“Sandy didn’t. Our father was very charming when he wanted to be. Usually when he wanted something. To women, he was a delight. Until he was done with them, I suppose. But he was hard on Sandy, and he left him nothing but trouble. But I’m not telling you this as gossip or a history lesson. I’m telling you because I think you might like to hear it. Sandy isn’t like our father, no matter what anyone says. He’s loyal and just and puts his family and his land above everything else.
“Do you know the meaning of the name Alexander? It means defender or helper of man. I know his manner can be cold. Superior, even. And I know he can seem like such a superior snob. But he isn’t. He’s a good man.”
“I know.” My voice is small. He’s a good man who can’t seem to help himself. I don’t mean it as a slight. It’s more an observation. An affinity, maybe.
“I did tell him to stay away from you and now I’m beginning to wish I hadn’t. Griffin is—”
“Please.” I shake my head, unwilling to get into this.
“You’re a good person, Holland. You deserve better.”
“How come there’s no portrait of him? Of Alexander?” I ask, trying to change the subject.
“There is.” I begin to follow her across the room, realising what we’re heading towards.
“This is us,” she says, pointing at the portrait Chrissy had shown me my first day here.
I find myself smiling up at the boy in long pants and the girl in the blue dress.
“You know, when Chrissy told me about ‘Lady Isla’s wee boys’ I thought you were married to the duke.”
“The Dalforth’s aren’t that bad,” she says with a laugh.
“What about the later duchess?” Like a scab I can’t help but pick, I find myself glancing around the room, wondering where her portrait is.
“We don’t have one. Just this.” Her shoes echo as she walks to the far end of the room as I hesitate, wondering if I should follow. But I do. There, on a credenza, stand a dozen silver framed photographs. Some sepia. Some black and white. Some colour. Isla reaches to one at the back, lifting it before dusting the sleeve of her blouse over the front. “This is Leonie,” she says, passing it over. “I’m not even sure Sandy realises it’s still here.”
“He doesn’t like the reminder,” I assert as I stare at the image of the Duke and Duchess of Dalforth on their wedding day. He seems so young, and she resembles a fairy queen. They appear so happy. So happy I can’t look at it, so I pass it over.
“I suppose that’s one way to look at it,” she replies cryptically as she sets it back on the credenza.
I know it’s not right or even sane to be jealous of someone who isn’t living, but that pain in my chest tells me I am. Which, in a way, tells me I’m doing the right thing. I need to remember how Alexander looked on his wedding day to help strengthen my resolve. To remind me Leonie had Alexander in a way he’ll never be available to me.
Whether it was an enviable marriage or not, this little walk through the Dalforth past has been a useful reminder. And maybe he’s right. Maybe I am despicable. But sometimes you’ve got to be cruel to be kind. Especially to those you love.
38
Holly
“You brought this on your own head,” I mutter, slapping jelly viciously to a slice of bread. “If you hadn’t acted like Griffin had leprosy, he wouldn’t have known, and then you wouldn’t have had to go through this whole stupid charade.”
“You’ve not eaten your snacks already, have ye?” Chrissy asks, bundling into the family kitchen with a pile of laundered kitchen towels. “Were you talkin’ to yourself?”
“No,” I retort, slapping the bread onto the top of another before swinging around to face her. So she caught me in the pantry last week. Big whoop! Caught me and helped me fill my little tote with delicious nibbles to take to my room. And fruit. And now she thinks I might be pregnant, so she thought it might be a good idea to say that out loud?
I was so embarrassed. In fact, I think my cheeks are still burning now.
“What’s got your knickers in a knot, then?” She puts the neat pile of towels down and turns to face me, pressing her fist to one generous hip.
“Well, funny you should ask, Chrissy.” I turn back to the jelly sandwich, slice it viciously, and swing back again. “But last night at dinner, Archie saw fit to announce to the family that you think I might be pregnant.”
Hers is not the reaction I anticipated.
Basically, she laughs. She laughs like it’s the funniest thing she’s heard in weeks.
“The wee bampot,” she says, wiping a finger under her eyes. “He’d have me hangit, I’m sure!”
“He’d have you what-it?”
She makes a fist above her ear and sticks out her tongue.
“He’d get you hanged?”
“Aye, and I’d die innocent!” she says with another incredulous chuckle. “I never made any such suggestion. I only said you had the eatin’ habits of an expectant mother. Strange, like. It was, I thought, better than announcing you were trying to stay out o’ reach of himself.” She slides me a very eloquent look. One that says, I see you. I know what this is.
“Oh. Well. Sorry.”
“Not as sorry as you will be,” she mutters as she bustles past me, yanking on the dishwasher door.
“I’ll be sorry why?” I ask, following her progress, perplexed.
“Because that man is no good.” She almost throws a cup onto the top shelf, making it rattle.
“I know,” I protest, aggrieved. “Well, he’s no good for me, but I have been trying to stay away from him.”
“Not Sandy,” she says in a low hiss, the dishwasher door clunking closed. “I’m talkin’ about—”
“There she is.” My shoulders tense at the sound of Mari’s voice. I really could do without this. “I told you you were wrong about her,” she says to Chrissy. “First, she sets her sights on Cameron, then goes after himself. And now, she’s with his brother. What does that tell you about her?”
I turn very slowly in the direction of Mari. “See this outfit?” Like a cheesy game show hostess, I do a little flourish, indicating my denim cutoffs. “Giving a fuck doesn’t really go with it.”
So worth cursing just to see her face.
“Mari, you apologise,” Chrissy chastises.
“I’m only saying—”
“You’re only saying something that’s moving you this close”—I hold up my finger and thumb, the digits almost touching—“to a smack in the jaw.” Cursing and a beatdown. Guess she picked the wrong day to mess with me.
“Holly!” Chrissy censures.
“You’re just a silly girl who knows nothing about anything,” I add, incensed. “A silly girl who’s projecting, as far as I can see.” I whip around to Chrissy as I say, “I saw her in the pub with Cameron at the weekend, the same man who told me she was in the pub last Friday when she called in sick.”