by Liz Fielding
Breaking away from a look that seemed to sear her soul, she turned away, tossing the thing on to the back seat.
‘Has there been a break-in?’ she asked as he pulled away from the kerb, into the busy late-evening traffic.
‘No. The flat is fine,’ he said, concentrating on the road as he eased his way across the lanes.
Of course it was. If it had been something that simple he wouldn’t have bothered her; he’d have dealt with it himself. Or had Miranda do it for him.
‘I don’t understand. Nobody knows I’m living there.’
Only Simone and Claire. Simone’s lost diary flashed through her head but she dismissed it. The address of the flat couldn’t possibly have been in her diary…
‘Just you, my agent…’
Daisy.
She felt the blood drain from her face.
Daisy was in trouble. ‘What is it? What’s happened?’
‘They wouldn’t give me any details, Belle. Just that someone admitted to A &E earlier this evening was carrying a letter with your name, your address and they didn’t know who else to contact.’
‘Hospital? But…’ She moved her lips, did everything right, but no sound emerged. ‘She’s unconscious?’
‘Apparently she collapsed in the street. They wouldn’t tell me any more.’
‘No…’ She cleared her throat, tried again. ‘No.’ Then, ‘I’m sorry you were bothered. I didn’t want you…’
‘Bothered.’ He finished the sentence when she faltered.
Belle heard the dead sound in his voice. Well, what had she expected? ‘I’m sorry.’
‘So am I, Belle. So am I.’
Ivo steered the big car across the city with only the intermittent slap of the wipers clearing the icy drizzle breaking the silence.
She.
He hadn’t said whether the person was male or female, but Belle had known. So it was true. She had a daughter.
He waited, hoping that she would tell him, trust him. Then, glancing at her as he pulled up in front of the hospital, he realised that she was beyond that. That she was taut with anxiety, with something else. Fear?
He reached across, briefly touched her hands, which were clenched together in her lap, and when she looked up he said, ‘We’ll take care of her, Belle.’
For a moment he saw something flicker in the depths of her eyes, something that gave him hope, then, quite deliberately, she shook her head, moved her hands.
‘There is no we. Thank you for coming to fetch me, for the lift.’ She opened the door before he could get out and do it for her. ‘I can handle it from here.’
‘You may not want to live with me, Belle, but I’m still your husband,’ he said, doing his best to keep the desperation from his voice. To stop her from shutting him out. This was not like buying a car. Painting a ceiling. He’d spoken to the policeman. He knew how hard this was going to be. ‘I am still your friend.’
She did not look at him as she said, ‘We’ve never been friends, Ivo.’
And with that she swung her legs from the car and walked away from him, picking up her gown as she climbed the steps to the entrance.
For a moment he stayed where he was, pinned to his seat by her words. Knowing that he should go after her, that she would need him, no matter what she said.
We’ve never been friends…
Was that the truth?
He’d wanted her body. Had wanted the warmth she’d brought to his life.
What, apart from a sense of security that she no longer needed, had he ever given her in return?
Even now, when she’d left him, when she’d plainly said that there was nothing in their marriage, nothing in him, to hold her, he was plotting and planning as if she were some company, some thing he wanted to possess, control.
Not a woman who, with each passing day, he admired more, understood more, missed more. Who he knew he would not want to live without.
We’ve never been friends…
Her words dripped into his mind like acid, peeling away the layers of scar tissue that had built up since his earliest years, protecting him from pain, letting in light so that he could see that he’d been asking the wrong question. It wasn’t what, how much, he could give her to bring her back that he should be asking himself; he already knew that there weren’t enough diamonds in the world, or flowers, no penthouse apartment built that would do it for him.
She didn’t want, need, possessions; she had all she’d ever need without him. But security wasn’t just a well-stocked portfolio. There was a deeper psychological dimension to it, a need that transcended physical comfort, one which no amount of money could provide; that was the security she’d sought from him and which he’d failed so miserably to give her. Because for all his wealth, he knew his own emotional piggy bank was empty.
