‘Did you mind?’
It was almost the first personal question she had asked him, and even now she half wished she had not done so. She didn’t want to know anything about him that would make him seem human and vulnerable: she wanted to keep him at a distance and preserve a wall of silence between them.
‘At first, but I got on very well with my grandfather, and on balance I think I was far better off as a much-wanted grandson than I would have been as a reluctantly accepted step-son.’
Was he saying that his step-mother had not wanted him?
As they had reached the door of his apartment Jenna could not ask. The tension inside her was appalling as she waited for him to open the door. To have to follow him into the empty drawing-room was a painful let-down.
‘Lucy’s probably with Sarah in her room. She’s in a wheelchair now, although the doctors are still convinced that the paralysis is hysterical and will eventually go. I’ll go and get Lucy. Would you like a cup of coffee?’
Jenna nodded numbly. Her mouth felt dry, her head ready to burst with pain.
She stood in front of the window overlooking the park, one remote corner of her mind admiring the delicacy of the wrought-iron balcony while the rest of it was seized by crippling tension.
‘Hello!’
She turned round at the sound of Lucy’s voice. Her niece stood just inside the door, and there was no sign of James. Lucy looked tired and pale. There was an open anxiety in her eyes and all the resentment and bitterness Jenna had felt on learning that she had gone to James dissolved. Automatically she opened her arms, unsure which of them it was who sobbed first as Lucy ran into them.
‘I’m sorry…so sorry,’ Lucy whispered tearfully hugging her with fierce intensity. ‘I didn’t mean to hurt and upset you. It’s just that I’ve been so desperate to know about my father, it’s almost been like being ill. I can’t explain it to you, but…’
‘It’s all right, I do understand.’
Of course she did, and it was almost worth all the pain and trauma of the last twenty-four hours to see Lucy transformed like this and once again the loving, affectionate girl she had previously been.
‘James was furious with me when he found out that I’d run away from school. He said I was the most thoughtless, selfish brat he’d ever met.’
Tears glimmered in the brown eyes, but unbelievably Lucy was grinning. ‘I think that’s what convinced me more than anything else that he is my father…he sounded so much like a parent!’
Jenna felt her throat constrict. The difference in Lucy was unbelievable. Did she have the right to destroy her very evident happiness by telling her the truth?
‘James?’ she questioned, raising her eyebrows a little.
‘Well, somehow it doesn’t seem right calling him “daddy”!’ Lucy pulled a wry face. ‘He’s far too macho to be a parent.’ She giggled. ‘I think if he wasn’t my father, I could almost fall for him myself! Sarah calls him James too.’
‘She is his sister,’ Jenna pointed out.
‘Umm. I wonder what that will make us when you and James are married? We’ll be step-sisters, but she’ll also be my aunt, won’t she?’
Jenna was stunned. Shock followed by a swift burst of anger. James had had no right to tell Lucy they were getting married. He had out-manoeuvred her very neatly, knowing quite well that she could hardly turn round and tell Lucy they weren’t.
‘Wasn’t it a coincidence,’ Lucy was chattering on happily, ‘the two of you bumping into one another like that after all these years? James told me that you met when you first came to London, and that he had to go away when his grandfather became ill and that when he came back you’d disappeared.’ Lucy looked reproachful. ‘Why didn’t you let him know you were expecting me?’
‘Because, my dear daughter, your mother is far too proud to attempt what she no doubt saw as a form of moral blackmail,’ James drawled, coming into the room carrying a tray of coffee. ‘In fact it was a mix-up all round. When she didn’t reply to my letters, I naturally assumed that she no longer wanted to have anything to do with me. I had no idea that…’
‘She was expecting me,’ Lucy concluded for him, dancing over to him and relieving him of the tray. ‘I was just telling Ma that you’re so sexy that if you weren’t my father I could quite easily fall for you myself!’ she told James cheekily, putting the tray on the table and turning back to hug him.
Watching his easy acceptance of her exuberant affection, Jenna saw that she had been wrong in thinking that he would make a poor parent. He seemed to know instinctively how to handle Lucy: he was firm with her yet understanding.
‘When’s the wedding going to be?’ Lucy was perched on the arm of a chair, nibbling biscuits and looking at Jenna.
‘Just as soon as we can arrange it,’ James answered for her. ‘In fact, I’m planning to take your mother out to dinner tonight so that we can discuss it.’
He turned to Jenna. ‘Come and meet Sarah.’
With Lucy trilling away happily at her side about the wedding and how exciting and thrilling it all was there was nothing Jenna could say. She followed James into an inner corridor with several doors off it.
He opened one of them and stood back so that Lucy and Jenna could precede him.