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Well, why should he fight for Sean? His son had cost him his business as well as his grandchild and his peace of mind. He wasn’t worth fighting for.
‘Next Wednesday, two o’clock, here?’ Bernie suggested. ‘Easier for you to come up to Manchester than for all of us to come down to London.’
‘Very well,’ Terry accepted. ‘If I can’t make it for some reason I’ll let you know the day before.’
‘I hope you will make it,’ Bernie said with cool insistence. ‘Be there, Terry.’
Terr
y replaced the phone, his teeth gritted and his whole face aching with tension.
Miranda knew she must not struggle, if she were to have any chance of survival. As her body sank she tried to stay calm, to think rationally. Her fingers fumbled with the heavy weight on the chain. How was it fastened? If she could only shed it. Fish swam around her in the blue water. Up above light glowed; the distant sun penetrating the waves.
She did not want to die.
The weight had been hooked on to the chain; she dragged at it, fighting to lift it up, and off.
It resisted, then suddenly she felt it coming upwards, managed to force it away and felt it fall. Released, her body bobbed up like a cork, surfaced in the warm Aegean, and she felt the sun shining down into her face. She blinked, trying to look around, searching for a sign of the boat from which she had been flung.
Ah, there it was – heading off into the distance, leaving a shining track behind it, like some great water snail. The sea was calm here, there was little wind, the weather was different to the weather when they left Delephores.
Where was she? How far from land?
Nobody would ever know what had happened to her – except Alex, perhaps. Had he known she would be drowned? Had Terry told him?
Her body was chill, despite the heat of the sun. She wished she could hate Alex, but her Angel of Death had got under her skin, she loved him more than life itself, which was ironic. How else could you love the Angel of Death?
She would have to float. She had learnt to do that when she was taking a rescue badge at school. You had to wear pyjamas, with the jacket sleeves tied to stop you using your hands, and float until your partner rescued you.
She would do that now. Relaxing, she let her body bob up and down on the gentle waves, turning her head from side to side slowly, to look round the horizon. If another boat came along she would be picked up, saved from death. All hope was not over.
But there were no other boats in view. How long could she keep up, stop herself sinking?
Panic rose in her throat; she felt herself grow heavy, dragged down under the glittering, blue, sunlit water. Oh God, Oh God, she thought, prayed, terror streaking through her. Please don’t let me drown.
Chapter Fifteen
Nicola walked out of the house while her aunt was having one of her marathon phone calls in the drawing room. Nicola could hear her high, Home Counties voice talking on and on and on, interspersed with shrill laughter.
‘You aren’t serious! She didn’t? Heavens, Daphne, did she really? And what did he . . .? He didn’t?’
She had left Nicola in the conservatory, doing a watercolour of some flowers Aunt Eloise had arranged for her.
‘When you’ve finished that you can go upstairs and start packing. I know we aren’t going to New York until the day after tomorrow, but you’ll need time to pack, you’re going to have to be selective. There’s this tiresome weight problem, you can only take one suitcase, so choose carefully, and remember, we’ll be able to buy anything you need in New York and we’ll be coming back by sea so there won’t be a weight problem coming back.’ She had given one of those unreal, insincere smiles Nicola hated so much. ‘Now, just concentrate on your painting, sweetie. I’ll look in on you later.’
Aunt Eloise was her mother’s sister and looked like her. Nicola had never liked her much, which didn’t matter as Eloise lived in Manhattan and rarely came to London, but her father had invited her over to, in his words, ‘be company’ for Nicola at this time. What he really meant was be a jailer, watch Nicola like a hawk, keep her away from Sean.
She had not seen Sean since he was arrested. Her father had almost had a fit when she said she wanted to visit him.
‘In a prison? My daughter, walking into a prison to see a murderer? Certainly not. The idea is ludicrous. Now, never suggest it again. Eloise, can’t you think of something? Keep her occupied?’
‘New York,’ Eloise had said. ‘Why don’t I take her back to the States with me? Show her a good time, find her other young men to stop her thinking about . . . about that one?’
‘Excellent,’ Francis Belcannon had said in relief. ‘Absolutely. Take her at once.’
But Aunt Eloise had wanted to do some shopping in London, meet with old friends she rarely saw, take in the latest exhibitions and visit the best boutiques. She had not been in a hurry to go back to New York just yet. Francis Belcannon had paid her fare and was putting her up; she was having a free holiday and hadn’t got bored with London yet, although she would. Eloise de Haviland always got bored with everything. She was a great traveller; drifting from Peking to Moscow, from Cairo to Istanbul, buying and chattering, floating like a gilded dragonfly over the surfaces of life everywhere. Even her native New York was largely foreign to her. She never visited some parts of it. Manhattan and Long Island, they were her chosen spots. Everywhere else was uncertain; dirty or dangerous, or full of disturbing people, people without money or influence, who might want something from her, might attack her or steal from her.
She had a beautiful, exquisite, apartment looking over the park, with the sort of security she could trust. Shops delivered. She had carefully checked staff. She never had to do anything for herself.