How did you fill a dry well?
Where did you go for something you could not buy?
The dilemma of a thousand fairy tales. What did he have to barter that was worth the heart of Belle Davenport?
As if on cue the phone rang, offering, if not an answer, another chance.
Belle ignored the ripple of interest that her arrival in A &E provoked.
She made herself known at reception, was taken through to one of the treatment rooms where a scarecrow of a girl was lying on the examination table. Thin, pale, wearing nothing more than a T-shirt, a pair of black jeans. Belle tried not to react, betray her shock, horror, but forced herself to reach out.
‘Daisy?’ she said.
The girl did not respond to her touch, refused to meet her eyes. She was nineteen, nearly twenty, but she looked so young, so pathetic, so thin…
She’d had this picture in her head of Daisy as a grown-up version of the little girl she remembered. Blonde, pretty. Happy. A young woman with a family. Someone she could love. Who would love her. Not this sorry creature.
‘Is she hurt?’ she asked, turning to the nurse.
‘The doctor couldn’t find anything. No bumps, no bruises, no sign of self-harm.’
Self-harm? She swallowed.
‘Is she anorexic?’ She could hardly bring herself to say the word, but she needed to know the worst.
‘She’s pregnant, Miss Davenport.’
‘Pregnant!’
‘She just passed out. It happens, although it would be less likely if she was eating regularly, had a little TLC.’ Then, ‘I thought you knew her?’
‘Yes,’ she said. ‘I know her.’
At least she thought she did, but there was no connection, no instant bonding, none of the emotional attachment that she’d anticipated, hoped for. But then, why would Daisy have any reason to feel that way about her?
‘It’s been a very long time since I’ve seen her,’ she added, when the nurse continued to look at her, clearly expecting a little more. ‘Are you admitting her?’
‘This is a hospital, not a B &B.’
B &B? Bed and breakfast…‘She can’t wait until morning for something to eat!’
‘We’re not an all night café, either.’
‘No.’ Belle flushed with embarrassment. ‘I’m sorry. I can see you’re rushed off your feet. I’ll go and organise some transport, get out of your way.’ She glanced at Daisy, but there was no reaction, no pleasure, no rejection, just a blank stare. ‘If that’s all right?’
‘If you want her, she’s all yours.’ She turned to the girl, who had not moved, and said, ‘It seems as if it’s your lucky day.’
That earned the nurse a glare. She was clearly immune because she just said, ‘Take it or leave it, but I need this room for someone who’s actually sick.’
Daisy sat up slowly, lowered feet encased in a pair of scarred and muddy black sports shoes, then slid to the floor, picked up her coat and headed for the door without a word.
The nurse raised a rather-you-than-me eyebrow in Belle’s direction. Belle shrugged and then, realising that she was in danger of losing her sister all over again, hurried after her.
&nbs
p; ‘Wait.’ Then, when she kept going, head down as she strode towards the door, ‘Daisy. Please…’
‘I didn’t ask them to call you,’ she said, without stopping.
‘I know.’ Belle hurried alongside her, struggling to keep up in her high heels and long dress. ‘But I’m here. Look, just wait while I call a cab.’ Daisy finally stopped, but still did not look at her. ‘Sit down. Or get a cup of something hot from the machine. Chocolate. That will warm you…’
‘I haven’t got any money.’
‘Take this.’
Belle turned. Ivo was standing behind her, extending a handful of change in Daisy’s direction, but he was looking at her. After what she’d said to him, she hadn’t expected to see him ever again.
Maybe that had been her intention. To drive him away.
‘You left your bag behind,’ he said, before she could ask. ‘Jace came after you, but we’d already gone so he dropped it off at the house. Manda phoned me. She knew you’d need your keys.’
‘I…yes.’
Only then did he turn to Daisy. ‘We’ve met before.’
She didn’t reply, just stalked off towards the door.
