A Dream of Thee Read online

  A DREAM OF THEE

  Mary Wibberley

  He controlled both words and people!

  Catriona Forbes returned home to the Scottish island of Crannich only to please her grandparents. But she had to admit she desperately needed the break from her hectic life as a famous actress.

  Her unexpected encounter with Lachlan Erskine, a very successful playwright, made her visit anything but restful. Lachlan was as powerful and disturbing as ever.

  Catriona was furious when she learned just how cleverly he had manipulated circumstances to fit her into his plans. She was determined that he wouldn’t be play master of her life a second time...

  CHAPTER ONE

  Catriona was walking in the woods with Simon. It was one of those beautiful autumn days when it was actually not raining, and Simon said, in his usual authoritative way: ‘You know, Kate, I can see it all now, those dreary cottages spruced up, that ghastly jetty replaced with a new one, a craft shop where that tatty old mill is now—’

  Catriona was only half listening. Simon’s enthusiasms were legendary, his money guaranteed success in anything he chose to do, and he’d only been here half a day and was already replanning the island. She let him ramble on, nodding, adding a comment in all the right places, but, remembering Crannich as it had been so many years ago.

  She had left there at eighteen and gone to live in London, and life had changed dramatically, practically overnight. This had once been her home and she had loved it, but she was as much a stranger here now as Simon. She didn’t belong here any more. Perhaps she never had. But she had been unable to ignore the plea of her elderly grandparents, her only relatives, and she had returned to stay after seven years—

  ‘Kate! You’re not listening,’ he said accusingly.

  ‘Sorry.’ She gave him a cool little smile. ‘I was thinking.’

  ‘Hmm. I know you were born here, my love, but really, you don’t intend to stay, do you?’

  ‘For a week or two, that’s all, I promise. My grandparents have never asked me to come home before quite so strongly—’

  ‘Home?’ His expression barely hid his contempt. ‘My love, you no more belong here than I do I—’

  ‘But you’re planning to buy those cottages, the old mill—’

  ‘Not to stay here myself, for God’s sake.’ He laughed. ‘Heaven forbid! I’ll come up in the beginning, just to start it off, of course, but I’ll get Ned on it then. I’ll make a packet. All the trendy Hampstead types who can’t wait to get away and try the simple life for a week or two—especially if I advertise it right, imply it’s the “in” thing—you wait!’

  ‘You’re a cynical swine,’ she commented. God, she was tired. If their letter hadn’t come, she would have had to get away somewhere, anywhere, for a week—

  ‘Aren’t I just? And you wouldn’t have it any other way, would you, my precious?’ He gave her a smile that barely escaped a leer. ‘You’re my kind of person, Kate—let’s face it. And you no more care about this stagnant backwater than I do. It’ll wake the people of this little island up all right. Give ‘em something to do, instead of just idling their time away fishing.’

  ‘My grandparents live here, remember?’ she said tartly.

  ‘Sure they do. And they’re dear people. But they’re old. They’re quite happy in that big house—it’s well away from the village. It won’t bother them. You know, I might even open up some kind of health farm here—’

  ‘Over my dead body,’ said a voice, and a man stepped out of the trees to the side of them. Simon stared hard, as if trying to locate the source of an unpleasant smell, and Catriona stared too—and felt her heart pound erratically, and the blood rush to her face. If Simon had not had hold of her arm, she might have fallen. The man, quite unmistakably, all six foot three of him, was Lachlan Erskine. A man she had thought, and hoped, she would not see again.

  ‘And who the devil are you?’ demanded Simon.

  Lachlan walked forward. His black hair was as shaggy as ever, he wore faded jeans and a fisherman’s jersey that needed one elbow darning, and he looked like a disreputable layabout—except for his face. The thick black eyebrows, the deep-set eyes, straight broad nose, wide mouth and square chin were anything but disreputable. He looked extremely hard, tough—and aggressive. ‘I’m Lachlan Erskine,’ he answered. ‘You’re Simon Meredith—and she’s Catriona Forbes, late of this island, now of London, well-known actress, darling of the TV screens, chat shows, and jet-setting trendies. Is that where you’re from?’

  ‘That’s none of your damned business.’ Simon turned to Catriona. ‘Do you know this man?’ He asked it in tones which implied that she might have warned him if so.

