And that was without taking Douglas into consideration.
Julia walked out to the doorway of the room and whispered, “I’ve been here a few hours, please give me time, let me see how it goes.”
“I’m coming for Thanksgiving. I can’t wait until spring term or whatever they call it. I want to see my babies,” Patty returned.
Julia’s mother wanted to be close to her baby’s babies. Gavin had been her pride and joy. She was using her drama to cover her grief and Julia was glad of it. This kind of Patricia she could handle, grand statements, dire threats she never intended to carry out, Julia was used to that. If her mother gave way to the mourning she was covering, Julia would lose it herself and she couldn’t, not now. She had to be strong.
“We stick with the plan, Mom. I need a chance to settle in here and the kids need it too. No more upheavals. No more drama. Please, please, let me handle it.”
Patricia hesitated for a moment and then sighed extravagantly. “Thank God you have Mrs. K, she at least, even through that English reserve, has got a heart in her chest. Okay, call me tomorrow. Love you, miss you already my Doll Baby.” And she hung up, not letting Julia say her own good-byes.
Julia walked back into the room and replaced the phone. She took a moment to study the kids; Willie and Lizzie doing their homework and Ruby playing some game by herself.
Julia was tired. No, not tired, exhausted. And she knew it wasn’t jetlag. Since the phone rang in the deep of the night five months ago, she hadn’t had a full night’s sleep. That same, awful night, she and her mother had rushed to the airport and then spent the next two weeks dealing with their own grief and the grief of the three children.
A car accident.
Gavin, Julia knew, drove too fast. It was raining. They were coming home from having dinner together at some country pub on one of England’s dangerously winding roads. It was dark. Gavin might have driven fast but the driver of the other car was driving faster, he’d lost control and gone over the centre line on a curve. Gavin had died at the scene, so had the other driver. Tamsin had lived for three days and thirteen hours but never woke from her coma.
She just quietly slipped away.
One summer, many years ago, while Julia was in England for a visit, they were in the garden, drinking Pimm’s and lemonade and watching Lizzie and Willie run through the hose that Gavin was pointing at them. It was then that they had asked her to be guardian to the kids if anything ever happened to them.
She’d said, “Of course!” In the way someone says when they’re honoured but they know they’re answering a question that pertains to an event that will never, in any darkest imaginings, ever happen. Ruby hadn’t even been born yet and Julia was still married to Sean.
Of course, she thought now as she watched the kids.
She hadn’t known that she’d be sharing custody with Douglas but they had told her they wanted her to move to England and she’d agreed to that as well. It wouldn’t happen anyway, so why should she worry?
Sean, as usual, had been angry. “It’s fucking cold there. I’m not moving there,” he’d ranted (even though it was colder in Indiana than it was in Somerset).
“It’s not going to happen so there’s no need to get angry about it,” Julia responded, as always, trying to soothe his foul temper (and, as always, failing miserably).
Now, Sean was gone, which was one less worry but perhaps the reason for another.
Why on earth had Tamsin and Gavin given joint custody to Douglas? Why had they asked Julia to move into this enormous, ghastly house with their kids and share that responsibility with a brother who was responsible to no one?
Julia knew Tamsin loved her brother and saw the best in him.
But Julia didn’t see it.
And how on earth did Tammy convince Gav?
A tremor went up Julia’s spine just thinking about Douglas Ashton.
It wasn’t an unpleasant kind of tremor, not in the slightest. It was a pleasant kind of tremor, exciting and slightly wicked.
Any time over the many years she’d known him, when her mind wandered to Douglas, that same thrilling, illicit tremor would chase its way up her spine.
Julia had had a screaming crush on him the moment she’d first met him. Perhaps, if she was completely honest with herself, she always had one. He was just that type of man.
To a girl of twenty-one, this tall man with his powerful body, thick, dark hair, strong jaw and eyes so intensely blue they were nearly black… well, he was exactly what one would think of as a titled English aristocrat. He had a posh accent and was so arrogant and sexy, she squirmed just being in the same room with him.
