Angel of Death Read Online Free

drink too much of the champagne so freely on offer and had just swallowed a mug of strong black coffee. Not that she ever did drink more than a glass or two of wine. But tonight it would have been irritating to have to get a taxi to the station and take the train back to town. It would leave her with the problem of picking up her car some other time.
    Sean, however, was not in the habit of thinking about consequences. All his life his father had made his life easy. Miranda did not have parents to do that favour for her. Her father had vanished when she was ten, her mother had not been the sort of parent who believes in mollycoddling offspring. Miranda had left home at eighteen to get a job in London, and had only had herself to rely on for years. It would do Sean good to have to do his own thinking for once.
    As she drove away, she caught a glimpse in her wing mirror of Alex Manoussi coming out of the house. From the way he stared after her car she guessed he had followed her, was looking for her, and shivered. Thank God she had escaped before he caught up with her.
    He still had the same effect on her as he had had, even before the yacht foundered. Always in black, his face set in strong, hard lines, his manner cold, he was not a man anyone would take to on sight.
    When he walked up to her and asked her to dance one evening, on the yacht, she had found being in his arms a disturbing experience and afterwards had avoided him whenever they were in the same room. He had not spoken to her during the dance; she had learnt nothing about him and been left curious.
    ‘Who is he?’ she had asked Tom.
    ‘No idea. Obviously the boss knows him. Not exactly the life and soul of the party, is he?’
    ‘He looks like the angel of death.’
    Tom had laughed. ‘You do say the oddest things, darling. What do you mean, the angel of death?’
    ‘I saw a picture once, when I was about eight. My grandfather had it hanging on his wall. There was a little girl, lying on a bed, and beside the bed a man all in black.’
    ‘An undertaker? A clergyman?’
    ‘No, a man like that one there – with a face like stone, wearing some sort of armour. And he had big, black wings. Grandad said he was the angel of death, who had come for the child. It was really spooky. I hated it. And that guy looks just like the angel. All he needs is black wings.’
    He had come for Tom, the very next night. Had he come for her today? Why had he suddenly reappeared, after three years?
    A shiver ran down her back. Was she going to die?
    Oh, don’t be so ridiculous, she told herself. This is rank superstition. Grow up, why don’t you?
    That night, she dreamt the old nightmare and woke up with the sound of Tom drowning going on and on inside her head and tears running down her face.
    She was glad to get up, take a shower, wash the memories out of her head.
    It was hot and sunny that Sunday; a little humid. Miranda would not normally wear shorts and a t-shirt to work, but nobody else was around in the office to see her. The porter downstairs at reception, was reading the sports section of a Sunday newspaper with his feet up on the edge of the desk he sat behind. He looked up as she buzzed at the plate glass doors, recognised her and grinned before zapping the door open.
    ‘Working on a Sunday? Hope you’re on double time!’
    ‘I hope so, too.’ She walked towards the lift while he watched, enjoying his view of her neat behind in brief red cotton shorts which revealed most of her long, slender legs.
    ‘You shouldn’t let him take advantage of you!’ he called, thinking that he would love to take advantage of her, himself. She had a curvy, sexy little bottom and he loved those legs.
    She pressed the lift button, lifting the hair from her perspiring nape with her other hand, groaning. ‘It’s already really hot out there. We’re going to have a scorcher.’
    ‘Afraid the air-conditioning is switched off,’ the porter apologised. ‘I’m not allowed to have it