Having hired a car in Zurich and driven to Davos, she opted to walk to the conference centre, and left her hotel quietly seething that her father so wanted an in with Dawson and Cross that he was fully prepared to make full use of Ross Dawsons interest in, not to say pursuit of her to that end. He was obviously hoping that by spending a week in close proximity of each other, with limited chance of her avoiding Ross, something might come of it!
She wouldnt put it past her father to even have telephoned in the first instance on some business pretext, and then casually let Ross, a director of Dawson and Cross, know that his daughter would be in Davos for a whole week.
She felt hurt as well as angry that her father, having sold her once, cared so little for her he was fully prepared to do it again. Over her dead body!
But, thanks to Henry having got wind of what was going on, he had been able to forewarn her, and at least do a little something to limit the time she had to spend with Ross. Not that she didnt like Ross. She did. She just had an extreme aversion to being manipulated. And, in the light of past events, who could blame her?
She knew that her father had been having a liaison with his PA, Anna Fry, for years. She wished he would concentrate his attentions more on Anna, and leave his daughter out of his scheming.
As Phelix neared the Kongresszentrum she saw other smartly dressed representatives making their way towards the entrance. She would be glad to see Chris and Duncan, she realised, and hoped nobody else would wonder, as she had before Henry had tipped her off, what possible reason she could have for being there. At least she had been spared the surprise of seeing Ross Dawson unexpectedly.
She made her way inside the building, hoping there were no other unexpected surprises waiting for her on this trip.
Where did you get to? She turned to find that Duncan Ward and Chris Watson had spotted her coming in and had come over to her. We looked high and low for you last night. Reception said you hadnt checked in.
It was gratifying to know that they had been concerned about her. I should have let you know, she apologised. Im sorry. I thought Id prefer a hotel a bit further away.
As in I might have to put up with you two talking shop during the day, but I want some rest from it in the evenings? Chris grinned.
Not at all. She laughed, and did not have a chance to say anything else because someone was calling her name.
Phelix! She looked over to where Ross Dawson was making his way over to her. Phelix Bradbury! he exclaimed as he reached her.
Hello, Ross, she replied, and was about to make some comment with regard to his act of being surprised to see her there when, even as Ross kissed her on both cheeks, she caught a glimpse of a tall, dark-haired man standing with a blonde woman and another man. But it was the dark-haired man that held Phelix riveted. She felt a deafening silent thunder in her ears, but even as she tried to deny that he was here after all, it took everything she had to keep her expression composed. She glanced casually away, but not before she noticed that he had been looking at nowhere but her!
Her insides were all of a jangle. She had not seen him in eight years, and only twice before then, but she would know him anywhere! She had been just eighteen then, he twenty-eight. That would make him thirty-six now.
Phelix began to get herself more of one piece when she realised that, thankfully, he could not possibly have recognised her. She was nothing remotely like the awkward and, in her view, late-developing teenager she had been then. But that was itshe was out of here!
But, having grown a veneer of sophistication, even if her insides were now feeling like just so much jelly, Phelix knew she could not just simply cut and run. But she wasnt staying, that was for sure! As soon as she possibly could, she would tell either Chris or Duncan that she had forgotten something, had a headache, a migraine, athletes footshe didnt care whatand was going back to her hotel. From there she would make arrangements to fly back to England.
Hoping against hope that he was a figment of her imagination, she found she was irresistibly drawn to glance over to him again. It was him! He was tall, but even so would have stood out from the crowd of people milling around.
She slid her glance from him to the other man standing with him, and on to the close to six feet tall glamorous blonde woman. His girlfriend? Certainly not his wife.
Oh, heavens, he was looking her way again. Phelix flicked her glance from him. She was not unused to men giving her a second look, so knew his second glance was no more than passing interest. But, apart from his female companion, herself and several other women, the conference seemed to be a predominantly male affair.
She tried to tune in to what Ross and the other two were babbling on about, but when she felt as much as surreptitiously glimpsed the man leaving his companions, so her wits seemed to desert her.
