'Maybe we should leave now she's asleep?' she suggested, noting Katie's pallor, the droop of her shoulders.
She felt deeply ashamed of herself. How could she have allowed that creep to influence her to the extent of being on the point of believing he could do no wrong, and that Katie, her own dearly loved kid sister, had made the whole thing up?
'You've had a long and worrying day. And there's nothing either of us can do here now. Sleep is the best medicine Mum can get at the moment and we'll come in again in the morning.'
Tears stung her eyes. Her mother looked so small and frail hooked up to that drip. But she was going to be all right, and that was what counted.
'Did Gran make it to the hospital?' she asked as they tiptoed quietly from the room, and Katie shook her head.
'No. I don't think she felt she could face it. You know—the journey, the waiting around. David was here with me for most of the time—until Mum regained consciousness, that is. Otherwise I don't think I could have faced it, either. Not on my own. He went back when we knew Mum was going to be OK—he's got his dogs to feed and let out for a run. He kept Gran informed by phone, and she phoned you. Have you got your car?'
Caro shook her head. David Parker, her grandmother's head gardener, certainly had a happy knack of coming to the rescue, she thought approvingly, her mouth twitching when Katie went decidedly pink and offered, 'You can come back with us, then.' She looked at her watch. 'Dave said he'd come and collect me at eight. It's nearly that now. We'll wait in the car park, shall we?'
'That young man deserves a rise,' Caro said drily as they walked out of the hospital together. 'You should learn to drive, Katie.'
'I know. Dave's promised to teach me.'
'You get on well with him.'
'Very.' Katie bit her lip. 'I—I work with him in the gardens now. Old George finally retired and I suggested I took his place; I've always loved plants and flowers, you know that.'
Caro stood back for Katie to precede her through the door to the visitors' car park, her golden eyes thoughtful. Finn had mentioned something about a floral decorator's business, hadn't he? She let it go. For now.
'Don't tell me Gran pays you a wage?'
'She does so!' Katie grinned. 'She refused to think of my working in the gardens at first. Said I was just playing around. But Dave insisted, and not even Gran dares to go against him—she relies on him for much more than keeping the grounds beautiful now that the Fairchilds are getting so long in the tooth.
'So she pays me what she's graciously pleased to call "apprenticeship wages"—just means roughly half of what Old George was getting—just to let everyone know she still calls the shots! Oh, look.' She had been scanning the arrivals and now her face lit up. 'There he is!'
Dave Parker drove an elderly Volvo estate and he was just as attractive and reliable-looking as ever. And Caro breathed a silent sigh of relief as his eyes lit up when he saw Katie waiting.
At least whatever her sister obviously felt for her grandmother's gardener wasn't one-sided, a fact confirmed by events when, half an hour later, he dropped them off at the lodge.
Caro, dumping her bags in the porch and turning, waiting for Katie who had the doorkey, noted the lingering lover-like kiss with satisfaction.
'It's serious, is it?' she asked when a few minutes later the Volvo's tail-lights disappeared down the lane.
'We plan to marry in the autumn,' Katie confided. 'Gran might not like it, but she'll have to lump it. You know what she's like, the rage she'll get into when she hears a member of the exalted Fair family is actually going to marry a servant!
'Do you think one of us should go over and see if she's all right? I know she has the Fairchilds and Polly to dance attendance and bow to her every whim but you know how miffed she gets if she thinks one of us is neglecting her.'
'I'll phone through and let her know we're back from the hospital later,' Caro offered. She needed to talk to her sister. They had gravitated to the kitchen, flicking lights on as they went. Caro gave silent thanks to the absent Dave because his relationship with her sister appeared to have given her the confidence to stand up for herself for the first time in her life. She could actually talk about the possibility of displeasing her grandmother without going pale and shaking in her shoes.
However, there was something she had to know, something that might shake all that new-found confidence. 'As far as I know, Finn Helliar's still up at the big house with Gran.'
'Finn? Helliar? Why should he be here?'
Katie's face had gone scarlet. 'Something to do with those trust funds,' Caro said, and picked up the kettle. 'Tea?'
