Reform of the Rake

by Catherine George

  ‘Emily can’t wait! And I’m quite looking forward to seeing you myself,’ added Sarah affectionately. ‘Buy a new dress. You deserve it.’

  Lowri was visited with a strong feeling of déjà vu as she went down the curving staircase in St John’s Wood to join one of the Clares’ celebrated parties. She paused halfway down, suffering a sudden attack of stage-fright at the sound of laughter and music from the drawing-room, and gave herself a stern lecture. Her only problem was lack of practice these days when it came to socialising. Since Rhosyn’s advent she’d had no time or opportunity for it. Tonight would do her good. Besides, she reminded herself, she’d already met several of the guests invited tonight. And the new dress she’d bought for half-price in the expensive shop just up the street from Little Darlings looked good on her, she knew. But a flattering dress and the glittering crystal earrings Holly had given her for Christmas were neither of them remedies for the butterflies fluttering beneath her green velvet midriff.

  Then a familiar figure crossed the hall and looked up and Tom Harvey let out a crow of delight.

  ‘Lowri! What a sight to gladden these old eyes. Let me ply you with strong drink and tell you how gorgeous you look.’

  Suddenly Lowri was brimming with party spirit, and went running down to let Tom sweep her into the drawing-room into the crush of people gathered there to celebrate the new year. There were exclamations of pleasure from people she’d known before her flight from London, and a welcome from others meeting her for the first time. Now that her hair had grown and her rigorous diet and exercise routine had pared down her figure Lowri’s likeness to Sarah was much more marked, and commented on by several people who mistook her for another sister. Rupert seized her hand to introduce her to a tall, lanky young man with a laughing intelligent face, and told him to take care of his little cousin.

  ‘Lowri here did the donkey work for The Atonement,’ said Rupert grinning. ‘So be careful how you tread. She’s a tigress in defence of my matchless prose.’

  ‘I’m directing the adaptation for television,’ the man told Lowri, as Rupert went off to welcome new arrivals. ‘My name’s Jack Benedict. Why haven’t I met you before?’

  ‘Because I don’t live in London, I suppose.’

  Jack led her to a secluded corner and began firing a barrage of questions at her, as to what she did and where she did it, whether she was spoken for and if not could he see her again as soon as possible.

  Lowri, laughing, made her answers deliberately vague and settled down to indulge in the type of flirtation she’d forgotten she enjoyed so much. It was fun to talk lighthearted nonsense with a man not only expert in the art, but flatteringly determined to keep her to himself.

  But after a while Lowri excused herself.

  ‘Where are you going?’ said Jack in alarm. ‘It’s not midnight yet, so don’t vanish on me like Cinderella.’

  ‘I’m just going upstairs to check on my daughter,’ she assured him, and grinned at the crestfallen look on his face.

  ‘So you are married,’ he said, sighing theatrically.

  ‘No, I’m not.’ She handed him her glass. ‘Hold on to that for me. I shan’t be long.’

  Lowri ran up the stairs and went along the upper hall to the guest-room she was sharing with her daughter. She opened the door very quietly, then stared, transfixed. Adam Hawkridge, looking spectacular in formal black and white, was gazing down at his sleeping daughter, with a look on his face which flipped Lowri’s heart over under the dark green velvet. He turned silently as he sensed her presence, and the thick dark brows drew together in a scowl as he seized her arm in a bruising grip and hustled her from the room.

  ‘What the hell do you mean by leaving Rhosyn up here on her own?’ he whispered furiously. ‘I saw you downstairs with some man, enjoying yourself far too much to give a thought to our daughter!’

  Lowri shook off his hand, incensed. ‘There’s an intercom on the table alongside the cot. The other half’s in the next room with Dominic, who’d be down to me in a second if she woke. Besides, it’s only half an hour since I left her to go downstairs. Not,’ she added, shaking with rage, ‘that it’s any business of yours!’

  ‘The hell it isn’t!’ Adam seized her by the elbows and shook her until her earrings tinkled together like windchimes. ‘She’s mine, too, remember.’

  ‘Do you think I ever forget?’ she spat, and at once his hands fell away and the fury drained from his face.

  ‘So you’re going to make me pay for the rest of my life,’ he said dully.

  Her eyes flashed. ‘Certainly not. I don’t want any payment from you. Ever.’

