Chapter 2 Anonymous Admirer

AS SHE OPENED the card Vivienne instinctively braced herself against the impact of this year's message. His words had a way of worming into her subconsciousness and tripping through her mind at unexpected moments; unsettling her judgements and slanting her perspective with a most unwelcome persistence. It was another invasion, of a kind she found impossible to fight. And that was the core of her frustration.

Her eyes skimmed over the unusually short verse, then backtracked to read the words again and again.

"The power and the passion of life

is in loving.

Embrace the power;

Savour the passion.

All else... is vanity!"

A sense of outrage grew as Vivienne furiously dissected their meaning. Was he suggesting that it was only a vanity to have spent all these years of hard work earning her medical degree? That she should have spent that time loving him instead? And precisely where would that have got her? Vivienne thought scornfully-- out on a limb, depending on him not to drop her when he felt like it!

From the time in her life when she could first comprehend what was going on about her, she was determined to stand on her own two feet and not depend on anyone. For anything! And she had done it.

A flash of anger burned through her. It wasn't her fault that love was in short supply where she was concerned. She hadn't asked to be born on the wrong side of the blanket to a man like Sir Gabriel Carter. She hadn't wanted her mother to die before she was old enough to remember her. And as for passion, it was all too easily generated when there was wealth in the background; and other people savouring that had proved a bitter exercise for her.

If she had ever counted on loving to be the power and passion of her life, she would be in a very sorry state. And if that was what her anonymous lover really thought, she would soon disabuse him once she had the opportunity.

She tossed the card into the drawer where she kept the others and determined not to look at any of them ever again. Not even when she felt lonely or sad, nor when she suffered the occasional bouts of deep depression.

One day he would reveal himself, and she would confront him with them. She knew all the words by heart and she would certainly put his sincerity to the test. She would demand to know why he had sent them, and what he meant by them, and she would get the truth out of him if it was the last thing she did!

The doorbell rang again.

Vivienne's heart gave an agitated leap and she took a deep breath to restore a facade of calm composure. It would certainly be her father this time.

She strode quickly into her bedroom for a last-minute check on her appearance. Not that she should care what he thought of her. She had learnt to do without his caring since infancy. But some wisp of pride demanded that she not look inferior to his legitimate daughter whenever her father escorted her out in public. Aria Carter was the darling of the social pages. Vivienne never would be. She scorned such empty nonsense, yet she had it thrust upon her. There was no getting away from the Press when her father was so newsworthy... Sir Gabriel Carter, with a finger in every corporate pie, a financial network that spread across the world, and always making profits, of course; more money to become bigger and richer and more powerful.

Had he bought her mother, in the same way as he had bought all his other mistresses since his wife had died? Vivienne fiercely wanted to know, but she never asked...never would ask... not anything of him. Not ever!

The blue ice of her eyes hardened at the thought. Her reflection in the hall mirror assured her that not a wisp of her dark blonde hair had escaped from the elegant coil, that her make-up was as perfect as it could be, and the white dinner gown draped itself over the lissom curves of her body with all the style and grace of its elegant line.

Yes, she was ready for her father... ready for anybody, ready to meet any of them on any ground ... and hold her own. She walked unhurriedly from her bedroom, picked up her handbag from the hall table, and opened the door.

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