not middle-aged, like poor old Jerry, and you may really fancy him—I can see how you would, he's got a good body, and he isn't bad-looking at all, but he's also a Gifford and has a bank full of the green stuff, and that's what it's all about in the end, isn't it?'

  'Oh, get out!' Liza said, feeling sick. 'And take your mind to the cleaners.'

  'I love you, too, honey,' Tawny said, laughing angrily and slamming the door on her way out.

  That was the last straw for Liza; she sat behind her desk staring at nothing, shaking with rage, then she looked at the clock and saw that it was nearly three o'clock. She had had enough; she had to get away. She wouldn't bother to dictate a batch of letters for Maddie to do on Monday before she got back. She would just go now, drive down to the cottage and forget all this madness.

  She kept her packed suitcase in her car boot, she was ready to leave and she was the boss, after all. Why stick to a routine she had worked out herself?

  Maddie looked up in surprise as Liza put her head round the door. 'Sorry, did you buzz for me? I didn't hear you, something must be wrong with the console.'

  'I didn't buzz, I just came to say I'm off. See you on Monday, usual time, have the coffee ready.' Liza used a light tone but Maddie wasn't deceived; she stared, frowning in concern.

  'Are you OK?' They had worked together for nearly five years, ever since Liza had started the agency. They had built it up together, and Maddie could run it all on her own if she had to, Liza knew that. Maddie was more or less the same age, but she had never been pretty. Liza sensed that that bothered Maddie; she would have liked to be beautiful and she envied the models who came in and out all day. She was kind-hearted and calm and unflappable, tall and bony with short brown hair and dark, rather melancholy eyes. Liza liked her face; it was full of gentle warmth. Maddie hated it, herself; she looked at it in mirrors and wished it didn't belong to her because it was plain, and not all the tips Liza had given her could make much difference to its broad, raw-boned lines. Maddie was an incurable romantic; a dreamer. She would have loved to meet Prince Charming; instead she looked after her invalid mother when she wasn't working. Liza wished she could think of some way of convincing Maddie how much more lovable she was than someone like Tawny with her vivacious looks and her mean, selfish little heart and mind.

  'I'm just fed up,' Liza said with a wry smile. 'I want to get out of here and I can't wait.'

  Maddie looked worried. 'Are they going to stop Bruno seeing you?'

  'Not you, too,' Liza said with a groan. 'I don't want to talk about it, Maddie. Why do you think I have to get out of here?'

  'I understand,' Maddie said with deep sympathy, but she didn't, of course, she had no idea. Maddie's eyes were wearing rose-coloured spectacles; she saw Liza and Bruno as star-crossed lovers, not friends and playmates. Liza envied her suddenly; it must be nice to have a loving heart and a peaceful mind like Maddie.<
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  'Have a nice weekend,' Liza said.

  'You, too,' said Maddie kindly.

  It took Liza nearly an hour to get out of London's snarling traffic and closely packed streets—the suburbs went on for ever—but eventually she emerged on to the wide, dual carriageway which ran across the flat Essex miles into the countryside surrounding the Thames estuary. At that time on a Friday, even in June, there wasn't too much traffic heading in that direction and Liza was able to cover quite a distance in the next half-hour. But when she turned off into the maze of winding little lanes which criss-crossed the marsh she found herself forced to slow to a crawl, because a river mist had drifted inland, thick and wet and white, coiling around trees and houses like damp cotton wool, making it impossible to see far ahead. It was lucky that Liza knew her way so well; she was almost feeling the way now, like one of the blind, recognising landmarks and twists of the road without seeing anything on either side.

  A pub sign flashed out of the mist at last and she gave a sigh of relief, recognising the local pub, the Green Man. The sign was new, a vivid painting of a dancing, capering figure dressed from head to foot in green leaves. There was a faintly sinister element in the painting, and the local regulars at the pub didn't like it as much as the old sign, which had been a faded, weatherbeaten picture of Robin Hood, but the landlord was pleased with his new sign and ignored complaints.

