by Sara Craven
‘Please don’t regard me as some kind of victim.’ He sounded amused. ‘Perhaps you don’t realise there isn’t a man in England who wouldn’t jump at the chance of dinner à deux with television’s top fantasy woman.’
Isn’t there? thought Rhianna. Isn’t there? Because I can think of one standing only a few feet away right now. So why are you doing this? Why?
‘Besides, just think of the moral victory you’ll score over Margaret Rawlins,’ he went on. ‘Arming for a battle and finding it’s been cancelled. All the Brownie points for good behaviour to our side, and only at the cost of two new place-cards.’
He turned to Rhianna. ‘I know you must be disappointed at missing out, but comfort yourself with the knowledge that you’ve headed off yet another difficulty at this happy time, and can bask in the bridegroom’s undying gratitude.’
He allowed an instant’s silence for her to digest this, then smiled at her charmingly. ‘So, are you prepared to make this sacrifice, Rhianna—for Simon’s sake, if nothing else?’
She met his gaze, hard and metallic, like silver. Read its challenge, which held no charm at all.
‘Put like that,’ she said coldly and clearly, ‘how can I possibly refuse?’
His smile widened. ‘Oh, I’m sure we can both think of a number of ways,’ he said softly.
He turned to Moira Seymour, whose expression was still set in stone. ‘I suggest Rhianna goes with you to the hotel for a token appearance at the pre-dinner drinks, which will thrill the Castle Pride fans, and then I’ll whisk her away before the management start counting heads. Agreed?’
‘I suppose so.’ It was Carrie who spoke, her tone reluctant. She walked over to Rhianna and slid an arm through hers. ‘Although it’s the last thing I’d planned—to have two of my favourite people missing.’ She frowned fiercely. ‘But it’s a solution to a problem that should never have arisen, and I shall tell Simon so.’
‘Well, don’t be too fierce.’ Diaz smiled at her. ‘Or he might change his mind and not turn up on Saturday.’
She relaxed, grinning back at him. ‘Never in this world,’ she said.
While Rhianna, her own face expressionless, drank some lemonade and felt it turn to pure acid in her throat.
CHAPTER FOUR
THE dinner that followed was not the easiest Rhianna had ever sat through, although the watercress soup, the ducklings with kumquats, and the crème brûlée which rounded off the meal were all flawless.
At another time she’d have been irritated by Moira Seymour’s faintly fretful monologue about the wedding, and the problems arising from it, all attributable to Margaret Rawlins, a subject from which she refused to be diverted despite her husband and daughter’s best efforts.
But Rhianna was simply thankful not to be required either to contribute or even to listen.
On the other hand, she realised tautly, an absorbing conversation on some neutral topic might have proved a distraction from the presence of Diaz, equally silent, on the other side of the table.
When coffee had been drunk he excused himself, pausing briefly beside Rhianna’s chair on his way to the door. His brief smile did not reach his eyes. ‘Until tomorrow evening, then. At the hotel.’
She made herself look back at him. ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘Of course. Until then.’
And only she was aware that the hand replacing her cup on its saucer was not entirely steady.
‘You didn’t eat much at dinner,’ Carrie commented critically, as the pair of them walked on the headland later, enjoying the cool, moonlit stillness. ‘But be warned—you’re not allowed to be ill—not just before my big day.’
‘I think I’m just a little tense,’ Rhianna admitted, trying to inject some lightness into her tone. ‘Thinking more about tomorrow night’s meal instead.’
‘It’ll be fine,’ Carrie consoled her. ‘In fact, though I hate to admit it, you’ll probably be far better off elsewhere.’ She grimaced. ‘This family dinner promises to be tricky in the extreme, accompanied by a strong whiff of burning martyrs. And after all,’ she added, ‘it’s not the first time Diaz has taken you out to dinner à deux.’
Rhianna stared at her, her throat tightening. ‘What do you mean?’
‘Your birthday treat,’ Carrie prompted. ‘You can’t have forgotten the high note of your early teens? I’ve never been so jealous in my life.’
