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Daisy sagged in her seat. She couldn’t tell them, she wouldn’t tell them, but all she wanted to hear was her dad’s comforting drawl and step into her mother’s embrace. She didn’t allow herself that luxury very often.
‘Actually, can we go to the registrar’s tomorrow? I don’t feel comfortable registering until we have told my parents. Would you mind if we visit them first?’
Daisy waited, her hands slippery with tense anticipation. It had been so long since she had consulted with someone else or needed consensus on any action.
‘Of course.’ Seb took his eyes from the road for one brief second, resting them appraisingly on her hands, twisting in her lap. ‘But if we’re going to tell your parents we’re engaged we should probably stop at a jeweller’s on the way. You need a ring.’
* * *
‘Daisy! Darling, what a lovely surprise.’
It was strange being face to face with someone as familiar, as famous as Sherry Huntingdon: model, muse and sometime actress. Her tall willowy figure, as taut and slender at over fifty as it had been at twenty, the blonde hair sweeping down her back seemingly as natural as her daughter’s.
‘And who’s this?’ The famously sleepy blue eyes were turned onto Seb, an unexpectedly shrewdly appraising look in them. Maybe not that unexpected—you didn’t stay at the top of your profession for over thirty years without brains as well as beauty.
‘Sebastian Beresford.’ He held his hand out and Daisy’s mother took it, slanting a look at him from under long black lashes.
‘What a treat.’ Her voice was low, almost a purr. ‘Daisy so seldom brings young men home. Come on in, the pair of you. Violet’s around somewhere and Rick’s in his studio—the Benefit Concert is creeping up on us again. Daisy, darling, you will be here to take some photos, won’t you?’
‘Wouldn’t miss it.’ Daisy linked her arm through her mother’s as they walked along the meandering path that led from the driveway around the house. It was a beautiful ivy-covered house, large by any standards—unless one happened to live in a castle—dating back to William and Mary with two gracefully symmetrical wings flanking the three-storey main building.
Unlike Hawksley it had been sympathetically updated and restored and, as they rounded the corner, Seb could see tennis courts in the distance and a cluster of stable buildings and other outbuildings all evidently restored and in use.
An unexpected stab of nostalgic pain hit him. Hawksley should have been as well cared for but his grandfather had taken a perverse pride in the discomfort of the crumbling building—and as for Seb’s father... He pushed the thought away, fists clenched with the unwanted anger that still flooded through him whenever he thought about his father’s criminal negligence.
Sherry came to a stop as they reached a large paved terrace with steps leading upwards to the French doors at the back of the house. Comfortably padded wooden furniture was arranged to take the best advantage of the gorgeous views. ‘I think it’s warm enough to sit outside.’ Sherry smiled at her daughter. ‘I’ll go get Rick. He’ll be so happy to see you, Daisy. He was saying the other day we see more of Rose and she lives in New York. You two make yourselves at home. Then we can have a drink. Daisy, darling, let Vi know you’re here, will you?’
‘I’ll text her.’ Daisy perched on a bench as she pulled out her phone and, after a moment’s hesitation, Seb joined her. Of course they would sit together. In fact, they should be holding hands. He looked at her long, slender fingers flying over the phone’s surface and willed himself to casually reach over and slip his own fingers through hers.
Just one touch. And yet it felt more binding than the ring he had bought her and the vows he was prepared to make.
‘That’s Dad’s studio.’ Daisy slipped the phone back into her dress pocket and pointed at the largest of the outbuildings. ‘The first thing he did was convert it into a soundproofed, state-of-the-art recording studio—we were never allowed in unsupervised but it didn’t stop us trying to make our own records. They weren’t very good. None of us are particularly musical, much to Dad’s disgust. The room next to it is used as rehearsal space and we turned the orangery into a pool and gym, otherwise we pretty much left the house as it was. It hasn’t changed much since it was built.’
But it had. The paintwork was fresh, the soft furnishings and wallpaper new, the furniture chosen with care. New money in an old building. It was what Hawksley needed, if only his great-great-grandfather had married an American heiress.