  Liza carefully inched her way down a tiny lane leading off at right angles, hearing the slap of the tide against the wooden jetty at the far end of the lane. Her cottage was a stone's throw away; she had got here safely and was very pleased with herself for her navigation under such difficult circumstances, but she congratulated herself a minute too soon.

  She was grinning cheerfully when her car ran smack into the back of another car. She hadn't seen the tail-lights or heard another engine. She had had no warning of any kind.

  It was lucky that her car was only crawling along the kerb at about five miles an hour, and even luckier that Liza had her seat-belt on—it might have been much worse. As it was, she was thrown forwards with a violent jolt into the steering wheel and had all the air knocked out of her lungs for a minute. She was too shocked to hear the crumpling of the car bonnet or the splintering of the glass in her windscreen. When she was conscious of anything again it was very quiet and still. She sat up, her heart beating like a sledge-hammer and her breathing thick and painful, and peered into the waves of white mist.

  Through it she heard the sound of striding and then a face lunged at her through the mist; an angry face, dark and ruthless, without an ounce of sympathy for the pain Liza was in or a trace of kindness for her to appeal to. A face Liza disliked intensely on sight. It was obviously mutual.

  'What the hell were you doing, driving like a damned maniac in this weather?' he snarled, his hard mouth curling upwards as if he might bite at any minute. Liza eyed him coldly. His face was wolfish, she decided; he had thick black eyebrows above fierce, blue eyes and moody features. She couldn't imagine him being the life and soul of a party, even in a good mood, if he ever had any.

  'I was almost at a standstill!' she hurled back. 'It was you who was the cause of the accident—you weren't showing any lights.'

  'You mean you didn't see them!' he said, but she saw a flicker in his eyes, a passing uncertainty—had his lights failed without him noticing? Too late to check now; she only had to lean forward to see the battered rear of his car, the smashed glass of his lights.

  That was when she saw that he was driving an estate car; a very muddy estate car which looked as if it was at least ten years old. That was a relief; if she was found responsible for the accident, at least he couldn't claim much on a vehicle in that state.

  'Look, I'm sorry,' she began, turning to him and taking in more about him this time. He was wearing a shabby old fawn mackintosh which was open and under which she saw a well worn tweed jacket, and olive-green sweater, rough cord trousers in more or less the same shade and muddy green wellies.

  'And how could you drive in those boots?' Liza attacked, pointing. 'Your feet would slip on the controls!'

  'I wasn't driving. I was debating whether to go into the Green Man or set off for home!'

  'Don't you mean go back into the Green Man?' she asked. 'Had you been drinking?'

  'No, I had not,' he said with a bite, yanking open her door and gripping her arm. 'I think you'd better get out of there. We'll walk back to the pub and ring the police.'

  'My cottage is nearer,' Liza said with cold dignity. 'We can ring from there.'

  'Cottage?' He looked around him, his black brows lilting.

  'Behind you—you can see the gate, it's only a few yards.'

  'Well, out you get, then,' he said and Liza felt herself being pulled out of her seat. Her head went round and she gave a silly little moan, swaying.

  'Don't do that,' she said and found herself talking into his sweater. She was leaning on his chest, her body slack and cold. What on earth am I doing here? she thought stupidly.

  'What are you doing?' he asked a second later and Liza i nod to stand upright, but only slithered down his body until she was seized and propped up against her car. He leaned forward and spoke slowly and clearly, an inch away from her face. 'Where is your key?'

  Liza tried to reach into her car for the keys dangling from her dashboard, but the movement made her dizzy again. A moment later she was over his shoulder, seeing the ground from a strange angle; it was swinging to and fro and Liza felt seasick so she moaned weakly, shutting her eyes, and that was better. Not much better, but a little.

  He must have found her door key on the key-ring in the dashboard, because he opened the front door of the cottage and a moment later the hall light came on and then the sitting-room light. Then Liza was lying on the comfortable sofa, and the stranger took of his fawn mackintosh and covered her with it. She heard him switch on the electric fire on the hearth; the bars slowly glowed orange and she sighed as the heat reached her. She was shivering, but the appalling coldness was passing.

