‘He’s never going to come out officially, and he’s never going to leave the Church,’ Ludo said sadly. ‘So what’s a boy to do? I love him more than anything in the world, and he loves me more than any other person. But being a priest is equally important to him as being with me, and I can’t change that. Here I sit, planning everyone’s perfect weddings with their antique teapots and lilies of the valley, God help me, when what I want more than anything is to plan my own. But I can’t, and I probably never will. Not as long as I’m with Liam. I know the new Pope’s making nice noises about being gay-friendly, but the gulf between “you’re not all going to hell” and “feel free to get married and settle down” is still gaping wide.’
He sighed.
‘Not to whinge on, of course,’ he said as the waiter returned with a bottle dewed with cool drops from the chill of the terrace’s wine fridge. ‘But just to make the point that sometimes one finds oneself in situations that one simply has to accept. If you really think you can’t stand to be with anyone else but Tarquin, the waiting game is all you have left. And you’re going to have to hold your chin up and smile so successfully that sarcastic queens like me don’t spot that, as Aretha Franklin sings so wonderfully, you’re laughing on the outside, crying on the inside. Because most of us, I’m sorry to say, will mock you horribly for it.’
Eva nodded, her eyes wide and concentrated.
‘I’m so sorry about—’ she started, but Ludo was already waving her away with a sweep of his hand.
‘Please! We don’t dwell,’ he said firmly. ‘And we certainly don’t apologize for things that aren’t our fault. Now pop down to that spa like a good girl, have a steam and a nice cry and get it all out so you can look bright and fresh for dinner and like you don’t have a care in the world, while I ring my beloved and tell him that Thunderbirds are Go for Chianti next spring.’
He suited the action to the word, picking up his iPhone and flickering his fingers over the touch screen as Eva obediently stood up and proceeded to follow his instructions exactly as he had laid them out. Ludo was quite right. Crying her heart out in a hammam turned out to be the single most therapeutic thing she had ever done in her life.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Stanclere Hall, February
‘Miss Brianna?’
Mrs Hurley put her head round the corner of the library door, her voice sounding unaccustomedly tentative. But then, everyone had been on tenterhooks around Brianna Jade for the last couple of months, even Edmund; ever since the engagement party, the staff and master of Stanclere Hall had been walking on eggshells trying to keep her happy, and failing. Naturally, they all assumed that the key issue was the abject failure of the Style photo shoot, and they also took for granted that Tamra’s storming out immediately after evicting Milly meant that Tamra was furious not just with Milly, but with her own daughter.
Because Tamra had not been back to the Hall since then. All the energy she had pumped into the first phase of the renovations, all the detailed plans and loving care that she had brought to the magnificent redecoration of the central wing and the public rooms, had now dissipated in a puff of smoke. Instead, she was travelling widely, photographed in the gossip columns tossing back her hair and smiling for the cameras, a different handsome tanned young man by her side in every new photograph: from the Sandy Lane Hotel in Barbados to Cabo San Lucas in Mexico to the Amanpuri resort in Phuket, she had spent the last couple of months hitting a whole range of the most exclusive winter-sun holiday destinations, partying hard, sometimes with Lady Margaret, sometimes with the latest gigolo of choice.
The building works at Stanclere continued, of course, according to her instructions, now supervised by a project manager hired by Tamra. Ironically, although Tamra had previously driven the workers crazy with her relentless drive for perfection, now that she was absent, everyone missed her. With Tamra in charge, they had all known that they were doing their absolute best, because there was no alternative: if they didn’t execute a task perfectly, they would have to tear it out and do it all over again. This had swiftly raised standards all over the site, especially because Tamra, a very successful businesswoman, had been as swift with praise as she was with criticism, and had wielded her power to give bonuses with the skill that came with experience of managing people. The works had flown along before: now they chugged at a slower pace, done perfectly competently, but without Tamra’s taste and flair.
