Emerald Mistress (27 page)

As Eva broke off her recitation with the hint of a stifled sob, Gustav swiftly abandoned his stance behind the sofa. Sitting down beside Harriet’s slender mother, he grasped her hand in a gesture of encouragement. ‘He was the type of man who preyed on young girls. How were you to recognise that?’

‘I’m so glad that you understand.’ Eva rested enormous blue eyes on her husband and spoke as though they were alone together. ‘I’d heard whispers about how he’d treated his wife, but I paid no heed. Although the church didn’t recognise his divorce from her, I did think of him as a single man.’

‘Naturally you would.’ Harriet was feeling rather superlative to the proceedings. She could not comprehend why her mother’s husband was taking the leading role in a matter which she felt was really nothing to do with him.

Eva held on fast to Gustav’s hand and looked across at her daughter, her eyes unexpectedly hard in her beautiful face. ‘There’s nothing new or exciting in my story, I’m afraid. Your father said he loved me. He said he wanted to marry me and I believed
him. I was hopelessly infatuated with him. When I realised I was pregnant, I went straight to him. I was so innocent I believed that he would be pleased. Do you know what he said?’

Encountering her mother’s cold, challenging gaze, Harriet felt most uncomfortable and shook her head. ‘I have no idea.’

‘He said that the baby I carried was nothing to do with him and suggested that I must have been intimate with other men.’

‘Now perhaps you can understand why your mother wanted to forget what happened to her almost thirty years ago.’ Gustav exuded the grave disapproval of a man with far from liberal views. ‘It may be a cliché, but Eva was seduced with lies and deserted.’

‘Horrible…’ Harriet wondered if she was being super-sensitive in feeling that her unknown father’s sins had somehow become hers.

‘I never saw him or heard from him again. I ran away from home and caught the ferry to England.’

‘When did he die?’

Eva pursed her lips and then shrugged a delicate shoulder. ‘It was quite recent. In fact it was only a few months ago. But please don’t get the idea that I deprived you of the chance of knowing him. He
wouldn’t have admitted you were his. He would have refused to have anything to do with you.’

‘If anything, your mother was protecting you from the hurt of that knowledge and rejection,’ Gustav opined. ‘Regrettably, your father was not a pleasant character.’

Harriet studied the older man with an unease she tried to conceal. ‘You seem to know a lot about my background.’

‘I have no secrets from Gustav,’ Eva proclaimed.

Harriet tried not to think of the secrets that had been kept from her. ‘May I ask what my father’s name was?’

‘Cavaliere.’ Eva tilted her chin as she said that name. ‘Now perhaps you’ll understand why I want your parentage to remain a secret.’

As still as a stone carving, Harriet stared with fixed attention at the older woman. She could not credit that she had heard a name she recognised and, of all names, that particular one which had such deep personal significance. ‘Cavaliere?’ She had to say it twice before sound actually emerged from her lips. ‘Cavaliere?’

‘Valente Cavaliere. I dare say you’ve never heard of him,’ Eva contended brightly. ‘But in his day he was a famous international tycoon. He married the daughter of the big house outside Ballyflynn and divorced
her when she had an affair. She was always ill. He used to visit with his child.’

Gustav was frowning with distaste. ‘Cavaliere was a notorious womaniser. In his lifetime he was involved in some very sordid scandals.’

Harriet was so rigid with tension that she was afraid a sudden movement might break her into a host of little pieces. Her mother had referred to Valente Cavaliere’s fame in a bright, almost boastful tone that was horribly inappropriate. Tension pounded behind her brow. Unable to think straight, she sat as if she was frozen in time.
Cavaliere
. That name had gone into her mind and there it lodged, like a ship caught in a whirlpool. Round and round the name went inside her buzzing head, and her skin turned clammy, perspiration beading her short upper lip.

‘You remind me of your father. You always have,’ Eva said almost sweetly. ‘You have the same problem with your weight.’

‘Valente Cavaliere?’ With pronounced care, Harriet vocalised every syllable of that name. ‘You’re saying that he was the man who got you pregnant…. my father?’

‘Haven’t I just told you so?’

‘There’s a great deal for Harriet to take in, my dear,’ Gustav said quietly.

