One Night with Morelli

CHAPTER TWO

THE TWO YOUNG women who stood waiting in the bedroom were both in their mid-twenties but there the similarity ended.

The girl who sat on the edge of the four-poster, one slim ankle crossed over the other, was an elegant, tall, blue-eyed blonde. The other one, who had spent the last five minutes prowling restlessly up and down the room, her heels making angry tapping sounds on the age-darkened polished boards, was neither tall nor blonde, and, even though the two women were dressed identically, she was somehow not elegant.

She was five three without heels and had chestnut-brown hair. Making no concession to the occasion—the dress was enough—she wore it as she always did: scraped into the heavy knot on her slender neck. It was not a style statement, though it did reveal the length of her neck and the delicate angle of her rounded jaw, just convenient. When exposed to even a sniff of moisture it fell into a mass of uncontrollable kinky waves and Eve liked control in all aspects of her life.

There had been a period when she had struggled to emulate her friend Hannah’s effortless elegance, but no matter how hard she tried it just didn’t happen. She always ended up looking as though she were dressing up in her mother’s clothes. Gradually Eve had found her own style or—as an exasperated Hannah put it—uniform, which was a little unfair. Not all Eve’s trouser suits were black—some were navy—and who had time to shop anyhow when they had a business to run? You couldn’t afford to relax in this competitive world.

‘Ouch!’ She tripped over the skirt of her duck-egg-blue silk bridesmaid dress and banged her knee on the window seat. The pain made her green eyes film with tears.

‘Well, if you’d come to a fitting it wouldn’t be too long.’ Harriet gave an affectionate smile and shook her head. The frantic last-minute pinning meant that Eve’s dress had a sort of waist but the neckline of the fitted bodice still had a tendency to gape and slip down a couple of inches if Eve moved too quickly—and Eve moved quickly a lot. Her friend was never still mentally or physically, and just watching her made Hannah feel tired.

Eve gave another hitch accompanied by a hiss of exasperation. If she’d been more naturally blessed in the boob department it wouldn’t be a problem, but even with the tissues tucked into the strapless bra that was chafing the partially healed scar on her shoulder blade she was one cup size short of keeping the bodice up.

On the plus side, while she was focusing on not exposing herself she wasn’t thinking about her mother throwing herself away on a man who didn’t deserve her! The furrow in danger of becoming permanent in her wide brow deepened because, impending wardrobe malfunction or not, she was thinking about it and had been ever since her mother had rung excited as a schoolgirl with the glad tidings. A week was not a long time but Eve had prayed her mother would come to her senses.

She hadn’t.

‘The measurements you sent must have been way off. Sarah said you’ve lost weight since she saw you last,’ Hannah commented.

Eve felt a stab of guilt that intensified when Hannah made excuses for her.

‘I know Australia is a long way to come for a fitting.’

‘I didn’t go there to avoid my mother!’ Eve protested.

‘I never thought you did.’

Until now, thought Eve, wishing she could keep her big mouth shut. ‘I don’t see what all the big hurry is for anyhow.’ The way Hannah was looking at her made Eve frown. ‘Well, do you?’

Hannah pressed a protective hand to her stomach, reflecting on how odd it was that Eve, who was super smart and intuitive in so many ways, could not have at least suspected. She had often felt a little intimidated by her friend’s quick brain and focused drive, but for all her ability there were times when Eve couldn’t see what was right under her nose and this was one of those occasions. Hannah swiftly changed the subject; now was probably not the time to voice her suspicions.

‘Well, you made it back in time, which is the main thing. I’d have loved you to be at my wedding too,’ Hannah added wistfully.

‘I didn’t get an invite.’

‘I barely made it there myself.’

‘Fine, be mysterious,’ Eve grumbled, thinking that whatever the full story behind her friend’s marriage to the Prince of Surana she had never seen Hannah looking happier or more beautiful—she was positively glowing.

‘But you must be happy, Evie; this is what we have always wanted. For us to finally be a family.’

Eve swallowed the retort on the tip of her tongue.

She could hardly say to the man’s daughter your dad is a sad loser and I never wanted him to marry my mum. I wanted her to wake up to the fact he was using her and end the sordid, secret affair.

She had no idea what had happened to make Charles Latimer, not only acknowledge the long-term affair with his cook after years of hiding it, but propose to her and then invite half the world to the wedding. She glanced out of the window at the sound of another helicopter coming in to land—another VIP, she thought sourly. Charles Latimer certainly moved in glittering circles.

Her jaw set as she turned away. ‘What’s keeping her?’ As far as Eve was concerned it was a disaster!