But then had come Sean, then Douglas’s mysterious disappearance.
Julia had learned a great deal from the mistakes she’d made with Sean, mistakes she vowed to herself (on a daily basis) she would never repeat.
Sean was a great deal like Douglas, reserved, handsome, edgy. Julia knew now that it matters not how dangerous they seem, how attractive, exciting and wealthy they are, or the challenge they represent with their ice-cold aloofness that you were certain you could penetrate.
What a woman needed in a mate was a companion. Someone who would clean the cat litter, pop to the store for milk or fix the sink.
All the passion and intensity was overrated, and in Julia’s experience hid biting cruelty and extraordinary selfishness.
The very idea of her and Douglas was ridiculous, Julia knew. Not to mention Douglas Ashton would never in a million years want her. An Indiana girl who’d lived her entire life in a small town where you could drive the length of Main Street waving continuously because you knew every driver in every passing car (and if you didn’t wave, once they got home, they’d call your mother and ask, “What on earth’s wrong with Jewel? I just saw her driving along Main Street with her head in the clouds. She didn’t even wave! She drives like that, she could have an accident!”).
Douglas was not like Tammy at all. He wouldn’t consider lowering himself to a girl born to and raised by a divorcee. Douglas vacationed on the Riviera. Douglas flew to Paris in a private jet for a one hour meeting. Douglas’s gorgeous but stoic face was printed in magazines (normally while escorting catwalk models or Hollywood starlets or debutantes sporting hairstyles that cost more than Julia used to earn in a week).
Julia walked to the enormous windows and stared at the dormant garden, still thinking of Douglas, the man with whom she was now forced to live for at least the next twelve years.
Unlike his mother, he was always courteous to her, often gallant and sometimes fleetingly friendly, but never warm. She learned not to be concerned by his demeanour, that, she soon discovered, was how he treated everyone and was quite like his father’s behaviour (for the short time she knew Maxwell Ashton before his untimely death). Douglas’s cold indifference was legendary, he rarely smiled and even more rarely laughed.
After he came back from whatever he was doing those two years, something had changed in him. He had a strange, yet magnetic, sinister quality. She couldn’t put her finger on it but whatever it was made him no less attractive, in fact, this mysterious allure, including his remoteness, added to his appeal. He used to be quiet, watchful, you could almost, but not quite, forget he was in a room and then be startled when you caught him watching you.
And Julia had caught him watching her a great deal, probably wondering (undoubtedly somewhat clinically) how she had managed to insinuate herself into the Ashton Family Fortress.
Once he’d come back from his Disappearance (made notable in her mind with a capital “D”), even if you hadn’t seen him enter a room, you knew he was there. His very presence was forceful and the moment he cut his dark eyes to you, Julia could think of no other way to describe it, except, oh my.
Julia knew, though, that her ex-husband had been the beginning and the end of dealing with those kinds of men, handsome, arrogant and entirely self-centred. She’d rather be alone for the rest of her life than endure even a sm
idgen of the heartache Sean had bestowed on her or the relentless days of piecing together your life and self-confidence when they were gone.
“Dinnertime! Come on children, it’s all served up. Get it while it’s hot.”
Mrs. K had walked into the drawing room. The room was enormous, could easily and comfortably fit thirty (maybe even forty) people. Decorated in ice blue and white, unflinchingly formal with three gigantic crystal chandeliers running the length of it, it was chilly, even with the fire that now burned in its colossal grate.
The kids had headed to that room straight after tea. Not to the warm leather-couched entry, or the slightly more comfortable, book-lined library or the definitely more suitable billiards room or lounge.
“Grandmother Monique says kids are seen and not heard, the drawing room is the farthest away from Grandmother’s morning room and Uncle Douglas’s study,” Lizzie had explained while Julia tried not to show any reaction, least of all her extreme, albeit exhausted, irritation.
