Penny Jordan (12 page)

Just like she felt now?

As she experienced the draining mixture of anger, panic and despair swirling blackly through her, Olivia gritted her teeth. 'Caspar, I know you've managed to negotiate extended time out from the university for this trip, but you
know
I can't go with you. We've already discussed it and—

'No. No,
we
have not discussed it,' Caspar interrupted her angrily. I have tried to discuss it, Livvy, but all
you've
done is put a veto on the whole subject.'

Lifting her hands to her head in protest, Olivia reminded him, 'Caspar, I simply don't have time for another argument. I've got an appointment at eight-thirty and before then I've got to—'

'Oh...I'm sorry if our private lives are interfering with your busy work agenda,' Caspar interjected sarcastically. 'Forgive me if I forget from time to time just how important a person you are. A full partner in the family firm.'

As she listened to the angry sarcasm in his voice, Olivia's mouth compressed.

When Jon had talked over with her the issue of her becoming a full partner in the practice, he had insisted that she was not to feel that she would be under increased pressure to take on more work.

So far as he was concerned, he had said sharing the partnership with her was simply a way of recognising the very important role she played in the firm's business.

But Olivia had not been able to see things that way. The euphoria of her love for Caspar and then the birth of their two daughters had, for a while, masked all the underlying pain and anxiety that she had carried with her from her childhood into adulthood. Just recently, though, with the tension between her and Caspar growing into a frighteningly dangerous rift and the pressure she was putting on herself at work, she was beginning to feel very close to paranoid.

Not that she thought about her feelings and her fears so analytically or even in any way acknowledged their cause. So far as Olivia was concerned, what was driving her on was quite simply necessity, although what that necessity might be she wasn't really able to name.

Now as she saw the very real anger in Caspar's eyes, the panicky feeling of alienation and pain that seemed to be growing between her and her husband made her react defensively. She immediately took Caspar's insistence on attending his half-brother's wedding as somehow saying that his blood family, his brothers, the
males
in his family, were more important to him than she was.

'I don't understand why you're so anxious to go to this wedding. After all, it isn't as though you and Bryant are close. You've told me yourself that when he was born you were already in high school and that the only time you ever saw him was when you spent duty vacations with your father and Bryant's mother. For heaven's sake,'

she added irritably, 'if we attended every single one of your motley collection of siblings' weddings, christenings and other celebrations, we'd be spending over half our lives travelling.'

'Well, that sounds like a bonus to me,' Caspar informed her curtly. 'At least we'd see something of one another that way. Right now, with your spending virtually ninety per cent of your waking hours working—'

'Don't be ridiculous,' Olivia interrupted.

'You're exaggerating.'

'Am I?' Caspar asked coldly. 'I don't think so.

Ask the girls what they think—if you dare.'

'That isn't fair,' Olivia protested fiercely. 'I spend as much time with them as I can.'

'As much time as you
can,
and how much time is that exactly, Livvy?'

Olivia bit her lip. It was true that just lately she had not been able to spend as much time with their daughters as she longed to, but it was in part for their sakes that she was pushing herself, that she was working as hard as she was. What kind of a role model would she be for them if she allowed them to grow up as she had done, believing that to be a female automatically meant that one was somehow of less worth as a human being? No! There was no way she was going to allow that to happen to
her
daughters. No way at all, and if that meant she had to work when she would much rather have been with them...

'You're just saying that because...because you're trying to put pressure on me over this wedding,' Olivia retorted angrily. 'I don't understand why it is you're so keen to go to it anyway. After all, it isn't as though you and your family have ever been particularly close, is it?'

'Not like you and
your
family, you mean,' Caspar countered furiously. 'And we all know just how close the Crighton clan is, don't we? Especially those of us who are on the outside of its charmed circle.
We
are your family, Livvy, me and Amelia and Alex, but sometimes—no, correction—
most
of the time now, you behave as though—'

'That's not fair and it's not true, either,' Olivia protested immediately.

