The Loving Slave Read online

  From Back Cover…

  When did love turn to vengeful hate?

  Young Gina hero-worshipped Quentin Hurst, but to him she was just a child, a dirty tomboy who helped in his stables with the horses. His frequent snide remarks had been cruel, but she'd always forgiven him.

  Except for the cruellest cut of all—his smiling indulgence of the elegant Blanche Edgar.

  But Gina was older now, with beauty and status of her own. The wounded heart she bore was a woman's heart, and now, in turn, with a woman's wiles she wanted to hurt Quentin….

  Excerpt…

  "You're beautiful—grown-up at last…"

  Quentin drew her to her feet and continued, "Why not forget the past and concentrate on me? "

  Gasping at his audacity, Gina felt her heartbeats quicken. "Why the sudden change of heart?" she asked coolly. "You never noticed me before."

  "You never used to look like you do now," he said huskily. "But I remember the few times I had you in my arms I didn't want to let you go. You must have known that"

  "I remember you always pushed me away." Her eyes widened as she relived the hurt.

  "I didn't want to frighten you. But you felt something, I'm certain."

  "If I did," Gina lied, "I can't recall it."

  "You need reminding?" Before she could escape, his mouth came down firmly over hers.

  The Loving Slave

  by

  Margaret Pargeter

  CHAPTER ONE

  GINA, hearing the car coming before she saw it, took to her heels and ran all the way from the stables to the house, a distance of some two hundred yards. Her red hair streamed out behind her slender young body as she moved gracefully, like summer grass in the wind, but she cared nothing for any impression she might make. This was no time to remember that she was eighteen and grown up. Far more important that she catch Quentin before he entered the house. Matthews, the butler, never let her in there if he could help it, and she would rather talk to Quentin outside.

  As his powerful car purred to a stop and he thrust open the door, she was there, grabbing his arm as he got out, terrified he might get away before hearing what she had to say.

  'Quentin!' she cried breathlessly, her huge green eyes fixed anxiously on his hard, handsome face, 'I think there's something the matter with Hector.'

  'Hector?' Quentin Hurst paused impatiently, frowning down at the young girl who was clinging to his arm like a limpet. He was tall and by comparison she was small. He towered above her, his frown deepening as his glance flickered over her hands. Her thin hands were shapely enough but less than clean, and she smelled of the stables. Already there was a grubby mark on the sleeve of his suit and, while he never jibbed at their cost, his suits were extremely expensive.

  He had passed an exceptionally busy day and was tired, the board meeting that afternoon having proved particularly irksome. He didn't like to think he had a flock of fools for directors, but sometimes he was almost convinced of it. They relied too much on his brilliant judgment and, today, instead of bringing a perverse satis­faction, it had irritated more than usual. On top of this he had guests coming to dinner and could well have done without Gina and her troubles. Angrily he chose to forget her age and that the horse she mentioned was his favour­ite. She was paid, wasn't she, to deal with mishaps at the stables? It was high time she lost the childish habit of running to him every time something went wrong.

  His glance moved over her coldly, condemnation in his eyes. 'Haven't I told you,' he said curtly, 'to send for the vet when you're in any doubt about anything? Damn it all, Gina, I'm not exactly a pauper and Richard has suf­ficient faith in your judgment to know you wouldn't bring him out unnecessarily.'

  Stricken, Gina retreated in bewilderment, as Quentin removed her offending hands, dropping them back to her sides. 'I'm sorry,' she murmured uncertainly, unhappy at his obvious disapproval. Her eyes darkened with con­centration on the harsh lines of his face. Perhaps she should have remembered he would be tired, but over the years she had often hung on his arm and he had never objected before. This was the first time he had looked at her with actual distaste.

  'I'm sorry, Quentin,' she watched him intently, un­consciously seeking to hold him with entreating eyes. 'I thought I ought to ask your permission this time before sending for Richard.'

  'You know if there's anything wrong…'

  'Yes, but you did complain about the size of his bills.'

  'Not his accounts so much as the number of visits, which I'm sure you'll agree is not quite the same thing. I only keep four horses.'

