Persuade Me Page 18

  He dragged his thoughts back to the present. The sea dragon was an obvious candidate for ‘Parents of the Deep’, since the female delegated all parenting duties, even egg hatching, to the male. In contrast, he was sure that Anna would make a loving mother. He recalled that first unexpected sighting of her in Uppercross, when she stopped to comfort the dark-haired little boy he’d mistakenly thought was her son. For one crazy moment he imagined another boy in Ollie’s place: slightly older, tall for his age – blond like his father or dark like his mother? The child they might have had, made from a love that was somehow still so real …

  He scraped his chair back and rose abruptly from the table. ‘I need some fresh air.’ He shot Guy an angry look. ‘Call me when you’ve finished giving my interview.’

  ‘Hold on a minute.’ Obviously still hungry for something frank and revealing, Duncan put a heavy hand on Rick’s arm. ‘This is a question that only you can answer. What do all these observations of sea creatures tell you about yourself and your fellow man?’

  Rick twisted his mouth into a grim smile, shook off Duncan’s hand and threw caution to the winds. ‘That I generally prefer hanging out with bottom dwellers than with human beings. That the rules of male-female relationships are much more straightforward under the sea. And that my perfect mate is a sea dragon.’

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  Anna walked briskly towards the Royal Crescent – partly because she wanted to arrive early and pre-empt any comments from her father about her timekeeping, and partly to keep warm. She’d decided to wear the coral dress that she’d bought for the wedding of an old Oxford friend. But that had been in the summer; now, even under her wool coat, the flimsy fabric was no proof against the chill of an October night.

  Then, in spite of the cold, she stopped. In the golden glow of old-fashioned streetlights, the elegant sweep of Georgian houses unfurled before her like the stunning backdrop to an empty stage, waiting for the show to begin. Even the prospect of an evening with Walter and Lisa couldn’t subdue a little thrill of excitement. It wasn’t every day that she had an invitation to dinner at a world-famous hotel, was it?

  Moments later she was inside number sixteen. A welcoming smile from the doorman, a polite enquiry, and she was following a member of staff through the reception area and out into softly lit private gardens. She stared across at a row of renovated outbuildings – ‘originally coach houses for Royal Crescent residents, madam – the first two are now our spa, The Bath House, and our restaurant, known as The Dower House’. The man led her towards the building next to the restaurant – ‘The Pavilion, madam, where Sir Walter and his guests are staying’ – and she stepped into an entrance hall almost the size of her flat.

  To her right, on a red leather sofa, sat Lisa – in a dazzling white off-the-shoulder creation that showed her golden limbs to perfection and left Anna feeling pale and uninteresting. She was on her mobile, deep in conversation – if that wasn’t a contradiction in terms. ‘Oh God, yes,’ she was saying, ‘we’ll be getting the meal over as soon as possible … Nine-thirty I would think, so let’s meet there at ten … No, just the three of us. See you later.’

  Anna didn’t know whether to be relieved that dinner would be finished in a couple of hours, or worried that she was included in Lisa’s plans for the evening.

  Lisa snapped her phone shut and greeted Anna with unusual enthusiasm. ‘Come and see my suite, it’s absolutely divine!’ She almost dragged Anna through the nearest door and gave her a guided tour of a beautifully furnished bedroom, bathroom and conservatory-style sitting room. As they stopped to admire every antique bureau and original painting, this took longer than Anna expected.

  ‘Just like being at home,’ Lisa said complacently, ‘but the service is far better. Nothing’s too much trouble.’

  Knowing the scale of Lisa’s demands, Anna couldn’t help but be impressed.

  ‘Cleo’s got a room down the hall, very handy if I need her,’ Lisa went on. ‘And Walter’s in the Beau Nash suite, named after the famous Regency fashionista, you know, so appropriate. Come on, I’ll show you.’

  Anna followed her sister, wondering whether to point out that Lisa must be thinking of Beau Brummell, because Beau Nash pre-dated the Regency period by several decades. But she didn’t. And she could have added that Walter had better take note since, despite helping to make Bath the most fashionable resort in eighteenth-century England, Beau Nash had died in poverty as a result of his extravagances. But she didn’t. Lisa had never had much time for accuracy, historical or otherwise.

