One Christmas Morning & One Summer's Afternoon (8 page)

It was only Daniel’s presence that had stopped Laura having a knockdown, drag-out fight with Gabe Baxter, who clearly thought the whole Denver Trotter incident hilarious.

‘You put something in that boy’s drink, didn’t you?’ Laura had hissed at him, pulling him aside backstage.

‘I don’t know what you’re talking about.’

‘Pull the other one. I know Denver isn’t the most likable child …’

‘He’s a bloody menace.’

‘But he
is
a child. What you did was completely uncalled for.’

To Laura’s amazement, Gabe actually had the temerity to lose his temper with
her
. ‘Oh? And who made you the judge of what’s called for and what isn’t? That lad’s been bullying poor George for weeks now, and no one’s done a damn thing to stop him. Those teachers at St Hilda’s should be shot.’

This was one point on which Laura agreed with him. The teachers should have stepped in, but none of them dared face the wrath of Denver’s father.

‘Whatever you may think about me, Miss High and bloody Mighty, I am not a snob. I was sticking up for the Monroe boy, posh or not.’ And with that Gabe had turned on his heel and stomped off, without even offering to help clean up the mess he’d made.

Forget him
,
Laura told herself, climbing out of the shower and drying herself, rubbing hard at her scalp to try to wake herself up a bit.
Forget the lot of them. Tonight’s about me and Daniel, nothing else.

Half an hour later, she came downstairs to find Daniel kneeling on the window seat, with his head outside.

‘Listen.’ He beckoned her over. ‘How lovely is that?’

The church bells of St Hilda’s were pealing, a rich, layered sound ringing out through the cold night air. It was pitch black outside, so there was nothing to distract the senses from the ancient melody other than a lingering smell of wood smoke.

‘They’re practising for the Christmas Eve carol service,’ said Laura. Washed and scented, with her freshly dried hair hanging loose and glossy down her back, she felt a lot better than she had earlier; although she still wished that her burgundy velvet dress didn’t feel quite so tight. If she ate too much at dinner tonight, her bodice was in serious danger of popping open and giving the gentlemen of the Furlings Fox Hunt more than they’d bargained for.

Closing the window, Daniel slipped an arm around her waist. ‘You look amazing.’ He kissed her, pressing his lips to hers, then moving slowly down her neck and collarbone to the tops of her spectacular breasts. Laura shuddered with desire.

‘We could always skip the ball,’ she whispered, running a hand through his thick, chestnut hair.

Daniel laughed. ‘And waste that beautiful dress? I don’t think so.’

Laura hid her disappointment as he stood up and stretched, scratching Peggy’s ears before retrieving his suitcase.

‘I’ll go up and change,’ he said briskly. ‘Won’t be long. Then we can have a couple of gin and tonics before we set off.’

* * *

Furlings’s Great Hall shimmered in the candlelight like a brightly jewelled palace. Everyone agreed that Mrs Worsley and the Ball Committee had outdone themselves this year, and that the house had never looked more spectacular. Constrained as ever by Rory Flint-Hamilton’s tight hold on the purse springs, the hunt wives had sensibly gone for a Victorian Christmas theme. Expensive ice sculptures had been replaced by simple but striking arrangements of holly berries and dark-green foliage. Walls were hung with ivy and mistletoe and clove-stuck oranges, instead of pricey artificial decorations, and gaudy electric light fixtures had been eschewed in favour of more than a thousand simple church candles, twinkling like living stars on the walls, windowsills and every available surface.

The tables, dressed with plain white linen, made the perfect backdrop for the spectacular Flint-Hamilton silver, polished to burnished perfection by the kitchen staff till it gleamed and danced in the candlelight. Red glass bowls of dates and brightly coloured sugared almonds added a dash of colour, and throughout the house a rich, pungent smell of mulled wine filled the air. Flames leaped up in the huge, baronial fireplace, where a pile of pine logs as tall as a ten-year-old child crackled cheerfully. And, in all four corners of the room, Christmas trees cut from the estate woodlands, and decorated only with candles in clear glass baubles, stood like sentries, welcoming guests to the feast.

Most of the locals came early, eager to start the merrymaking and to catch the first glimpse of this year’s celebrity guests. The Home Secretary and his wife were coming, as were Hugh Grant and his new girlfriend, and the Hollywood actress Mia Celeste. Keira Knightley pleased everyone by arriving early with her fiancé, James Righton
and
both of the Miller sisters. And the new English cricket captain showed up, fresh from his Test victory in the West Indies, looking tanned and gorgeous and, rumour had it, newly single.

