“How about—” that beatific smile—“Auric?”
“As in Goldfinger? Get real. Okay, you’ve had your chance, mate … .”
“Mummy darling!” I squeaked as soon as the front door opened to my knock. “I’m awfully sorry to arrive unannounced and all that, but I had to let you meet Dominic. Isn’t he just divine?”
Sean had time to glare at me before he shouldered his way through the narrow opening, looking for all the world as if I was the one thrusting him eagerly inside. My mother, without a chance of mounting a viable defense, backed up into the tiled hallway, nothing but bewilderment on her smooth features.
She looked normal. Normal for my mother, that is. Hair set and face perfect, she was wearing a high-neck cream silk blouse with a fine-knit wool cardigan over it, probably cashmere, and, yes, pearls at her throat and ears. She’d finished off the ensemble with a tweed skirt and sensible shoes. Every inch the countrified English lady.
And not the slightest sign that she was being held here under duress.
For an expanded moment, we stood there, the three of us. It felt to me that I saw everything in that austere space in the blink of an eye. The gleaming black-and-white diagonal set of the tiles underfoot, the old church pew that doubled as a repository for car keys and unopened mail, with a line of scrubbed Wellington boots beneath, the polished dark wood staircase stretching to the upper floor.
And the two unidentified jackets on the pegs below the antique mirror.
I glanced up at it, saw the crack of the slightly open door to the drawing room reflected there, and instinctively held out my arms wide.
“Mummy, it’s so lovely to see you,” I said, my voice still loud and as guileless as I could make it. “Now, I know it’s naughty of us to just pop up from London like this, but Nicky’s just so impulsive.” I threw Sean an adoring glance and he, to his credit, managed to smile indulgently at me rather than vomit.
For another second my mother stared at me with a kind of horrified expression, but that could have been wholly accounted for by my lunatic behavior. I waited a beat longer. If I was totally off base, all I’d done was make an ass of myself. But, if not …
Then, numbly, she shuffled forwards and allowed herself to be engulfed in a big daughterly hug, when the most physical contact she’d initiated in years was a chaste hello/good-bye kiss to her powdered cheek. She vibrated with tension in my arms. I put my mouth very close to the pearl stud in her ear and murmured, “Where are they?”
If that was possible, she stiffened, as though I’d suggested something indecent, and pulled back. Then her eyes swiveled, very deliberately—towards the staircase and back. Towards the drawing room and back.
“Darling,” she said, her voice croaky. She cleared her throat. “Um, how wonderful to see you. What a nice surprise! I’m afraid I—I can’t really offer you lunch or—”
“Oh, gosh, we couldn’t possibly put you to all that trouble at such short notice,” I interrupted gaily. “Besides, I promised darling Nicky I’d show him a real country pub.” I gave a tinkling little laugh. “He’s fully expecting a bunch of yokels with straw in their mouths and string round their trouser legs. I’ve told him he’s more likely to rub shoulders with the same stockbrokers here that he does up in Town.”
My mother stepped out of my embrace and turned to Sean, who’d been waiting politely for us to finish our show of familial affection.
“Mrs. Foxcroft, it’s such a pleasure,” he said, in that kind of drawling, slightly bored upper-class voice you can’t escape from in the trendy parts of Soho. “I’ve heard so much about you.” He grasped my mother’s arms and made a production of air-kissing her on both cheeks. I thought she was going to faint. “And now that I’ve met you, all I can say is that you must have had your daughter when you were awfully young.”
My mother flushed and preened automatically, a knee-jerk response to the heavily ladled charm. Then she threw me an utterly confused look and stumbled back a pace.
“We just thought we’d stop off for a nice cup of tea, then we’ll be on our way,” I said deliberately, moving forward to take her arm. “And perhaps one of your scrummy cakes? I’ve been telling Nicky what a total angel you are in the kitchen.” I glanced at Sean with a huge smile and added wickedly, “Mummy’s buns are absolutely to die for.”
Sean’s expression froze momentarily as he fought for control over it, then relaxed into courteous attention. “Oh I’m sure they are,” he murmured, and threw me a warning glance. Don’t push it. This is not a game.
Trust me. I know.
“Oh, er, well, please do come through,” my mother said, any double entendres going straight over her head. She pushed open the door to the drawing room and led us inside.
I don’t know quite what I’d been expecting, but the sight that greeted me wasn’t it. The only occupant of that starchily formal room was a tall blond woman, who sat on the sofa with her legs gracefully arranged, her long shins slanted alongside each other, knees pressed demurely together.
She had apparently been flicking through the pages of the magazine that lay open on her lap—The Field, if the photo spread of gundogs was anything to go by. When we walked in she put the magazine aside and glanced up with nothing but polite inquiry on her strong-boned face.
I took one look at the way she emptied her hands and knew she was a player.
“Oh, gosh, Mummy, we didn’t realize you had visitors,” I cried, going all aflutter. “How awfully rude of us!” I bounded forwards, closing rapidly on the woman on the sofa. My intention was to overcrowd her but she unfolded her legs and got to her feet faster than I’d hoped.
“Awfully rude of us,” I repeated, having to lift my gaze to look her in the eye as I pumped her hand with a purposefully limp grip. The short-sleeve dress she wore showed off lean, well-defined muscles, but, even close-up, her face bore no scar tissue to show she was a fighter, and no hint that she’d had surgical help to remove it.
Now, I pulled a little moue and treated this stranger to a conspiratorial smile. “I just couldn’t wait to show off darling Nicky.”
“Well, I can’t say I blame you for that,” the woman said, dropping my flaccid hand as soon as she was able to.
Her accent was American—educated midwestern, if I was any judge. As she spoke, she ran her glittering eyes over Sean in a slow predatory survey. He bore it with an arrogant indifference, as though this kind of female adoration happened all the time and was just another cross he had to bear. “Wherever did she find you?”
Sean’s expression became ever more languid. “Polo,” he said, and smiled at me as though the sun rose and fell in my eyes. “I have a small string.”
“Really?” Blondie said, swallowing it and impressed, despite herself. “Well, you should talk to my … associate. He’s the horse nut.”
My mother had slunk silently into her favorite armchair next to the original Adam-style fireplace during this brief exchange. Her gaze was not inside the room and her hands were trembling. She’d been knitting—something she did only when she was upset—the beginnings of an Aran sweater, by the looks of it. The heavy-gauge wool and number-two needles and all the related paraphernalia were stuffed into an old brocade bag at the side of the chair. She picked it up now, stared at the partially completed garment, then put it down again without seeing a thing.
“Your associate?” I queried, moving to my mother’s side. I put a reassuring hand on her shoulder but she didn’t respond to my touch.