  They returned to the entrance hall and crossed to the door opposite; when Lisa tried to open it, however, it was locked.

  ‘I’ve got Anna here, she’s dying to see your suite,’ she called out imperiously.

  Muffled voices from inside. Then Cleo’s throaty laugh and Walter’s pompous tones, ‘It’ll have to be another time, I’m getting dressed. Meet you at the restaurant.’

  Lisa gave a little shrug and moved away.

  ‘Don’t you think that’s weird?’ Anna said, as she and Lisa left The Pavilion and turned along the path to their right.

  ‘What – that he wants some privacy to get dressed?’ Lisa gave a languid wave to someone across the garden.

  ‘No – the fact that Cleo’s part of that privacy.’

  A laugh of tinkling condescension. ‘You really don’t get it, do you? She’s his masseuse – naturally she sees him with no clothes on, but it doesn’t mean anything. I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised at your ignorance – the nearest you ever got to a massage was being flogged with birch twigs in that Russian bath house.’

  They were at The Dower House and Lisa was about to step through the doorway, when Anna caught hold of her arm. ‘Listen, does Cleo lock the door when she gives you a massage?’

  Lisa lowered her voice to a contemptuous hiss. ‘No need, I don’t care who comes in and sees me naked. But Walter’s a different generation, although I know it’s sometimes hard to believe.’ She shook off Anna’s hand, her face contorted with rage. ‘And for God’s sake don’t make a scene – remember where you are!’

  A split second later, however, she composed her features in a serene mask and glided swan-like into another spacious entrance hall. She paused expectantly, and the waiters flocked. Anna’s coat was whisked away as if by magic, and she found herself swept into the main dining room in Lisa’s wake, ushered towards the conservatory area and seated at a table for five, opposite a rather unnerving expanse of mirror.

  ‘Not there!’ Lisa said, eyes narrowing. ‘She can go on the end, then the four of us will be in our usual places.’

  Lisa must be referring to herself, Walter, Cleo and the ‘someone special’ – who, by the sound of it, was a frequent dining companion; obviously Lady Dalrymple, as she was staying in the same hotel. Anna exchanged a smile with the nearest waiter and moved to the chair at the end of the table.

  While Lisa stood fidgeting with her mobile, Anna took the opportunity to look around. Classy furnishings in neutral tones of soft beige and olive green, white damask tablecloths, sparkling silver and crystal – it was a style of restaurant to which she was totally unaccustomed. Walter and Lisa, on the other hand, would feel completely at home – in fact, with its subdued lighting and that huge mirror overlooking the table, this place might have been designed for Walter.

  Just then a man’s voice interrupted her thoughts – a voice she’d heard only a week ago but never expected to encounter here.

  ‘Lisa darling, you look sensational!’ She watched William Elliot-Dunne hold her sister close, saw his lips brush hers, intimate and teasing, for several seconds. Eventually, he seemed to recollect where he was and escorted her to one of the chairs under the mirror. Then, as if he sensed Anna’s stare, he turned and looked down at her, eyes wide in disbelief. ‘Anna! Nobody told me you’d be here.’

  ‘Same,’ she said tersely.

  He lifted up her hand and she felt the heat of his lips on her skin. ‘You
look even more beautiful than your mother,’ he murmured, so that only she could hear.

  She blushed and shook her head. ‘Don’t be silly.’

  As he pulled out the chair on Anna’s left, Lisa said sharply, ‘Not there, Bill darling, that’s for Cleo. You’re over here, beside me.’

  Another kiss on the hand, a rueful grin – and he was off to sit next to Lisa, full of apologetic charm. When Walter and Cleo arrived, Anna found herself marooned as Lisa and Cleo monopolised the two men. Not that it mattered; their conversation might as well have been in Japanese, revolving as it did around fashion labels and beauty treatments and people she didn’t know.