‘When?’ Belle demanded. ‘When have you seen her before?’
‘She’s the girl who set off your car alarm the other day.’
So close. She’d been so close…‘You said she had green hair.’
‘That was four days ago. And actually I think I prefer the blue,’ he said. ‘It goes with her eyes.’
‘What do you mean by that?’
‘Nothing.’ Then, ‘Hadn’t we better go after her?’
CHAPTER SIX
T HERE is no we…
She’d said the words in an attempt to drive him away and she suspected that he was using ‘we’ now in an attempt to show her how wrong she was.
He needn’t have bothered.
Whatever happened they would always, in her mind, her heart, be connected for eternity-in the memory of every touch, kiss, the sweet caresses that drove every other thought from her mind. In those moments when nothing else existed.
‘Belle?’
‘Yes,’ she said, catching her breath. Then, as they emerged through the sliding doors, ‘Where’s she gone?’
‘Not far,’ Ivo said with certainty.
Belle ignored the cynical undertone-he didn’t understand, how could he?-and said, ‘We’ve got to find her. It’s cold. She’s hungry…’ She couldn’t quite bring herself to say what else she was.
‘She’s there, look. On the other side of the road.’
Wishing she was wearing something more sensible on her feet, something more sensible full stop, Belle ran down the steps. Ivo was there before her. ‘Get in the car.’
She took no notice, side-stepping him, lifted her skirts as she began to run.
‘Daisy, wait…Where are you going?’ she demanded breathlessly, dodging cars to cross the road. Just wanting to hold her, keep her safe.
Then, as Daisy paused and turned, instead of reaching for her, she found herself held back by a force field of anger so powerful that she took a step back.
‘Why did it have to be you? You abandoned me!’ Then, pitiably, ‘I wasn’t looking for you. I was looking for my father.’
‘Why?’ The word was shocked out of her. ‘Why would you want to find him? He didn’t just abandon Mum and me, he abandoned you too. Everything that happened was his fault…’
‘Liar!’
‘It’s true!’ And then, seeing Daisy’s face crumple, Belle would have done anything to call the bitter words back. She’d been a baby when it had happened. She didn’t have a clue. How could she? All she knew was that her mother had died, her sister had abandoned her. Who else was there for her but some fantasy figure of a father? What other hope did she have?
The rain had stopped but a raw wind was whistling down the narrow street and, shivering, desperate to make it right, call the words back, Belle fought back all the bad memories. If that was what Daisy wanted, if that was what she needed, then she’d find her father for her.
‘We’d have a better chance of finding him together, Daisy.’
‘Oh, right. Like you want that.’
‘It’s what you want that matters to me.’
Ivo pulled up alongside them, got out of the car and took off his coat, wrapping it, warm from his body, around her shoulders, as if she were the one who needed looking after. As if he were the only person in the world capable of doing it.
Maybe he was.
And she heard Simone’s voice saying, ‘Ivo could help you…’
She had no doubt that finding Daisy’s father would be a lot more difficult than finding Daisy. That if anyone could do it, he could.
She shook her head. She had to do this on her own. Stand on her own two feet and, shrugging off his coat, she draped it around her sister.
‘I’ll help you, Daisy,’ she said. ‘Whatever you want. There are agencies who can help, who specialize in searching for people. Family members.’
‘Family? You’re not my family!’
Ivo saw Belle flinch as if struck. Open her mouth as if to speak but unable to find words to express her feelings, and he felt her pain to the bone.
‘Belle…Please,’ Ivo said, impatiently. ‘Both of you. Daisy? Why don’t you get in the car?’
Daisy told him in words of one syllable, just what he could do with his car.
‘There’s no point in standing here getting soaked,’ he said, letting it go. There was enough raw emotion flying about without him adding to the mix. Belle had made it more than clear that she wanted to deal with this herself, didn’t want him involved. ‘I’ll leave you to talk.’
‘Why would I want to talk to her? She abandoned me, left me, didn’t want to know!’