‘No,’ Rhianna said quietly after a pause. ‘I—hadn’t forgotten.’ She looked up at the sky. ‘I might walk down to the cove before I turn in. I love seeing the moon on the water. Want to come?’
‘Not in these heels,’ Carrie demurred. ‘And you take care, too,’ she added severely. ‘I’m not having you hobbling into church with a broken ankle either.’
‘All right, Granny,’ Rhianna said meekly, and dodged, laughing.
A broken ankle would heal, she thought as she made her way down the track. But what do you do about a breaking heart? And how do you prevent the ache of all the lonely years ahead of you?
Shoes in hand, she walked down the beach until she reached a particular flat rock, and sat down, looking at the sea, smooth as glass in the moonlight.
Nothing to be seen this time. No movement in the water. No dark head, sleek and glossy as a seal’s, breaking its surface in the glitter of the late afternoon sun of that long-ago day.
Although she’d been too immersed in her own unhappiness to notice anything around her. Or not immediately, anyway.
Her thirteenth birthday, she’d been thinking with desolation. And no one had remembered. She’d received no presents. Not even a card. And Aunt Kezia hadn’t even wished her Many happy returns of the day. While Carrie, who would at least have sung ‘Happy Birthday’, was away on a school field trip.
She’d waited in vain all day for something—anything. A token recognition of this milestone in her young life. Disappointment and hurt had built up inside her as she’d remembered past birthdays.
Her mother had always made them special, she thought. Magical. Parties for her schoolfriends, including more recently a theatre matinee, and a hilarious trip to an ice rink. Always a cake with candles, and the warmth of arms round her. The knowledge that she was loved and treasured.
She’d tried hard to be brave, telling herself it didn’t matter that the day had been ignored this time. That next year it would be different. Knowing that it probably wouldn’t.
Until eventually she’d escaped down to the cove, the place where she’d been happiest since she arrived at Penvarnon, and once there, sitting on her favourite rock, had found her eyes blurring as she was suddenly tipped over some edge into a morass of loneliness and pain, where tears were the only relief.
And once she’d started to cry it had been impossible to stop, and she’d lain, hunched and shaking with her sobs, on the hard, flat surface.
She’d been pushing herself upright again, hiccupping a little as she tried to drag a strand of drenched hair away from her face, when she saw him.
Saw Diaz Penvarnon emerging from the sea, completely nude, the salt drops glistening on his body as he strode through the shallows to the beach, as unaware of her presence as she’d been of his. Until then.
The sound she had made, however, a small choking cry of shock and embarrassment, had brought his head round sharply, and he’d stared at her, brows snapping together.
He’d said, with a kind of resignation, ‘Oh, God,’ then walked to the folded towel waiting on a patch of shingle, winding it swiftly round his lower body.
Then he’d walked across to her, grim-faced. ‘Rhianna Carlow,’ he said. ‘What the hell are you doing here?’
‘I wanted to be by myself,’ she said huskily. Her eyes were gummed with weeping, and her face was hot with mortification as she pressed her hands to her cheeks. ‘I thought all your visitors had gone and you’d left as well.’
‘Didn’t you see there was someone swimming and figure they might like some privacy too?’ he asked harshly, then paused, his attention arrested as he
saw her distress. He went on more gently. ‘Come on, it’s not that bad, surely? You must have seen a man without his clothes before?’
She hadn’t, as it happened, but she didn’t say so.
‘It—it’s not that.’ She swallowed another sob.
‘Then what’s wrong?’ He was frowning again, but as if he were puzzled rather than angry. ‘There must be something.’ He sat down beside her, his hand cool and damp on her shoulder through the thin tee shirt. ‘Don’t cry any more. Tell me.’
She bent her head, her voice catching on the words. ‘It’s my birthday—I’m thirteen—and no one remembered…’
He said, almost blankly, ‘Dear God.’ Then he was silent for so long that she glanced at him, wondering, and saw the tanned face hard and set as he stared at the sea.
She felt nervous again, and moved restively, dislodging his hand. She said haltingly, ‘I’m sorry. I’m stopping you getting dressed. I—I’ll go. My aunt will be looking for me.’