  But she learned a couple of things. First, she needn’t have worried that she was part of Lisa’s plans for three later as it became obvious that Lisa, Cleo and ‘Bill darling’ went out together most nights. And second, watching William Elliot-Dunne at work was like watching a puppet show: he was the master puppeteer, pulling everyone’s strings.

  Except hers, of course.

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  Dinner was even more of a triumph than Walter had anticipated – although it hadn’t got off to the most promising start.

  Really, Anna had no business to change her appearance, however subtly, without telling him! At first, he actually thought it was Irina sitting there … The short hairstyle showing off the shape of her neck; the softly glowing skin that had never needed any cosmetic retouching; the coral dress – Irina’s favourite colour and, he recalled with distaste, the shade Anna had once painted the walls of her room at Kellynch. The table blurred before him and he clutched Cleo’s arm more tightly – thank God for Cleo!

  And thank God, too, for William. As soon as he saw Walter and Cleo, he jumped up, rushed to embrace them, then stepped back in awe and fixed stunned eyes on Walter.

  ‘We’re wearing the same clothes again! It’s uncanny – as if I’ve found an identical twin I didn’t know I had.’ The dear boy seemed overcome with emotion.

  Walter glanced automatically at the large mirror opposite. He saw a misty figure in a taupe suit and ivory shirt, nearly identical to the man facing him – the same crisp blond hair, smooth tanned face, piercing blue gaze. Not identical twins – William’s features had one or two little irregularities – but they would certainly pass for brothers.

  They sat in their usual places: he faced the mirror, with Cleo next to him, William directly opposite and Lisa next to William. It was an ideal arrangement – Lisa and William made a beautiful couple and, if he tired of watching them, he could always watch himself. Just a pity about William’s slightly receding chin – more noticeable tonight because of the number of times he turned to look at the woman at the end of the table. But then, as Cleo reminded him when he’d mentioned it to her previously, there was only one man in Bath blessed with a perfect profile.

  The orders were taken, the champagne served, and a toast made by William in a gratifyingly loud voice – ‘To the 8th Baronet of Kellynch, Sir Walter Elliot, a name synonymous with everything that’s made England what it is today!’ Walter responded with a gracious nod of the head; but, out of the corner of his eye, he noticed Anna smile – and wondered what she found so amusing.

  So he wasn’t surprised when, shortly afterwards, she tried to spoil it all. As soon as William left the room – and his exquisite-looking foie gras starter – to answer a call on his mobile, she couldn’t resist saying, ‘That’s odd. When I met William in Lyme Regis only a week ago, he never mentioned he was coming to Bath.’

  ‘Don’t be ridiculous, you can’t have met him in Lyme Regis,’ Lisa said, with understandable irritation. ‘He told us himself – he was in London last weekend, going to all our old haunts. On the Sunday evening he drove like a madman to Kellynch, but found we’d gone to Bath. He stayed overnight with Minty and came here first thing Monday morning.’

  ‘I’m not being ridiculous, he was–’

  ‘He can’t have been in two places at once, just accept you made a mistake,’ Walter put in, magnanimously. At that moment, William returned to his seat and Walter leaned forward to confide, ‘My other daughter seems to be under the illusion that she met you in Lyme Regis last weekend. Have you got a double, or shall we call in the psychiatrists?’

  Everyone laughed at his little joke, except Anna.

  But then William’s face clouded and he said quietly, ‘I’m afraid she’s right. Remember I said I was revisiting old haunts? Well, not just in London, I went to Lyme Regis where I had that wonderful holiday with my mother, and Irina, and of course Anna … Naturally, I didn’t mention it because I didn’t want to cause you in particular,’ a tormented look at Walter, ‘any unnecessary pain. I know from my mother what a devoted couple you and Irina were.’

  Walter blinked back a tear. So thoughtful – the dear boy had obviously matured a lot during that traumatic time with the Texan divorcee. Not that William himself had breathed a word about it; but Walter had bumped into the friends William was staying with, the Wallises, and they’d reluctantly explained the whole sad story …

  No wonder William had been looking so often in Anna’s direction; he’d be trying to signal to her not to let on about Lyme. Little did he know that she never bothered to spare her father’s feelings.

