While Adam got into conversation with the kids, probably to try to put them at ease with him, Judith coaxed Hayley out of an unflattering lime-green top and into a soft raspberry pink that brought out the roses in her creamy cheeks.
‘It’s not you,’ she fibbed reassuringly. ‘But certain colours argue with the camera. We want you to look lovely, don’t we? That blood-red lipstick’s gorgeous but have you got anything softer?’
Next she chatted Nigel out of the England football shirt that rode up to exhibit the underside of his hairy paunch and into a hyacinth-blue polo shirt that covered him more respectably.
First, Adam requested shots of Nigel and Hayley washing up together in the kitchen. Hayley didn’t hide her disappointment with this idea. ‘But the kitchen needs decorating,’ she objected. ‘Why can’t we be taken in the lounge? The wallpaper’s lovely in there, and the suite’s only a year old.’
‘It’s the spirit of the feature.’ Judith turned up her palms, as if she totally agreed, but what could you do? ‘To give the reader a glow, you know, the idea that you deal with everyday life together and stay happy.’
‘I wouldn’t be happy drying up in this new shirt,’ protested Nigel.
‘You wouldn’t be happy just ’cos you’ve got hold of the tea towel,’ pointed out Hayley comfortably. Then she launched into the story of how she and Nigel started going out together at the third-year Christmas disco and had never looked at another person, ‘… not neither of us.’
Judith slotted a flash unit onto a stand while Adam got the couple laughing guiltily about how their parents had been outraged when they got engaged on Hayley’s sixteenth birthday without seeking permission. The parents had accused Hayley of being pregnant. ‘I wasn’t, but we’d had our moments,’ she giggled.
Nigel went red but added a, ‘Heh, heh.’
It was typical for the subjects to believe that the photographer would want to hear their story, although that was firmly the province of the freelance writer who’d identified the Donlyns as a case history in the first place. The feature writer must have conducted the interview, which the editor must have already decided to run or they wouldn’t have briefed a photographer.
Then Judith’s mobile phone went off with a loud rendition of a Mexican dance, distracting Nigel and Hayley just when Adam was beginning to get them relaxed and to forget they were the subjects of a photoshoot. He looked at Judith sharply, brows raised as she scrabbled for her phone. That, from Adam, was like a ferocious scowl from anyone else, and she felt herself flushing. ‘Sorry, sorry,’ she muttered as she whizzed out into the hall, embarrassed to be guilty once again of disturbing the shoot by forgetting to switch off her phone.
Having answered the call, she whizzed back. ‘It’s for you, Adam.’ Her voice was solemn but her eyes danced as she offered him the phone. ‘It’s Matthias. He says do you know your phone’s off?’
With a curse, Adam swiped the mobile from her hand. ‘It’s switched off because I’m on a shoot, Matthias! … No, obviously I haven’t forgotten about your wedding day tomorrow, son, and obviously I’ll be on time …Whatever else you have to worry about, it’s not me.’ He listened a while longer and then said, ‘Oh.’ He rolled his eyes. ‘Can that be changed? No? No point worrying, then.’ He switched Judith’s phone off and returned it to her, grumbling, without heat, ‘Flaming boy.’
Judith winked at Hayley and Nigel. ‘It’s his son’s wedding, tomorrow. Sounds like a few nerves are creeping in.’
The rest of the shoot went without incident. Adam was quiet on the drive home, twin lines engraved between his eyes and his expression troubled. After trying unsuccessfully to make him smile, Judith touched his arm. She knew that Matthias’s wedding had preoccupied him recently, but he’d been uncharacteristically short with Matthias on the phone. ‘You’re not wound up about shooting Matthias’s wedding, are you?’
He negotiated the next swarming roundabout before making a morose reply. ‘No. I’m wound up about Shelley.’ He flexed his fingers on the steering wheel and sighed.
Judith studied his profile, watching his gaze move from the windscreen to the mirrors. ‘Why?’ she asked eventually. ‘You and Shelley get on OK.’
He tutted and muttered at a driver trying to muscle into the traffic from another lane. ‘Yes. But Matthias says because you’re not my actual partner she’s seated you down the room somewhere, not with me at the top table. I’m sorry.’