If anyone had expected Brianna Jade to step up to the plate and take over now that her mother had gone AWOL, they learnt their lesson fast. After a few attempts by the project manager and Mrs Hurley to consult with her, they had both backed off, it being very obvious that the questions were bouncing off Brianna Jade. All she could offer was a weak smile and a muttered: ‘Just do what Mom would do, I guess,’ in answer to every question. The poor girl was under the impression that her mother was so angry with her failure to connect with the Style photo shoot that she had packed up and taken off for London, washing her hands of her daughter. Tamra had even refused to come back for Christmas and New Year, which had been a huge blow to Brianna Jade: they had never been apart for the holidays before, and Tamra had been planning a lavish fortnight of celebrations and parties at the Hall before the disastrous weekend of the shoot put paid to all that.
Instead, Tamra and Lady Margaret had celebrated Christmas in London at Lady Margaret’s house in Eaton Square and then flown to Barbados to see in the New Year: Tamra had told her daughter airily in a phone call that she felt that, in order to bond with Edmund, Brianna Jade really should spend the holidays with her fiancé without her old mother getting in the way. Brianna Jade had sobbed and protested and told Tamra that she was ridiculous even to think that, let alone say it, but Tamra had been utterly unyielding, even when her daughter asked in tears if she could come to London to see her mother for Christmas: all Tamra would repeat in reply, like a robot parrot, was that Brianna Jade and Edmund needed to bond without her in the way.
No matter how much Brianna Jade begged and pleaded and pointed out that Edmund was very fond of her mother, respected her drive and energy, was happy for Tamra to treat Stanclere Hall like her own country home, Tamra would not be swayed. The only moment Tamra had strayed at all from the robot parrot script was when Brianna Jade, desperate now, had suggested that Edmund himself call his future mother-in-law to reassure her that she was always welcome at what was now his and Brianna Jade’s home.
That, for some reason, had made Tamra utterly hysterical. Brianna Jade couldn’t imagine why, and she didn’t get an answer, no matter how much she asked. She barely even knew if her mother had heard the question. Tamra screamed incoherently that Brianna Jade had no idea what she was talking about and that she and her daughter needed a break, before pretty much hanging up on her.
It was the first fight they had ever had – not that it was even really a fight, as Brianna Jade hadn’t been able to get a word in edgeways. She’d stared at the phone in her hand as the line went dead, unable to believe what had just happened. Needed a break? What did that even mean? How could a mother and daughter who loved each other as much as the two of them did possibly need a break? What could Brianna Jade have done so badly wrong that her mother didn’t want to see her any more? Had freaking out at the photo shoot really been such a terrible crime that Tamra couldn’t forgive her? Oh God, would Tamra ever forgive her?
Ever since then, Brianna Jade had effectively been in mourning. Her relationship with her mother was the only close one she had ever known, and it had been the greatest source of love, companionship and trust she could imagine. Tamra might have dragged her daughter round every pageant conceivable, taken her on the road when Brianna Jade, a homebody, would much rather have stayed in Kewanee, but there had never been any doubt in Brianna Jade’s mind that her mother was doing everything for her daughter’s benefit.
All Mom ever wanted was to see me happy and settled with no money worries, Brianna Jade thought miserably. But how can I be happy w
ithout her? Of course we can’t live together for ever, just the two of us. I know that! I was totally fine sharing a house with her and Ken, and I’d be just as fine if Mom came and went from Stanclere Hall, kept her rooms here, kind of lived here half the time, came for all the holidays. And Edmund would be too!
I just wish she hadn’t reacted like that when I said he could call her and tell her he wanted her to come for Christmas. It’s like she’s mad at both of us now.
As far as bonding with her fiancé went, Brianna Jade could not deny that Edmund was being as lovely, sympathetic and understanding about her grief at her mother’s disappearance from her life as she could possibly have wanted. Seeing Brianna Jade’s misery, Edmund had bent over backwards to treat her with kid gloves, spending much more time with her than he had before, and although Brianna Jade was very grateful for his care and attention, she couldn’t help feeling a little odd about it. She loved the company, was highly relieved that Edmund was devoting his time to her, and yet it was as if he wanted something from her, was waiting for something from her, that she couldn’t figure out and so didn’t know how to provide. There was an air of anticipation, of excited expectation, that hovered around him for the first month or so after the photo shoot, and he was being so sweet and thoughtful to her that she really tried, even through her sadness, to give him whatever it was that he wanted in return.