They all quietly trooped into the dining room. Quiet, Julia was learning quickly, was very important not only for the children but also the staff. The young Russian girl so excelled in it that Julia had been startled by her twice. Veronika drifted about like a ghost.
The dining room, Julia thought while entering it, was the most extravagantly appointed room in the house. The walls richly covered with embossed paper that was created to look and feel like leather and was hand painted in deep moss green, black and rich bronze with accents of gold. The room not only held a long, shining walnut table that seated eighteen but also had two semi-circular windows along one side that held tables that each sat an additional four apiece and an enormous fireplace in which Ruby could set up house.
Mrs. Kilpatrick had gone all out, as best she could without forbidden fattening sauces and delicious desserts. Halved avocados filled with succulent shrimp to start then fillet steaks, steamed broccoli, Brussel sprouts, boiled potatoes and carrots and to end, a fruit parfait separated with layers of thick, rich, honey-sweetened Greek yogurt.
Julia and Mrs. K both tried to make it into an event and the food, even without butter, salt or sauce to season it, was still delicious.
“You’re a wonder,” she told Mrs. K with all honesty when the older woman whisked the dishes away.
“One does one’s best. Now, it’s one hour of television or computer and then you know what to do,” she told the children who rushed to have their very short bit of fun.
“An hour?” Julia asked once the children left, her irritation growing.
“Lady Ashton doesn’t want their brains turned to mush by telly or computer games,” Mrs. K explained.
Julia’s lips tightened at the very idea that three grieving children were not given an opportunity to lose themselves in pleasurable pastimes, but she held her tongue and nodded.
If she heard one more word about what Grandmother or Lady Ashton did or did not want, her exhaustion and jetlag would cause her to lose her ever-loving mind and she’d scream the house down. Something which, she understood, would not help her impossible, inconceivable situation one bit.
After the children’s short hour of fun, Mrs. K and Julia put them to bed, first Ruby and then Willie and Lizzie.
Sitting on Lizzie’s bed, Julia tucked her in tight all the way down her sides just as she knew Gavin used to do because that was what Patricia used to do.
“I’m happy you’re here, Auntie Jewel,” Lizzie murmured sleepily, but even tired, she didn’t sound happy at all.
“I’m happy too,” Julia lied, bent forward and gave her niece a kiss on her temple.
Julia rose and crossed the room but stood uncertainly at the door for several moments after she’d turned out the light, completely at a loss of what to do for the girl. She wished Gavin was there to tell her but, of course, she wouldn’t have had to do anything if he was.
With a heavy heart, she went to find Mrs. K.
“I’m off to the husband,” Mrs. K. announced when Julia arrived in the kitchen and saw that Mrs. K was putting on her coat. “Breakfast for the children is at seven o’clock. They have to leave no later than seven thirty. I expect you’ll have a lie in tomorrow, you must be done in.”
Julia looked at the clock. It was ten after nine. If Mrs. Kilpatrick was here in time to feed the children by seven, she was working incredibly long hours.
“I’ll be at breakfast, Mrs. K,” Julia, resolute, told the housekeeper and something in her tone made Mrs. K’s head come up.
The other woman regarded Julia closely. “I suspect you will, luv, but it doesn’t have to be tomorrow. Give yourself a wee bit of a break. And don’t you worry. You’ll get settled in, you all will.” Julia heard more hope than certainty in Mrs. K’s voice but she had no time to worry about it because with that, Mrs. K left.
As Julia headed out of the kitchen, she noticed that Mrs. K had put the house to sleep just as she did the children. Curtains were drawn and small lights were on here and there that did nothing to break the dark and everything to extend the frightening shadows of the big house with its large rooms and high ceilings.
Sommersgate House, her home for the next decade.
She shivered at the thought.
It was beautiful, haughtily and even brashly so, but it was not welcoming. Indeed, it was not welcoming in a tangible way, as if it had its own personality, its own set of eyes with which to look down on her with disapproval.
In fact, the house reminded her a great deal of Douglas.
She shook off that thought as she made her way to her rooms.
