Dark Angel

Luciano did not trust himself to speak. He walked away with the same hard, self-contained cool and acceptance that he had practised when he was threatened with knives in prison. He showed nothing and he refused to brood. But he could no longer comprehend why he had been wasting time considering the castle’s deficient plumbing when he could sell Ballybawn for an enormous, comforting profit. He told himself that, in the best of Irish traditions, he was feeling on top of the world. In the mood to celebrate his wonderful freedom from all female ties and expectations, he got so drunk that night that he ended up toasting Florrie O’Brien’s gloomy portrait in the great hall.

‘I shall die single too!’ he swore in Italian before he fell to thinking about Paola. Paola Massone, who would make a suitable wife in every way, who would ask nothing from him but the means to shop until she dropped. Paola, who rejoiced in every possible feminine and practical attribute but to whom he remained inexplicably impervious.

When he slammed the door on his exit, he did not notice that Florrie’s canvas fell off the wall. He did not notice that a trio of shivering wolfhounds were hiding under his bed again either. He did dimly recognise that eerie sobbing sound again but he knew it to be the wind whistling down the chimney, for as he was all too well aware Kerry cried over all sorts of things but never, ever over him.

CHAPTER SEVEN

THE car that picked Kerry up at a London airport the following afternoon had a large envelope lying on the rear seat that carried her name like an invitation.

Tearing open the envelope, Kerry extracted a single sheet of paper which contained a concise history of her mother’s life. The amount of pre-planning that her sisters appeared to have put into her reception was starting to amaze Kerry.

The account opened with the information that Carrie had at some stage changed her name from O’Brien to Carlton and continued with the details of her mother’s first marriage to a man called Sutton. Kerry learned about the birth of her eldest sister, Freddy, now a woman in her thirties, and winced when she read about the extramarital affair during which Carrie had fallen pregnant again by her lover. Her husband’s subsequent discovery that his wife’s infant twins were not his children had led to a nasty divorce. Freddy had been raised solely by her father. The twins had been separated; the older, known as Misty, had been placed in the care of foster parents, the younger, named Ione by her adoptive family, was raised in Greece.

Carrie had returned to using the name of Carlton and had pretended to be a single woman when she married Harold Linwood, who had had no idea of his bride’s past. A few years after leaving Kerry behind in Ireland, Carrie had died in a London boarding house and by that time she had been an alcoholic.

Entering the grand and intimidating central London hotel where she was to meet her sisters for the first time, Kerry was extremely nervous. Outside the designated top-floor suite her heart began beating so fast at the foot of her dry throat that she felt dizzy. Just an instant later as the door shot open in answer to her knock she was engulfed in a hug by a tall, laughing redhead and an animated hum of female voices surrounded her.

It was a minute or two before Kerry was fit to absorb impressions and separate the voices.

‘I’m Misty Andracchi, the older twin,’ the redhead informed her with a grin.

‘Ione Christoulakis…I’m three minutes younger and Misty never lets me forget it!’ A tiny, exquisite blonde beauty kissed Kerry on both cheeks.

‘And I’m Freddy al-Husayn, the eldest…’ A smiling pregnant woman with honey-blonde hair swept up in an elegant style came forward last.

‘We were excited to death when you wrote to the solicitor right out of the blue!’ Misty confided. ‘After four years, we’d given up hope of anything coming from those enquiries. We’d found a baby photo of you in Mum’s things and we knew you existed but we had no way of finding you until we discovered that Mum’s second husband was called Linwood. We had all the Linwoods we could trace contacted to see if we could establish any link with our mother’s second marriage.’

‘I’m afraid the letter took rather a long time to reach me,’ Kerry said awkwardly.

‘It doesn’t matter, we’re just overjoyed that you’re here now.’ Misty grasped both Kerry’s hands in hers, her eyes bright with satisfaction. ‘I have to be frank with you and admit that we already know an awful lot about you because we had some checks made. We had to be sure of your identity.’

Taken aback by that admission, Kerry stiffened. She had already noted the glitter of precious jewellery, the designer garments and the expensive air of confident gloss that suggested that her siblings were all rather more privileged in life than she was herself.

‘Our second biggest surprise and joy was discovering that we still have grandparents living. Oh, Kerry, we can’t wait to meet Hunt and Viola O’Brien!’ Freddy confided with delighted anticipation. ‘That was the best news ever—’

‘We ought to tell you something about ourselves first.’ Ione seemed to grasp Kerry’s bemused sense of dislocation. ‘We’re all married and our children range in age from nine years right down to six months old. So you’re an aunt as well—’

‘This is almost too much to take in all at once. I’ve been alone for a long time.’ Kerry’s voice wobbled a little, for she was touched by the affectionate acceptance that each woman had offered her yet she could already see the obvious differences between her sisters. Misty was the first to speak up, a natural leader with a lively personality. Freddy was quieter and more thoughtful. Ione with

her husky Greek accent was more of an enigma, but, though she might have less to say, she had a lovely, warm smile.

Freddy patted Kerry’s shoulder in an understanding gesture. ‘You’ve had a horrid struggle trying to manage on your own—’

‘But you’re not on your own now. You have us and all your problems are over,’ Ione assured her.

‘Which…er…problems would those be?’ Kerry questioned uncertainly.

Misty winced…. ‘Obviously we know that Luciano da Valenza evicted our grandparents from their home and that you’ve been forced to work for him—’

Freddy frowned. ‘We don’t think that your ex-fiancé has any excuse for the way he’s behaved since he came out of prison.’

‘He certainly sank very low in his treatment of you and our grandparents!’ Ione opined in angry disgust.

Kerry was surprised by the extent of her siblings’ knowledge of her circumstances and frankly dismayed by their opinion of Luciano. Keen to give them a more balanced view of recent events, she tried to explain. ‘Five years ago, Luciano gave just about everything he had in the world to Grandpa in a very generous loan. I know that Grandpa and Grandma have had to leave the castle but—’

‘Stop panicking. Nothing that’s happened is your fault,’ Ione asserted. ‘Sit back, relax and watch us in action. Our husbands agree that Luciano da Valenza needs a lesson.’

‘What are you talking about?’ Kerry asked in honest bewilderment.