everything dripped and sparkled in the sunlight.
‘I know the garden’s a mess,’ groaned Daisy as the two-foot grass drenched her jeans. ‘Lend me a combine harvester and I’ll make you enough hay to see even Wayne through the winter. I promise I’ll tidy up everything, including myself. I know it’s awkward with Chessie coming back, but we won’t get in your way.’ Then, seeing the unrelentingly bleak expression on his face, ‘Just let us stay till Christmas.’
‘No, I w-w-want you out of here t-t-tonight.’
Daisy’s lip started to tremble: ‘But you’re supposed to give us a month’s notice.’
‘I’ve changed the lease.’ Ricky removed a burr from her hair with a desperately shaking hand. ‘There’s a new clause which says you can’t stay here any longer if your landlord falls in love with you.’
But Daisy wasn’t listening. ‘We’ve got nowhere to go.’
Roughly Ricky turned her round to face the sun, examining her deathly pallor, the hectically reddened cheeks, the swollen eyes spilling over with tears.
‘I’m totally repulsive,’ she sobbed.
But when she tried to jerk her head away, his hands closed on either side of her face like a clamp.
‘Look at me.’
With infinite reluctance Daisy raised her eyes. Even jet lag couldn’t ruin his bone structure or the length of his dark eyelashes.
‘It’s not fair you should be so beautiful,’ she mumbled helplessly, ‘and we’ve got nowhere to go.’
‘What about R-r-r-robinsgrove?’ stammered Ricky. ‘You can bring Perdita and Violet and Eddie and Ethel and the puppies, even that inc-c-c-ontinent cat if you like. I love you,’ he said desperately. ‘Will you marry me?’
‘Me marry
His face was suddenly so unbelievably softened that she had to drop her eyes hastily, fearing some cosmic, practical joke.
‘Oh, please,’ Ricky spoke to the top of her head. ‘I couldn’t understand why I was so bad-tempered in America. I couldn’t sleep – I mean even less than usual. Then I realized I was missing you hopelessly all the time. I had to fight the t-t-temptation to ring you and beg you to come over.’ He smiled slightly. ‘I searched everywhere for daisies, but the lawns are so perfect over there they don’t have any.’
The rosiness of her cheeks spread to the whole of Daisy’s face, but she simply couldn’t get any words out. To save her trouble Ricky bent his head and kissed her, first very shyly and tentatively, then, when she responded with alacrity, very hard indeed, by the end of which Daisy’s knees had literally given way for the first time in her life and as she couldn’t speak or stand up they collapsed on to the old garden bench she still hadn’t got round to painting.
‘But what about Chessie?’ she mumbled finally.
‘Buggered off with Red.’
‘What! When?’
‘The night of the Westchester. She vanished in the middle of dinner. I went back to the house we’d rented. I couldn’t face any more celebrating. Didn’t feel there was anything to celebrate. Half an hour later Rupert rolled up with a letter to me that Red had had delivered to the restaurant. He said he was desperately sorry, but he’d been hopelessly in love with Chessie ever since she’d become his stepmother, but had been fighting it because he hadn’t wanted to screw up his father. It all falls into place – why he was so irredeemably bloody to her always, why he was so frantic to beat us. He was far more terrified she’d come back to me than Bart was. Then she hurled herself on me after the match and it finished him off completely. So he finally thought, Sod Bart, declared himself and they ran off.’
‘Goodness,’ said Daisy in awe. ‘Just like that?’
‘Well, not entirely,’ Ricky shrugged. ‘They’ve obviously been sidling round each other for ages. Perdita admitted she caught them in bed after the polo ball.’
‘Oh, the poor little duck,’ said Daisy appalled. ‘Why didn’t she tell anyone?’
‘She promised Red she wouldn’t.’
‘Is she absolutely devastated?’
‘No, at least not about him. Daisy darling, can we talk about us?’
‘Poor you,’ said Daisy in horror. ‘You must have been . . .’
‘Ecstatic, giddy with relief. I’d psyched myself out for so long, obsessed with proving we could win the Westchester, obsessed with getting Chessie back because I felt so guilty about Will. I knew she was miserable with Bart and I’d driven her into his arms in the first place. Suddenly I was free. I felt a great burden falling off my back. Like one of Victor’s ponies at the end of a chukka.’
Daisy giggled.
‘I got the first plane back,’ Ricky went on, ‘getting more and more panicky because I couldn’t get you on the telephone. Did you know there’s been a hurricane? London’s out of action. The Stock Exchange has stopped trading. Fifteen million trees have been blown down.’
‘That’s nothing to losing you,’ said Daisy simply. ‘When I saw Chessie leaping on you and looking so beautiful, I was so unhappy I just got drunk.’
‘I was worried you’d see that,’ admitted Ricky, ‘and I was worried Drew was in Rutshire, festering because we hadn’t asked him to play.’
‘Drew?’ stammered Daisy, going even pinker.
‘Drew,’ said Ricky acidly and told her about finding the puppies eating Drew’s shoe the day before he left. ‘Jesus, I was jealous!’
‘Oh, how awful! I’m so sorry.’
‘I’ll forgive you if you never, never, sleep with him again.’ Ricky cut short her frantic apologies with another kiss, then he drew her head against his chest, stroking her hair.
‘It’s strange,’ he said slowly. ‘I feel so safe when you’re in my arms, but all I want to do is to make you feel safe. You’ve always reminded me of a stray bitch chucked out for getting in pup, who, although she looked after all her puppies in the wild really well, needed a loving master and a home.’
‘Oh, I did,’ sighed Daisy.
‘It’s also a dreadful confession,’ said Ricky, ‘but it’s the first time in my life I’ve loved something more than polo. My nerve failed me at the beginning of that third match, I didn’t want to win because subconsciously I didn’t want Chessie back.’
Snuggling her face happily into his chest, Daisy suddenly saw pink spots before her eyes. Could it be her hangover? Then she blinked again and, putting her hand up, realized they were real pink silk spots on a blue background.
‘You’ve left off your black tie,’ she said in amazement.
Ricky glanced down. For a second he, too, had difficulty speaking.
‘I don’t have to wear it any more. The mourning’s over.’
Wonderingly, Daisy put her hand up and touched the scar on his face. For a second he flinched, then his hand closed over hers. ‘Darling, darling Daisy, are you quite sure you don’t mind being a double parent again?’
Suddenly he looked so vulnerable that Daisy put her arms round his neck and kissed him. They were so engrossed they didn’t hear the dogs barking or pause for breath until Violet appeared in the doorway.
‘Hi, Mum. I’m back. Christ!’
‘Bugger off,’ ordered Ricky. ‘We’re busy.’
‘Okey’doke,’ said Violet.
But two minutes later she put her head round the door with a faint smirk. ‘Sorry to interrupt you two love birds, but it’s Drew on the telephone for you, Mum.’
Ricky’s eyes narrowed. ‘It is bloody not,’ he howled, loping back into the house. Temporarily blinded after the sunlight, he snatched the receiver from Violet.
‘Drew? You can fuck off, and if you ever come within a million miles of Daisy, I’ll smash your head in – and break your bloody jaw. Pity Angel didn’t do it properly the first time,’ and he crashed the receiver back on the hook.
Violet whistled. ‘Wowee! Macho man.’
‘Don’t you get lippy with me, miss,’ snapped Ricky. ‘I’m going to be your new stepfather.’
For a second they glared at each other, then Violet giggled.
