Moonlight over Malta

By Brenda Lacey

Faith Worthing has only been working for Moonlight Cosmetics for a short time, so she is delighted to be sent to Malta to finalise a contract when a colleague is unwell, although her fiance Charles does not believe that she can cope alone. When she arrives, to find that the car that should have met her has not turned up, she is beginning to wonder if he is right! However, she is rescued by the handsome Hannibal Price, who works for a local hospitality company and who warns her to be wary of Jean-Baptiste Laval, the man that she has come to see. However, when she meets Laval, he returns the compliment - hinting that Hannibal is untrustworthy himself. But as event succeeds event - Faith believes her luggage has been searched and that she is being followed through Valetta - she is faced with a dilemma. Which man - if either - can she trust? What is the secret that both are desperate to hide? She finds herself in serious danger as she seeks the truth.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Brenda Lacey
• Release date: Apr 24, 2012
• ISBN: 9780957181335

Brenda Lacey

Brenda Lacey is an early writing name of Rosemary Aitken. Under that pseudonym she has published many short stories and two light romantic novels set in the mediterranean. Under her own name she has written a series of Cornish Historical novels, some of which have been book club choices, and as Rosemary Rowe (her maiden name) she is author of the Libertus Mysteries of Roman Britain. Rosemary was born in Cornwall, raised and educated largely in New Zealand, where she still has a house and family and where she taught for several years, before returning to the UK and a post in teacher Training, which she occupied until her retirement in 1987 following an industrial accident. Since then she has devoted herself chiefly to writing, although she has also examined extensively for Trinity College London, both in ESOL/TESOL (in which field she is the author of several well-known books) and also in Speech, Drama and Communication. Rosemary has two adult children, both University lecturers, and five grandchildren. She recently retired to her native Cornwall where she lives in a wooded valley near the Fal River.

Book preview

Moonlight over Malta

A Romantic Mystery

by

Brenda Lacey

Copyright acknowledements

© Rosemary Aitken 2012

Published at Smashwords in 2012 by Rosemary Aitken, Perranswood, Tredrea Gardens, Perranarworthal, Cornwall, TR3 7QG

ISBN 978-0-9571813-3-5

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of the Author.

These stories are entirely works of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in them are the work of the author's imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living, or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

First published in Great Britain

Copyright © 1995 by Brenda Lacey All rights reserved

Contents

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

About The Author

(return to contents)

Chapter 1

Malta was hot. Much hotter than Faith had expected. She had done no more than set one foot outside the airport terminal, and already she was aware of the heat bouncing back at her from the Tarmac. She must have been mad, she thought irritably, to agree to come on this assignment.

There hadn’t been much time to think about it. It should have been Stephanie, the chief Sales Executive from Moonlight Cosmetics, standing here today, but she was in hospital recovering from appendicitis.

Faith had received a call late on Friday night, and by Monday morning, here she was. There hadn’t even been time to call into the office and pick up the special presentation pack Stephanie had apparently prepared.

‘You’ll be fine,’ Brenda, the Managing Director, had said. ‘Stephanie has been there a dozen times. Everything is booked - plane tickets, hotel, exactly as it always is. And don’t worry about the presentation pack - you’ve got your own promotional material. I’m sure it’s just as good. Stephanie is just a perfectionist. She always has a hire care waiting at the airport. There will be probably be a map in it, so you have nothing to worry about.’

Except that there was no car. Faith had tried the rental desk. She had been to airport information. She had even come out into the heat and walked the length of the carparks. Nothing. Even the taxi drivers, who had clustered around when the plane landed an hour ago, had found their fares and left. Faith was beginning to wish that she had not dismissed them so loftily. Her appointment with Mr Laval at Sleima was at three fifteen. It was already two o’clock. She would have to do something.

She gave an exasperated sigh. It was all turning out exactly as Charles had said it would.

‘Fay, my dear girl,’ he had said when she told him, ‘that little company of yours may produce wonderful cosmetics, but they couldn’t organise their way out of a paper bag. You can’t really be going to Malta, just like that. It will be one problem after another. You mark my words!’

Damn Charles! Why was he always right? Well, she told herself firmly, she would not ring and ask his advice. Life was difficult enough without listening to Charles saying pointedly, ‘I told you so.’

Not that she wasn’t tempted. Charles would know someone, pull a few strings, and everything would go like clockwork. And he had told her to telephone if there was any problem at all.

No, she thought to herself firmly. That was absurd. She could manage perfectly well without Charles Chatcombe. Just because she didn’t have everything planned down to the last detail like he did, it didn’t mean that she couldn’t cope. She wasn’t completely useless, otherwise Moonlight Cosmetics would not have offered her this overseas assignment.