  'Where's the phone? I think you should see a doctor as well as the police,' he said, then walked away, probably having caught sight of the phone in the corner.

  Liza struggled up. 'No, please, I don't need a doctor. It was just the shock. I wasn't injured. A cup of tea and I'll be fine.'

  He came back and stared down at her, looming darkly, with those thick brows together above his vivid blue eyes.

  'A cup of tea? What you need is a stiff drink,' he said. 'And so do I—have you got anything or shall I walk back to the Green Man?'

  'There's some brandy in a cupboard in the kitchen, but I don't like it, I won't have any.'

  'If I have some, so do you,' he said tersely.

  Liza stared, baffled by the irony of his mouth.

  'When the police do a breath test I'm not going to be the only one with brandy in my veins,' he told her and she laughed.

  'Look, no need to report the accident—I'm sure we can reach an amicable settlement. I'll pay for the repairs to your car, how's that?'

  He considered her shrewdly, his eyes narrowed and thoughtful. 'How do I know you'll pay when the bill arrives?'

  'Estimate it and I'll give you a cheque at once.'

  'And if the cheque bounces?'

  'It won't,' she said coolly, and he ran assessing eyes over her from head to foot. Liza's clothes were elegant and expensive; even a small farmer could see that.

  'Poor little rich girl?' he mocked. 'Well, well. And Daddy will pay, I suppose?'

  Liza's mouth tightened, but she didn't snap back. She had no wish to talk to the police about the accident because it had suddenly occurred to her that a local reporter might get to hear about it. Liza was news at the moment because of Bruno and the Giffords; any of the London papers would pay well for a news item about her, and if by some mischance a gossip column heard about her Essex cottage they might also hear about her weekend visits and start to wonder who she met down there.

  Liza h
ad had enough of newspaper publicity. She would much rather pay the no doubt exorbitant bill for repairing the estate car. It would be cheaper at the price.

  'OK, it's a deal,' the stranger said and walked out. She heard him opening cupboards in the kitchen, then he came back with two glasses of brandy.

  'I shouldn't drink this on an empty stomach,' Liza said.

  'Nor should I,' he grimaced, swallowing the brandy. 'When we feel better we'll make a meal and some coffee.'

  'We?' Liza repeated, frowning. 'Shouldn't you be on your way home? Your wife will be worrying about you.'

  'I haven't got a wife.' he said, eyeing her through his lashes with amusement.

  'Well, somebody .. .' protested Liza.

  'You're forgetting something!'

  'What?' she asked warily, tensed to meet whatever was coming.

  'My car,' he said coolly. 'It's a write-off. I won't drive five yards in it tonight in this mist. And don't suggest I stay at the Green Man, because they don't have a spare room. There's a fishing competition being held locally and all their rooms are occupied by contestants wanting to be up at the crack of dawn.'

  'You could phone for a taxi,' Liza began, but he shook his head.

  'It would never find us in this mist. I don't know how you managed to find your way here, or do you use radar?' His eyes mocked her. 'Have you got ears like a bat, or X-ray vision?'

  'But how are you going to get home?' Liza asked slowly, sitting up and watching him with growing apprehension. She didn't know the man, and they were quite alone here. The Green Man was only just up the lane, at the top of the hill, a mere five or six minutes' walk away, but that was too far for safety. They wouldn't hear her scream from there and she couldn't run fast enough to get there before he caught up with her, even if she tried to make a dash for it.

  'Well, I've no intention of walking it,' he said with irony, watching her face as if he could read every passing expression on it. 'I don't want to walk into the river, and that mist is getting thicker, if anything.'

  Liza looked at the window; the curtains hadn't been drawn across it and she saw the mist pressing against the glass like a pale, smoky cat, soft and sinewy. He was right; the mist was thicker and it stifled and smothered every sound outside as if they were alone here at the end of the earth.