However, Brianna Jade might not have the business smarts and organizational skills of her mother, but she was clever and intuitive, and she couldn’t help sensing that whatever Edmund was waiting for, he wasn’t getting it. He was as kind and considerate as ever, but the anticipation seemed to fade, replaced by a sort of . . . resignation, was how she would have put it.
She’d made some attempts to ask him if there was anything missing from their relationship, and he had assured her that there wasn’t; that night, when they were having sex, however, there had been a very odd moment when she had suddenly screeched because, apparently, his watch strap got caught in her hair, pulling it nearly out by the roots. It had been really painful; he had apologized profusely and explained what had happened, because it was night-time and so dark she couldn’t see a thing. It had been the next day before she had had the even odder thought that Edmund never actually wore his watch to bed . . .
Which had made Brianna Jade wonder nervously if Edmund was secretly into some sort of kinky sex stuff that she definitely would not welcome at all. A previous boyfriend had wanted to spank her with a hairbrush once, and she’d told him exactly where to shove it; she wasn’t judgemental at all, was more than happy for everyone to get on with doing whatever they wanted with whomever they wanted, but no one was going to spank her or pull her hair or do anything freaky with her, thank you very much. The boyfriend had derisively called her vanilla, to which she’d snapped back that it was her favourite ice-cream flavour and not to let the door hit him on his way out.
However, since that scream of shock at what was hopefully an accidental hair-pull, Edmund hadn’t tried anything like that again – if in fact he had even tried it in the first place – and things had settled back into the normal, regular, vanilla sex routine, which Brianna Jade found perfectly satisfactory. She found herself wanting sex more than ever these days, probably as a compensation for Tamra’s absence; the physical contact was hugely comforting, the cuddling afterwards maybe even more so. She was leaning on Edmund so much for comfort at the moment, and could only be grateful that he was responding.
Because, since being informed that Milly had spotted her being carried back to the Hall by Abel after getting tipsy on cider, Brianna Jade had decided that her visits to the pigpens would have to become much less frequent. In a series of sly asides during the Style shoot, Milly had implied some truly nasty things about Brianna Jade’s friendship with Abel, things that had made Brianna Jade feel dirty and sordid. Not only would she never dream of cheating on her fiancé, but to imply that her happy, guilt-free friendship with Abel was sordid and creepy in some way, that Abel had some sort of designs on her, that he had got her drunk deliberately so he could make a pass at her . . . that was just horrible, and it had completely tainted Brianna Jade’s ability to hang out with Abel as she had done before.
She knew, of course, that none of it was true. She and Abel had simply made friends because of their mutual love of animals in general and pigs in particular, and not only had Abel not got her drunk on purpose, his grandmother had been there the whole time! Nothing could have been more innocent, and yet Milly’s nasty little quips about Abel’s size, dungarees and ability to sweep Brianna Jade off her feet had somehow poisoned the well, made it very difficult for her to feel as easy and natural and unaffected with him as she had been before.
So she had cut right back on her visits to the pigpens and to the Empress of Stanclere, and honestly, she almost thought sometimes that she missed them as much as she missed seeing her mom. Which was ridiculous, of course, but she couldn’t help feeling it. In fact, when Mrs Hurley popped her head round the door, Brianna Jade had been struggling with the urge to take the old route for her daily run, swing by the pigpens and see what Abel, the Empress and the rest of the pigs were up to; there would definitely be fewer now since the pre-Christmas pig slaughter. The impulse to visit the remaining ones was so strong that she greeted Mrs Hurley’s intrusion with huge gratitude for the distraction, her smile almost as bright and welcoming as it had been before she had effectively lost both Tamra and Abel from her life.
‘What is it, Mrs Hurley?’ she asked, sounding encouraging enough for the housekeeper to smile back in relief and come fully into the library.
