Hugo!
She dialled the number of his Lexminster flat and then, when there was no reply, she drove over to Lexminster to find him.
The shock of discovering that his flat was empty, and then of learning from a neighbour that Hugo had left for Somalia the previous day, made her reel with sick shock.
He had gone.
She had lost him.
It was over.
Now there was no going back.
Hugo!
Hugo!
CHAPTER NINE
‘WARD, I’M WORRIED about Dee.’
Ward Hunter replaced the financial section of the paper he had been reading and looked across the breakfast table at his wife.
They had been married less than a year, and he marvelled that he could have managed to live so long without her. Just the sight of her pretty face on the pillow in the morning had the power to lift his heart to a degree that left him shaken with the depth of their love.
The fact that she was carrying their child only increased his awe that life should have thought him worthy of such munificence.
‘You mustn’t worry,’ he chided her tenderly, adding a little bit more dryly, ‘Especially about Dee. She’s more than capable of running her own life, and running it extremely well.’
Anna gave a small sigh. Much as she loved her husband, there were some things, some signs, that only another woman could fully appreciate and understand.
Dee was very self-sufficient, very strong and independent, yes, but Anna was an extremely intuitive woman and she was concerned about her friend.
‘What exactly did she say to you about there being a problem with her plans to establish a unit like yours?’ Anna asked Ward thoughtfully.
‘Not much. Just that,’ Ward responded unhelpfully. ‘But that won’t be worrying her. Not Dee. She thrives on having something to get her teeth into.’
‘Mmm...’
Ward had a point, but Anna was still not totally reassured. She made a mental note to telephone Dee, or, even better, to call round and see her.
* * *
Grimly Dee opened her front door and let herself into her house. She had just spent the morning and the best part of the afternoon going round trying to discreetly canvass some support for her plans from the other committee members, but so far their reaction had not been reassuring.
Only the bank manager shared her view on how important it was to make the changes she wanted to make.
As she walked into the kitchen she dropped her files on the table. One of them contained her carefully worked out and detailed proposals for what she wanted to do and the other, which she had taken to discuss with her solicitor, was the original deed which had been drawn up when her father had first instituted the charity.
His depressing but expected advice had been that there was no loophole via which she could push through her proposals without the support of Peter Macauley—in other words, Hugo.
‘I sympathise with what you want to do, Dee,’ he had said, ‘but without the agreement of Peter’s representative on the committee, it just isn’t possible.’
‘I’ve got my own funds,’ Dee had reminded him. ‘If I use them...’
‘I can’t possibly advise you to do that,’ he had counselled her sharply. ‘You’re still only a young woman. You have your own future to think of. You already make a very substantial personal donation to the charity and—’
He had stopped, shaking his head, and Dee had known that he spoke the truth. It was her responsibility to manage the funds in the foundation her father had set up, and to this end, with Dee’s agreement, he had placed most of his personal wealth in that foundation.