by Janet Dailey
“I don’t have to listen to this shit!” Rob’s angry declaration was followed by the scrape of a metal chair leg across the patio tile, then the sound of footsteps.
It was only a matter of seconds before she would be discovered. Luz quickly stepped forward into their view. Rob stopped when he saw her and glanced quickly back at Trisha. Her facial muscles felt the strain of holding a pleasant expression as she joined them.
“If I had known you were back, Trisha, I would have put the pizza in the oven,” she said. “I hope you’re hungry. I fixed a giant one.”
“Aren’t you going to ask how Dad is?” Trisha’s previous irritation with Rob was now extended to include Luz.
“Why don’t you keep your mouth shut, Trish?” Rob demanded. “She’ll ask if she wants to know!” Just as suddenly, he seemed to retreat behind a brooding expression and took a long stride in the direction of the house. “I’m not hungry.”
“Don’t go, Rob.” Luz called him back, and unwillingly he returned, his back and shoulders hunched.
“Well, aren’t you?” Trisha persisted defiantly.
Luz obliged. “How is he?”
“Fine. So is Claudia. I know this will probably sound as traitorous to you as it did to Rob, but I happen to like her.”
“I thought you would.” But it didn’t help to know she’d been right. “Did they tell you their news?” Luz asked, very casually.
“Yes.” The quietness of her answer caught Rob’s attention.
“What news?”
“Dad wanted to tell you himself, but you won’t talk to him, so I suppose it’s up to me to tell you before somebody else does. Claudia is pregnant. Sometime around November, we’re going to have a little brother or sister.”
“A half brother or sister!” Rob shot back. “No wonder he didn’t give a damn about walking out on us. He’s already starting another family.”
“That isn’t true,” Trisha protested.
“Then what the hell else do you call it?”
“I don’t know.” She ran a hand through her shaggy chestnut hair. “I’m so confused.”
“I think that makes three of us,” Luz stated. “It happened so suddenly for all of us, I guess.”
“You must have had your fill of arguing and fighting,” Trisha realized.
“You could say that,” she admitted wryly. “At least, toward the last. Before that, I don’t suppose we talked that much—not about important things anyway.” She felt drained, empty, and very tired. “I’d better put that pizza in the oven if we want to eat tonight.”
“Luz,” Trisha said when she turned to leave. “Dad wants to pick up the rest of his things. He wondered when would be a good time for him to come over.”
She wasn’t ready to see him. She knew that. Everything was too painful and too fresh. At the moment she hated him too deeply for what he’d done to her—the way he’d destroyed her and turned her into a shell of a woman.
“Rob and I have a date to go riding in the morning. Why don’t you call him and see if he can come over then?” She was being cowardly, but she didn’t care. She didn’t want to see for herself how happy he was without her. Luz suspected the bitterness would be with her for a long time. “By the way, I’ve changed the dates of our European trip. We’ll be leaving as soon as you two graduate. I think we’ll all be ready for an extended vacation by then.”
“Do you think he’ll come to the graduation exercises?” Rob’s jaw was tightly clenched.
“I can’t imagine him missing it.”
“Will he bring her?”
“I don’t know.”
“If he does, I’ll—”
“—do the same thing that I will, Rob,” Luz interrupted, weighted by a dull ache inside. “You’ll be civil.”
But it wasn’t the easiest thing to do. When the graduating class walked down the aisle, Luz could hardly bear to stand next to them. Claudia looked so youthful and radiant, and Drew fairly beamed. She managed to avoid saying more than a few words to them, lingering until they had congratulated Rob before she approached him. It was the same awkward scene all over again at Trisha’s commencement. So different from the way she had envisioned it months ago—no celebration dinners, no large gatherings. It was all separate and strained.
A property settlement had been quickly agreed upon, neither side wanting to fight over it and prolong the granting of a divorce decree. The final divorce papers had been signed only a week before Rob’s graduation. And Luz’s so-called friends had been quick to inform her that Drew and Claudia had set their wedding date. All she could do was smile and nod—and pretend it didn’t hurt.
