‘I’m afraid it was my fault, Joycy,’ Sophie used the family name for the housekeeper. ‘Mummy gets upset by my behaviour. I don’t mean to upset her, but I—–’ she broke off as her stepmother left the dining-room, no evidence of tears on her face now as she smiled at them.
‘Mr Bedford’s coffee, Joycy,’ she smiled. ‘He’s never human until he’s drunk several cups of your delicious brew.’ She hummed to herself as she left them.
Joycy watched her mistress leave. ‘I wonder what your poor father has promised her this time,’ she remarked with amused tolerance.
‘Something else she doesn’t need,’ Sophie said dully, aware that once again she had caused her father to be put in an awkward position. It was a terrible way to think, but things were a lot quieter around here when her stepmother stayed in London.
She and her father lived a peaceful existence here, her father travelling rarely to his firm situated twenty miles out of London, and she going to the local college. The two of them spent a lot of time together, a lot of their tastes being similar despite their age difference.
Joycy smiled. ‘I’d better take this coffee in, it should help soothe your father.’
Sophie grimaced. ‘I think he’s going to need it,’ was her parting comment.
Poor Daddy, she thought as she cycled the mile to Helen’s house. He didn’t ask much from life, just a loving wife and daughter and the continuous success of his prosperous firm. But she and her stepmother had never got on. Sophie had spent most of her childhood brought up by servants, and so every time she had met her stepmother the sparks started to fly.
Not that she didn’t care for Rosemary—after all, she was the only mother she had ever known—but to Rosemary she was just a constant reminder of the passing of the years, a reminder Rosemary neither wanted or welcomed. What on earth her stepmother would do if she ever presented her with a grandchild she daren’t think. Not that that was a possibility for years yet; she didn’t even have a boy-friend.
Helen was out in the back garden sunbathing when Sophie arrived. ‘You look hot.’ She poured her out a long cool drink of lime from the jug on the table.
‘I am.’ Sophie collapsed on to the adjoining lounger.
‘You didn’t cycle over in this heat?’
Sophie sipped gratefully at the lime. ‘It’s quicker than walking.’
‘But more exhausting. It’s a pity you don’t like driving.’
‘I don’t have the concentration. Did you get into trouble for being late last night?’ she changed the subject.
Helen giggled, a petite girl with bubbly red hair and mischievous green eyes. ‘This morning, you mean. Dad was furious! How about you?’
‘About the same. Mummy turned up last night when I was out,’ Sophie added pointedly.
Helen grimaced. ‘The outcome of my late night was that Dad’s forbidden me to go out for a week. He’ll have forgotten all about it by tomorrow, but it means I won’t be able to go anywhere tonight.’
‘Neither will I. Mummy’s invited some people down for the weekend, which means I have to stay in to dinner tonight.’ Sophie sighed. ‘I wouldn’t mind, but she will insist on inviting Nicholas as my dinner partner.’
‘Poor you,’ Helen sympathised. ‘Who’s been invited for the weekend? Your mother usually knows the interesting people.’
‘I only know two of the guests, Eve Jeffers and—and Luke Vittorio.’
Helen choked over her lime juice. ‘Luke Vittorio?’
‘The one and only.’
Helen looked impressed. ‘I saw him on television the other night. God, he’s handsome. He has mesmerising come-to-bed eyes.’
‘Yes.’
‘And he’s so dark. That must be his Italian blood, I suppose.’
‘Possibly.’
Helen noticed her lack of enthusiasm for the first time. ‘You aren’t looking forward to him being there?’
That must be the understatement of the year! ’Most of Mummy’s friends I can take, but him … Well, it’s like Daddy said, what can we possibly do to entertain him? We aren’t exactly surrounded by night spots.’
‘I should think there must be lots of ways he could be entertained,’ Helen said teasingly. ‘I can think of a few ways myself.’
‘He’s bringing his own girl-friend down for that,’ Sophie informed her with disgust. ‘I don’t suppose he can go for very long without a woman.’
Helen raised her eyebrows. ‘What’s he done to upset you? You don’t usually take dislikes to people like this.’
‘I’m not usually forced into their company,’ she said with ill-humour. ‘Mummy has asked the great man to paint me.’
That really startled Helen. ‘A Luke Vittorio portrait …’
‘That’s what I said. Oh, he’ll say no, of course, but I don’t like the idea of him dissecting each little part of me before he rejects me. He’s so damned arrogant!’
‘I suppose so.’
‘You don’t sound very sure. I’ll tell you what, come over tomorrow afternoon and you can meet him.’
Helen sat up, smiling eagerly. ‘Really?’ she asked excitedly.
‘Yes, and welcome to him.’
Her friend laughed. ‘Let’s go and have a game of tennis, you can run off some of this steam. Stay for lunch and then go home when Mr Vittorio is safely installed in your house. Mum and Dad have gone out for the day shopping, so we have the house to ourselves.’
They played tennis for a couple of hours before going back to Helen’s and making themselves a hamburger each. It was almost three o’clock in the afternoon by the time Sophie set off for home. She really couldn’t delay any longer, she would have to change before meeting Luke Vittorio.
Her stepmother would be furious if she presented herself in tee-shirt and tight denims, and her hair was completely wild from her exertions on the tennis court. Her face was completely bare of make-up, her skin smooth and creamy, her lips a healthy pink, her violet eyes glowing as she enjoyed her ride back to her home.
She enjoyed the ride back much more than the ride to Helen’s, freewheeling down the long hill that had taken such effort to get up before lunch. What breeze there was whipped through her long silver-blonde hair, her eyes glowing with pleasure.
She was almost on top of the car turning out of the side road before she saw it, and she felt sure the driver of the Mercedes hadn’t seen her at all. The car was turning in from the right and she swerved precariously to avoid it, crashing up the grass verge to land in an undignified heap in a newly ploughed field.
The ground was soft to land on, but nevertheless Sophie felt shaken by the fall, peering over the tiny hedgerow at her bicycle, the wheels still spinning noisily. She sat up, rubbing her elbows which seemed to have taken the main pressure of her fall.
She looked up as a shadow fell across her, unaware of the dusty marks on her now pale cheeks, and her eyes widened with shock as she recognised the driver of the car she had swerved to avoid. Luke Vittorio!
There could be no mistaking that muscular physique clothed in fitted black silk shirt and thigh-hugging black trousers, the forbidding mouth with the full sensuous bottom lip, the hawk-like nose, the magnetic brown eyes, and the dark overlong-styled hair. He was much taller than she had imagined, well over six feet, and his skin was naturally dark instead of tanned, but there could be no doubt that this was indeed Luke Vittorio.
Sophie