‘Laura, my dear. You look a vision.’

Harry Hotham sidled up to Laura and Daniel, reeking of aftershave and looking as happy as a puppy in a steakhouse as a string of stunning young women wandered past. Beside him, his long-suffering wife Marjorie wore the expression of a woman who would have much preferred to be at home watching
Gardeners’ World
or listening to a Mahler symphony on Radio 3. In a sensible, knee-length floral dress and flat shoes, with her hair pulled back in an eighties-style bow and wearing no make-up at all other than a slick of bright-pink lipstick, she reminded Laura of her own mother.

I must call her
,
she thought guiltily. She’d been so consumed with the play, and Daniel, and her writing, she’d barely spoken to her parents in months.

‘You’d better keep a tight hold of her, Daniel.’ Harry winked amiably. ‘Or one of these young bloods will whisk her away.’

Daniel laughed thinly. He wasn’t really listening. Looking over Harry’s shoulder, he seemed almost awestruck by the glamorous guests who kept arriving, slightly to Laura’s surprise. She’d assumed he attended smart events like this all the time.

‘I mean it,’ Harry said to Laura. ‘You’re the belle of the ball.’

‘Thank you, Harry,’ Laura said politely, despite the fact that this was a blatant lie. The famous actresses looked ravishing, of course, but so did any number of the local girls, almost all of whom were slimmer and sexier than Laura. Even Lisa James, who was here not as a guest but to serve cocktails, was attracting a huge amount of male attention in her short black dress with the feather-fringed skirt. Watching her, Laura was astonished to see Gabe Baxter, squeezed uncomfortably into a dinner jacket and trousers, heading over to the bar and whispering something lewd in Lisa’s ear.

How did
he
get invited? After all the stick he gave me about the Furlings Ball! What was the expression he used? ‘A love-in for show-offs and posers.’

Turning around to ask Daniel if he’d excuse her for a moment, she found he’d already wandered off somewhere. Grabbing a fresh glass of champagne from a passing waiter for Dutch courage, she made her way over to where Gabe was standing.

‘Fancy seeing you here,’ she said archly.

Gabe looked her up and down, his eyes visibly lingering on her bust, straining for escape from its maroon velvet prison.

‘I got a last-minute invitation,’ he told Laura’s breasts. ‘One of the whippers-in is a mate of mine.’

‘Really? And here was I thinking that you wouldn’t be seen dead at this “love-in for posers”. I can’t imagine where I ever got
that
idea from.’

‘It’s like an illness with you, isn’t it?’ Gabe said hotly. ‘You have to be right about everything.’

‘At least I’m not a raging hypocrite, claiming to hate the upper classes then wangling your way in at the last minute to guzzle the lord of the manor’s champagne!’

Gabe flushed deep red. ‘You stupid cow. I came because …’ He left the sentence hanging.

‘What? You came because what?’ Laura challenged him. ‘I’d like to know.’

‘Never mind.’

For a few moments they stood there in awkward, charged silence. Then Gabe said, ‘Your boyfriend seems to be enjoying himself.’

Laura turned around, following Gabe’s gaze. Daniel was on the other side of the room, next to one of the Christmas trees, chatting animatedly to a beautiful blonde in a backless silver dress. The girl seemed glued to what he was saying, leaning forward and touching his forearm every few moments in a distinctly intimate gesture. Now it was Laura’s turn to blush.

‘He isn’t my boyfriend. We’re only dating casually,’ she heard herself saying.

‘So I see,’ said Gabe. ‘Well, you enjoy your night.’

He walked off, leaving Laura alone by the bar, watching Daniel. It was true they had not officially made a commitment to each other. She’d told herself she was happy to wait – Daniel was still mid-divorce, after all – but she realized now with a sharp pang that this was untrue. That she’d allowed things to continue on a vague, casual basis out of fear. After what had happened with John, she couldn’t bear the thought of being rejected again.

This realization was painful enough. But having to hear the truth from Gabe Baxter was an even more bitter pill.

Feeling Laura’s eyes on him from across the room, Daniel looked up and smiled at her. Making his excuses to the blonde, he came over.

‘Who was that?’ asked Laura.

‘Katie Crippin. She’s a wonderful stage actress. I met her last year, after—’

‘You were flirting.’