  They stared at each other in silence, then Dominic shot out of his room and came to a full stop, his eyes lighting up at the sight of the tall, tense man.

  ‘Adam—hi!’ he said, ‘Mum was afraid you wouldn’t come.’

  Adam’s eyes softened as he shook Dominic’s hand, then cuffed him playfully. ‘What’s your mother feeding you on? You’re shooting up like a beanstalk.’

  Dominic grinned, then frowned anxiously. ‘I came out to see Rosie. She was making a bit of a noise over the intercom.’

  Lowri thanked him affectionately and hurried back into the bedroom to investigate, then smiled as she heard the noise worrying Dominic. Her daughter was snoring.

  The tall young teenager put a hand to his mouth to stifle his laughter as he peered over Lowri’s shoulder. He turned to Adam, made a thumbs-up sign and went out, leaving the others to follow him more slowly. Outside on the landing Adam rubbed a hand over his face wearily, then looked at Lowri.

  ‘I’m sorry. I over-reacted. Rhosyn’s adventure seems to have knocked my equilibrium endwise.’

  ‘I never neglect her,’ said Lowri flatly.

  ‘I know.’ His mouth twisted. ‘I was just being bloodyminded. I saw you with that guy downstairs when I arrived and I was jealous, so I lashed out in the way I knew would hurt most.’

  Lowri’s eyes widened. ‘You were jealous?’

  ‘Is it surprising?’ His eyes moved over her slowly. ‘You look so beautiful, Lowri. So poised and self-contained; I hardly recognise the girl who blushed at me over the sexy underwear.’

  Lowri eyed the stairs pointedly. ‘We should go down.’

  ‘In a minute.’ Adam caught her hand in his. ‘Before I go tonight, Lowri, I want some kind of concession about Rhosyn. Make any reasonable rules you want and I’ll stick to them religiously, I swear. But don’t let her grow up thinking her father doesn’t care for her.’

  ‘No,’ she said, detaching her hand. ‘I won’t do that. I’ll work something out, I promise. Now we really must go down. I promised Sarah I’d help with supper.’

  The next couple of hours went by in a blur, as Lowri laughed and flirted with Tom Harvey and the patiently waiting Jack Benedict, happy to talk about Rhosyn to Carey Savage, who was insistent she take her baby to see her before she left London. At supper Lowri helped Sarah make sure no guest lacked anything in the way of food and drink, an arrangement which allowed her a little private conversation with her cousin.

  ‘You didn’t say Adam was coming,’ she accused in an undertone.

  ‘Rupert said you’d be mad, but I think it’s a good idea,’ said Sarah unrepentantly. ‘Time to bury the hatchet.’

  ‘Where exactly shall I bury it?’ hissed Lowri, and turned with a smile to offer strawberry feuilleté to Jack.

  Adam spent most of the evening talking to Rupert with Patrick Savage, but every time Lowri looked up she found his eyes on her, and looked away, hoping he’d leave early so she could enjoy herself properly. Which, she told herself bitterly, was a whopping great lie. If Adam left the party would be well and truly over for her.

  Just before twelve Sarah brought in a transistor radio while Rupert and Lowri handed out glasses of champagne to everyone as they gathered together for the countdown to midnight. When Lowri handed Adam his glass he seized her wrist and kept her close by his side as everyone chanted the last seconds
until Big Ben struck the hour to usher in the new year. Adam thrust his glass to Lowri’s lips, and she drank involuntarily, then he put the glass to his own lips and drained it and took her in his arms and kissed her.

  ‘Happy New Year, Lowri,’ he said huskily.

  ‘Happy New Year, Adam,’ she answered mechanically, her eyes locked with his, and ignoring the mêlée of jostling, kissing people about them he set down the glass and took her in his arms again, this time kissing her at such length that only applause and catcalls from an audience of laughing people brought them both back to earth.

  Lowri, scarlet-faced, was seized by Rupert, then by Sarah, with much kissing and laughter, then Sarah nodded significantly at Adam.

  ‘Go on. I’ve got my instructions.’

  Lowri had a quick glimpse of Jack Benedict’s rueful face as Adam rushed her through the hall, and then the kitchen, and out through the back door he slammed shut behind them before racing with her across the frost-crisp grass to the coachhouse, deaf to her protests.