When the silence stretched Hannah’s expression grew anxious. ‘It’s very romantic.’

Eve’s brows lifted. ‘You think?’

‘You know, I agree with you totally that Dad has behaved very selfishly over the years to Sarah, but your mum is the best thing that has happened to him,’ Hannah said earnestly. ‘I’m just glad he’s woken up to it. I can’t wait for Sarah to be my mum.’

‘She’s a good mum to have,’ Eve said, a lump forming in her throat as she thought of all the sacrifices her single mum had made over the years. She deserved the best and she was getting Charlie Latimer. Eve’s small hands tightened into fists, her nails inscribing half-moons into her palms. ‘I think she already thinks of you as a daughter.’

‘I hope so.’ Hannah’s blue eyes filled with emotional tears, which she blinked to clear as the door to the interconnecting room opened to reveal the bride.

Her face almost as white as the dress she was wearing, Sarah Curtis stood for a moment framed in the doorway before taking a step and almost immediately grabbing onto a table to steady herself. Reacting faster than Eve, Hannah was on her feet in an instant, her beautiful face creased in lines of concern as she rushed to supply a steadying hand to the older woman.

‘Are you all right, Sarah?’

Eve blinked. She wasn’t seeing her mother’s pale face as she was transfixed by the miles and miles of tulle her mother was wearing. The first sight of the outfit on its hanger earlier had rendered her literally speechless and it had been left to Hannah to make the necessary congratulatory noises. Somehow she had managed to sound totally sincere.

Hannah had to be a better actress than she had previously thought because the get-up was quite memorably awful and—what was worse—inappropriate. Eve didn’t know what had possessed her mother to suddenly decide to channel her inner princess!

Sarah gave a wan smile. ‘All I need is a bit of blusher.’

Hannah threw her a knowing look, her hands on her hips, and the older woman sighed heavily, suddenly looking sheepish. ‘All right, I wasn’t planning to tell you girls till later because I’m not quite twelve weeks yet and—’

It had to weigh a ton, Eve thought, sizing up the intricate beading on the mile-long train that was many a girl’s dream. But not hers; she had never dreamed of wearing such an elaborate get-up. Did that make her weird? If so she was glad, she decided defiantly! How did a woman in her forties think that it was in any way appropriate to wear a white meringue wedding dress?

She dragged her gaze upwards just as Hannah, looking totally regal in her beautifully fitting dress—actually she was a princess for real these days, a fact that Eve still hadn’t got her head around—walked over and hugged her mother. Both women were crying, to Eve’s confusion. Had her mum finally realised that the dress was a disaster?

‘You could always ditch the train,’ Eve suggested, trying to remain practical and upbeat for her mother’s sake. She knew she just had to suck it up today and be there for her mum in the future when things went sour with Charles, as they inevitably would.

Sarah, sniffing, laughed. ‘I wish it were that simple. I didn’t have any morning sickness at all with you, darling, but this time…’ She rolled her eyes and accepted the glass of water that Hannah passed her.

Playing mental catch–up, Eve blinked. Morning sickness…? She must have misheard. You only got morning sickness when you were…pregnant!

A stunned vacant expression clouding her green eyes, she felt herself hit a mental brick wall. The impact made her mind go blank and she sat down with a gentle thud on the window seat. Paler even than her mother, she sat there not even breathing until finally her chest lifted in a long shuddering sigh and her lashes swept down in a concealing curtain. She stared at her hands and waited for the dull metronome thud in her ears to subside, but it didn’t.

‘There, that’s better—all you needed was a bit of colour.’

A hand absently rubbing the nape of her neck, Eve looked up as her friend applied a finishing flick of blusher to the older woman’s cheeks.

‘You’re p-pregnant, Mum. H-how?’ Two sets of raised eyebrows turned her way and Eve blushed. She was regressing; she no longer stuttered or blushed. ‘Well, I suppose that explains it.’

‘Explains what, Eve?’ Sarah asked.

Eve shook her head and thought why the rich scumbag Charlie Latimer had suddenly decided, not only to make his secret affair with his cook public knowledge, but to marry the woman who had been his mistress. It didn’t involve a sudden attack of respect or love for Sarah; it was all about the possibility of an heir.

Not that Hannah looked as though she minded the possibility of being disinherited—her friend looked delighted.

‘I knew it,’ Hannah said smugly as she dabbed the moisture from around her soon-to-be stepmother’s eyes. ‘Whoever invented waterproof mascara deserves a medal—not that you’d know about that, Eve.’ She flashed her friend, who had been blessed with naturally thick dark lashes that required no embellishment, an envious smile before turning back to Sarah. ‘I said to Kamel last night that I thought you might be but he said that just because I’m—’ She stopped and covered her mouth with her hand. ‘I wasn’t meant to say anything until Kamel has told his uncle because of all this protocol. You won’t breathe a word, will you…?’