  Stiffly, Gina retorted, 'He doesn't charge for all his visits, I'm sure.'

  'Why not?'

  Not caring for Quentin's terseness, she gazed at him uneasily. Richard Hedley was a friend, one of the few she had, and she didn't want to say anything that might hurt him. 'He often looks in when he's passing, just to see that everything's all right.'

  'If you were any other girl I might say in the hope of a romp in the hay, but not with you. This is what puzzles me.'

  Gina was young and still innocent yet she could re­cognise an insult as well as anyone. Her smooth face flushed painfully. 'You don't think I'm pretty enough to warrant a—a romp in the hay, Quentin?'

  'No,' he was as indifferently frank as the dark glance he cast over her. 'You're too young and too plain, besides never being any too clean.'

  That was unfair, but she made no protest. She had looked on Quentin for so long as a kind of superior brother that she had learnt to accept his frankness without com­plaint.

  She was startled when his hand shot out to grip her narrow shoulder, as though for a moment he would like to have shaken her. 'Don't you ever wash?' he snapped.

  'I have a bath night and morning,' she replied mildly, 'whatever the weather.'

  If he frowned over her rather peculiar wording, he dis­missed it as irrelevant. 'Then I can't understand why you never look clean. Always half the stables on your face!'

  This time his tone was hard enough to make her shrink. Didn't he realise it was no easy task looking after four horses, as well as her father? And the horses Quentin expected to be immaculately groomed and ready, at almost a moment's notice, for the enjoyment of himself and his friends.

  'When I take people riding,' he went on coldly, taking the opportunity to release some of the day's tension on Gina's hapless head, 'I expect my stable girl to look as presentable as the mounts I supply.'

  'I'm sorry, Quentin,' she said humbly, immediately frightened he might send her away, 'I'll try to do better. I'm sorry to have bothered you about Hector, but I couldn't decide…'

  'I think you could,' he interrupted abruptly, having started on her untidy appearance now apparently ready to find fault with everything about her. His eyes glinted on her long tumbled hair, her patched shirt, her ragged jeans, and his steely fingers dug painfully in her shoulder. 'You were after some attention yourself, I suppose?' he suggested sarcastically. 'I know I haven't been near the stables recently, Gina, but I have been busy. You can cope, can't you?'

  Mutely Gina nodded, accepting this, for in part it was true, but she would never pretend about the horses. It hurt that Quentin should think she would. 'I'd better get back,' she said dully, twisting away from him.

  'Gina!' his command was sharp, swinging her around. 'What do you think is wrong with Hector?'

  Too anxious about the horse to feel offended for long, she hesitated before replying. 'I'm not sure. He's been sweating a lot. It could be colic, but there are other things. Since I noticed something was wrong I haven't given him any food or water.'

  'Send for Richard,' Quentin advised briefly, his hard features a little kinder. 'I mustn't forget how my father used to swear by this intuition of
yours. He often said it was infallible.'

  'Thank you, Quentin.' She would rather he had praised her expertise or common sense, but perhaps intui­tion was part of it. She smiled at him, her tired face sud­denly lighting up. 'I'll ring Richard at once.'

  At the stables she did just this, and was fortunate enough to catch Richard in. He promised to be with her within the hour. Like Quentin's late father, he too had a great respect for her judgment, when it came to horses.

  After speaking to him, Gina saw it was well after six. If she hurried she might just have time to pop home and see John. If he was in a good mood she might be able to persuade him to eat some supper.

  Hector, Quentin's thoroughbred hunter, was standing in his loosebox exactly as she had left him. Why wasn't he making a fuss, demanding her attention, being as auto­cratic as his master? Usually, when he knew she was near, if Hector didn't turn his head he tossed it, just to let her know he considered himself vastly superior to the soft-voiced young girl who attended him.

  'I'll not be long, old boy,' gently she rubbed her hand along his proud neck, feeling that he was still hot. Sadly she wished Mr Hurst had still been alive. Between the two of them they had been able to solve most things. Everything she knew about horses he had taught her, until she had become almost as expert as himself. With her quick intelligence she had never needed to be told anything twice, but she missed their lengthy discussions, his ready advice. Quentin loved horses, too, but he spent most of his days in London, which wasn't quite the same, although she tried to be fair. Quentin, at thirty-five, had a business to run, whereas his father had been retired.