Julia had not been surprised to see that she had been put in the guest suite, which was off the dining room and down the back hall that lead to a small Chapel (a lovely little Chapel which was really its own building but attached to the house, it nestled snugly in the sloping hill in which the curving drive was cut over a century ago).
Julia was not placed upstairs with the children or the other members of the family, even though all three children had their own room, as did Douglas and Monique. Douglas’s rooms (in plural, Tamsin told her after her and Douglas’s father died, and by tradition, Douglas had moved into the master suite when he’d inherited the title, the estates and all they contained) included his own private sitting room although Julia had never seen it. Julia knew that upstairs there were still four bedrooms besides and still, she was isolated, away from the rest.
Julia always loved the guest suite but now she felt as Monique meant her to feel, separate and not a part of the family.
The guest suite was decorated in periwinkle blue and clover green with accents of mushroom, silver and gold. This strange colour combination worked, in fact its interior designer won awards for it (according to Monique).
There was an antique, tall tester bed that was kept in pristine condition by Carter, (chauffer, errand-runner and handyman extraordinaire). The bed was draped in blue and green curtains and covered with an undoubtedly three billion-thread-count, clover green, sateen duvet. It was headed with twin stacks of three fluffy pillows with an enormous European square resting in front and a plethora of toss pillows encased in beaded, embroidered, tasselled or ruched satin or silk. There was an ornate, ivory marble-manteled fireplace with a chaise lounge covered in mushroom velvet with a clover green cashmere throw artfully decorating it which sat invitingly in front of the fire. There was a circular window that was the base of the turret that rose up the side of the house and in it were two comfortable chairs with a shared ottoman, this time in a sateen clover specked with periwinkle, one with another throw, this in blue, and a small, circular, intricately carved table in the middle. There was a writing desk facing the room with an ornate chair that had curved legs that matched the desk. The gleaming parquet floor was covered in a variety of thick, silk rugs.
Opposite the fire was a doorway leading to a dressing room that started with a hall which was lined on both sides in rails, inset drawers and shelves. This led to an opening that contained a dressing tabl
e built into one side with a huge mirror surrounded entirely with bright lights and fronted by a swirly-legged stool padded in periwinkle velvet. Behind the dressing table, a floor to ceiling three-way mirror was set into the opposite wall. Walking further down, there were more rails, drawers and shelves ending in a sparkling white bathroom which featured a mosaic-tiled floor, a claw-footed, roll-topped bath with gleaming silver taps and sprays and a separate shower cubical. Sumptuous towels in blue, mushroom and clover were hanging from heated towel rails and wrapped, rolled and tucked in various cubbyholes with thick piled rugs strewn appealingly about the floor.
Julia shed the suit she had not found the time to change out of and took a quick shower. Veronika had made certain her shampoo and soap were exactly where they needed to be.
Even though she was exhausted, Julia knew she would not sleep, it was daytime in Indiana and, anyway, sleep had eluded her for months.
She located and then put on a pair of pale blue yoga pants and a white, ribbed tank top and inspected Veronika’s work. The fact that she hadn’t unpacked her own case made Julia uncomfortable, not that Veronika would be inappropriate, just that Julia was not used to someone else doing her chores. Nevertheless, Julia had to admit Veronika did very good work. Everything was put in place, properly (even obsessively) hung or folded and Julia noted, a bit stunned, ironed. Rows of shoes matched carefully and lined up perfectly. Her toiletries were nicely displayed at the dressing table and, when Julia went back to the bedroom, the framed photographs and scented candles she’d brought with her were arranged to their best advantage.
A photo of the kids, Gavin and Tamsin with Patricia and Julia sat on the bedside table, everyone with their arms around each other in front of Patricia’s Christmas tree from two years past. Julia stared at it, felt the familiar hot tears at the back of her eyes and shook her head. She couldn’t give in, she’d shed enough tears and now was the time of healing, of moving forward, of making the best of an impossible (and inconceivable) situation.
Sommersgate House Page 3