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

He said casually, ‘I suppose Lainie will be finishing at the village school at the end of the summer. Have you decided where she’ll be going next? Sent for some prospectuses?’

Angela poured herself some more coffee. ‘No, I haven’t. Her recent reports haven’t been exactly thrilling, so I thought she might as well go to Hollingbury Comprehensive with the rest of her class. As I still have Jamie’s fees to cope with, it seems an ideal way to economise a little.’

Simon sat up abruptly. ‘Ma, you can’t be serious. Hollingbury Comp is a dump. Everyone knows that it barely scraped through its Ofsted inspection, and it has a drugs problem. Lainie wouldn’t have a prayer.’

‘I gather the staff are working very hard to improve things,’ Angela said repressively. ‘Besides, Laine’s hardly a high-flier, you know. If she’d tried a little harder, things might be different.’

Laine felt heat invade her face, and her mouth trembled as everyone looked at her.

After a pause, Daniel said quietly, ‘I realise I have no right to interfere in a family matter, Mrs Sinclair, but I’ve always considered Laine a very bright girl. I wonder if she could simply be bored at her present school, and in need of more of a challenge.’

His smile held apology as well as charm. ‘My godfather’s daughters both went to a place called Randalls, which has an excellent reputation.’ He added levelly, ‘And it offers full bursaries to pupils with genuine potential. I think Laine could be one of them, so fees wouldn’t be a problem.’

He paused. ‘There’s a written test as well as an interview, I believe, but I could easily get hold of some details—if that isn’t too presumptuous?’

‘Not at all.’ Angela smiled at him. ‘I’m just not sure that Laine’s up to it.’

‘Well, I think, along with Dan, that she should be given the benefit of the doubt,’ Simon said firmly.

The next time Laine saw Daniel, at the beginning of the summer holidays, she danced across the hall to him in excitement. ‘I did it—I did it. I’m going to Randalls in September.’

His brows lifted quizzically. ‘So you survived the exam?’

She considered. ‘Well, it wasn’t a real one, with sums and things. I just had to write about a favourite character from a book.’

His face relaxed into a teasing grin. ‘Now, let me guess. How about—Ben Gunn?’

She gasped. ‘How did you know that?’

‘I have a good memory,’ he said. ‘Besides, I knew it wouldn’t be the Lily Maid. Why write about a wuss?’ He paused. ‘Is your mother pleased?’

‘Yes,’ she said a little doubtfully. Angela had been more astonished than pleased, she thought, and had drawn a sharp breath when the school uniform list arrived. ‘Oh, yes.’ She gave him an uncertain look. ‘Are you pleased, too?’

‘Over the moon.’ He picked her up and swung her round. ‘It’s a good school, and you’ll have a great time.’

From the doorway, a girl’s voice said coolly, ‘Is this a private party, or can anyone join in?’

Laine saw the newcomer over Daniel’s shoulder—a tall, leggy blonde, in tiny shorts and a cut-off top that barely covered her breasts.

She looked, Laine thought with disfavour, like one of the Barbie dolls her former classmates had used to bring to school.

Daniel set Laine down without haste, and turned as the girl came wandering over, tossing back her hair, and allowing a condescending smile to play about her full lips as she studied the slight, childish figure standing in front of her.

‘You’re full of surprises, darling.’ She slid an arm through Daniel’s, pressing herself against him with possessive intimacy. ‘I’d never have figured you as the paternal type. So, who’s the baby?’

A protest rose to Laine’s lips, but she swallowed it back, concealing it behind the poker-face she’d learned to assume when trouble loomed.

Daniel said evenly, ‘She’s Simon’s little sister—as you probably knew already. So don’t waste your ammunition, Candida, my sweet, because you may well need it later. Now, why don’t you give Si a hand to get his stuff together for the vacation?’

‘Because I’m not anyone’s slave.’ She kissed him lingeringly on the cheek. ‘Even yours. And he sent me to say that, unless you help him repack the boot, there may not be room for it.’

His sideways glance was faintly caustic. ‘On the other hand, you could unload some of your own cases. That would make more space.’

‘Darling.’ Her voice grew throaty. ‘You’d hardly want me to walk round the villa naked for the next three weeks.’ She giggled. ‘Or would you?’

‘My father’s other guests might well object.’ He detached himself gently. ‘Now, behave yourself and wait in the drawing room while Laine tells her mother that we’re here.’

Her task accomplished, Laine went upstairs and found Simon in his room, hurriedly stowing clothes in a travel bag.

‘Come to help, scrap? Pass me those T-shirts, will you?’

She handed them to him. ‘Aren’t you going to be here for the holidays?’

He heard the wistful note in her voice, and his tone was kind. ‘Not this time, honey. Daniel’s father’s bought a place in Tuscany, and we’re driving down there for our last few weeks of freedom before we get trapped in the workplace.’

She was silent for a moment. ‘Is that lady with Daniel?’

‘Candy? Yes, she is. Why?’

‘I don’t think she’s very nice.’ Laine concentrated on refolding some swimming shorts.

His lips twitched. ‘Now, that,’ he said solemnly, ‘might depend on your point of view. And I’m sure Dan has no complaints.’

There was a stone lodged in her chest. ‘Is he going to marry her?’

He burst out laughing. ‘Good God, no. Our Daniel is definitely not the marrying kind. I can’t see him ever allowing a wife to cramp his style. And this holiday is all strictly casual.’

He studied her for a moment. ‘One day you’ll have boyfriends of your own, Lainie, and then you’ll understand that not all relationships need to be serious.’

He walked over to her and hugged her. ‘Congratulations on getting into Randalls, by the way. It’s just what you need, and you’ll do well there. Things are looking up for you, scrap.’

Were they? Laine wondered as she trailed along the landing. Then why did she feel that the sunlit day had suddenly become dull and full of clouds?

She decided not to go downstairs again, but sought her own bedroom instead, curling up on her favourite window seat and leaning her forehead listlessly against the glass panes.

She kept seeing the way that girl’s hand had touched Daniel’s arm, the pink-tipped fingers stroking his tanned skin. How her body had seemed to curve into his, as if they were part of each other.

There’d been sex education at her school, and she wasn’t sure what she’d hated most—her form teacher’s brisk resumé of the physical facts, or the sniggering crudities exchanged in the playground by her classmates.

Suddenly she felt unhappily that those few awkward moments in the hall had taught her far more about what happened between a man and a woman—and that it was a lesson she could have well done without.

And, although she did not realise it until much later, that revelation marked the end of her childhood.

Not the marrying kind … Nine years further on, Simon’s prophetic words seemed to resound in her brain, and she shook her head impatiently, trying to block them out.

It was time she stopped tormenting herself like this, she thought. What point was there in going back to the past, when it was the present and the future that were going to cause her the real problems?

She stood, looking around the kitchen as if she’d never seen it before.