‘We met up again recently. It all happened very fast.’
‘You can certainly say that.’ Anne’s eyes, so like Libby’s had been, except without the warmth and laughter, dropped to Marnie’s stomach. ‘Is it...?’
‘Of course not!’ Marnie read between the lines. ‘I’m not pregnant. That’s not why we’re getting married.’
Arthur expelled a loud breath and stood. Despite the fact it was just midday, he moved towards the dumb waiter and loudly removed the top from a decanter of sherry. He poured a stiff measure and cradled it in his long, slim fingers.
‘Then why the rush?’ Anne pushed, looking from her husband to her daughter and trying desperately to make sense of the announcement that was still hanging in the air.
‘Be vague on the details.’
‘Why not?’ she murmured. ‘Neither of us wants a big wedding.’ She shrugged her slender shoulders, striving to appear nonchalant even when her heart was pounding at the very idea of marriage to Nikos Kyriazis.
‘Darling, it’s not how things are done,’ Anne said with a shake of her head.
Marnie stiffened her spine imperceptibly, squaring her shoulders. ‘I appreciate that your preference might be for a big, fancy wedding, but the last thing I want is a couture gown and a photographer from OK! Magazine breathing down my back.’
Anne arched one perfectly shaped brow, clasped her hands neatly in her lap. At one time, not that long ago, Marnie might have taken Anne’s displeasure as reason enough to abandon her plans. But too much was at stake now. If only her parents knew that the wedding they were so quick to disapprove of was their only hope of avoiding financial ruination!
‘You don’t like the press. That’s fine. But our friends. Your family. Your godmother...!’
‘No.’ Marnie didn’t flinch; her eyes were tethered to her mother’s. ‘That’s not going to happen. Just you and Dad.’
‘And Nikos? Which of his family will be there?’ Anne couldn’t quite keep the sneer from her voice.
‘As you know, he has no family,’ Marnie responded with a quiet dignity. ‘Besides me.’
How strange it was to say that, knowing it was the literal truth if not a particularly honest representation of the situation.
‘I don’t like it,’ Arthur interjected, his sherry glass empty now, and his focus on Marnie once more.
Marnie had expected this, and yet still she heard the words with an element of disappointment. ‘Why not?’ she queried quietly.
‘I have never thought he was right for you. I still don’t.’
There was nothing inherently offensive in the statement, but it was the reasoning behind it that Marnie took exception to. Six years ago she’d let the implication hang in the air, but now she was older and wiser and significantly less worried about upsetting her parents. ‘For what reason, Dad?’
He reached for the sherry once more and Anne Kenington, across from Marnie, stiffened visibly.
‘He’s just not right.’
‘That’s not a reason.’ Marnie’s smile was forced.
‘Fine. He’s different. From you. From us.’
‘Because he’s Greek?’ she asked with an assumption of mock innocence.
‘Don’t be obtuse,’ he snapped.
Anne stood, moving her slender figure across the room towards the large glass doors that opened out onto the rolling green grass of the East Lawn. A large oak broke up the expanse of colour a little way in the distance, casting dark shadows beneath its voluminous branches.
‘Is there any point in having this discussion?’ she asked wearily.
‘Meaning...?’ Marnie asked softly.
‘Your plans appear to be set in stone,’ Anne continued, her pale eyes skimming over the gardens, her face a mask of calm despite the storm Marnie knew to be raging beneath.
Was that the only thing they had in common? Their steadfast commitment to burying any display of emotion? Keeping as much of themselves as possible hidden from prying eyes?
Marnie shifted her gaze back to her father. He looked as if he was about to pop a blood vessel. He was glaring at the sherry decanter, his fingers white around the fine crystal glass.
‘One hundred per cent.’ Marnie nodded. ‘I hope you can put the past behind you and be happy for us.’
Arthur’s harsh intake of breath was smothered by Anne’s rushed statement. ‘You’re a grown woman. Who you marry is your choice.’ She practically coughed on the statement.
Marnie stood, not sure what else she could add to the conversation. ‘Thank you.’