  Gina lived in a cottage in the middle of the thick woods which lay at the back of the main house and grounds. The other land on the estate, or most of it, was rented out, but Mr Hurst had insisted on keeping the woods exactly as they were, because of the wild life which he had studied with ever-increasing interest during the last years of his life. Gina worried that one day soon Quentin would wake up to their rampant disorder and start on them. Quentin was an entirely different proposi­tion from his father, there being little softness in his make­up. And, although he enjoyed riding and living in the country, she suspected his ruling passion was high fi­nance. Young as he was, he was rapidly gaining a formid­able reputation for it. He also had a reputation for being extremely ruthless when it came to getting his own way, whether in business or pleasure. Eventually, when he came to deal with the dark, overgrown woods, Gina feared they might get the same kind of treatment.

  The cottage, damp from the drip of overhanging bran­ches and leaking spouts, seemed to watch her approach with an oddly gloomy expression. Pushing open the creaking door, she reminded herself that she must re­member to oil the hinges. They were very rusty, but a little oil might help. There was no sign of her father. As she hurried over the bare flagged floor of the kitchen to his bedroom, her heart felt heavy as she saw he wouldn't want any supper this evening. The monthly sum he re­ceived from a private source he would never disclose must have arrived, and somehow he had managed to get hold of some whisky again. Bleakly she gazed at him as he lay in a drunken sleep. His heart was extremely bad, yet he kept on drinking heavily, slowly killing himself.

  Gently, her heart aching for him, she replaced the fallen rugs around his unconscious body. Then she left him, quietly closing the door. It was difficult to believe that John, as he always insisted his daughter call him, had once been a well known and successful surgeon. Gina doubted if anyone, seeing him now, would believe it. She had felt completely incredulous, herself, when she had first learnt this from Quentin's father just a week or two before he died, especially as that was all he would divulge. When, in shocked surprise, she had asked Mr Hurst why he had told her this, he had replied, grim-faced, that it had something to do with his conscience. It was something, he insisted, she should have been told long ago, but if she wished to know more then she must go to John himself.

  John had flown into what was, for him, quite a rage when confronted, and would tell her little more than she had learnt from Mr Hurst. The loss of his wife, Gina's mother, through a mistake which had cost a life, had re­sulted in him giving up his career and coming to live here. Once he had done Andrew Hurst a good turn and, in return, Andrew had given him a quiet old cottage to live in. Quentin, he said, had never known him, nor had Andrew's wife. They both thought John was a casual acquaintance whom Andrew had taken pity on. Neither of them, so far as Gina was aware, had ever visited the cottage.

  Gina stopped asking questions only when it became quite clear that John wasn't going to answer them. Gra­dually she learnt to accept her father's explanations, brief though they were, and to forget. There seemed nothing else she could do. Time passed and she left school, after Andrew Hurst died. He had always been kind to her and she mourned him. She certainly never felt he owed her anything. Whenever she thought of him now it was always with gratitude that he had been a friend, and had taught her so much about horses and stable management.

  Before leaving she threw some more logs on the fire. They were damp as she had only sawn them this morn­ing. Andrew had allowed them to collect the fallen wood around the cottage and she still did so, hoping that if Quentin found out he wouldn't raise any objections. For­tunately he never came near, keeping to the open fields when he was out riding, and too engrossed with his bus­iness in London to give the woods or what was in them a second thought.

  Richard Hedley was there when she returned to the stables, but he had just arrived. 'Hello, Gina,' he smiled at her. 'What seems to be the trouble?'

  'I'm not sure, maybe nothing much,' she said more or less the same to him as she had said to Quentin. 'It's Hector…'

  'Ah, his lordship's favourite!'

  Gina bit her lip. 'You shouldn't call Quentin that, Rich­ard. After all, he isn't a lord.'

  'He can act like one!'

  'Maybe sometimes,' she admitted, 'but not always. He can be very nice.'

