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The first thing Rhianna saw in the bedroom was her clothing, fresh, clean, and laid neatly across the bed.
‘Why the hell didn’t she put it away in the wardrobe?’ Diaz said, frowning.
‘Too intimate, perhaps.’ She smiled valiantly. ‘Also too suggestive of permanence. You’d better reassure her that her fears are unnecessary.’
He turned away. ‘I’d better say something, certainly.’ He looked down at the dresses on the bed, and picked up the green one she’d worn that first evening on the boat. ‘Wear this for me tonight, Rhianna. Please?’
Her heart seemed to twist. ‘If—that’s what you want.’
‘It’s what I have to settle for, anyway,’ he said, and walked into the bathroom.
Presently she heard the shower running, and realised he had not invited her to join him as he’d done earlier that day, when her attempt to wash his back had turned into something very different. When, with both of them drenched and laughing, she’d found herself lifted on to his loins and brought to a swift and tumultuous climax which had left her clinging to him, her legs too shaky to bear her weight.
She sank down on the edge of the bed, the dress draped across her lap and thought, He’s starting to say goodbye.
She dressed with extra care that evening. Diaz had gone by the time she emerged from the bathroom in her turn. Outside, the sky looked like granite, and she could hear the first heavy drops of rain thudding on to the balcony. Everything, she thought, was changing.
She put on her favourite underwear, silk embroidered with little silver roses, and made up her face with a light touch. She brushed her hair to the lustre of satin, then slipped into the green dress, winding the sash tightly round her slender waist.
She even chose the same earrings. Then, after touching scent to her pulse points, she went downstairs.
Diaz was waiting for her in the salon, a long, low-ceilinged room, with creamy walls and the same slightly old-fashioned furnishings that she’d noticed elsewhere, which seemed so much in keeping with the house. The enormous fireplace at one end of the room didn’t seem out of place either, she thought, listening to the splash of the rain.
But it was the portrait hanging over the fireplace that brought her to a surprised halt. For an instant she thought she was looking at Moira Seymour, only a frailer, more shadowy version, and then she realised who it must really be.
She said uncertainly, ‘Your mother?’
‘Yes,’ he said. ‘Painted not long after I was born. It was meant to hang at Penvarnon, but I had it shipped over here.’
Rhianna looked again. No, she thought. That could never be Moira Seymour. There was a quietness about the seated figure, a softness to the mouth that bore no resemblance to her sister’s glossy self-confidence. And Esther Penvarnon looked sad, too. Not at all like someone who’d just given birth to a much wanted child.
She hesitated. ‘Will you tell me about her—and your father? After all, it can’t make any difference now.’
He stared down into his glass, his brows drawn together. ‘I was away at school from the time I was seven,’ he said. ‘But even before that I knew somehow that they weren’t happy. My father was a big man, larger than life and full of energy. He taught me to swim and row a boat, and to bowl at cricket. He made life special, and I pretty much worshipped him. I saw much less of my mother. She suffered constantly from this terrible debilitating virus that left her with hardly the strength to move. I was always being told as a child to be quiet because she was asleep, or keep out of her room because she was resting.’
He added expressionlessly, ‘Looking back as an adult, I can see that it probably hadn’t been a real marriage for a very long time. There was my mother in a wheelchair, with my father still young, virile, and attractive to women. A recipe for the usual disaster.’
He shook his head. ‘I suppose there must always have been other women. Certainly he spent less and less time at Penvarnon, and I began to stay away too, discovering family life in other people’s houses.’
She said, ‘But your aunt and uncle…?’
‘Were there principally for my mother.’ His mouth twisted. ‘My father thought it would be good for her to have her sister’s companionship. The reality, I think, was very different. Eventually someone from the village was employed to care for her—your aunt.’
Rhianna looked at him gravely. ‘I would hardly mention Aunt Kezia and caring in the same breath.’
‘Yet she was devoted to my mother, apparently,’ he said. ‘Then, when she was promoted to housekeeper, her place was taken by her younger sister, Grace, who was planning to become a nurse.’
