No Mistaking Love

CHAPTER FIVE

A SUBDUED murmur of voices and the discreet chink of china greeted Kate as she stepped through the door and surrendered her coat to a silently efficient waiter. She felt vulnerable without its protection, and smoothed down her dress nervously.

It was very plain, a deep dark jade, with a wide V neck and arms demurely covered with long, tight sleeves. Otherwise the design was of classic simplicity, the skirt falling from a tailored bodice in soft folds of the finest wool.

It was a dress designed to flatter the wearer rather than itself. Kate had deliberately tried to underplay the effect by not wearing any jewellery, but she was still very aware of the sensuous feel of the soft material against her skin, of the way the stark design emphasised the swell of her breast and the pure sweep of throat and shoulder.

She was still unused to the feel of her hair and she touched it self-consciously as she followed the waiter across the room to where Luke was sitting.

He was studying a wine list with ferocious concentration, dark brows drawn together and lean jaw set, unaware of her approach. His expression was dauntingly grim; he looked like a man who had relied on himself for so long that he had forgotten that others could offer warmth and comfort, and Kate, who had been feeling edgy and resentful of the way he had cast her into confusion, found herself swept by a contrary rush of tenderness so unexpected that she faltered.

He looked up just then and saw her. At first incurious, impatient at his having his concentration broken, his gaze sharpened suddenly as he recognised his quiet, efficient secretary in the woman walking towards him.

Kate wished she weren't so conscious of the subtly alluring sway of the skirt as she moved. She had never been so aware of her own body. She could feel Luke's eyes on her slender curves and longed for her coat, a cardigan, anything to wrap around her defensively.

Luke was still holding the wine list. He laid it down very slowly as she came up to the table and then, as if suddenly aware of the waiter's surprised look, rose hastily to his feet.

To Kate's relief, his eyes had left her body and rested on her face, as if he was still having trouble convincing himself that it was really her. She wished he would say something to break the silence, which threatened to become awkward.

Instead, he glanced down at his watch.

`I'm not late!' Kate found herself saying instinctively.

Her sharpness seemed to break the spell, and a more familiar look of impatience closed over his face. `I didn't say you were.'

`You didn't need to. You just looked at your watch in that very pointed way!'

Kate allowed the waiter to pull out her chair and sat down, ruffled as much by the look that had been in Luke's eyes as she had walked towards him as by her uncharacteristic self-consciousness and the awful realisation that she had hoped he would do more than think about the time.

A half-smile twisted Luke's mouth. `I was playing for time. I wasn't quite sure it was you until you snapped at me like that!'

Kate's lips tightened. She shook the starched linen napkin out with a pointed flick of her wrists. `Of course it was me. A haircut doesn't change you that much!'

`Evidently not.' Luke's voice was dry and Kate flushed slightly. He obviously thought she was being shrewish. She must pull herself together.

`The hair's a great improvement,' he went on. `I told you it would look better short.'

Hardly an effusive compliment! `Thank you,' Kate said crisply, determined not to let him guess that she was disappointed by his lack of interest.

There was a short pause. Luke looked as if he was about to say something, then changed his mind.

`I've ordered for you,' he said eventually, picking up the wine list once more. `I thought it would be easier.'

`I'm perfectly capable of choosing my own meal, thank you,' Kate said frostily. `I have been to a restaurant before, and I won't need the menu translated!'

Luke frowned, but he handed her the menu that lay by his plate with an irritable shrug. `Have it your own way.'

Kate opened the menu and studied it with spurious interest. She didn't really care what she ate, but it seemed important to keep some control to herself. Luke had ordered her about enough for one day!

Peeping over the top of the menu, she saw that he was intent on the wine list. In dinner-j jacket and bow-tie, he looked darkly, dourly attractive. The subdued lighting softened his features, but, when he looked up suddenly and met her gaze over the leather-bound lists, the slate eyes were as penetrating as ever.

Kate dropped her eyes hastily back to the menu.

`Have you decided yet?' Luke asked in a voice of long suffering as a waiter appeared at his elbow.

`I'll have the salmon and sole roulade, and then the magret de canard.' She closed the menu with a defiant snap.

