Total pages in book: 85
Estimated words: 81922 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 410(@200wpm)___ 328(@250wpm)___ 273(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 81922 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 410(@200wpm)___ 328(@250wpm)___ 273(@300wpm)
Then he said the most beautiful thing. ‘How I wish I could have met your mother,’ he said softly and sincerely.
My eyes welled up with tears. When I blinked to clear them away they rolled down my cheeks.
He wiped them away with his thumbs. ‘Do you have a photograph of her?’
Unable to speak, I nodded.
‘Can I see it?’
I nodded again and, uncrossing my legs, got off the bed and went to my phone. I came back to the bed and showed her to him.
He looked at her photograph carefully before raising his eyes to me. ‘You look just like her.’
I sniffed. ‘You really think so?’
He smiled. ‘Yeah. Like an angel. When angels take their clothes off they make rainbows in men’s hearts.’
I stared at him. ‘Why Ivan, I didn’t think you had it in you. You’re a poet.’
He laughed and, imitating my accent, said, ‘Honey, I am many things, but I ain’t no poet.’
CHAPTER 25
Tawny Maxwell
Nothing suited Ivan’s mother less than the nickname Bobo. She had straight black hair like him and the same sensual lips, but her eyes were dark chocolate and her skin was carefully
preserved and tended to, and despite her penchant for sun and heat, kept a delicate share of pale. She was wearing a grey turtle-neck jumper, a knee-length pencil line black skirt, and a
pair of black kitten-heeled court shoes.
She stood up to receive me and it was immediately obvious that she must have been a great beauty once. Even now she was attractive, elegant and as narrow-hipped as a snake. Robert once
told me that when he met her she was a drop-dead beauty. He called her a free spirit who could never be tamed by a mere man.
Her marvelously painted eyes watched me with vivid interest.
‘Hello, Tawny,’ she greeted. As I had expected, her voice was cultured and clear.
‘Hello Ma’am.’ I realized that I had unconsciously scrubbed the Southern twang out of my voice.
She smiled charmingly. ‘Do sit down,’ she invited, and vaguely gestured towards the sofa next to the one she had been sitting on.
‘Thank you,’ I said in my normal voice and perched at the end of the sofa.
She rang a bell and a woman in a black dress with a white apron appeared at the door.
‘You may serve tea now, Betty,’ she said.
The woman nodded and disappeared.
She sat on the sofa diagonal to me and crossed her smooth legs. ‘So you are about to marry my son.’
I smiled. ‘It would seem so.
‘Yes, I can see how my son would adore you, but you don’t seem to be Robert’s type,’ she observed shrewdly.
‘Well, I must have been. He married me,’ I said coolly. You were right Robert. Still she ain’t gettin’ no secrets from me.
‘Well,’ she exhaled. ‘He must have changed a great deal since I knew him.’
‘He always said wonderful things about you.’
‘Did he? He was a sly devil.’
I smiled. ‘Yes Ma’am, he was that, but he changed a lot in the last years of his life.’
‘I didn’t go to his funeral,’ she admitted softly.
I gave a little shrug. Looking out of the window at the rolling green landscape I remembered Robert. ‘I know. We played him Gustav Mahler’s Adagietto, 5th symphony.’
‘Yes, I remember now he told me he wanted me to play it for him at his funeral.’
An awkward silence descended on us. I brought my gaze back to her. ‘It doesn’t matter that you didn’t go. He knew you wouldn’t.’
She tried to frown but the Botox wouldn’t allow it. ‘Really?’
‘In fact, he said, if you came he would be disappointed.’
Her eyes were alive with curiosity. ‘Why?’
‘Because it would mean life had finally beaten you into doing things you did not want to do. He admired you for being, in his words, wildly and fiercely independent.’
She took a deep breath. ‘Are you in love with my son?’ she asked archly.
I bit my lower lip. She was far too intelligent for me to lie to her. ‘I hope you won’t think me rude if I don’t answer that question. I find it almost impossible to talk about my
private life with someone I have just met.’
She leaned back and regarded me with a frown. ‘So you’re not in love with Ivan and yet you are marrying him. My son is no fool. Why would he marry you? Is it to protect you?’
‘You’ll just have to ask him that. I’m afraid I’m not at liberty to say.’
‘I wondered about you. Everybody said you were a gold digger, but you’re not, are you?’
‘What makes you say that?’
She smiled. ‘Because, my dear, I’m a gold digger and you’re nothing like me.’
My mouth dropped open.
She lifted one elegant shoulder and dropped it. ‘It’s not a secret. I married Ivan’s father for his title, but he was an impoverished Lord other than this place, which had been heavily
mortgaged. He was, what is that charming saying you Americans have for a person who has nothing?’