Should she ring the hospital and see how Des was? Did she care how he was? ‘Dumbass bastard!’ Kaylee swore, jogging along the Esplanade as daylight began to streak the eastern sky with multicoloured hues. He could die for all she cared.
It was cold but she was too angry with herself to notice anything that was going on around her as she relived, yet again, the events of the night before. The worst thing of all, apart from Des being carted off in an ambulance, sirens blaring, was the way she had dropped her guard and freaked out and shown herself to be needy and desperate. She had reminded herself of Charlotte in Sex and the City when she shrieked at her boyfriend Harry, ‘Set the date! Set the date!’
Kaylee was beyond mortified, and beyond devastated. She had given Des Williams so much more that that Barbie Doll Uptown wife. He’d more or less told her that. Des had been such a charming and cultivated man. And so much more interesting than most of the men she worked with. She liked Europeans. They had a different outlook on life that she found refreshing. She and Des had clicked, better than she’d ever clicked with any other man.
And Kaylee knew their relationship was far different from the ones he shared with his hyper wife and spoilt daughter. From what she’d heard about Jazzy, she seemed to be a rather demanding young woman who had a huge sense of entitlement. Kaylee didn’t make demands on Des. That was one way of scaring off a man. She wasn’t the granddaughter of a Southern Belle for nothing, she thought wryly. She had been ultra laid-back and Des had loved that about her. He’d relaxed with her, and she understood his work and the pressures he was under. He’d told her she was wild in bed. For all the good it had done her.
Kaylee slowed to a walk. She was thirty-five, single and childless, despite her successful career. Her high-school friends back home in Charlotte would look on her as a failure, despite all she had achieved. Her mother certainly did. ‘When are you going to give your pop and me a grandchild, sugar?’ Mary Beth would ask her every birthday.
Do you think I don’t want to? she’d want to yell, but she’d shrug and say she hadn’t met the right man yet. ‘And all those millions of men in New York City!’ Mary Beth would scoff. ‘You need to come back home and meet your own kind.’
The lump in her throat nearly strangled Kaylee and a harsh, rasping sob escaped her. She had thought the tall, handsome Englishman with the sexy accent and the attractive blue eyes had been her kind.
Colette had slept a deep and dreamless sleep, thanks to the brandy and Xanax, but she felt exhausted when she awoke to find daylight seeping into her bedroom. Lying in bed remembering the events of the night before, she felt a nervous fluttering in her stomach. Life had changed. The rug had been pulled from under her and she needed to focus. She lay immobile, arms rigid by her side. She was on her own. She needed to shore up the ditches and she needed to break the news to Jazzy that her father had had a heart attack in the arms of his mistress and that Colette was going to divorce him. That was going to be one of the hardest things she had ever, or would ever, have to do. Her daughter would be devastated. She would not reveal the other great treachery Des had planned. Jazzy would not learn from her what a complete and utter heel her father was.
A gentle knock on the door elicited a weary, ‘Come in.’
‘Would you care for breakfast in bed or in the breakfast room, ma’am?’ Encarna asked.
‘Here, please, just juice, coffee and a fruit cup and yogurt.’ Colette hauled herself up into a sitting position. ‘Encarna, Mr Williams has had a heart attack. He’s in Lennox Hill.’
‘Oh no! Ma’am!’ the middle-aged woman exclaimed as her hand flew up to her mouth, her face falling in dismay. ‘I’m very sorry to hear that. Will he be all right?’
‘I hope so. I’ll know more today. Will you freshen up the guest room, please. My friend Hilary is coming over from Ireland. And would you pack a case for my husband? I’ll take it in to the hospital later.’
‘Of course. I’ll just get your breakfast first, ma’am. Why don’t you lie down and have a little rest until it’s ready. You look tired,’ Encarna urged kindly. ‘Shall I open the drapes?’
‘I think I will rest here, Encarna, and no, leave them as they are, please.’ Colette slid back down under the duvet and pulled it up to her ears. She should ring the hospital and find out how Des was, and she should call his secretary, and she really had to ring Jazzy. She would make the calls after her breakfast, she decided, putting off the unpleasant tasks for just another little while. She lay motionless in the peace of her womb-like room. If only she could stay snug and warm and protected in this little cocoon forever, Colette thought sorrowfully, dreading all that lay ahead of her.
C
HAPTER
T
HIRTY
-S
IX
‘Thank you, Lauren. I’ll be bringing Des in his phone shortly. I’m sure he’ll be in touch himself as soon as his doctors allow it.’ Colette closed the conversation, hugely