'No.' Katie sat down heavily at the kitchen table. 'There's an opened bottle of wine in the fridge. Let's have that, shall we?'
'Why not?' As Caro found glasses and poured out the chilled Spatlese she pondered on the best approach to use. Reminding her sister, now happily looking forward to marriage with David Parker, that two years ago she had tried to kill herself for love of Finn Helliar was a bit of a facer. The wine might help smooth over a few awkward moments.
She wouldn't have mentioned Finn's name but she needed to know Katie was well and truly over him, not still pining in the secret places of her heart for the man she had loved and lost. Only then could she herself begin the process of forgetting him and the strangely ambiguous relationship they had.
'How did you know he was up at the house with Gran?' Katie asked in a careful little voice. 'You don't know him, do you?'
'I've had dealings with him through the agency,' Caro answered, just as carefully. It seemed the easiest way to put it. No need to mention her bungled role as avenging angel just yet, perhaps not ever. 'So yes, I can safely say I know the guy.'
Katie put her glass down on the table and cleared her throat. 'In that case— Listen, Caro, this isn't going to be easy for me, but—' Her eyes were over-bright, her lips shaking, pressed tightly together. 'I made a huge fool of myself,' she muttered. 'I thought I was in love with him at one time. And I really did think he cared for me.'
She was describing circles on the top of the table with the tip of her index finger, her voice so low Caro had to strain to hear her reply when she asked, 'Where did you meet him? You never told me. I wouldn't have thought you moved in the same circles.'
'We don't. Didn't. It was at Gran's birthday party. Her eightieth. You couldn't make it because you came down with flu. Remember? Finn got roped in because he'd come down about Gran's investments and stuff. I got this monumental crush on him and I suspect I made a nuisance of myself. And he was kind, and I mistook it for something else and—'
'He was kind?' Caro interrupted. 'You mean he didn't actually seduce you?'
'No!' Deep colour flooded Katie's face again. 'Did I give you that impression? I must have done. To be truthful, I don't remember him ever touching me.'
Speechless, Caro stared into her sister's pink face. She still looked breathtakingly sweet, young for her years, but the wide, childish innocence of her eyes had been replaced by something more adult, stronger, tougher. She had, Caro suspected, finally grown up.
'The torn blouse,' Caro reminded her. 'Did it tear itself, or did you mistake that for something else?'
She would never have been able to talk to the pre-Dave Katie like that, not if she'd wanted to avoid floods of tears and whole days of hurt silence. It was a measure of her sister's new maturity that she was able, after searching through her memory banks, to offer, 'Grief! You thought he'd torn it off me! I got mugged. Look, I'd better start at the beginning.' She finished the wine in her glass and helped herself to some more. 'Gran's party. All those wrinklies, moaning about their ailments. Nobody talked to me. Mum was helping Mrs F and Polly with the food. I tried to help, for something to do, but I just got in the way. And Finn was there, like I said, trying not to look bored to death. I thought he was the most gorgeous thing I'd ever seen. And he actually spent time with me, talked to me, admired the floral decorations I'd done and s
aid I could, if I wanted, do it professionally. He really made me feel special, as if I had something to offer.'
Caro could understand that. He had the knack of making a girl feel very special indeed. Add to that Katie's desperately low self-esteem—deepened by Gran's continual carping—and the way she'd always seemed to inhabit a dream world of her own making, and everything began to make sense of a kind.
'He said that I had a talent and should use it, and mentioned that there were plenty of hostesses in London and the Home Counties who paid the earth for someone to provide floral decorations for their dinner parties; so, well, I went up to London a time or two and dropped by his offices and asked his advice about setting up in that kind of business on my own—'
'Were you serious about that?'
'Of course not!' Katie raked her fingers through her hair. 'Oh, I dare say I thought I was at the time. But it was just an excuse to be with him, to get his attention. And he was good at that—giving me attention. He'd take me to lunch and give me all sorts of what was probably extremely sound advice—none of which I took.
