Fiona Hood-Stewart – The Society Bride (страница 2)

‘They are coming to tea tomorrow with their son, Ramon, whom you may remember. He came over once or twice when he was at Eton and then Oxford.’

‘Sorry, I haven’t a clue who he is.’ She shook her tawny gold-flecked hair, highlighted by two weeks of playing tennis every day in the South of France, and jumped up. ‘I’m off to the tournament now. Do you need anything before I go? Water for your pills?’ she asked, suddenly concerned.

Her grandfather seemed to have aged much during the past weeks, and she worried about him. Not for nothing had she inherited her deceased French mother’s perception and innate capability for running Thurston Manor, their lovely country house near Windsor, and for making sure that her beloved grandfather was cosseted.

‘No, no, my child. Off you run. Just make sure to be back on time for tea tomorrow.’

‘I’ll try. But we have the semi-finals, and if I get through today I may be playing.’

Don Rodrigo smiled at her benignly. He loved her so dearly, and wished—oh, how he wished—that he could live to see her bloom into the flower he perceived emerging, watch as she travelled towards womanhood. But that was not to be, he reminded himself with an inner sigh, accepting the soft kiss on his withered old cheek. And he must make sure she was safely provided for. Not just financially—there she was only too well provided for. If anything that was half the worry. In fact what truly concerned him were the fortune-hunters that he knew would hover like anxious vultures from here to Tierra del Fuego the minute he was dead and buried.

It was four by the time the Bentley drew up on the gravel drive before the splendid country house. Ramon experienced another wave of distaste. The whole thing was utterly absurd, and left him feeling as though he were participating in a very bad B movie. Still, he’d listened to his mother’s urgings and his father’s request to at least honour the visit. And he would, he supposed, alighting from the vehicle. At least after this he might be able to bring his father and Don Rodrigo to reason.

Several minutes later they were being conducted by the dignified white-haired butler onto the lawn, where Don Rodrigo heaved himself with some difficulty out of a wicker chair.

‘Amigos,’ he said, embracing Pedro and kissing Augusta. ‘What a pleasure it is to receive you in my home.’ Then he turned towards Ramon and eyed him closely. ‘How do you do, Ramon? It is several years since we last met, but I’ve followed your may I say rather brilliant progress?’ He quirked a brow and smiled. ‘Knowing your father, I am not surprised. But impressed. Very impressed.’

‘Coming from you, that is a compliment indeed,’ Ramon murmured, shaking the other man’s hand. He sensed the slight shaking and frailty in the fingers and realised that the sharp grey eyes belied failing health. He also realised that Don Pedro would not easily be fobbed off. As he sat down next to his mother at the table, already laid for afternoon tea, he wondered just how hard it was going to be to get out of this marriage. There was no sign of Nena, he observed a sudden spark of hope flashing. Perhaps she’d been told and had refused to agree to the arrangement. She was, after all, nearly twenty.

If so, all the better.

He was quite willing to help her out, advise her financially—even be a trustee, if Don Rodrigo so wished.

The thought began to take shape. Perhaps that was the way to work the situation, he mused, his quick brain already solving the matter. If Nena didn’t agree to the marriage then he could bow out gracefully and not be blamed, and it would all work out for the best. It was, he reflected, allowing wishful thinking to take the upper hand, a mere question of initiating the correct strategy.

‘Have they arrived?’ Nena asked breathlessly as she jumped out of her new Audi TT. After throwing her tennis racket onto one of the hall chairs, she glanced at herself in the gilt mirror. ‘I look a mess. But I suppose I’d better dash out and say hello, or Grandfather will kill me,’ she exclaimed to Worthing, the butler, who was eyeing her severely as he closed the door.

‘Don Rodrigo and the guests are on the lawn, Miss Nena.’ He still called her by her childhood name.

‘Good. Well, do see that tea is served, won’t you? Oh, and Worthing? Please ask Cook to serve both China and Ceylon. I don’t know which the guests would prefer.’

‘Of course, Miss Nena,’ he replied, pursing his lips and shaking his head fondly as she flew across the hall, through the drawing room, and down the steps to the lawn, where the group was seated under the chestnut tree facing the lake.