‘Oh.’ She digested this. She didn’t think she’d ever actually agreed to be Adam’s plus-one at the reception when he’d asked her but she hadn’t said ‘no’ either and she’d fulfilled the same role at a couple of formal dinners he’d had to attend at Christmas. ‘Seating plans are always a pain. I expect it’s just expediency.’
He nodded as he slowed for traffic lights. ‘Maybe.’
Chapter Twenty-One
Shelley Leblond was a striking woman, tiny and glamorous. At Matthias’s wedding the next day, Judith marvelled at how Shelley carried off peach-blonde hair and clothes that were too young for her. Surely most women nudging fifty wouldn’t choose a short, tight wedding outfit in grass green and daffodil yellow? And, if they did, they wouldn’t look so damned good in it? Shelley had a big laugh and a great smile and posed on the imposing steps of Brinham Country Club between her tall, attractive sons with proprietorial pride, talking easily to Adam while his whirring camera captured the shot.
They were presently what felt like hours into the wedding photos and the beautiful bride in blush satin and her chatty bridesmaids in cornflower silk were having a break while Adam took shots without them. The end-of-February breeze seemed to come from the ice caps and their lips looked on the verge of turning as blue as the bridesmaids’ dresses. Matthias took stunningly to the stark formality of a morning suit, hair groomed, jaw shaved, trousers pressed.
Caleb, a cheerfully laid back best man, his ponytail hanging down his back, hands in pockets, looked as if he were wearing the matching outfit for a bet. Adam had elected to wear a lounge suit and looked understated but handsome in the winter sunshine that he was muttering was ‘shit for wedding photos’.
Shelley’s latest boyfriend, apparently, had made a late choice not to attend the wedding after all, which probably explained why Judith wouldn’t be seated with Adam for the wedding breakfast. Shelley had waved the question of her boyfriend’s absence away by saying she’d never be able to spare him any attention but it seemed likely they’d fallen out and Shelley didn’t fancy navigating her son’s wedding alone.
Now she called gaily, ‘Adam, you’ve got to be in some of these photos. Get the shot set up and then come and look gorgeous. I’m sure your assistant can push the button.’
Adam gave Judith an apologetic look. ‘Um …’
She grinned. ‘Go on, get the other side of the camera.’ She ‘pushed the button’ for a few shots with Matthias and Caleb, then with Matthias and bride Davina, Shelley’s hand tucked lightly through his arm throughout.
Then, as Adam moved to disengage, Shelley tugged him back. ‘Adam, we’ve got to have some together with the best man, too.’ She called to Judith. ‘Take two or three and then just of Adam and me.’
Judith let a few shots run while Shelley tossed her hair and smiled up at a rock-like Adam, unsure whether Adam looked uncomfortable at being the ‘victim’ in the photos or because it was always tricky for divorced parents at the marriage of their child.
But Adam was soon back behind the camera and in photographer mode. ‘Got an empty memory card, Jude?’
‘Yes, I’ll change it.’ She took the camera off the tripod then flipped open the back and slid the empty card in place, stowing the full one safely in a wallet in a pocket of the silver equipment case.
Adam lifted his voice as he took back the black, expensive camera. ‘Matthias and Davina, please.’ Then, to her again, ‘We’ll finish out here with the bride and groom by that towering weeping willow. I’ll need some reflectors or their skin tones will be green and
gloomy.’ Absently, he fired off three candid shots of Caleb and Matthias laughing together, Matthias’s hand at his new wife’s waist. ‘Can you manage the smaller case, Jude? Then we’ll go indoors for the cake.’
‘We’re doing the cake shots before the meal?’ Judith queried.
‘That’s the plan – so I can enjoy the reception and circulate. Not my plan,’ he added in a lowered voice, with a significant look in Shelley’s direction.
Hiding a grin at his long-suffering air, Judith filled her arms with equipment and set off awkwardly across the grass. When she reached the willow, she discovered that she was alone and turned to see that Shelley had intercepted Adam and was laughing up into his eyes. He was stooping slightly to listen to her, hand in pocket. She looked petite and feminine, which made Adam appear as if he were looming over her protectively.
