His Rags-to-Riches Bride: Innocent on Her Wedding Night / Housekeeper at His Beck and Call / The Australian's Housekeeper Bride

Instead, I made him the sun in my sky. The centre of my universe. The focus of everything I wanted from life. And that made me—vulnerable. Especially when I was seventeen and came face to face with my first personal tragedy.

She’d had no presentiment that anything was going to happen. Her only real foreboding had concerned Simon and Candy’s wedding, which had been scheduled to take place in the summer. And for which she would be required to wear lavender taffeta.

But, quite apart from that, she had known in her heart that Candy was the last person in the world she’d have chosen as a sister-in-law. And suspected the feeling was mutual.

Their only common ground was the vexed subject of Simon’s climbing. Candy had been uneasy about it and so had she—especially when he’d been invited at the last minute to go to Annapurna in place of someone who was ill.

‘It’s the chance of a lifetime,’ he’d said buoyantly. ‘Serious stuff. A dream come true.’ His face had clouded slightly. ‘But I’ve promised Candy that I’ll cut down once we’re married. She says it’s no longer a hobby but an obsession, and she could be right.’

Laine swallowed, remembering how she’d been sent for by the headmistress, and had gone to her study filled with trepidation, wondering what she’d done to fall from grace. But Mrs Hallam’s expression had spoken of distress rather than severity, and she’d risen and came round the desk, taking Laine’s hands in hers. An unheard-of gesture.

‘My dear,’ she said gravely. ‘I’m afraid I have some very sad news for you.’ She hesitated, shaking her head sorrowfully, and Laine thought, Daniel—oh, please God, don’t let anything have happened to Daniel.

‘What—is it?’ She hardly recognised her own voice.

‘Elaine, dear, there is no easy way to say this. It’s—your brother—Simon. There’s been an accident, and he and another man have been killed.’

‘Simon?’ Shock mingled with shame that her first thought—her instinctive prayer—had been about Daniel. ‘Oh, no—please. There must be some mistake.’

Mrs Hallam bent her head. ‘Laine—I’m so sorry.’

She heard herself give a little moan, and was gently encouraged to sit in one of the armchairs normally reserved for visitors, told that tea had been sent for, and that matron was packing a case for her, because her brother was expected at some time during the next hour to take her home.

‘Would you like a friend—Celia, perhaps—to sit with you until he arrives?’

‘No, thank you. I—I think I’d rather be alone. If that’s all right.’

And Mrs Hallam nodded and quietly withdrew.

A member of the kitchen staff brought the tea, poured it out for her, and pressed the cup and saucer into her hands.

Where they remained, the tea cold and untouched, half an hour later, when the study door opened and Daniel came in.

She stood up, spilling some of the liquid on her skirt. She said numbly, ‘It’s you. I—I thought Jamie was coming.’

‘He was, but your mother became hysterical at the idea of being left.’

He took the cup and saucer from her shaking hand and replaced them on the tray. He said gently, ‘They’ve put your case in my car, Laine. We can go as soon as you feel able.’

She shook her head. ‘I don’t seem to—feel anything at all. Not yet. You see, I—I can’t quite believe it.’

‘No one can.’

She stared down at the carpet. ‘What happened—do you know?’

He said quietly, ‘Details are sketchy, but it seems there was some kind of rock fall, and he and an Italian guy were swept away.’

‘Oh, God,’ she whispered, horrified.

‘Si had named Jamie as next of kin, and he was the one they notified before the newscasts went out. He was meeting your mother for lunch. She’d gone up to London to do some shopping with Candida, and he asked me to go with him to break the news.’ He was silent for a moment. ‘It was—truly bad. One of the worst moments of my life.’

He sighed. ‘Jamie drove them down to Abbotsbrook, and the doctor’s seen them and prescribed sedatives. But your mother still wouldn’t let Jamie out of her sight.’

‘I can hardly blame her for that.’ She swallowed. ‘I’m ready to leave now.’

They had been travelling for twenty minutes when she said, in a small stifled voice, ‘Could you stop, please? I think I’m going to be sick.’

Daniel pulled over onto the verge and she stumbled out, kneeling on the short grass, her shoulders hunched as she retched dryly and painfully over and over again, until at last the harsh sounds became gasping sobs, and tears followed.

He lifted her and held her close, his hand cupping the back of her head as she wept into his shoulder in a fierce, cleansing outpouring of grief.

Cry while you can, an icy voice in her brain seemed to be saying, even as she clung to him. But do it here and now. Because when you get to Abbotsbrook you’ll have to provide comfort to your mother, and the girl who was nearly Simon’s widow. And you’ll have to sort Jamie out too.

At last, when there seemed to be no tears left, she leaned against him, trembling a little, knowing that she did not want to move out of the warmth of his embrace.

He was the first to detach himself, holding her deliberately away from him as he looked down at her pale, unhappy face. He said quietly, ‘We have to get back. People will be waiting for us.’

He retrieved a bottle of mineral water from the cool box in the boot and made her drink most of it, before damping his handkerchief with the remainder and wiping away the worst of the tearstains.

‘You’re going to need all your strength, Laine,’ he told her almost abruptly as he started the engine. ‘These next few days are not going to be easy.’

If you would only hold me, she thought, I could face anything. Even—this.

But she said nothing, sitting beside him in silence for the rest of the journey.

When they arrived at Abbotsbrook, Daniel carried her bag into the house and set it down in the hall.

‘I have things to do, Laine.’ His voice sounded almost curt. ‘I’ll be back later.’

She watched him go, controlling an impulse to run after him. Beg him not to leave her. Because she had to be strong, she thought. Starting now.

As she heard the car’s engine die away someone said her name, and she saw Jamie emerging from the drawing room, his face pale and set.

He came over and gave her an awkward hug. ‘God, sis, I can’t believe it, can you? I keep thinking that I’m going to wake up at any moment, and find it’s all been a bad dream.’ He looked past her. ‘Where’s Dan? They’ve both been asking for him.’

‘He had to go.’ She hesitated. ‘Jamie, I don’t want to seem heartless, but wouldn’t it be better if Candida could be looked after by her own family? We’re going to have our hands full.’

‘I suggested it, naturally, but it seems she doesn’t get on with her mother.’ He shook his head. ‘The drive down was a nightmare. She kept saying that Annapurna was cursed, and she’d known something dreadful was going to happen. You can imagine the effect that had on Ma,’ he added heavily.

She nodded. ‘Is she using Simon’s room?’

‘Well, yes. She just walked in there and shut the door. I—didn’t know what to say. After all, it’s where she’s always slept when she’s stayed here, I suppose.’

She sighed. ‘I suppose so too—and yet.’ She patted his shoulder. ‘I’ll go and sit with Mother. Wait for her to wake up.’

And wait for Dan to come back too. Because he was Simon’s best friend, and for that reason, if no other, he’ll be here for us. Or for a while, at least. Until the mourning time is over, and we all pick up our lives again somehow.

She did not dare look any further into the future than that. Because she knew it would be like staring down into an abyss. A terrible place that she had never known existed until this moment. But which seemed, somehow, to have been waiting for her the whole of her life.