  Catriona looked coldly at Lachlan. ‘He used to live here, years ago. The same as I did,’ she answered. Her green eyes clashed with his hard grey ones, and Simon might not have been there. The memories were strong. She hated him...

  ‘It’s no surprise you’re with him,’ Lachlan said to her. ‘I should have known you’d bring trouble when you returned.’

  She felt her temper rising, but quelled it. That was what he wanted, to see her make a fool of herself—of course! Just like last time. She was older now, and wiser, no longer the naive girl from the island. She smiled instead.

  ‘And what are you doing?’ she asked calmly. ‘Slumming?’

  ‘No, living here.’ His tone was deadly, his voice quiet.

  Simon, puzzled, angry, looked from one to the other. He was usually in charge of every situation, but this was beyond him. ‘Would you mind telling me,’ he said, in tones as deadly as Lachlan’s, ‘what this is all about?’

  ‘I’ll tell you on the way home,’ she answered.

  ‘Never mind that, I’m not going anywhere until you explain what you meant by “over my dead body”,’ said Simon, glaring at Lachlan in a way that guaranteed wilting in practically everyone he had opposition from.

  Lachlan merely laughed. He wasn’t supposed to have done that. He was supposed to look embarrassed, or glance away. Instead he came nearer.

  ‘I’ll explain all right,’ he said, and looked Simon slowly up and down. ‘It means that I don’t like your fancy ideas for craft shops and health farms and crowds of people rushing about bleating how marvellous it is to be staying on this quaint little island—’ he stopped, turned to Catriona and smiled. ‘And you’d better tell him that I always get my own way.’

  She caught her breath, shaken, and moved fractionally away. ‘Leave it, Simon,’ she said. ‘You won’t get anywhere with him.’ She injected as much scorn as she could manage into the last word.

  Simon was not to be humoured. He shook her arm free. ‘Won’t I?’ She saw the danger signs in his face, the tightening of the skin round his mouth, the way his eyes narrowed, and she wanted to warn him. He wasn’t in London now, and he wasn’t dealing with the usual kind of people he dealt with, and while he too was tough and strong, he hadn’t encountered a man like Lachlan before, because if he had, he wouldn’t have forgotten it. Catriona hadn’t forgotten him, and it had been some years since she had last encountered him...

  ‘Listen here, Erskine, I don’t take kindly to people eavesdropping on my private conversations for a start. So why don’t you push off and go back to your fishing, or whatever it is you do, there’s a good fellow, because there’s nothing you can do to stop me doing precisely what I want, and if I wasn’t serious before I would be now, because those cottages, and that mill, are for sale, and because no one, but no one, tells me what to do or what not to do. Savvy?’

  ‘You pompous idiot,’ grinned Lachlan, amused.

  Too late, Catriona saw Simon’s hand going up. She tried to stop him, but was pushed aside as Simon launched himself forward, face blazing red. Nob
ody had ever dared to call him pompous—not to his face anyway—and no one in their right mind would ever had said he was an idiot. Lachlan had just done two unforgivable things.

  Thud! Simon’s fist connected, not with Lachlan’s jaw but with his upraised forearm, his left forearm. His right came out with the speed of light, and Simon seemed to leap backward, arms flailing, before crashing into the undergrowth, where he lay sprawling.

  ‘Oh dear,’ said Lachlan mildly, and with apparent satisfaction. ‘Did he fall over?’

  ‘You beast!’ Furious, unheeding, Catriona launched herself on the man who was just about to suck his knuckles, and swung her bag at his face. He caught it, wrenched it from her, and took hold of both her hands. His eyes gleamed darkly as he looked down at her.

  ‘Careful,’ he warned. ‘You don’t want to hurt yourself, do you?’

  ‘Let me go!’ She tried to pull away, but he pulled her towards him and held her helpless against his chest.

  ‘Fiery as I remember,’ he said softly. ‘Fiery Catriona of the red hair and green eyes ‘

  ‘You—you—!’ She glared at him, eyes blazing fury, and kicked his leg, and heard, from somewhere in the background, a muffled groan as Simon came round. But it didn’t seem to matter. There might have been only two of them in that dark, overgrown place. Only the two of them, as it had been once, long, long ago...