Butoh, helphe seemed to be making his way in her direction! Dying a thousand deaths, Phelix prayed that he was making his way elsewhere, or that if he was perhaps coming over to say hello to Ross, that Ross would not think he had to introduce them; the name Phelix was a dead give-away.
He halted as he reached them and her mouth dried and her heart raced like a wild thing. Ross, she heard him greet Ross Dawson, and saw him nod to Duncan and Chris. And then he turned his cool grey eyes on her. How she remained outwardly calm as, for the longest second of her life, he studied her, she never knew. And then casually, every bit as if he had seen her every day of his life for the past eight years, How are you, Phelix? he asked.
Her throat was so dry she didnt think she would be able to utter a word. But the poise she had learned since she had last seen him stood her in good stead. Fine, Nathan, she murmured. You?
You know each other? Ross asked.
From way back, Nathan Mallory drawled, his eyes still on her. She guessed he couldnt believe the evidence of his vision; the change in her from the frightened timid mouse she had been eight years previously to the cool, collected and polished woman who stood before him now.
Youre here for the conference? she enquired, and could have bitten out her tongue for having asked so obvious a question.
One of our speakers had to drop out. As I intended coming this way, I thought I might as well come early and fill in for him.
She smiled, noddedshe knew darn well his name had not been down on the programme as one of the speakers. She, knowing he was likely to be in Davos next week with the other heads of businesses, had scrutinised the list of speakers very thoroughly before at last bowing to her fathers insistence that she come this week as part of the Edward Bradbury Systems entourage.
If youll excuse me, she managed, striving with all she had to hold down the dreadful feelings of anxiety that were trying to get a holdshe hadnt felt like this in years! I think I have to register in.
Somehow or other she was able to make her legs take her in the direction she wanted them to go. And later, having had no intention of still being there but somehow having been swept along, she was in a seat, listening without taking in a word of what the introductory speaker was droning on about.
She had by then started to recover from seeing Nathan Mallory again after all those years. As well as being tall with dark hair, Nathan was handsomequite devastatingly so. A man who could have any woman he chose. But Nathan Malloryshe drew a shaky breathwas her husband! She, for all she went by the name Phelix Bradbury, was in actual fact Mrs Nathan Mallory. Phelix Mallory. Oh, my word!
She had by then started to recover from seeing Nathan Mallory again after all those years. As well as being tall with dark hair, Nathan was handsomequite devastatingly so. A man who could have any woman he chose. But Nathan Malloryshe drew a shaky breathwas her husband! She, for all she went by the name Phelix Bradbury, was in actual fact Mrs Nathan Mallory. Phelix Mallory. Oh, my word!
As she twisted her wedding ring on her fingerthe marriage band he had put thereher thoughts flew back to more than eight years ago. She ceased to hear the speakers voice and was back in the cold, cheerless home she shared with her father in Berkshire. She was no longer in the conference hall, but was in her fathers study, back before she had met Nathan.
Her grandfather, cold and forbidding Edward Bradbury Senior, had died shortly after her mother. Phelix had missed her warm and loving mother so much, and later realised that, perhaps needing warmth and comfort at that time, she had been ready to imagine herself in love when Lee Thompson, their gardeners son, home on vacation from university.
It seemed as though she had always known Lee. She had always been shy with people, but hed seemed to understand that as their romance blossomed.
Though hed left it to her to seek her father out in his study and tell him that she and Lee were going to marry.
Marry! her father had roared, utterly astounded.
We love each other, she had explained.
You might love himwell see how much he thinks of you! Edward Bradbury had retorted dismissively. And that had been the end of the conversation and the end of her romance.
She had seen neither Lee nor his father again. When Lee had not phoned as he had said he would she had telephoned him, and had learned that his father had been dismissed from his job and that Lee had been bribedfor that was what it amounted toto sever all contact with her.
She had been too shocked to fully take in what Lee was saying. What do you meanmy father will pay off all your student loans? she had protested.
Look, Phelix, Im in hock up to my ears. I was mad to think we could marry and make a go of it. Wed be broke for years! Youre not working and
Ill get a job, shed said eagerly.