'I just wanted to talk about it because it gave me the excuse to be near him. Then came the last time we met. I arrived at his office, uninvited, needless to say, and he saw me briefly and told me he'd given me all the advice he could. I was shattered. Oh, he was very nice about it but it didn't make any difference. I was still shattered! Instead of a cosy lunch with the man I loved, with him giving me one hundred per cent of his attention, I was back on the street, on my own, and to cap it all I got mugged!'
Too cross to sit still and listen to any more of this, and frankly appalled, Caro jumped up and tugged the chintzy curtains across the window. It was getting dark outside now and the lights from the big house could be seen glimmering faintly through a belt of trees.
Finn Helliar could very well be behind one of those lit windows. She couldn't bear to be reminded of him—of the things she'd said to him, the dreadful things she'd accused him of. Of the way he'd kissed her and the way she'd responded... Of the way things might have worked out if only...
Oblivious of all that simmering rage, Katie was saying penitently, 'Naturally, I ran straight back to Finn. His secretary got him out of a meeting, and naturally—though I didn't see it that way then—he took me back to his flat and asked his secretary to buy a blouse to replace my ripped one and bring it round.'
She was twisting her hands together in her lap, her eyes embarrassed, avoiding Caro's. 'I honestly thought he'd taken me to his home rather than sort me out back at the office because I was special to him. God, I was too naive to be true! When I think back to it now I loathe myself! I wouldn't let him call the police—my handbag had been stolen but there was nothing much in it, just my fare home and bits and bobs of make-up. And then I got hysterical when he told me he'd phone Mum and get her to drive in and fetch me home.
'I really lost it then. I didn't want to be fetched anywhere—I wanted to stay there with him. And told him so, told him I loved him and hurled myself at him. He was quite probably horrified.'
'I can imagine,' Caro said through her teeth.
She loomed over her sister. She couldn't bring herself to sit down at the table with her right now. 'You didn't try to drown yourself, did you? What you said led me to believe you did and you let me go on thinking it.'
'I'm sorry,' Katie muttered miserably. 'Looking back, it all seems so stupid. That day, the day I got mugged, Finn put me in a cab and sent me home. Mum was out. I got changed and went out, walking aimlessly, and ended up at the lake, of all places. It was evening by then—dusk. Dave came out of the woods, on the track. He was walking his dogs. He called out to me—just "Hi there", you know—but I turned away quickly. I didn't want him to see I'd been crying. I lost my footing and fell in. I felt so stupid. And when you thought I'd done it deliberately, well—' she pulled in a huge, anguished breath '—it seemed more, well, romantic, and—'
'Don't say anything more,' Caro bit out. 'I'm going to bed. I might be able to bring myself to exchange a civil word with you in the morning. There again, I might not.'
The way she was feeling right now, she never wanted to have to speak to her sister again!
CHAPTER TWELVE
'So I'M not at all sure when he'll be back,' Lucy Helliar apologised as she closed the door between the suite and the vestibule, and Caro, trying not to scream with frustration, found a smile and obeyed the invitation to step right along in.
'Some unforeseen legal business cropped up in Paris—involving solicitors and the record company Fleur was with and re-issues and everything getting tied up so that any future income goes to Sophie,' Lucy explained. 'I don't understand the ins and outs of it myself, but it seemed complicated and urgent so he had to drop everything and fly over.'
The compulsion to apologise to Finn had been too strong to deny but it had taken all her courage to bring herself to actually face him. And now Lucy was telling her he was in France, had been for the last eight days.
In the main living room Sophie, with Horn sitting solemnly at her side on the apple-green carpet, was loudly 'reading' a rag book held upside down, but the baby babble turned to a crow of delight as she turned and spied Caro, holding out her arms to be picked up and cuddled.
Caro obliged, annoyed by the lump that jumped into her throat. It was over two weeks since she'd last seen Sophie and she'd missed her more than she would ever have believed possible.
'I guess you'll be relieved to hear everything went smoothly as far as Mytton Wells is concerned. Finn pulled strings and contracts were exchanged the day before he flew to Paris. You should all be comfortably settled in soon. Finn tells me the house is structurally sound as a bell—it just needs re-decorating and the few bits and pieces the previous owners left behind need moving out.'
