One Reckless Night by Sara Craven Page B

really believed her father would go to the threatened lengths. But, arriving at the office the day after she had quietly but firmly told Dr Wickham that she would not be keeping the appointment he'd arranged for her to terminate her pregnancy, she had found her way barred by a clearly embarrassed security guard.
      She'd been forced to wait in Reception until Tessa Lloyd, brimming with ill-concealed triumph, had arrived to conduct her to her office and stand over her while she cleared her desk. And before leaving she'd been required to hand back her car keys.
      After that Zanna had seen no point in waiting for the humiliation of eviction from the flat, so she'd packed her clothes and her home computer and moved out to a hotel, using it as a base to start her hunt for a new home and employment.
      Fortunately, shortage of money had not been an immediate problem, although she couldn't live indefinitely on her savings, which were ebbing away at frightening
      speed.
      No, her main difficulty was that her name seemed to have become poison in the marketplace. Every job application she submitted ran into some kind of invisible barrier, and her total lack of references, added to brief, snide comments about her sudden departure in the financial pages of the daily Press, suggested she'd been guilty of some stunning misdemeanor. Fraud, at the very least, she'd realized with helpless horror. And she knew her father was at the back of it all. It was part of her on-going punishment for defying him. Although, from a practical point of view, he clearly didn't want Zanna taking her expertise to some rival company.
      Candor about the real reason for her dismissal hadn't helped either. Companies were unlikely, she'd been told civilly but dismissively, to hire a young woman who would soon be asking them to pay for her maternity leave-especially when there was no guarantee that she'd return to work after the birth.
      Gritting her teeth, Zanna had started applying for secretarial posts and making the weary rounds of the temping agencies. But many of them, including the one she'd just left, already had sufficient people on their books to supply current demand. Jobs weren't easy to come by, she was told regretfully. It was all part of the recession. Now, pausing in the sunlit street while she flexed her aching toes in their smart court shoes, she pondered whether her volatile stomach was ready to tolerate some coffee. She had learned by bitter experience to start the day with a glass of mineral water and a dry biscuit, and to take things one step at a time thereafter.
      But there weren't any coffee-shops in this particular street, she thought ruefully. It was all art galleries and antique shops, interspersed with the occasional designer boutique. The kind of place she'd have found a happy hunting ground in former days. Suppressing a sigh, she decided to walk to Fortnum and Mason.
      Waiting to cross the road, she found herself gazing almost absently at a display of vibrant abstract art behind an imposing stretch of plate glass. New since I was here last, she thought, scrutinizing the name emblazoned across the immaculate dark green awning.
      Lantrell Galleries, she repeated silently. Now, why did that sound familiar? She'd reached the other pavement before she remembered that, for some obscure reason, in some other existence, she'd been invited to the opening. She glanced irresolutely at her watch, then made up her mind. As she was on the doorstep she might as well pay them a belated visit.
      She pushed open the heavy glass door and went in. She was immediately aware of light and space and color, of the subtle scent of polished wood and expensive fabrics and a wide and shallow ramp leading in a gentle semi-circle to an upper floor. The atmosphere was discreetly luxurious, she thought, glancing round her, and totally inviting.
      'Welcome to Lantrells.' The receptionist was the epitome of blonde chic, but her smile was genuinely