Vendetta Read Free Page A

did you not, Miss Mitchell?’
    This time she wasn’t going to chicken out. She squared her shoulders. ‘No. That is, not exactly—’
    ‘Not exactly? You do surprise me, Miss Marvel-lous.’
    Nerves slipped their leash. ‘Will you stop calling me that?’
    ‘Perhaps I should call you Miss Marmalade instead. That would be a more descriptive nickname—your hair being the colour it is… That wouldn’t offend you, would it? After all, what’s in a name? “That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet”…’
    His frivolity was definitely a trap, the quotation from Romeo and Juliet containing a baited message that Vivian could not afford to acknowledge without betraying her tiny but infinitely precious advantage.
    ‘As a matter of fact, there’s an awful lot in a name,’ she said, ignoring the lure. ‘Mine, for example, is Vivian Mitchell—’
    Instead of leaping to his feet in justifiable outrage, he rocked his chair on to its back legs with his booted heels, his expression one of veiled malice as he interrupted her confession. ‘Vivian. Mmm, yes, you’re right,’ he mused, in that low, gratingly attractive voice. ‘Vivian… It does have a certain aptness to your colouring, a kind of phonetic and visual rhythm to it…razor-sharp edges springing up around singing vowels. I do have your permission to call you Vivian, don’t I, Miss Mitchell?’
    ‘Yes, of course,’ she bit off, his feigned innocence making her feel like a mouse between the paws of a lion. ‘But you requested that Janna Mitchell bring you the documents and co-sign the settlement. Unfortunately my sister couldn’t come, so I brought them instead. Otherwise, everything is exactly as you asked…’
    ‘She couldn’t come?’ he asked mildly. ‘Why not?’
    Having expected a savage explosion of that banked energy, Vivian was once more disconcerted by his apparent serenity.
    She moistened her lower lip nervously, unconsciously emphasising its fullness. ‘She has flu.’
    Janna was also sick with guilt and remorse, and the combination had made her pathetically easy to deceive. As far as her sister or anyone else knew, Vivian’s prime motive for taking her place on this trip was her desperate desire to get away from everyone for a while.
    ‘Convenient.’
    She winced at the flick of the whip. Not so serene, after all.
    ‘Not for her. Janna hates being ill.’ Her younger sister was ambitious. As a newly qualified lawyer, working in Marvel-Mitchell Realties’ legal department, she had a rosy future ahead of her, one that Vivian intended to protect.
    ‘Messes up those gorgeous ice-blonde looks, I suppose,’ he said, casting a sardonic look at her wild ginger mane.
    Vivian froze.
    ‘You knew,’ she whispered, feeling momentarily faint. Thank God the masquerade had only been intended to get her inside the door.
    ‘The moment I saw you.’
    ‘But you’ve never met Janna—or anyone from Marvel-Mitchell,’ she said hollowly. ‘Until now you’ve always insisted on dealing through an intermediary—’
    ‘So you decided to be honest, in spite of the fact I might be none the wiser for the deception. I’m impressed.Or was I supposed to be?’ he added cynically. ‘Are you always so honest, I wonder?’
    ‘I try to be.’ Her tartness reproved his cynicism.
    ‘A neat piece of sophistry. You try but you don’t necessarily always succeed, mmm?’ His voice hardened. ‘You can’t have been so naïve as to think I wouldn’t investigate the people I do business with? I’m not a fool.’
    ‘I never thought you were.’ But she had seriously underestimated his thoroughness.
    ‘I’m sure that Marvel, too, conducted its own investigations into my integrity…?’
    It was a question rather than a comment, and Vivian answered it as such.
    ‘Other than maintaining a current credit check, Peter felt there was no need, since we’ve been buying and selling properties on your behalf for several years without any