‘You’re a menace,’ Iggy said, reaching for the handle of the bedroom door.
His big hand braced on the wood above her, his voice silky dark against her ear as he whispered. ‘When are you going to come to my bed, Igraine?’
Now. She had to bite down on her lip to prevent the word from escaping. ‘Soon,’ she managed, her voice husky with the need he stirred up inside every time his big body crowded close like this.
He trailed one finger down her spine, sending a helpless shiver through her, and she couldn’t stop herself from leaning back against him. ‘I’ll make it good for you, so good you won’t remember being with anyone other than me.’
He sounded so sure of himself, so deliciously, infuriatingly arrogant that it irritated her just enough for her to find the will to wrench open the door. ‘Don’t let your mouth make promises your body won’t be able to deliver, Talbot.’ And with that she stalked from the room, his warm laughter following her down the corridor and just a hint of a wobble still in her knees.
Two minutes later, she entered the yellow drawing room where her aunt held court as she had for all the years Iggy could remember. Morgana continued her conversation with Constance who was seated at her left, though she raised an eyebrow at Iggy to let her know her tardiness had been noted.
Lucie leaned close as Iggy slipped into the chair next to her. ‘Everything all right? You look a little bit flushed.’
‘I ran into a spot of trouble on the way from my room,’ Iggy muttered, settling her crisp white napkin over her lap.
‘Trouble in a tall muscular package, I’m betting,’ Lucie whispered back with a knowing grin.
Their eyes met. ‘He’s driving me crazy,’ Iggy confessed softly.
Lucie’s brows drew together. ‘There’s not a problem between you two, is there?’
Pulling a face to indicate her indecision, Iggy sighed. ‘He’s just a lot to handle sometimes.’
‘Lucky you,’ Lucie deadpanned from the side of her mouth before reaching for the glass of champagne in front of her. ‘I’d say that calls for a toast.’
Smothering a laugh, Iggy reached for her own glass and clinked it against Lucie’s before taking a sip. The crisp, dry wine fizzed over her palate and she gave an appreciative sigh. ‘You’re spoiling us with the good stuff, Aunt Morgana.’
‘Well, we have such a lot to celebrate, it only seemed fitting.’ Reaching for her glass, Morgana raised it first towards to Lucie, and then Constance. ‘I know we’ve already celebrated with the others, but I wanted to personally welcome you both to the family. Bluebell Castle is a better place for having you both under its roof.’
‘What a lovely thing to say, Morgana. Thank you so much for opening your home to us.’ Constance smiled across the table towards her daughter. ‘If you’d told me at the start of this year how much things would change for us, I wouldn’t have dared believe it possible.’
‘Welcome to you both,’ Iggy echoed, forcing the rather large lump which had formed in her throat back down. ‘It’s nice to have the gender balance tip a bit more in our favour.’
Mrs W came in carrying two large cake stands; one filled with finely cut finger sandwiches, the other laden with bite-sized squares of cake and colourful macarons. ‘If I can get you anything else, just ring,’ she said, before accepting Morgana’s nod of dismissal.
They tucked in, the conversation turning to the wedding, the way it seemed to every time they sat down lately. Not that Iggy minded one bit. Lucie seemed delighted at the prospect of marrying Arthur, and surprisingly relaxed about the whole thing. ‘Mum and I are going dress shopping next weekend,’ she said to Iggy whilst topping up both their glasses from the champagne bottle. ‘You should come with us.’
It was a very touching gesture, but Iggy wouldn’t dream of intruding on such a special mother and daughter moment. Shoving away a pang at the unlikelihood she’d ever share a similar day with her on mother, she gave Lucie a smile of thanks. ‘You’ll want it to be just the two of you, surely? You can take lots of pictures and show me afterwards.’
‘Well, I suppose we could,’ Lucie drawled out the last word. ‘But I’m sure you’d rather try on bridesmaid dresses for yourself rather than leaving it to me to choose for you. What if I subjected you to Bo Peep ruffles?’
‘Bridesmaid?’ It hadn’t occurred to her for a moment that Lucie would want her to fill that role. ‘You never mentioned it before.’
‘I was waiting for the right moment.’ Lucie reached for her hand. ‘Arthur’s going to have Tristan stand up with him, and I can’t think of anyone I’d want by my side more than you.’