What could you do? Youre trained for nothing. Any money youd be able to bring in would be nothing at all like as much as wed need to keep us afloat.
That was when a pride she hadnt known she had started to bite, and she had taken a deep breath. So, for money youd forget all our plans, all we ever said? All
I have no choice. Im sorry. I shouldnt be talking to you now. Im risking the bonus your old man promised me if I
Goodbye, Lee, she had cut in, and had put down the phone.
After that she hadnt cared very much what happened. But a few days later she had been able to accept that, her pride feeling more bruised than her heart, that she had been more fond of Lee than in love with him. And that in fact what lay at the base of her wanting to marry him was more an urgent desire for change of some sort. More a need for some kind of escape from thisnothingness. For the chance to leave home, the chance to get away from her intimidating father.
And, since it was for sure Lee had not been in love with her either, shed realised that any marriage theyd made would probably not have lasted. Not that she had seen her fathers actions as doing her a favour. She had not. Shed still wanted to get away. But she supposed then that she must have been living in some kind of rose-tinted never-land, because when shed got down to thinking about leaving and striking out on her own, she had known that she just could not afford to leave. She could not afford to live in even the cheapest hostel. And as Lee had more or less statedwho would employ her?
Another week went by, but just when she had started to feel even more depressed, her father summoned her to his study. Take a seat, he invited, his tone a shade warmer than she was used to. Obediently, she obliged. Ive just been advised of the contents of your grandfathers will, he went on.
Oh, yes, she murmured politely, wondering why he was bothering to tell her. Grandfather Bradbury had been as miserly as his son, so probably had a lot to leavebut not to her. In any event, she was sure that anything he left was bound to have some ghastly condition attached to it.
Your grandfather has been very generous to you, her father went on.
Really? she exclaimed, surprised, Grandfather Bradbury had never shown any sign that he knew she existed when he had been alive.
But Im afraid you are unable to claim your quite considerable inheritance until you are twenty-five, he enlightened her. The hope that had suddenly sprung up in her, died an instant death. Bang went her sudden joy at the thought that she could leave home and perhaps buy a place of her own. That is, unless her father murmured thoughtfully.
Unless? she took up eagerly.
Well, you know he had a thing about the sanctity of marriage?
To her mind hed had more of a thing about the iniquities of divorce. Hed had a fixation about it ever since his own wife had walked out on him and, despite all his best efforts, had ultimately divorced him. He had passed his loathing of women breaking their wedding vows down to his son. Phelixs mother had confided in her one time when Edward Bradbury had been particularly foul to her how she had wanted to divorce him years ago. He had gone apoplectic when shed had the nerve to tell himdelighting in telling her that if she left him she could not take their daughter with her. When youre eighteen, she had promised, well both go. And, until that last desperate bid when Phelix had been seventeen, she had stayed.
Eryes. Phelix came out of her reverie to see her father drumming his fingers on his desk as he waited for her to agree that his father had had a thing about the sanctity of marriage.
Sohe obviously wanted you to be happy. Her father almost smiled.
Ye-es, she agreed, knowing no such thing.
Which is why a clause was inserted in his will Naturally there was a clausepossibly some snag to prevent her claiming her inheritance even when she was twenty-five, to the effect that if you marry before you are twenty-five you will be eligible to receive ten percent of the considerable sum he has left you.
Honestly? she gasped, her spirits going from low to high, then back down to positive zero. Oh, if only this had happened a couple of weeks ago. She could have married Lee and claimed that ten percent and have been free! Well, not entirely free. Only now did she fully accept that she was glad her romance with Lee had gone no further. Marriage to him would have been a big mistake.
Your grandfather plainly did not want you to suffer financial hardship in any early marriage you made.
Isee, she answered quietly.
And how do you feel about that?
Her father was actually inviting her opinion about something? That was a first. Well, I wouldnt have minded having a little money of my own, she dared. With her father forbidding her to take any lowly job which would shame him, he made her a tiny allowance that, at best, was parsimonious.
Well have to see if we cant find you a suitable husband, he, having paid off her one chance of marriage, had the nerve to state.