  'When it suits him.'

  Glancing at Richard wryly, Gina wondered why there should be so much antagonism between two men who had apparently known each other all their lives. 'You'd better have a look at Hector,' she tried to change the subject tactfully. 'I'm very worried about him.'

  'Right!' Richard immediately reverted to what he was for the greater part of each day and often during the night, a very competent veterinary surgeon. Together they went into the stables.

  Before entering Hector's loosebox, Richard spoke to him quietly. Hector knew the vet and liked him and stood quite still.

  'Has Quentin seen him yet?' Straightening from his examination of the big horse, Richard glanced at the anxious girl by his side.

  'No—not yet. He has guests coming, this evening, but he did say he would look in later if he has time. What is it, Richard?'

  Richard grimaced. 'I think he's been gorging himself on too rich a pasture. At a guess.'

  Gina frowned. 'I had a horrible feeling it might be my fault,' she confessed unhappily. 'You see, I didn't have time to exercise him long enough myself, so I let him graze in the river field.'

  'You mean he's too strong for you?'

  She didn't answer this, not directly, having a weary suspicion it might be true,. 'My father wasn't well yester­day, Richard. That was why I was so pushed for time, but I feel dreadful about Hector,' she put a hand re­morsefully on his silky coat. 'It's all my fault.'

  'Never mind,' Richard wouldn't allow this, 'we can all make mistakes. You did the right thing in sending for me, though. When a horse is valuable it doesn't pay to take risks.'

  'It's the horse that's important, surely, not his value?' Gina raised a small, indignant face.

  'Of course, you're quite right,' Richard soothed, 'but Quentin mightn't think so.'

  This frightened Gina. 'No, he might not,' she agreed soberly. 'Hector cost a great deal of money.'

  'Well, we'll soon have him fit again.' Richard, sensing her alarm, was reassuring. 'There's not much damage done. Nothing that c
an't be cured with a little extra care and attention.'

  'Oh, I'm so glad!' Gina's face, suddenly radiant with relief, caught Richard unawares. He stared at her, as if only beginning to realise that under her untidy appea­rance lay a beautiful girl. He blinked, unable to look away. He was a male of thirty, his sole passion animals, but now he had a strange feeling that this was about to change.

  Gina noticed with perplexity his rather dazed expres­sion. 'Richard, what is it?'

  'Gina,' he exclaimed, 'how old are you?'

  'Eighteen,' she smiled, trying not to feel uneasy. 'I left school almost a year ago.'

  'Are you going on to university?'

  She had a feeling that Richard was just talking for talking's sake, and shook her head. 'No, I hardly think so. I enjoy looking after Quentin's horses.'

  'But that would be a waste.'

  'It depends—' she shrugged.

  'On what, for heaven's sake?'

  'Why,' she was startled that he was so intense, 'I sup­pose on what one wants from life. University doesn't appeal to me.'

  'I can't think why this should.' Tersely his glance roamed the shadowed stables before returning to rest en­quiringly on Gina's face.

  Gina merely smiled, her wide, innocent smile which entranced unconsciously. The man watching her un­expectedly caught his breath, but before he could add anything further, she said anxiously, 'Perhaps we should talk about Hector?'

  Pulling himself quickly together, Richard obliged. He was a good vet and didn't often allow himself to be diverted from a sick animal, not even by someone as sud­denly interesting as Gina.

  Later, as he was leaving, she said, 'I'll pass what you've told me on to Quentin. I'm sure he'll look in, after his guests have gone.'

  'You can't wait here?'

  'Why not? It wouldn't be the first time, and I've things to do.'

  'You could wait a long time,' he warned gruffly. 'Some of Quentin's guests are pretty potent, from what I've seen.'

  Vaguely Gina thought of this as she completed her tasks for the day. Already Hector seemed easier and she had every confidence in Richard. It was Quentin she was unsure of. In spite of his apparent indifference and his sophisticated girl-friends, she knew he would be worried about Hector. She didn't want him arriving here and then coming on to the cottage, looking for her. He was unpredictable and he just might, and she would rather he didn't come anywhere near the cottage.