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He turned, and she shivered under the look in his eyes, but refused to let it daunt her. Lucy was waiting for them by the door, and she glanced quickly at them.
‘Fancy a game of Scrabble?’ Luke suggested.
She looked uncertainly from Luke to Genista and guessing what she was thinking Genista said gaily, ‘I’d love it—how about you, Lucy?’
She told herself it wasn’t because of what Luke had said about putting on a loving front; it was for Lucy, who had already been hurt enough by the adults in her life, and she made a vow that for the duration of Lucy’s stay she would do everything in her power to preserve the façade of a happy marriage.
CHAPTER SEVEN
GENISTA opened her eyes slowly. She was lying on her side facing the window, sunshine pouring in through the curtains. She glanced at her watch. Half-past eight! She turned her head half fearfully, but she need not have worried—the other side of the bed, which had obviously been occupied by Luke, was now empty save for the impression of his head against the pillow and a faint rumpling of the sheet.
She had not heard him come to bed. The phone had rung just as she was on the point of going upstairs and he had disappeared into the library, much to her relief. Lucy was a sensitive and intelligent child, and she had no idea how she was going to manage to preserve the united front Luke was insisting on, in her presence. She pushed the bedclothes aside, tensing at the sudden nausea that overtook her. The meal the previous evening had been very rich, and it was no wonder she felt queasy—after all, she had eaten next to nothing over the last few days, being far too worked up to enjoy her food.
By the time she reached the bathroom the sickness had subsided, leaving her feeling faintly shaky and very relieved. Being ill was the last thing she could cope with at the moment. She sensed that Luke would have scant sympathy and look upon her ‘symptoms’ as a means of evading his instructions.
Lucy was just pouring herself a cup of coffee when Genista walked into the kitchen. Dressed in a tee-shirt and jeans, the girl looked even younger than she had done the evening before.
‘Hi! I was just about to bring you a drink. Luke said not to wake you too early, and to tell you that he had to go to the office but that he’d be back around five.’
Subsiding thankfully into a chair, Genista took the cup of coffee Lucy was proffering. At least she would have one day without Luke’s unkind taunts and control-draining presence.
‘I thought I might go riding this morning,’ Lucy informed her over breakfast. ‘There’s a stable just down the road. Fancy coming with me?’
Outside the sun shone mellowly on the immaculate gardens, and the prospect of being out of doors was very tempting.
‘I’d love to,’ Genista admitted. ‘But I’m not a very good rider—in fact I haven’t been on horseback since my teens, and I haven’t had time to explore the gardens yet.’
‘How about a compromise, then?’ Lucy suggested cheerfully. ‘Riding this morning, lunch here and then an exploration of the gardens—they stretch for quite a way, you know. As well as the formal gardens round the house, there are a couple of acres of grounds with woods, and a very pretty lake.’
Lucy voiced no curiosity that Genista should know so little of her new home, and Genista silently blessed the girl’s ready acceptance. She seemed happier this morning, and while Genista tidied away their breakfast things and wrote a note for Mrs Meadows Lucy dashed upstairs to change into riding gear. It would be perfectly all right for her to wear jeans, she had assured Genista when she expressed her doubts, and they would be able to hire hats from the stables.
It had been so long since Genista visited the country proper that she had forgotten the simple delight of walking down a country lane early in the morning. The sky was that particularly soft shade of blue only seen in June, dew still sparkling on the grassy verges of the road. Beyond the hedge crops gleamed golden in fields speckled with the silky scarlet of poppies.
‘Umm, just taste this air!’ Lucy sighed blissfully. ‘It’s like breathing freedom! I really hate school. Mother was very clever. She should have gone on to Cambridge, but she met Father instead. She keeps going on to me about having a career. She can’t seem to understand that the things that interest her don’t appeal to me.’
‘What would y
ou like to do?’ Genista asked, sympathising, but knowing how radically one’s views could change between fourteen and twenty-four. In ten years’ time Lucy might bitterly regret not being able to support herself. Genista had found that even where money was not an issue, many girls of her own generation found their careers so stimulating that they did not want to give them up. Thinking back to her own teens and the years before she met Richard, Genista could well remember viewing unmarried girls in the village in their early twenties with mixed pity and horror, and she suspected that modern teenagers were no different, although with the example of her parents’ marriage before her, Lucy was bound to be a little more mature.
The stables were in a small hollow a little over a mile from the house. They had recently changed hands, Genista learned from the cheerful girl they found in the office-cum-tack room, but she was sure that Mr Lawson would be able to fix them up with a couple of mounts, if they could wait fifteen minutes until he had finished the lesson he was giving.
With the whole day stretching lazily ahead of them, Genista was quite content to sit down and watch the stable cat basking drowsily in a sheltered corner of the yard, while Lucy and the stablegirl chattered happily together.
She hadn’t realised the intensity of the strain she had been under since her marriage, until she felt tiredness sweep over her. The fresh air probably hadn’t helped she acknowledged, stifling a yawn. Heavens, she couldn’t go to sleep here! Nevertheless that was what she was on the point of doing when a pleasant male voice roused her.
‘Sleeping Beauty, I presume,’ its owner teased. ‘What a pity you woke up. I was looking forward to rousing you in the time-honoured fashion.’
From her sitting position on the old chair she had been provided with, Genista had to look up a long way to reach the thin, tanned face and amused blue eyes of the man who had just walked into the yard. As he was dressed casually in an open-necked shirt and jeans and ancient riding boots, scuffed and worn, she had no difficulty in placing him as the owner of the stables.
He was younger than she had expected—somewhere in his late twenties, she guessed, and to judge by the way he was looking at her slender figure in her old, tight-fitting jeans, horses weren’t his only interest.
‘I’m Trevor Lawson,’ he said, introducing himself. ‘Belinda said you were interested in hiring a couple of mounts.’
‘Yes, that’s right,’ Genista agreed, scrambling to her feet, aware of the warm tinge to her skin, where his eyes had rested on it—and knowing he was aware of it too.
‘My husband’s niece was keen to ride and I said I’d come with her, although I’m no expert.’
‘Husband? So you’re married?’ Did he really sound faintly regretful, or was she merely imagining it? ‘Well, if you’d just care to follow me back into the office, to register, I’ll see what I can do. I’ve only taken over this business recently, although I’ve lived in the area for several years.’ He walked with a slight limp, which Genista hadn’t noticed at first, and as though aware of it, he patted his leg lightly and said, ‘I got this through T.T. racing—I was lucky I didn’t lose my leg. My doctor recommended that I take up riding for therapy. I enjoyed it so much that I bought this place. No one wants a motor-cycle rider who’s afraid of falling off, and although I’m virtually okay now, as far as track racing goes, I’ve lost my nerve.’