Part II
CHAPTER X
The polo fields at Windsor Great Park had a distinctly British look, precisely manicured and evenly green. Each blade of grass on the smooth, hard surface appeared to be clipped to the proper height, with no variation allowed. The effect was clean and neat, the product of decades of care and tradition. The “sport of princes” had been imported to the western world by the British Tenth Hussars in the latter part of the eighteenth century after they had watched a visiting tribe of horsemen from Punjab, India, demonstrate their skill on horseback with a stick and ball. The game gained immediate popularity with the horse-loving British.
From a lawn chair on the sidelines, Luz watched the game in progress, the Round Tower of Windsor Castle in the background. A straw boater and sunglasses shaded her face from the glare of a June sun. The weather was perfect, a faint breeze wafting through the trees in the park, a pure azure sky above. The drizzling rain that had bogged the turf the previous week and made the playing surface slick and treacherous had finally moved out. Now the field was fast and hard, and the play matched it.
She lifted the powerful binoculars and focused on the column of riders racing toward the far goal. There was always something about rough sports that conjured images of war, whether it was football pitting burly men against each other, or polo with its dashing cavalrylike charges by columns of horses and riders.
The sunlight glistened on the shiny-coated horses, stretched in a flat-out run and colored in rippling shades of browns and blacks with a dun thrown in, providing a splash of dark gold. She centered the focus on the front pair of riders jostling for position on the ball and saw the neck shot Rob made, his mallet swinging in front of his horse, under its neck, and hitting the ball at an angle for the goalposts. Lowering the binoculars, Luz watched for the signal from the white-coated goal judge, positioned on the ground behind the posts. He waved a flag over his head, indicating a score.
“I believe your son is going to be a better player than his grandfather was,” Fiona Sherbourne remarked as the riders slowly trotted their horses back to the center of the field. “Henry has kept it very quiet that he has a Kincaid playing on his Seven Oak team. Strategy, he says.”
Luz glanced at the Englishwoman who had been their hostess for a little over two weeks. She was seated in the chair next to Luz, her posture flawlessly erect, yet managing to appear relaxed. Although she was ten years Luz’s senior, her soft dewy skin looked firm and young. More than once since she’d been in England, Luz had covertly scanned the brown hairline for a hint of surgical scars, but they were well hidden if they were there.
“I’m glad Henry is pleased. Rob has been very anxious about playing up to the caliber of the rest of the team.” The opposing players faced off at midfield, angling toward the sidelines. The umpire bowled the ball among them, and play resumed with a clash of hooking mallets.
“Anxious isn’t the word.” Tired of sitting, Trisha stood up and slipped her hands inside the large pockets of her green skirt. “He’s become so obsessed with the fear he might forget some minor rule difference that he’s been driving me crazy.”
A melee ensued once the ball was knocked clear of the throw-in. Three times it was sent in different directions as red-and blue-shirted riders fought for control of it, horses stopping and spinning to lunge after it. The bell rang ending
that chukkar of play. The riders pulled in their horses and headed for the pony lines to change mounts and, if there was time, spend a moment together in the small team pavilion discussing tactics.
“I think I’ll walk around and see who’s here.” Trisha was never content to remain on the sidelines for long, preferring action to observation. “The Royal Family is in residence at the castle. Who knows? Maybe I’ll run into a prince.”
Fiona watched her leave. “I wondered how long she’d be content to sit with us. Young people always want to be doing something, have you noticed?”
“We all were like that at her age.” Personally, Luz had preferred the nonstop round of outings, teas, and parties that had filled their days since they’d arrived in England. The frenetic pace seemed to suit the quiet desperation that drove her.
“It amazes me how those two have grown up in three short years. They’re practically adults. No doubt they believe they are.” She smiled.