`Sure?'

'Yes, thank you.'

`I was thinking of a Sauvignon to start with, and then a Chateau d'Yquem,' Luke said with

heavy irony. `Is that acceptable, or would you like to choose the wine too?'

'No, that sounds fine,' Kate said primly, folding her hands in her lap and refusing to rise to the bait.

Luke turned to the waiter. `We'll have the salmon and sole, and then the duck-as I ordered previously.' When he had ordered the wine he turned back to meet Kate's accusing gaze.

`What's the matter?'

'Why didn't you tell me what you'd ordered?' 'What, and have you choose something different, just to be difficult? I chose what I thought you'd like. What's wrong with that?'

'I've got a mind of my own,' Kate said with a touch of sullenness.

`I'm well aware of that, Kate!'

'You'd never guess it the way you've been treating me today!'

`What do you mean by that?'

'You choose my hairstyle, my clothes, my meal… I might as well be a plastic dummy sitting

here!'

`Don't be ridiculous!' Luke said crossly. `I thought we went through all that this morning?' `We agreed that you appreciated my work and that you'd make more effort to be pleasant.' `I have!'

`I don't call it pleasant to make someone parade in front of you while you walk round them and criticise as if they were in some kind of cattle market!'

'So that's why you were in such a bad mood all afternoon,' Luke said, inspecting the bottle of wine presented by the waiter. He waited until a small amount had been poured into his glass, then took a sip, and nodded. `Most women would have enjoyed having an afternoon at the hairdressers', not to mention a free wardrobe.'

Kate waited until the waiter had finished pouring the wine. `I'm not most women,' she pointed out tartly as he left the bottle on the table and disappeared discreetly. `I'm me, and I don't appreciate being treated like… like some kind of bimbo!'

To her chagrin, instead of looking contrite, Luke grinned. `Kate, you're the last person I'd treat as a bimbo!'

She wished he wouldn't smile like that. Kate seized her glass and took a gulp of wine, trying to keep her eyes off the heart-wrenching lift of his mouth.

`As far as I'm concerned,' Luke said, `you're a sensible and intelligent woman, and a damn sight too valuable to me to start treating like a sex object! I can't tell you what a relief it is to find a woman prepared to keep a relationship on a strictly business footing, and who doesn't expect to be showered with compliments!'

`One every now and then wouldn't go amiss!'

`I would have said that you look wonderful in that dress, but you'd probably just have accused me of being sexist!' For a moment their eyes clashed, and then Luke smiled ruefully. `I'm sorry,' he apologised. `It's just a bit of a shock to find my prim and proper secretary transformed so suddenly into something quite different!' He reached over and touched her hand briefly. `You look beautiful tonight, Kate. Is that better?'

Kate was glad of the dim light that disguised the deep flush that swept up her throat. She withdrew her hand hastily, shaken by the way her heart had jolted at his touch.

`I was only joking,' she muttered. `Sensible and intelligent were enough of a compliment!'

`Were they? I don't know of any other woman who would have been satisfied with that!'

'Ah, but as far as you're concerned I'm not a woman,' Kate said drily. `I'm your secretary.'

Luke picked up his glass and looked at her over the rim, an enigmatic expression in his eyes.

`When you look the way you do tonight it's hard to remember.'

Kate felt as if she had stepped suddenly on to uncertain ground, and she took a hasty sip of wine while she tried desperately to think of a way to bring the conversation back to safe, familiar territory. She was tense, flustered by the warmth in his voice.

`You said you wanted to talk to me about the trip to Paris,' she reminded him, wondering if her voice sounded that high and unnatural to him too. `Whom exactly are we going to meet?'

She avoided looking directly at him, certain that he would read the silly, girlish flutterings of her heart in her eyes. She wasn't sixteen now, she chided herself. She was a grown woman, too sensible to misinterpret the most casual of compliments, the briefest of touches. This was a business dinner, that was all. True, Luke was being pleasant, but it really shouldn't set her heart pounding like this…

Luke gave her a quick, keen look, but answered her readily enough. 'Philippe Robard and his grandson, who's also a director of the company. Robard owns the Oasis chain of hotels-you must have heard of them when you were in France?'

