‘There’s no point in sitting there brooding,’ Andrew remarked suddenly, arousing her from her uneasy speculations, and Helen met his accusing gaze with some frustration. As if she didn’t have enough to worry about, without Tricia’s husband playing some stupid game of his own.
‘I’m not brooding,’ she replied, which was true. Her thoughts were far less pretty. If her mother was here on the island, what was she going to do about it? Did Fleur know her father was dead, for instance? And if she did, did she care?
‘Yes, you are,’ Andrew contradicted her flatly. ‘What’s the matter, Helen? Can’t you take a joke?’
‘Was that what it was?’
Helen refused to be treated like a fool, and Henry gave his father a doubtful look. ‘Why did that man think you and Helen were married?’ he piped up curiously, and Helen heard Andrew give an irritated snort.
‘How should I know?’ he exclaimed, proving he was not as indifferent to his wife’s possible reaction as he’d been to Helen’s. If the children accused him of perpetuating the mistake, Tricia wouldn’t be at all pleased. Particularly as the Aitkens were exactly the kind of people she liked to mix with.
‘Well, perhaps you should have corrected him,’ Helen observed now, aware that if she wasn’t careful she’d be the one blamed for assuming Tricia’s identity, and Andrew scowled.
‘How was I to know what you’d told him?’ he demanded, refusing to let her off the hook. ‘I didn’t want to embarrass you, that’s all. The man might have been a nuisance.’
Helen was always amazed at the lengths some people would go to protect their own positions, and she gazed at the back of Andrew’s head now with undisguised contempt. What had she expected, after all? She was only the nursemaid. She just hoped Tricia wouldn’t imagine she’d done something to warrant the misunderstanding.
‘He was nice,’ asserted Sophie, apparently deciding she had been quiet long enough. Happily, she was looking better now that she had something else to think about.
‘How would you know?’ asked Henry at once, seldom allowing his sister to get away with anything. ‘He hurt my arm, and he called me a rude name. I’m going to tell Mummy that Helen didn’t stop him.’
‘You’re not going to tell your mother anything,’ cut in his father sharply, evidently deciding that it wasn’t in his best interests to let Henry carry tales. ‘Or I might just have to tell her that without Mr Aitken’s intervention you’d have been minced meat.’
Henry hunched his shoulders. ‘I wouldn’t,’ he muttered.
‘You would,’ said Sophie triumphantly. ‘Anyway, I liked him. And I think Helen liked him, too.’
‘Heavens, I don’t even know the man,’ Helen demurred, annoyed to find that the child had achieved what her father couldn’t. Hot colour was pouring into her cheeks, and Andrew’s expression revealed that he knew it.
‘Who is he, anyway?’ he asked. ‘You never did tell me. What did you find out about him? You seemed to be having quite a conversation as I walked out of the airport buildings.’
‘I don’t know anything more than you do,’ Helen declared, not altogether truthfully, glad that she was flushed now, and therefore in no danger of revealing herself again. ‘I didn’t even know his name until you asked him.’ Which was true. ‘He’s probably another tourist. The island’s full of them.’
‘Hmm.’ Andrew was thoughtful. ‘He didn’t look like a tourist to me. Unless he’s been here since Christmas. You don’t get a tan like that in a couple of weeks.’
‘Does it matter?’
Helen didn’t particularly want to talk about it, or think about it, for that matter. The image she had, of a tall dark man with the lean muscled body of an athlete, was not one she wanted to cherish. Chase Aitken, she thought scornfully, polo-player, playboy, and jock. Not to mention adulterer, she added bitterly. She hoped she’d never see him again.
Tricia was up and dressed when they arrived back at the villa. She had shed her trailing wrap in favour of a loose-fitting tunic, and her auburn-tinted hair had been brushed to frame her face. She looked much different from the languid female who had waved them goodbye, and she greeted her husband more warmly than she’d been known to do before.
‘Sorry I couldn’t meet you, darling,’ she said, getting up from the cushioned lounge chair she had been occupying on the terrace. Set in the shade of a huge flame tree, it was an oasis of shadow in the late afternoon heat that still drenched the villa. Only the breeze from the ocean provided a warm draught of air to dry moist skin, but Tricia looked cool and comfortable, and totally relaxed.
‘No problem,’ said Andrew easily, bending to bestow a kiss on his wife’s upturned lips. But his eyes sought Helen’s as he offered the salutation, and she had the uneasy feeling that their relationship would never be the same again.
‘Can we have some juice?’ Henry cried plaintively, bored by his parents’ demonstration of marital felicity, and his mother turned to look at him with some impatience.
‘You can’t be thirsty,’ she said. ‘I told Helen to get you both a drink at the airport. Heaven knows, you had enough time.’ She glanced at her watch. ‘I expected you back half an hour ago. The plane was obviously late.’
‘She didn’t get me a drink—’ Henry was beginning
indignantly, when his father chose to intervene.
‘Actually the plane was on time,’ he said, earning a raised eyebrow from his wife. ‘But there was some holdup with the luggage. And Helen had her hands full, because Sophie had been sick.’
‘Oh.’ Tricia looked somewhat distastefully at her daughter. ‘Not again.’
‘Yes, again,’ went on Andrew evenly. ‘We all had our problems, didn’t we, Henry?’ He gave his son a warning look. ‘Now, run along and ask whoever it is your mother said is looking after us——’
‘Maria,’ supplied Sophie proudly, and her father smiled.
‘Very well. You two go and ask Maria if she’d be kind enough to give you a drink.’
‘Helen can do it,’ protested Tricia, before Henry and Sophie could leave them. She carefully resumed her position on the lounger. ‘As they’re obviously tired, it would probably be a good idea to give them their supper early and put them to bed.’
‘Oh, Mummy—’
‘But a want to talk to Daddy—’
The two children both spoke at once, but Tricia just ignored them. ‘You can have an early night, too, Helen,’ she added, stretching out her hand towards heir husband. ‘I shan’t need you any more today.’ She sighed contentedly. ‘Drew and I will enjoy a quiet evening together. It’s ages since we had any time alone.’
‘Helen’s not a child, Trish.’ Andrew came to her defence, even though she hadn’t wanted him to. ‘Put the brats to bed by all means, Helen. But then you must join us for supper.’
‘Helen may