“Don’t remind me.” It seemed the whole world was conspiring to make her feel older.
“Dear Luz.” Still smiling, now with a secretive quality, she leaned closer and pressed a hand on her forearm. “What you need is the name of my doctor.”
The remark confirmed her suspicions, but she wasn’t tempted by it. To Luz, cosmetic surgery was more than an admission of vanity. It was a statement that a person had to look young in order to be accepted and admired—and loved. She resented that truth she had so painfully learned for herself, insisting that she preferred the martyrdom of age and loneliness to the appearance of false youth.
“What I need is a Pimm’s No. 1,” she replied.
“That does sound refreshing.” Fiona lifted a gloved hand and discreetly wagged a forefinger to summon the uniformed servant hovering in the background. She requested the chauffeur to fetch a drink for each of them from the well-stocked bar built into the Rolls-Royce. “Did I tell you I received orders from Henry that champagne was to flow like water at Saturday night’s party? I believe he hopes to get the opposing team drunk. Originally, I had scheduled the party to take place the following evening as a celebration for the tournament victors, but Henry wanted it on the eve of the final match. It’s all part of his grand scheme of psychological warfare. He goes to such lengths to win a polo tournament. And all he receives is a silver cup to add to the already extensive collection in his display case.”
“I doubt that I’ll ever understand why people glorify youth, beauty, success … and winning polo games.” Her smile was tainted with bitterness.
“Luz, you are becoming a dreadful cynic.”
“I suppose I am.”
* * *
Windsor Castle sat in a grand sprawl along the banks of the Thames an hour outside of London. Its gray mass of stone walls, turrets, and ramparts was dominated by the great Round Tower, its mast flying the Royal Ensign to signify that her majesty was in residence. The massive stone walls enclosed thirteen acres of ground, symbolically protecting the State Apartments, home of the monarchy, and St. George’s Chapel, the embodiment of the Church of England, while the town of Windsor sat within their shadow. Outside the battlements stretched the eighteen hundred acres of green meadow and trees that composed Windsor Great Park, connected to the castle by an elm-lined avenue known as Long Walk. Located within the boundaries of Great Park were the polo grounds.
Trisha strolled up the sidelines, gravitating toward the pony lines where grooms and horsemen were gathered. She had no specific purpose in mind. She recognized faces among the scattering of spectators waiting for play to resume. Unable to put a name with every face, Trisha simply nodded and smiled at all of them, but didn’t stop to strike up a conversation. She wasn’t in the mood for company.
On the whole, the trip had thus far exceeded her expectations. On previous visits to England she had still been a child, but now she was free to go and do as she pleased. She was of age now, no longer a schoolgirl. And every day had been party and play time. She’d thrown herself into the fun with a kind of wild abandon.
Walking alone on this grassy field with the sun warm on her back, Trisha realized she hadn’t escaped the thing she’d run so hard from—her parents’ divorce. Part of her wondered why she let it affect her at all. She was not to blame for the split. Even if they didn’t love each other anymore, she still loved them both.
But that was it. She was caught in the middle, her feelings for neither of them changing while she watched them change. Her father looked younger, acted younger, and dressed less conservatively. When Trisha had visited him the day before they left for England, he’d been wearing jeans. Her father in jeans!
As for Luz, the change had been more subtle—a retreat into some bitter dark world while she continued to show an insouciant face to those she met. Most people didn’t notice the new sharpness of her tongue or the brittleness of her smile, but Trisha did.
One new trait her parents shared was this pretended lapse of memory for the last eighteen years. Each of them acted as if Trisha had been born, full-grown, a month ago. Neither wanted to talk about the past, reluctant to recall even happy times. Trisha had learned not to mention Luz when she was with her father, especially if Claudia was there, and Luz usually changed the subject if she said anything about her father. The divorce had strained her relationship with both of them, because she and Rob were reminders of the past, especially for her father, who was starting a new life with a new woman and a new family on the way.