‘I didn’t want to disturb you, miss,’ Mrs Hurley said, ‘but there’s a visitor asking for you. Says she’s your cousin from America.’
She cleared her throat, the well-trained servant’s way of indicating disbelief without actually saying a word.
This was not, in itself, impossible. Brianna Jade had a lot of cousins in America: both Tamra and the late lamented Brian Schladdenhouffer had had numerous siblings who had gone on to produce numerous spawn. And yet Brianna Jade very much doubted that one of her many Schladdenhouffer or Krantz cousins, or whatever surname of predominantly Scandinavian or German extraction taken on marriage by the female Schladdenhouffers or Krantzes, had decided to fly across the Atlantic and make their way to Rutland County for the purpose of visiting their very estranged relative without even so much as a phone call first.
No, this female ‘cousin’ could be only one person. And suddenly, Brianna Jade found herself wishing devoutly that her only problems were the absence from her life of her mother and her best friend at Stanclere Hall.
‘She’s called Barb, right?’ Brianna Jade said, a sense of doom enveloping her as thickly as if a dark blanket had been dropped over her head.
Mrs Hurley nodded.
‘That’s right, miss. I think she rang you here, months ago, didn’t she? So she is your cousin?’
She managed to pitch the second sentence so perfectly between a statement and a question that Brianna Jade could have chosen not to answer it if she hadn’t wished to; it wasn’t Mrs Hurley’s place to query her employer, but at the same time, as the housekeeper of Stanclere Hall, it was her business to know how to treat every guest who came below its hallowed roof. Considering the appearance and demeanour of this new visitor, her relationship to the Earl’s fiancée would certainly make a difference to which bedroom might be assigned to her, or whether she merited a maid’s unpacking her suitcase.
‘Not really. Sorta,’ Brianna Jade muttered in confusion. Barb had a hold over her: Brianna Jade couldn’t directly contradict something Barb had said. ‘It’s, uh, a big family on both sides. She’s kind of . . . anyway . . .’
‘Brianna Jade! Honey, you in here?’
Behind Mrs Hurley’s apron-clad figure, Barb Norkus burst into the library, grinning from ear to ear.
‘Wow, look at all these books! Have you read ’em all? Sheesh, this place is so old!
Hey, you’ve come a long way from that tumbledown shack of the Lutzes’, right?’
Barb’s voice was as sharp and nasally inflected as ever, but she was much thinner and paler than Brianna Jade remembered; her face was greyish, in fact, and although Barb had made an effort to outline her eyes in black pencil and gloss her lips, the use of concealer to hide the dark circles beneath her eyes and the rough reddish skin around her nostrils would have been considerably more useful in improving her appearance. You couldn’t grow up where Brianna Jade had without being familiar with the signs of meth use, and she had no doubt, looking at the skinny figure before her, the jeans and sweater Barb was wearing hanging off her bones, that a lot of the money Brianna Jade had been sending Barb had gone up her nose or into a pipe.
‘Would you like a cup of tea?’ Brianna Jade said automatically: she was so accustomed by now to asking this question of British guests that it popped out of her mouth, and she could have bitten her tongue off when Barb burst into raucous laughter.
‘Get you, lady of the house!’ she said maliciously. ‘I guess you’ve been watching Downton Abbey to learn all this British shit!’
Barb’s hair was freshly bleached, with barely any roots showing; she had pulled it back into a long ponytail and her nails were newly done. She had made some effort to spruce up before dropping in on Brianna Jade. The jeans and sweater looked new as well, and the big bag slung over her shoulder, which she now dumped onto the library table, was a Coach ripoff from Macy’s; it was obvious that Barb had come up in the world financially. But you would never have looked at her thin frame and imagined for a moment that she had once been Corn Queen of Watseka. You needed curves to be a beauty queen, and curves were not what a diet of cigarettes, meth and diet sodas got you.
‘A plate of sandwiches, please, Mrs Hurley,’ Brianna Jade said, standing up and managing to summon some sort of outward composure as her brain raced frantically. ‘And, um . . .’
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