Roddy Kilpatrick felt that perhaps Douglas wanted to prove he was worthy of some attention from the both of them, the kind a proud father and mother would show.
Mrs. Kilpatrick didn’t believe that. Maxwell Ashton had been dead for years and there was no sign Douglas intended to slow down or settle down. Further, he seemed to regard his mother, as with everyone and everything else, with a cold disregard. She existed and he acknowledged that fact, and that was the end of it.
Rumour had it he’d more than quadrupled the family fortune and the way he did it was, no other way to say it, suspect. He had an office in Bristol and held a full staff at his offices in London. What he did to make his money, Mrs. K had no idea. He had a reputation as a dangerous man and it was a fact that he’d mysteriously disappeared for two years, without word or sighting. He had returned with no excuses for his absence looking no longer boyishly handsome but with a thin scar marring his hard mouth and lines etched into the sides of his eyes that were caused by wind and sun, and obviously not from playing polo.
His disappearance was never explained and, as for the rest, it was simply none of her business.
Mrs. Kilpatrick knew Samantha Thornton, Lord Ashton’s personal assistant, had been keeping in close contact with Julia and Julia and her mother called the children once or twice a week since the accident. Julia was no fool; she knew that the children had been left in the servants’ care.
“We’re all well, we’re just happy you’re here,” Mrs. Kilpatrick answered, loyal to the last to her employers who kept her and her husband fed and housed in the Groundskeeper’s Cottage up the lane.
Julia looked like she didn’t share Mrs. K’s sentiments but she was discreet enough not to say so.
She looked down at Ruby. “Well, we’ll get things sorted soon enough,” she said with considerable feeling, leaving Mrs. K to wonder what she meant.
“Er… well, as you know, Lady Ashton has been called away…” On a cruise, Mrs. K thought but did not say. She was as shocked as she was certain Julia and Patricia had been when they heard that Lady Monique would accept an invitation to cruise the Mediterranean rather than welcome a member of the family who was to move into their home. “And Lord Ashton wanted me to tell you he had unexpected business in London and won’t be home until late tonight, but I have a nice welcome dinner planned for you and the children…”
“You’re a gem, Mrs. K.” Julia smiled a smile that did not reach her eyes and then turned to her niece.
Mrs. K inclined her head in an acknowledgement. “Once Veronika has unpacked your bags, I’ll show you to your rooms.”
On that, she left, hearing Ruby chatter away to Julia while she walked away.
The children adored their Auntie Jewel, who came to visit often and would meet Tamsin, Gavin and the children for holidays. Mrs. K had to believe that Julia would find a way to heal the raw wounds of a family torn asunder.
As for Sommersgate and its master, Mrs. K could only hope.
Fervently hope.
Mr. Kilpatrick thought his wife was slightly mad but Mrs. K had been at Sommersgate long enough to love it. The house, too, had wounds to heal and those were a great deal older and more imbedded than the three Fairfax children’s.
What Sommersgate needed was love, laughter and happiness and, for over one hundred years, the house had lacked all three. It was a tall order, to think this headstrong American woman could soothe the overwhelming grief of three young children and cure a century of sorrow that clung to a pile of stone, glass and iron.
Her biggest challenge was to melt the heart of the dangerously cold Douglas Ashton who was the key to it all.
Mrs. Margaret Kilpatrick had been neither seen nor heard in that house for thirty-seven years. That did not mean she neither saw nor heard. And she knew that there was something between Ms. Julia Elizabeth Fairfax and Lord Douglas Ashton, Baron Blackbourne. Something even they didn’t know was there and now there were no husbands or siblings to get in the way.
Mrs. Kilpatrick had to admit she was tense, but, still, she had hope.
Chapter Two
The Chill and the Scream
“I’m on the archery team and next year, I might get to play polo.”
Willie was chatting on the phone with Patricia, who had taken the day off work to wait for Julia’s call to say she was at Sommersgate, safely ensconced in the freakishly strange Gothic Victorian mansion with the children firmly tucked under her wing. Being thus in the evil clutches of the evil Ashtons who never really welcomed Patricia’s beloved son (or at least Monique hadn’t) and to whom, Patty maintained, Tamsin had been the result of an unfortunate mix up in the nursery at the hospital.
That afternoon, Willie and Lizzie had come home from Tancote Boarding School, a posh “public school” located forty-five minutes away where they were day students rather than being boarded there. They used to be at the local community school but Monique had quickly taken care of that. She’d not liked the idea that they would be partaking of government funded schooling and had not had a problem telling anyone who would listen to her displeasure.
Julia was annoyed when she’d heard from Sam, Douglas’s PA, that the kids had been enrolled in a new school so soon after their parents had died. However, thousands of miles away and powerless to do anything, she’d simply gritted her teeth and waited.
Polo and archery, oh my, Julia thought sardonically as she listened to Willie chattering away to his grandmother while she watched Lizzie studiously doing her homework and Julia tried to pretend that everything was all right.
But everything was most definitely not all right.
They’d come home from school in the Bentley chauffeured by Carter, wearing posh school uniforms and had been sat down immediately to “tea” of cucumber sandwiches and a pot of fat free yogurt each.
“What on earth are you feeding them?” she’d whispered to Mrs. K.
Mrs. K shrugged and answered, “Lady Ashton doesn’t want them falling into unhealthy eating habits. We’ve never stocked sweets, crisps or puddings in this house, unless we’re entertaining, of course.”
“What about those biscuits you gave me earlier?” Julia asked.
“I was entertaining,” Mrs. K explained.
Of course.
Even though Julia was sentenced to live in spooky Sommersgate for the next twelve to thirteen years, she was still considered a guest.
Monique Ashton wasn’t worried about health; she was worried about the kids gaining weight. Monique herself was ten pounds underweight and was of the mind that fashionable, well-bred people emaciated themselves as proof of their fine upbringing. This, too, had been something Julia had heard Monique wax on about on more than one occasion, often pointedly looking at Patricia, who very much liked chocolate, potato chips and puddings of all kinds and looked the sort who did. Tamsin had always had a kitchen full to the brim with food, from grapes, apples and carrot sticks to chocolate covered malt balls and bags of microwave popcorn.
“Okay, she’s right here, Lizzie, Grammy wants to speak to you,” Willie called, breaking into Julia’s thoughts.
Lizzie threw her pencil down and slinked to the phone. She cast a brief glance in Julia’s direction as she took the phone from her brother and said, “Hello, Grandmother.”
Julia tried not to grimace.
Grandmother.
Patricia wouldn’t like that one bit. Monique was called “grandmother”. Patricia was Grammy, Gramma or just plain old Gram.