He faced his mother with his temper close to the surface.
“Mother,” he said tersely by way of greeting, “you’ve been busy while I was away.”
Her step faltered when she caught site of the unusual look on his face but she persevered. “Well yes, I was just at the spa and –”
“I didn’t mean the spa. I meant Julia.”
Her eyes narrowed. “Of what, exactly, are you accusing me? Did she –?”
“Julia didn’t say a word,” he informed her and realised it was true.
Julia had been angry last night and said something about his mother being as warm as Siberia but that was the extent of it. After Mrs. Kilpatrick and Charlotte’s descriptions of his mother’s behaviour, he was a little surprised that Julia didn’t throw that in his face, especially when she was angry.
“Well,” Monique sat in a chair across from his desk, completely composed except her eyes flashed maliciously. “She’s insufferable. I cannot imagine what drove Tamsin to torture me in her death. It is, frankly, too much to take to force her poor, grasping, American,” she said the word with all the xenophobia she felt, “sister-in-law on us. It is simply too much!”
“Unka Douglas,” Ruby screamed from the doorway.
Douglas looked up to see Ruby racing across the room toward him and Julia standing in the doorway, her face pale beneath the rosy blush on her cheeks, acquired, no doubt, from being outside. Her posture was rigid, her eyes angry. She was wearing a pair of her faded, snug-fitting jeans, an item in her wardrobe of which he was beginning to be rather fond. The jeans ended in a pair of scuffed, old cowboy boots. She had on a thermal shirt with little pink dots printed on it, over that a Western-style denim shirt that buttoned part of the way up with pearl snaps and a thin, pink, downy vest over it all. Her hair was pulled back from her face in a ponytail at the crown of her head and her gorgeous face was free of makeup.
Ruby interrupted his perusal of Julia by jumping up, he caught her in his arms, lifting her into his lap and she threw her own arms around him, giving him a big, sloppy kiss on the cheek.
“Hello Ruby,” Douglas murmured when he caught her eyes.
“We just went to the supermarket,” Ruby yelled.
“Did you?” he asked but his eyes moved to Julia.
Monique didn’t bother to turn and her face remained a frozen mask.
“Yes, we’re going to make choca-chip cookies today!” Ruby shouted.
“I’ll bet you are,” Monique muttered scathingly and at that, Julia spoke.
“Come on Ruby, let’s get washed up and make those cookies.” Her voice betrayed nothing to Ruby as she extended her arm but her movements were jerky and Douglas knew she was angry and he knew this was because she’d heard his mother’s words.
Douglas leaned forward, put Ruby on her feet and the little girl rushed back toward Julia. Julia didn’t say a word to either Douglas or Monique. She just took Ruby’s hand and walked stiffly away.
“Charming. I’ve been gone for days and she doesn’t even say hello,” Monique noted, her tone ugly and she ignored the fact that she not only hadn’t greeted her grandchildren’s aunt, she also had not greeted her grandchild, nor, Douglas realised something very telling, did Ruby even look at her grandmother.
He sat back in his chair, put his elbows on its arms, steepled his fingers and rested his chin on them. Then he regarded his mother coldly and, as usual, quickly made his decision.
“Mother, I don’t believe we’ve had an important conversation,” he declared with deceptive calm.
“Yes, dear?” she asked, her eyebrows going up, her face the picture of innocence. He reacted rather negatively to this familiar faux expression.
“I think,” he started, “you need to be aware of my thoughts on the matter of Julia and the children.”
“And what are those, darling?” She was the picture of motherly love and concern. For years he’d ignored it but now it made bile rise up the back of his throat.
“Julia is now a member of this family, not a member of staff, not a guest, though you haven’t treated her as such. She will be afforded all the power and protection that means.”
All motherly love gone in a flash, her voice now had an edge when Monique demanded, “Perhaps you should make yourself perfectly clear.”
“It means that Julia’s position here, as co-guardian to Tamsin’s children, is elevated above yours,” he retorted bluntly and heard her gasp.
“I cannot believe you’d –” she began.
“Believe it,” Douglas cut her off. “If you don’t like it, you can move to the dower house in Clevedon or I’ll find you a place in London.” Her eyes widened in fury but unaffected, Douglas carried on. “Now, do I make myself perfectly clear?”
“I cannot believe you’d chose that… that… woman over me!”
He didn’t bother to reply.
Then her face changed, the outrage melting to venom. “I see. I see very well. You are, of course, welcome to her. She’ll suck you dry, as she did with Sean, but –”
“That’ll do,” Douglas declared with such finality her head jerked. She stared at him a moment, her eyes working then she nodded slowly and rose from her chair in order to leave.
She moved to the door but stopped and paused for a parting shot. “I cannot believe I’ve raised such a cold-hearted son who’d put his mother out in favour of a money grubbing schemer.”
“Can’t you? As I remember, you didn’t particularly care to raise Tamsin or me at all. Both of us you ignored and for my part you left me in the hands of a vicious and abusive father.”
Again she let out an outraged gasp, this quite genuine as he’d brought up a subject that they had never discussed.
Not ever.
“I’ll not have you talk about your father in that way!” Monique snapped.
“Mother, in case you hadn’t noticed, he’s been dead for years. He can’t hear you defend him and then offer you a diamond necklace for your efforts.”
She blew air out of her nostrils at this effrontery and then, without a word, whirled on her heel and left.
Douglas stared at the door for long moments after she left. He was furious at the conversation and cursing himself, his mother and Julia who was inadvertently responsible after bringing up all his old demons last night during their conversation. Demons he had methodically locked away. Demons he did not want to, would not, face.
It was high time he had the conversation he’d been meaning to have with Julia since this morning.
With determination, he got up and went to the kitchen to do just that.
Chapter Ten
The Proposal
They were elbow deep in cookie dough, three baking sheets sitting on the vast kitchen table half-filled with sloppy balls. Ruby was on her knees on the bench, her fingers a mess, slipping Carter, who was sitting across from her doing a crossword puzzle, pieces of dough (while consuming much of it herself) nearly as fast as Julia could put them on the sheets.
“It would be nice, Ruby-girl, if your brother and sister had some cookies when they got home from school,” Julia admonished but her tone was teasing.
After she said this, with confusion Julia noticed Carter stiffen and he glanced swiftly down at his crossword puzzle, all the smiles and winks he’d been passing Ruby erased from his face.
“Carter.”
Julia jumped and turned around to see Douglas stroll arrogantly in the kitchen. She cursed him silently, prowling around like a cat. How a big man like him could be so damn quiet, she’d never know.