'Isn't it?' Caspar challenged her. 'Have you any idea just how many people still refer to you as Olivia
Crighton
? No matter how much you try to deny it, Livvy, you're still held in thrall to the Crighton credo, to the Crighton way of doing things. Can you imagine how
you
would have reacted if I'd suggested that
we
didn't go to Louise's wedding, for instance...and she isn't even a sibling.'

'That's different. We've all grown up together.

I see my cousins all the time. You haven't seen your half-brothers and sisters for years.'

'No, I haven't,' Caspar agreed quietly, 'which surely makes it all the more understandable that I should want to see them now. Remember how, when we first got married, Livvy,
you
were the one to preach forgiveness—a new start, a new way of integrating with and reacting to my family.'

'We
did
visit them,' Olivia insisted.

'I'm just not getting through to you, am I?'

Caspar responded grimly. 'Well, perhaps
this
will get through to you, Livvy. I am going to be at my half-brother's wedding and so are my children.

Whether my wife comes with us is, of course, up to you.'

As Olivia opened her mouth to protest and tell him exactly what she thought of his high-handed behaviour, she could hear the warning sound of the girls coming downstairs and she knew that it was too late to say what she was feeling. Instead, she forced her lips to part in a wide smile as the kitchen door opened and both girls came rushing in.

'Right, girls, breakfast, and then you've got ten minutes to collect all your gear together.'

'Oh, good, it's Dad's turn for the school run,'

Amelia was saying happily as she tucked into her breakfast whilst Olivia quickly drank her now-cold cup of coffee and prepared to leave. "That means we can go the long way round and drive past the field with the ponies in it.'

As she kissed both girls and headed for the door, deliberately avoiding going anywhere near Caspar, Olivia could feel the pain and resentment inside her like a hot, hard lump that pressed painfully against her breastbone.

It wasn't Amelia's fault that those innocent words had underlined the differences between her and Caspar's parenting roles. Caspar, as a senior university lecturer, could arrange his working day to allow him a more leisurely start in the morning.

It was different for her. She could just imagine what her grandfather would have to say if he found out that she was drifting into the office any later than eight-thirty. He would condemn her immediately for it. As she drove to work, though, she couldn't help dwelling on what Caspar had said. He hadn't meant it, she was sure. There was no way he would go to his Bryant's wedding without her. He was just trying to put pressure on her, to
blackmail
her. But he of all people knew how impossible it was for her to take any time off right now. As her husband, he ought to have been more understanding.

'WELL, THERE'S OBVIOUSLY
at least one and probably more holes in the roof,' David warned Honor as they stood side by side surveying the large damp patches on the ceiling and walls of the bedroom.

'Yes. I'm afraid you're right, and it's even worse up in the attic,' Honor agreed.

They were on the last part of their tour of the house, and from what David had seen, there was enough work simply repairing the building's de-fective windows and roof to keep him busy for the next few months.

Once, a long time ago, in another life, another David would have looked at Honor in horror at the mere thought that he might undertake such work. He would not have had a clue where to start or how to go about it, because his father had brought him up to believe that any kind of manual labour was vastly beneath him. Even the children's bonfire behind the house every fifth of No-vember had been put in place by the man they had in to do the garden.

Things were different now, of course, and in the years he had been away, he had learned, initially out of necessity, how to do such jobs. He had also, much to his surprise, discovered just how much satisfaction could be gained from teaching himself how to do them well.

Now his experienced eye quickly recognised the tell-tale signs of neglect in the fabric of the old house. He reckoned he could quite easily tackle most of the work himself.

'What I'd like to do is scout round a little to see if I can pick up matching materials so that the repairs can be as invisible as possible. When it comes to finding the right quality of hardwood for the window frames...' He paused and shook his head.

'My cousin may be able to help you there,'

Honor offered. 'I'll give him a ring and arrange for us to go over.' She stopped as she saw the way David was frowning.