When Kate nodded he went on, `He's expanding fast, with an eye to the UK in particular. You probably know that his speciality is buying up old buildings-mostly run-down chateaux and transforming them into five-star hotels. Everything top quality, of course, but with an eye to retaining the original character of the building as far as possible.'

He fiddled absently with his knife. 'Robard's been extraordinarily successful so far, but he needs to be careful not to lose quality control as he expands. He's a hotelier, not an engineer.'

`And that's where we come in?' Kate was concentrating fiercely on what he was saying to take her mind off its sudden obsession with his mouth.

`Exactly. I'm offering him a complete consultancy service on the construction front, leaving him free to concentrate on running the hotels. That's why it's so important that we give him the right impression tomorrow. He needs to feel that we embody the qualities he's looking for in his buildings: style, efficiency, quality.'

Kate hailed the arrival of the waiter with the first course with relief. Now she would be able to look at her plate. `He can get all that from a French firm, can't he?' she said vaguely, picking up her knife and fork.

`Yes, but remember he wants to get a foothold in the UK as much as I want to get one in France.' Luke seemed more interested in his business than in his food. `We've got a good international reputation outside Europe, and you, Kate, are going to give us our European flavour.'

`I see.' Kate's eyes were lowered to her plate, and a wing of hair shone in the reflected light. `What exactly do you want me to do?'

'You'll be there as my assistant, and, obviously, to help out with any language problems. I expect you to impress them with your efficiency and the charm which I know very well you possess, even if you don't waste any of it on me!'

Kate looked up in astonishment and her eyes, huge and dark, caught the gleam of gold from a candle near by. She put her knife and fork down slowly. `What on earth do you mean?'

It was Luke's turn to concentrate on his dinner. `I've seen the way you talk to people in the office. They all like you. I'm sick of my directors telling me how charming you are! All I ever get from you is disapproval or a lecture about my manners, or lack of them.'

There was a strange note in his voice, and Kate bit her lip. She could almost swear he was hurt!

`That's not fair,' she protested. `I'm perfectly nice to you sometimes.'

Luke leant over to refill her wine glass, and then his own. `Only sometimes!' he said, but she was relieved to see a glint of amusement in his eyes. `The trouble with you, Kate, is that you're very honest-sometimes uncomfortably so. I'm not used to that. I learnt early on not to expect too much honesty from women.'

Bitterness shadowed his voice and Kate wondered if he was remembering Helen. Was she being any more honest than Helen in not admitting that she had met Luke before? she wondered guiltily.

On an impulse she opened her mouth to tell him, but then the waiter was beside them, checking their glasses, offering them another roll, and by the time he had gone the moment had passed and Luke had changed the subject.

`I suppose going to Paris tomorrow will be like going home for you?'

'In a way,' she said, not sorry to let go of the opportunity to tell Luke the truth. It would only have embarrassed them both. `It's funny, all the time I was in France I thought about coming back to England, and now I'm here I think about France just as nostalgically. Having dual nationality makes you a little schizophrenic!'

`I never think of you as being French,' Luke said thoughtfully. `You always seem so cool and English.'

`I take after my father.'

`What was he like?'

Kate wondered what Luke would say if she told him that he knew perfectly well. He had always despised her father, she remembered, had thought of him as stuffy and snobbish. He hadn't known how kind and generous her father could be to those he loved.

`He was rather cool and English too,' she said lightly.

There was a lurking smile about Luke's mouth. `He sounds all right.'

For one dizzy moment time seemed to telescope, and Kate found herself wishing desperately that her father could have known this new Luke.

`So you don't regret coming back to England?'

'No.' Kate shook her head, feeling the shining softness bounce against her cheek. `I would have come back before, but my mother is…well, she's very gay and very charming, but hopelessly impractical! After my father died and we went to France it somehow seemed natural that I would look after things like money. Veronique, my halfsister, was married by then, but I was always more sensible than her anyway, even as a child.' She sighed.