  And now William was asking very kindly after one of the Musgrove girls, something about an accident, and Anna was talking about hospitals and operations – a subject that she very well knew Walter detested.

  He intervened swiftly. ‘My dear friend Lady Dalrymple has hired some boxes at the Theatre Royal next Saturday. We’re all invited, of course.’ A stern look at Anna. ‘It’s a Russian play, so she’d particularly like you to be there.’

  Anna’s eyes lit up; she really did look distressingly like Irina tonight. ‘Yes, it’s Chekhov’s Three Sisters. I tried to get tickets for Jenny and me, but they only had the most expensive ones left.’

  If that was a hint to invite the Smith woman, he was having none of it. Instead, he turned the conversation adroitly to the hotel spa, and which treatments they should sample over the coming week, a discussion he knew Anna would have no interest in. And he would have held court like this all through dinner, if William hadn’t left the table again – and this time his filet mignon – to answer another call on his mobile.

  Taking advantage of a natural lull in the conversation, Anna said in that deceptively gentle voice of hers, ‘I don’t understand. After all William’s done, after all the blustering about never speaking to him again, how are we sitting here having dinner together?’ She ignored Lisa’s anguished ‘You just don’t want me to be happy!’ and stared fearlessly at Walter.

  Walter stared fearlessly back, knowing he had nothing to reproach himself for. ‘It’s quite simple. When William left Lisa so suddenly, he was not in control of his own mind. Brandi Berette is by all accounts an exceptionally beautiful creature, been on the cover of Vogue–’

  ‘It was Playboy,’ Lisa put in, with a little sob.

  ‘Either way, a force to be reckoned with, and that’s without taking her $4 million dollar divorce settlement into account. If you recall, she hired William to give her investment advice – then it all went horribly wrong. She threw herself at his feet, plied him with alcohol and drugs, seduced him and dragged him off to Texas as her live-in adviser.’ Walter let out a little shuddering sigh. ‘One simply can’t imagine what he went through … he was virtually a prisoner for her pleasure … but at least it kept him out of the sun, so terribly ageing.’

  Anna gave a nasty little laugh. ‘If you believe all that, you’re even more gullible than I thought. What else has he told you – he only escaped when the Marines turned up?’

  Walter felt his face purpling with rage – and then Cleo’s fingers were soothing his clenched fist and Anna’s rudeness didn’t seem to matter quite so much.

  Thankfully, Lisa stepped in. ‘He hasn’t told us anything,’ she said hotly. ‘Walter had to force the truth out of his friends, and they warned us no
t to discuss it with Bill in case he breaks down.’

  Anna merely smiled. ‘How convenient – to be too traumatised to explain himself and to have friends lined up to do it for him. I bet they didn’t need much forcing, whoever they are.’

  ‘You’re wrong, Torquil and Jemima Wallis aren’t the sort of people who lower themselves to gossip.’ Lisa gave her sister a pitying look. ‘I don’t expect you know them – they live in one of those huge luxury apartments in The Circus.’

  ‘A very attractive couple, quite a rarity in Bath,’ Walter mused. ‘Such a shame Torquil’s prematurely grey. He must be only in his early thirties, but he looks as old as me!’ He gazed expectantly round the table.

  Cleo made a little moue of disgust. ‘No, Sir Voltaire, I ’ave to disagree wiz you – ’e looks much older.’

  This led to an enthralling conversation about youth versus the appearance of it. Walter was flattered to learn that he was generally thought to be no more than forty; and his happiness was complete when William returned and let slip that he’d been asked if he and Sir Walter were brothers.

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  At the bar of his hotel in Southampton, Rick knocked back another whisky and frowned at Guy.

  ‘So now you’re telling me I’m not just a recluse, I’m a rude and abusive recluse?’ he said carefully, wondering if Guy was using this bizarre tongue twister as some kind of breathalyser.

  ‘That’s right.’ Guy leaned his face in close, as though Rick was hard of hearing. ‘You’re making my job almost impossible and you’re not doing yourself any favours. For God’s sake, if you’re depressed don’t take it out on other people – go for a run or something!’