An Exception to His Rule(56)

                ‘I don’t think so. I think that’s...Charlie,’ Harriet said slowly. ‘I wouldn’t be surprised if Charlie keeps a sort of weather eye out for Damien.’

                ‘Oh, I think he does.’ Isabel rested her chin in her hands and studied Harriet. ‘You’re pretty perceptive yourself, my dear.’

                Harriet grimaced. ‘I don’t know about that. So she—Veronica—didn’t marry Patrick’s father?’

                Isabel shook her head. ‘She hasn’t remarried.’

                ‘Is there any chance of them getting back together?’

                ‘No.’ Isabel said it quite definitely. ‘It was one of those white-hot affairs that was too explosive to last, even apart from the drama over Patrick. Of course the double, triple even quadruple irony to it all is that Patrick was named after my father, Damien’s grandfather.’

                Harriet let the towel drop onto the counter. ‘Oh, no!’

                ‘Oh, yes.’ Isabel shrugged. ‘Not that there would be any point in changing his name and he’d been christened by the time they found out, anyway. But it does...it was such a mess.’

                Harriet sat down. ‘Do you think he’ll ever marry again?’

                Isabel stretched then she rocked Harriet to the core. ‘Yes. If you would have him.’





                                      CHAPTER SEVEN

                ‘I...I BEG YOUR pardon?’ Harriet stammered.

                But Isabel simply looked at her wisely.

                Harriet got up and did a turn around the studio with her arms crossed almost protectively. ‘It couldn’t work. The reason he came back from Perth—not that he ever got there—was to tell me why it couldn’t work.’

                ‘Why couldn’t it?’

                ‘He doesn’t want to be married again. He’s suspicious and cynical now and, even without any of that, he’s a difficult, unbending kind of person and he admits that his habit of command was probably one of the reasons they fell out so badly.’

                ‘Probably,’ Isabel conceded. ‘He’s very much like my father, his grandfather, the first Patrick. The one who started it all. Dynamic, forceful—’ Isabel nodded wryly ‘—difficult. Whereas my brother, Damien’s father, was more interested in culture and the arts, passionate about sailing, that kind of thing. He was so nice—’ Isabel looked fond ‘—but it’s true to say we went backwards during his stewardship and it took all of Damien’s grandfather’s genes plus plenty of his own kind of steely determination to pull the business out of that slump.’

                ‘The first thing that struck me about him,’ Harriet said dryly, ‘was how arrogant he was. I never felt more...more vindicated—that’s not the right word, but it definitely was a release of some kind—when I slapped his face, although I got myself kissed for my pains.’ She stopped and bit her lip.

                ‘That first day you came to Heathcote?’ Isabel queried and when Harriet nodded she laughed.

                ‘Sorry,’ she said, ‘but I knew something had happened between you two. So did Charlie.’

                ‘Charlie walked in on it,’ Harriet said gloomily, ‘that’s how he knew.’ Then she had to smile. ‘If you could have seen his expression.’