`What's wrong with being sensible?' 'Nothing. It's just that sometimes I wonder what would have happened if I'd gone through a rebellious stage. I might have had more fun.' `Kicking the system? I did all that,' Luke said. `Oh, I-' Kate stopped. She had been about to say `I know'. `I can imagine,' she said after an infinitesimal pause.

Luke didn't seem to have noticed. `I thought I was having fun at the time, but, looking back, I think I was just unhappy.' He gave a careless shrug, but Kate felt suddenly ashamed.

It had never occurred to her before that the cold recklessness of Luke's youth had been due to unhappiness. It was well-known in the village that his mother had left years before, and since then he had lived alone with his father, an eccentric and rather reclusive man. No, his memories of Chittingdene would probably not be happy ones. She was glad she hadn't mentioned the past. Luke gave the impression of a man who had put it firmly behind him.

`How is your mother managing without you now?' he was asking.

`She got married again a few months ago.' Kate took a sip of wine. 'Thierry is far more capable than I am of looking after my mother, and he can afford to spoil her, but…'

`But you don't like him?'

`No. I've tried, but we just don't get on. Oh, it was all very polite, but somehow that made it even worse. When my sister sent Solange to school here it was an ideal excuse to leave without hurting my mother's feelings…' Kate trailed off. She hadn't meant to tell Luke all this, but somehow it had all come out. `They'll be far better off without me cramping their style,' she finished briskly. `My mother's a great party-goer, and always beautifully dressed. I'm afraid I didn't inherit any of her sense of style! She certainly looks far too young to have a daughter as old as me!'

'She sounds rather like someone I used to know, or at least know of. What was her name, now?' Luke's eyes narrowed in an effort of memory. `Well, it doesn't matter what her name was, but she was a Frenchwoman too-far too glamorous and racy for Chittingdene!'

Kate put her fork down on the plate rather unsteadily. 'Chittingdene?'

`The village where I grew up,' Luke explained. `It's a sleepy little place buried in Somerset. I haven't been there for years. Couldn't wait to leave.' He stared into his wine. `It's strange, I haven't thought of Chittingdene in years. I certainly haven't thought of Mrs… what was her name, now?'

`How did you get into project management?' Kate asked quickly, anxious to divert his mind from the past. She was surprised that he remembered her mother, who had always found village life much too staid and had spent as much time as possible in France.

Luke was talking, but her mind kept veering back to the past, comparing the rebellious youth she had known to the determined man who sat opposite her now, telling her about his struggle to succeed. They were so alike, and yet so different. Or was it just that she had been too young to see him properly before?

‘It must have been hard work,' she commented when he looked at her with raised brows, obviously wondering at her silence.

`It was,' Luke said. `But worth it in the end. I'm a rich man now.'

`I suppose you must be,' Kate said doubtfully, thinking of what a long, lonely slog it must have been.

`You don't sound very sure, Kate,' he said with some amusement. `No, don't tell me! Money isn't everything?'

`Well, it isn't, is it?'

'Kate, I'm disappointed in you! It's not like you to be trite. I suppose you think I should have acquired a wife and children and a dog to fetch my slippers along the way to make it all worthwhile?'

Kate met his eyes with her clear gaze. He was mocking, but there was an underlying edge of defensiveness in his voice. `I don't think you should have married. I'm just surprised you haven't.'

`I never wanted to get married,' he said shortly.

`I like my women as cynical as I am. That way no one expects anything and no one gets hurt.'

Don't they? Kate thought. What about the boy abandoned by his mother, shrugged aside by

Helen Slayne? What about the years of cynicism hardening slowly into bitterness?

`What about you?' Luke asked. `Why aren't you married? Are you holding out for Mr. Right? Or pining for a long-lost love?'

Unbidden, a memory of that long-distant summer's day washed over Kate. The smell of the long grass, the touch of his hands, the taste of his kiss. But that wasn't love, she reminded herself fiercely. That was just an initiation, a glimpse of how things might be.

`I'm not married because nobody has ever asked me to marry him.'

`Nobody's seen the way you look tonight.'

`No,' Kate agreed, hating his casual, meaningless words, her smile brittle. `You're the first.'