That blasted lump was back in her throat again, and Iggy found herself blinking back tears. ‘I’d love to do it, thank you.’ She squeezed Lucie’s hand back, feeling in that moment like she was really gaining a sister.
Keeping hold of her hand, Lucie glanced across the table to her mum. ‘And will you give me away?’
Constance reached beneath the table for her napkin, raised it and dabbed at a tear on her cheek. ‘Oh, darling, that’s a lovely idea, but you might want someone a bit less emotional than me to lean on during your big moment. Every time I even picture you in a wedding dress, I start weeping.’
‘Perhaps you could ask Lancelot to do it for you. I’m sure he’d be delighted, and then your mother and I can hang on to each other in the family pew.’ Aunt Morgana was looking more than a little dewy eyed, which was very unusual for a woman who prided herself on her composure. She fluttered a hand in front of her face. ‘Such nonsense! I’m blaming the champagne.’
The four of them were still laughing when the drawing room door opened to admit a very pale-looking Mrs W. ‘Umm, excuse me for interrupting, but there’s a visitor.’
Before they could enquire who, the door swung fully open to admit a swirl of Chanel No. 5 perfume and a slender blonde woman clad in a neat cream trouser suit. The scent hit Iggy’s nose, bringing with it a flood of memories as her brain tried to process what her eyes were seeing.
‘Hardly a visitor, Mrs Walters,’ the blonde declared as she swept past the flustered housekeeper. Taking the empty chair beside Constance, she picked up a spare glass and held it out towards Lucie. ‘I hope I’m not too late to join the celebrations.’
‘Umm, no,’ Lucie replied, faintly, her good manners automatically kicking in to pour champagne into the glass. ‘The more the merrier, I guess. Her inquisitive gaze flicked from the new arrival to Iggy.
Shaking off her shock, Iggy drained her own glass in one swallow, then held it out to Lucie. ‘Fill it up, and yours too, you’re going to need it.’ She raised the crystal flute across the table, no warmth in her words as she spoke once more. ‘Constance, Lucie, may I present Helena Ludworth-Mills-Wexford-Jones. My mother.’
Helena’s smile didn’t waver, but there was a certain tightness around her eyes as she returned Iggy’s toast. ‘Always a pleasure to see you too, darling.’ Having taken a sip, she switched her attention to Lucie. ‘When I saw the announcement in the newspaper, I had to come and meet the lucky woman who’ll be marrying my darling Arthur. Though it was naughty of him not to tell me the good news himself.’
‘Perhaps if your children heard from you more than once or twice a year, you’d know what was going on in their lives.’ Morgana’s steely façade was well and truly back in place.
‘Perhaps if you’d not forced me out of my home and turned your family against me, we wouldn’t be in this situation,’ Helena snapped. She reached back to touch the elegant chignon tied at her nape, and then let out a brittle laugh that sent a warning shudder up Iggy’s spine. ‘But that’s all water under the bridge, and I’m here to concentrate on the future, not the past.’
Embarrassment and anger burned through Iggy, and it was only out of deference to Lucie and Constance that she held her tongue. The familiar complaint she’d heard throughout her childhood summed up her mother to a T-whatever happened, it was always someone else’s fault.
Her g
aze strayed to the head of the table, where Morgana sat ramrod straight, disapproval radiating from every pore. She knew people found her aunt intimidating, though she’d never found her so as her stern nature had been tempered with an equal balance of deep affection she’d lavished on Iggy and her brothers. For the first time, she found herself contemplating whether a grain of truth ran through her mother’s accusation. It couldn’t have been easy for a young bride to enter a household where a woman as foreboding as Morgana acted as matriarch.
Hadn’t Iggy already decided she needed to withdraw from her own position at the castle to make room for Lucie? She adored her future sister-in-law and knew she was surrendering what had always been a temporary role to someone who was wholly suited to taking it on. Though it would break her heart to leave, she’d never, ever let Lucie sense even a hint of resentment at the change her presence had wrought over Iggy’s circumstances.