‘Doubtful,’ he said. ‘In the extreme. But don’t run away. I’ve got an idea that might improve matters.’ He added drily, ‘And my clothes are in The Cabin, so you don’t have to worry. I won’t be blighting your adolescence a second time.’ He sent her a brief, taut smile. ‘So, wait here until I’m decent again, and we’ll walk back to the house together.’
She had a belated but pretty fair idea of what she must look like, and was tempted to ignore his instructions and bolt while he was in The Cabin getting dressed. But something told her that he, at least, was trying to be kind, so it was only good manners to wait and hear what he had to say.
She did what she could, scrubbing fiercely at her face with her sodden hanky, and combing her hair with her fingers.
When he came out of The Cabin, she joined him, eyes down, and they walked up the track side by side.
He took her straight round to the stable block, where Miss Trewint was cleaning the paintwork on their front entrance.
She checked, her lips thinning. ‘Rhianna, where have you been? I hope and pray you haven’t been making a nuisance of yourself again.’
‘On the contrary,’ Diaz said. ‘I found her in the cove, like a sea urchin on a rock, and she’s been excellent company. So much so that, with your permission, I’d like to take her out to dinner to celebrate her birthday.’
He paused, and the older woman gazed at him open-mouthed, her face warming with undisguised annoyance.
‘Unless you have something else planned, of course,’ he added smoothly. ‘No? I thought not.’ He turned to Rhianna, who was also staring at him, dumbfounded and totally lost for words, but with an odd little tendril of disbelieving joy unfurling inside her too.
‘Wash your face, sea urchin,’ he directed. ‘And I’ll be back around six-thirty to collect you.’
Kezia Trewint found her voice. ‘Mr Penvarnon, this is nonsense. There’s absolutely no need for you to go to all this trouble…’
‘Now, there we disagree.’ His smile held charm, but it was also inexorable, and Rhianna felt a faint shiver between her shoulder-blades. ‘So—six-thirty. Don’t be late.’ And he was gone.
Alone in the moonlight, Rhianna let herself remember…
Aunt Kezia, of course, had not bothered to disguise her anger and bitterness at this turn of events.
‘Barely out of childhood, and already throwing yourself at a man.’ She chewed at the words and spat them out. ‘And a Penvarnon man at that. The shame of it. And he must have taken leave of his senses.’
‘I didn’t throw myself,’ Rhianna protested. ‘He felt sorry for me and was kind. That’s all.’
‘Because you told him the suffering orphan tale, I suppose? All big eyes and no bread in the house.’ Miss Trewint scrubbed at the paintwork as if determined to reach the bare wood beneath it. ‘And what will Mrs Seymour have to say when she hears? We’ll be lucky to keep our place here.’
Rhianna stared at her. ‘Mr Penvarnon wouldn’t let us be sent away—not for something he’d done,’ she protested.
“So you think you know him that well, do you?’ Miss Trewint gave a harsh laugh. ‘Well—like mother, like daughter. I should have known.’ She paused. ‘You’d better get ready, if you’re going. You can’t keep him waiting.’
Rhianna went up to the flat. Whatever Aunt Kezia said, she thought rebelliously, she wasn’t going to allow it to spoil the evening ahead—the prospect of being taken out to dinner as if she was grown-up.
But she couldn’t entirely dismiss the older woman’s unpleasant remarks, especially when she recalled Carrie’s reluctant confidences.
She knew in her heart that Grace Carlow had been a good and loving person, and that she couldn’t have—wouldn’t have—done anything wrong. All the same there was a mystery there, and one day she would get to the bottom of it and clear her mother’s name.
But common sense told her that she must wait until she was older for her questions to be taken seriously.
She had a quick bath and washed her hair, being careful not to use too much hot water, while she mused on what to wear.
She would have given anything to have a cupboard full of the kind of clothes her classmates wore outside school, at the weekends and at holiday times, she thought wistfully, but her aunt considered serviceable shorts and tee shirts, with a pair of jeans for cooler days, an adequate wardrobe for her. And she couldn’t even contemplate what Kezia Trewint would have said about the make-up and jewellery the other girls took for granted.
Which only left her school uniform dresses, still relatively new, full-skirted and square necked in pale blue.