He had tried to talk her out of it. ‘Fay, darling,’ he had said, as they sat at the best table in Charles’s favourite restaurant and waited for the lobster and strawberries, ‘have you any idea what you are letting yourself in for? You have never been farther than the Isle of Wight in your entire life.’

‘Well,’ Faith said stoutly, ‘this is a golden opportunity.’

Charles gave that little laugh of his which let you know that he thought you an imbecile. ‘You think so? It seems absurd to me. Stephanie goes sick at the eleventh hour with a big contract at stake, and do they have another senior executive to take her place? No. Instead they ask you - at all of three days’ notice. Junior sales executive? You haven’t been in the place five minutes.’

Faith toyed with her lobster. She didn’t really care for shellfish.

‘Well, they must think I have promise.’

Charles smiled. ‘Or, of course, Stephanie may have the whole contract sewn up already, so it is just a question of getting Laval to sign the paper-work. Yes, I expect that is what it is. Still, the way the firm operates, don’t be surprised to get there and find that they have forgotten to warn Laval that you are coming.’

He reached out and took her hands in his own, firm, well-manicured ones.

‘If you want to go to Malta, why don’t you agree to marry me, and we can go together? A honeymoon. Malta, Greece, Italy - we could take in Switzerland on the way back.’

Why did the prospect leave her so cold? Thousands of women would be delighted to share their lives with Charles Chatcombe. And he was genuinely fond of her. Her sister was always urging her to accept him.

‘Think about it, Faith. No more money worries. No more nine-to-five.’

But Faith knew the answer. Charles would run her life like he ran his own, as a military operation. No more getting up early to listen to the birds. No more walking on the cliffs because it was raining and the wind was in your face. No more worries. No more excitement ...

So she had smiled at him, and said, firmly, ‘I want to take this job.’

And here she was, hot, late, hungry and irritable, with no car. Well, she would not be beaten. She pulled down the jacket of the fawn, linen suit which had looked so smart and cool in London, and seemed so crumpled now, tossed back her blonde hair and marched back to the Information Desk.

‘My car,’ she said, knowing that she sounded like an outraged primary school teacher. ‘What has happened to my car?’

The pretty girl behind the counter flashed her a patient smile. ‘I am sorry, madam. Unless you know the name of the hire company ... There are many hire firms on the island. But if you wish, I could try and arrange a hire car for you.’

‘But it is supposed to have been paid for,’ Faith wailed. ‘It’s a regular thing. I saw the booking form myself.’

‘And you don’t remember the name of the company?’

Faith shook her head. Last Thursday it hadn’t mattered to her.

‘Credit card?’ the girl said.

Faith shook her head. ‘Everything was supposed to be prepaid. And I haven’t even brought very much money. I was only supposed to be here for a day or two. And even the taxis have gone, now. I don’t know what to do. I’ve got an appointment in Sleima in less than an hour.’

‘Perhaps I can help,’ a warm, amused voice said.

Faith spun around. There was a man at her elbow. He was dark, olive skinned, with flashing, brown eyes and an easy grace she had already noticed admiringly among some of the young taxi drivers and airport employees. In fact, she thought, she recognised the man. Hadn’t he been standing among the taxi drivers touting for custom at the door? Her eyes had been drawn, even then, by the muscular physique under the open-necked shirt.

‘My company is supposed to have arranged for a hire car to meet me,’ she

said. ‘But it doesn’t seem to have arrived.!

‘You have a company?’ A smile twinkled at the corners of his eyes.

Was he teasing her? It was impossible to tell. She tossed her head back with what she hoped was an authoritative gesture and said, ‘Moonlight Cosmetics. I have an appointment to meet a Mr Laval in Sleima this afternoon - he’s a big importer. Not that I suppose you have ever heard of him.’

The brown eyes were as unfathomable as ever.

‘Oh, yes. I’ve heard of him. Malta is a small place. He’s an important man, a big importer, as you say. Oh, yes, I’ve certainly heard of Mr Laval.’

There was something in his tone which made her say, ‘And you don’t like what you hear?’

He gave a half-comic grin, spreading his hands in a little gesture of deprecation. ‘No, no. That is too strong. It is only that we are not alike, he and I. He is a businessman - he thinks only of his work, of profit.’

‘And you?’

‘Ah, Miss Worthing, I am a creature of sun and sea. I have to make a living, yes, but I work to live - he lives to work. But I am working this afternoon, and maybe, after all, I can be of assistance. I myself am going to Sleima - perhaps I can give you a lift?’

But she was staring at him doubtfully. ‘How did you know my name?’

For a moment a faint flush touched his cheeks, and he shifted his gaze.

‘A moment ago,’ she persisted, ‘you called me Miss Worthing. How did you know my name?’

He shrugged, a little abashed. ‘If you do not wish people to use your name, Miss Faith Worthing, you should