‘He is having a lovely time,’ Daisy agreed quietly, turning to look at Francesco again and ignoring Slade’s last words. Slade seemed to have put the scene in the study behind him, she thought despairingly, but how was she ever going to match his cool, calm composure? She couldn’t—it was quite beyond her.
‘And you, are you having a lovely time?’ She had been standing to one side of the main crowd watching the performance, having sought the shade of a luxuriant beech tree, and now Daisy realised too late there was no one within earshot.
‘Me?’ He had turned her round again as he had spoken, his touch firm, and now she forced a bright smile as she said, ‘It’s not my party. It doesn’t matter whether I’m having a nice time or not.’
‘And life hasn’t been a party for you for quite a while, has it, Daisy?’ he said even more softly.
She shrugged the loaded question away as the thought came even more strongly that she would have to leave Slade’s employ. Apart from any feeling he might have for her—and it was only in that moment that she acknowledged she dared not believe the lasting quality of what he had declared in the study earlier—he was the type of man who would have to get to the bottom of anything or anyone he didn’t understand. He would keep digging; he wouldn’t give in until he had exposed all there was to expose. And that would mean him finding out about Jenny, and then he would expect her to talk about it…
‘Slade.’ The rapier-sharp voice cutting across the lawn brought both their heads turning as one towards the intimidatingly beautiful face of Slade’s mother-in-law, and Daisy gave a silent groan as she looked into the imperious, cold eyes. Claudia had telephoned the house earlier that day and left a message with Isabella to say she was feeling unwell and would be unable to make the party. But she didn’t look ill; in fact she looked very well, Daisy thought warily as she noticed what could almost be termed a triumphant expression on the older woman’s face.
‘Ciao, Claudia.’ Slade didn’t compromise his eternal soul by stating he was pleased she had come—as he had done when greeting his other guests—but nevertheless his impeccable good manners came to the fore as he walked across to his mother-in-law, his hand still firmly gripping Daisy’s arm and making it impossible for her to do anything else but walk with him. ‘You have recovered from your indisposition?’ he asked courteously, once they had reached Claudia’s side.
Claudia waved the enquiry away with a sharp movement of her hand, and in that moment Daisy knew the older woman hadn’t been unwell and that something was afoot. Something which affected her. ‘I hope it isn’t too presumptuous,’ Claudia said now, her voice very cool and even, ‘but I have brought a guest of my own along. I believe he is known to your…to Francesco’s nanny?’ And the slate-hard eyes rested fully on Daisy, something malignant in their depths.
Daisy heard Slade’s, ‘What the…?’ at the side of her, but she could feel the blood draining from her face and was concentrating very hard on not fainting as she stared at the tall, good-looking man who had materialised at Claudia’s side from out of the crowd, like a genie out of a lamp.
She said not a word as Ronald approached her, but then, as Slade stepped forward, his face black with rage, she found herself clutching at his arm and saying, ‘It’s all right, Slade, really. It’s all right.’
‘You have sixty seconds to get off my property.’ There was pure steel in Slade’s voice as he looked at the other man. ‘And that goes for you too, Claudia.’
‘Well!’ Claudia’s outraged gasp would have been funny in other circumstances. Daisy doubted if anyone had ever spoken to her as Slade had just done in the whole of her life.
‘I just want a word with my wife.’ Ronald had retreated a step or two, his eyes wary at the ugly look on Slade’s dark face. Ronald had never been one for physical fitness and it was clear he had recognised who would come off worse if this altercation degenerated into a brawl.
‘Was. She was your wife,’ Slade ground out through his teeth. ‘Past tense. And you’ve fifty seconds left.’
‘Daisy? Daisy, please. I need to talk to you.’
As Ronald appealed to her, Daisy realised she had to do something fast if Francesco’s day wasn’t to be spoilt by seeing his father involved in something nasty. ‘Let him say what he wants to say, Slade,’ she said shakily, still holding on to his arm, more for support than anything else now, ‘and then he can go. Don’t spoil the day for Francesco.’