At least she understood what was happening. Trisha doubted that Rob ever tried to. All he cared about was polo. And his dedication to the sport was something Luz appeared to be absorbing as well, as if it gave her a purpose. Trisha supposed it was natural, since Rob had always been Luz’s favorite. As a result of their increasing closeness, she felt more estranged from the family group. It created a loneliness, and Trisha guessed it was the loneliness she was trying to fill that prompted her to party so much, accepting every invitation that came her way.
Play resumed on the field to complete the game’s last chukkar. Trisha paused a minute to watch the action, but it didn’t hold her interest despite her brother’s participation on the leading side. Her glance strayed from the contestants as she started walking again. It passed over the two men dressed in riding breeches and boots lounging against the front fender of a car parked roughly ten yards ahead of her. Something familiar about one of them pulled her attention back to the pair.
A stunned second later, Trisha recognized Raul Buchanan. That strong, angular profile and smoothly cropped brown hair couldn’t belong to anyone else. She didn’t need a glimpse of those light blue eyes to confirm that it was Raul. Her downcast spirits soared, and her steps lifted as she approached him unobserved, his attention on the field of play.
“Did you see Sherbourne miss the ball again?” The remark was addressed to the man with him, the faint accent and resonant pitch of his voice so familiar to her again. “He is unable to hit a backhand shot on the near side. If the back had followed him, he would have had an easy goal.”
“Should I warn Rob that you are scouting his team?” Trisha spoke and smiled in satisfaction when his glance settled on her with a flicker of recognition.
“I knew I had played against the rider in the Number One position before, but I failed to recognize him without the Kincaid string of ponies. Thank you for identifying Sherbourne’s ringer.” He inclined his head slightly in her direction while his gaze stayed on her face. “Let me introduce my teammate, James Armstrong. James, this is Miss Trisha Thomas, granddaughter of Jake Kincaid.”
“This is indeed a pleasure, Miss Thomas.” The English rider formally shook hands with her. He was a slightly built man with a narrow face and high forehead, his hair bushing thickly from a thinning top. “Your grandfather was a superb competitor. I am glad to learn your brother is following in … his boots, shall we say.”
“Thank you. I believe Rob loves the game even more than Jake did,” Trisha said, then turned back to Raul, conscious t
hat his gaze hadn’t left her. “This time I don’t think you’ll be able to accuse him of saving his horses.”
“Not this time.” He remained attentive yet slightly aloof, with a hint of warmth that kept Trisha hoping.
A jetliner thundered overhead on its flight path from Heathrow Airport not many miles distant. It briefly disrupted the flow of conversation as they waited for its roar to abate.
“I take it you and your brother are visiting the Sherbournes at Seven Oak.” The comment came from James Armstrong.
“Yes. We arrived a little over two weeks ago.” She wondered how long Raul had been here.
“How are you finding England so far? You couldn’t have chosen a better time of year—Ascot Week, Wimbledon.”
“It’s been a never-ending round of activities,” Trisha admitted and belatedly wished she had spent more time with her brother on the polo fields. She might have learned earlier that Raul was in England. “I’m having a marvelous time. Although it is a treat to see a familiar face.”
“I presume you two met while Buchanan was playing in the States,” Armstrong guessed.
“We did,” Raul replied.
An impish light crept into her eyes. “Unfortunately, at the time, Raul thought I was too young for him.” She sensed a ripple of impatience as the furrow in Raul’s brow deepened and his glance swung away from her.
“Is that right?” Armstrong feigned a cough to conceal a chortling laugh and clapped a hand on Raul’s shoulder. “I’ll leave you to settle this, old boy. Meet you later at the pub.” He moved away.
For long seconds there was only the background noise from the field—the gruntings of horses straining for speed and the thudding of hooves on the grassy sod. Trisha wandered over to lean against the car hood near Raul and feigned a brief interest in the action. Then she turned back to Raul. “Are you sorry he left?” she asked.