  She remembered, and shivered inwardly, and Lachlan released her, as if he too remembered. ‘Take him back,’ he said abruptly. ‘Because I don’t want to see him again. Just tell him it doesn’t pay anyone to tangle with me.’

  He turned away and vanished into the trees as Simon staggered to his feet. ‘I’ll kill the b—’ he began.

  Catriona held him. ‘Ssh!’ she said. ‘He’s gone. Let’s go back.’

  ‘The coward!’ He stroked his jaw carefully, wincing. ‘That was a lucky blow he landed—which way did he go? I’m going to give him the thrashing—’

  ‘You’ll not find him,’ she said. ‘He’s used to these woods. Don’t you see? He must have followed us—and we didn’t even know.’

  ‘He’s mad! The man’s a lunatic. My God!—You knew him—and you didn’t warn me?’

  ‘I didn’t know,’ she said, stung by his tone. ‘How could I? I’ve not seen him for—’ she hesitated—‘years. I didn’t know he was staying here.’ Or I wouldn’t have come back myself, she added silently. But she couldn’t tell Simon that, or he would want to know why. ‘We’d better go home and I’ll put something on your chin. Look—er—’ She hesitated. How to tell Simon not to try anything physical with a man like Lachlan, without making him more determined to sort him out? Simon was extremely proud of his fighting prowess, a good amateur boxer, rugby player and keep-fit enthusiast. ‘Er—if I were you, I’d keep out of Lachlan’s way. He was well known for being—er—a bit rough in the old days.’

  ‘Are you trying to tell me he’s stronger than me?’ Simon demanded, furious, eyes on her, contempt filled.

  I’m damned sure he is, unfortunately, she thought. ‘No, not that—but you fight fair, and I’ll bet he wouldn’t,’ she answered. The lie seemed to appease him, for the moment anyway. He grunted something, she went to pick up her bag, found that the strap had snapped, and they set off back to her grandparents’ home.

  That was only the first shock. The second and greater one came later that day. They had not mentioned the encounter with Lachlan to Catriona’s grandparents, and it was only when they were sitting round the dinner table that night that her grandfather said:

  ‘How long will you manage to stay with us, Catriona?’ He smiled gently at her across the table. A tall man, slightly stooped now, well into his seventies, with a shock of white hair and weather-beaten complexion, he looked a figure of health, as did her grandmother, who was busily employed in helping herself to green beans, and who paused spoon in mid-air, as if waiting for Catriona’s reply.

  She smiled at them. Simon’s dignity had been restored, his ruffled feathers smoothed down, and the atmosphere was calm again. Catriona loved them. She regretted her long absence—now that she was here. She had thought of them often in London in the midst of her busy life, and had telephoned them every week and come up occasionally, but their importance had faded in the light of new excitement, new friends, constant adulation...

  ‘I’ll try and stay for a week or so,’ she answered. ‘Simon has to go back on Monday, of course, but I’m between jobs at the moment, and I badly needed a break. It’s so peaceful here.’ But I couldn’t stand it for more than a week, she thought. I don’t belong here any more.

  ‘That’s nice, dear,’ her grandmother said. ‘Simon, some beans for you?’

  ‘Please, Mrs. Forbes.’ Simon took the dish from her. He could be very charming when he chose, and he was choosing to be so now. Catriona knew why. He intended finding out all he could about the cottages, and the mill. ‘Thank you. This is a wonderful house, full of character. Catriona described it to me, of course, but I must say the reality exceeds my expectations.’

  ‘Ah,’ said Mr. Forbes. ‘But it’s getting too much for us now, I’m afraid. Much too big.’ He looked at his wife who looked back at him and, it seemed to Catriona, gave a slight, warning shake of her head.

  ‘Well, never mind,’ she said briskly. ‘I’m sure Simon and Catriona don’t want to hear about our problems. Potatoes, Simon?’

  ‘Please. Delicious food. You grow all your own vegetables, don’t you?’

  ‘We do,’ Mr. Forbes beamed. Gardening was his hobby. Simon couldn’t have done better if he’d been primed by Catriona. She could relax, and let the conversation ebb and flow round her. She wondered where Lachlan was living. In his old house? She would avoid it, and him, scrupulously, while she was there. She needed a rest anyway. There was plenty of space on the island to take gentle strolls without having to encounter him.