Morgana had never been anything other than scathing towards Helena as far as she could remember, though Iggy had always assumed it stemmed from her disapproval of Helena for abandoning her family. What if she’d felt that way towards Helena from the beginning, and worse, had made it clear how she felt? The unexpected pang of sympathy towards her mother sat uncomfortably. Why was she even questioning her aunt’s integrity? Digging her nails into her palm, Iggy did a slow mental count to five. Her mother had been in the room for mere moments and was already manipulating the emotions of everyone present.
‘Your remembrance of events differs greatly to mine, Helena.’ Iggy didn’t think she’d ever heard her aunt speak so coldly to anyone. ‘I have no desire to embarrass our guests any further with our dirty laundry, so I’ll leave it at that.’ Morgana took a delicate sip from her china teacup. ‘May we assume this is a flying visit?’
‘That’s up to Arthur.’ Helena paused to send a sweet smile across the table to Lucie. ‘And his enchanting bride-to-be, of course. Beaumont is over in America on an extended business trip, and I don’t have any particular plans for the summer so I thought I’d come and help with the wedding arrangements.’ The look of satisfied malice that flashed in her mother’s eyes vanished so quickly, Iggy thought she might have imagined it, but she knew better.
Even if her mother had been dealt a bad hand when she was younger, she’d had the best part of twenty-five years to put things right between them. Recalling the last contact at New Year’s Eve when she’d phoned in tears because the allowance she’d been paid by Iggy’s father-even throughout her subsequent three marriages-had finally ceased according to the terms of his will, Iggy hardened her heart once more. Helena never did anything out of the goodness of her heart, and whatever had caused her to turn up at the castle like a proverbial bad penny, she’d bet the wedding had little, if anything, to do with it.
*
‘I’m not staying a night under the same roof as that wretched bloody woman!’
Iggy banged her head softly against the wall outside her uncle’s room as she listened to him yelling in fury. He’d stormed upstairs the moment he’d entered the family room before dinner to find Helena perched on one of the sofas like a queen holding court. From the banging and crashing of furniture, it sounded like he was actually packing his bags.
‘Lancelot, please. I know this is difficult but think of the children. If they want a chance to spend time with their mother, then surely you owe it to them to keep your feelings under wraps.’ Constance had followed Lancelot to his room, and Iggy had to give her credit for stepping into the middle of their family mess in an attempt to mediate.
Wondering if she should intervene, Iggy edged closer to the slight gap where the door had resisted his efforts to slam it closed. Tristan seemed as ambivalent as she was about their mother’s arrival, but kind-hearted Arthur had lit up at the news. He’d always held out hope when it came to Helena, no matter how many times she might have let them down in the past.
Before she could make up her mind, the decision was taken out of her hands by her uncle flinging open his bedroom door and stalking out with a large holdall gripped in one hand. ‘She’s a poisonous bitch, Connie,’ he flung over his shoulder. ‘I’ve spent the past twenty-odd years watching her tear the heart out of those children time and again. I won’t stand by and let her do it again.’ He stopped short at the sight of Iggy, scrubbing a weary hand through his silvering hair. ‘Don’t ask me to apologise, because I won’t.’
Straightening up, Iggy rested her hand on his arm. ‘I don’t particularly want her here, but it’s up to Arthur.’
Lancelot’s features crumpled into a frustrated scowl. ‘She’ll ruin the bloody wedding. She’ll ruin everything, she always does.’
Iggy squeezed his arm. ‘We won’t let her. Give her a couple of days and she’ll get bored and move on. You know what she’s like.’ It was the hope she had to cling to. Like a magpie, Helena was attracted to anything shiny and new. Right now, it was the idea of the wedding, but she fully expected something else to crop up on the social circuit which would draw her away. ‘It’s Ascot in a couple of weeks, and you know she never misses that.’
Her uncle placed his hand over hers where it rested on his arm, squeezed her fingers and then gently removed her hold. ‘I’m sorry, darling, but for as long as she’s staying in the castle, I can’t be around her. I’ll be in the stables if you need me.’ Her uncle kept a room in what had been the old stable hand’s quarters in the upper floor of the stable block for the odd occasion where he had a sick horse that needed watching overnight.
With a nod, Iggy stepped aside, feeling as miserable as Constance looked standing in the open doorway of Lancelot’s room. ‘I’ll talk to him later, once he’s had a chance to calm down a bit,’ she said, giving Iggy a lopsided smile that didn’t belie the worry in her gaze.
