female who had waved them goodbye, and she greeted her husband more warmly than she’d been known to do before.
‘Sorry I couldn’t meet you, darling,’ she said, getting up from the cushioned lounge chair she had been occupying on the terrace. Set in the shade of a huge flame tree, it was an oasis of shadow in the late afternoon heat that still drenched the villa. Only the breeze from the ocean provided a warm draught of air to dry moist skin, but Tricia looked cool and comfortable, and totally relaxed.
‘No problem,’ said Andrew easily, bending to bestow a kiss on his wife’s upturned lips. But his eyes sought Helen’s as he offered the salutation, and she had the uneasy feeling that their relationship would never be the same again.
‘Can we have some juice?’ Henry cried plaintively, bored by his parents’ demonstration of marital felicity, and his mother turned to look at him with some impatience.
‘You can’t be thirsty,’ she said. ‘I told Helen to get you both a drink at the airport. Heaven knows, you had enough time.’ She glanced at her watch. ‘I expected you back half an hour ago. The plane was obviously late.’
‘She didn’t get me a drink—’ Henry was beginning
indignantly, when his father chose to intervene.
‘Actually the plane was on time,’ he said, earning a raised eyebrow from his wife. ‘But there was some holdup with the luggage. And Helen had her hands full, because Sophie had been sick.’
‘Oh.’ Tricia looked somewhat distastefully at her daughter. ‘Not again.’
‘Yes, again,’ went on Andrew evenly. ‘We all had our problems, didn’t we, Henry?’ He gave his son a warning look. ‘Now, run along and ask whoever it is your mother said is looking after us——’
‘Maria,’ supplied Sophie proudly, and her father smiled.
‘Very well. You two go and ask Maria if she’d be kind enough to give you a drink.’
‘Helen can do it,’ protested Tricia, before Henry and Sophie could leave them. She carefully resumed her position on the lounger. ‘As they’re obviously tired, it would probably be a good idea to give them their supper early and put them to bed.’
‘Oh, Mummy—’
‘But a want to talk to Daddy—’
The two children both spoke at once, but Tricia just ignored them. ‘You can have an early night, too, Helen,’ she added, stretching out her hand towards heir husband. ‘I shan’t need you any more today.’ She sighed contentedly. ‘Drew and I will enjoy a quiet evening together. It’s ages since we had any time alone.’
‘Helen’s not a child, Trish.’ Andrew came to her defence, even though she hadn’t wanted him to. ‘Put the brats to bed by all means, Helen. But then you must join us for supper.’
‘Helen may not want to,’ Tricia observed tersely, not at all pleased to have her plans overset. ‘She might like a quiet evening, too.’
‘We are on holiday, Trish,’ retorted Andrew, just as Helen was about to agree with her. ‘Besides, I’m sure you’ll want to hear about the man we met at the airport. He said his name was Aitken, didn’t he, Helen?’ He turned back to his wife. ‘Do we know anyone of that name?’
Tricia stared first at her husband, then at Helen. ‘Aitken?’ she exclaimed. ‘Did you say Aitken?’
‘That’s what he said,’ said Andrew maliciously, enjoying Helen’s discomfort. ‘The name is familiar, but I can’t imagine why.’
‘I can,’ said Tricia suddenly, and for an awful moment Helen thought she had made the connection between Chase Aitken and her mother. But then, as the other woman began to speak again, she realised how unlikely that was. Her mother had left her father almost twenty years ago.
‘Well, you won’t know,’ Tricia explained patiently. ‘It’s the name of the man who owns the house beyond the point. I asked Maria who our neighbours were, and she said his name was Aitken.’ She clasped her hands together excitedly. ‘D’you think it’s the same man?’
‘I’d say it was highly likely,’ said Andrew, frowning. ‘Though the chap didn’t make any comment when I told him we were staying here. You’d think he’d have mentioned it, wouldn’t you, Helen? Unless we offended him, of course.’
‘Offended him?’ exclaimed Tricia sharply, looking from one to the other of them with suspicious eyes. ‘How could you have offended him? For heaven’s sake, Helen, what did you say?’
Helen noticed the assumption that she was the one who must have said something to offend him, and she was just about to explain what had happened when Andrew broke in.
‘Well, as you know, Sophie had been throwing up all over the car park, and the bloke came over to offer his assistance. We let him think that Helen was my wife, and I don’t think he was impressed by our behaviour.’
‘You did what?’
Tricia stared at her husband, aghast, as Helen wished the ground would open up and swallow her. But she had nothing but admiration for the way Andrew had turned the tables. Not only had he implicated her in his schemes, but he’d successfully neutralised any flack from Aitken’s direction.
‘It was just a game,’ he said carelessly, draping his jacket over one shoulder and loosening his tie. ‘For God’s sake, Trish, I doubt if he believed it. Does Helen look like the mother of these two, I ask you? A fool could see she’s far too young.’
‘She’s exactly four years younger than me,’ said Tricia through her teeth, and Andrew gave a dismissive shrug in her direction.
‘Like I said, far too young,’ he remarked, grinning at her frustration. ‘I’m going for a shower now. I assume we do have showers in this place?’ He sauntered towards the French doors that opened into the villa. ‘You can come and show Daddy where Mummy’s room is, Henry. And then, while I’m changing, d’you think one of you could get me a beer?’
‘Andrew!’
Tricia’s temper was simmering, but he was totally undaunted by her infuriated stare. ‘Oh, and ask Maria if she’d get my suitcase,’ he added. ‘Unless someone else would like to oblige.’
Helen spent an uncomfortable evening on her own.
After giving the children their suppers and getting them ready for bed, she’d sent a message, via Maria, to say she had a headache, and would not be joining her employers for the evening meal. Instead she’d made herself a salad, eating it in her room, with the doors and windows securely bolted.
Which was one of the reasons why it was so uncomfortable, although, compared to the other events of the day, the humidity in her room was of little importance. Dear God, what was she going to do? She was almost sure the woman she had seen was her mother. And she was staying just a short distance away. Oh, lord, how could she bear it?
The clipped exchange she had with Tricia, after Andrew had gone for his shower, hadn’t helped. It had been useless trying to explain that Andrew hadn’t actually said she was his wife, that Aitken—she refused to think of him as Chase—had only assumed it. She hadn’t even been given the opportunity to relate properly the events which had led up to his introduction, and if she’d hoped that by telling Tricia how he’d spoken to her—how he’d criticised her—the other woman might relent at all, she’d been wrong. Tricia wasn’t interested in her feelings. She was only interested in the embarrassment their behaviour might have caused her.
‘I think you behaved totally irresponsibly,’ she had said, pacing up and down the terrace, and Helen had noticed how somehow she had shouldered all the blame. ‘Have you seen the house beyond the point? Well, of course you must have. It’s huge, Helen, and obviously expensive. The man must be seriously rich!’
‘Why?’ Helen had sighed. ‘He