  ‘What do you think you’re doing?’ she gasped, stumbling in unaccustomed high heels.

  ‘What I should have done a long time ago,’ said Adam tersely, and dragged her unceremoniously up the familiar iron stairs to the flat and unlocked the door.

  ‘But Rhosyn—’

  ‘Dominic will tell Sarah if she wakes.’ Adam switched on a lamp, and shut the door, jerking his head at the telephone on the desk. ‘One ring from that and we can be back in the house in seconds. But for the moment —’ He let out his breath slowly and released her hand. ‘But for the moment I need to speak to you in peace, without any amorous editors and TV directors butting in.’

  Lowri’s heart began to slow down again. ‘You’ve spoken to me several times lately,’ she pointed out prosaically. ‘What’s so special about tonight?’

  ‘Our previous encounters were too emotive to allow for practical discussion,’ he said quietly. ‘And my phone calls to enquire after Rhosyn the last couple of days were hardly productive. Your telephone manner is straight out of the deep freeze, Lowri.’

  She shrugged. ‘You could at least have told me you were coming here tonight.’

  ‘I was pretty sure you wouldn’t turn up if I did.’

  ‘If I’d had any idea you intended that—that exhibition in there just now I’d have stayed at home!’ she snapped, and folded her arms.

  ‘I didn’t intend anything,’ he cut back. ‘It just happened!’ He sighed impatiently. ‘Look, Lowri, I want ten minutes of your time. Then you’re free. To get back to the party, or whatever else you want.’

  Lowri sat down on the sofa. ‘All right. Get it over with, then.’

  Adam loomed over her, frowning. ‘Why are you so hostile, for God’s sake? After what happened to Rhosyn, and Christmas and so on, I thought you were softening towards me.’

  ‘I was,’ she retorted, ‘until I found you with Rhosyn tonight, at which point your accusations sent my good intentions up in flames!’

  ‘I’ve apologised for that,’ he said stiffly.

  ‘True. So what is it that’s so important you have to drag me from the party to say it?’

  Adam let himself down beside her warily, as if he expected her to jump up and run at any moment. ‘First of all, there’s something my mother thinks I should have told you from the first.’

  Lowri’s eyes narrowed. ‘Go on.’

  ‘During our brief but unforgettable relationship,’ said Adam tonelessly, ‘you may remember I was up to my ears in taking over the company from my father. And an unkind fate made you choose the worst possible day to explode your little bombshell in my ear. I’d just learned that my father had only a short time to live.’

  Lowri gazed at him in horror. ‘You didn’t know before?’

  Adam shook his head. ‘No one did, except my mother. And she firmly refused to let it spoil what time they had left. Their long, lazy cruise together, Dad told me at the end, was the best preparation for heaven a man could ever wish for.’

  There was silence for a moment, then he cleared his throat and went on.

  ‘He also told me that marriage to the right woman was exactly what I needed. But by then, of course, it was too late. My one hope of that vanished the day you disappeared from my life.’

  ‘Oh, come on,’ said Lowri scornfully, ‘If that’s the case why were you so perfectly bloody to me when I told you I was pregnant?’

  ‘At that particular moment in time it was the straw that broke the camel’s back. I was dog-tired from overwork, and Dad had just let me in on a tragic secret I had to keep to myself. I was off my head with grief when you arrived that night.’ Adam took her hand in a painful grip. ‘I’m not proud of it, dammit, but when you told me you were pregnant I flipped. And by the time I realised what I’d done and tried to redeem myself with a proposal it was too late. You’d retreated into your little shell and I couldn’t do a blind thing about it.’

  ‘But you grew colder and more remote by the minute right up to the date we’d set for the wedding,’ cried Lowri, twisting round to face him. ‘Why?’

  Adam stared blankly. ‘What are you talking about? You were the cold, remote one, Lowri. You made me feel so bloody guilty I was afraid to touch you!’

  She eyed him dubiously. ‘Are you telling me the truth?’

  His mouth twisted. ‘Yes, Lowri, I am. And while we’re on the subject there’s another little detail my mother bawled me out for keeping to myself, too.’

  Lowri thawed a little. ‘What was that?’

  Adam shrugged. ‘From your point of view it might be a total irrelevance. But you may as well hear it all. When I finally realised my bride wasn’t going to turn up that day something hit me right between the eyes. Not having come up against it before, it had never occurred to me—until that moment—why you were so different from the other girls I’d known.’