‘Just don’t find yourself caught in the middle of it all,’ Iggy begged her. ‘You’re so good for him, I’d hate for the two of you to fall out over this.’
Constance shook her head. ‘I’ll try, but it’s not just me caught in the middle, I have Lucie to think of, too. Nothing’s ever easy, is it?’
‘Not where my mother is concerned,’ Iggy agreed ruefully and they shared a smile.
‘Are you all right, though?’ The warmth in Constance’s voice drew her like a magnet, and Iggy accepted a hug, fighting the urge to cling on when Constance closed her arms around her.
Why can’t our mother be like this?
It was a forlorn hope, a child’s foolish wish and Iggy pushed it aside. Helena was as she was, and that was all there was to it. ‘I’m okay. It’s a bit of a shock to the system, but as I said to Lancelot, with any luck, she’ll move on again just as quickly as she arrived. We’d better go back down and make sure she’s not causing any mischief.’ Another forlorn hope, as it turned out.
When the two of them entered the family room, all eyes turned their way. Ignoring everyone else, Iggy caught Tristan’s gaze and gave an imperceptible shake of her head in response to his raised eyebrows. Rolling his eyes, he stood and offered his seat to Constance, fussing around her until she was beaming up at him.
‘I’ll fix some drinks, shall I?’ Arthur said, his hearty tone just the wrong side of fake. Iggy wanted to shake him. She understood his conflicted feelings about their mother, but he needed to get over them. She was never going to change.
‘A G&T for me please,’ Helena tipped her face up to smile at her eldest son as he stood, drawing Iggy’s attention to the fact she’d injected herself into the middle of the sofa between Arthur and Lucie. Turning that smile towards Constance, Helena notched it up and said in a sweet voice. ‘Poor Lancelot. He’s always carried such a torch for me. I had hoped he would’ve got over it by now, but apparently not.’
Watching Constance’s brow crease in shock, Iggy glared across the room at her mother. ‘How can you possibly say that?’
Helena opened her mouth to respond, but Morgana cut her off. ‘Forget about the drinks, Arthur, let’s go straight into dinner.’ There
was no missing the warning look she shot at Helena on her way out of the room.
Completely nonplussed, Iggy exchanged a look of confusion with Arthur who was standing beside the drink’s cabinet still clutching an open bottle of Bombay Sapphire gin. Lancelot couldn’t stand Helena, so why on earth was she suggesting otherwise?
As the others filed out, she cornered Arthur. ‘You can’t let her stay here. Can’t you see she’ll ruin everything?’
To her shock, his expression darkened to a frown. ‘You’re just like all the others. It can’t have been easy for her to come here after all this time, knowing the kind of reception she’d receive.’
‘With bloody good reason,’ Iggy hissed. ‘She’s going to drive a wedge between all of us if we’re not careful.’
Red-faced, Arthur glanced towards where Lucie was waiting for him by the door before glaring back down at Iggy. ‘The only thing that’s going to drive a wedge through this family is your inability to let the past go. Mother wants to celebrate mine and Lucie’s wedding with us, is that really so bad?’ Without waiting for her response, he stalked across the room, took Lucie’s arm in his and walked out.
Her heart wanted to break. Not because of his uncharacteristic outburst, although she hated the idea of being at odds with him for even a moment. Beneath his anger, she sensed a terrible need for their mother’s love and acceptance. She would give anything to be proven wrong, but she desperately feared her beloved brother was in for a terrible fall. ‘Oh, Arthur.’
Chapter 15
Will had never seen a family dynamic change so swiftly as that of the Ludworths’ in the space of a few minutes. He’d been about to descend the stairs for dinner when a furious Lancelot had rushed past him, with Constance and Igraine in his wake. She’d barely given him a glance, and her worried expression had been enough for him to decide not to interfere and continue on his way down to the family room.
He still had no real grasp on what was going on, but he’d instinctively disliked the way the stranger seated on the sofa had widened her eyes at him as he walked through the door. He knew that look, had seen it too often in the past. He was interesting to them because of what he was, not who he was. After managing a polite introduction, Will had retreated to the opposite sofa and done his best to remain inconspicuous.
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