A ridiculous way to end the conversation but, then again, what about the circumstances of this wedding wasn’t ridiculous?
She slipped from the room, the muted voices of Arthur and Anne chasing her down the long corridors of Kenington Hall. She emerged onto the front steps and breathed in deep. Her cheeks were flushed, her skin warm. She moved deliberately away from the East Lawn, wanting to be far from her parents.
She walked with innate elegance until she reached the edge of the rose gardens. Then she slipped her pumps from her feet and cast one last glance towards the house. She began to move as she’d wanted to since she’d first seen Nikos again. As though the earth had turned to magma and was burning through the soles of her feet. She couldn’t stand still; she could no longer be composed and calm.
And so she ran.
She ran as though the ghosts of the past had taken animal form: they were lions and tigers and they were chasing her, making her tremble with fear and terror.
‘No daughter of mine is going to throw her life away on a no-hoper like that! You will end it, Marnie, or you will be out of this house faster than you can say inheritance.’
Arthur’s hateful declaration was a cheetah, fierce and gnashing its teeth.
‘I don’t care about money! I love him!’
She sobbed as she remembered her impassioned cry, her belief that if she could only get her parents to understand what a good man Nikos was they would shelve their dislike.
But their dislike hadn’t had a lot to do with the man he was so much as the man he wasn’t.
‘He’s got no class. He will never make you happy, darling.’
At least Anne had tried to couch her objections gently. But her meaning had been clear. No class. No money. No social prestige.
Even then she’d stood fast. She’d fought for him.
‘We’ve been through enough this year, for God’s sake!’ Arthur had finally shouted. ‘We’ve already lost one daughter. Are you going to make us lose you, too?’
Marnie ran until her lungs burned and her eyes stung with the tears the wind held in check. She ran past the lake that she’d fallen into as a child, before she’d learned to love the water and to navigate its murky pull; she ran around the remnants of the tree house where she and Libby had spent several long, sticky summers, pretending they were anywhere but Kenington Hall. She ran to the very edges of the estate, where an apple orchard shielded the property from the curious view of a passer-by.
Finally she came to an abrupt stop beneath a particularly established tree, bracing her palm against the trunk and staring back at the sprawling stone mansion.
Her whole life had been lived within its walls. She’d learned to walk, she’d played hide-and-seek, she’d read book after book, she’d been a princess in a castle. It was her place in the world.
But why hadn’t she left when her parents had taken a stand against Nikos? Why hadn’t she moved to London like most of her friends?
Because of Libby.
A sob clogged her throat. She swallowed it.
They’d lost Libby. And it had changed them for ever. Maybe they would have been difficult and elitist, anyway. But their grief had made it worse. And it had made Marnie more forgiving.
How could she run away from them and leave them alone after burying one of their daughters?
She groaned now, shaking her head.
So she’d put her life on hold. She’d remained at home, under their roof, managing the gardens, working in her little home office, pretending she didn’t resent them for their heavy-handed involvement in a relationship that had been so important to her.
Was this marriage to Nikos a second chance? Might they even fall in love again?
Her heart turned over in her chest as she remembered the exquisite emotions he had evoked in her as a teenager. She had loved him fiercely then—but not enough. Because she’d walked away from him instead of staying and fighting and there was no turning back from that.
* * *
Goose bumps danced along her soft skin. ‘This is beautiful.’
And it was. The house was nothing like she’d imagined. Set high on a hill on the outskirts of Athens, it was crisp white against a perfect blue sky. Geraniums tumbled out of window boxes, creating the impression that the flowers had sprung to life there and decided to blow happily in the light, balmy breeze. Clumps of lavender stood proud from large ceramic pots and the fragrance of orange blossom and jasmine hung heavy in the air.
‘I’ll give you a tour tomorrow—introduce you to the household staff.’
‘Staff?’ That was interesting. ‘How many staff?’
He put his hand in the small of her back, propelling her gently towards the front door. ‘My housekeeper, Eléni, and her husband, Andréas. Two gardeners...’