sister’s friends long before I ever met you. The wild Irish girl with ice and fire running in her veins. And I can tell. There isn’t a false bone in your body. I can feel it.’
She laughed loudly, exploding with the humour of the situation. ‘You can certainly feel every bit of me,’ she said affectionately, wriggling her hips and feeling his body react instantly.
‘Jamie, Lily – I hope you’re not eating all the chocolates. Leave some for the rest of us, you greedy pigs!’ It was Sybil.
‘Jesus!’ Lily struggled away from him at the sound of Sybil’s high heels marching towards the kitchen.
‘Nobody else wants liqueurs: they want to dance,’ Sybil went on, ‘but I’ve got to have something sweet after dinner.’
She was getting nearer. How awful if she found them semidressed.
Quickly, Lily did up her buttons and smoothed down her hair. Reaching up, she rubbed a smudge of red lipstick from Jamie’s mouth.
‘Coming, Sybil,’ Lily said loudly. ‘Can’t find the chocolates.’ She put her hand on the doorknob to open it. They were both respectable again, if a little flushed.
‘Lily –’ Jamie sounded urgent.
Lily turned the knob and opened the door. Four years of fear of Matron made her anxious about even being seen to do anything wrong. Whatever Jamie had to say to her, he could do it later.
‘There’s something I must tell you,’ he said.
Sybil was outside the door. ‘There you are,’ she said, smiling.
‘Sorry, Sybil,’ Lily said, doing her best to sound breezily unconcerned. ‘I had to bandage poor Mr Timms’ knee.’
‘Really,’ said Sybil, and Lily could instantly tell from her voice that the other woman knew exactly what had been going on. It was so subtle, but it was there, and Lily felt the stain of embarrassment on her face.
Now, Sybil linked one arm with Lily, and held the other out for Jamie to take.
‘I’m longing to dance,’ she said in a confiding voice. ‘You’ll love The 400, Lily, it’s such fun. She’s never been before, Jamie. Imagine that? Jamie and Philip almost lived there once upon a time, didn’t you, darling?’
They were at the back stairs now, and Sybil briskly let go of Lily’s arm in order to walk up with Jamie because there wasn’t room for three of them together.
Lily felt a sense of unease at Sybil’s bright, acid tone.
‘Some people prefer the Florida or the dear old Café de Paris, but I just adore The 400,’ Sybil went on, in a falsely wistful voice. ‘What about Miranda?’ Sybil enquired. ‘Which club is her favourite?’
Lily’s unease grew. Jamie wasn’t saying anything; he was walking beside Sybil as stiffly as if he was at a funeral.
‘Miranda is Jamie’s wife, Lily. She’s such a darling, we all love her. Such a pity she’s stuck in Scotland, isn’t it?’
Lily felt herself falter on the steps and Jamie looked back at her, reaching out an arm, but she drew back from him sharply.
Jamie was married. He wasn’t free to make love to her, he was betraying his wife and he’d just betrayed her.
Bile rose in Lily’s throat. Irrespective of how it looked or how Sybil would gloat, she had to get away from him.
‘Excuse me,’ she said, ‘back in a moment –’
She turned and fled downstairs to the cloakroom, slammed the door behind her and sank on to dusty parquet flooring beside an old, cracked lavatory. There was no relief when she’d been sick: the nausea was still there. She felt so confused and empty. A lightning bolt had hit her. It was like nothing she’d ever felt before, and now, it had been whipped away just as quickly. Except now she knew what it was like to feel that volcano of emotion, and once she’d felt that way, she couldn’t un-feel it.
Her body still tingled with the rasp of his mouth on it, and yet here she was, crouched on the cloakroom floor, alone and feeling used. She wanted to die. No; she wanted him to die. She wanted him to suffer the way she was suffering.
He was there when she came out a few minutes later. She’d been sure he’d be too much of a coward to wait for her, yet there he was: tall and concerned, not looking like the cheater he was.
‘Lily, please let me explain –’
‘Don’t touch me!’ she hissed at him, spitting fire.
‘I wanted to tell you –’
‘Keep away. I never want to see you again as long as I live.’
She ran up the back stairs and into the dining room where Diana, darling Diana, was waiting for her. There was no sign of Sybil. The rest of the party must have gone down the main stairs to the front door.
‘I’m so sorry, Diana, I don’t feel well. I’m going back to the nurses’ home.’
‘What?’ Diana was stunned. They had arranged with the Home Sister to stay in South Audley Street for the night: a special dispensation that had required a week of wheedling. And now Lily wanted to go back to their tiny little room in Cubitt Street.
‘Please,’ begged Lily, looking anguished. ‘I’m sorry.’ She grabbed her small handbag and fled through another door, thanking her lucky stars that this house was so enormous, like a palatial warren. She made it upstairs to the bedroom she’d planned to share with Diana, then shut and locked the door. She didn’t turn on the light but sat on the bed in the darkness, waiting in case Jamie came looking for her. Hopefully, if he asked Diana, she’d make him think Lily had gone back to the nurses’ home. So she’d be safe here. Safe to lie on the bed, feeling the twin fires of shame and pain, and let the tears flood down her cheeks. She heard the huge front door slam shut. That was it, then: he was gone from her life for ever and she could try to forget the white-hot heat of passion and how it had felt. She never had to think of Lieutenant Jamie Hamilton ever again.
There was nothing more beautiful than the sight of New York’s skyscrapers soaring into the sky on a sunny morning, Izzie decided as she sat in the back of the cab. She loved New York, even loved this patchouli-scented cab with its dangling beads that rattled off every surface like mini-castanets for the entire trip.
The city spoke of fresh starts – it was impossible to come here without starting again, without thinking of reinvention. In New York, you could be anyone you wanted to be.
And from now on, Izzie vowed, she was going to be a totally different person from the Izzie Silver of three weeks ago.
She’d thought about it on the long flight across the Atlantic, hemmed in beside two chatty German girls on their first trip to America.
They were going to see so much, do so much,