Cursing the fact that, as a plus-one, she’d to dress like a wedding guest, Judith made a return journey for the large case and the tripod. Her newly purchased dress spangled with meadow flowers was pretty but suitably elegant heels were hell on the ankles when traipsing over the winter-softened lawns. And the wind cut through her. She missed her trousers and boots and especially her coat.
‘It would’ve been better if I’d worn a suit and flat shoes,’ she grumbled, when Adam finally joined her. ‘And whenever I bend over, I have to hoist up my neckline.’
The corner of his mouth twitched as he assessed the sky and then the willow. ‘Don’t hoist on my account.’
They finally escaped into the warmth of Brinham Country Club for the cake shots, then Shelley dashed up as the final flash popped, beckoning to Adam and the parents of Davina and looking pointedly at her watch, leaving Judith to pack away the camera equipment. By the time she had, in several trips, lugged everything to the car, Adam was involved in greeting guests.
If Judith had found the photos turgid, the wedding reception was worse.
The food was good and the speeches entertaining, but after that … For what seemed like hours, she watched Matthias and divine Davina in one another’s arms on the dance floor, Davina a vision in her wedding dress. The barely pink satin made her look like an angel at daybreak and Matthias, tall and handsome, his silver cravat still neatly tied, gazed at her adoringly, ignoring the other dancers and some children tearing around the dance floor in endless games of chase.
To occupy her mind as she sat alone amongst chattering groups of people she didn’t know at the tables of The Magnolia Room, the glittering pride of the country club, Judith tried to establish who was who among the family. Adam’s mother was easy enough – Judith heard both Matthias and Caleb call her Grandma, and Adam call her Mother. She was stooped and leant on a stick as if afraid she’d tip over without it. Two tall, rangy men just had to be Adam’s brothers, Terence and Guy, similar enough to him in appearance even if she hadn’t heard them also call the stooped woman Mother. A woman with improbably platinum curls seemed to be Mother’s sister.
Judith smothered a yawn and, from habit, lifted her hand to toy with Giorgio’s crucifix around her neck. Her fingertips encountering the beads she’d worn instead today set her brooding about Alexia’s letter, now tucked into the drawer of her dressing table. As Adam had teasingly pointed out, Judith was none too keen on being in the wrong and it was beginning to seem to her that the wrong was exactly where she was. Sending the crucifix back to Alexia sounded a simple fix but how could she establish that Alexia was the one who was entitled to it when Alexia refused to discuss the matter?
She wrestled with the problem until a conviction grew in her that she knew what it was she had to do. She’d have to check with Adam when it was best to take time off.
She searched him out with her gaze and caught a glimpse of him across the room between table decorations of silver and blue balloons and great displays of sea holly with tortured hazel. Shelley had commandeered him for hostly duties, which could be viewed as reasonable, Matthias being just as much his son as hers. However, Shelley was acting as if she and Adam still belonged together. Judith couldn’t be peeved as she had no claim on Adam herself, but it rankled when he’d asked Judith to stay for the reception so that he wouldn’t be Adam-no-date. She suppressed another yawn and tried not to notice Shelley not only linking Adam’s arm but leaning her head against it. Shelley was petite and pretty and the epitome of femininity. A girly girl if ever Judith had seen one.
Caleb was the only other guest Judith knew and he was part of a scuffling crowd in the corner, jacket off, shirt ballooning from his trousers as he shared in gusts of laughter and tipped pints of beer down his throat. Briefly, she considered joining the mob around him but, as she’d be roughly twice the age of anyone else in the group, immediately discarded the idea.
Judith watched Shelley tug Adam around to face her as she laughed up into his face. It was an intimate, familiar gesture … and Judith had no idea why it made her feel as if she had ants crawling beneath her skin. Not stopping to analyse the unwelcome feeling, she unhooked her jacket from around the back of her chair and wriggled into it, picked up her bag and jumped to her feet. Skirting the dance floor and threading through the press of bodies she escaped The Magnolia Room. In the privacy of the ladies’ cloakroom she was able to switch on her phone and dial a cab. A minute later she’d retrieved her coat and was ready for a discreet escape.