‘No!’
Belle’s cry tore at him. He’d heard enough and cutting off the torrent of abuse that Daisy unleashed upon Belle, he said, ‘That’s it. Enough. I’ll give you money for food, but I’m not going to allow Belle to stand here in the rain listening to your self-pitying rant-’
‘Allow me?’ Belle turned on him, blazing with fury. ‘Allow me?’
‘You won’t be use or ornament with pneumonia,’ he pointed out, doing his best to keep things on an even keel, but aware that sympathy would only fuel whatever was driving Daisy’s misery.
‘Don’t you understand? I don’t care about myself. I only care about her.’
‘I know, Belle. Believe me, I know.’
‘This isn’t about you. About us,’ she said, misunderstanding his meaning. Assuming he was referring to the fact that she’d left him for this. ‘If I walk away, where will she go?’
‘The same place she stayed last night, I imagine,’ he said, as gently as he could. ‘And the night before that. Why don’t you ask her?’
‘No.’ Belle felt the rain soaking through the lace and silk to her skin. Freezing rain. She’d been here before. Cold, wet, hungry. She knew all the dark places where frightened women hid from the night. ‘No,’ she said, talking to herself as much as Ivo, ‘I can’t take that risk.’
‘What risk?’ He turned his attention to Daisy. ‘She’s been hanging around your flat, ringing your number. Do you imagine it was a coincidence that she conveniently passed out in the street with your address in her pocket on the biggest night of your year? She’s making you run, Belle, making you chase her. She’s not going anywhere you won’t find her.’
‘What made you such a cynic, Ivo?’ she demanded.
Ivo was desperate. The rain was coming down steadily now, soaking into the sweater he was wearing, soaking into the girl’s miserable clothes, plastering Belle’s beautiful dress to her skin and her hair to her cheeks, her neck. She said she didn’t care about herself but he did and, despite everything, he cared more than he would ever have believed possible about her daughter too, simply because she was Belle’s flesh and blood.
‘I’m not a cynic, Belle,’ he said, but he knew what he was dealing wi
th here and if he had to be the bad guy to get them somewhere safe and warm, he was prepared to do that for them both. ‘I’m a realist.’ He opened the rear passenger door and said, ‘What do you say, Daisy? A hot bath, a warm bed, good food. It’s got to be better than this.’
‘Stuff your hot bath. I don’t need her and I certainly don’t need you.’
‘You don’t get me,’ he assured her, hoping that humour might work where an appeal to sense had not. She didn’t move. ‘Suppose I throw in a hundred pounds?’ he offered. Money was the only inducement he had left. Money always talked.
‘Ivo!’
‘No? A thousand pounds?’ he persisted, ignoring Belle’s outrage.
‘I hate you,’ Daisy said, glaring at him. Then, sticking her chin out, ‘Five thousand pounds.’
He saw Belle’s face and something inside him broke. She didn’t deserve this. She didn’t deserve any of this…
‘I hate both of you,’ Daisy shouted, tossing off his coat, flinging it at Belle. It happened so quickly that while Belle was caught up in the coat and he was momentarily distracted, the girl disappeared. It was as if she’d melted away. Thin as she was, that clearly couldn’t be the case; obviously she’d ducked down one of the barely lit alleyways between the buildings.
He swore, furious with her, furious with himself. It wasn’t supposed to be like this. It wasn’t how he’d imagined it. He’d been sure that when Belle had connected with her lost child, had that need fulfilled, he would be able to tell her the truth. From the time the policeman had arrived on his doorstep he’d known it wasn’t going to be that easy but, with all his experience with Manda, he should have done better than this.
It was as if he’d turned into his father overnight.
‘I’m so sorry, Belle.’
She shook her head. ‘Help me, Ivo,’ she begged. ‘Help me to find her…’
Her words should have made him the happiest man alive, but life was never that simple. All he had to be grateful for was that he was there, that she was still speaking to him.