Sighing, she put one of them on, slipped her feet into her black regulation shoes, brushed her cloud of hair into relative submission and went downstairs to wait for him.
He was a few minutes late, and for a stricken moment she wondered if he’d had second thoughts. Then he came striding across the stable yard with a set look to his mouth which suggested that Moira Seymour might indeed have had something to say about his plan.
But his face relaxed when he saw her, and he said, ‘You’re looking good, Miss Carlow. Shall we go?’
His car was wonderful, low, sleek and clearly powerful, but he kept its power strictly harnessed as he negotiated the narrow high-hedged lanes leading out of Polkernick with a sure touch.
It wasn’t a long journey—just a few miles down the coast to another village built on a steep hill overlooking a harbour. The restaurant was right on the quay, occupying the upper storey of a large wooden building like a boathouse, and reached by an outside staircase.
Inside, it was equally unpretentious, with plain wooden tables and chairs, and the menu and wine list chalked up on blackboards.
There were quite a few people eating already, but a table for two had been reserved by the window with a view of the harbour, and a girl in tee shirt and jeans came to light the little lamp in its glass shade which stood in middle of the table, and take their order for drinks.
A combination of excitement and her crying jag had made Rhianna thirsty, and she asked shyly for water.
‘Bring a jug for both of us, please, Bethan. Ice, but no lemon,’ Diaz directed. ‘And just a half-bottle of the Chablis I had last time.’
He smiled at Rhianna. ‘It’s a seafood place,’ he said. ‘I suppose I should have asked if you like fish.’
‘I like everything,’ she said simply, adding, ‘Except tripe.’
‘That’s not a taste I’ve acquired either.’ He paused. ‘Ever had lobster?’
Mutely, she shook her head.
‘Then that’s what we’ll have,’ he said.
And so they did—plain and grilled, with a tossed green salad, a bowl of tiny sauté potatoes, and a platter of fresh, crusty bread. It was preceded by a delicate shrimp mousse, and when the wine came Diaz poured a very small amount into another glass and handed it to her.
‘To Rhianna,’ he said, raising his own glass. ‘On her birthday.’
She sipped the wine carefully, an
d thought it was like tasting sunshine and flowers.
Her pudding was a raspberry tartlet with clotted cream, carried ceremoniously to the table by a stout man with a large apron over his blue check trousers who, Diaz told her, was the owner and chef, Morris Trencro. In the middle was a tiny ornamental holder, with a lighted candle for her to make a wish, then blow out.
‘No room for the proper thirteen, maiden,’ Mr Trencro said. ‘But reckon you won’t mind that.’
What was more, he began singing ‘Happy Birthday,’ in a strong baritone, and at his signal the rest of the customers joined in, turning to smile at this young red-haired girl whose eyes were shining more brightly than any candle flame.
And then they’d driven home, as decorously as they’d come.
There had been a moon that night too, thought Rhianna, and Diaz had put quiet, beautiful music—Debussy, she thought—on the CD player. And what with that, all the gorgeous food and that little drop of wine, she’d had to fight to stay awake, because she didn’t want to miss a single moment of her heavenly evening.
Of course, there had been repercussions later, she recalled wryly. Not from Aunt Kezia, oddly enough, although that was probably due to the brief, private interview Diaz had had with her in the sitting room after he’d brought her home.
But Moira Seymour had seemed to develop another layer of ice whenever she saw her.
And worst of all, she thought, was when she’d returned to school in September and found herself the object of unwanted and unwarranted attention from some of the older girls.
‘My sister Bethan saw you at the Boathouse in Garzion with Diaz Penvarnon,’ Lynn Dellow had announced, looking Rhianna up and down. ‘She says he was making a big fuss about your birthday, and pouring wine down you. She says you were wearing your yucky school dress and looked a proper sight.’ She giggled. ‘I thought Mr Penvarnon liked ladies his own age, not little schoolgirls.’
‘That’s a disgusting thing to say,’ Rhianna told her hotly. ‘It wasn’t like that. I—I didn’t have many birthday presents, and so he gave me a treat, that’s all.’