Luke was turning a spoon between his fingers as he watched her, but now he stopped and replaced it deliberately back by his plate. `I suppose I am,' he said slowly.

An uncomfortable silence fell. Kate gulped at her wine and searched her mind feverishly for a way to steer the conversation back to less personal waters. They were supposed to be talking business. How had they got on to love and marriage?

`Is Monsieur Robard-?'

'Do you know-?'

They both spoke at once, and broke off awkwardly.

`Go on,' Kate said, embarrassed.

`I was just going to ask if you knew Paris well,' Luke said in a stilted tone.

Kate seized on the innocuous topic, and for the rest of the meal kept the conversation cool and impersonal with an effort. Plates appeared and disappeared, glasses were refilled. Kate ate and drank and didn't taste any of it. She talked and talked about business, while her eyes kept sliding away from Luke's. She was agonisingly aware of him. She wished he would stop their determinedly polite conversation. She wished he would be rude, or make her angry, do anything to take her mind off the overwhelming desire to reach over and touch him. She was terrified to look at his face in case she couldn't drag her eyes away from his mouth, so she watched the other diners, and the gleam of cutlery, and his fingers curled around the stem of his glass.

At last it was over. Luke helped Kate into her coat and she shivered at the brush of his fingers.

`I'll get you a taxi,' he said as he opened the door for her. `I can walk from here.'

`I can easily get a bus,' Kate protested, but Luke ignored her, and they walked down to the corner of the road, not touching.

It had been raining. The pavement gleamed under the street-lights and cars passed them slowly, their tyres swishing on the wet road.

Kate dug her hands firmly into her pockets and stared down the road, willing a familiar yellow light to appear. Luke seemed content to wait in silence, but he was watching her so closely that Kate began to get more and more unnerved.

`Is something the matter?' she asked crossly at last.

`I keep getting this feeling I've met you before,' Luke admitted, almost reluctantly. `I haven't, have I?'

Kate's pulse leapt and she looked quickly away. `I think I'd remember you if we had met,' she said, unwilling to tell an outright lie now, but unable to face all the explanations if she admitted the truth.

`I suppose it's because you look so different tonight.' Luke sounded dissatisfied. He stepped up beside her on the kerb, and Kate had to make an effort not to flinch at his nearness. He was looking up and down the road, as if as anxious as she for a taxi.

`I can't get used to you like this,' he went on, glancing down at her. `I keep noticing things I never noticed about you before…' He trailed off, and Kate had the strangest feeling that he had surprised himself as much as her. `It really is amazing what a difference a haircut makes.'

There was an odd expression in his eyes. Kate wanted to look away but couldn't. Her heart was lurching and bumping in her chest. `I hope you think you've got a good return on your investment,' she said bravely.

Unhurriedly Luke reached out and pushed the soft wing of hair away from her face. `I do,' he said. `I do indeed.'

Before she knew how it happened his hand had slid under her hair to hold her head still as he bent and kissed her.

Caught unawares, with her hands trapped in her pockets, Kate was helpless to resist. She toppled against his lean, hard strength, felt his arm pull her closer.

Past arrowed into present. Here on this damp winter street, with Luke's lips insistent on hers, Kate might -have been standing in that summer wood again. The deep ache of need was the same, the yearning, the heady sense of desire at the taste of his mouth and the firmness of his hand at the nape of her neck.

Kate's response was purely instinctive. Her lips parted and she relaxed into him, submerged by a jumbled tide of intense excitement, lurking guilt and recognition that no one else had ever been able to make her feel this way.

She wanted to free her hands from her pockets, to touch his face and feel his male-rough jaw beneath her fingers, but Luke was lifting his head, lifting a hand, and a black taxi squealed to a halt beside them.

The click of its meter seemed unnaturally loud. Dazed, Kate stared at it as if she had never seen a taxi before. 'Wh-what did you do that for?' she managed.

`Just a wise investor enjoying a little profit,' Luke said. She couldn't read his expression as he turned away to speak to the driver, but then he handed her into the taxi and shut the door on her as if nothing had happened.

`I'll see you at the airport at half-past ten,' was all he said through the window. `Don't be late.'