Smoothing her hair back, she hurried across the grass. How nice for her grandfather to have some people to entertain. He saw so few nowadays. She was sure it wasn’t good for him to lead such a solitary existence, she reflected as she drew up on them from behind, but perhaps a lot of social activity might tire him.

‘Hello, I’m so sorry I’m late.’

Ramon turned.

‘Aunt Augusta, Uncle Rodrigo, it’s been ages,’ she said, kissing Ramon’s parents while he looked in frank admiration at the gorgeous, lithe young woman—at her never-ending long bronzed legs that eradicated for ever the fuzzy image he’d formed of a rather dowdy, plump adolescent. Her smile, he reflected, was dazzling, her teeth white and perfect, and her lightly tanned skin set off the beauty of her huge almond-shaped green eyes in a manner fit to leave even a seasoned womaniser like himself dazed.

And her hair…

It fell in feathery wisps from a ponytail, giving her the air of having tumbled straight out of bed, and leaving him in dire danger of an embarrassing physical reaction.

Pulling himself together, Ramon rose and shook hands, hoping none of these untoward emotions showed, and reminded himself of the true nature of their visit here.

‘Will you excuse me if I pop upstairs and change?’ she was saying to his mother in a charmingly assured manner that belied her youth. ‘I look a dreadful fright.’

He watched as she retreated swiftly across the lawn, trying to suppress the delightful image of that long, curved, slim body uncoiling amongst bedsheets, finding himself distressingly prey to a sensual twisting tug. He must not, he realised, removing his eyes from her, lose track of reality here. He caught his father’s approving eye and quickly concentrated once more on the conversation.

But if his father thought that Nena’s astonishing beauty and charm might make the marriage any more acceptable he was wrong. Instead it somehow made it worse. It was one thing to do a poor dowdy creature a favour, another to place under his protection a paragon whom, when she found her feet, would be the toast of society in every city they visited. The thought was strangely disturbing and he banished it.

‘Ramon, I hope you have thought about your father’s and my proposition,’ Don Rodrigo said, easing himself with obvious difficulty in the wicker chair, reminding Ramon of just how much was at stake here. ‘After one look at my lovely granddaughter I’m sure you are aware how impossible it would be for me to allow her to go out alone and unchaperoned into the world.’

‘Well, I don’t altogether agree, no,’ Ramon countered. ‘After all, sir, we are in the twenty-first century. A well-selected board of trustees could easily take care of her affairs. She seems a confident young woman, quite able to look after herself,’ he added.

‘Ha!’ Don Rodrigo let out a harsh exclamation. ‘Much you know about it. Oh, she’s got confidence and charm and excellent manners, of course. But she would be swept off her feet by the first fortune-hunter that walked into her life. And, believe me, they’re already lining up,’ he said darkly.

‘That I can believe,’ Pedro Villalba replied, sending his son a meaningful look from under his thick silver brows.

‘And it’s not only my little Nena I’m concerned about,’ Don Pedro continued, meeting Ramon’s eyes with a look as steady as his own. ‘It’s the future of all I’ve built up over a lifetime. I have no intention for that to go to rack and ruin, frittered away by some spendthrift. Trustees, as you mentioned earlier, are all fine and dandy, but they will not direct her sentimental life, look after her as a woman needs looking after.’

‘Excuse me for being so bold,’ Ramon said, leaning forward, ‘but does Nena have any idea of what’s going on here?’

‘Up until now I deemed it preferable to stay silent. After all, I do not want her to be unduly upset. And when she learns of my illness,’ he said stifling a sigh, ‘she will be most upset.’

‘Of course.’ Ramon looked down. ‘Don Rodrigo, although I would be more than willing to accept a role in an advisory capacity, I don’t feel that—’

‘One moment, young man. I am aware that all this has been thrust upon you in a most impromptu manner. But will you not at least take the opportunity, now that you have come all this way, of getting to know my granddaughter a little better? I am not suggesting that the two of you fall in love, or anything of that nature, merely that together you establish a well-balanced relationship. Nena has been brought up in the strictest possible manner. She would make you a good wife.