Hostile engagement Read Online Free PDF

would get cold feet at spending as much as a hundred pounds while know-
     
    ing he would have one of the cleverest lawyers available working for him.
    `So the only way I'm going to get my ring back is by paying you the three thousand you paid for it?' she asked, feeling weary, fed up and frustratingly angry all at the same time.
    The ring isn't for re-sale,' she was told bluntly. Then after a long moment when her spirits hit zero, he added, `There is a way in which I will return it to you—though I'm not certain the sentimental value of your inheritance is sufficient for you to contemplate agreeing with what I have to suggest.'
    `I'll do anything you ask,' she said proudly, having no, idea what he had in mind, though if he wanted her to whitewash the stuccoed outside walls of the Hall she would do it, for all it would probably take her ten years, from the sheer size of it. She looked steadily back at him, intrigued to know what she could possibly do for him that warranted him handing over an item of jewellery he had paid three thousand pounds for. The very air around them seemed to be taut, and she sat silently, holding her breath as she waited. Then shakingly, shatteringly, Jud Hemming's eyes locked with hers, refusing to let her look away, and he announced with no sign of emotion in his voice at all :
    `I will return the ring to you provided you wear it on your engagement finger.'
    `Engagement finger ...?' she queried, her incomprehension showing in every contour of her face. She just couldn't understand what he was asking. He couldn't be saying he intended to remove the ring from Carol Stanfield's hand and that she should ...
    `To be more precise, Miss Carey, I'm saying I want you to be engaged to me.'
    `You're joking !' It was out before she could stop it. The tightening of his lips told her he wasn't joking, though she hadn't needed that small movement to tell her he rarely, if
     
    ever, joked in his life. He was a parti cularly dour man, she thought. B ut why? I ... I mean, you're already engaged to Carol Stanfield, aren't you? What's she going to say about this? She'll be dreadfully hurt.' As yet it wasn't sinking in that he was serious, even though she knew she couldn't doubt it.
    `As a matter of fact I am not engaged to Carol,' he said smoothly.
    ... but she was wearing your ring?'
    `I didn't give it to her.'
    `You mean she just-took it?'
    He didn't answer, and Lucy's imagination took off. Light was just beginning to penetrate. She saw it all now. He had tired of his affair with Carol—Lucy didn't at that point speculate why then had he invited Carol to stay at his home —while from Carol's point of view she wanted something more permanent from him than.to be just another mistress. Carol must have seen the ring-probably in his bedroom, Lucy didn't wonder-and had laid claim to it. With the unshakeable belief he had that all women were nothing more than gold-diggers that wouldn't have endeared Carol to him, and in order to extricate himself from the situation, Jud Hemming wanted to use Lucy as a means of finishing his relationship with the poor girl.
    `What about Carol's feelings?' Lucy blurted out. Surely Carol would be deeply hurt if she agreed to his suggestion to become his fiancée-she wanted her ring back, certainly, but she had to live with herself, didn't she? Could she be hard enough to take what was rightfully hers and in so doing cause that friendly girl so much unhappiness?
    `Carol's feelings need be no concern of yours,' Jud Hemming said coolly, then with that hard note returning to his voice, 'Either you wear that ring as my fiancée, or you don't get it back-take it or leave it.' With that he turned his back on her and went over to the drinks cabinet and replenished his glass.
     
    Lucy wasn't sure which feeling was uppermost in her mind at that moment. Anger that he could so callously get rid of the girl who at one time must have meant something to him rose within her. Carol couldn't have just