Harriet parted numb lips. ‘Yes. Are you absolutely sure that Valente was my father?’

‘Now you’re being horribly rude and insulting! How dare you?’ Two spots of feverish pink adorning her taut cheekbones, Eva rose up in a sudden movement that took both her companions by surprise and stalked out of the room.

‘You’re very shocked. Eva can’t have understood that,’ Gustav sighed. ‘Perhaps you can now see why your mother asked for discretion. She has a real dread of her secret being exposed. Cavaliere had an unsavoury reputation, and she can’t face being associated with him in that way.’

Harriet said nothing. She did not trust her voice or her temper. It seemed to her that there was no proper acknowledgement of how she might feel. She got up to leave.

The older man went through the polite motions of offering her tea and suggesting she wait for her mother to join them again. But Harriet sensed that he was keen to close the chapter and the entire episode. He wasn’t comfortable with emotional scenes. She was walking out of the hotel with no idea where she was going when her mobile phone buzzed. It was Boyce.

‘I tried to speak to Mum about your long-lost father,’ her half-brother began. ‘But it went pearshaped on me…’

‘Did it?’ she said dully.

‘I had no idea that Gustav was working in the room next door and was able to hear every word I said. It was a bloodbath! Mum started crying, and Gustav came wading in, and I had to drop the subject.’

‘Of course you did.’

‘To be frank, I don’t fancy tackling Mum again. She has Gustav wrapped round her little finger, and I would prefer not to have to tell him to mind his own business. I’m sorry.’

‘Don’t worry about it. It’s really not that important.’

‘Are you sure?’

‘Totally.’ She snatched in a deep, trembling breath. ‘Did Mum tell you anything at all?’

‘Nothing.’

‘Did you mention Rafael to Mum?’

‘No. You know what’s she like. She didn’t want me to go to Ireland, so she wasn’t interested in hearing a word about what went on there.’

‘That’s good. Do me a favour—don’t mention Rafael. It’s…er…him and me…well, it’s over,’ she said jerkily.

‘Is it? Was the two-week holiday the kiss of death? I have to admit I’m surprised. By the way, my offer to buy Slieveross has been accepted.’

‘Oh, that’s wonderful news…’

He soon rang off, and she put her phone back in her bag. Until someone passing by stared at her she did not realise that her face was wet with tears, and she worked hard at pulling herself back together. Her thoughts tried to travel straight to the heart of the agony growing at a steady rate inside her. But she was convinced that if she acknowledged that agony it would drive her off the edge of sanity. How could the world be so small? And how could fate be so horribly cruel that what she most valued and needed and loved had become what would ultimately destroy her? Feeling raw emotions starting to pull at her, she shut down that dangerous inner turbulence and made herself think instead in small, simple steps that only stretched a little way ahead.

She did not even need a plan of action. After all, she knew what had to be done, didn’t she? Rafael would be waiting for her at his city apartment. She had to break off their relationship. Immediately. There was no need to tell him what her mother had told her. No need whatsoever. News like that he could definitely do without. It wouldn’t change anything, or make the facts any more palatable. Valente Cavaliere had blighted his son’s life practically from birth. Rafael could live without another score to add to Valente’s considerable tally. She could protect
Rafael from knowing the unbearable truth and of having to live with it as she would have to. Wasn’t that the best she could do for Rafael? Wasn’t that the only way left to show her love?

A manservant let her into the penthouse apartment. It was as contemporary as Rafael’s other properties were traditional: an imposing display of soaring ceilings and immense stretches of marble and limestone space. Rafael was talking in French on the phone and did not initially see her. He was propped up against the edge of a glass desk in a relaxed pose. His lean, bronzed profile was etched against the light spilling through the window behind him. He laughed, moving a lean brown hand in an expressive gesture of emphasis. For an instant she thought her heart might crack wide open; for an instant the agony she had suppressed leapt to the fore and threatened to destroy her.

‘Harriet…’ He framed her name softly and stretched out his hand with the unquestioning assurance of a lover who knew his every attention was welcome.

She lost colour, her fine skin tightening over her delicate bone structure. Numbly she compressed her lips, shook her head in urgent negative, and turned away to walk back out of the room in a silent indication that she would wait for him to finish his call.