Daniel frowned. ‘Don’t be silly.’

‘I’m not being silly. You were flirting with her, right in front of me.’

‘Are you jealous?’ Daniel smiled. When Laura didn’t smile back he grew serious again. ‘Where did all this come from?’

‘It came from you flirting.’ Laura jutted her chin out with a braveness she didn’t feel. ‘I don’t like it. I … I want us to be exclusive.’

Just at that moment, the Reverend Slaughter hobbled over and started talking to Laura about tomorrow’s Nativity play, launching into conversation loudly and insistently, the way that only the very elderly and very deaf are able to do. There was nothing for Laura to do but nod and smile and watch helplessly as Daniel was sucked back into the throng.

‘We’ll talk later,’ he mouthed, over the Reverend’s bald head.

Oh God
,
thought Laura.
Oh God, oh God, oh God. I’ve blown it.

‘… don’t you agree, Miss Tiverton?’ With a start, she realized that Reverend Slaughter was still talking.

‘Oh, yes, definitely.’

‘So you’ll make the changes?’

‘Erm …’

A loud gong reverberated through the Great Hall.
Saved by the bell
.

‘Dinner is served!’

* * *

Dinner was delicious – smoked-salmon rillettes with horseradish sauce, succulent roast beef with all the trimmings, and a Christmas pudding so drenched in brandy it should have come with a health warning – but Laura barely took a bite. Instead, in despair at having so rashly overplayed her hand with Daniel, and feeling fat and uncomfortable in her tight burgundy dress, she drowned her sorrows in Rory Flint-Hamilton’s excellent vintage claret. Daniel was seated at a table so far across the room she’d have to crane her neck just to catch a glimpse of his back. Meanwhile, some sadist had sat her between Gretchen Lewis, St Hilda’s school librarian and officially the most boring woman in the village, and Lord Lomond, a Scottish grandee in his eighties with a gammy leg and foul temper to match. Ignored by both of them, Laura allowed the good wine to work its magic, becoming contentedly glazed as she watched the glamorous guests, admiring the huntsmen’s red frock coats and mentally rating the women’s dresses on a scale of one to ten. She was just thinking that Hugh Grant’s girlfriend looked the prettiest of all of them – in a short red halter-neck dress and spectacular matching boots, like a porn Little Red Riding Hood …
Little Red Riding Hooker
,
Laura thought and laughed, spilling claret down the bodice of her dress – when the most stunning girl she had ever seen in her life swept into the room.

In a floor-length, nude silk dress, slashed to the thigh and completely backless, and with her perfectly streaked honey-blonde hair piled on top of her head like a crown, Tatiana Flint-Hamilton glided across the room like a goddess. Through her semi-drunken haze, Laura wondered where she’d been until now. Hiding upstairs in her bedroom, just waiting for the right moment to make an entrance? If so, that would make her a raging narcissist. Then again, how could you not be if you looked in the mirror every morning and saw
that
staring back at you? Her photographs didn’t come close to doing her justice.

To Laura’s horror, she saw that Tatiana was seated at the next table to Daniel. As she approached, he stood up and pulled out her chair for her. Laura watched, frozen, as the two of them kissed on the cheek and exchanged a few words, Tatiana laughing at some comment of Daniel’s before she sat down and was immediately pounced upon by Harry Hotham.

They know each other.

It was clear from both of their body language that Daniel and Tatiana Flint-Hamilton had met before.

Why didn’t he say anything to me?

Dinner was almost over and the live band were taking their places, ready for the start of the dancing. There were to be reels and some old English country dances – Strip the Willow, the Dashing White Sergeant and the like – followed later by a traditional disco. Carriages were officially at midnight, but in previous years the Furlings Ball had been known to go on until dawn, with the younger generation drinking and partying long after the oldies had gone home to bed. With the play tomorrow, Laura would have to make an early night of it. She longed to get away, to somehow take back what she’d said to Daniel earlier, go back to Briar Cottage and make love until everything was all right again. But, if she tried to drag him home too early, she risked looking even more pathetic and desperate.
I must stay, and dance, and act as if nothing’s happened. Nothing
has
happened. I should never have let Gabe Baxter get to me. So what if Daniel was flirting with that actress? And so what if he’s met Tatiana Flint-Hamilton before? None of that means anything. He came here to spend Christmas with
me
. I have to get a grip.