The Valentine Child. JACQUELINE BAIRD
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‘Are you all right, Zoë?’
She glanced up into concerned deep brown eyes and tried to smile. ‘I will be when this is over.’ A supporting arm closed around her tiny waist and she relaxed against the hard, muscled, masculine frame of her husband of two months—Justin. She still had to pinch herself sometimes to believe that she and Justin were actually man and wife.
‘Zoë.’ Justin’s voice snapped her back to the present.
She raised misty blue eyes to his. ‘I’m OK.’
‘You’re not,’ he contradicted her bluntly. His hand tightened fractionally on her waist. ‘Slope off to your secret seat, and I’ll make sure you’re not disturbed for a while’ His hand moved to her back and turned her to the door. His dark head bent, she felt the feather-light brush of his mouth against the top of her head and she was out in the large oak-panelled hall.
Justin knew her so well, she thought, slipping quickly through the door opposite and making straight for the window-seat. Curled up behind the curtain, she stared out of the window. The clear, bright light of a mid-May day glinted over the long lush green lawns and on down to the river, which wound like a sinuous silver snake along the bottom of the garden.
Too nice a day for a funeral! She sighed deeply, and a tear rolled slowly down the curve of her cheek. Uncle Bertie—dead…
She wiped away the moisture with the back of her hand. She couldn’t have any tears left. She had done her crying for her uncle over the past few months when it had become obvious that it was simply a matter of time before his ruined heart gave out. The funeral today was the last act for a man who had led an exemplary life. The guests across the hall numbered among some of the greatest names in the land, here to pay their respects.
Uncle Bertie had been an eminent judge destined for one of the highest positions in the English judiciary, until he had suffered his heart attack last November.
Zoë closed her eyes and lay back against the wall, her feet tucked beneath her. She was going to miss him, she knew. But—thank God!—she had Justin; she was not alone, and Uncle Bertie had been delighted when she’d married his protégé. So she at least had the solace of knowing that her uncle’s last weeks had been happy.
Smiling softly to herself, she glanced at her sparkling engagement ring and the pale gold band beside it. Then she breathed on the window, misting the glass, and, in a childish gesture, drew a heart with her forefinger and inserted the initials ZG and JG with a rather wobbly arrow, remembering the Valentine’s ball.
No girl had ever had a more tender, intoxicating initiation into womanhood. Justin was the perfect lover; slowly and carefully he had kissed and caressed, urged and cajoled her through the intricacies of love, and at the final moment had protected her from any untoward consequences.
The next morning, when he had taken her back to Black Gables, he had formally asked Uncle Bertie for her hand in marriage, informed her arrogantly that as his wife-to-be she no longer needed to work, and, of course, she had agreed. Then, a month later, on the arm of her uncle Bertie, she had walked down the aisle of the village church to wed Justin.
She sighed. Who would have thought that two months later Bertie would be dead? Then she heard the voice of Mrs Sara Blacket, the wife of one of the partners in Justin’s law firm, speaking.
‘It’s a magnificent house. Gifford has done very well for himself, even if he did have to marry the old man’s niece to get it.’
Why, the cheeky old bat! Zoë thought, and would have moved, but then she recognised another voice—that of Mary Master, the wife of a High Court judge.
‘Oh, I don’t think Justin married for any mercenary reason. They make a lovely couple, and it’s obvious she adores him.’
‘I don’t dispute the girl loves him, but my Harold told me he’d heard that Bertie Brown, when he realised he was dying, offered Justin his place as the head of chambers on condition that he married the niece. He wanted her settled before he died.’
‘I find that hard to believe. In any case, the other partners would have had some say in the matter,’ Mary Master argued.
‘Bertie was well liked, and which one of them would refuse a dying man’s last wish? As Harold said, the girl is exquisitely beautiful, tiny—like a rare Dresden china doll—but young and hardly a match for an aggressively virile male like Gifford.
‘His taste in the past was for large, bosomy ladies more his own age. Remember the Christmas dinner two years ago and Justin’s redhead partner? Harold told me they were taking bets on whether her boobs would stay covered through to the sweet course.’
‘Oh, really, Sara!’ Mary exclaimed. ‘That’s a bit much, and in any case Justin was not dating Zoë at the time. He was a free agent.’
Zoë cringed behind the curtain, her face flaming; she could not believe what the Blacket woman was saying. Didn’t want to.
‘Believe me or not, Mary, but I wouldn’t mind being a fly on the wall when the will is read. Bertie befriended Justin Gifford when he was a teenager and his father died—apparently they were old friends. I’ll bet Gifford gets at least half the old boy’s estate, if not more. Hardly fair on Zoë, his only living relative.’
‘Surely it’s not important? They are married—everything they have is divided equally anyway.’
Zoë heard Mary Master reply. The woman’s voice was fading—they were obviously leaving the room—but Zoë could not move; she was frozen in shock.
‘Exactly my point.’ Sara Blacket’s piercing voice echoed in the room as she closed the door. ‘Gifford is a very ambitious man and by doing what the old man wanted and marrying the American girl he has made doubly sure of getting control of virtually everything. I can’t see young Zoë being involved in finance at allshe’s the arty type.’
Zoë stared at the heart she had drawn on the glass; the mist was fading, the shape disappearing—a bad omen! Don’t be stupid! she told herself, and quickly raised her hand and rubbed the window clean. But she could not clean the doubt in her mind away so easily. Could it be true? Had Uncle Bertie insisted that Justin marry her? No, of course not, her common sense told her. Justin loved her, didn’t he?
She slid off the seat and stood up. She was overreacting. Sara Blacket was a nosy, overbearing old gossip whose husband, as the most senior in chambers, had wanted to be head himself. Justin had told her as much. Obviously it was pure sour grapes on Sara’s part.
‘Zoë? Zoë?’ Justin’s voice broke into her uncomfortable thoughts, and, smoothing the plain black jersey shift down over her hips, she moved towards the door. It was flung open and Justin walked in, his dark eyes full of concern.
‘Ah! There you are. I saw Mary and Sara leave. I take it you didn’t get the peace you were looking for,’ he said lightly, casually slipping an arm around her shoulders. ‘Judge Master is waiting in the study, darling. It’s time to say goodbye to the guests, and then the will will be read. Are you up to it or would your rather wait? There’s no hurry.’
‘Why? Because you know what’s in it?’ The curt words had left her mouth before she could stop them…
‘No. No, I don’t.’ Justin turned her around to face him, his arms encircling her waist, holding her loosely, his dark eyes scrutinising her pale face. ‘I was thinking of you; you look tired. It’s been a long day.’
Held in his arms, conscious of his warmth and the tender care in his expression, Zoë hated herself for doubting him for a minute, but she could not control her wayward tongue. She loved Justin, and she needed his reassurance.
‘You do love me, Justin?’ she asked softly, her eyes catching his, a pleading light in their sapphire depths.
‘Of course I do, silly girl; I married you, didn’t I?’ And his dark head lowered, blocking out the light as his mouth moved over hers in an achingly tender kiss.