But outside the cloakroom she found Adam lurking. He frowned. ‘I spotted you skulking off in this direction. You’re leaving?’
She wondered whether she should feel guilty that she’d intended to melt away without telling him. ‘Yes, I’ve just rung for a car.’
He cast a hunted look towards The Magnolia Room. ‘I’ve talked to almost every guest at this bloody do except you – the one I actually want to speak to. And you’re my guest. I’m never normally guilty of such atrocious manners but I just couldn’t get away. Are you totally fed up with me?’
She grinned, but said, firmly, ‘Totally. Next time you need a date for the sake of appearances, ask Mum.’ Then, seeing his face fall, she gave his arm a pat. ‘I’m joking, don’t worry. I understand you’ve got to talk to everyone. You’re the father of the groom.’ She zipped up her coat.
Disconsolately, he fell into step with her, his sleeve brushing hers as she crossed the softly carpeted foyer to the big double doors where she’d arranged to await the taxi.
‘I feel a proper shit,’ he said morosely. ‘Every time I turned to look for you, Shelley found someone else she decided I just had to talk to. I don’t suppose you’d change your mind, and stay? One dance?’ he wheedled.
Smiling, she shook her head. ‘You don’t even like dancing.’ Adam’s intentions might be pure but Shelley was so good at taking his arm and steering him off in the name of father-of-the-groom duties that she was pretty sure she’d be on her own again within ten minutes of returning to The Magnolia Room.
Adam hunched into his jacket as the doorman opened the door and let them out into a frigid evening. ‘Matthias is about to slip off to the bridal suite with a bottle of champagne in one hand and Davina in the other. My father-of-the-groom duties must be over. Do I really have to stay here on my own?’
A car turned in between the stone gateposts and up the drive, its tyres crackling over the gravel. ‘Here’s the taxi,’ Judith pointed out unnecessarily, stepping forward to signal her whereabouts. When the car drew to a halt she opened the back door and turned to wish Adam goodnight … only to find him racing around and getting in the other side. She gasped, ‘Adam, you’re not supposed to be getting in it!’
‘No one will miss me,’ he said cheerfully as he clambered into the back seat. He grinned at her as he gave the driver her address.
‘You’re supposed to be staying the night here,’ she protested.
‘I didn’t make that booking,’ he pointed out. ‘I’ll fetch my car in the morning.’ He leaned back in the car seat, pulling off his tie with a huge sigh of relief.
Fifteen minutes later, the taxi deposited the
m outside Judith’s house in Lavender Row and drew quietly away into an evening that was fast becoming misty. ‘I’m sure you should’ve stayed,’ Judith said for about the tenth time, teeth chattering, and struggled to open her door, which seemed to swell a little more with every wet winter day that passed. She thought longingly of the hot, dusty country she used to live in where freezing, dank evenings like this were unknown.
‘For whose benefit?’ Adam asked, hands jammed in pockets because his coat was back at the country club along with his car. He turned up his collar against the damp as he fidgeted on the step below hers. ‘Matthias and his divine wife will by now be tucked away in the honeymoon suite. Caleb is in his favourite spot, the middle of a crowd, getting thoroughly and mortifyingly drunk. Neither of them needs their old man around.’
‘And Shelley?’ she couldn’t help asking, still fighting the recalcitrant door.
He paused. ‘I hope she’s enjoying the party. It’s more her kind of thing than mine.’ Then he reached over Judith’s shoulder and struck the door a swift blow from the heel of his hand. The door flew open.
Judith shuffled into the inky black hall, wishing that she was like Molly and always remembered to leave on a light when she expected to return after dark. ‘I think your presence was required for her to enjoy herself.’
He sighed, stepping in close behind her as she wiggled the door key to free it from the lock. His voice was neutral. ‘You noticed, did you?’
The key came free, making her jerk backwards. ‘Difficult not to.’
He said, ‘She tells me it’s time for us to talk about our future. See what can be salvaged now that we’ve both had time to think.’
‘Oh?’ Judith concentrated hard on not letting her heart sink. But it was selfish of her to let her mind fly to the conclusion that Adam would have no time to be her friend if he returned to being Shelley’s husband.
A Home in the Sun Page 21