Lucy bobbed around the room, picking up Sophie's scattered toys, tidying them away. Caro thought she looked relieved to have an adult to talk to after her solitary baby-minding stint.
'I'm not saying that this hotel isn't enormously comfortable, of course. And it's so handy for the park for Sophie's outings, and the staff couldn't be more accommodating, but it's not like a proper home of your own, is it? Now, would you like me to ring for tea, or shall we have it later when Sophie has hers? And tell me how your poor mother is. Are you sure you're happy to leave her? You mustn't feel you have to hurry back on my account.'
Caro declined the offer of tea, began to think seriously about Lucy's final remark, and sat down on one of the sofas with the baby on her knee. She reassured her hostess about her mother's condition.
'Mum's been out of hospital for a few days now and she's feeling much, much better. Her ribs are still strapped and giving her some discomfort but, as she says, that's nothing to what it could have been. And my sister's taken time off work to look after her.'
She and Katie had had several more long talks over the last couple of weeks and Caro had gradually been able to come to terms with what her sister had done, and forgiven her.
And when she'd phoned through to her partner Mary had said, 'Of course you must take time off until poor Emma's home and well on the way to recovery. Do give her my love. Does Finn Helliar want someone to replace you? Should I contact him?'
'If he does, he'll contact you. But don't hold your breath,' Caro had said drily. She would give Mary the news of her ignominious dismissal some other time. 'Why didn't you tell me he was widowed and had travelled back to England with his mother?'
'Didn't I? Goodness. I suppose it must have shot out of my head when you insisted on being interviewed for the position of nanny,' Mary had defended.
So now all that was left was the truly desperate need to put things right with Finn. He wasn't here, of course, and it might be days more before he was back in England, but if she wasn't very much mistaken Lucy was opening a door on a golden opportunity— provided she was brave enough, or devious enough, to take it.
'Well, if you're absolutely sure?'
She held her breath and felt her heart thump about in her chest and only expelled a long, slow sigh when Lucy affirmed, 'Yes. Exactly. Of course I was—and still am if it's necessary—perfectly happy to look after little Sophie until Finn can get back from France. But I don't have too much time left in Great Britain and I would like to finish that visit with my friends—but only if you're absolutely sure you are able to leave your mother and pick up your duties here again.'
Her assumptions had been right! Finn hadn't told his mother he'd sacked the nanny. She couldn't imagine why. There was a lot to Finn Helliar she didn't understand. And stuff about herself she was only just beginning to understand, like the depth of devious behaviour she was capable of and the precise extent of her bravery.
It would be easier if Lucy, dear soul that she was, was out of the way visiting her friends when she finally faced Finn with that apology, but when he discovered what she had done he would not be a happy man.
But that didn't stop her. She took a deep breath, painted on a smile, and said, 'Perfectly sure, Mrs Helliar. So why don't you contact your friends and make whatever arrangements you need to make now?'
He would not be pleased to arrive back in London and find her re-installed as Sophie's nanny. Correction, he would spit tacks! But it would give her the perfect opportunity to try to put things right. To apologise profoundly and to take her leave of him carrying second prize with her.
Not first prize, which would be to hear him say he'd been telling the truth about falling in love with her, but the second prize of his forgiveness, which was, after all, probably more than she deserved.
Caro was sure she was going into a decline, or something remarkably like one. Just three days back as Sophie's nanny and all her clothes hung loosely on her and her cheekbones stuck out like doorknobs.
Three days of wondering if she'd done the right thing, of pushing Sophie's buggy for miles and miles round Regent's Park, of long, long evenings broken only by Lucy's friendly phone call when she checked that they were OK, three days of being too hyped up to do more than pick at her food, of wondering when he'd show up and how she'd face him when he did. 'Shall we do something really exciting today?' she asked Sophie on the morning of the fourth day. 'Let's give the park a miss and have a real day out.'
The Millionaire's Baby Page 11