David didn't know Lord Astlegh personally, so he had no fear of Honor's cousin recognising him, but he had no idea whether or not the man knew any other member of his family and in particular his twin. The last thing he wanted right now was to meet anyone who was likely to recognise him through his likeness to Jon. This was one of the reasons that staying with Honor in her out-of-the-way house was so perfect.

'What's wrong?' Honor asked. 'You'll like him, I promise you.'

Honor's perceptiveness caught David off guard.

She was far too intuitive, far too quick to pick up on his innermost feelings. Tiggy, for instance, would never in a million years have sensed what Honor had so easily discerned.

'It isn't so much a matter of my liking
him,'

David admitted wryly.

'You mean he may feel obliged to take on a paternal role and question your intentions towards me?' Honor laughed, shaking her head. 'I'm forty-four, and all other considerations apart, my cousin is so unworldly that he'd feel that I have far more experience in judging whether or not someone is to be trusted than he does.'

'Really!' David couldn't stop himself from giving her a tender look. He suspected that even if her life had held some pain, she had actually lived the kind of sheltered existence that meant that she had little or no idea to what depths of unpleasantness people could sometimes sink.

'Yes, really,' Honor confirmed firmly. 'My late husband was a photographer—perhaps not another David Bailey—but he was well-known enough in the seventies and eighties to attract commissions from glossy magazines that kept him in drink and drugs as well as gave him an endless supply of pretty models,' Honor said frankly.

'He had a bit of a thing about threesomes,' she added, 'and contrasts. Perhaps that was the artist in him. His favourite combination was one black model and one white. The reason I know is not just because he told me so, but because I saw the photographs—and so, too, very nearly did the girls! He wanted me to see what he was getting elsewhere that I refused to supply for him.' She gave David a brief smile. 'Sharing has never been my strong suit.'

'I'm sorry,' David apologised.

'There's no need to be. I'm not. It was a bad marriage, but I learned a lot from it—and it gave me Abigail and Ellen.'

'It wasn't your marriage I was apologising for.

It was for my misjudgement about you—for pi-geon-holing you as a woman who'd been pretty much sheltered from life's realities.'

As Honor held his gaze, David had to struggle to resist the temptation to close the distance between them. There was something so warm and inviting about her, something that...

A little hoarsely he told her, 'Although it's been very neglected, the house itself is well-built and a good size. With the land that goes with it, the property is sure to be a good investment and—'

'I could never buy it,' Honor interrupted him.

'My cousin is totally opposed to anything that means breaking up the estate, and I have to admit I can see his point of view. However, he
has
told me that I can have as long a lease on the house as I wish, so I've opted for one of ninety-nine years.'

'That should be long enough,' David agreed, smiling. 'Even if you are a witch.'

'Will you stop saying that?' Honor scolding him, laughing. 'I am not a witch.'

'Ah, but you would say that, wouldn't you?'

David teased her back, his expression changing abruptly as his body registered the fact that she had turned towards the open bedroom window and the breeze was flattening her top against her body. 'I'm not too sure I can believe you,' he added huskily. 'I certainly feel as though you've cast a very special spell over me.'

'Oh?' Honor questioned, turning her head to look at him.

'I'm sorry, I shouldn't have said that,' David apologised gruffly.

'Why not, if that's the way you feel?' Honor asked him calmly.

'What I feel isn't... I shouldn't be talking to you like this,' David protested, pushing his hand into his hair. 'I don't have anything to offer a woman—any woman, but most especially a woman like you.'

Honor gave him a long, steady look before saying, 'Isn't that for
me
to decide?'

And then, before he could make any response, she turned and pointed to the damp patch on the wall. 'If you can cure this,' she told him briskly,

'then I intend to redecorate this room and move into it. I don't know why, but somehow I feel this is the right room for me. The whole place needs redoing, of course, but all this other work has to be done first. Then I intend to try to persuade Freddy to let me add on a glass house for my herbs.'