A Share in Death

The brief flicker of pleasure on her face at the thought vanished as she remembered the last time she had met a lover there. She’d known exactly what she must say, must do, and it had slipped out of her control, somehow, all her intentions retaining no more force than a trickle of water. All the carefully gathered strands of her life seemed to be falling from her hands, one by one.

The gentle tapping on the cottage door jerked Cassie out of her reverie. Anger rushed through her. She yanked open the door. “I told you never to—”

Duncan Kincaid stood there, with his infuriating cat-thatatethe-canary grin. “Expecting someone else? I’ll go away again.”

After a moment Cassie pulled the door wide and stepped back, not speaking until she had closed it behind him. “What are you doing here?” She drew the dressing gown more tightly around her body.

Kincaid gazed around the room, hands in his pockets, and Cassie suddenly remembered the clothes discarded on the floor. She bent and picked them up, threw them into the bedroom and shut the door.

“Nice.” Kincaid indicated the cottage. “Do much entertaining here?” Cassie held herself in check, refusing to be baited. Just what in hell did he know? “Just you.” She smiled at him with a trace of her former poise. “Like a drink?”

Kincaid shook his head. “No, thanks. We’ve just had an object lesson in the evils of alcohol, don’t you think?” His smile invited her to share his amusement at the debacle of the cocktail party, but Cassie wasn’t to be drawn. 80 deborah grombie

“Cassie.” He perched himself on the arm of one of the overstaffed chintz armchairs and regarded her with an open, friendly look that she found even more alarming than the smile. “If you and Graham Frazer were together the night Sebastian died, why didn’t you say so? It’d be so much easier on both of you.”

 

Turning away from him, she walked around the counter into the kitchen. “Coffee, then?” She filled the coffee pot, the ritual movements buying her time to think. How much did he know? What could she gain by denial?

“Look, Duncan. Don’t give me that sympathetic tone, as if my welfare were tops on your list of priorities. I’m not stupid. And just what makes you think I was with Graham that night?” She kept her voice level, bantering.