‘Oh, Hannah, darling, Kamel must be thrilled!’ Sarah’s waterproof mascara was once again being put to the test as she reached up to hug Hannah.

‘We both are, but Kamel is acting as though I’m made of glass. He won’t let me do a thing, and the man is driving me crazy,’ Hannah confided with a laugh.

The expression in her friend’s eyes when she said her husband’s name made Eve look away feeling uncomfortable, almost as though she had intruded. Eve was prepared to like the prince her friend had married because he was clearly as potty about Hannah as she was about him, but the cynic in her wondered how long the honeymoon period would last.

‘You’re both having babies.’ Eve was still playing mental catch-up.

Looking mistily ecstatic, Sarah clapped her hands. ‘Isn’t that incredible? Our family is growing, girls.’

‘A real family,’ Hannah chimed in.

Eve cleared her throat. It was obviously her turn to respond, but what to say…? She managed a faint and unimaginative, ‘Incredible.’

She’d moved a long way on since she had lain awake at night wishing she had a real family. Eve had pretty quickly realised that not having a father, at least not one willing to acknowledge she existed, was actually a blessing, not a curse. Unlike the majority of her classmates she had been spared the trauma of seeing her parents going through an ugly divorce or separation.

Her mum had not even had boyfriends until she came to work for Hannah’s father. Hannah had caught on much sooner than Eve and she had been more concerned by the secrecy than the relationship itself.

For Eve, it hadn’t just been the secrecy, it had been everything, and the longer the affair had lasted, the deeper her anger had grown as she’d watched helpless to do anything while her mother allowed history to repeat itself as she had become what amounted to the plaything of man who treated her like the hired help in front of his rich and powerful friends.

Charles Latimer might not be married but in every other way he was her own father—a selfish loser who used and humiliated her mum. Of course, back then Sarah had been a young impressionable student on her first holiday job—easy pickings for her unscrupulous rich employer.

What Eve could not understand was how her mother could let it happen again when she was now an independent, intelligent woman. How could she allow herself to be used and humiliated like this…? Where were her pride and self-respect?

Did Mum realise that he was only marrying her because of the baby? Eve wondered. Well, at least he was one step up the evolutionary scale of slime from her own father, whose contribution when he had learnt of her had been to write a signed note that included the words get rid of it.

Eve had never told her mum she had found the note while searching for her birth certificate, and she’d never let on she knew the identity of her father. Instead she had carefully folded it and put it back in the box that held her birth certificate.

‘Having a baby at your age…’ She sensed rather than saw Hannah’s look of warning. ‘Not that you’re old, obviously.’

Her mother managed a wan smile at the retrieval. ‘Always the soul of tact, Evie.’

Eve watched as Hannah and her mum exchanged a look. She didn’t resent the rapport that her mum and her friend had but, though she rarely acknowledged it, there were occasions when she did envy it. Eve was her daughter but Hannah was a kindred spirit.

‘I just meant…’ She paused and thought, What did you mean? ‘Couldn’t it be dangerous…for you, and the baby?’ But not for Charlie Latimer. Eve felt the anger and resentment she had always felt towards the man deepen so that they lay like an icy block behind her breastbone.

‘Loads of women in their forties have babies these days, Evie.’ Hannah proceeded to tick off a list of well-known celebrities Sarah’s age and older who had given birth recently.

‘And I’ll have a lot more support than I did last time around; your father has been marvellous, Hannah.’

Too little too late, Eve thought, before the guilt kicked in; it always did when she thought about all the things her mum had given up to be a single parent. She finally deserved some happiness but was she likely to find it with Charlie Latimer…?

Eve clenched her jaw. No, her mum deserved more—she deserved better after all the sacrifices she had made.

Wanting to give her mum the things she deserved had been behind Eve’s choice to reject the prestigious university scholarship she’d been offered and instead start her own firm. It hadn’t been easy. All the banks had turned the inexperienced eighteen-year-old away and in the end it had been a charitable trust set up to promote youth enterprise that had been convinced by her business plan and the rest, as they said, was history. Nowadays she was held up as one of the trust’s success stories, and regularly mentored young aspiring entrepreneurs and helped raise funds.

It had been a year ago that Eve had been able to go to her mother and triumphantly tell her she didn’t need to work for Charles Latimer, and that she, Eve, was able to support her while she did what she wanted: a university course, open her own restaurant…anything.