Rafael watched her departure with a frown. Harriet had yet to utter a single critical word in relation to her mother or her sister. She had told no lies either. As a result, Rafael had wasted no time in reaching his own conclusions about Harriet’s nearest and dearest. In his opinion Eva was shallow and neglectful, and Alice a spoilt and spiteful cheat; neither of them deserved Harriet. Now she had returned from visiting her relatives looking as though she had just staggered clear of a motorway pile-up, and Rafael knew exactly where to bestow the blame. Obviously there would have to be some changes, he reflected grimly. The next time he would be present when Harriet saw her relatives. That way he could ensure that she was treated with all due respect.

Harriet stumbled dizzily into the cloakroom, where she was overcome by nausea. In the aftermath, she leant up against the wall, rested her clammy brow on the cold, unyielding tiles and shivered uncontrollably. She felt like she was living a nightmare she could not wake up from. Please, please let me wake up, she thought wretchedly. For the first time in her life she could find nothing to be positive about, and that sense of black hopelessness was threatening to drown her. Struggling to get a grip on herself again, she freshened up. She examined the hollow blankness in her eyes in the mirror and
glanced away. She had to do it and leave the apartment again. One small step at a time. But it was such a huge, terrifying step now she was actually facing it.

‘I have something to say…’

Rafael inclined his proud dark head, the charismatic smile she adored tugging at the corners of his expressive mouth.

Her spine as stiff as a poker, Harriet contrived to look in his direction and yet not focus. ‘I loved Italy. I had a great time. But I’d like us to just go back to being partners in the yard…and nothing more.’

‘OK…’ Rafael murmured, without any expression at all.

‘I’ve been really happy, and I don’t want you to think that I don’t appreciate you.’ Harriet hovered in desperate search of words that might remove the risk of her inflicting the smallest sting to his ego.

His lean, strong face was impassive. ‘Why would I think that?’

‘It’s just that I thought you might, and I couldn’t bear that,’ she muttered frantically, letting her restive hands link in front of her and twist together. ‘It’s important to me that you know that I was really, really happy with you—’

‘Only not right at this moment.’

Harriet blinked, misery choking her thoughts and responses. ‘Sorry?’

‘It would seem obvious that I am not making you really,
really
happy right now,’ Rafael delineated, with cutting clarity of diction.

Harriet shot him a stricken look. ‘But that’s not your fault. Please don’t think that it is. I hope we can still be friends.’

‘No,’ Rafael asserted, without hesitation.

Her lower lip wobbled and she studied the marble floor until she had a grip on her flailing emotions again. ‘It’s important to me.’

‘Either you’re in my life on my terms or out of it.’

‘Out,’ she mumbled sickly.

‘Are you still planning to go straight back to the airport?’ Rafael drawled.

‘Yes.’ She could hardly squeeze the word out.

He lifted the phone. ‘My driver will take you.’

And she waited for him to say something else, but he didn’t. The silence clawed at her, and she was afraid that she would fill it, that she would let the truth spill out to damage him as much as it had damaged her.

To guard against that risk, Harriet turned on her heel and walked back out into the echoing hall. A minute later the manservant appeared with her suitcase.
No other sound disturbed the quiet until the buzzer on the intercom announced the arrival of the limo. She wanted to run back and say…What would she say to Rafael? What was there to say? Despair settling like a lump of concrete inside her, she let the lift carry her down to the basement car park.

CHAPTER TEN

U
NA ALMOST FELL
off her bicycle in her desperate eagerness to speak to Harriet. ‘I think Fergal must be seeing that English tourist who’s renting a room at Dooleys!’

Harriet glanced at the teenager’s anguished face and hurriedly looked away again. ‘So?’

‘Don’t you know how I feel about him?’ Una gasped tearfully. ‘I just saw him walking through the village with her!’

With effort, Harriet fought free of her preoccupation. She put an arm round the distressed girl and gave her a comforting hug. ‘I’m sorry you’re hurt.’

‘I’m more than hurt…I love him. I can’t stand to see him with someone else!’

Harriet breathed in deep but remained silent.

‘Go on—say what you’re thinking!’ the teenager urged fiercely.

‘You’re too young for Fergal and I’m afraid that he has a life to get on with,’ Harriet murmured, as gently as she could.