The Perfect Retreat Page 0,80

been?’ she screamed at Kitty.

‘What?’ asked Kitty, looking around.

The others came out of the drawing room into the foyer at the sound of Willow’s voice. ‘I have called and called you. Where the fuck were you?’

‘I was with Ivo,’ stuttered Kitty.

‘While you were fucking him, my child and your charge has gone missing!’

‘Which one?’ asked Kitty, panicking.

‘The stupid one,’ said Kerr under his breath. Johnny heard it and frowned at him.

‘Lucian, with the dog! I wrote you a note to tell you to look after them! Jenny said she gave it to you, why didn’t you read it?’

Kitty reached into her pocket and pulled out the note. She could make out a few of the words.

Willow was hysterical. ‘Why, Kitty? I entrusted you with my children and you left them here alone? Jinty was soaked and screaming, she was crying and crying!’ Willow was gulping for breath. ‘And Poppy alone in the dark, the TV as the only light? You know she hates the dark Kitty, you know that!’

Kitty was crying now, sobbing as Willow’s face loomed close to hers. ‘I know, I know,’ she spluttered.

‘No you don’t know. You don’t fucking know! You have no idea. You left them here alone. Fuck you Kitty, fuck you. Why didn’t you read the fucking note? Why?’ She was leaning over Kitty, who was a head shorter than her, now. Kitty fell to the ground.

Willow leaned over her, screaming. ‘Why didn’t you read the fucking note, tell me?’ Poppy watched from the top of the stairs, while Jinty cried in her room at the sound of her mother’s voice.

Merritt stepped in and pulled Willow away. ‘Stop it,’ he said. ‘Stop it.’

‘Why, Kitty?’ screamed Willow again, and Ivo stepped forward.

‘She didn’t read the fucking note because she can’t fucking read, you bitch!’ he yelled at Willow and the room went silent.

‘Ahhh, of course, she can’t read,’ said Johnny out loud. ‘When we shagged I sent you that letter asking for you to come and visit, but you never did. Even after I took your virginity and everything,’ he said with realisation dawning on his face.

Ivo stepped up as though to hit Johnny, but Merritt got in first and punched him squarely in the nose.

‘She is my sister after all,’ he said to Ivo.

Ivo nodded with respect as Lucy came into the foyer, her mobile pressed up to her ear. ‘They found him; at the police station; were about to send out a report when I rang, been there about an hour. A farmer brought him in. Found him under a tree asleep.’

Willow started to cry again. She instinctively ran to Merritt’s arms, but he pushed her away.

‘No one speaks to my sister like that, ever. Pack your things, get your children and get the fuck out of my life,’ he said to her in a quiet voice. And striding past the group, their mouths agape, Merritt walked away from what he had once believed was his future.

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

Willow fled with Lucy to pick up Lucian from the police station and Kerr stood helplessly looking at the sobbing girl on the ground. Johnny sat next to her, rubbing his jaw where Merritt had hit him.

Tatiana watched with a vested interest. ‘You OK, darlink?’ she asked Johnny, concerned whether he would still be able to make her a star of the art world.

‘Fine; I probably deserved that.’ He laughed and got to his feet. ‘You care to have a go now that I’m running away with your lover?’ he asked Kerr.

‘No, I’m fine thanks,’ said Kerr, rubbing his own face in the same place Merritt had hit Johnny and thankful it hadn’t been him on the end of those enormous hands.

Tatiana tottered over to Kerr. ‘Darlink, we’re over, you know. I just wanted to come and meet the director but instead I meet Johnny, so it all works out, da?’ she said, in that cloying voice that annoyed Kerr more than he could explain.

Kerr shrugged. ‘Fine, fine, whatever,’ he said, and he meant it. He had new plans now, and they certainly didn’t involve Tatiana and her need for public adoration. He had his own public to adore him and he was planning on getting a new fanbase, in the US.

Tatiana touched his face. ‘You’re a good man,’ she said insincerely.

Johnny looked at Kerr. As far as he could see there was nothing about Kerr that was decent, and certainly not the way he spoke about his own flesh and blood. So the child was