‘I need to speak to you alone, just the two of us.’ Ronald was wearing his butter-wouldn’t-melt-in-my-mouth look, but it didn’t cut any ice with her, not any more, Daisy realised with something like relief. In fact, now the initial shock was over, she found the confrontation—which she had known, deep inside, would happen one day—wasn’t affecting her at all as she had imagined. When she looked at Ronald she saw a cruel, vain, selfish and incredibly manipulative man, and she couldn’t believe she had once thought she loved him. But she had loved the image he had projected, the façade he’d put forward, that was all. She hadn’t known the real Ronald, not until she had received the photographs. And she knew now she shouldn’t have tried to avoid seeing him again—she was stronger than he was. Any day.
‘Do you want to talk to him alone?’ Slade asked Daisy.
‘No.’ She answered Slade but kept her eyes on Ronald, and they were cold. ‘There is nothing personal between us any more. Anything he wants to say he can say in front of the whole world.’
‘Daisy, you know how I feel.’ Dark red had flared across
Ronald’s cheekbones at her words but he still couldn’t believe she really was finished with him, Daisy thought with a touch of disbelief. After Jenny, after all he had done, he still had the utter arrogance, the conceit, to think he could talk her round. His ego was truly phenomenal. ‘I love you; I’ve always loved you and I always will. You have to believe that.’
‘Then that is your misfortune,’ Daisy said very clearly, ‘but you’re wrong; you don’t love me, Ronald. The only person you love, the only person you have ever loved, is yourself.’ He had never even mentioned Jenny. He had known about the miscarriage and that it was a little girl, but he had never once mentioned it because at bottom he simply didn’t care.
‘Give me one more chance and I’ll prove it to you.’
Claudia was very quiet but Daisy was aware the Italian woman’s eyes had been fixed on her face all through the exchange, and now Daisy looked straight at Slade’s mother-in-law as she said, ‘I don’t know what you meant to accomplish today, Mrs Morosini, or what Ronald told you to persuade you to act as you did, but he is as dead to me as if he were six foot under the ground. He simply does not exist for me any more.’
And then she turned to face Ronald fully again. ‘I’ll never give you another chance, Ronald. The last months I’ve spent hating you, but I realise now that even that is giving you too much significance in my life. You would have done far better to remain with Susan once the divorce was absolute. You deserve each other.’
‘Divorce?’ Claudia turned on Ronald accusingly. ‘You told me you were married to her, that she is your wife.’
She couldn’t take much more of this. Daisy was conscious that she was trembling inside, that her legs were shaking and her stomach nauseous, but she also knew she had to prevent Ronald from knowing. She had astounded him with her attitude—she could see it in his angry face—but she needed to remain cold and strong and calm on the outside if he was going to go for good. Any weakness and he would seize on it and use it against her; it was the nature of the man. And she never wanted to set eyes on him again.
‘So you thought you would bring him here today with the idea of exposing Daisy as what?’ Slade asked Claudia grimly. ‘A runaway wife, an adulteress? That’s what you thought, isn’t it? If you weren’t my son’s grandmother I would make sure I never set eyes on you again. And you—’ his narrowed stare was frightening as he took a step towards Ronald ‘—you’ve had your sixty seconds.’
‘Slade, think of Francesco!’ Daisy’s voice was urgent and she was holding on to his sleeve for dear life again, but Ronald had read what was in the other man’s face and he was off across the lawn like a greyhound.
He was gone for good. As Daisy watched Ronald’s ignominious retreat she wondered how she could ever have been so misguided as to have fallen in love with a man like him. But she had been young, young and naive, when Ronald had blazed into her life, and painfully trusting. His smooth tongue, his ability to act a part, what almost amounted to a split personality—they had all played their part in concealing Ronald’s true character, and he was ruthlessly clever and eloquent in proving black was white.