  ‘You made no secret of the fact that my girlish enthusiasm for your bed appealed to you most,’ she said tartly, trying to release her hand.

  Adam’s grip tightened. ‘It was part of it,’ he agreed. ‘But the difference between you and all the rest was the simple fact that I loved you.’

  Lowri stared at him in utter disbelief. ‘Would you mind saying that again?’

  ‘Certainly.’ Adam’s-colour heightened slightly. ‘I’ll say it as many times as you like now I’ve started. I discovered I loved you, Lowri, and I still love you, and just to put the icing on the cake I’m pretty sure, heaven help me, that I always will love you.’ He let go of her hand. ‘Right. That’s all I had to say. Now you can go back to the party.’

  She shook her head thoughtfully. ‘I don’t think I will, thanks just the same.’

  He moved nearer. ‘Why?’ he demanded. ‘Is a slight change of heart possible on your part now I’ve come clean at last?’

  She shook her head. ‘No.’

  His face darkened. ‘None whatsoever?’

  She smiled a little. ‘Adam, I fell in love with you the moment I first saw you. I battled against it but it wasn’t any use—no—-’ She warded him off. ‘It’s because I loved you so desperately that your reaction to my news hurt so badly.’

  ‘And you stopped loving me from that moment on,’ he said heavily, his colour receding. ‘Which is why you left me waiting that day.’

  ‘No. You’re wrong,’ she said matter-of-factly. ‘I loved you so much, in fact, that I couldn’t face the thought of marrying someone who was only doing it because he felt obliged to.’

  ‘It was never like that,’ said Adam morosely, looking away. ‘I admit I suggested marriage as the only possible solution to our little problem. But I only discovered the real reason for my proposal when it dawned on me you weren’t going to turn up. That day or any other.’ He breathed in deeply. ‘If revenge was your object, Lowri, you got it in spades. I hope it was sweet.’

  ‘No, it wasn’t,’ said Lowri swiftly. ‘It was you I wanted, not revenge. I never stopped wanting you or loving you, either, no matte
r how hard I tried. When I had Rhosyn it was you I wanted with me, not Sarah or Rhia or even Dad. Just you. That’s why there’s no change of heart, Adam. I’ve never stopped loving you—’

  Adam seized her in his arms. ‘Is that the truth?’ His eyes glowed with a light so brilliant that Lowri’s closed, dazzled. She nodded dumbly, and he bent his mouth to hers in an oddly passionless kiss.

  But after a while the kiss changed, Adam’s mouth asking questions which hers answered with fervour, and suddenly her fingers were undoing his bow tie and his were busy with her zip, then the phone rang.

  ‘Sorry to interrupt,’ said Sarah. ‘But there’s a young lady over here who needs her parents.’

  ‘Is she crying?’ demanded Lowri breathlessly, her face scarlet.

  ‘No. She seems to want to play. And while I’d be happy to oblige I still have guests—’

  ‘We’ll be there right now!’ Lowri put down the phone and grinned at Adam. ‘Our daughter demands our presence.’

  Adam caught her close and crushed the life out of her with his hug. ‘I never thought I’d hear you say “our”. Let’s go.’ He smiled ruefully as he smoothed back her hair. ‘A pity she couldn’t have waited just a little longer.’

  Lowri chuckled as they clattered down the iron steps. ‘Welcome to fatherhood, Adam Hawkridge. Are you sure it’s what you want?’

  ‘Positive,’ he panted as they raced across the lawn. ‘And I’m not really sorry we were interrupted. When I get you in my bed at last I want you there all night.’

  ‘You’ll be lucky,’ whispered Lowri, as they stole up the stairs. ‘Rhosyn wakes up sometimes, remember.’

  Adam stopped just outside the guest-room door. ‘In which case we take turns—no more single blessedness for you, Lowri Morgan. Soon,’ he added sternly, ‘to be Hawkridge, I’d remind you.’

  ‘We’ve got a lot of sorting out to do before then—’

  ‘Then come and do it in here with your daughter,’ said Sarah, hurrying from the room. She grinned at them both and hurried off. ‘Blessings, my children,’ she said over her shoulder. ‘Come and have some more champagne when Rosie’s settled.’