  ‘Sorry?’ She realised that her grandmother was speaking to her.

  ‘I said old Mrs. Grant died last month. Her house is up for sale.’

  ‘Oh, I’m sorry about that. She was about ninety, wasn’t she?’

  ‘Ninety-five. She’d had a good life, mind, active to the end.’

  ‘Did you say her house was up for sale?’ asked Simon, injecting a respectful, sorry-about-Mrs.-Grant note to his voice, but clearly determined to get the conversation round to where he wanted. ‘Would that be one of the cottages that’s for sale down by the shore?’

  ‘Why, no, they’ve been for sale for a while. There’s no sign put up yet in hers. It’s alone, past those six. So many people move away, you see.’ Mrs. Forbes clicked her teeth. ‘Aye, it’s a shame right enough, but that’s progress for you. There’s no money here, you see, any more. Since the old woollen mill closed there’s no work either.’

  ‘And that’s for sale as well?’

  ‘Aye, it is.’ Mr. Forbes gave him a shrewd look. ‘You’d not be interested, would you now?’

  Simon laughed, a modest, unassuming laugh. He did that well, Catriona thought. ‘Heavens, it’d be more money than I can afford, I dare say.’ You liar, she thought.

  ‘Och, I don’t know,’ Mr. Forbes said thoughtfully. ‘We’ve a brochure on it somewhere that says the price—it’s not much they’re asking—there’s no demand, you see.’

  ‘I’d appreciate a look later.’ Simon gave him a winning, boyish smile.

  ‘Aye, well, remind me to look it out, Mary.’

  ‘I will, dear,’ his wife replied. ‘Tell me, Simon, what would you want with an old mill?’

  ‘Well, it could be opened as a craft shop,’ he answered.

  ‘That it could. But who would you sell to? We get very few tourists here.’

  ‘Well, I’ll be perfectly frank with you, Mrs. Forbes. I was mentioning to Catriona today that it seemed a shame to see so many houses empty, and I’ve a lot of friends in London who would love to get away for odd weekends, somewhere quiet like this—away from the hustle and bustle you know.’

&nbsp
; ‘Ah, you’d buy the houses too, and rent them out, you mean?’ Ian Forbes asked, as if interested.

  ‘Something like that. It’s only an idea, of course—at the moment.’

  ‘It would bring life back to the community,’ said her grandfather slowly, ‘but would it work out?’

  ‘I’d go into all that. I’d have to see round there first, and get an idea what state they were in.’

  ‘I don’t like it,’ Mary Forbes said firmly. ‘No disrespect to you, Simon, but we like our island as it is.’ She looked at him. ‘You see, you’re a stranger here. You don’t know our ways.’

  ‘No, but I’d like to,’ he answered. ‘It’s so peaceful—so beautiful,’ He gave her a smile calculated to melt a heart of stone. ‘Could you not share that beauty with others?’

  ‘Now, Mary, you mustn’t be hard on him. What will he think of us, eh?’ said Mr. Forbes, and she turned her gaze on him. White-haired, rosy-cheeked, she looked gentle and soft, and Catriona suppressed laughter. She was a match for anyone if she chose to be—probably even Lachlan. Which was a strange thought for Catriona to have, especially in the light of her grandmother’s next words. ‘Lachlan wouldn’t like it either,’ she said, unaware that it was like waving a red flag in front of an enraged bull to mention that name in front of Simon, whose hand went up instinctively to his jaw.

  ‘Lachlan?’ he said softly. ‘Would he be the man we met today, Catriona?’ Soft and dangerous, his voice, and he looked at her.

  ‘Yes,’ she answered.

  ‘Oh, you’ve met him?’ Mary Forbes’ blue eyes were on Simon, shining with innocence.

  ‘Yes, we met him,’ he said. He put down his knife and fork. ‘He—met us in the woods and told us—we were talking, and he must have overheard—that he didn’t like the idea. But I fail to see what business it is of his, quite frankly.’

  Ian Forbes cleared his throat. ‘Aye, well, he has the keys for the properties, you see.’

  Catriona froze. He had what?

  ‘Is he the seller?’ Simon’s face was a picture.