Phaedra smiled up at him. “Yes, David, you most certainly can.” It felt good to be part of his family.
Once back in David’s kitchen, Phaedra set about clearing the kitchen table. She laid out scales, bowls, a spatula, two wooden spoons, a teaspoon for David, and the ingredients Harris had brought down from the main house in the car: eggs, extra butter, flour, cocoa, and baking powder—things that David would never have in his store cupboard. David sat at the table with a cup of tea, watching her bustle about as if she had always cooked in his kitchen. She wore his mother’s green apron and a purposeful expression on her face. He decided that women must all think alike, for his mother had arranged his cutlery, utensils, and crockery, and Phaedra seemed to know instinctively where she had put everything.
She had tied her hair back into a ponytail so now he could see her face more clearly. Her beauty was arresting, especially as the balls of her cheeks blushed like sweet plums. A part of him was elated that she had walked into his life and set it aflame with her enthusiasm and joy, but the other part lamented the fact that he could never have her. He realized that, in spite of all the obstacles, he was falling in love with her.
“Instead of staring at me as if I’m an alien, why don’t you mix some butter and icing sugar together for the filling?” She passed him a bowl and wooden spoon. “And no licking until I give you permission.”
“You’re not an alien, Phaedra,” he replied seriously. “You’re a beautiful woman. I still can’t quite get my head around the fact that you’re my half sister.”
She cracked an egg on the side of her bowl and dropped the contents into the flour and sugar mixture with a gentle puff. “Neither can I. One moment I have no one, and then suddenly, I have a family.”
“Can’t you delay your return to Paris?” he suggested.
She began to stir the mixture. “It’s only across the Channel, David.”
“I know, but we’ve only just found you.”
“London isn’t home to me.”
“Fairfield can be your home. We’re your family now. Wouldn’t you like to be part of a big family?”
She stopped stirring for a moment and smiled wistfully. “I used to watch my friends with their families and wish that I had a family like them. You know, the old cliché: mother, father, a dog or two. I always felt different. Middle-class families are very conventional where I come from. I longed to be like everyone else.” She began to beat the mixture with vigor. “I’m happy now, though. I like my life.”
“Aren’t you lonely?”
“Of course not.”
David didn’t believe her. “Everyone needs a family,” he persisted.
“I’m a grown-up now.”
“It makes no difference what age you are. You’ve just learned to suppress your longing. Delay Paris and give us a chance. I think you’ll be happy you stayed.”
She grinned at him, and he knew he had won her over. “Put a little more muscle into that stirring, and I’ll think about it.” She swapped her spoon for an electric whisk, and the room grew noisy with the sound of whirring.
Once the cakes were in the oven Phaedra disappeared upstairs to her room. She closed the door and sat on the edge of the bed, staring uneasily into the half distance. She hadn’t imagined she would feel attracted to any of George’s sons. She hadn’t even listed it as a possibility. But she couldn’t deny that she had liked the look of David right from the moment she had laid eyes on him in the church. Then when he had driven up to London to persuade her to come to Fairfield Park for the weekend, she had relished the fizzy feeling he gave her in the pit of her belly and how that feeling had carried her through the week, along with the eager anticipation of seeing him again on the Friday. Dear God, what would George say? If he was watching her now, what was he thinking?
David had been very persuasive. She did find the idea of having a family seductive. All her life she’d felt alone—a burden to her mother, dislocated from society because she was “that poor Chancellor girl,” passed around her mother’s friends for sleepovers when she wanted to go off with her suitors, or worse, dragged along on vacation when her mother had no alternative but to take her with them. Phaedra remembered those lonely summers on windy beaches, sent off to play by herself because her mother wanted time alone with her man. How she’d longed for a family then. Now she had the chance of having a big family, she’d be mad to let it go.
When she came back downstairs, the sweet aroma of cake filled the kitchen. David remained at the table, reading the Saturday papers. “They smell ready,” she said, grabbing the oven gloves and opening the Aga door. A hot blast of sponge-scented air enveloped them. She pulled the tray of lemon cupcakes out first, then bent down again to pull out the cake tins.